Observations indicate that the universe is expanding at an ever-increasing rate. It will expand forever, getting emptier and darker. Although the universe doesn’t have an end, it had a beginning in the Big Bang. One might ask what is before that but the answer is that there is nowhere before the Big Bang just as there is nowhere south of the South Pole.

Most sets of values would give rise to universes that, although they might be very beautiful, would contain no one able to wonder at that beauty.

I don't think the human race will survive the next thousand years, unless we spread into space. There are too many accidents that can befall life on a single planet. But I'm an optimist. We will reach out to the stars.

In fact, if one considers the possible constants and laws that could have emerged, the odds against a universe that produced life like ours are immense.

As we shall see, the concept of time has no meaning before the beginning of the universe. This was first pointed out by St. Augustine. When asked: What did God do before he created the universe? Augustine didn't reply: He was preparing Hell for people who asked such questions. Instead, he said that time was a property of the universe that God created, and that time did not exist before the beginning of the universe.

The media need superheroes in science just as in every sphere of life, but there is really a continuous range of abilities with no clear dividing line.

No one undertakes research in physics with the intention of winning a prize. It is the joy of discovering something no one knew before.