The world doesn't usually affect us directly. It's what we do with it. It's the filters that we put on it. That's the foundation of certainly most pop-psychology, and of a lot of psychotherapy, cognitive therapy. So that, I think, is the greatest truth.

Some comedians really are funnier than others. Some people really are more beautiful than others. But these are true only because of the kinds of creatures we happen to be; the perceptual apparatus - apparati - that we happen to have.

Morality binds and blinds. It binds us into teams … but thereby makes us go blind to objective reality.

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

To understand most important ideas in psychology, you need to understand how the mind is divided into parts that sometimes conflict. We assume that there is one person in each body, but in some ways we are each more like a committee whose members have been thrown together to do a job, but who often find themselves working at cross purposes.

Sports is to war as pornography is to sex. We get to exercise some ancient, ancient drives.

Love and work are to people what water and sunshine are to plants.