We are not the only avatars of humanity. Once our computing machines achieved self-consciousness, they became part of this design.

There were reprints of American editorials. Liberals saw it as a resurgence of social protest and decried the discrimination, poverty, and hunger that had provoked it. Conservative columnists acidly pointed out that hungry people don't steal stereo systems first and called for a crackdown in law enforcement. All of the reasoned editorials sounded hollow in light of the perverse randomness of the event. It was as if only a thin wall of electric lighting protected the great cities of the world from total barbarism.

Lovemaking seems all too absurd when described.

I now understand the need for faith - pure, blind, fly-in-the-face-of-reason faith - as a small life preserver in the wild and endless sea of a universe ruled by unfeeling laws and totally indifferent to the small, reasoning beings that inhabit it.

Nothing helps an artist's career more than a little death and obscurity.

All of our lives are governed by a certain degree of faith in bullshit.

Stupidity has a price and it always gets paid.