We are special in the sense that we can know our place in the cosmos. We can know our place in space. We are at least one of the cosmos's ways of knowing itself. That fills me with reverence and joy. Another insight I really want people to consider is this: everyone has gotten this far. Everyone you meet has made it this far. Nobody is superior to anyone else from an evolutionary standpoint.

Promoting a religious agenda that is to apply to every citizen is inconsistent with our laws in the US. It seems to me that your community and mine can live and work together without conflict.

A two-and-a-half-year-old is pretty experienced at making a mess, anyway.

Hard to find anything lovelier than a tree. They grow at right angles to a tangent of the nominal sphere of the Earth.

If NASA is to reach beyond the Moon and someday reach Mars, it must be relieved of the burden of launching people and cargo to low earth orbit. To do that, we must invest more in commercial spaceflight.

Recommending or insisting on abstinence has been completely ineffective.

Some of the most wonderful aspects and consequences of evolution have been discovered only recently. This is in stark contrast to creationism, which offers a static view of the world, one that cannot be challenged or tested with reason. And because it cannot make predictions, it cannot lead to new discoveries, new medicines, or new ways to feed all of us.