James Leonard

“In the US, arguments rage over how much control we grant to state and federal lawmakers over the uteruses of its citizens. Some demographics feel strongly that pregnant people should not have the right to terminate their pregnancy after the first six weeks, around the time you can first detect a heartbeat via ultrasound.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson, Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization

“Of the fifteen most religious states, eleven had laws on the books ready to ban or greatly restrict abortion the moment the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 case that decriminalized abortion. Clearly, belief in a loving, compassionate, Christian God and in the sanctity of all human life (viable or not) strongly motivates these views. They're not being bad citizens, they're being good Christians— although ten of those same eleven states also embrace the death penalty.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson, Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization

“Knowledge of your mortality may also be a force unto itself— the urge to achieve, and the need to express love and affection now, not later.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson, Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization

“We often admire the complexity of our human brain: that the number of neurons it contains rivals the number of stars in the Milky Way Galaxy; that we possess amazing powers of rationality and thought; that our frontal lobe confers high-level, abstract reasoning.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson, Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization