There's so much bullshit and deception out there- and most of it comes out of defensiveness and fear- not from evil intent. Most of the time- it's because they're scared and don't know how to tell the truth. You have to draw people out of the position of fear to really understand them- flat-out asking people if they're liars will never help you.

There is a rationality to believing in conspiracy theories that purport to identify somebody acting in secret to harm or gain an advantage that's illegal or immoral, over somebody else without their knowledge or consent.

My initial motivation for studying quantum computing was a desire to understand the fundamental computational limits of the universe. Even in the absence of practical applications, I believed this pursuit was worthwhile as the most rigorous test of quantum mechanics to date. In fact, I often joke that disproving quantum computing sceptics is the primary application of a quantum computer, with everything else being a bonus.

art has always played a role in revolution, evolution and change. Art has always been a great changing force, the great common denominator, and a force to help people understand the world we live in, and the people within that world.

When you fail, you take ownership of the failure, and then you assess what mistakes were made, what could be done differently, what better instructions you could have given, what better support you could have given, then you fix those problems, move on and try again, simple.

The surprising consequence is that amplitudes can interfere with each other. If an event can happen in two different ways, one with a positive amplitude and one with a negative amplitude, the contributions can cancel out, leading to zero probability of the event occurring. Decreasing the number of paths can paradoxically increase the likelihood of an outcome.

We [older generations] want to sit down with people and talk about things- but young people go to a restaurant, and sit together, both with their telephones! In today's world, people have become so ambitious, everything has to be quick, and everyone wants more… there is so much greed. Have, have, have. Everything has to be quick.

Online trolling and abuse is a real problem now. A lot of people who want to express an opinion now are fearful that they'll get piled-on. And there's no real immunity from it.

When you tell people these things, they get a little fatalistic about it. They tend to think, 'Well, I guess there's not much I can do about that.' I would call that a bias. It is wrong just as often as it's likely to be right. We really need to interrogate and deconstruct that assumption. It's rarely true, and it can lead people to internalise some of these effects in a way that can be pretty damaging and totally unnecessary.

Fear is healthy, fear is natural, and if anyone's ever told you they've been to combat and were never afraid... they're either lying or a sociopath. Fear is a very good reaction; it makes you think more clearly.

It's conceivable that survival odds were higher for ancestors who embraced false information endorsed by their tribe, compared to those who acknowledged empirically accurate information but were thereby alienated from their group.

These markets will become a crucible for innovation and dynamic change. This will give more growth to derivative markets as we move forward.