This week’s crop of the profound and amusing.

When we remember that we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.
[Mark Twain]

Skeptical scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep insights can be winnowed from deep nonsense.
[Carl Sagan]

As an atheist I do not believe that there is a God in fact, but the fact of the beliefs of others that God is is highly consequential. It is less important what the real Islam or Christianity is, than what Islam or Christianity is for the people at any specific place and time.
[Razib Khan at ]

Science has nothing to do with common sense. I believe it was Einstein who said that common sense is a set of prejudices we form by the age of 18. Inject somebody with some viruses and that’s going to keep you from getting sick? That’s not common sense. We evolved from single-cell organisms? That’s not common sense. By driving my car I’m going to cook Earth? None of this is common sense. The common sense view is what we’re fighting against. So somehow you’ve got to move people away from that with these quite complicated scientific arguments based on even more complicated research. That’s why it’s such an uphill battle. People start off with a belief and a prejudice–we all do. And the job of science is to set that aside to get to the truth.
[Simon Singh in an interview with Wired at http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/08/mf_qa_singh/]

Q: How can you tell if it’s been raining cats and dogs?
A: You step in a poodle!
[Misty at Flickr at http://www.flickr.com/photos/misty69/4969353334/]