“If we ever established contact with intelligent life on another world,...” — Martin Rees Quote

“If we ever established contact with intelligent life on another world, there would be barriers to communication. First, they would be many light years away, so signals would take many years to reach them: there would be no scope for quick repartee. There might be an IQ gap.”

“Nuclear weapons give an attacking nation a devastating advantage over any feasible defense. New sciences will soon empower small groups, even individuals, with similar leverage over society.”

“There's now, for the first time, a huge gulf between the artefacts of our everyday life and what even a single expert, let alone the average child, can comprehend. The gadgets that now pervade young people's lives, iPhones and suchlike, are baffling 'black boxes' - pure magic to most people.”

“Manned spaceflight has lost its glamour - understandably so, because it hardly seems inspiring, 40 years after Apollo, for astronauts merely to circle the Earth in the space shuttle and the International Space Station.”

“From the growth of the Internet through to the mapping of the human genome and our understanding of the human brain, the more we understand, the more there seems to be for us to explore.”

“Emotions are one of the main things that derail communication. Once people get upset at one another, rational thinking goes out of the window.”

“There is a world of communication which is not dependent on words.”

“When I deal with my son, my wife and I definitely take the time to make sure that he feels comfortable in every situation. The communication needs to be there. I think my wife has done a great job at really getting good at being able to communicate with our children.”

“Every player in every team speaks to each other in order to improve the quality on the pitch - that communication is necessary.”

“One thing I've learned to appreciate as I've gotten a little older is direct forms of communication.”

“It's easy to look at kids sitting around a campfire looking at their phones and to think, 'What a shame.' But I think they're going to be more advanced in terms of communication than my generation.”