What I'm thinking / worrying about...

What I'm most interested in is the long-term future of humanity, which sadly is a subject with a reputation for being a bit silly. Nevertheless, it's worth thinking seriously about what risks we face and what could go wrong. At the very least, there's always the threat of nuclear war. There's also the possibility that environmental destruction will ultimately lead to our demise. More than that, new technologies like biotech, nanotech, and AI could eventually be powerful enough to represent an actual threat to humanity, if abused, or just poorly used. See for example:

Anyway, this is why I'm going back to university from 2008 to study biology; because biotechnology and controversies surrounding it will become increasingly important.

Positions on various issues

Economics?: Broadly on the left, but getting more centrist as I get older; and every time I learn more about economics I seem to be nudged vaguely rightwards. But I'm convinced that a mild dose of regulation is necessary to prevent all kinds of objectionable corporate behaviour.
Religion?: Atheist, with Buddhist leanings, though karma and reincarnation are clearly nonsense. I'm more sympathetic to followers of the big religions (i.e. Christians and Muslims) than many atheists are, though I find their spiteful, vicious God highly implausible.
Ethics?: Ultimately, I think some form of Utilitarianism must be correct. I have a brief argument for an objective ethics.
Truth?: Truth is anything that describes things as they are. "What is truth?" is not a profound question.
Ontology?: Physicalism. Reductionism. Probably some other Bad Things.
Cosmology?: Fine-tuning must be explained by either an incredible coincidence, God, or multiple universes. Prefer the third.
Meaning of life?: Life exists simply because it can. Finding a better meaning than that necessarily involves rejecting the interests of our genes, and choosing our own interests instead.
Many-worlds interpretation?: Probably. I used to think it explained everything, but then I learned about Born probabilities. Learning that there was something MWI didn't easily explain necessarily lowered my confidence in MWI.
Free will?: Doesn't exist in any really strong sense.
Consciousness?: I do not - yet - understand how a bunch of atoms moving around can feel like anything.
Global warming?: Must defer to the experts, who seem to think it's real and human caused. Suspicious of non-experts who are convinced it isn't. I would assign a probability to it of .75 or so.
War in Afghanistan?: Seems justified, though why isn't it won already?
War in Iraq?: Has both benefits and costs. Primary benefit is removal of Saddam, and thus, salvation for his future victims. Hard to determine how many such victims there would have been. Costs are enormous.

Books I recommend

On evolution and its ramifications:

Richard Dawkins: The Ancestor's Tale, and Climbing Mount Improbable. The first is a history of life, and the latter a sort of explanation of evolution (which I admit I haven't actually read yet, but I've heard good things about). The Selfish Gene is good as well.
Daniel C. Dennett: Freedom Evolves. Argues for a sort of free will of a non-magical type - the only type we're going to get. This is Dennett's best and clearest book.
Robert Wright: The Moral Animal. A slightly dated introduction to evolutionary psychology.
Keith E. Stanovich: The Robot's Rebellion. A good book on the ramifications of evolutionary psychology. This book will convince you that your genes are not there to help you; you are here to help them.

On ethics and related subjects:

Peter Unger: Living High and Letting Die. A good critique of common-sense morality.
John Rawls: A Theory of Justice. Important work on the "social contract".
Derek Parfit: Reasons and Persons. Gives a reductionist account of personal identity. Skip parts 1 and 2 though, which are deathly dull.

On the universe and mankind's future in it:

David Deutsch: The Fabric of Reality. A physicist gives his guide to the meaning of everything.
Nick Bostrom: Anthropic Bias: Observation Selection Effects in Science and Philosophy. A difficult but excellent look at "the anthropic principle" and related subjects.
Iain M. Banks: Matter. Or some of his other Culture books. An interesting but probably too-conservative imagining of a futuristic society.

On thought:

Douglas Hofstadter: Godel, Escher, Bach. This one's hard to explain.

On God:

National Council of Churches: The Holy Bible (New Revised Standard Version, with Apocrypha). It's worth understanding the (sadly, false) religion of a quarter of the world's population.
M. A. S. Abdel Haleem: The Qur'an: A New Translation. Likewise.