AI without validation is too unreliable to be of use in any serious application.
What are bad recommendations you hear in your profession or area of expertise?
Question
What advice would you give your twenty-year-old self, and what should they ignore?
Time & hindsight
Question
What is your greatest fear?
Identity & self
Question
What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Identity & self
Question
How would you like to die?
Death & what remains
Question
Aside from a property, what is the most expensive thing you have bought?
Money & investment
Question
What did you want to be when you were growing up?
Identity & self
I would come home and ask my mother, my father, my grandparents, my great-grandparents, 'Why?'. And they would say, 'That's the way it is. Don't get in the way, don't get in trouble!'
Emory University Quadrangle, Atlanta, Speakola (speech transcript archive), 12 May 2014 source ↗
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Terence Tao
Mathematician; Fields Medallist, 2006
Recorded
Quanta Magazine reporter, Reported interview, Quanta Magazine, 13 April 2026
source ↗
Michael Phelps
United States swimmer, 2000–2016
I think it's something that nobody's really talked about in the past because we're supposed to be this big, macho, strong person that has no weaknesses. You know, we're supposed to be perfect.
Magnus Carlsen
Norwegian chess grandmaster; World Chess Champion 2013–2023
Not very well. I try to win the next one. I've always been told that you should win and lose with a smile, but since I became a professional, I've thought the best way of learning to deal with defeat is not to lose.
Recorded
On-stage interview, Milken Institute Global Conference, Los Angeles, Chess.com, 5 May 2017
source ↗
Daniel Ek
Co-founder and former chief executive of Spotify
Many people talk about a willingness to have failures. I hate failures. I don't think you should strike to make failures. I think it's OK to make mistakes – but by the time they become real failures, you probably should have discovered them much earlier.
More from John Lewis
View profile →You must find a way to get in the way, you must find a way to get into trouble — good trouble, necessary trouble.
Recorded
Emory University Quadrangle, Atlanta, Emory News Center, Emory University, 12 May 2014
source ↗
As a participant in the movement, as I was sitting in, I came to that point where I lost all sense of fear.
When I was growing up on a farm in rural Alabama, I fell in love with raising chickens. They seem truly innocent. Whenever I'm around chickens, I feel happy.
I don't want to die. I don't think I'm going to die…but we all have to die. Since I do, I hope I live on in the hearts and minds of people.
Buying art…. But it makes me happy!
When I was growing up I wanted to be a minister. I wanted to preach.
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