If you give somebody a lot of questions to answer and then they walk by a bowl of candy, they are more likely to grab the candy because they're tired out from answering questions and can't resist.

A lot of good ideas are actually bad ideas because, since they sound good, everybody's already doing them.

It's surprising that the world is understandable to the extent that it is.

The brain is really hard to see. The whole thing is very large - the human brain is several pounds in weight - but the connections between brain cells, known as synapses, are really tiny. They're nanoscale in dimension. So if you want to see how the cells of the brain are connected in networks, you have to see those connections, those synapses.

Remember, when we're conscious of something, that state is quite often generated by unconscious processes that happen right before it.

Maybe we'll understand more about how the universe came to be, and what forces drove it in the early days and which forces drive it now.

I often try to think about, What sounds like a bad idea, but if you find the right plan of attack, it's actually a really good idea? I spend a lot of time really trying to systematically tackle problems from different angles.