Millions of people die every day. Everyone's got to go sometime.

To terrify children with the image of hell, to consider women an inferior creation - is that good for the world?

[I]f you think that American imperialism and its globalised, capitalist form is the most dangerous thing in the world, that means you don't think the Islamic Republic of Iran or North Korea or the Taliban is as bad.

What they [the 9/11 attackers] abominate about 'the west', to put it in a phrase, is not what western liberals don't like and can't defend about their own system, but what they do like about it and must defend: its emancipated women, its scientific inquiry, its separation of religion from the state.

The essence of tyranny is not iron law. It is capricious law.

My chief consolation in this year of living dyingly has been the presence of friends.

I don't want them (religious followers) trying to inflict their belief on me.