John Brunner Quotes

They surely are condemned to Hell Who rule their lives by greed and lust And Satan waits for those as well Who in machines repose their trust.

Nothing short of religion could persuade a normal girl to make herself look so awful.

...is this an unforgivable invasion of privacy? Invasion of privacy it is; unforgivable ...Well, do you believe that justice shall not only be done, but shall be seen to be done? The privacy my worm is designed to invade is that privacy under whose cover justice is not than and injustice is not seen. It doesn't care whether the poker who leeched his tax-free payoff spent it on seducing little girls; it cares only thata he was rewared for commiting a crime and wasn't brought to book. It doesn't care if the shivver who bought that congressman was straight or gay; it cares only that a public servant took a bribe. It doesn't care if the judge who misdirected the jury was concerned to keep her lover's identity secret; it cares only that a person was jailed who should have been released.
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Few of us are equipped to cope with the complexity and dazzling variety of twenty-first-century existence.

We cannot afford the luxury known as conscience. The enemy we are up against certainly doesn't have one, so we are obliged to be absolutely rational. Cruel, if you like. People of good will, tolerant, liberal, whatever term you care to use, have always labored under a disadvantage. Those in power, those who want to hold on to power whatever the cost, have one ultimate recourse. If all else fails, they are prepared to kill. This is not available to pacifists.

If the evidence says you’re wrong, you don’t have the right theory. You change the theory, not the evidence.

UNFAIR Term applied to advantages enjoyed by other people which we tried to cheat them out of and didn’t manage.

we’ve always predicated our quotations on the assumption that life expectancy in the United States would continue to rise. But during the past three years it has in fact started to go down.

Even this far from shore, the night stank. The sea moved lazily, its embryo waves aborted before cresting by the layer of oily residues surrounding the hull, impermeable as sheet plastic: a mixture of detergents, sewage, industrial chemicals and the microscopic cellulose fibers due to toilet paper and newsprint. There was no sound of fish breaking surface. There were no fish.

"But I was never put on trial, never convicted!" "You are not entitled to a trial." "Anybody's entitled to a trial, damn you!" "That is absolutely true. But you see you are not anybody. You are nobody.

I never thought of asking anyone to do it for me. Something’s wrong with me. In a time of trouble should people not be able to ask help without feeling demeaned?

The day shall dawn when never child but may Go forth upon the sward secure to play. No cruel wolves shall trespass in their nooks, Their lore of lions shall come from picture-books.

And how many problems have been solved to date?”
“We haven’t exterminated ourselves.”
“You claim credit for that? I knew you had gall, but this is fantastic!

True, you’re not a slave. You’re worse off than that by a long, long way. You’re a predatory beast shut up in a cage of which the bars aren’t fixed, solid objects you can gnaw at or in despair batter against with your head until you get punch-drunk and stop worrying. No, those bars are the competing members of your own species, at least as cunning as you on average, forever shifting around so you can’t pin them down, liable to get in your way without the least warning, disorienting your personal environment until you want to grab a gun or an axe and turn mucker.

Get me a drink of water, please, and something to quiet my belly. It’s rumbling so much I can’t hear myself think.