"Some people experience rare moments when everything they believe is challenged. Or at least shaken up. Those moments stay with them. Surprise, real surprise, is an exotic thing not soon forgotten."

"I continue to be surprised by judgmental native stereotypes and apathy, but if I wasn't that would mean I'd become accustomed and tolerant. I don't want to stop being surprised. I just want them to stop."

"The archaeologists of the future will find themselves excavating heaps of our discarded junk, picking through mountains of DVDs and yoghurt pots and wondering: “who the fuck were these idiots?"

"The idea would be in my mind - and I know it sounds strange - is that the most important advances in medicine would be made not by new knowledge in molecular biology, because that's exceeding what we can even use. It'll be made by mathematicians, physicists, computer scientists, figuring out a way to get all that information together."