Most of us believe in order to feel secure, in order to make our individual lives seem valuable and meaningful.

It just seems to me that we either have an irrational need to believe or we have a desire to understand and to improve that understanding. For those of the latter set, accuracy and accountability are paramount, but for creationists, those things don’t even matter.

The more we want it to be true, the more careful we have to be. No witness's say-so is good enough. People make mistakes. People play practical jokes. People stretch the truth for money or attention or fame. People occasionally misunderstand what they're seeing. People sometimes even see things that aren't there.

This may be the fundamental problem with caring a lot about what others think: It can put you on the established path — the my-isn't-that-impressive path — and keep you there for a long time. Maybe it stops you from swerving, from ever considering a swerve, because what you risk losing in terms of other people's high regard can feel too costly.

This may be the fundamental problem with caring a lot about what others think: It can put you on the established path — the my-isn’t-that-impressive path — and keep you there for a long time. Maybe it stops you from swerving, from ever even considering a swerve, because what you risk losing in terms of other people’s high regard can feel too costly.

People believe what they need to believe.

...[W]hy should we pay so much attention to what 'most people' think? The really reasonable people, who have more claim to be considered, will believe that the facts are exactly as they are.

I believe that people believe what they believe they believe.

The more we are committed to believing that something is true, the less likely we are to believe that its opposite is true, even in the face of clear evidence that shows we are wrong.

The reason “belonging” was so potent, so attractive, so much a part of the human yearning, was that it also meant safety, and loyalty. If you were “one of us” you were protected.

If we take something to be the truth, we may cling to it so much that when the truth comes and knocks on our door, we won't want to let it in.

When you have a strongly held belief, don't you think it's important to express that belief accurately?

People believe what they want to believe.

Some people care too much. I think it's called love.