We humans can look deep into future and predict what will happen, but then turn around and do nothing about it.

The word happiness is used to indicate at least three related things, which we might roughly call emotional happiness, moral happiness, and judgmental happiness.

I actually think the same things do make most people happy. The differences are extremely small, and around the margins. You like peach ice cream; I like strawberry ice cream. Both of us like ice cream much better than a smack on the head with two-by-four.

The mistakes we make when we try to imagine our personal futures are also lawful, regular, and systematic. They, too, have a pattern that tells us about the powers and limits of foresight in much the same way that optical illusions tell us about the powers and limits of eyesight.

Human beings are works in progress that mistakenly think they're finished.

People want to be happy, and all the other things they want are typically meant to be a means to that end.

Arthritic toothless people who love orgasms are more likely to reproduce than are limber, toothy people who do not.