The U.S. started with no stars. In fact, it started with a completely different flag. The last two were added in 1959, Hawaii and Alaska.

Since the 1940s, we've been saying there are no differences, we [humans] are all identical. We're going to know at year end if that is true.

We traditionally in this world didn't have enough calories to feed all of us and had huge famines, not just in Africa, but had them across India, across Southeast Asia, and across China. Because of Borlaug's work at Simit and because of this we have huge excess, until very recently, in agricultural produce and the prices went through the floor.

Until African-Americans and Hispanics can get serious, not just about area studies, which are important, but also about science and technology, they're not going to generate that wealth and that job within those communities. And that has absolutely devastating consequences for the places where people live, for the jobs and for the wealth.

The definition of who's literate and who's not keeps changing. So, in Neanderthal times, if you painted on a cave wall, that was enough to transmit how you hunt, how you eat, how you cook, how you dress, and we can read about that.

There's a creativity, a power, an energy, an ability to do things unlike any other period in history. It's a little bit like sitting in the Renaissance, but multiplied a thousand-fold.

Within the United States, there is a real division between the PhDs given in science and math to the Asian community, to the traditional white community, and then to African-Americans and Hispanics.