Emotionally I am an atheist. I don’t have the evidence to prove that God doesn’t exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn’t that I don’t want to waste my time.
I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it.
The laws of history are as absolute as the laws of physics, and if the probabilities of error are greater, it is only because history does not deal with as many humans as physics does atoms, so that individual variations count for more.
Society is much more easily soothed than one’s own conscience.
The temptation was great to muster what force we could and put up a fight. It’s the easiest way out, and the most satisfactory to self-respect – but, nearly invariably, the stupidest.
It has always been my ambition to die in harness with my head face down on a keyboard and my nose caught between two of the keys.
I type 90 words per minute on the typewriter; I type 100 words per minute on the word processor. But, of course, I don’t keep that up indefinitely – every once in a while I do have to think a few seconds.
Arthur Clarke says that I am first in science and second in science fiction in accordance with an agreement we have made. I say he is first in science fiction and second in science.
It is remarkable, Hardin, how the religion of science has grabbed hold.
That’s the harm of Close Encounters: that it convinces tens of millions that that’s what just science fiction is.
There are so many benefits to be derived from space exploration and exploitation; why not take what seems to me the only chance of escaping what is otherwise the sure destruction of all that humanity has struggled to achieve for 50,000 years?
No vision of God and heaven ever experienced by the most exalted prophet can, in my opinion, match the vision of the universe as seen by Newton or Einstein.
Experimentation is the least arrogant method of gaining knowledge. The experimenter humbly asks a question of nature.
It was obvious that bigotry was never a one-way operation, that hatred bred hatred!
Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world.
All normal life, Peter, consciously or otherwise, resent domination. If the domination is by an inferior, or by a supposed inferior, the resentment becomes stronger.
It’s humbling to think that all animals, including human beings, are parasites of the plant world.
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.
The world is being Americanized and technologized to its limits, and that makes it dull for some people. Reaching the Moon restores the frontier and gives us the lands beyond.
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.