Isaac Asimov quotes - page 3

A fire eater must eat fire even if he has to kindle it himself. (Isaac Asimov)
It seems to me, Golan, that the advance of civilization is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy. View quote
Isaac Asimov
Once you get it into your head that somebody is controlling events, you can interpret everything in that light and find no reasonable certainty anywhere. View quote
Isaac Asimov
The spell of power never quite releases its hold. View quote
Isaac Asimov
A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws. View quote
Isaac Asimov
Courtiers don't take wagers against the king's skill. There is the deadly danger of winning. View quote
Isaac Asimov
I don't like anything that's got to be. I want to know why. View quote
Isaac Asimov
The fall of Empire, gentlemen, is a massive thing, however, and not easily fought. It is dictated by a rising bureaucracy, a receding initiative, a freezing of caste, a damming of curiosity - a hundred other factors. It has been going on, as I have said, for centuries, and it is too majestic and massive a movement to stop. View quote
Isaac Asimov
But suppose we were to teach creationism. What would be the content of the teaching? Merely that a creator formed the universe and all species of life ready-made? Nothing more? No details? View quote
Isaac Asimov
Every human being lived behind an impenetrable wall of choking mist within which no other but he existed. Occasionally there were the dim signals from deep within the cavern in which another man was located - so that each might grope toward the other. Yet because they did not know one another, and could not understand one another, and dared not trust one another, and felt from infancy the terrors and insecurity of that ultimate isolation - there was the hunted fear of man for man, the savage rapacity of man toward man. View quote
Isaac Asimov
A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. (Isaac Asimov)
The whole business is the crudest sort of stratagem, since we have no way of foreseeing it to the end. It is a mere paying out of rope on the chance that somewhere along the length of it will be a noose. View quote
Isaac Asimov
Radiation, unlike smoking, drinking, and overeating, gives no pleasure, so the possible victims object. View quote
Isaac Asimov
A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. View quote
Isaac Asimov
Economics is on the side of humanity now. View quote
Isaac Asimov
The history of science is full of revolutionary advances that required small insights that anyone might have had, but that, in fact, only one person did. View quote
Isaac Asimov
If you were to insist I was a robot, you might not consider me capable of love in some mystic human sense, but you would not be able to distinguish my reactions from that which you would call love - so what difference would it make? View quote
Isaac Asimov
Where any answer is possible, all answers are meaningless. View quote
Isaac Asimov
At odd and unpredictable times, we cling in fright to the past. View quote
Isaac Asimov
Inertia! Our ruling class knows one law; no change. Despotism! They know one rule; force. Maldistribution! They know one desire; to hold what is theirs. View quote
Isaac Asimov
It is well-known that the friend of a conqueror is but the last victim. (Isaac Asimov)
Happiness is doing it rotten your own way. View quote
Isaac Asimov
Religion is more conservative than any other aspect of human life. View quote
Isaac Asimov
Knowledge is indivisible. When people grow wise in one direction, they are sure to make it easier for themselves to grow wise in other directions as well. On the other hand, when they split up knowledge, concentrate on their own field, and scorn and ignore other fields, they grow less wise - even in their own field. View quote
Isaac Asimov
All life is nucleic acid; the rest is commentary. View quote
Isaac Asimov