Quote

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.

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
Sort
Nooses
Since
Stratagem
Chance
Rope
Business
Paying
Ends
Length
Whole
Somewhere
Crudest
Way
Mere
Foreseeing
Along
Noose

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It is the chief characteristic of the religion of science that it works.
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You can't assert an answer just because it's not something else.
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Having reached 451 books as of now doesn't help the situation. If I were to be dying now, I would be murmuring, Too bad! Only four hundred fifty-one. (Those would be my next-to-last words. The last ones will be: I love you, Janet.) [They were. -Janet.]
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We're forever teetering on the brink of the unknowable, and trying to understand what can't be understood.
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No matter how carefully records are kept and filed and computerized, they grow fuzzy with time. Stories grow by accretion. Tales accumulate--like dust. The longer the time lapse, the dustier the history--until it degenerates into fables.
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During the century after Newton, it was still possible for a man of unusual attainments to master all fields of scientific knowledge. But by 1800, this had become entirely impracticable.
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From my close observation of writers... they fall into two groups: 1) those who bleed copiously and visibly at any bad review, and 2) those who bleed copiously and secretly at any bad review.
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Saying something is 'too bad' is easy. You say you disapprove, which makes you a nice person, and then you can go about your business and not be interested anymore. It's a lot worse than 'too bad.' It's against everything decent and natural.
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What would you consider a good job? Answered as follows: A good job is one in which I don't have to work, and get paid a lot of money. When I heard that I cheered and yelled and felt that he should be given an A+, for he had perfectly articulated the American dream of those who despise knowledge. What a politician that kid would have made.
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And above all things, never think that you're not good enough yourself. A man should never think that. My belief is that in life people will take you at your own reckoning.
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They won't listen. Do you know why? Because they have certain fixed notions about the past. Any change would be blasphemy in their eyes, even if it were the truth. They don't want the truth they want their traditions.
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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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Grip the nettle firmly and it will become a stick with which to beat your enemy.
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At odd and unpredictable times, we cling in fright to the past .
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There is no one so insufferable as a person who gives no other excuse for a peculiar action than saying he had been directed to it in a dream.
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Uncertainty that comes from knowledge (knowing what you don't know) is different from uncertainty coming from ignorance.
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You must keep sending work out you must never let a manuscript do nothing but eat its head off in a drawer. You send that work out again and again, while you're working on another one. If you have talent, you will receive some measure of success - but only if you persist.
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So, then, what is style? There are two chief aspects of any piece of writing: 1) what you say and 2) how you say it. The former is content and the latter is style.
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Do not forget that a traitor within our ranks, known to us, can do more harm to the enemy than a loyal man can do good to us.
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You wait for the war to happen like vultures. If you want to help, prevent the war. Don't save the remnants. Save them all.
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