The purpose of education is not to validate ignorance but to overcome it.

Of course, supernatural acts are what miracles are all about. They are, after all, precisely those things that circumvent the laws of nature. A god who can create the laws of nature can presumably also circumvent them at will. Although why they would have been circumvented so liberally thousands of years ago, before the invention of modern communication instruments that could have recorded them, and not today, is still something to wonder about.

We all trust each other to some extent. We have to rely on experts to some extent, but we should learn to be sceptical.

There is a maxim about the universe which I always tell my students: That which is not explicitly forbidden is guaranteed to occur.

What people believe impacts on what they do. And it's not as if religion is universally bad. Of course it's responsible for many peoples doing good actions.

The one experience that I hope every student has at some point in their lives is to have some belief you profoundly, deeply hold, proved to be wrong because that is the most eye-opening experience you can have, and as a scientist, to me, is the most exciting experience I can ever have.

The amazing thing is that every atom in your body came from a star that exploded.