"If we were to wipe out insects alone on this planet, the rest of life and humanity with it would mostly disappear from the land. Within a few months."

"So in my freshman year at the University of Alabama, learning the literature on evolution, what was known about it biologically, just gradually transformed me by taking me out of literalism and increasingly into a more secular, scientific view of the world."

"Every major religion today is a winner in the Darwinian struggle waged among cultures, and none ever flourished by tolerating its rivals."

"Blind faith, no matter how passionately expressed, will not suffice. Science for its part will test relentlessly every assumption about the human condition."

"To conquer fear is to realize that courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it."

"The seeds of triumph are sown in the quiet mornings when no one is watching — an essential principle for the reflective life."

"The best way to win against the intolerable is to tolerate them, for this they have seldom dealt with. Your indulgence may soften their malice and open their eyes to more honorable ways."

"To be successful you have to be selfish, or else you never achieve. And once you get to your highest level, then you have to be unselfish. Stay reachable. Stay in touch. Don't isolate."