Society needs to see science not as a luxury of funding but as a fundamental activity that drives enlightenment, economics, and security.
Science surrounds you. It's not something that you can step aside, step over or push out of your way because you were never good at science in school. Science is around you. Once you know and embrace that fact, it might stimulate curiosity within you to learn more about the natural world.
There's a saying in the scientific community, that every great truth goes through three phases. First, people deny it. Second, they say that it conflicts with the Bible. Third, they say that they've known it all along.
What I’m saying is, when different experiments give you the same result, it is no longer subject to your opinion. That’s the good thing about science: It’s true whether or not you believe in it. That’s why it works.
We went to the moon and discovered Earth.
Kids are never the problem. They are born scientists. The problem is always the adults. They beat the curiosity out of kids. They outnumber kids. They vote. They wield resources. That's why my public focus is primarily adults.
Lots of people think, well, we're humans; we're the most intelligent and accomplished species; we're in charge. Bacteria may have a different outlook: more bacteria live and work in one linear centimeter of your lower colon than all the humans who have ever lived. That's what's going on in your digestive tract right now. Are we in charge, or are we simply hosts for bacteria? It all depends on your outlook.
The dinosaurs never saw that asteroid coming. What's our excuse?
No matter what eyewitness testimony is in the court of law, it is the lowest form of evidence in the court of science.
I want to put on the table, not why 85% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences reject God, I want to know why 15% of the National Academy don’t.
We live in a world where not everyone has the urge to help others... It is OK to encourage others to pull themselves up by the bootstraps, but if you do, just remember that some people have no boots.
Darwin's theory of evolution is a framework by which we understand the diversity of life on Earth. But there is no equation sitting there in Darwin's 'Origin of Species' that you apply and say, 'What is this species going to look like in 100 years or 1,000 years?' Biology isn't there yet with that kind of predictive precision.
We are only intelligent by our own measures
If that god is described as being all-powerful and all-knowing and all-good, I don't see evidence for it anywhere in the world. So I remain unconvinced. If that god is all-powerful and all-good, I don't see that when a tsunami kills a quarter-million or an earthquake kills a quarter-million people. I'd like to think of good as something in the interest of your health or longevity.
If you're scientifically literate, the world looks very different to you, and that understanding empowers you.
If you need to invoke your academic pedigree or job title for people to believe what you say, then you need a better argument.
Any time scientists disagree, it's because we have insufficient data. Then we can agree on what kind of data to get; we get the data; and the data solves the problem. Either I'm right, or you're right, or we're both wrong. And we move on. That kind of conflict resolution does not exist in politics or religion.
UV is bad for molecules because its high energy breaks the bonds between a molecule's constituent atoms. That's why UV is bad for you, too: it's always best to avoid things that decompose the molecules of your flesh.
For centuries, epilepsy was the exact expectation of someone being possessed by the Devil. There was no better explanation, and it allows you to admit the existence of the Devil. If there's a Devil, that mean's there's a God.
In the animal kingdom, one of the keys to survival is to outwit your enemies. And when you're surrounded by carnivores, one of the best strategies is to fade into the background and disappear.
Would a NASA reality show "Lunar Shore" be more popular than "Jersey Shore?" Civilization's future depends on that answer.
Not only are we in the universe, the universe is in us. I don't know of any deeper spiritual feeling than what that brings upon me.
The persistent failures of controlled, double-blind experiments to support the claims of parapsychology suggest that what's going on is nonsense rather than sixth sense.
Intelligent design is a philosophy of ignorance.
The day that you stop looking - because you're content God did it - I don't need you in the lab. You're useless on the frontier of understanding the nature of the world.
