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Who would fare better in this world of fitful time? Those who have seen the future and live only one life? Or those who have not seen the future and wait to live life? Or those who deny the future and live two lives?

Alan Lightman

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Alan Lightman
Age: 75
Born: 1948
Born: November 28
Astrophysicist
Novelist
Physicist
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Memphis
Tennessee
Alan Paige Lightman
Would
Wait
Time
Seen
Life
Waiting
World
Future
Lives
Two
Fitful
Better
Fare
Live
Deny

More quotes by Alan Lightman

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My writings are an exploration, and I think a lot of writers would tell you this, but in writing, you're not simply putting down things that are already known to you. You're actually discovering in the writing process, you're actually creating knowledge.
Alan Lightman
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People are content to live in contradictory worlds, so long as they know the reason for each.
Alan Lightman
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The history of science can be viewed as the recasting of phenomena that were once thought to be accidents as phenomena that can be understood in terms of fundamental causes and principles.
Alan Lightman
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Except for a God who sits down after the universe begins, all other gods conflict with the assumptions of science.
Alan Lightman
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For me, consciousness is the most interesting unsolved problem of science, and, in fact, we may never know what it is about a particular arrangement of neurons that gives rise to consciousness. Our consciousness, like the air we breathe or like the passage of time, is central to our existence as intelligent beings.
Alan Lightman
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You've made something grand, but it will be grander if it has feeling and beauty and harmony.
Alan Lightman
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There is a place where time stands still ...illuminated by only the most feeble red light, for light is diminished to almost nothing at the center of time, its vibrations slowed to echoes in vast canyons, its intensity reduced to the faint glow of fireflies.
Alan Lightman
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I'm humbled and enormously grateful to be connected to [Franz] Kafka in a any way. He is one of the writers I admire. I think he has been a big influence on me. I appreciate the idea of the individual person battling the society - which is true in all his books.
Alan Lightman
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I think e-mail is representative of our fast food mentality in the United States, where everything has gotten faster and faster, and we're required to respond to inputs more quickly with less time for thought and reflection. I believe that we need to slow down.
Alan Lightman
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Some make light of decisions, arguing that all possible decisions will occur. In such a world, how could one be responsible for his actions? Others hold that each decision must be considered and committed to, that without commitment there is chaos. Such people are content to live in contradictory worlds, so long as they know the reason for each.
Alan Lightman
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That's the fine balance of a fiction writer...to be able to give your characters enough freedom to surprise you and yet still maintain some kind of artistic control.
Alan Lightman
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It's the Platonic philosophy in The Republic that philosophers should lead the country.
Alan Lightman
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While people brood, time skips ahead without looking back.
Alan Lightman
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Scientists will forever have to live with the fact that their product is, in the end, impersonal.
Alan Lightman
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The tragedy of this world is that no one is happy, whether stuck in a time of pain or joy.
Alan Lightman
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Every essay - the subject matter of every essay - is ultimately about the essayist him or herself. That ultimately, every essayist is writing about his or her view of the world.
Alan Lightman
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It's exciting having a student who is not used to expressing their emotional side and bringing that out in them and see that developing and helping to nurture that. That's an exciting thing. In a class of fifteen there are usually two very good writers, equal to good student writers anywhere in the country. Those two make the class wonderful.
Alan Lightman
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-But rational thoughts lead only to rational thoughts, whereas irrational thoughts lead to new experiences.
Alan Lightman
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If I were not a writer, I would spend more time doing the things that I am already doing, which include doing research in physics, teaching, and running a nonprofit organization with a mission to empower women in Cambodia.
Alan Lightman
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A person who cannot imagine the future is a person who cannot contemplate the results of his actions. Some are thus paralyzed into inaction.
Alan Lightman