If asked my opinion about virginity, I would say, “I’m opposed to it.” I don’t think it deserves to be celebrated, at any rate. Or at least, if I’m not opposed, I’m very highly skeptical and critical of it.
One can’t live without fear, it’s a question of what is your attitude towards fear? I’m afraid of a sordid death. I’m afraid that I will die in an ugly or squalid way, and cancer can be very vigorous in that respect.
I’m not very impressed by people who yell “traitor” and “communist” and other less printable things. I don’t like it.
I could be spending time looking through a telescope or into a microscope and finding out the most extraordinary, wonderful things, but people say faith can move mountains. Faith in what, by the way? You haven’t said.
It’s a better tradition for people who think for themselves and who don’t pray in aid of any supernatural authority. That’s what you should be spending your life is in spreading and deepening that tradition.
Anyone who can look me in the eye and say they prefer the story of Moses or Jesus or Mohammed to the life of Socrates is intellectually defective.
The creation story is ridiculous garbage. And has given us a completely false picture of our origin as a species and the origins of the cosmos. If you want a good mythical story it would be the life of Socrates.
I think the socialist movement, by removing many, many people from grinding stagnation and poverty and overwork, does enable people not just to lead better lives but to be better people.
I think that there is no supernatural dimension. The natural world is quite wonderful enough. The more we know about it, the much more wonderful it is than any supernatural proposition.
If you say “the economy,” you show you’re stupid. There’s no such thing as the economy. There is not a unity between the forces of production and the relations of production.
I don’t say things like “the grace of God.” All that’s white noise to me, not because I’m an intellectual. For many people, it’s gibberish. Likewise, the idea that the Koran was dictated by an archaic illiterate is a fantasy.
I think the cultural task is to separate our impulses and needs and desires from the supernatural and, above all, from the superstitious.
I have a strong constitution which has served me quite well, though if I hadn’t had such a strong one I might have led a more healthy life perhaps.
I’d like to prove to other people that it’s not the end of everything to be diagnosed with cancer.
If people I’ve never met or don’t know say that what I’ve written or done or said means anything to them, then I’m happy to take it at face value, for once. It cheers me up.
My political life has been informed by the view that if there was any truth to religion there wouldn’t really be any need for politics.
There are two clocks ticking in Iran. One is the democracy movement clock which is ticking now faster than it was but it’s got a lot of catching up to do. And then there’s the clock that’s ticking towards a nuclear weaponry.
The thing about religion is that it’s the first and the worst. The worst because it’s the first.
If you’ve led a rather bohemian and rackety life, as I have, it’s precisely the cancer that you’d expect to get. That’s a bit of a yawn.
Friends call me Hitch. Maybe it can be turned into a 900-phone number. People would pay to talk to me.