197 answers answered between 1974 and 2026 one of 25 in The Q&A
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
A verbatim standing question in The Guardian's rotating Q&A questionnaire, documented across respondents and years.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Public figures who have answered a question like this elsewhere. Quoted from the source shown, not written for FLAPSS.
I would like to add something that’s not essential to the science, but something I kind of believe, which is that you should not fool the layman when you’re talking as a scientist.
Their frankness and honesty.
Selfishness—people who don’t care about others or their feelings and will do or say anything as long as they get what they want.
People who speak with heavy American accents. I can barely understand them. No, seriously, dishonesty.
Generally speaking, envy, resentment, revenge, and self-pity are disastrous modes of thought. Self-pity gets pretty close to paranoia and paranoia is one of the very hardest things to reverse. You do not want to drift into self-pity.
Greed and stupidity.
Unnecessary judgment.
Judgmental without investigation.
Picking their nose and eating it.
Lack of understanding and tolerance.
People who judge other people's actions on their own thought process.
Rudeness and racism.
Indecision and wishy-washiness.
Freeloaders with a sense of entitlement.
To be dishonest. Sometimes people have to be dishonest in order not to hurt, but if someone is basically dishonest, that is a different matter.
Actually, I dislike dealing with schedules and logistics—mine and others’.
Talking too much.
Vindictiveness and spite.
Serially telling endless boring jokes and sexism and racism and homophobia (they often go together).
Selfishness and no respect for the others.
Nobody has answered this one yet.