In fact, these possibility collapses happen at the level of elementary particles, but they happen in just the same way: one moment several things are… - Philip Pullman

One moment several things are possible, the next moment only one happens, and the rest don't exist. Except that other worlds have sprung into being, on which the did happen.

There’s been terrible things we seen, en’t there? And more a coming, more’n likely. So I think I’d rather not know what’s in the future. I’ll stick to the present.

You going to be a scientist when you grow up?” That sort of question deserved a blank stare, which it got.

There’s plenty of folk as’d like to have a lion as a dæmon and they end up with a poodle. And till they learn to be satisfied with what they are, they’re going to be fretful about it. Waste of feeling, that is.