Empathy is an antidote to righteousness, although it's very difficult to empathize across a moral divide

People are wrong when they say that everything should be more diverse, even, say, rock bands. It's an error, an overgeneralization.

Most of our social nature is like that of other primates - we're mostly out for ourselves.

Human thinking depends on metaphor. We understand new and complex things in relation to the things we already know... once you pick a metaphor it will guide your thinking.

Happiness doesn't come from getting what you want. It doesn't come from within, either. Happiness comes from *between*--from finding the right relationship between yourself and others, between yourself and your work, and between yourself and something larger than yourself.

People can believe pretty much whatever they want to believe about moral and political issues, as long as some other people near them believe it, so you have to focus on indirect methods to change what people want to believe.

Economic issues are just as much moral issues as social issues.