It makes us a thread in a tapestry that has unrolled for centuries before us, and will unroll for centuries after us. We're midway through the loom, that's the present, and what we do casts the thread in a particular direction, and the picture of the tapestry changes accordingly. When we begin to to try to make a picture pleasing to us and to those who come after, then perhaps you can say that we have seized history.

You can't choose your childhood, it's just what happens to you. But after that you choose. And that's really what (makes you).

None of us know our real names.

In a capitalist world, the word capital has taken on more and more uses. . . . human capital, for instance, which is what labor accumulates through education and work experience. Human capital differs from the classic kind in that you can't inherit it, and it can only be rented, not bought or sold.

Desire is life trying to continue to be life. All living things desire... Life is wanting.

Each of us have a gift, you see, given us freely by the universe. And each of us with every breath gives something back

A lot of scientists act on their beliefs and so do things that look crazy to the rest of us.