Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.
Sigmund FreudIt seems certain that we do not feel comfortable in our presentday civilization, but it is very difficult to form an opinion whether and in what degree men of an earlier age felt happier and what part their cultural conditions played in the matter. . . . It is time for us to turn our attention to the nature of this civilization on whose value as a means to happiness doubts have been thrown.
Harold BloomWhen death becomes the center of our consciousness, then religion authentically begins. Of all religions that I know, the one that most vehemently and persuasively defies and denies the reality of death is the original Mormonism of the prophet, seer and revelator Joseph Smith.
Michael ShermerI would like to immodestly propose Shermer’s Last Law . . . “Any sufficiently advanced extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) is indistinguishable from God.” God is typically described by Western religions as omniscient and omnipotent. Because we are far from possessing these traits, how can we possibly distinguish a God who has them absolutely from an ETI who merely has them copiously relative to us? We can’t.