Isaac Asimov Quotes
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If you're going to write a story, avoid contemporary references. They date a story and they have no staying power.
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The last question was asked for the first time, half in jest, on May 21, 2061, at a time when humanity first stepped into the light. The question came about as a result of a five dollar bet over highballs, and it happened this way…
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If my doctor told me I had only six minutes to live, I wouldn't brood. I'd type a little faster.
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The fall of Empire, gentlemen, is a massive thing, however, and not easily fought. It is dictated by a rising bureaucracy, a receding initiative, a freezing of caste, a damming of curiosity - a hundred other factors. It has been going on, as I have said, for centuries, and it is too majestic and massive a movement to stop.
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I fear my ignorance.
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Surely there is no language more majestic than that of Shakespeare, Milton, and the King James Bible, and if I am to have one language that I know as only a native can know it, I consider myself unbelievably fortunate that it is English.
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I accept nothing on authority. A hypothesis must be backed by reason, or else it is worthless.
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I believe that only scientists can understand the universe. It is not so much that I have confidence in scientists being right, but that I have so much in nonscientists being wrong.
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Now any dogma, based primarily on faith and emotionalism, is a dangerous weapon to use on others, since it is almost impossible to guarantee that the weapon will never be turned on the user.
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I have always dealt with economic forces, rather than philosophic forces, but you can't split history into neat little non-overlapping divisions. For instance, religions tend to accumulate wealth when successful and that eventually tends to distort the economic development of a society.
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Secrecy as deep as this is past possibility without nonexistence as well.
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I suppose he’s entitled to his opinion, but I don’t suppose it very hard.
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There is no belief, however foolish, that will not gather its faithful adherents who will defend it to the death.
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'You’re the U. S. Robot’s psychologist, aren’t you?' 'Robopsychologist, please.' 'Oh, are robots so different from men, mentally?' 'Worlds different.' She allowed herself a frosty smile, 'Robots are essentially decent.'
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Writing is an addiction more powerful than alcohol, than nicotine, than crack. I could not conceive of not writing.
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The foundation of all technology is fire.
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I recognize the necessity of animal experiments with my mind but not with my heart.
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He is energetic only in evading responsibility.
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It takes more than capital to swing business. You've got to have the A. I. D. degree to get by - Advertising, Initiative, and Dynamics.
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Knowledge is indivisible. When people grow wise in one direction, they are sure to make it easier for themselves to grow wise in other directions as well. On the other hand, when they split up knowledge, concentrate on their own field, and scorn and ignore other fields, they grow less wise - even in their own field.
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If you were to insist I was a robot, you might not consider me capable of love in some mystic human sense, but you would not be able to distinguish my reactions from that which you would call love - so what difference would it make?
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'That was the time to begin all-out preparations for war.' 'On the contrary. That was the time to begin all-out prevention of war.'
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For it is the chief characteristic of the religion of science, that it works, and that such curses as that of Aporat’s are really deadly.
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Weisinger, a couple of years ago, made up the following story: 'Isaac Asimov was asked how Superman could fly faster than the speed of light, which was supposed to be an absolute limit. To this Asimov replied, 'That the speed of light is a limit is a theory; that Superman can travel faster than light is a fact.''