#p

["The Devil in the Dark"] impressed me because it presented the idea, unusual in science fiction then and now, that something weird, and even dangerous, need not be malevolent. That is a lesson that many of today's politicians have yet to learn. ↗

— Arthur C. Clarke

#fear #politicians #politics #science-fiction #star-trek

Now you see, Dr. Stadler, you're speaking as if this book were addressing to a thinking audience. If it were, one would have to be concerned with such matters as accuracy, validity, logic and the prestige of science. But it isn't. It's addressed to the public. ↗

— Ayn Rand

#reading #science

A scientist may not be sure of the answer, but he's often sure he can find one. And that's a condition which is clearly not enjoyed by philosophy. ↗

— B.F. Skinner

#philosophy #science #science

The only way we could remember would be by constant re-reading, for knowledge unused tends to drop out of mind. Knowledge used does not need to be remembered; practice forms habits and habits make memory unnecessary. The rule is nothing; the application is everything. ↗

— Henry Hazlitt

#knowing #memory #practice #science

Is this how humanity waves good-bye? Hell no. ↗

— Rick Yancey

#apocalypse #cassie #fiction #horror #humanity

By looking far out into space we are also looking far back into time, back toward the horizon of the universe, back toward the epoch of the Big Bang. ↗

— Carl Sagan

#big-bang #science #space #time #science

Both the old and new physics were dealing with shadow-symbols, but the new physics was forced to be aware of that fact - forced to be aware that it was dealing with shadows and illusions, not reality. ↗

— Ken Wilber

#science #science

There's no real objection to escapism, in the right places... We all want to escape occasionally. But science fiction is often very far from escapism, in fact you might say that science fiction is escape into reality... It's a fiction which does concern itself with real issues: the origin of man; our future. In fact I can't think of any form of literature which is more concerned with real issues, reality. ↗

— Arthur C. Clarke

#future-prediction #reality #science-fiction #science

So one must be resigned to being a clock that measures the passage of time, now out of order, now repaired, and whose mechanism generates despair and love as soon as its maker sets it going? Are we to grow used to the idea that every man relives ancient torments, which are all the more profound because they grow comic with repetition? That human existence should repeat itself, well and good, but that it should repeat itself like a hackneyed tune, or a record a drunkard keeps playing as he feeds coins into the jukebox... ↗

— Stanisław Lem

#cycles #despair #emotion #fear #free-will

The Emperor, you see, protects... He protects mankind, through the Legions, through the Martial corps, through the war machines of the Mechanicum. He understands the dangers. The inconsistencies. He uses you, and all the instruments like you, to protect us from harm. To protect our physical bodies from murder and damage, to protect our minds from madness, to protect our souls... There are insane dangers in the cosmos, dangers that mankind is fundamentally unable to comprehend, let alone survive. So he protects us. There are truths out there that would drive us mad by one fleeting glimpse of them. So he chooses not to share them with us. That's why he made you... Remember, Garviel. The Emperor is our truth and out light. If we trust in him, he will protect. ↗

— Dan Abnett

#god #inspirational #irony #science-fiction #faith