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

If the Royal Variety Show was put in a matter transportation machine with the Royal Institution Christmas lectures, this is what you'd get.

I'm glad the universe is pointless. It means if I get to the end of my life, the universe can't turn to me and go, 'What have you been doing, you idiot? That's not the point!

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.

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.

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.

The worst, the most difficult thing I think is that the more you become intrigued by science and the information is out there, the more you are aware of the paucity of your own knowledge.