It is people who are violent, rather than "religions"; and since we secularised our politics we have had two major world wars, the Holocaust, the Soviet Gulag, and the atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki - none of which were inspired by religion. If we want to understand the dangers of our world, we can no longer accept the old received ideas.

Compassion is a practically acquired knowledge, like dancing. You must do it and practice diligently day by day.

You put yourself in the receptive frame of mind with which we approach music or poetry, which you can measure the difference on a neurological scanner.

I think I get from my books what other people get from family or a relationship or from prayer.

If we want to create a viable, peaceful world, we've got to integrate compassion into the gritty realities of 21st century life.

We can't say what God is, and until the modern period, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim theologians in the three God religions all knew that. They insisted that we have no idea what we meant when we said that God was good, or wise, or intelligent.

My greatest solace is my study. If I am deprived of my study, I can become lost, unhappy and unhinged.