I believe in humanity: our indwelling capacity for good, our insatiable desire to make ourselves known to one another, our coruscating passion for knowledge, our ability to handle the truth, and our capacity for learning from really dumb mistakes.

I believe in humor as the universal solvent of ignorance, grief, and fear.

I believe in public libraries.

I believe in using intellectual property rights to establish a sustaining wellspring for the creative endeavors of others; I believe in the Creative Commons license.

I believe in putting final punctuation outside the quotes unless it was present in the original.

I believe in the Oxford comma.

I don't believe in rigid gender lines, violence as national economic policy, or any particular religion (though I'm congenial to many).