Adam Roberts Quotes

She didn’t have to believe the technology existed. She only had to believe that people believed the technology existed. People, being stupid, believed all sorts of things.

Nobody can overthrow the fascist dictator by being nicer than him. The reason for this is: by definition everybody is always already nicer than the fascist dictator.

So it ends
As it begins.
Off we climb
And no one wins.

There is always war," said Dakkar, coldly. "There will always be war, whilst empires oppress and distort human potential.

You're just doing that to pass the time," said Davide, dismissively.
"Just to pass the time," agreed Jac. "Though I suppose time will pass, in any case, regardless of what I do.

She thought of the multitude.
Trillions of human beings, wrappend like a fog about their home star. The mind collapsed at the scale and the numbers. But if ethics meant anything at all, it meant not letting the largeness of the human population overwhelm our moral knowledge that life is lived individually, and that even when agglomerated into billions and trillions individual human beings deserve better han being used as tools. That the overwhelming majority of this vast mass of humanity was poor, living precariously and subsistence lives in leaky shanty bubbles, eating ghunk and drinking recycled water—this made this more, not less, true. These were the people least able to help themselves. Thery should be helped, not exploited.

Very well. I do not wish to initiate a political discussion. I care only for loyalty."
"Loyalty," said Jhutti, "is a political word.

Do you know what this is?
"The floor, Miss?"
"Dust! I read about it—tiny particles of matter.

I avoid all political complications," said Cloche, with a severe expression. "Of whatever stripe. I only wish that political complications would similarly avoid me, and my work.

“The rest of the materials inside your submarine must have floated—must have flown around! What did you think?”
“Some people,” Lebret confessed, “suggested poltergeists.”
“Poltergeists!” Dakkar’s huge face registered astonishment. “Are you all idiots?”
“It was a chaotic time,” said Lebret, weakly.
“Poltergeists!” repeated Dakkar, disbelievingly. “I was certain it would be scientists who responded to my message! Instead they have sent down a clutch of gullible mystics and table-rappers!” He sounded genuinely disgusted.

The future cannot be won with the weapons of the past," insisted Dakkar. "To rise up like Spartacus will only lead to millions of ordinary people being crucified, and the Caesars—and Czars—retaining an even tighter grip on power. No, no, the future must be won for justice and equality with the weapons of the future.

You must register your disagreement, must you Monsieur?" he said, in a level voice. "Consider it registered. Consider it simultaneously disregarded.

Come out," Sukarno cried into the vegetation. "I have a gun!"
"Mr. Sukarno," said Iago, without looking at him. "You are, if you don't mind me saying, too fond of shouting 'I have a gun.'

Money is not our concern. Our concern is the sea. The sea is not persuaded by bankers’ drafts and stocks of bullion; the sea respects nothing but the grit and willpower of dedicated seamen.

That a human being had died did not distress her. Had it been somebody she knew it would have upset her; she wasn’t a monster. Had it been somebody she cared about. But it was nobody she knew, and it would have been disingenuous to pretend that the death of somebody she didn’t know affected her on an emotional level.