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Q: WHAT IS SOMETHING COMING UP THAT MIGHT CHANGE OUR LIVES THE WAY THE INTERNET HAS? Our whole understanding of genetics and how the body functions. We’ve learned very, very quickly that
just having the genetic sequence of our human DNA is insufficient to understand our bodies. So, the understanding of our human organism from the dynamic, epigenetic point of view is a very
important part of the future. Q: YOUR TITLE AT GOOGLE IS “CHIEF INTERNET EVANGELIST.” PREACH A LITTLE ABOUT THE WORK GOING ON THERE. We’ve worked very hard on something called Google
Assistant and Google Now, where we take information you’ve given us, like your calendar, for example, and we provide you with advice. If we know where you are, and we know you are supposed
to be at a certain place at a certain time, we can pop up a little window that says, “It’ll take you 45 minutes to get to that destination, so you might want to leave now.” The ability to
interact with a computer presence like you would a human assistant is becoming increasingly feasible. Q: WHAT KIND OF CACHET COMES WITH BEING A FATHER OF THE INTERNET? In all honesty,
my family has paid a price for the 40 years that I’ve been associated with the internet and its evolution because I’ve been distracted, and I’ve traveled a lot — 80 percent of my time.
Fortunately, my family hasn’t disowned me, and they are users of the internet. My wife spends an enormous amount of her time online, finding things like where are we going on vacation, or,
“How about renting the Duke of Northumberland’s house for our 50th wedding anniversary in London?” Which she did, and which we celebrated on September 10th. Q: YOU ARE 73, AND DON’T SEEM TO
BE THINKING ABOUT RETIREMENT MUCH. I’ve asked people who have had very successful careers, and they tell me, "don’t retire, keep working in some fashion or other." For me,
personally, the interaction with young people makes a huge difference. On top of that, of course, there’s always new science, and for me, new science has always been the ultimate attractor.
That keeps me very much alive and curious.