The uniqueness of humans has been claimed on many grounds, but most often because of our tool-making, culture, language, reason and morality. We have them, the other animals don't, and -- so the argument goes -- that's that.

If some good evidence for life after death were announced, I'd be eager to examine it; but it would have to be real scientific data, not mere anecdote. As with the face on Mars and alien abductions, better the hard truth, I say, than the comforting fantasy.

The cannabis experience has greatly improved my appreciation for art, a subject which I had never much appreciated before.

We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology and yet have cleverly arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology.

For all our failings, despite our limitations and fallibilities, we humans are capable of greatness.

Religions are often state-protected nurseries of pseudoscience, although there's no reason why religions have to play that role. In a way, it's an artefact from times long gone.

My fundamental premise about the brain is that its workings - what we sometimes call "mind" - are a consequence of its anatomy and physiology, and nothing more.