Comedy is defiance. It's a snort of contempt in the face of fear and anxiety. And it's the laughter that allows hope to creep back on the inhale.

Today's preoccupation with physical theories of everything takes a wrong turn from the purpose of science - to question all things relentlessly. Modern physics has become like Swift's kingdom of Laputa, flying absurdly on an island above the earth and indifferent to what is beneath.

Robert Lanza

The desire to live in our imagination is driven by this suspicion that we're disembodied sensibilities cobbled into our bodies. That idea has infused most of human thought since the very beginning.

Richard Powers

It is not fit the public trusts should be lodged in the hands of any, till they are first proved and found fit for the business they are to be entrusted with.

Matthew Henry

There's a continuity between what I care about in any form: I care about it in my music, in article-writing, in how I dress, in how I live, in my relationships, in how I navigate paparazzi, how I decorate my home. There's such a continuity between everything that I don't really care what form it shows up in.

Alanis Morissette

In 1978, I entered Tohoku University, into the Department of Electrical Engineering, Faculty of Technology.

Koichi Tanaka

Nothing is too high for the daring of mortals: we storm heaven itself in our folly.

Horace

I was about to get a degree in economics when I accepted that I'd be a lousy businessman, and if I didn't give acting a try I'd regret it for the rest of my life.

Peter Gallagher

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.

Helen Keller

Deciding whether to trust or credit a person is always an uncertain task.

Aldrich Ames

Let no one who loves be unhappy, even love unreturned has its rainbow.

James M. Barrie

When a man is in love how can he use old words? Should a woman desiring her lover lie down with grammarians and linguists? I said nothing to the woman I loved but gathered love's adjectives into a suitcase and fled from all languages.

Nizar Qabbani

Happy the man whose wish and care a few paternal acres bound, content to breathe his native air in his own ground.

Alexander Pope