Sometimes terror and pain are not the best levers; deception, when it works, is the most elegant and least expensive manipulation of all. - Vernor Vinge

Viki was awed by all the incredible quackery. Daddy thought such things were amusing—“like religion but not so deadly.”

Civilizations rise and fall, but all technical civilizations know the greatest secrets now. They know which social mechanisms normally work, and which ones quickly fail. They know the means to postpone disaster and evade the most foolish catastrophes. They know that even so, each civilization must inevitably fall.

If there be only hours, at least learn what there is time to learn.