The modern world has delivered great progress, but a fierce price. That, in a nutshell, is the story of disen­chantment. It’s neither truthful nor helpful. 

There is a whole host of perfectly acceptable dead people whom you never knew and who can still be of service. They are the artists and philoso­phers, scien­tists and vision­aries whose presence is still felt long past their due date.

The notion that things “happen for a reason” is a powerful idea. It is also a dangerous one. The concept of “agency” is so central to our under­standing of ourselves and our world that we apply it even where there is no agency to be found.