I mean when you get down to very low numbers of nuclear weapons and you contemplate going to zero how do you deal with the reality of that technology being available to almost any country that seeks to pursue it? And what conditions do you put in place?

I'm a futurist. Technology is our way out of almost every problem we have. Technology can create a new sense of community.

I have an almost religious zeal... not for technology per se but for the Internet which is for me the nervous system of mother Earth which I see as a living creature linking up.

A wisely chosen illustration is almost essential to fasten the truth upon the ordinary mind and no teacher can afford to neglect this part of his preparation.

I am a teacher and I am proud of it. At Cornell University I have taught primarily undergraduates and indeed almost every year since 1966 have taught first-year general chemistry.

I loved almost everything about being a teacher but I was an unusual teacher.

Writing became an obsessive compulsive habit but I had almost no money so I thought about being an urban firefighter and having lots of free time in which to write or becoming an English teacher and thinking about books and writers on a daily basis. That swayed me.

I used to write things for friends. There was this girl I had a crush on and she had a teacher she didn't like at school. I had a real crush on her so almost every day I would write her a little short story where she would kill him in a different way.

IT is mere coincidence that Cooper was born in the year which produced The Power of Sympathy and that when he died Uncle Tom's Cabin was passing through its serial stage and yet the limits of his life mark almost exactly the first great period of American fiction.

I can hardly express in words my deep feeling and sympathy for them knowing as I do the many serious handicaps and obstacles that will confront them in almost every walk of life.