“The sad fact is that spending rises every year, no matter what people want or say they want.”

I’m an economist by training. I don’t really work as an economist. I only worked briefly as an economist.

That was horrifying beyond words, and that’s where science – in my opinion, this is just an opinion – that’s where science leads you.

I am scared of getting old. I am scared of being ill.

Keep on beginning and failing. Each time you fail, start all over gain, and you will grow stronger until have accomplished a purpose – not the one you began with perhaps, but one you’ll be glad to remember.

Sleep more at night. If it’s allowed at work or home, take a nap in the afternoon. You’ll be amazed at how much better you’ll feel.

I’m not a Mensa member. I have no idea where that rumor came from. I never have been, and I doubt if I ever will be.

I think Darwinism as a theory explaining evolution within species is incredibly brilliant – just unbelievably, incredibly brilliant.

Evolutionism as taught by Darwinism has nothing to say about how life originated. Has nothing to say about how the governing principles in the universe, gravity, thermodynamics, motion, how those originated. It’s got some gigantic missing pieces.

I have always been very diversified, so I have never suffered a catastrophic loss. I spread my money around the way a large institutional investor does. I use different brokerage firms. I manage some of my accounts myself.

The indispensable first step to getting the things you want out of life is this: decide what you want.

I’d say the main way people get into terrible financial trouble is just to spend too much money relative to their income, and that is an endemic problem in the United States of America, and that’s the kind of thing that should be taught about in schools.

I always assumed scientists were free to ask any question, pursue any line of inquiry without fear or reprisal.

When I seemed to be irritable or sad, my father would quote the learned Dr. Knight, and then say, ‘Just go to sleep.’ Like all smart aleck kids, I thought the advice was silly. But as I’ve grown older, I’ve realized just how smart Knight was.

I am so in love with just lying in bed listening to Mozart.

We are not supposed to be all equal. Let’s just forget that. We are supposed to have equal rights under law. If we do that, we have done enough.

My ‘thing’ is that I just lie in my immense bed and look out the window at the skyline over Virginia and the sky and the airplanes coming into Reagan. I really love doing that.

I never wanted to be run of the mill.

What you ain’t never understood is that I ain’t got nothing, don’t own nothing, ain’t never really wanted nothing that wasn’t for you. There ain’t nothing as precious to me…There ain’t nothing worth holding on to, money, dreams, nothing else–

Personally, I feel that in my own work I wanted to look programmed or impersonal but I don’t really believe I am being impersonal when I do it. And I don’t think you could do this.

I wanted to be a cartoonist when I was young.

Being raised in Iowa, I know what a cornfield does for me, and I wanted to have that same kind of feeling for the Ramapo Mountains.

I didn’t become a Tory just to become part of a managerial group who wanted to run the country…

I wanted to have a career that would last a hundred years if possible.

They didn’t want it good, they wanted it Wednesday.