There were the rules we were taught, and there were the rules we did our job by. The two were related, but as distant cousins rather than siblings. - Jasper Fforde

"Humans are molded by evolution to be short-termists, Miss Next," he continued. His voice rumbled deeply and seemed to echo inside my head. "We need only to see our children to reproductive age to be successful in a biological sense. We have to move beyond that. If we see ourselves as residents on this planet for the long term, we need to plan for the long term."

People die in the Winter; it’s what it’s there for.

“Think of it this way: A single brain cell has no intelligence, but in company it can do extraordinary things. Perhaps the entirety of existence is the true, unifying intelligence that drives what occurs—for a reason that is quite beyond our understanding, or even to a higher plane where the concept of understanding is laughably redundant.”
It was an interesting concept. Mycroft had often theorized that the whole of existence was so large and hideously complex that it must be sentient. And if this were so, then it must have a truly warped sense of humor and have an abiding love of math and hydrogen—and a deep loathing for order.