“Basic research is what I am doing when I don’t know what I am doing.”

With our present knowledge, we can respond to the challenge of stellar space flight solely with intellectual concepts and purely hypothetical analysis. Hardware solutions are still entirely beyond our reach and far, far away.

My friends they were dancing here in the streets of Huntsville when our first satellite orbited the Earth. They were dancing again when the first Americans landed on the Moon. I’d like to ask you, don’t hang up your dancing slippers.

I only hope that we shall not wait to adopt the program until after our astronomers have reported a new and unsuspected asteroid moving across their fields of vision with menacing speed. At that point it will be too late!

One good test is worth a thousand expert opinions.

By the year 2000 we will undoubtedly have a sizable operation on the Moon, we will have achieved a manned Mars landing and it’s entirely possible we will have flown with men to the outer planets.

If we continue at this leisurly pace, we will have to pass Russian customs when we land on the moon.

Conquering the universe one has to solve two problems: gravity and red tape. We could have mastered gravity.

The rocket worked perfectly, except for landing on the wrong planet.

Our sun is one of a 100 billion stars in our galaxy. Our galaxy is one of billions of galaxies populating the universe. It would be the height of presumption to think that we are the only living thing in that enormous immensity.

A good engineer gets stale very fast if he doesn’t keep his hands dirty.

My experiences with science led me to God. They challenge science to prove the existence of God. But must we really light a candle to see the sun?

All one can really leave one’s children is what’s inside their heads. Education, in other words, and not earthly possessions, is the ultimate legacy, the only thing that cannot be taken away.

Nature does not know extinction; all it knows is transformation. Everything science has taught me-and continues to teach me-strengthens my belief in the continuity of our spiritual existence after death. Nothing disappears without a trace.

For me, the idea of a creation is not conceivable without invoking the necessity of design. One cannot be exposed to the law and order of the universe without concluding that there must be design and purpose behind it all.

Man is not made for space. But with the help of biologists and medical doctors, he can be prepared and accommodated.

I have learned to use the word ‘impossible’ with the greatest caution.

There were basically three themes. One was the sun theme which is the guitar when he’d get sun on his leg and it comes again in the end. And there’s of course the lullaby which Dido sang, “If I Rise.” And then there’s this driving guitar which is the motivation theme.

Filling a need is not merely good business; it’s a basic attitude towards life. If you see a need, do whatever you can to meet that need.

Childhood is not a state which only applies to the first phase of our lives in the biological sense. Rather it is a basic condition which is always appropriate to a life that is lived aright.

We have to get back down to basics. We have to start organizing at the neighborhood level to get people educated to vote.

Ultimately, health care fails the most basic test. It’s not organized around the needs of the patient.

A basic law: the more you practice the art of thankfulness, the more you have to be thankful for.

Do not doubt your own basic goodness. In spite of all confusion and fear, you are born with a heart that knows what is just, loving, and beautiful.

I don’t panic. The same thing applies to me as to everybody else, so I’m given to euphoria and despair. And I would say that I basically have survived by recognizing my mistakes.