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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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 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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Secrecy as deep as this is past possibility without nonexistence as well.
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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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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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He is energetic only in evading responsibility.
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I suppose he’s entitled to his opinion, but I don’t suppose it very hard.
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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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There is no belief, however foolish, that will not gather its faithful adherents who will defend it to the death.
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I recognize the necessity of animal experiments with my mind but not with my heart.
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It seems to me, Golan, that the advance of civilization is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy.
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The foundation of all technology is fire.
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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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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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Writing is an addiction more powerful than alcohol, than nicotine, than crack. I could not conceive of not writing.
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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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I accept nothing on authority. A hypothesis must be backed by reason, or else it is worthless.
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To him, a stilted geometric love of arrangement was 'system,' an indefatigable and feverish interest in the pettiest facets of day-to-day bureaucracy was 'industry,' indecision when right was 'caution,' and blind stubbornness when wrong, 'determination.'
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Remarkable what a fragile flower romance is. A gun with a nervous operator behind it can spoil the whole thing.
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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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All life is nucleic acid; the rest is commentary