Atheists

"I thought that, that side of [Rudd's] character – the very anxious, 'I must be in the media, I must shine in Parliament today' – would fall away when he became Labor leader and there was no more fighting for the spotlight; the spotlight was well and truly on him."

"The sense of regret that we didn't need to be here. The sense of friendship lost, something very special lost, the team ability of the two of us. That was sitting very heavily on me."

"I always had this long shadow from the way in which I became Prime Minister, and active steps were taken basically every day of my prime ministership to have that shadow become darker and darker, not lighter and lighter."

"I was seriously worried about his psychological state, I thought he wasn't coping, and he wasn't showing any signs of finding a way back to coping ... At that point, if you'd asked him to make a huge decision as Prime Minister on that day, yes, I would have been concerned about his capacity. My sense of him at that point was that he was spent in a physical and psychological sense."

""There was no cataclysmic moment of revelation, but as I moved into my 20's, doubts grew and then overwhelmed." ..."

"'Because it's there' could never be enough of an explanation for entering politics. ..."

"It's a big emotional thing to do, to challenge the leadership of your political party. There is nothing pleasant about it, there's nothing fun about it. It's quite a horrible gut-wrenching process."

"Hindsight can give you insights about what went wrong. But only faith, reason and bravery can propel you forward."

"I was very conscience that if you put even your toe on this very sticky piece of paper, then you would be caught on it."

"We cannot have the government or the Labor party go to the next election with a person leading the party and a person floating around as the potential alternative leader. Anybody who enters the ballot tonight should do it on the following conditions: that if you win you're Labor leader, that if you lose you retire from politics."

"There's been a lot of analysis about the so-called gender wars . . . me playing the so-called gender card because heavens knows no-one noticed I was a woman until I raised it, but against that background, I do want to say about all of these issues, the reaction to being the first female Prime Minister does not explain everything about my Prime Ministership, nor does it explain nothing about my Prime Ministership. I've been a little bit bemused by those colleagues in the newspaper who have admitted that I have suffered more pressure as a result of my gender than other Prime Ministers in the past but then concluded that it had zero effect on my political position or the political position of the Labor Party. It doesn't explain everything . . . it explains some things. And it is for the nation to think in a sophisticated way about those shades of grey. What I am absolutely confident of is it will be easier for the next woman and the woman after that and the woman after that - and I'm proud of that."

"Tactics hadn't gone [Rudd's] way – I had taken a view about something else forming the issue of the day – and after the tactics meeting broke up he very physically stepped into my space, and it was quite a bullying encounter. It was a menacing, angry, performance."

"I was offended when the Leader of the Opposition went outside the front of the parliament and stood next to a sign that said 'Ditch the witch'. I was offended when the Leader of the Opposition stood next to a sign that described me as a man's bitch. I was offended by those things. Misogyny, sexism, every day from this Leader of the Opposition. Every day, in every way, across the time the Leader of the Opposition has sat in that chair and I have sat in this chair, that is all we have heard from him."

"I indicate to the Leader of the Opposition that the government is not dying of shame—my father did not die of shame. What the Leader of the Opposition should be ashamed of is his performance in this parliament and the sexism he brings with it."

"The Leader of the Opposition says, 'Do something'; well he could do something himself if he wanted to deal with sexism in this parliament. He could change his behaviour, he could apologise for all his past statements and he could apologise for standing next to signs describing me as a witch and a bitch—terminology now objected to by the frontbench of the opposition. He could change standards himself if he sought to do so. But we will see none of that from the Leader of the Opposition, because on these questions he is incapable of change. He is capable of double standards but incapable of change."

"I was very offended personally when the Leader of the Opposition, as Minister of Health, said, and I quote, “Abortion is the easy way out.” I was very personally offended by those comments. You said that in March 2004, I suggest you check the records. I was also very offended on behalf of the women of Australia when in the course of the carbon pricing campaign the Leader of the Opposition said, 'What the housewives of Australia need to understand as they do the ironing.' Thank you for that painting of women's roles in modern Australia!"

"Will the misogynists and the nut jobs on the internet continue to circulate them? Yes, they will. And it wouldn't matter what I said and it wouldn't matter what documents were produced and it wouldn't matter what anybody else said, they will pursue this claim for motivations of their own which are malicious and not in any way associated with the facts."

"Here he [Abbott] is, trying to fudge one way and fudge the other; This morning he went out and accused me of a crime. Back it up or shut up."

"Good sense, common sense and proper process are what should rule this parliament. That is what I believe is the path forward for this parliament, not the kinds of double standards and political game playing imposed by the Leader of the Opposition, who is now looking at his watch because, apparently, a woman has spoken for too long [loud protests from the Opposition benches]—I have had him yell at me to shut up in the past!"

"I will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man. I will not. And the Government will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man. Not now, not ever. The Leader of the Opposition says that people who hold sexist views and who are misogynists are not appropriate for high office. Well, I hope the Leader of the Opposition has got a piece of paper and he is writing out his resignation, because if he wants to know what misogyny looks like in modern Australia he does not need a motion in the House of Representatives; he needs a mirror."

"What I believe, what the Labor Party believes, is that marriage is between a man and a woman."

"There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead."

"There is nothing that should lead you to expect bastardry of that magnitude. Hard things happen; a hard thing happened to Malcolm Turnbull, a hard thing happened to Bob Hawke, a hard thing happened Kim Beazley, a hard thing happened to Kevin Rudd, a hard thing happened to me. You can still make choices on how you conduct yourself."

"I suggest Australians rush to their kitchens and check that their spoons aren't bent after that performance."

"Now I understand for Mr Downer and other members of the chattering classes in the Liberal Party: they might think what qualifies you to know about national security, is you sit in a minister's office typing press releases all of your lives, with the greatest risk to your personal safety being a papercut – Mr Downer might think that's appropriate; well I do not."

"I know the Leader of the Opposition [Tony Abbott] has an unhealthy kind of obsession with the so-called "faceless men in the Labor Party"; what he really should be obsessed about is the useless men sitting behind him."

"It's a cute project to work on."

"I don't support the idea of a big Australia with arbitrary targets of, say, a 40 million-strong Australia or a 36 million-strong Australia. We need to stop, take a breath and develop policies for a sustainable Australia... I support a population that our environment, our water, our soil, our roads and freeways, our busses, our trains and our services can sustain."

"Stay away from the church. In the battle over science vs. religion, science offers credible evidence for all the serious claims it makes. The church says, “Oh, it’s right here in this book, see? The one written by people who thought the sun was magic?” I for one would like to see some proof that there is a God. And if you say, “a baby’s smile,” I’m going to kick you right in the stomach."

"Why is it that Johnny Spaghetti Stain in Georgia can knock a woman up, legally be married to her, and then beat the day lights out of her, but these two intelligent, sophisticated writers who have been together for 20 years can’t get married? It’s infuriating and idiotic. I’m incredibly passionate about my support for the gay community and what they’re dealing with at this current point in time. I have arguments with people where I get red in the face, screaming at the top of my lungs."

"They’re literally terrible human beings. I’ve read their newsletter, I’ve visited their website, and they’re just rotten to the core. For an organization that prides itself on Christian values — I mean, I’m an atheist, so what do I know? — they spend their entire day hating people."

"The work of Carl Sagan has been a profound influence in my life, and the life of every individual who recognizes the importance of humanity's ongoing commitment to the exploration of our universe."

"My thought is always, ‘It’s only downhill from here’. That’s how I’ve always operated, ever since I began Family Guy. I had the crippling fear that I used up all the funny last week. That crippling insecurity really drives you to do your best. Your moments of pure joy are few and far between, but they do exist."

"Censors tend to do what only psychotics do: they confuse reality with illusion."

"I think of horror films as art, as films of confrontation. Films that make you confront aspects of your own life that are difficult to face. Just because you're making a horror film doesn't mean you can't make an artful film."

"Dolphins read each other’s emotions by sonar and it’s the inside of the body, the configuration of the viscera, that lets dolphins know whether the dolphin they are meeting is tense or happy. Their emotions are much more connected with the insides of each other’s bodies. We don’t have that. It’s like denying 90% of what we are physically, not knowing it."

"Technology isn’t really effective, it doesn’t really expose its true meaning, I feel, until it has been incorporated into the human body. And most of it does, in some way or another. Electronics. People wear glasses. They wear hearing aids that are really little computers. They wear pacemakers. They have their intestines modified. It’s really quite incredible what we’ve been able to do to the human body and really take it some place that evolution on its own could not take it. Technology has really taken over evolution. We’ve seized control of evolution ourselves without really quite being conscious of it. It’s no longer the environment that affects change in the human body, it’s our minds, it’s our concepts, our technology that are doing that."

"Everybody's a mad scientist, and life is their lab. We're all trying to experiment to find a way to live, to solve problems, to fend off madness and chaos."

"I'm an atheist, and so I have a philosophical problem with demonology and supporting the mythology of Satan, which involves God and heaven and hell and all that stuff. I'm not just a nonbeliever, I'm an antibeliever - I think it's a destructive philosophy."

"I think all my movies are commercial. That's my delusion. I thought Naked Lunch was wildly entertaining, so what do I know?"

"If you’ve ever sat in a room with twins, immediately you’re forced to deal with this confusion. You’re afraid to call them by name because you’re afraid you’re going to get it wrong. At first being a twin is a source of power, you can switch, you can fool people—but then it becomes a vulnerability because people confuse you when you don’t want them to. The famous story of the twins who were both spanked when either one of them did something wrong because the parents wanted to make sure they got the right twin. So that would immediately make each twin totally responsible for the other one’s actions and therefore would make you want to control the other twin’s actions. It gets quite twisted and the confusion of identities becomes quite intense."

"I know that many artists feel that they are frauds - that's part of the pleasure of creativity."

"We are confused and bemused, and think that it’s a momentary delusion that will soon dissipate, leaving our lives to continue as they were."

"I'm always working on the same thing, the creation of an identity. It's mysterious: We think identity is genetically given, but I believe there is creative will involved with the decision of who we are going to be. All my movies are concerned with this."

"Omnisexuality is the term that I use in Hysteria. There seems to be a strain of pure sexuality that can embody itself in any possible way, female, male, something else. This is the first time I’ve ever articulated this, but I think I’m most interested in that essence of sexuality that seems to be able to take many forms but has still a specific feel and tone to it that we all recognize. You can’t really define it as male or female. I’m very fascinated with the way in which maleness and femaleness is specifically physical. but not necessarily purely sexual. There is a difference amongst all those things. This takes you right back to the mind/body schism that I go crazy with all the time."

"All stereotypes turn out to be true. This is a horrifying thing about life. All those things you fought against as a youth: you begin to realize they're stereotypes because they're true."

"The desire to be loved is really death when it comes to art."

"We humans are already at this moment artificially reared, with the provision of basic life needs and without having to fight for it. We would even, as a species, be able to survive a long period of total glaciation of the Earth."

"A characteristic feature of the Professor was the fascination with technical novelties, especially those that could facilitate his scientific and editorial work. When home computers started to appear in the second half of the 1980s, he immediately brought to our Department one of them, and then the next ones. In this way, he initiated, and then, being a deputy director, he took care of the computerization of the Institute."

"A truly Renaissance personality. Absolutely undisputed authority, world-renowned scholar, a real neuroenthusiast who can also spray such a cascade of wit and humor that all anecdotes should hide!"