Reading is a huge effort for many people, a bore for others, and, believe it or not, many people prefer watching TV.

The copycat effects of media violence, similar to those previously attributed to westerns, radio serials and comic books, are easy to exaggerate.

Nothing is perfect. Life is messy. Relationships are complex. Outcomes are uncertain. People are irrational.

So, if falling crime rates coincide with the rise of violent video games and increasing violence on TV and at the cinema, should we conclude that media violence is causing the drop in crime rates?

Actually, I can't imagine anything more tedious than a perfect person, especially if it was someone who also demanded perfection from me.

I suspect the secret of personal attraction is locked up in our unique imperfections, flaws and frailties.

Universal literacy was a 20th-century goal. Before then, reading and writing were skills largely confined to a small, highly educated class of professional people.

The thing we need most is each other.

Obviously, every child should be given the best possible opportunity to acquire literacy skills.

It's Australian to do such things because, however uncivilised they may seem, it's human to do them.

One reason we resist making deliberate choices is that choice equals change and most of us, feeling the world is unpredictable enough, try to minimise the trauma of change in our personal lives.

Hard work is the engine that produces success. Hard work is success in realization.

What you cannot understand you don’t treasure.

Saying no is so heartbreaking.

He directed that the stone over his grave be inscribed: Hic jacet hujus sententiae primus auctor: DISPUTANDI PRURITUS ECCLESIARUM SCABIES.

Romney still enjoys the Republicans' traditional advantage among voters who are veterans, but the Obama campaign is confident it can chip away at that.

Happiness is not the whole aim of education. A man must be independent in his powers and character; able to work and assert his mastery over all that depends on him.

I think that most of the candidates [for presidency] can't run the railroad, and I still worry that whoever gets elected will have policies designed for political rather than practical reasons.

If aliens did visit us, I'd be embarrassed to tell them we still dig fossil fuels from the ground as a source of energy.

You may not realize this, but people have the power to change the world.

We have very beautiful bad weather here at present - rain, wind, thunder - but with splendid effects; that's why I like it.