Unfortunately, the way things were organized, I was forced to decide between them. In a way, the choice was made for me because the science teaching was so uncreative and discouraging. In biology, there was a teacher who talked about how when you cried, the tears got rid of toxins, so it was good for you to cry. I said, “What about the other way — is it good to laugh?” And the teacher said, “Please, be serious.”

Years later, it turns out that some scientists think it’s healthy to laugh. But a question like that, whether it turns out to be true or not, is a good thing to hear from a kid. You want to hear curiosity.

How did you become so passionate about science?

Through reading. When I was in my early 20s, I started reading every article of every issue of Scientific American. At the time, I’d been reading a lot about the paranormal and telepathy, and I thought Scientific American would help me know if any of that was true. There, I discovered a whole other way to think, based on evidence. And so I left my interest in spiritualism behind, in favor of critical thinking.

After that, I began to read books about science avidly. Even today, it’s what I mostly read.

You must have been thrilled when the magazine asked you to host its television series “Scientific American Frontiers.”

Oh, I think they asked a lot of people. I used to joke that a letter came addressed to “Occupant.”

I said I’d only be interested if they’d let me do the interviews. I saw it as a chance to learn about their work from scientists themselves. They took a chance on me because they didn’t know how it would turn out with someone who wasn’t a trained science journalist.