I do look for openings where I can overturn popular misconceptions, but unlike Christopher Hitchens, I am neither a contrarian nor a lone heretic. I like to have a significant number of academics watching my back.

Probably Hobbes got it right when he said that a leviathan, a third party with a monopoly on the use of legitimate use of force in a territory, might be among the biggest violence reduction techniques ever invented.

Consciousness turns out to consist of a maelstrom of events distributed across the brain. These events compete for attention, and as one process outshouts the others, the brain rationalizes the outcome after the fact and concocts the impression that a single self was in charge all along.

Evolution is an indispensable component of any satisfying explanation of our psychology.

The theory that religion is a force for peace, often heard among the religious right and its allies today, does not fit the facts of history.

With violence, as with so many other concerns, human nature is the problem, but human nature is also the solution.

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