People need stories more than bread itself. They tell us how to live, and why.

Many a doctrine is like a window pane. We see truth through it but it divides us from truth.

I had an experience I can't prove, I can't even explain it, but everything that I know as a human being, everything that I am tells me that it was real. I was part of something wonderful, something that changed me forever; a vision of the Universe that tells us undeniably how tiny, and insignificant, and how rare and precious we all are. A vision that tells us we belong to something that is greater than ourselves. That we are not, that none of us are alone. I wish I could share that. I wish that everyone, if even for one moment, could feel that awe, and humility, and the hope, but... that continues to be my wish.

Blessed are the poor in spirit, the meek, the peacemakers. You're the salt of the earth, the light of the world. Turn the other cheek, don't give alms in public, don't pray in public, you can't serve God and Mammon, consider the lilies of the field, judge not lest you be judged, don't be a hypocrite, whatever you ask for you'll get, do unto others as you want to be done by, beware of false prophets.

When we are young, we learn the myths. And we interpret them as we get older. In the end, we see they are just myths.

Imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, "This is an interesting world I find myself in, an interesting hole I find myself in, fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!" This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for.

As far as the planet is concerned, it is not concerned. It is a lump of rock. It is inhabited by clumps of self-replicating molecules we call life forms, the purpose of which is to reverse entropy for as long as possible, by capturing energy from the sun or from other life forms. The ecosystem is simply the flow of captured energy between these life forms. It has no values, no wishes, no demands. It neither offers nor recognises cruelty or kindness.

There have been seven disasters since humans came on the earth, very similar to the one that's just about to happen. I think these events keep separating the wheat from the chaff. And eventually we'll have a human on the planet that really does understand it and can live with it properly. That's the source of my optimism.

Sum ergo amor.