“I tend to believe that religious dogma is a consequence of evolution.”

Well, let me tell you, ants are the dominant insects. They make up as much as a quarter of the biomass of all insects in the world. They are the principal predators. They’re the cemetery workers.

Change will come slowly, across generations, because old beliefs die hard even when demonstrably false.

The essence of humanity’s spiritual dilemma is that we evolved genetically to accept one truth and discovered another. Is there a way to erase the dilemma, to resolve the contradictions between the transcendentalist and the empiricist world views?

Destroying rainforest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.

In 2010, my two Harvard mathematician colleagues and I dismantled kin-selection theory, which was the reigning theory of the origin of altruism at the time.

Science and religion are the two most powerful forces in the world. Having them at odds… is not productive.

Nature holds the key to our aesthetic, intellectual, cognitive and even spiritual satisfaction.

Of course, there is no reconciliation between the theory of evolution by natural selection and the traditional religious view of the origin of the human mind.

Ants have the most complicated social organization on earth next to humans.

The world depends on fungi, because they are major players in the cycling of materials and energy around the world.

Companies that are willing to share, to withhold in order to further the growth of the company.

In many environments, take away the ants and there would be partial collapses in many of the land ecosystems.

If we were to wipe out insects alone on this planet, the rest of life and humanity with it would mostly disappear from the land. Within a few months.

Theology made no provision for evolution. The biblical authors had missed the most important revelation of all! Could it be that they were not really privy to the thoughts of God?

Willing to try to get a better atmosphere through a demonstration of democratic principles, fairness and cooperation, a better product, those will win in the end.

Persist! The world needs all you can give.

There is no act, however trivial, but has its train of consequences.

Customs form us all, our thoughts, our morals, our most fixed beliefs; are consequences of our place of birth.

On the breast of that huge Mississippi of falsehood called History, a foam-bell more or less is no consequence.

Success is a consequence and must not be a goal.

Every fairy child may keep Two strong ponies and ten sheep; All have houses, each his own, Built of brick or granite stone; They live on cherries, they run wild I’d love to be a Fairy’s child.

Sanity — that is the great virtue of the ancient literature; the want of that is the great defect of the modern, in spite of its variety and power.

Be convinced that to be happy means to be free and that to be free means to be brave. Therefore do not take lightly the perils of war.

Nothing can ever happen twice. In consequence, the sorry fact is that we arrive here improvised and leave without the chance to practice.