Each of our lives is a part of the lengthy process of the universe gradually waking up and becoming aware of itself.

Absurdity is one of the most human things about us: a manifestation of our most advanced and interesting characteristics.

Philosophy is the childhood of the intellect, and a culture that tries to skip it will never grow up.

Materialism is incomplete even as a theory of the physical world, since the physical world includes conscious organisms among its most striking occupants.

Life may be not only meaningless but absurd.

What is it like to be a bat? What is it like for a bat to be a bat?

A person may be greedy, envious, cowardly, cold, ungenerous, unkind, vain, or conceited, but behave perfectly by a monumental act of the will.

Everyone is entitled to commit murder in the imagination once in a while, not to mention lesser infractions.

Perhaps the belief in God is the belief that the universe is intelligible, but not to us.

fundamentally an organism has conscious mental states if and only if there is something that it is like to be that organism--something it is like for the organism.

Altruism itself depends on a recognition of the reality of other persons, and on the equivalent capacity to regard oneself as merely one individual among many.

People who avoid their fears also avoid their power.

Even the most ordinary things can be made extraordinary simply by doing it with the right people.

I was not merely cleaning an oven

Whether we are in the city, the countryside, or the wilderness, we need to sustain ourselves by choosing our surroundings carefully and nourishing our awareness in each moment.

The manner of giving is worth more than the gift.

The past is a funeral gone by.

that was humanity's problem right there. they are brain damaged from the early sun

That which is not present in deep dreamless sleep is not real

To this day we seem to act in the world as though we know what's right for everybody.

I'm seeing the world partially through the eyes of a kid. Not all the time. There's no black and white to it. But sometimes I'm seeing it like I'm 4.