We are not good at recognizing distant threats even if their probability is 100%. Society ignoring [peak oil] is like the people of Pompeii ignoring the rumblings below Vesuvius.

The notion of a defense that will protect American cities is one that will not be achieved, but it is that goal that supplies the political magic, as it were, in the president's vision.

We have only two modes - complacency and panic.

Under budgetary pressure (arbitrary or not) it is truly remarkable how many options one discovers one can do without.

Oil production should peak out around the world in the early 1990s...That means in five years' time we may have chewed up most of the possibility of further expansion of oil production.

Crying is right at hand in the smothering dark, closed inside someone else, when you see how everything you can ever accomplish will end up as trash.

You remove heavy metals out of the ground and you turn that into tables, and houses and bridges and dreams for people in the developing world. I love doing that.

However beautifully you play the violin, you can always play the violin even more beautifully again.

For free will is what makes us Heaven's creatures.

I don't know what a world would be like if you do away with sexy images.

I never said the way of Christ is easy. Are you prepared to let go of everything He would not approve?

I never like to use those terms [like pessimistic].

The role of the educator is one of tranquil possession of certitude in regard to the teaching of not only contents but also of 'correct thinking.'

There's a lot you can't tell about people, looking in from the outside" -Hanna

The worse the passage the more welcome the port.