Nathan Myhrvold Quotes

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Nathan Myhrvold

Profession : Businessman

Birth : August 3, 1959

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

Nathan Myhrvold

I was good at math and science, and I got lots of degrees in lots of things, but in a parallel universe, I probably became a chef.

Nathan Myhrvold

We have the only cookbook in the world that has partial differential equations in it.

Nathan Myhrvold

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.

Nathan Myhrvold

I never was a popular kid in class.

Nathan Myhrvold

If I want popularity, I go to a chef's convention.

Nathan Myhrvold

If people don't find what you are doing threatening, then it is probably not very important.

Nathan Myhrvold

We should have more invention.

Nathan Myhrvold

If people don't get paid for their inventions, that's not a good thing. In the case of many patents, there are people who aren't in a position to take them to the next level. If you don't enforce your rights, no one is going to enforce them for you.

Nathan Myhrvold

Microsoft, Apple, Facebook all bought huge patent portfolios to further their strategic game. They're doing what I'm doing!

Nathan Myhrvold

Our reactor actually burns nuclear waste as fuel. So not only is it safe and powerful, it solves an important issue: It actually reduces nuclear waste instead of creating. It's the reactor of your dreams.

Nathan Myhrvold

Some article called me the most feared man in Silicon Valley. Good Lord! Why? My teenage boys got a kick out of it: 'Dad, how could this be true? You're not even the most feared person in this house.'

Nathan Myhrvold

I've never filed a patent lawsuit. I hope never to file a patent lawsuit. That may be unrealistic, but it would be great if I could avoid doing it... Lawsuits are a ridiculous way to do business.

Nathan Myhrvold

No CEO ever says, 'Damnit, we need to increase research!' I want to encourage them to do that.

Nathan Myhrvold

I've been on a team that won the world championship of barbecue. But barbecue's interesting, because it's one of these cult foods like chili, or bouillabaisse. Various parts of the world will have a cult food that people get enormously attached to - there's tremendous traditions; there's secrecy.

Nathan Myhrvold

Another random thing I do is the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, or SETI. And you may be familiar with the movie 'Contact,' which sort of popularized that. It turns out there are real people who go out and search for extraterrestrials in a very scientific way.

Nathan Myhrvold

Now, to find dinosaurs, you hike around in horrible conditions looking for a dinosaur. It sounds really dumb, but that's what it is. It's horrible conditions, because wherever you have nice weather, plants grow, and you don't get any erosion, and you don't see any dinosaurs.

Nathan Myhrvold

When we first did 'Modernist Cuisine,' I think most people in cookbook publishing would have said, 'This is insane.'

Nathan Myhrvold

If you have a block of ballistics gelatin and a high-speed camera, pretty soon somebody gets a gun!

Nathan Myhrvold

Words can hurt you. In the larger world, it frames how people think about you, and it can hurt you in lots of little, subtle ways.

Nathan Myhrvold