The world and the universe is an extremely beautiful place, and the more we understand about it the more beautiful does it appear.

The physicist's problem is the problem of ultimate origins and ultimate natural laws. The biologist's problem is the problem of complexity.

Do you really mean to tell me the only reason you try to be good is to gain God's approval and reward, or to avoid his disapproval and punishment? That's not morality, that's just sucking up, apple-polishing, looking over your shoulder at the great surveillance camera in the sky, or the still small wiretap inside your head, monitoring your every move, even your every base though.

The idea that God could only forgive our sins by having his son tortured to death as a scapegoat is surely, from an objective point of view, a deeply unpleasant idea. If God wanted to forgive us our sins, why didn't he just forgive them? Why did he have to have his son tortured?

With respect to those meanings of 'human' that are relevant to the morality of abortion, any fetus is less human than an adult pig.

I think we certainly benefit from social institutions which encourage us towards moral behavior. It's very important to have law. It's very important to have a moral education.

Things exist either because they have recently come into existence or because they have qualities that made them unlikely to be destroyed in the past.