Virtue and merit can become their opposites if they are exacted or compelled.

To be in opposition is not to be a nihilist. And there is no decent or charted way of making a living at it. It is something you are, and not something you do.

Pakistan has to export a lot of uneducated people, many of whom have become infected with the most barbaric reactionary ideas.

Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty and wisdom will come to you that way.

Those who want to be offended don't have the right to try and close down the newspaper that offends them.

I think the cultural task is to separate our impulses and needs and desires from the supernatural and, above all, from the superstitious.

The secular argument, or the liberal argument, is to as much as possible remove taboos so things do not become unmentionable; to let some air into the discussion.