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Let’s say they get speech, and they got theory of mind, so they get religion pretty soon, too—an emergent side effect of ascribing intentionality to aspects of their environment. Animism, polytheism, whatever. They probably discover ritual magic pretty fast because their brains are predisposed to modeling complex entities. Abstract thinking.

— Charles Stross The Nightmare Stacks (2016)

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More quotes by Charles Stross

Human consciousness isn’t optimized for anything, except maybe helping feral hominids survive in the wild.

Rule 34 (2011)

No plan of battle survives contact with the enemy, and time is the ultimate opponent.

Rule 34 (2011)

Never trust a man who thinks his religion gives him all the answers.

Halting State (2007)

In my experience, the best way to deal with such people is to politely agree with everything they say, then ignore them.

Glasshouse (2006)

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a sane employee in possession of his wits must be in want of a good manager.

The Fuller Memorandum (2010)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Charles Stross (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.