Philosophy

Knowledge isn't always used to make people better off, of course. It can be used to make more lethal weaponry and more effective militia and armies – so we must couple knowledge with humanism, with universal sympathy, for it to be a force for good. Without knowledge, however, all the sympathy in the world would be impotent – they must exist together.

Cognitive Scientist & Psychologist Known for Research on Language and Human Nature

An appreciation of entropy is necessary to grasp that we are not entitled to wellbeing, progress, comfort, or health. The forces of the universe are- at best, indifferent- at worse, antipathetic- to our interests. Left to their own devices, things get worse.

Cognitive Scientist & Psychologist Known for Research on Language and Human Nature

The very idea that – say – Make America Great Again – should be our guiding creed captures almost all the counter-enlightenment themes. It idealises the greatness of a nation as the ultimate good, as opposed to making all people healthier, safer, happier, richer and better educated. Rather than looking ahead to the progress that can be made, it looks back to a hypothetical golden-age to which we must return.

Cognitive Scientist & Psychologist Known for Research on Language and Human Nature

Once we take their quantum property into account, space and time changes dramatically. Space is granular, because one of the characteristics of quantum theory is to show that continuous things have often a granular structure, like light, which is a cloud of photons. Similarly, time cannot be anymore understood ad an external independently flowing entity. Time is just he counting of granular happenings in nature.

Theoretical physicist known for loop quantum gravity research and popular science writing

Quantum mechanics is the most radical break in our thinking of reality that we have ever encountered... Quantum mechanics comes along and says that whole experience is misleading, and that the best you can ever do is to predict the probabilities of outcomes. Quantum mechanics says our world is nebulous, fuzzy, a haze of possibilities until it somehow snaps to attention upon an appropriate interaction, observation or measurement.

Theoretical Physicist & Bestselling Author on String Theory & Cosmology

Quantum mechanics is a whole new way of thinking– it says that the world is all by itself as a wave function of the universe, but you can never observe that. You can never observe a wave function directly. There is a complex relationship between what the world is and what you see when you look at it, and that relationship involves the idea that you can never predict precisely what you will see, but you can simply say the probability of what you will see.

Theoretical physicist & podcaster explaining cosmology and philosophy

I feel altogether confident that the historian of the future will estimate the past thirty years as the most extraordinary in the history of the world up to the present... there has been no period at all comparable with it unless it be the period about 300 years ago, which saw the development of Galilean and Newtonian mechanics. This was indeed of incalculable importance for the destinies of the race; the conceptions then introduced are not only the basis of modern material civilization, but they were the cause of a very complete change in man's whole intellectual and spiritual outlook- in his philosophy, his religion, and his morals.

Physicist who measured electron charge and discovered photoelectric effect

There is very little that matters more in democracy, than truth. I think cynicism is dangerous - that's a self-fulfilling prophecy as well. That's a very dangerous position, and I think we've got to fight cynicism.

Labor Secretary & Economist; Leading Voice on Inequality

I wish I had known that Football is the most important part of the least important parts of my life. A bad result or losing in a final of the champions League is hard to take, but there are worse things to endure in life.

Legendary football manager with multiple Champions League titles

So many people say, 'Jacqueline, I would love to change the world- but I don't know my purpose yet…' Purpose doesn't come to people sitting at the starting blocks and thinking about purpose. You have to live it.

Founder of Acumen Fund & social entrepreneur focused on global poverty alleviation

Inside each of us are monsters and angels- there are no divisions between good and bad people- and I've seen how those times of insecurity can make us do terrible things to each other.

Founder of Acumen Fund & social entrepreneur focused on global poverty alleviation

Those who have the most meaningful, purpose filled lives tend to dream so big – that those dreams will rarely be completed in a lifetime. What keeps you going is the beauty you encounter at every juncture of the path.

Founder of Acumen Fund & social entrepreneur focused on global poverty alleviation

Success means having a lifestyle that I enjoy. It means slowing down, enjoying what I do, and having as few stakeholders as possible. I don't want a bunch of investors. I don't want a ton of employees.

Founder of Nasty Gal & Author of "#GIRLBOSS

I don't really think about legacy, I'm more interested in my next thing, my next project… my writing is driven by a love of music, and an affection for being around music, and for telling stories… I don't have a grand plan; this is my life.

Renowned composer known for film scores and electronic classical music

Human progress often comes at great cost to people who are willing to sacrifice for the sake of principles or in defense of the rights of others. It took hundreds of millions of people to die before we created a global security and human rights order and all of these are under stress. One would hate to think it would be another similar amount of deaths before we made more progress.

UN Human Rights Chief & International Justice Advocate

I'll hope I have helped be more generative and less extractive, through my own actions, and through my support of others. We live in a world where we're constantly battling these forces and we need to ensure we're more generative than extractive — of each other, of our planet — I believe we can do it.

Founder of Kickstarter, crowdfunding platform pioneer