[Science doesn't deal with facts; indeed] fact is an emotion-loaded word for which there is little place in scientific debate.

A theory is scientific only if it can be disproved. But the moment you try to cover absolutely everything the chances are that you cover nothing.

All science is full of statements where you put your best face on your ignorance, where you say: ... we know awfully little about this, but more or less irrespective of the stuff we don't know about, we can make certain useful deductions.

Sometimes I am a little unkind to all my many friends in education ... by saying that from the time it learns to talk every child makes a dreadful nuisance of itself by asking 'Why?'. To stop this nuisance society has invented a marvellous system called education which, for the majority of people, brings to an end their desire to ask that question. The few failures of this system are known as scientists.

An observer situated in a nebula and moving with the nebula will observe the same properties of the universe as any other similarly situated observer at any time.

If you walk along the street you will encounter a number of scientific problems. Of these, about 80 per cent are insoluble, while 19½ per cent are trivial. There is then perhaps half a per cent where skill, persistence, courage, creativity and originality can make a difference. It is always the task of the academic to swim in that half a per cent, asking the questions through which some progress can be made.

Religion divides us, while it is our human characteristics that bind us to each other.