“You put too much stock in human intelligence, it doesn't annihilate human nature.”

“Soviet-style communism failed, not because it was intrinsically evil, but because it was flawed. It allowed too few people to usurp too much power. Twenty-first century market capitalism, American-style, will fail for the same reasons. Both are edifices constructed by human intelligence, undone by human nature.”

“...'cause humans, above all, fear intelligence. how humans, scared out of their minds, gather whatever intelligence they can put their hands on and put it all in a central penitentiary named facts...”

“Hard experience of life has shown us that, generally speaking, it is inadvisable to trust too much in human nature.”

“The worst of having so much tact was that you never quite knew whether other people were acting naturally or being tactful too.[The human element]”

“Yet human intelligence has another force, too: the sense of urgency that gives human smarts their drive. Perhaps our intelligence is not just ended by our mortality; to a great degree, it is our mortality.”