I can't stand clutter. I can't stand piles of stuff. And whenever I see it, I basically just throw the stuff away.

I have long thought that anyone who does not regularly - or ever - gaze up and see the wonder and glory of a dark night sky filled with countless stars loses a sense of their fundamental connectedness to the universe.

If string theory is right, the microscopic fabric of our universe is a richly intertwined multidimensional labyrinth within which the strings of the universe endlessly twist and vibrate, rhythmically beating out the laws of the cosmos.

Most scientists like to operate in the context of economy. If you don't need an explanatory principle, don't invoke it.

So: if you buy the notion that reality consists of the things in your freeze-frame mental image right now, and if you agree that your now is no more valid than the now of someone located far away in space who can move freely, then reality encompasses all of the events in spacetime.

If the theory turns out to be right, that will be tremendously thick and tasty icing on the cake.

We are living through a remarkably privileged era when certain deep truths about the cosmos are still within reach of the human spirit of exploration.