"Imagination is a straightforward form of virtual reality. What may not be so obvious is that our ‘direct’ experience of the world through our senses is virtual reality too. For our external experience is never direct; nor do we even experience the signals in our nerves directly — we would not know w"
"So once again, any theory of the structure of the universe in all but its earliest stages must take a position on what life will or will not be doing by then. There is no getting away from it: the future history of the universe depends on the future history of knowledge. Astrologers used to believe "
"We cannot observe any of this, but when we apply our best theories to the future of the stars, and of the galaxies and the universe, we find plenty of scope for life to affect and, in the long run, to dominate everything that happens, just as it now dominates the Earth’s biosphere."