You could give Aristotle a tutorial. And you could thrill him to the core of his being. Aristotle was an encyclopedic polymath, an all time intellect. Yet not only can you know more than him about the world. You also can have a deeper understanding of how everything works. Such is the privilege of living after Newton, Darwin, Einstein, Planck, Watson, Crick and their colleagues.
Richard Dawkins, from a lecture called "Science, Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder"
The world and the universe is an extremely beautiful place, and the more we understand about it the more beautiful does it appear. It is an immensely exciting experience to be born in the world, born in the universe, and look around you and realize that before you die you have the opportunity of understanding an immense amount about that world and about that universe and about life and about why we're here. We have the opportunity of understanding far, far more than any of our predecessors ever. That is such an exciting possibility, it would be such a shame to blow it and end your life not having understood what there is to understand.
McDonald: Now a lot of people find great comfort from religion. Not everybody is as you are -- well-favored, handsome, wealthy, with a good job, happy family life. I mean, your life is good -- not everybody's life is good, and religion brings them comfort.
Dawkins: There are all sorts of things that would be comforting. I expect an injection of morphine would be comforting -- it might be more comforting, for all I know. But to say that something is comforting is not to say that it's true.
Richard Dawkins, from an interview by Sheena McDonald
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