The moral, then, is that familiar categories of behavior - marriage customs, food taboos, folk superstitions, and so on - certainly do vary across cultures and have to be learned, but the deeper mechanisms of mental computation that generate them may be universal and innate.

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

The fact that people can forget these simple truths when intellectualizing about children shows how far modern doctrines have taken us. They make it easy to think of children as lumps of putty to be shaped instead of partners in a human relationship.

Most wars are not fought over shortages of resources such as food and water, but rather over conquest, revenge, and ideology.

M.I.T. has a reputation for turning out Dilberts. They may be brilliant in what they do, but no one can understand what they say.

The typical imperative from biology is not "Thou shalt... ," but "If ... then ... else.

The more you think about and interact with other people, the more you realize that it is untenable to privilege your interests over theirs.