Philosophy used to be a field that had content, but then natural philosophy became physics, and physics has only continued to make inroads. Every time theres a leap in physics, it encroaches on these areas that philosophers have carefully sequestered away to themselves, and so then you have this natural resentment on the part of philosophers.

A truly open mind means forcing our imaginations to conform to the evidence of reality, and not vice versa.

There are a lot of legislators who are afraid that kids will learn science and lose their faith.

There is a maxim about the universe which I always tell my students: That which is not explicitly forbidden is guaranteed to occur.

I hope that every [person] at one point in their life has the opportunity to have something that is at the heart of their being, something so central to their being that if they lose it they won't feel they're human anymore, to be proved wrong because that's the liberation that science provides. The realization that to assume the truth, to assume the answer before you ask the questions leads you nowhere.

People are interested in science, but they don't always know they're interested in science, and so I try to find a way to get them interested.

[The writers of the holy books] did not even know the earth revolves around the sun. Why are we listening?