[T]he values to which people cling most stubbornly under inappropriate conditions are those values that were previously the source of their greatest triumphs.

The adoption of agriculture, supposedly our most decisive step toward a better life, was in many ways a catastrophe from which we have never recovered.

Although native Africans domesticated some plants in the Sahel and in Ethiopia and in tropical West Africa, they acquired valuable domestic animals only later, from the north.

I'd rather spend my leisure time doing what some people call my work and I call my fun.

Think of all the human suffering caused by the sad truth that beautiful sexy women or handsome Porsche-owning men often prove to have miserable genes for other traits

With the MacArthur grant, I realized that people have high expectations of me, that they were placing me in this group of achievers. I compared what Id actually achieved in my life with what I would like to achieve and what other people have achieved, and I found that comparison depressing.

Thousands of years ago, humans domesticated every possible large wild mammal species fulfilling all those criteria and worth domesticating, with the result that there have been no valuable additions of domestic animals in recent times, despite the efforts of modern science.