“Real life security and contentment come not from putting a gun in the cupboard, but from taking a role in the world’s future.”

Wishful thinking is not sound public policy.

The great music for so many artists – the Beatles, the Rolling Stones – was always at the moment when they were closest to pop. It would be easy for U2 to go off and have a concept album, but I want us to stay in the pop fray.

So far as we know, Earth is the only planet which supports life, and it is the only planet on which we can survive.

The overarching factor to me is if we can’t be kind to each other, we won’t be kind to the planet.

When we imagine the world a century from now, when we look our great grandchildren in the eye and see them smiling back at us because they know we cared for them, we smile too!

Anarchism may be described as the doctrine that all the affairs of men should be managed by individuals or voluntary associations, and that the State should be abolished….. Nor does the Anarchistic scheme furnish any code of morals to be imposed upon the individual. “

We are all born bonded to nature; that’s why we put depictions of flowers and forests, rather than bulldozers or log piles, on our walls.

I will be Green until the day I die, if not for a long time after.

Humans are mentally sick with a disease called fear.

With a small fraction of the hundreds of billions of dollars spent on the Iraq war, the US and Australia could ensure every starving, sunken-eyed child on the planet could be well fed, have clean water and sanitation and a local school to go to.

Australia must prioritise education spending. It is not a question of whether or not we have the money, it is a question of how we choose to spend it.

Years ago I resolved that because I had no ancestry myself I would leave a record of which my children would be proud, and which might encourage them to still higher effort

Never want something without expecting it

In the end, climate change is a math problem.

Whereas our common past, out of Africa, saw a global diaspora of humankind, our common future depends on a global coming together and consensus, resulting in a more equitable distribution of the Earth’s largesse.

In securing the future of the planet, we secure happiness for ourselves. One of the aims of the Greens is to turn around the tide of pessimism amongst the young people of the world.

The only reason that we like complex numbers is that we don’t like real numbers.

We can still astonish the gods in humanity And be the stuff of future legends, If we but dare to be real, And have the courage to see That this is the time to dream The best dream of them all.

Real life was messier than fiction, and in it you didn’t always have time to do or say the right things.

I believe there is no more creative medium than photography to recreate the living world of our time. Photography gladly accepts the challenge because it is at home in its element: namely, realism – real life – the now.

The basic problem, actually, is how to get rid of the idea that we’re going to get rid of our problems. Only then can we relate directly with the real issues of our life.

Horror writers can write about everything in the real world that a mainstream novelist can–plus the supernatural, which is the most fertile field for metaphor imaginable.

People talk about love and it seems like a cliche but it’s a real thing – the more love we spread around the world the more it’s going to change lives.

My only real fear was that I would not be able to surf again because I was concerned that I would not physically be able to do it. I knew that if I wasn’t able to surf then my life would really change.