"But I try not to think with my gut. If I'm serious about understanding the world, thinking with anything besides my brain, as tempting as that might be, is likely to get me into trouble."
"Avoidable human misery is more often caused not so much by stupidity as by ignorance, particularly our ignorance about ourselves."
"For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring."
"The chief deficiency I see in the skeptical movement is its polarization: Us vs. Them — the sense that we have a monopoly on the truth; that those other people who believe in all these stupid doctrines are morons; that if you're sensible, you'll listen to us; and if not, to hell with you. This is nonconstructive. It does not get our message across. It condemns us to permanent minority status."
"Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality."
"There is much that science doesn't understand, many mysteries still to be resolved. In a Universe tens of billions of light-years across and some ten or fifteen billion years old, this may be the case forever. We are constantly stumbling on new surprises"