If you ask an American where the DJIA or Facebook is trading today, everybody knows. Ask the same person how many kids dropped out of high-school last year and nobody knows. That to me is very short sighted, after all what is the better barometer of the future of America?

Think about how that feels when you're told that for this essential skill that is part of the astronaut job, you're not needed. It's as if they were saying, 'You don't bring anything essential and we won't miss you.' That encouragement pushed me to show up to spacewalking meetings I wasn't initially invited to.

It takes intellectuals to come up with some of the most moronic ideas possible.

What we see in the science is something very different. We often see that romantic partners basically see the best in each other. They're wearing rose-coloured glasses. And the primary thing that brings people together is what we would call attachment bonds or pair bonds: the idea that people are looking for somebody who they feel has their back, somebody who's going to celebrate their successes, and somebody who's going to be there for them.

It's okay to have differences... it's okay to have different religions... it's okay to not agree on everything. However, respect should always be there. Sometimes you have to listen before you talk.