As technology accumulates and people in more parts of the planet become interdependent, the hatred between them tends to decrease, for the simple reason that you can't kill someone and trade with him too.

I teach classes 28 weeks of the year, but the rest of the time I do research and write books.

Thinking is a physical process, the human brain is not exempt from evolution

All our behaviours are a result of neurophysiological activity in the brain. There is no reason to believe there is any magic going on.

I think a lot of moral debates are not over what is the basis of justice, but who gets a ticket to play in the game.

Natural selection is not the only process that changes organisms over time. But is the only process that seemingly designs organisms over time.

In fact, without a specification of a creature's goals, the very idea of intelligence is meaningless. A toadstool could be given a genius award for accomplishing with pinpoint precision and unerring reliability, the feat of sitting exactly where it is sitting. Nothing would prevent us from agreeing with the cognitive scientist Zenon Pylyshyn that rocks are smarter than cats because rocks have the sense to go away when you kick them.