“I bought a brand-new Cadillac. I wrote them a cheque for it.”
Mike Smith of De Soto Parish in Louisiana splashing out after becoming a millionaire overnight. Energy firms are buying up land in the region after discovering what could be the US’s largest natural gas deposit (The New York Times, 29 July)
“There is a massive difference between no risk and a very small risk. Semantics make all the difference here.”
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David Wilson of the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, responds to the Swiss Federal Commission’s suggestion that antiviral drugs are so effective that HIV-positive men don’t need to wear condoms during sex with an uninfected partner (Toronto Globe and Mail, 25 July)
“A society that doesn’t allow scientists [academic freedom] has a problem.”
Howard Atkinson of the University of Leeds, UK, calls for scientists to be able to conduct small trials of genetically modified crops in secret, with full disclosure for commercial trials only. Activists destroyed Atkinson’s 400-plant trial of cyst-resistant GM potatoes (The Guardian, London, 29 June)
“If you are going to build a mother ship, it’s only right that you should name it after your mother.”
Richard Branson on the plane that will serve as the mother ship for the first commercial space flight. The plane is named “Eve” after Branson’s mother (Los Angeles Times, 29 July)
“We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand.”
Computer scientist and virtual reality pioneer Randy Pausch speaking last September at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, after he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Pausch died last week.
