I've often thought there ought to be a manual to hand to little kids, telling them what kind of planet they're on, why they don't fall off it, how much time they've probably got here, how to avoid poison ivy, and so on.

Most kids can't afford to go to Harvard to be misinformed.

I still catch myself feeling sad about things that don’t matter anymore.

I'm an old guy, and I was protesting during the Vietnam War. We killed fifty Asians for every loyal American. Every artist worth a damn in this country was terribly opposed to that war, finally, when it became evident what a fiasco and meaningless butchery it was.

I thought scientists were going to find out exactly how everything worked, and then make it work better.

But anyway, it's obvious through human experience that extended families and tribes are terribly important. We can do without an extended family as human beings about as easily as we can do without vitamins or essential minerals.

I am an atheist (or at best a Unitarian who winds up in church quite a lot).