Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun.

Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea.

This planet has-or rather had-a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

And so the problem remained; lots of the people were mean, and most of them were miserable, even the ones with digital watches.

Many were increasingly of the opinion that they'd all made a big mistake in coming down from the trees in the first place. And some said that even the trees had been a bad move, and that no one should ever have left the oceans.

And then, one Thursday, nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change, a girl sitting on her own in a small cafe in Rickmansworth suddenly realized what it was that had been going wrong all this time, and she finally knew how the world could be made a good and happy place. This time it was right, it would work, and no one would have to get nailed to anything.

Sadly, however, before she could get to a phone to tell anyone about it, a terrible, stupid catastrophe occurred, and the idea was lost forever.

This is not her story.

Reporter: After all that you've just gone through, I have to ask you the same question a lot of people back home are asking about space these days. Is it worth it? Should we just pull back, forget the whole thing as a bad idea, and take care of our own problems, at home?

Sinclair: No. We have to stay here, and there's a simple reason why. Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics - and you'll get ten different answers. But there's one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on: whether it happens in a hundred years, or a thousand years, or a million years, eventually our sun will grow cold, and go out. When that happens, it won't just take us, it'll take Marilyn Monroe, and Lao-tsu, Einstein, Maruputo, Buddy Holly, Aristophanes - all of this. All of this was for nothing, unless we go to the stars.

Lister: Cat?

Cat: Mmm?

Lister: Ya ever see the Flintstones?

Cat: Sure!

Lister: D'ya think Wilma's sexy?

Cat: Wilma Flintstone?

Lister: Maybe we've been alone in deep space too long, but every time I see that body, it drives me crazy. Is it me?

Cat: Well, I think in all probability, Wilma Flintstone is the most desirable woman that ever lived.

Lister: That's good. I thought I was going strange.

Cat: She's incredible!

Lister: What d'ya think of Betty?

Cat: Betty Rubble? Well, I would go with Betty... but I'd be thinking of Wilma.

Lister: This is crazy. Why are we talking about going to bed with Wilma Flintstone?

Cat: You're right. We're nuts. This is an insane conversation.

Lister: She'll never leave Fred, and we know it.

Erin: The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse just showed up and they don't know where to park.

Student: What is Truth—what is God?

G’Kar: If I take a lamp and shine it toward the wall, a bright spot will appear on the wall. The lamp is our search for truth, for understanding. Too often, we assume that the light on the wall is God, but the light is not the goal of the search, it is the result of the search. The more intense the search, the brighter the light on the wall. The brighter the light on the wall, the greater the sense of revelation upon seeing it. Similarly, someone who does not search, who does not bring a lantern with him, sees nothing.

What we perceive as God is the by-product of our search for God. It may simply be an appreciation for the light, pure and unblemished. Not understanding that it comes from us. Sometimes we stand in front of the light and assume that we are the center of the universe. God looks astonishingly like we do. Or we turn to look at our shadow and assume that all is darkness. If we allow ourselves to get in the way, we defeat the purpose, which is to use the light of our search to illuminate the wall in all its beauty and in all its flaws. And in so doing to better understand the world around us.

Student (confused): Ah, yes, but what is Truth and what is God?

G’Kar: [sigh] Truth is a...river.

Student: And what is God?

G’Kar: God is...the mouth of the river.

Students (in general): AHHH...(very pleased with the final answer)

Kurdy: All right ... Smith. What were the two words "God" said to you that first day?

Mister Smith: Fractal Theory.

Kurdy: What the hell is Fractal Theory?

Mister Smith: How the hell am I supposed to know? I'm just God's sock puppet okay? He shoves his hand up my ass and words come out the other end. Who knew math was involved.

Homo sapiens. What an inventive, invincible species. It's only been a few million years since they crawled up out of the mud and learned to walk. Puny, defenseless bipeds. They've survived flood, famine and plague. They've survived cosmic wars and holocausts. And now, here they are, out among the stars, waiting to begin a new life. Ready to outsit eternity. They're indomitable... indomitable.

You will need to know the difference between Friday and a fried egg. It's quite a simple difference, but an important one. Friday comes at the end of the week, whereas a fried egg comes out of a hen. Like most things, of course, it isn't quite that simple. The fried egg isn't properly a fried egg till it's been put in a frying pan and fried. This is something you wouldn't do to a Friday, of course, but you might do it on a Friday. You can also fry eggs on a Thursday, if you like, or on a cooker. It's all rather complicated, but it makes a kind of sense if you think about it for a while.

Adam: Sugar?

The Doctor: Ah. A decision. Would it make any difference?

Adam: It would make your tea sweet.

The Doctor: Yes, but beyond the confines of my taste buds, would it make any difference?

Adam: Not really.

The Doctor: But -

Adam: Yeah?

The Doctor: What if I could control people's taste buds? What if I decided that no one would take sugar? That'd make a difference, to those who sell the sugar, and those who cut the cane.

Adam: My father, he was a cane cutter!

The Doctor: Exactly. Now if no one had used sugar, your father wouldn't have been a cane cutter.

Adam: If this sugar thing had never started, my great-grandfather wouldn't have been kidnapped, chained up and sold in Kingston in the first place! I'd be a African!

The Doctor: See? Every great decision creates ripples - like a huge boulder dropped in a lake. The ripples merge, rebound off the banks in unforseeable ways. The heavier the decision, the larger the waves, the more uncertain the consequences.

Adam: Life's like that. Best thing is just to get on with it.

You can observe a lot just by watching.

In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.

He hits from both sides of the plate. He's amphibious.

Life... is like a grapefruit. It's orange and squishy, and has a few pips in it, and some folks have half a one for breakfast.

The knack of flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.

I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.

The generation that would change the world is still looking for its car keys.

If you create Frankenstein, you can't be real surprised if he eats the village.

I have a plan, even though it might not make sense some time, and I don't say it.

sailing on the seven seize the day tripper diem's ready
jack the ripper owens wilson phillips and my supper's ready
lucy in the sky with diamond dave's not here I come to save the
day for nightmare cinema show me the way to get back home
again

It's like when you're a kid. The first time they tell you that the world's turning and you just can't quite believe it 'cause everything looks like it's standing still. I can feel it. The turn of the Earth. The ground beneath our feet is spinnin' at a thousand miles an hour. And the entire planet is hurtling around the sun at sixty seven thousand miles an hour. We're falling through space, you and me. Clinging to the skin of this tiny little world and if we let go...

I object to all this sex on television. I mean, I keep falling off.

It's not pining, it's passed on. This parrot is no more. It has ceased to be. It's expired and gone to meet its maker. This is a late parrot. It's a stiff. Bereft of life, it rests in peace. If you hadn't nailed it to the perch, it would be pushing up the daisies. It's rung down the curtain and joined the choir invisible. This is an ex-parrot.

Second Old Woman: Penguins don't come from next door, they come from the Antarctic.
First Old Woman: BURMA!
Second Old Woman: Why did you say Burma?
First Old Women: I panicked. Full sketch here.

Break, damn you! Break! You've never had a spanner like this thrown at you! Chew on me until your teeth crack. Grind me up until your gears lock. I am the nail in your tyre, the potato jammed in your exhaust pipe, the treacle poured in your petrol tank. I am the banana peel beneath your foot, the joker who ruins your straight flush, the coin that always comes up heads and the gun that you didn't know was loaded - I am the Doctor!

Willow: Chemistry is fun; it's a lot like witchcraft, only less newt.

More to come...