God made the world in seven days, but on the eighth day man got cracking. He created light, warmth, the potato crisp and the dishwasher. And every single one of these things - everything that makes your life pleasant, comfortable, safe and exciting - is down to engineering.
[Isambard Kingdom] Brunel did a damn sight more for Britain than Hume, Smith or Locke. Brunel beats Darwin, too. Darwin told us where we had come from. But with his ships, tunnels and railway lines Brunel took us to where we were going.
[On the shortage of scientists] Which would you rather do? Hang around in Soho, drinking skinny lattes with Graham Norton, or emigrate to somewhere like Durham and spend your life teaching hydrogen how to speak?
[On the Hubble space telescope] Brilliant pictures. Glad it's there, but when all is said and done, it's just a big Nikon.
In two million years man managed to discover only three important things: fire, the fact that wood floats, and the horse. Then within 100 years, starting in about 1820, he came up with everything else. Railways, cars, aeroplanes, horror stories, electricity, the computer, the lawnmower, the record player, barbed wire and, of course, linoleum.
Advertisement
What about the most beautifully made creation? Is it the 1995 Honda Civic or maybe the Great Wall of China? Perhaps it's one of David Linley's wardrobes or a Brunel steamship? I've decided that the most perfectly crafted of all man's achievements, with the greatest attention to detail and quality, is, in fact, the 1965 Riva Aquarama. Oh, and it'll do 50mph. Quite a boat.
Paddington station is still as beautiful and as functional as it was when Brunel built it. Now compare that with the mobile phone you bought last September. Ugly isn't it?
In the same way that 16th century man built ships to see what was on the other side of the ocean, we must build technology to get round the problem of being too slow... We have to peel away our Gatso mindset, our obsession with avoiding risk, and build a machine that will take us up to and beyond the speed of light.