Let me say it diplomatically: Most religions are tribal to some degree.

The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion.

Morality binds people into groups. It gives us tribalism, it gives us genocide, war, and politics. But it also gives us heroism, altruism, and sainthood.

Reciprocity is a deep instinct; it is the basic currency of social life.

The most powerful force ever known on this planet is human cooperation - a force for construction and destruction.

Empathy is an antidote to righteousness, although it's very difficult to empathize across a moral divide

Sacredness binds people together, and then blinds them to the arbitrariness of the practice.

The human mind is a story processor, not a logic processor.

Human rationality depends critically on sophisticated emotionality. It is only because our emotional brain works so well that our reasoning can work at all.

Diversity is not a virtue. Diversity is a good only to the extent that it advances other virtues, justice or inclusiveness of others who have previously been excluded.

Morality binds and blinds. It binds us into teams … but thereby makes us go blind to objective reality.

To obey the commands of Scripture can finally become a delight when we see that the reasons almost always center around God's love and provision for us in Christ.

The property of power is to protect.

Writing is something Ive always done on the side. I thought that no one would be interested, so I kept it to myself.

Daybreak is a never-ending glory; getting out of bed is a never ending nuisance.

When you are young you don't always realise how full of doubts everybody is.

[Literature is] a process of producing grand, beautiful, well-ordered lies that tell more truth than any assemblage of facts.

When I started to internalize fat positivity and believe it, my response was the same one I had when I started to understand the scope of gender inequality: deep indignation.

I have no business to feel downcast or querulous merely because when so much as been given me I have not had even more.

I suddenly realised, hey, I'm not a lazy idiot, I'm an idler! It's something to aspire to, it's part of the creative process! That's fantastic!

I'm proud I'm English and I'm passionate about my country.