I don't understand the notion that modern farming is anything do to with nature. It's a pretty gross interference with nature.

Pain is pain, and the importance of preventing unnecessary pain and suffering does not diminish because the being that suffers is not a member of our own species.

Were we incapable of empathy – of putting ourselves in the position of others and seeing that their suffering is like our own – then ethical reasoning would lead nowhere. If emotion without reason is blind, then reason without emotion is impotent.

If we can put a man on the moon and sequence the human genome, we should be able to devise something close to a universal digital public library.

The future of the world depends on how well we meet it.

Each of us spends money on things that we do not really need. You could take the money you're spending on those unnecessary things and give it to this organization the Against Malaria Foundation which would take the money you had given and use it to buy nets to protect children. And we know reliably that if we provide nets, they're used, and they reduce the number of children dying from malaria. Fortunately more and more people are understanding this idea, and the result is a growing movement effective altruism.

Knowing that we can control our own behaviour makes it more likely that we will.