I like to cross the divide between the personal world and the scientific world.

If you love somebody, you love them. My parents had a 25-year age gap between them and my mum was the breadwinner, my dad the house husband. I'm a strong believer that a good relationship can work, whatever the situation.

Study until twenty-five, investigation until forty, profession until sixty, at which age I would have him retired on a double allowance.

The chief role of the universities is to prolong adolescence into middle age, at which point early retirement ensures that we lack the means or the will to enforce significant change.