Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius.

I think anything that requires real global breakthroughs requires a degree of intensity and sustained effort that cannot be done part time, so it's something you have to do around the clock, and that doesn't compute with our existing educational system.

The college kids should think hard about what they're doing. If you have a great idea for a company, there's no right time to start it, and it's often better to start it sooner rather than later. I went to Stanford undergrad and Stanford Law School, and if I had to do it over again, I might still do those things, but I wish I had asked the type of questions like, why I was doing it, was it just for the status and prestige, or was it because I was really interested in the substance of it.

Anyone who prefers owning part of your company to being paid in cash reveals a preference for the long term and a commitment to increasing your company's value in the future.

If you think about basic science or coming up with new theories of mathematics, these are not the kinds of things which are necessarily a well-defined market to pay people.

In a world where wealth is growing, you can get away with printing money. Doubling the debt over the next 20 years is not a problem.

A startup is the largest endeavor over which you can have definite mastery. You can have agency not just over your own life, but over a small and important part of the world. It begins by rejecting the unjust tyranny of Chance. You are not a lottery ticket.