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What lasts in the reader's mind is not the phrase but the effect the phrase created: laughter, tears, pain, joy. If the phrase is not affecting the reader, what's it doing there? Make it do its job or cut it without mercy or remorse.

Isaac Asimov

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Isaac Asimov
Age: 72 †
Born: 1920
Born: January 2
Died: 1992
Died: April 6
Author
Autobiographer
Biochemist
Journalist
Non-Fiction Writer
Novelist
Prosaist
Science Fiction Writer
Science Writer
Scientist
Isaak Osimov
Paul French
Asimov
Isaak Ozimov
Make
Effects
Phrases
Joy
Mercy
Lasts
Effect
Pain
Laughter
Jobs
Created
Without
Tears
Affecting
Writing
Reader
Remorse
Mind
Cutting
Phrase

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The first step in making rabbit stew is catching the rabbit.
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The bible must be seen in a cultural context. It didn't just happen. These stories are retreads. But, tell a Christian that -- No, No! What makes it doubly sad is that they hardly know the book, much less its origins.
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To test a perfect theory with imperfect instruments did not impress the Greek philosophers as a valid way to gain knowledge.
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There is no merit to discipline under ideal circumstances. I must have it in the face of death or it is worthless.
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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.
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We all know we fall. Newton's discovery was that the moon falls, too-and by the same rule that we do.
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All life is nucleic acid the rest is commentary.
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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.
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Surely no child, and few adults, have ever watched a bird in flight without envy.
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A myth or legend is simply not made up out of a vacuum. Nothing is--or can be. Somehow there is a kernel of truth behind it, however distorted that might be.
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I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them.
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Scientific apparatus offers a window to knowledge, but as they grow more elaborate, scientists spend ever more time washing the windows.
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It is change, continuing change, inevitable change, that is the dominant factor in society today. No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account not only the world as it is, but the world as it will be. This, in turn, means that our statesmen, our businessmen, our every man must take on a science fictional way of thinking.
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To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today.
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Gratitude is best and most effective when it does not evaporate itself in empty phrases.
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The appearance of strength is all about you. It would seem to last forever. However... the rotten tree-trunk, until the very moment when the storm-blast breaks it in two, has all the appearance of might it ever had. The storm-blast whistles through the branches of the Empire even now. Listen... and you will hear the creaking.
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If I am right, then (religious fundamentalists) will not go to Heaven, because there is no Heaven. If they are right, then they will not go to Heaven, because they are hypocrites.
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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.
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Even as a youngster, though, I could not bring myself to believe that if knowledge presented danger, the solution was ignorance.
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