If our long-term survival is at stake, we have a basic responsibility to our species to venture to other worlds. Sailors on a becalmed sea, we sense the stirring of a breeze.

Maxwell's Equations have had a greater impact on human history than any ten presidents.

Exploration is in our nature. We began as wanderers, and we are wanderers still. We have lingered long enough on the shores of the cosmic ocean. We are ready at last to set sail for the stars.

The fact that someone says something doesn't mean it's true. Doesn't mean they're lying, but it doesn't mean it's true.

So those who wished for some central cosmic purpose for us, or at least our world, or at least our solar system, or at least our galaxy, have been disappointed, progressively disappointed. The universe is not responsive to our ambitious expectations.

In the deepest sense the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is a search for ourselves.

What an astonishing thing a book is.