In the first session, Alan Guth discusses reasons why the inflationary universe has been so influential; history of the development of the inflationary universe model; high school interest in science and preference for oscillating universe model; early career in particle physics; change in career to cosmology; influence of Steven Weinberg; question of legitimacy of work on early universe; mental pictures of the beginning of the universe; first introduction to the flatness problem; visualization of cosmological models; what types of questions can be asked in science; quantum effects in the creation of the universe; different views of quantum mechanics; meaning of time in the early universe; anthropic principle; multitude of universes; questions of purposeful versus accidental nature of our universe. In the second session, he discusses his parental background; education at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); summer work at Bell Labs; history leading up to the discovery of the inflationary universe model; introduction to the flatness problems and horizon problems; initial conditions in physics; question of legitimacy of flatness and horizon problems; attitude toward de Lapparent, Geller, and Huchra's work on large-scale inhomogeneities; the question of whether the universe is homogeneous on the large scale; outstanding problems in cosmology: galaxy formation, measurements of anisotropy in cosmic background radiation, dark matter; ideal design of the universe.