Isaac Asimov Quotes

Why do you think it is stupid to go to windows instead of to doors?"

"Because you advertise what you're trying to hide, silly. If I have a secret, I don't put tape over my mouth and let everyone know I have a secret. I talk just as much as usual, only about something else. Didn't you ever read any of the sayings of Salvor Hardin? He was our first Mayor, you know."

"Yes, I know."

"Well, he used to say that only a lie that wasn't ashamed of itself could possibly succeed. He also said that nothing had to be true, but everything had to sound true. Well, when you come in through a window, it's a lie that's ashamed of itself and it doesn't sound true."

"Then what would you have done?"

"If I had wanted to see my father on top secret business, I would have made his acquaintance openly and seen him about all sorts of strictly legitimate things. And then when everyone knew all about you and connected you with my father as a matter of course, you could be as top secret as you wanted and nobody would ever think of questioning it.

Battling a sickness of the spirit was like standing in a quicksand and beating it with a stick.

It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for subtlety.

Polen said, 'Let me hear from you sometimes.'
The words were dull thumps. They meant nothing. Casey knew that. Polen knew that. Everyone knew that. But words were meant to hide emotion and when they failed, humanity loyally maintained the pretense.

Câți pământeni nu reacționează printr-o ură oarbă față de toți cetățenii galactici, fără deosebire? E o boală aproape universală - ură pentru ură. Doresc concetățenii dumneavostră cu adevărat egalitate, toleranță reciprocă? Nu! Cei mai mulți nu vor decât să se-ntoarcă roata, aducându-i pe ei deasupra.

In my fiction I am careful to make everything probable and to tie up all loose ends. Real life is not hampered by such considerations.

Tritt listened placidly, clearly understanding nothing, but content to be listening; while Odeen, transmitting nothing, was as clearly content to be lecturing.

the mere act of not being a traitor is also a long way from agreeing to be an active helper.

So then,' said Jael, 'you're establishing a plutocracy. You're making us a land of traders and merchant princes. Then what of the future?' Mallow lifted his gloomy face, and exclaimed fiercely, 'What business of mine is the future? No doubt Seldon has foreseen it and prepared against it. There will be other crises in the time to come when money power has become as dead a force as religion is now. Let my successors solve those new problems, as I have solved the one of today.

It is the nature of science that answers automatically pose new and more subtle questions.

It all had a beginning in the original cosmic explosion, whatever that was, and it'll all have an end when all the stars run down. Some run down faster than others. Hell, the giants won't last a hundred million years. The sun will last ten billion years and maybe the dwarfs will last two hundred billion for all the good they are. But just give us a trillion years and everything will be dark. Entropy has to increase to maximum, that's all. (Lupov)

Dors shook her head. "I can't bear to hear a human being spoken of with contempt just because of his group identification — even by other human beings. It's these respectable people here who create those hooligans out there.

The rate of technological advance has been slowing for centuries and is down to a crawl now. In some cases, it has stopped altogether. Is this something you've noticed? After all, you're a mathematician.' 'I can't say I've given the matter any thought.' 'No one does. It's accepted. Scientists are very good these days at saying that things are impossible, impractical, useless. They condemn any speculation at once.

Întreaga ştiinţă se bazează pe credinţa în anumite premise şi în valabilitatea deducţiei şi a inducţiei.

The trouble with you, Peter, is that when you think of a witness to a planetological statement, you think of planetologists. You divide up human beings into categories, and despise and dismiss most. A robot cannot do that. The First Law says, 'A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.' Any human being. That is the essence of the robotic view of life. A robot makes no distinction. To a robot, all men are truly equal, and to a robopsychologist who must perforce deal with men at the robotic level, all men are truly equal, too.