I feel that the great challenge of our time is the communication of ideas.

We envy only those whom we feel ourselves to be like; we envy only members of our reference group. There are few successes more unendurable than those of our close friends.

Although I don't believe in God, Bach's music shows me what a love of God must feel like.

It is not necessarily at home that we best encounter our true selves. The furniture insists that we cannot change because it does not; the domestic setting keeps us tethered to the person we are in ordinary life, who may not be who we essentially are.

When I see someone like Richard Dawkins, I see my father. I grew up with that. I'm basically the child of Richard Dawkins.

Instead of bringing back 1600 plants, we might return from our journeys with a collection of small unfêted but life-enhancing thoughts.

It's clear to me that there is no good reason for many philosophy books to sound as complicated as they do.