Science Fiction Quotes - Page 2

• Science fiction writers, I am sorry to say, really do not know anything. We can't talk about science, because our knowledge of it is limited and unofficial, and usually our fiction is dreadful.

  Philip K. Dick

  Sorry, Writing, Fiction

  Philip K. Dick (1985). “I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon”, Doubleday Books

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• In sci-fi convention, life-forms that hadn't developed space travel were mere prehistory -- horse-shoe crabs of the cosmic scene -- and something of the humiliation of being stuck on a provincial planet in a galactic backwater has stayed with me ever since.

  Barbara Ehrenreich

  Horse, Shoes, Space

  Barbara Ehrenreich (1990). “WORST YEARS OF OUR LIVES”, Pantheon

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• Science fiction is the search for a definition of mankind and his status in the universe which will stand in our advanced but confused state of knowledge (science), and is characteristically cast in the Gothic or post Gothic mode.

  Brian Aldiss

  Confused, Fiction, Definitions

  Brian Wilson Aldiss (1995). “The Detached Retina: Aspects of SF and Fantasy”, p.72, Syracuse University Press

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• The fancy that extraterrestrial life is by definition of a higher order than our own is one that soothes all children, and many writers.

  Joan Didion

  Children, Order, Definitions

  FaceBook post by Joan Didion from Jul 28, 2011

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• To almost no one's surprise, Astrid said, "Dune, by Frank Herbert. 'I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that bring total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the Fear has gone there will be nothing.'" She and Lana together spoke the last phrase of the incantation. "'Only I will remain.

  Michael Grant

  Fear, Eye, Past

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• It is better to write a bad first draft than to write no first draft at all.

  Will Shetterly

  Book, Writing, Firsts

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• The Force is really a way of feeling; it's a way of being with life. It really has nothing to do with weapons. The Force gives you the power to have extrasensory perception and to be able to see things and hear things, read minds and levitate things. It is said that certain creatures are born with a higher awareness of the Force than humans. Their brains are different; they have more midi-chlorians in their cells.

  George Lucas

  Power, Cells, Giving

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• Science fiction is really sociological studies of the future, things that the writer believes are going to happen by putting two and two together.

  Ray Bradbury

  Believe, Two, Together

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• Science-fiction balances you on the cliff. Fantasy shoves you off.

  Ray Bradbury

  Balance, Fiction, Cliffs

  Introduction to "The Circus of Dr. Lao" by Charles G. Finney, 1956.

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• Fantasy deals with the immeasurable while science-fiction deals with the measurable.

  Walter Wangerin

  Fiction, Fantasy, Deals

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• Science fictions are suppressed only when likely to contribute more knowledge and freedom than the defensive orthodoxies they challenge.

  Timothy Leary

  Challenges, Fiction, Orthodoxy

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• Science fiction, because it ventures into no man's lands, tends to meet some of the requirements posed by Jung in his explorations of archetypes, myth structures and self-understanding. It may be that the primary attraction of science fiction is that it helps us understand what it means to be human.

  Frank Herbert

  Mean, Men, Self

  "Men on other planets" in "The Craft of Science Fiction" edited by Reginald Bretnor, 1976.

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• Science fiction and comedy are generally a pretty bumpy mix.

  Matt Groening

  Fiction, Comedy

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• I've called science fiction 'reality ahead of schedule'

  Syd Mead

  Reality, Fiction, Schedules

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• Everything is becoming science fiction. From the margins of an almost invisible literature has sprung the intact reality of the 20th century.

  J. G. Ballard

  Reality, Sprung Up, Fiction

  "Fictions of Every Kind" (1971)

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• Science fiction is hard to define because it is the literature of change and it changes while you are trying to define it.

  Tom Shippey

  Trying, Fiction, Literature

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• What's great about science fiction is that it allows for surreal scenarios even if they pertain to the real world.

  Larissa Sansour

  Real, World, Real World

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• Physics has entered a remarkable era. Ideas that were once the realm of science fiction are now entering our theoretical — and maybe even experimental — grasp. Brand-new theoretical discoveries about extra dimensions have irreversibly changed how particle physicists, astrophysicists, and cosmologists now think about the world. The sheer number and pace of discoveries tells us that we've most likely only scratched the surface of the wondrous possibilities that lie in store. Ideas have taken on a life of their own.

  Lisa Randall

  Lying, Taken, Thinking

  "Warped Passages: Unraveling the Universe's Hidden Dimensions". Book by Lisa Randall, 2005.

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• I love the science-fiction genre because there's always so many endless possibilities! It's a limitless genre and can be fun playing around with otherworldly ideas.

  Laura Mennell

  Fun, Ideas, Fiction

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• We sat around on a hotel balcony with a bottle of wine and tried to figure out how you would go about blowing up a planet. That's the kind of conversations science fiction writers have when they get together. We don't talk about football or anything like that.

  Kevin J. Anderson

  Football, Writing, Wine

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• The best science fiction is as good as the best fiction in any field.

  Theodore Sturgeon

  Fiction, Fields, Best Science

  Venture Science Fiction, March 1958.

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• Sci-fi is often a metaphor. I think it's more the themes and questions that science fiction raises rather than the exact predictions that should guide us.

  Peter Singer

  Thinking, Fiction, Metaphor

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• The beauty of science fiction is its open canvas. You can hypothesize about any element of the world. It doesn't have to be laser battles and things exploding, you can be JG Ballad and maybe just change one little thing about the real world and that becomes science fiction.

  Duncan Jones

  Real, Battle, Littles

  Source: www.indielondon.co.uk

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• I feel like science fiction is so much more mainstream now than it has been. And I feel like thats because technology has caught up with us.

  Alaina Huffman

  Technology, Fiction, Mainstream

  "Exclusive Interview: Alaina Huffman Talks Smallville, Stargate Universe, and Agent Mom". Interview with Alex Zalben, www.mtv.com. January 27, 2011.

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• By challenging anthropocentricism and temporal provincialism, science fiction throws open the whole of civilization and its premises to constructive criticism.

  Alvin Toffler

  Civilization, Challenges, Criticism

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