I don't think the soul is immortal, or at least not immortal in individuals, but it may be immortal as an aspect of the human personality because when I talk about what literature nourishes, it would be silly of me or reductionist to say that it nourishes the brain.

The gods that we've made are exactly the gods you'd expect to be made by a species that's about half a chromosome away from being chimpanzee.

No one has the right to tell me what to do because he has a divine warrant.

Religion is not just incongruent with morality, but in essential ways incompatible with it.

Morality comes from humanism and is stolen by religion for its own purposes.

And the pleasures and rewards of the intellect are inseparable from angst, uncertainty, conflict and even despair.

A sort of moral blackmail is exerted from both poles. The underclass, one gathers, should be dulled with charity and welfare provision lest it turn nasty. The upper class must likewise be conciliated by vast handouts, lest it lose the "incentive" to go on generating wealth.