Physics is really nothing more than a search for ultimate simplicity, but so far all we have is a kind of elegant messiness.

A world without newspapers or a world where the newspapers are purely electronic and you read them on a screen is not a very appealing world.

I wanted to quit and to do this forever, sleep in a bed and in a tent, see what was over the next hill and never see a hill again. All of this all at once, every moment, on the trail or off.

It was one of those sumptuous days when the world is full of autumn muskiness and tangy, crisp perfection: vivid blue sky, deep green fields, leaves in a thousand luminous hues. It is a truly astounding sight when every tree in a landscape becomes individual, when each winding back highway and plump hillside is suddenly and infinitely splashed with every sharp shade that nature can bestow - flaming scarlet, lustrous gold, throbbing vermilion, fiery orange.

If you believe in god, it's much more fantastic to believe that he created this universe billions of years ago and set in motion this long train of activities that eventually resulted in us. I think that's so much more satisfying, more thrilling, than the idea that it was all done in seven days.

Human beings would split the atom and invent television, nylon, and instant coffee before they could figure out the age of their own planet.

I'm not funny in person. I mean I'm really not. I'm one of those people who always screw up anecdotes.