“If your belief system is not founded in an objective reality, you should not be making decisions that affect other people.”

I wonder if, in fact, we have been observed by aliens and upon close examination of human conduct and human behavior they have concluded that there is no sign of intelligent life on Earth.

I think the best thing a parent can do, when raising a child, is simply get out of their way.

Everyone should have their mind blown once a day.

After 50 years of television, there’s no other conclusion the aliens could draw, but that most humans are neurotic, death-hungry, dysfunctional idiots.

Practically every food you buy in a store for consumption by humans is genetically modified food. There are no wild, seedless watermelons. There’s no wild cows.

When scientifically investigating the natural world, the only thing worse than a blind believer is a seeing denier.

We are part of this universe; we are in this universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts, is that the universe is in us.

We are all connected; To each other, biologically. To the earth, chemically. To the rest of the universe atomically.

If you’re really successful at bullshitting, it means you’re not hanging around enough people smarter than you.

Imagine a world in which we are all enlightened by objective truths rather than offended by them.

In the end, it’s the people who are curious who change the world.

To learn more about science, turn off your electronic device and go outside and look around a bit. Nature is calling you. Go on. The internet will still be here.

You don’t want to raise a kid in a culture where the kid who asks the most questions is annoying. You want a culture where the kid who asks the most questions gets awards and gets another piece of cake.

So maybe part of our formal education should be training in empathy. Imagine how different the world would be if, in fact, that were ‘reading, writing, arithmetic, empathy.’

You can’t have people making decisions about the future of the world who are scientifically illiterate. That’s a recipe for disaster. And I don’t mean just whether a politician is scientifically literate, but people who vote politicians into office.

Intelligent design is a philosophy of ignorance.

Poverty disproportionately affects women around the world.

Even an idle phone conversation when driving takes a 40 percent bite out of your focus and, surprisingly, can have the same effect as being drunk.

If you don’t have an effective teacher in front of the classroom, you won’t change the trajectory for students.

It has had a calamitous effect on converted peoples. To be converted you have to destroy your past, destroy your history. You have to stamp on it, you have to say ‘my ancestral culture does not exist, it doesn’t matter’.

Looks like what drives me crazy Don’t have no effect on you– But I’m gonna keep on at it Till it drives you crazy, too.

The Congress is virtually incapable of passing any reforms unless they first get permission from the powerful special interests who are most affected by the proposal.

So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame, Angels affect us often.

Lofty designs must close in like effects.