“Until about 70,000 years ago, humans were just another kind of animal. They weren't particularly important. Their impact on the world was not greater than that of jellyfish, fireflies, or woodpeckers. However, 70,000 years ago humans evolved new cognitive abilities that turned them into the most powerful force on the planet.”

— Yuval Noah Harari

Bestselling author of "Sapiens" & historian studying human civilization

The quote archive

Wisdom in fragments

A growing archive of 3,000+ moments, drawn from every interview.

We run the very real risk now, not of going back to the 1970s, but of going back to the 1930s or 40s with economic and financial collapse, massive pandemic, and real-world wars.

— Nouriel Roubini

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

I have grey hair, I'm 64. I grew up in Italy in the 1960s, 70s and early 80s. When I grew-up, I never worried about nuclear war, global pandemic, technology destroying jobs, climate change destroying the world, or stable democracies being taken over by authoritarian extremists.

— Nouriel Roubini

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

Today, there is uncertainty like we've never seen before. We are not only facing economic risks, but real social, political, geopolitical, technological, and environmental risks too.

— Nouriel Roubini

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

Until now, we had an insolvency problem – but we didn't have a liquidity problem that could trigger that insolvency because interest rates were so low. Now they're rising, and the mother of all debt crises is going to occur.

— Nouriel Roubini

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

We are facing the mother of all debt crises. When you look at the data on private and public debt, the debt to GDP ratio was near 200% of global GDP in 1999, today it's more like 350% and rising. In advanced economies, it's over 420% and in China, 330% and rising.

— Nouriel Roubini

Economist known for predicting the 2008 financial crisis.

When Putin invaded in February 2022, we made the mistake of thinking that Putin's of this conflict would be one made by a 'reasonable person'. There are some very worrying elements of intelligence suggesting he has been very seriously out of touch… isolated from reality… and that he's only listening to those telling him what he wants to hear.

— Simon Smith

Putin badly miscalculated his chances of quick success in launching his 2022 invasion of Ukraine. But I think he will make a much sounder calculation of the costs to him of taking the action of using WMD.

— Simon Smith

Those anxieties have been largely invented as an answer to an internal threat Putin was facing. He knew the Russian people have been getting fed-up of Putinism, and that has to be a major factor in the invention of this external threat.

— Simon Smith

Russia always seemed to me to have a problem accepting that you have to listen to the voice of smaller countries. Russia often seemed simply to assume that you get what you want if you're bigger, and more powerful.

— Simon Smith

I don't think it was inevitable until the point where the tanks started rolling-in. It was unstoppable at that point… But 20 years ago, would we have realised this was going to happen? My sense would be absolutely not. I say this as someone who participated in a really sincere effort to reach-out to Russia, to include Russia in the cooperative mechanisms that work for us.

— Simon Smith

I've sat in front of the chief ideologue in the Moscow Kremlin, and I remember him saying to us in so many words, that 'you cannot govern Russia unless you have a one-party state: Our job in the Kremlin here and now, is not to recreate the communist party, but it's to recreate the one party which will be the natural choice'. He didn't say it would be the only choice, (but I think that's what he meant), of the Russian electorate.

— Simon Smith

We have this macho-willpower-crap, as if somehow willpower is the answer to everything in life and if someone needs help, it means they don't have the willpower. It's a nonsense.

— Marshall Goldsmith