“I'm often characterized as an optimistic writer, and certainly my 'Neanderthal Parallax' and 'WWW' trilogies shade toward the utopian. I like to think that's not simple naivete, but rather a...”

“I started wondering why it is that people line up behind charismatic leaders. It's easy to understand the emergence of a figure who's narcissistic and compelling. But why people follow this...”

“Hard science fiction, which is what I write, often is rightly criticized for having either negligible or unbelievable characterization, but the science I've actually studied most post-second...”

“Learning to ignore things is one of the great paths to inner peace.”

“No one disputes that seeming order can come out of the application of simple rules. But who wrote the rules?”