Larry Niven Quotes

Casual murder, casual suicide, casual crime. Why not? If alternate universes are a reality, then cause and effect are an illusion. The law of averages is a fraud. You can do anything, and one of you will, or did.

10) Anarchy is the least stable of social structures.

as old as seas and mountains. . . .

As I said before, Mr. Fleming, we understand terrorists. There are two things to remember in dealing with them. First: we must never accede to their demands. Second: those of us who abhor their actions must be prepared to stand together against them.

"Exercise is wonderful," said Louis. "I could sit and watch it all day."

The morning was blacker than the inside of a smoker’s lungs.

Allen, it puzzles me that a man can shoot thirty-two full-grown men and women before the sheriff’s men gun him down. You’re more his time, maybe you can tell me. Why didn’t someone just shoot the son of a bitch?

5) If you've nothing to say, say it any way you like. Stylistic innovations, contorted story lines or none, exotic or genderless pronouns, internal inconsistencies, the recipe for preparing your lover as a cannibal banquet: feel free. If what you have to say is important and/or difficult to follow, use the simplest language possible. If the reader doesn't get it then, let it not be your fault.

"They used to teach us that evolution of intelligent beings wasn't possible," she said. "Societies protect their weaker members. Civilizations tend to make wheel chairs and spectacles and hearing aids as soon as they have the tools for them. When a society makes war, the men generally have to pass a fitness test before they're allowed, to risk their lives. I suppose it helps win the war." She smiled. "But it leaves precious little room for the survival of the fittest."

It's very difficult for a black man to get out of South-Central Los Angeles, and get out civilized....The only men I know who have escaped, all began reading Robert Heinlein at age ten.

As I said, it was inevitable, and I don’t let laws of nature upset me.

Species evolve to meet the environment. An intelligent species changes the environment to suit itself. As soon as a species becomes intelligent, it should stop evolving.

“Ah…if it’s not a glitch, and Welles seems certain that it’s not a glitch, then…what is it?”
“A glitch. People who say that they have all the bugs usually haven’t turned over enough rocks.”

3) Stories to end all stories on a given topic, don't.

The moral of this story is, anything you don’t understand is dangerous until you do understand it.