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“Machines!” Wyeth snorted. “Machines are the easiest things in the universe to outwit because they’re predictable—that’s their function, to be predictable, to do exactly what they’re designed for, time after time.

— Michael Swanwick Vacuum Flowers (1987)

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Space

More quotes by Michael Swanwick

What the common man calls Evil, he once told me, is nothing more than the fear of one’s own potential.

Jack Faust (1997)

Everyone dies—the rearrangement of when is a matter of only statistical interest.

Stations of the Tide (1991)

Indeed, what is magic but impossible science?

Stations of the Tide (1991)

Money can always be traced. It leaves a trail of slime behind it wherever it goes.

Stations of the Tide (1991)

This is the price you must pay for knowledge: You must understand and acknowledge its consequences.

Jack Faust (1997)

All Michael Swanwick quotes →

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Since, in the long run, every planetary society will be endangered by impacts from space, every surviving civilization is obliged to become spacefaring — not because of exploratory or romantic zeal, but for the most practical reason imaginable: staying alive.

Carl Sagan Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (1994)

The stars awaken a certain reverence, because though always present, they are inaccessible; but all natural objects make a kindred impression, when the mind is open to their influence. Nature never wears a mean appearance.

Ralph Waldo Emerson Nature (1836)

Her blue eyes sought the west afar,
For lovers love the western star.

Walter Scott The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)

Einstein's space is no closer to reality than Van Gogh's sky.

Arthur Koestler The Act of Creation (1964)

Attribution

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