A conspiracy theorist is a person who tacitly admits that they have insufficient data to prove their points. A conspiracy is a battle cry of a person with insufficient data.

Anyone who has wrestled knows that it's the hardest thing in the world to do. Anyone who says something else is the hardest thing has never wrestled. That's what I have found. ... You don't wrestle because it's easy, you wrestle because it's hard. I don't do astrophysics because it's easy, I do it because it's hard. And I juxtapose the two in my mind, body, and soul all the time.

We are not simply in the universe, we are part of it. We are born from it. One might even say we have been empowered by the universe to figure itself out - and we have only just begun.

I have a personal philosophy in life: If somebody else can do something that I'm doing, they should do it. And what I want to do is find things that would represent a unique contribution to the world-the contribution that only I, and my portfolio of talents, can make happen. Those are my priorities in life.

We should not measure our space-faring era by where footprints have been laid.... We should measure our era by how many people take no notice at all. A legacy rises to become culture only when its elements are so common that they no longer attract comment.

So not enough people in this world, I think, carry a cosmic perspective with them. It could be life-changing.

WhenIWasYourAge: It took a week to learn whether your photos came out okay.