"We need to start training ourselves to think longer term. Long-term thinking is a giant lever. You can literally solve problems if you think long-term, that are impossible to solve if you think short-term. And we aren’t really good at thinking long-term. Five years is a tough timeframe for most institutions to think past. And we probably need to stretch that to 10 years and 15 years and 20 years and 25 years, and we’d do a better job for our children or our grandchildren if we could stretch those thinking horizons. And so the clock, in a way, it’s an art project, it’s a symbol. And if it ever has any power to influence people to think longer term, that won’t happen for hundreds of years, but we are going to build it now and let it accrue the patina of age."

"I’m here and I could say, “Lex, how tall do you think this ceiling is?” And you’d be like, “I don’t know, Jeff, maybe 12 feet tall.” And I would say, “I think it’s 11 feet tall.” And then we’d say, “You know what? Let’s just call it 11 and a half feet.” That’s compromise, instead of. The right thing to do is to get a tape measure or figure out some way of actually measuring, but think getting that tape measure and figure out how to get it to the top of the ceiling and all these things, that requires energy. Compromise, the advantage of compromise as a resolution mechanism is that it’s low energy, but it doesn’t lead to truth. And so in things like the height of the ceiling where truth is a noble thing, you shouldn’t allow compromise to be used when you can know the truth."

"I think with the geopolitical implications and how much resource was put into it. At the peak, that program was spending 2% or 3% of GDP on the Apollo program. So, much resource. I think it was pulled forward in time. We kind of did it ahead of when we, quote, unquote, should have done it. And so, in that way, it’s also a technical marvel. I mean it’s truly incredible. It’s the 20th century version of building the pyramids or something. It’s an achievement that because it was pulled forward in time and because it did something that had previously been thought impossible, it rightly deserves its place in the pantheon of great human achievements."