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The uplifters are forever running around telling blockheads they would do better if they would believe in themselves. But they already do. That is why they are blockheads.

Jack McDevitt

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Jack McDevitt
Age: 89
Born: 1935
Born: April 14
Author
Novelist
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Philadelphia
Pennsylvania
Forever
Running
Around
Better
Believe
Would
Blockheads
Telling
Already

More quotes by Jack McDevitt

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If you're right, and nobody really cares what's out there, I wonder whether we're even worth saving.
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When things go wrong, the standard management strategy is to decide who takes the blame. This should be an underling, as far down the chain as possible, but preferably with some visibility so people know management means business.
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The Peacekeepers had a tradition that every problem had a solution. It was a nice slogan. Wasn't true, but it sounded good.
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Courage is perhaps our most admirable trait. The man, or woman, who possesses it is able to plunge ahead, despite dangers, despite warnings, despite hazards of all kinds, to attack the task at hand. Often, it is indistinguishable from stupidity.
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So long as men and women are free, no one is safe. People will be in danger because others can't operate vehicles responsibly or shoot straight. Because physicians are sometimes incompetent and lawyers dishonest. But most of all they will be in danger from ideas. It is the price we willingly pay to be free. Nor would we have it any other way.
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Solitude is only a good idea if you have the right people along to share it.
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An optimist is somebody who thinks our various political and social systems, schools and churches, support groups and Boy Scout troops, jury trials and congressional committees, are on the up-and-up. That they are intended for the benefit of the members. The reality is that they are designed to keep everyone in line.
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There's not much to be said for sightseeing. You go somewhere that has a waterfall. You have a beer, watch the water go over the edge, and move on. Tours are all the same. In the end, the only thing that matters is the beer.
Jack McDevitt
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Throughout our long and sorry history it has been men who supposed themselves to be exemplars of integrity who have done all the damage. Every crusade, whether for decent literary standards or to cover women's bodies or to free the holy land, had been launched, endorsed, and enthusiastically perpetrated by men of character.
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Tides are like politics. They come and go with a great deal of fuss and noise, but inevitably they leave the beach just as they found it. On those few occasions when major change does occur, it is rarely a good news.
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If you want creative and successful children, resign yourself to jousting with rebels.
Jack McDevitt
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We could never know who we truly were until we heard the whispers of the stars.
Jack McDevitt
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Intelligence is like pornography. I can't define it, but I know if when I see it.
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So we have progressed to the point where we can move politicians around faster than light. I'm not sure I see the advantage.
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The real problem has to do with the inability by people to admit that a position they've held a long time might be wrong. That's all. Not that it is. Just that it might be. I don't know why it is, but we tend to fall in love with things we believe, Threaten them, and you threaten us.
Jack McDevitt
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... the truth is that when your people don't tell you what you need to know, it's a failure of leadership.
Jack McDevitt
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Boundaries have no existence save on charts or in small minds. Nature does not draw lines.
Jack McDevitt
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Certain types of decisions can be safely ignored. Some issues will go away with the passage of time, others will be so slow developing that the decision-makers will depart before the results of their neglect becomes manifest. Which brings us to the environment.
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Truth, beaten down, may well rise again. But there's a reason it gets beaten down. Usually, we don't like it very much.
Jack McDevitt
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Faith is conviction without evidence, and sometimes even in the face of contrary evidence. In some quarters, this quality is perceived as a virtue.
Jack McDevitt