Aviation is the branch of engineering that is least forgiving of mistakes.

The average student emerges at the end of the Ph.D. program, already middle-aged, overspecialized, poorly prepared for the world outside, and almost unemployable except in a narrow area of specialization. Large numbers of students for whom the program is inappropriate are trapped in it, because the Ph.D. has become a union card required for entry into the scientific job market.

Life is nature's way to give mind oportunities it wouldn't otherwise had.

We do not know how much of the environmental change is due to human activities and how much [is due] to long-term natural processes over which we have no control.

Science and religion are, of course, two different ways of looking at the universe; and it's the same universe with two different windows.

I belonged to a small minority of boys who were lacking in physical strength and athletic prowess. ... We found our refuge in science. ... We learned that science is a revenge of victims against oppressors, that science is a territory of freedom and friendship in the midst of tyranny and hatred.

Almost everything about the universe is astounding. I think the most amazing thing is how gifted we are - we are only monkeys who came down from the trees just recently. We have these amazing gifts of music and mathematics and painting and Olympic running.