Joshua Lederberg Quotes & Sayings

If we have isolated individuals able to inflict enormous harm, imagine what a single lunatic can do with a nuclear weapon. I think the whole base of civil society is at risk. — Joshua Lederberg

If it takes you 20 or 25 years to establish yourself in one field, you really ought to be careful not to stray too far. — Joshua Lederberg

As soon as you go into any biological process in any real detail, you discover it's open-ended in terms of what needs to be found out about it. — Joshua Lederberg

If you want to solve very complex problems, you will have to end up letting machines work out a lot of the details for themselves, and in ways that we don't understand what they are doing. — Joshua Lederberg

I'm chairing a UNESCO committee on how to improve global Internet communications for science; help third-world people get onto the Net so they can be part of the process. — Joshua Lederberg

The single biggest threat to man's continued dominance on the planet is the virus. — Joshua Lederberg

The central moral issue of science is that we do not have a science of peace and hardly know where to begin in building one. — Joshua Lederberg

If lifespan jumps by 30 or 40 years, that has enormous implications. — Joshua Lederberg

I started on the use of the Internet for scientific communication. Our research group was one of the very first to make really systematic use of it as a way of managing research projects. — Joshua Lederberg

I'm not easily inhibited by the fact that I don't know something about a subject. It doesn't stop me from dabbling in it. — Joshua Lederberg

I hope I've lived a life of science whose style will encourage younger people. — Joshua Lederberg

I'd like to put in a vote for the intrinsic fascination of science. — Joshua Lederberg

I was a bad practicing physician because I was never sure of the diagnosis or of the treatment. — Joshua Lederberg

I wish I had a talent for dropping things as well as taking on new ones. It gets to be quite a clutter after a while. — Joshua Lederberg

So many of the things I've predicted were technologies that were just sitting right in front of us. — Joshua Lederberg

I believe I am a person with unusual talents. I think I'd be a liar or stupid if I were to deny that. — Joshua Lederberg

My ambitions were already very clearly fixed by the time I was 6 or 7. — Joshua Lederberg

By the time I was 12 or 13, I was studying biochemistry textbooks. — Joshua Lederberg

If you wanted to dissect the structure of living cells, genetic analysis was an extremely powerful method, so my interest turned to that. — Joshua Lederberg

I think we have to believe we are here for some purpose, and I know there are many cynics who will deny it, but they don't live as if they deny it. — Joshua Lederberg

I did get a very fine education, and not just in science. It took some pressure on the part of my elders to convince me that I really should take an interest in humanities. — Joshua Lederberg

I certainly saw science as a kind of calling, and one with as much legitimacy as a religious calling. — Joshua Lederberg

To have the recognition of your colleagues is great. The public attention is a mixed blessing. — Joshua Lederberg

I have many shortcomings. I feel very lucky to have been able to have what I've had. — Joshua Lederberg

Being successful at a very young age gave me the confidence and the capability to try out other things. — Joshua Lederberg

Try hard to find out what you're good at and what your passions are, and where the two converge, and build your life around that. — Joshua Lederberg

I got my Nobel Prize for my lab work. — Joshua Lederberg

I don't believe anybody can really grasp everything that's even in one textbook. — Joshua Lederberg

I was making a lot of momentous personal decisions. I was still very very young: when the prize was awarded, I was 33; the work I had done when I was 21. — Joshua Lederberg

I was reading five or six years ahead of my grade during public school. I was pretty bored. I made a contract with some of my teachers that if I didn't ask too many questions, I could work in the back of the room. — Joshua Lederberg

A Swedish newspaper reporter called and said, You've been awarded the Prize. I was quite sure it was a practical joke. — Joshua Lederberg

All of civility depends on being able to contain the rage of individuals. — Joshua Lederberg

I get curious about new things. My real strength is going into a field that has not been investigated before, and finding new approaches to it. — Joshua Lederberg

We are all very individual. You have to find out what you can do best, and be self-conscious about that. — Joshua Lederberg

When I was in high school, I became interested in cytochemistry: chemical analysis under the microscope, and trying to understand the composition of cells. — Joshua Lederberg

Although I am a public figure, I'm still a little shy. I don't think my own personality is important. I prefer to keep some small dosage of privacy. — Joshua Lederberg

Everybody has to learn for the first time. — Joshua Lederberg