The mind is not a machine, it is an idea. And the Idea resists all attempts to control it.

The only thing binding individuals together is ideas. Ideas mutate and spread; they change their hosts as much as their hosts change them.

I try not to be surprised. Surprise is the public face of a mind that has been closed.

Thought, like any parasite, cannot exist without a compliant host.

A society that fears knowledge is a society that fears itself.

Human spirit is the ability to face the uncertainty of the future with curiosity and optimism.

Many scholars have complained of our tendency to see history only in conflicts, but I am not convinced they are right. It is in conflict that our values are exposed.

... from our vantage point it is now clear that the only thing the population had to fear was fear itself.

Which came first, the mind or the idea of the mind? Have you never wondered? They arrived together. The mind is an idea.

In the end, living is defined by dying.

Unable to attribute misfortune to chance, unable to accept their ultimate insignificance within the greater scheme, the people looked for monsters in their midst.

Poetry will die when love and pain cease to exist.

When a fire rises, don't be quick to worry. Find the purpose of the fire, if it's negative, water it down, if positive, feed the flames.

Some people are attracted to sickness, to the kind of madness where sparks fly off the head, to the incoherence of despair, masked by nervous energy, which winds up looking like bewildered joy.

When the voice of truth rises from the minarets, the Buddha smiles, and the broken chain of history reconnects.

I do as much comedy as I possibly can, but I'm basically limited by the imagination of the secretaries who make the decisions.

Sanctified by their initiatory experiences and furnished with their spirit guardians, the shaman alone among human beings is able to consciously travel into the spiritual worlds as cosmic explorers.

In the attention economy, anyone trying to connect with an audience must treat the user's time as the ultimate resource.

Silence came before creation, and the heavens were spread without a word

Make sure to be well informed before accepting the challenge of a commission - check out that you have a source of reference readily available.

People always ask about the transition from TV show to a movie, but it felt like just going to a different school. You don't really notice the transition, when you're in the moment.