I never smile when I have a bat in my hands. That's when you've got to be serious. When I get out on the field nothing's a joke to me. I don't feel like I should walk around with a smile on my face.

When I did 'Battlestar Galactica' it was the first time I really understood science fiction. That was a very political drama but set in spaceships so people didn't really take it seriously. But some really fascinating things were explored in that.

I finally decided one day reading science fiction magazines of the time I could do at least as well as some of these people are doing. So I finally made a serious effort.

Modern science then so far from being an enemy of romance is seen on every hand to be its sympathetic and resourceful friend its swift and irresistible helper in its serious need and an indulgent minister to its lighter fancies.

Young people ask me if this country is serious about science. They aren't thinking about the passport that they will hold but the country that they must rely on for support and encouragement.

Goethe died in 1832. As you know Goethe was very active in science. In fact he did some very good scientific work in plant morphology and mineralogy. But he was quite bitter at the way in which many scientists refused to grant him a hearing because he was a poet and therefore they felt he couldn't be serious.

If Margaret Thatcher took climate change seriously and believed that we should take action to reduce global greenhouse emissions then taking action and supporting and accepting the science can hardly be the mark of incipient Bolshevism.

Those theologians who are beginning to take the doctrine of creation very seriously should pay some attention to science's story.

More generally I made an effort to leave out things that weren't relevant to the main narrative themes of the book namely that there were two sides to Steve Jobs: the romantic poetic countercultural rebel on one side and the serious businessperson on the other.

And I don't believe that children are innocent. In fact no one seriously believes that. Just go to a playground and watch the kids playing in the sandbox! The romantic notion of the sweet child is simply the parents projecting their own wishes.