Dennis E. Taylor Quotes

Interestingly, two hundred years later and twenty light years away, people still behaved the same in elevators as they did in Original Bob’s day. Everyone turned to face the doors, and ignored each other.

About half of the global population was currently living in New Zealand, Madagascar, and, strangely, Florianópolis, Brazil.

How are you supposed to feel if you are forced to do what you would have done anyway?

All actions have risks. Most inactions even more so.

I also catalogued many larger mammal analogues that had four limbs.

I believe that it is only possible to acquire true morality without input from a deity. It is only when you do something because you believe it is the right thing to do, instead of because of any moral desserts, that you are acting morally. Likewise, it is only when you refuse to do something because of the Golden Rule, rather than because of a threat of punishment, that you are behaving in a moral manner.

In 2036, the USA elected an over-the-top, unapologetic fundamentalist president named Andrew Handel. Yes, that Handel. During his term, he tried to ban election of non-Christians to any public post, and tried to remove the constitutional separation between church and state. He was nominated, supported, and elected based on his religious views, rather than on his political or fiscal expertise. And of course, he appointed persons of similar persuasion to every post he could manage, in some cases blatantly ignoring laws and procedures. He and his cronies rammed through far-right policies with no thought for consequences. In a number of cases, when challenged on the results, he declared that God would not allow their just cause to fail. He eventually brought the USA to its knees in an economic collapse that made the 2008 recession look like a picnic in the park.

It's a strategy of mine that I like to call, 'As a matter of fact, you give me your wallet.

Well, the fecal matter seems to have struck the atmospheric propulsor.

People’s capacity for turning dogmatic stupidity into political movements never ceased to amaze me.

Some problems simply do not yield to reductionist techniques, particularly those that are dependent on emergent phenomena.

We — by which I mean the people working on the project, including myself — are not scared of you, Bob. We’re scared of the tactical nuke buried in the basement.” If I’d still had eyebrows, they would have shot right off my head. “Habba-whaaa?

I had three issues that bothered me. Was I conscious? Could I actually consider myself to be alive? And was I still Bob? Philosophers had been going on and on about this type of thing for centuries, but now, for me, it was personal. A human, regardless of their opinion on the subject, could depend on being a human. The minister’s offhand reference to me as ‘it’ and ‘replicant’ had stung at a level I was just now starting to appreciate.

I’d made a decision to help the Deltans avoid extinction. What had started as a small, anonymous intervention quickly turned into a full-time job as The Bawbe, resident sky god.

I sat back, staring into space, so preoccupied that I stopped patting Spike. I was reminded of my primary duty by a furry head butting against my chin. “Sorry, your highness.” I smiled at the cat and resumed justifying my existence.