Most people talk as if Miami and Bangladesh still have a chance of surviving: most of the scientists I spoke with assume we'll lose them within the century, even if we stop burning fossil fuel in the next decade.

When energy prices go up, the difficulty of projecting demand also goes up - uncertainty goes up.

I just think that a much more important part of the problem we face, which was evident 10 years ago and is even more evident now, is that the way we share information among ourselves as American citizens has been radically transformed. The line between news and entertainment has almost dissolved, where ratings now have a big impact on what kinds of stories are covered and not stories.

I flew on Air Force Two for eight years, and now I have to take off my shoes to get on an aeroplane.

We are close to a time when all of humankind will envision a global agenda that encompasses a kind of Global Marshall Plan to address the causes of poverty and suffering and environmental destruction all over the earth.

The fate of mankind, as well as religion, depends on the emergence of a new faith in the future. Armed with such a faith, we might find it possible to resanctify the earth.

Speaking from my own religious tradition in this Christmas season, 2,000 years ago a homeless woman gave birth to a homeless child in a manger because the inn was full.