"It's always been like an endless exploration: following that which can't be named and arranging my life around it. Wondering has been the engine. So, it has not felt like departures as much as just obvious next steps." https://youtu.be/U7rhplILAIg Rob Bell is always...
“I get a lot of hate mail, death threats and rape threats..I think the violence of their response to me reflects just how frightened they are by these ideas. They accuse me of blasphemy and various other things, but actually it reflects their deep seated...
"I have regrets. Only a fool has no regrets. But on the big political issues I've been consistently right. And those who rule us have been consistently wrong." When you binge watch three documentaries about Saddam Hussein and his sons, you learn a lot. And afterwards...
"No one would watch me on Jeopardy! and say, 'Wow, this guy is smarter than Stephen Hawking because he knows all his state birds.' I think they know it's a different thing." If I get a few answers right on Jeopardy!, I pat myself on the back. Ken Jennings won 74 games...
"When everybody laughed at me for wanting to go to Africa and live with animals, my mother always said, 'If you really want something and never give up you’ll always find a way.'” Every time Jane Goodall delivers a speech she always begins with a chimpanzee greeting....
"The best artists work out of the desire to produce beauty, otherwise it's not real and something else. This intertwining of money, power, and status is a corruption of purpose." You may not recognize the name Milton Glaser, but you would most certainly recognize his...
"Mahatma Gandhi said it, 'I like their Christ, I don't like their Christian.' Unfortunately, when Christendom has been hijacked and made into a state religion or a power institution it gets abused... Christianity is a commitment of surrender, not of power over...
"Celine Dion has a huge international following...So, it isn't surprising that a Senegalese man would know of, and admire, her. But, to have this come from an Al-Qaeda captor in the Sahara Desert, some weeks into our captivity, was so bizarre." ...
"The higher, more distant, level of patriarchy is capitalism. This is what is represented by corporate truth. You don't see a man beating a wife, but there's a fictitious man beating all the women, children and people of the world." In a world full of powerful...
"The day I start believing that what I have to say is much more important than the people who I learn things from, I will be crossing a dark line." Raj Patel is many things: an author of two successful books, an academic with degrees from some of...
"I've had emails saying that I'm from Satan, and that I'm doomed to hell, but that goes with the territory." The Bible is one of the world's most popular, and controversial books. When you decide to dedicate your whole life to analyzing,...
"Like most researchers, I'm driven by some fundamental curiosity of how the world works...The greater goal of that is how can we use that knowledge to change public policy, and change life conditions on earth. Where that comes from, who knows?" When you finish...
"The idea that the World Bank is some sort of right-wing American institution set to serve the Western policy to crash Africa is a fantasy that collides against the reality of the people actually making these policies...It's sort of a convenient whipping boy for...
"Poverty is no longer the number one challenge to Africa; it is inequality. This is the most deadly issue facing African countries because it is so easily politicized, ethnicized, and very easily militarized." John Githongo is a man you need to know about. In my...
"(In 50 years) Canada will be what it always has been, economically the 51st state, socially a place awkwardly unsure of itself and without any true national cohesion." Vaclav Smil is currently being touted as one of the world's most important thinkers, and you've...