Isaac Asimov Quotes - Page 16

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• Life would be impossible on such a planet. It wouldn't get enough heat and light, and if it rotated there would be total darkness half of every day. There wouldn't be any native inhabitants. You couldn't expect life - which is fundamentally dependent on light - to develop under such extreme conditions of light deprivation. Half of every axial rotation spent in Darkness! No, nothing could exist under conditions like that.

  Isaac Asimov

  Light, Darkness, Would Be

  "Darkness in literature: 'Nightfall' by Isaac Asimov" by Richard Lea, www.theguardian.com. December 19, 2012.

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• I wanted to be a psychological engineer, but we lacked the facilities, so I did the next best thing - I went into politics. It's practically the same thing.

  Isaac Asimov

  Next, Psychological, Wanted

  Isaac Asimov (1951). “Foundation”

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• To introduce something altogether new would mean to begin all over, to become ignorant again, and to run the old, old risk of failing to learn.

  Isaac Asimov

  Running, Ignorance, Mean

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• You see, proteins, as I probably needn't tell you, are immensely complicated groupings of amino acids and certain other specialized compounds, arranged in intricate three-dimensional patterns that are as unstable as sunbeams on a cloudy day. It is this instability that is life, since it is forever changing its position in an effort to maintain its identity--in the manner of a long rod balanced on an acrobat's nose.

  Isaac Asimov

  Long, Effort, Forever

  Isaac Asimov (2010). “Pebble in the Sky”, p.31, Macmillan

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• When I sit down at the typewriter, I write. Someone once asked me if I had a fixed routine before I start, like setting up exercises, sharpening pencils, or having a drink of orange juice. I said, "No, the only thing I do before I start writing is to make sure that I'm close enough to the typewriter to reach the keys."

  Isaac Asimov

  Writing, Exercise, Typewriters

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• And it came to pass that AC learned how to reverse the direction of entropy. But there was now no man to whom AC might give the answer of the last question. No matter. The answer - by demonstration - would take care of that, too. For another timeless interval, AC thought how best to do this. Carefully, AC organized the program. The consciousness of AC encompassed all of what had been a Universe and brooded over what was now Chaos. Step by step, it must be done. And AC said, "LET THERE BE LIGHT!" And there was light...

  Isaac Asimov

  Men, Light, Giving

  "The Last Question". Science Fiction Quarterly, archive.org. November 1956.

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• Why this reluctance to make the change? We fear the process of reeducation.

  Isaac Asimov

  Management, Process, Reluctance

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• It was easy to cover up ignorance by the mystical word "intuition.

  Isaac Asimov

  Ignorance, Intuition, Cover Ups

  Isaac Asimov (2012). “Foundation's Edge”, p.377, Spectra

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• When I feel difficulty coming on, I switch to another book I'm writing. When I get back to the problem, my unconscious has solved it.

  Isaac Asimov

  Book, Writing, Problem

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• This game the Persian Magi did invent, The force of Eastern wisdom to express: From thence to busy Europeans sent, And styled by modern Lombards pensive chess.

  Isaac Asimov

  Games, Chess, Busy

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• Surely, if we take on thinking partners - or, at the least, thinking servants - in the form of machines, we will be more comfortable with them, and will relate to them more easily, if they are shaped like humans. It will be easier to be friends with human-shaped robots than with specialized machines of unrecognizable shape. And I sometimes think that, in the desperate straits of humanity today, we would be grateful to have nonhuman friends, even if they are only the friends we build ourselves.

  Isaac Asimov

  Grateful, Thinking, Humanity

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• Speech as known to us was unnecessary. A fragment of a sentence amounted almost to a long-winded redundancy. A gesture, a grunt, the curve of a facial line--even a significantly timed pause yielded informational juice.

  Isaac Asimov

  Curves, Long, Juice

  Isaac Asimov (2004). “Second Foundation”, p.19, Spectra

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• In theory, there is nothing the computer can do that the human mind can not do. The computer merely takes a finite amount of data and performs a finite number of operations upon them. The human mind can duplicate the process

  Isaac Asimov

  Finite Number, Data, Numbers

  Isaac Asimov (1990). “The Complete Stories”, Broadway Books

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• Never judge your own writing. You're not fit to do so.

  Isaac Asimov

  Writing, Judging, Fit

  Isaac Asimov (1995). “Yours, Isaac Asimov: A Lifetime of Letters”, Doubleday Books

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• Plate glass... has no beauty of its own. Ideally, you ought not to be able to see it at all, but through it you can see all that is happening outside. That is the equivalent of writing that is plain and unadorned. Ideally, in reading such writing, you are not even aware that you are reading. Ideas and events seem merely to flow from the mind of the writer into that of the reader without any barrier between. I hope that is what is happening when you read this book

  Isaac Asimov

  Book, Reading, Writing

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• Experimentation is the least arrogant method of gaining knowledge. The experimenter humbly asks a question of nature.

  Isaac Asimov

  Knowledge, Science, Arrogance

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• I never considered myself a patriot. I like to think I recognize only humanity as my nation.

  Isaac Asimov

  Thinking, Humanity, Patriotism

  Isaac Asimov (2012). “Foundation's Edge”, p.245, Spectra

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• The dangers that face the world can, every one of them, be traced back to science. The salvations that may save the world will, every one of them, be traced back to science.

  Isaac Asimov

  Science, World, May

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• All of a sudden, space isn't friendly. All of a sudden, it's a place where people can die. . . . Many more people are going to die. But we can't explore space if the requirement is that there be no casualties; we can't do anything if the requirement is that there be no casualties.

  Isaac Asimov

  Space, People, Safety

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• Rejection slips, or form letters, however tactfully phrased, are lacerations of the soul, if not quite inventions of the devil-but there is no way around them.

  Isaac Asimov

  Writing, Rejection, Soul

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• I'm an indoors person. I'm not afraid of the outdoors and I penetrate it easily and cheerfully. However, I must admit I like Central Park better than the wilderness, and I like the canyons of Manhattan better than Central Park, and I like the interior of my apartment better than the canyons of Manhattan, and I like my two rooms better with the shades down at all times than with the shades up. I'm not an agoraphobe at all, but I am a claustrophile, if you see the distinction.

  Isaac Asimov

  Central Park, Two, Parks

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• Before another century is done it will be hard for people to imagine a time when humanity was confined to one world, and it will seem to them incredible that there was ever anybody who doubted the value of space and wanted to turn his or her back on the Universe.

  Isaac Asimov

  Future, Science, Space

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• The peace and joy of the Christmas season was marred by a proclamation of a general strike of all the military forces of the world. Panic reigns in the hearts of all the patriots of every persuasion. Meanwhile, fears of universal disaster sank to an all-time low over the world.

  Isaac Asimov

  Peace, Fear, Military

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• Unfortunately, in many cases, people who write science fiction violate the laws of nature, not because they want to make a point, but because they don't know what the laws of nature are.

  Isaac Asimov

  Writing, Knowledge, Science

  Isaac Asimov, Carl Howard Freedman (2005). “Conversations with Isaac Asimov”, p.176, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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• There is no right to deny freedom to any object with a mind advanced enough to grasp the concept and desire the state. -(from "The Bicentennial Man) story)

  Isaac Asimov

  Men, Mind, Desire

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