To support the people we care about is intrinsic, it is not instrumental. It's not something we do because we're hoping to get some other outcome.

We're in a culture where everything is either consumption or production, so child care is either a very, very bad-paying form of work or a very expensive luxury that you purchase. There isn't a good place in our picture of the world for what caregiving is about. Even teenage babysitters have sort of disappeared from the scene.

What's it like to be a baby? It's like being in love in Paris for the first time after you've had three double espressos.

Being a grandmother is a wonderful thing, so my advice is skip the children. Go straight to the grandchildren.

The brain is highly structured, but it is also extremely flexible. It's not a blank slate, but it isn't written in stone, either.

Animals are certainly more sophisticated than we used to think. And we shouldn't lump together animals as a group. Crows and chimps and dogs are all highly intelligent in very different ways.

Babies and young children are like the research and development division of the human species, and we grown-ups are production and marketing.