鈥淚 bought a brand-new Cadillac. I wrote them a cheque for it.鈥�
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鈥檚 largest natural gas deposit (The New York Times, 29 July)
鈥淭here is a massive difference between no risk and a very small risk. Semantics make all the difference here.鈥�
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David Wilson of the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, responds to the Swiss Federal Commission鈥檚 suggestion that antiviral drugs are so effective that HIV-positive men don鈥檛 need to wear condoms during sex with an uninfected partner (Toronto Globe and Mail, 25 July)
鈥淎 society that doesn鈥檛 allow scientists [academic freedom] has a problem.鈥�
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鈥檚 400-plant trial of cyst-resistant GM potatoes (The Guardian, London, 29 June)
鈥淚f you are going to build a mother ship, it鈥檚 only right that you should name it after your mother.鈥�
Richard Branson on the plane that will serve as the mother ship for the first commercial space flight. The plane is named 鈥淓ve鈥� after Branson鈥檚 mother (Los Angeles Times, 29 July)
鈥淲e cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand.鈥�
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.