David Brin Quotes

But there is one more reason to protect other species. One seldom if ever mentioned. Perhaps we are the first to talk and think and build and aspire, but we may not be the last. Others may follow us in this adventure. Some day we may be judged by just how well we served, when alone we were Earth’s caretakers.

The propensity of Earthlings to get into trouble, and to learn thereby, was the reason my owners agreed to this mad venture – although no one expected such a chain of unusual calamities as befell this ship. Your talents were underrated.

There isn’t one America anymore. If there ever had been.

Science gives man what he needs. But magic gives him what he wants.

None of these problems resolved by the prescriptions of shamans and priests. Not by patronizing mystics or condescending monks.
Technology. That’s what made things better! In fits and starts—and often horribly abused along the way—that’s where we found answers that were consistent, dependable, uncapricious. Answers that applied to lord and vassal alike. Answers that improved life across the board and never went away.

It's how creativity works. Especially in humans. For every good idea, ten thousand idiotic ones must first be posed, sifted, tried out, and discarded. A mind that's afraid to toy with the ridiculous will never come up with the brilliantly original.

She had called in the debt that parents owe a child for bringing her, unasked, into a strange world.

The Tandu were daring, but they did not add to their crimes the gaucherie of originality.

Like California . . . contemporary New Zealand had gradually transformed its longstanding tradition of tolerance into a positive fetish for eccentricity.

Only a knowledgeable, empowered and vocal citizenry can perform well in democracy.

Loneliness, her arch enemy, never seemed content.

The best means to an end are not always those that appear most direct.

They say survival is Nature’s only form of flattery.

nous pouvons nous doter de garanties constitutionnelles, établir une stricte répartition des pouvoirs, mais de telles mesures ne prennent un sens que lorsque les citoyens assurent que ces garde-fous soient respectés. Or, ceux qui ont soif de puissance et d’argent sont sans cesse à l’affût d’un moyen de violer les lois ou de les tourner à leur avantage.

Where subtlety fails us we must simply make do with cream pies.