I think the easiest people to fool are ourselves. Fooling ourselves may even be a necessary precondition for fooling others.

I'm not a great believer in awards-of course the fact that I've never won one has nothing to do with it at all!

I still find it hard to understand that anyone could argue that you can't have machines that exhibit consciousness.

The bomb lives only as it is falling.

Reason shapes the future, but superstition infects the present.

I've always loved Scotland, and I'm not a huge fan of big cities, to be honest. I like them to dip into for a bit, but I'm not sure I would want to live in one again.

The truth is not always useful, not always good. It’s like putting your faith in water. Yes, we need the rain, but too much can sweep you away in a flood and drown you. Like all great natural, elemental forces, the truth needs to be channeled, managed, controlled and intelligently, morally allocated.