Sometimes I mistake this for a universe that cares.

But I’ve never seen the Icarus story as a lesson about the limitations of humans. I see it as a lesson about the limitations of wax as an adhesive.

Take wrong turns. Talk to strangers. Open unmarked doors. And if you see a group of people in a field, go find out what they are doing. Do things without always knowing how they'll turn out.

I never trust anyone who's more excited about success than about doing the thing they want to be successful at.

You don't use science to show you're right, you use science to become right.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can make me think I deserved it.

The role of gender in society is the most complicated thing I’ve ever spent a lot of time learning about, and I’ve spent a lot of time learning about quantum mechanics.

Correlation doesn’t imply causation, but it does waggle its eyebrows suggestively and gesture furtively while mouthing ‘look over there.’

Things are rarely just crazy enough to work, but they're frequently just crazy enough to fail hilariously.

If at first you don't succeed, that's one data point.

You don't become great by trying to be great. You become great by wanting to do something, and then doing it so hard that you become great in the process.

On the forest floor was the LVR's smoldering ceiling panel, just lying there like the lid of a sardine can that had been eagerly and violently thrown away by someone who very much liked sardines.

To be crazy is not necessarily to writhe in snake pits or converse with imaginary gods. It can sometimes be not knowing what to do in the morning.

‎Perfect? How can you define a word without concrete meaning?

You [Scots] come of a race of men the very wind of whose name has swept to the ultimate seas.

Evil or not, the recording industry kept Auto-Tune on the down-low. Cher's producer forced Auto-Tune to jump suddenly from one pitch to the next.

At the back of it there lies the central citadel of obstinacy: I will not give up my right to myself--the thing God intends you to give up if ever you are going to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.

I have never met anyone who wanted to save the world without my financial support.

The current situation with regard to theory is odd and maybe defined by a paradox.

Ill-luck is, in nine cases out of ten, the result of taking pleasure first and duty second, instead of duty first and pleasure second.

Reynie's fce fell. 'It's not funny, Kate.' For a moment - a fleeting moment - Kate looked desperately sad. 'Well, of course it's not funny, Reynie Muldoon. But what do you want me to do? Cry?