Larry Niven Quotes

The luck of Teela Brown.

"Johnny, did you ever hear of the Club of Rome?" Johnny had, but the audience would need reminding. "They were the people who did computer simulations to find out how long we could get along on our natural resources. Even with zero population growth — " "They tell us we're finished," Sharps broke in. "And that's stupid. We're only finished because they won't let us really use technology. They say we're running out of metals. There's more metal in one little asteroid than was mined all over the world in the last five years! And there are hundreds of thousands of asteroids. All we have to do is go get 'em." "Can we?" "You bet! Even with the technology we already have, we could do it. Johnny, out there in space it's raining soup, and we don't even know about soup bowls."

my fur is matted, my eyes refuse to refocus, my sthondat-begotten room is too small, my microwave heater heats all meat to the same temperature, and it is the wrong temperature, and I cannot get it fixed.

Gradually he was learning the size, the scale of the Ringworld. It was unpleasant, like all learning processes.

A civilization has the ethics it can afford. We

One mark of a good officer, he remembered, was the ability to make quick decisions. If they happen to be right, so much the better

in intelligence work we have to go by capabilities, not by intentions. If a potential enemy can do something to you, you have to prepare for it, without regard to what you think he wants to do.

The hammer has fallen.

I need exercise and solitude. This time of confinement has threatened my sanity!

The State has a superfluity of testicles, Peersa said with no particular emphasis.

You probably used fusion bombs against the Girls.

Once Louis Wu had sworn to live forever.

"There were the meaningless greetings the humans called "formalities": insincere inquiries into the state of health, nebulous benedictions and hopes for past well-being; all compensations for the lack of human Mediators."

She risks her own life, Louis thought, then blames me for not getting angry. An attention-getting device? How long has she been doing it? Anyone else would die young, with a habit like that!

I'll have to get over this sooner or later, Louis thought. Why not now? A friend had taught him this cantrip, this bit of magic for recovering from shock or grief. Sometimes it worked.