The well-meaning contention that all ideas have equal merit seems to me little different from the disastrous contention that no ideas have any merit.

We can always take but never give.

We live in a vast and awesome universe in which, daily, suns are made and worlds destroyed, where humanity clings to an obscure clod of rock.

We are one species. We are starstuff.

Cutting off fundamental, curiosity-driven science is like eating the seed corn. We may have a little more to eat next winter but what will we plant so we and our children will have enough to get through the winters to come?

We live in an in-between universe where things change all right...but according to patterns, rules, or as we call them, laws of nature.

One trend that bothers me is the glorification of stupidity, that the media is reassuring people it's alright not to know anything. That to me is far more dangerous than a little pornography on the Internet.