23 quotes
Human knowledge is never entirely consistent or complete, because the human brain is only a crude and transient mass of watery cells, error-prone and glacier-slow.
The Humanoid Universe (1980)
Human belief is seldom related to truth.
The Humanoid Universe (1980)
SF still appeals to the young, as always, because so much of it is set in the futures in which they will be living.
Will Academe Kill SF? (1978)
Accelerating change has become almost the first fact of life.
Will Academe Kill SF? (1978)
Conquerors live by conquest; the first failure is a signal for the conquered to rise against them.
Star Bridge (1955)
“Magic.” He shot photos and shook his head. “Pure magic, till we learn enough to understand it.”
The Stonehenge Gate (2005)
And introvert is one of the harmless scientific terms he used to use when he was really writing about witches.
Darker Than You Think (1948)
The vampire legend, he might conclude, has served conveniently for many thousand years as a conventional folk expression of unconscious feelings of aggression and guilt.
Darker Than You Think (1948)
He was a strong man in wise enough to realize that beyond power itself is the power of using it wisely.
Star Bridge (1955)
He certainly didn’t feel insane, he reflected—but then did any lunatic, ever?
Darker Than You Think (1948)
Science fiction, as I like to define it, is fiction based on the imagined exploration of scientific possibility. The distinction from fantasy—or from other sorts of fantasy—lies in the word possibility.
Will Academe Kill SF? (1978)
Quietly she said: “I know I’m not insane.”
So, Barbee understood, did all lunatics.
Darker Than You Think (1948)
Two weeks passed, by the time of the ship—physiological time, that measured by heartbeats and all bodily rhythms, in which the span of life moved relentlessly toward its end, regardless of motion backward or forward along the time dimension.
The Legion of Time (1938)
Power is habit-forming. We grew addicted to it. Few things survive the centuries’ slow decay: senses grow dull; passions grow weak; and ideals die. Only the taste for power lives on as an excuse for survival.
Star Bridge (1955)
You have a right to be curious. And I have a right to refuse to satisfy it. You may credit it to your own charm or an old man’s whim, if you like. You are interesting, you know. Hired killers always are. Not admirable, but interesting.
Star Bridge (1955)
Creation.…
It is its own nemesis. Success is temporary, and idolization will not make the ephemeral permanent. Decay is implicit in the birth of any organism.
An empire is an organism.
Star Bridge (1955)
The criticism of SF has tapped rich new vines for researchers, and I can think of writers who seem to be trying harder to impress the critics than to please their readers. I’m afraid the critical tail has begun to wag the creative dog.
Will Academe Kill SF? (1978)
Horn cut the thought off. That was a metaphysical blind alley. He had to assume the reality of things outside himself; this existence was self-centered enough, and he had no desire to return to the universe-creator illusion.
Star Bridge (1955)
“Whatever a woman is,” Wendre said, “she’s that second and a woman first.”
Star Bridge (1955)
The mystery of it gets me. The builders of the trilithons and the road were high-tech wizards, but their skills didn’t save them. I’ve been wondering how they died. Maybe they got too good at the science of war.
The Stonehenge Gate (2005)