“If I had been married earlier in life, I wouldn’t have seen the double helix. I would have been taking care of the kids on Saturday. On the other hand, I was lonely a lot of the time.”

There are many people of color who are very talented.

Nothing new that is really interesting comes without collaboration.

Today, the theory of evolution is an accepted fact for everyone but a fundamentalist minority, whose objections are based not on reasoning but on doctrinaire adherence to religious principles.

There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so.

Science moves with the spirit of an adventure characterized both by youthful arrogance and by the belief that the truth, once found, would be simple as well as pretty.

There is only one science, physics: everything else is social work.

Science that leads over the horizon depends on gathering the best minds and enabling them to do what the best minds naturally seek to do: pursue the most thrilling questions of the time.

You’ve never heard of an English lover. Only an English patient.

Already for thirty-five years he had not stopped talking and almost nothing of fundamental value had emerged.

The way to do great science is to stay away from subjects that are overpopulated, and go to the frontiers.

Some think there is something wrong about enhancing people.

The pace of discovery is going unbelievably fast.

No one may have the guts to say this, but if we could make better human beings by knowing how to add genes, why shouldn’t we?

The luckiest thing that ever happened to me was that my father didn’t believe in God, and so he had no hang-ups about souls.

Whenever you interview fat people, you feel bad, because you know you’re not going to hire them.

I think the reason people are dealing with science less well now than 50 years ago is that it has become so complicated.

My father was always not concerned about the wealth I have, but every year he would ask me, how much have you given in charity? And how much taxes have you paid?

I don’t care about three years ago – I don’t care about two years ago. I don’t care about last year. The only thing I care about is this week.

I don’t care for sex. I find it an embarrassing, dull exercise. I prefer sports, where you can win.

It’s not yours, nor is it mine. It’s ours, so let’s protect it!

Love is knowing that she is delicate and not breaking her still.

There can be no greater well wisher for me in life than my mother.

You’re not just going out there, maybe sacrificing your own life. There’s also sacrifices still going on at home. You can serve in the military and have a good marriage, but you just need to be aware of it so you can take those steps to take care of it.

When people talk to you in such glowing terms, that is the time to be very, very alert because the worst of the mistakes are made in the best of the times.