All human societies go through fads in which they temporarily either adopt practices of little use or else abandon practices of considerable use.

History as well as life itself is complicated -- neither life nor history is an enterprise for those who seek simplicity and consistency.

Forced to choose between limiting population or trying to increase food production, we chose the latter and ended up with starvation, warfare, and tyranny.

The adoption of agriculture, supposedly our most decisive step toward a better life, was in many ways a catastrophe from which we have never recovered.

AIDS and malaria and TB are national security issues. A worldwide program to get a start on dealing with these issues would cost about $25 billion... It's, what, a few months in Iraq.

We're uncomfortable about considering history as a science. It's classified as a social science, which is considered not quite scientific.

Biology is the science. Evolution is the concept that makes biology unique.

Technology has to be invented or adopted.

Rhino-mounted Bantu shock troops could have overthrown the Roman Empire. It never happened.

Human societies vary in lots of independent factors affecting their openness to innovation.

Why did human development proceed at such different rates on different continents for the last 13,000 years?

This is the very perfection of a man, to find out his own imperfections.

The most basic task of any museum must be the protection of works of cultural significance entrusted to its care for the edification and pleasure of future generations.

Nothing more do I ask than to share with you the ecstasy and sacrament of my life.

His blessings and His provisions for us are based entirely on HIS GOODNESS and HIS FAITHFULNESS.

There is only one message that can change the course of human history forever, end the torture, and bring you back to God. That message is The New Gospel: WE ARE ALL ONE.

For a photographer, it's a necessity that you can shoot stuff magically. Accidents are necessary, but after I take the photograph, it's not over. I work on it more.

I don't feel as if I'm in competition with myself; not at all.

I've overcome neglect and deprivation, abandonment and abuse.

There’s got to be something wrong with us. To do what we did.

My life all-around is really different than a lot of other poets. Not poets that are parents, too, but just that I can hardly find anyone who works in the industries that I've worked in.