185 Quotes by Nathan Myhrvold

Among modern occupations, only cult leaders and TV weathermen rival the technological visionary’s ability to retain credibility despite all evidence to the contrary.

Don’t let the secret recipe die with the inventor.

The idea behind a dish – the delight and the surprise – makes a difference. Great literature surprises and delights, and provokes us. It isn’t just ‘Here’s the facts – boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl.’ It’s how you tell it.

One of the problems with posing a ‘bold new plan’ is that you can’t just extrapolate from previous plans.

With cult foods, there is an underlying assumption that the best cooking ideas came generations ago. Yet culinary innovation is nothing to be ashamed of. When a chef tells me he is cooking with his grandmother’s recipe, I always wonder why. Did talent skip the past two generations?

Business is war! Its leaders are strategic commanders, who boldly snatch victory from the jaws of defeat – and who perform other acts of derring-do. This kind of talk sounds great in the boardroom, and, for that matter, in the bookstore, where dozens of authors counsel would-be corporate warriors.

Most estimates of the mortality risk posed by asteroid impacts put it at about the same risk as flying in a commercial airliner. However, you have to remember that this is like the entire human race riding the plane – it is one of the few risks that really could wipe us all out.

If you had a really good – battery, it wouldn’t matter that the sun goes down at night and the wind stops blowing sometimes. But at the moment, battery technology is nowhere near good enough to use at utility scale.

The best value for money in cooking equipment, in my mind, is first a digital scale and digital thermometer. They’re both about $20. They help you cook so much more accurately that they’re both enormously valuable.