If the experience of science teaches anything it's that the world is very strange and surprising. The many revolutions in science have certainly shown that.

As an actress it's part of your job to be able to imagine just about anything - even if it's not within your personal experience.

There are a lot of obstacles in the way of our understanding animal intelligence - not the least being that we can't even agree whether nonhuman species are conscious. We accept that chimps and dolphins experience awareness we like to think dogs and cats do. But what about mice and newts? What about a fly? Is anything going on there at all?

No one ever pretended that shopping for anything is a rational experience. If it were would there be Fluffernutter? Laceless sneakers? Porkpie hats? Would the Chia Pet even exist?

Reading a book is like re-writing it for yourself. You bring to a novel anything you read all your experience of the world. You bring your history and you read it in your own terms.

In high school I was on the youth advisory council for the Mayor's Office of Los Angeles and that was kind of my first experience in the bureaucratic system. We tried to get things done and nobody was really interested in getting anything done.

The things I was allowed to experience the people I was able to call friends teammates mentors coaches and opponents the travel all of it are far more than anything I ever thought possible in my lifetime.

The first essential in writing about anything is that the writer should have no experience of the matter.

You may never learn the names of any of the people you talk to in a dog park even after many many hours spent there with them and many hours of conversation. But if - knock on wood - anything should ever happen to your dog these nameless non-strangers will rally sympathize offer to help and hold your hand. I know this from experience.

I like to think of my behavior in the sixties as a 'learning experience.' Then again I like to think of anything stupid I've done as a 'learning experience.' It makes me feel less stupid.