I can't imagine having a conversation about 'Celebrity Big Brother' in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The law of unintended consequences is the only real law of history.

The ascent of money has been essential to the ascent of man.

As a teacher, my strategy is to encourage questioning. I'm the least authoritarian professor you'll ever meet.

The West may collapse very suddenly. Complex civilizations do that, because they operate, most of the time, on the edge of chaos.

To make a living space, there first had to be a killing space.

All empires have depended on local legitimacy and local collaboration; they are not based primarily on coercion. An imperial rule that relies wholly on coercion can't endure. It's too expensive.

The British press has an insatiable appetite for making public things that should be private. It's a prurience that I've never understood.

The Armenian genocide showed what could happen when empires were beaten into nations.

If young men have jobs - or the prospects of jobs - they are less likely to take up arms, they are less likely to join the resistance.

In Stalin's Russia racial persecution was often disguised as class warfare. More than 1.5 million members of ethnic minorities died as a result of forced resettlement.

There is an undeniable web connecting incidents such as the rise to power of dictators... poverty and the perception of human beings as disposable property.

‪#‎PRAISE‬ ‪#‎CRITICISM‬ ‪#‎NEUTRAL‬If you live off people's compliments..you will soon die of their criticism..

Falling in love is not at all the most stupid thing that people do - but gravitation cannot be held responsible for it.

The process of developing superior strategies is part planning, part trail and error, until you hit upon something that works.

I'm just kind of lazy and messed up and self-managed - self-mismanaged.

There is a potential heroine in every woman.

When nothing upsets you, you are at the beginning of the path. When you desire nothing, you are halfway on the path; when nothing becomes everything, you are perfected.

I'm only seven, although I died In Hiroshima long ago, I'm seven now as I was then - When children die, they do not grow.

Happiness lies in making others happy, in forsaking self-interest to bring joy to others.

The key is dictating what the fans do rather than letting them dictate what you do.