I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form read more

I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image.

Usenet is like a herd of performing elephants with diarrhea -- massive, difficult to redirect, awe-inspiring, entertaining, and a source read more

Usenet is like a herd of performing elephants with diarrhea -- massive, difficult to redirect, awe-inspiring, entertaining, and a source of mind-boggling amounts of excrement when you least expect it.

The only thing you will ever be able to say in the so-called 'social' sciences is: "some do, some don't.".

The only thing you will ever be able to say in the so-called 'social' sciences is: "some do, some don't.".

Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science.

Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science.

For a smart material to be able to send out a more complex signal it needs to be nonlinear. If read more

For a smart material to be able to send out a more complex signal it needs to be nonlinear. If you hit a tuning fork twice as hard it will ring twice as loud but still at the same frequency. That's a linear response. If you hit a person twice as hard they're unlikely just to shout twice as loud. That property lets you learn more about the person than the tuning fork. - When Things Start to Think, 1999.

As crude a weapon as a cave man's club, the chemical barrage has been hurled against the fabric of life.

As crude a weapon as a cave man's club, the chemical barrage has been hurled against the fabric of life.

Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under read more

Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under thy observation in life.

Science is the tool of the Western mind and with it more doors can be opened than with bare hands. read more

Science is the tool of the Western mind and with it more doors can be opened than with bare hands. It is part and parcel of our knowledge and obscures our insight only when it holds that the understanding given by it is the only kind there is. . -C.G. Jung.

The great secret of doctors, known only to their wives, but still hidden from the public, is that most things read more

The great secret of doctors, known only to their wives, but still hidden from the public, is that most things get better by themselves; most things, in fact, are better in the morning.