My fans want me to talk to them. And even if they want to be critical, I want to hear what they've got to say.

But when I was a little kid, I was always writing stories and illustrating little books that I would create.

If everybody, every day, would try to do one thing that pulls them beyond themselves the world will start being a better place.

I don't do things that are illegal.

I believe all complicated phenomena can be explained by simpler scientific principles.

Just after graduation in 1966, like many of my contemporaries, I applied for research training at the National Institutes of Health. Perhaps because his wife was a poet, Ira Pastan agreed to take me into his laboratory, despite my lack of scientific credentials.

I want to know where joy lives. I'd interview scientists, religious leaders and heads of state. I'd want to find out exactly what makes people happy. I'd want to look into the biology, the chemistry of the human brain.

In fact, scientific results are a careful attempt to objectively measure reality, and although they may be refined over time, they are always our best hope of getting at the truth.