Wherever you are on Earth, there is more life present than in the rest of the known universe.

You always need to find the balance in the science, but the balance to talking about evolutionary theory is not to talk about creationism, that's not a balance, that's misleading and it's just wrong.

I don't have any hobbies because my working job is my hobby. What I do is I spend my whole time looking through telescopes and having brain scans and buying books about various different ideas and I just sit around, that's my life.

As much as of course that Englishness of always to be embarrassed about any sense of complement, it is nice to know that a lot of the projects that I've worked on that people do feel there has been some effect.

My life is constant revision but it's not revision, a lot of it is for the first time.

I am not man or beast; I am bibliosexual, and a seedy bibliosexual who haunts the streets, laden with carrier bags held by blistered fingers, stooping under the weight of the rucksack that has brought on sciatica and a Dickensian demeanour.

To be paid, to be employed to be an enthusiast and be excited about existence is fantastic.