In order for us to have a future that’s exciting and inspiring, it has to be one where we’re a space-bearing civilization.

I suppose we need not go mourning the buffaloes. In the nature of things, they had to give place to better cattle, though the change might have been made without barbarous wickedness.

To state the facts frankly is not to despair the future nor indict the past. The prudent heir takes careful inventory of his legacies and gives a faithful accounting to those whom he owes an obligation of trust.

It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn’t get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before in various periods in the history of man.

We will move forward, we will move upward, and yes, we will move onward.

The end of the human race will be that it will eventually die of civilization.

Of the various branches of electrical investigation, perhaps the most interesting and immediately the most promising is that dealing with alternating currents.

Rhetoric is a poor substitute for action, and we have trusted only to rhetoric. If we are really to be a great nation, we must not merely talk; we must act big.

The slogan of progress is changing from the full dinner pail to the full garage.

We welcome the scrutiny of the world – because what you see in America is a country that has steadily worked to address our problems and make our union more perfect.

What I’m trying to do is, is to make a significant difference in space flight. And help make space flight accessible to almost anyone.

It’s a pity that nobody has found an exploding black hole. If they had, I would have won a Nobel prize.

He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.

Study the past, if you would divine the future.

Pretty much, Apple and Dell are the only ones in this industry making money. They make it by being Wal-Mart. We make it by innovation.

Many badly needed goals, like fusion and cancer cure, would be achieved much sooner if we invested more.

In the twenty-first century, the robot will take the place which slave labor occupied in ancient civilization.

The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.

I’m always interested in what you can do with technology that people haven’t thought of doing yet.

Change in all things is sweet.

I have realized that the past and future are real illusions, that they exist in the present, which is what there is and all there is.

It’s important that we attempt to extend life beyond Earth now. It is the first time in the four billion-year history of Earth that it’s been possible, and that window could be open for a long time – hopefully it is – or it could be open for a short time. We should err on the side of caution and do something now.

So never lose an opportunity of urging a practical beginning, however small, for it is wonderful how often in such matters the mustard-seed germinates and roots itself.

For Africa to move forward, you’ve really got to get rid of malaria.

I can no longer type, so I use TalkingPoint and Dragon Dictate. It’s a speech-to-text program, and there’s an add-on for talking which some guys came up with.

Unquestionably, there is progress. The average American now pays out twice as much in taxes as he formerly got in wages.

Develop an attitude of gratitude, and give thanks for everything that happens to you, knowing that every step forward is a step toward achieving something bigger and better than your current situation.

Energy innovation is not a nationalistic game.

Necessity… the mother of invention.

In the 1960s when the recording studio suddenly really took off as a tool, it was the kids from art school who knew how to use it, not the kids from music school. Music students were all stuck in the notion of music as performance, ephemeral. Whereas for art students, music as painting? They knew how to do that.

What I’m asking for is hard. It’s easier to be cynical; to accept that change isn’t possible, and politics is hopeless, and to believe that our voices and actions don’t matter. But if we give up now, then we forsake a better future.

But Apple really beats to a different drummer. I used to say that Apple should be the Sony of this business, but in reality, I think Apple should be the Apple of this business.

I think Tesla will most likely develop its own autopilot system for the car, as I think it should be camera-based, not Lidar-based. However, it is also possible that we do something jointly with Google.

Partition is bad. But whatever is past is past. We have only to look to the future.

I think that the idea of having a different approach to every single one of my albums is so exciting to me. I never want to make the same record twice. Why do it? What’s the point?

In the history of medicine, it is not always the great scientist or the learned doctor who goes forward to discover new fields, new avenues, new ideas.

After 2014, we will support a unified Afghanistan as it takes responsibility for its own future.

When Thomas Edison worked late into the night on the electric light, he had to do it by gas lamp or candle. I’m sure it made the work seem that much more urgent.

Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.

The day will come – and it is not far off – when the legacy of Lincoln will finally be fulfilled at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, when a black man or woman will sit in the Oval Office. When that day comes, the most remarkable thing about it will be how naturally it occurs.

Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future, too.

The future is called ‚perhaps‘, which is the only possible thing to call the future. And the important thing is not to allow that to scare you.

Woz is living his own life now. He hasn’t been around Apple for about five years. But what he did will go down in history.

I think we are at the dawn of a new era in commercial space exploration.

You tell me: Can you live crushed under the weight of the present? Without a memory of the past and without the desire to look ahead to the future by building something, a future, a family? Can you go on like this? This, to me, is the most urgent problem that the Church is facing.

Do the difficult things while they are easy and do the great things while they are small. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.

In the material sciences these are and have been, and are most surely likely to continue to be heroic days.

We’re working on New Glenn, which is our orbital vehicle, but we have in our mind’s eye an even bigger vehicle called New Armstrong.

We’ve gotta reinvest in space travel. We should’ve never left the moon.

The press, the machine, the railway, the telegraph are premises whose thousand-year conclusion no one has yet dared to draw.

Expecting is the greatest impediment to living. In anticipation of tomorrow, it loses today.

Tesla is becoming a real car company.

Start wide, expand further, and never look back.

Science in the modern world has many uses; its chief use, however, is to provide long words to cover the errors of the rich.

Fashion has become so whatever. I don’t think there are any stones left to unturn.

SpaceX is only 12 years old now. Between now and 2040, the company’s lifespan will have tripled. If we have linear improvement in technology, as opposed to logarithmic, then we should have a significant base on Mars, perhaps with thousands or tens of thousands of people.

For NASA, space is still a high priority.

I have won this lottery. It’s a gigantic lottery, and it’s called Amazon.com. And I’m using my lottery winnings to push us a little further into space.

In order to fulfill the aspirations of masses, we have to sharpen the tool called the government machinery: we have to make it keen, more dynamic, and it is in this direction that we are working.

If my future were determined just by my performance on a standardized test, I wouldn’t be here. I guarantee you that.

Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.