Markets also have a very bad psychological effect. They drive people to a conception of themselves and society in which you're only after your own good, not the good of others and that's extremely harmful.

Science talks about very simple things, and asks hard questions about them. As soon as things become too complex, science can't deal with them... But it's a complicated matter: Science studies what's at the edge of understanding, and what's at the edge of understanding is usually fairly simple. And it rarely reaches human affairs. Human affairs are way too complicated.

Private companies can make a personal profile, direct you to things - they will say - that you would be interested in, but that's their choice not your choice.

Humans may be destroying their chances for decent survival. It won't kill everybody, but it would change the world dramatically.

Up until the First World War, when people turned anti-German, Germany had been described by American political scientists as the model of democracy.

If kids are studying for a test, they're not going to learn anything. We all know that from our own experience.

If you look at history, even recent history, you see that there is indeed progress. . . . Over time, the cycle is clearly, generally upwards. And it doesn't happen by laws of nature. And it doesn't happen by social laws. . . . It happens as a result of hard work by dedicated people who are willing to look at problems honestly, to look at them without illusions, and to go to work chipping away at them, with no guarantee of success — in fact, with a need for a rather high tolerance for failure along the way, and plenty of disappointments.