Jack McDevitt Quotes
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Technological civilizations don’t last long. You're all right until you get a printing press. Then a race starts between technology and common sense. And maybe technology always wins.
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How does it happen that the most intractable types always rise to the top?
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'I'm not optimistic,' he said. 'The issue clearly flies in the face of the First Amendment. People have a right to tell kids whatever they want about religion.''Do they have a right to push human sacrifice?''Of course not, Mac. But this isn’t human sacrifice. It’s just a church school.''I'm not sure the effect isn’t similar.'
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'We are not a debating club,' Franklin said. 'Our goal is to get at the truth, where that is possible.'
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There is no justice. There are occasional acts of vengeance, or regret, but there’s no real justice. In the natural scheme of things, it is not possible.
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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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'I suspect we would be wise,' he said without looking up, 'to avoid declaring what God will or will not allow.'
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MacAllister commented recently that Plato was right, that democracy is mob rule, that the voters can be counted on consistently to find the candidate with the fewest scruples and put him in office.
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At night the sea is very loud,And voices ride the tide.At another time, in another place,Beneath the silent moon,We laughed together.
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Mac continued to write scathing commentary on assorted hypocrisies in high places and low, without which hypocrisies, he cheerfully conceded, civilized life would be impossible.
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The man was either foolish or fearless. Assuming there was a difference.
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'The media have gone berserk.''The media always go berserk. A kid falls off a bike in Montana, they’re all over it. Until something else happens.'
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The problem is that too often the only people who can act don’t want change. Power doesn’t so much corrupt as it breeds conservatism.
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Truth is slippery, not because it is difficult to grasp, but because we prefer our preconceptions, our beliefs, our myths.
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There are few professions whose primary objective is to advance the cause of humanity rather than simply to make money or accrue power. Among this limited group of humanitarians I would number teachers, nurses, bookstore owners, and bartenders.
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Sometimes the cost of integrity is the loss of a friend.
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What would happen is that people like Geroge and Alyx would grow old and die chasing a dream. Although there were probably worse things to do with one’s life.
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Lasker mouthed, 'Trust him,' and Max sighed. Trust a lawyer? It flew in the face of his most cherished principles.
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Put the money into schools. Rational ones that train young minds to think, to demand that persons in authority show the evidence for the ideas they push. Do that, and we won’t need to provide a world for the Sacred Brethren who, given the opportunity, would run everyone else off the planet.
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The beginning of wisdom is to admit to being inept. We’re all a bit slow. We have our moments, but in the end, we have to resort to bumbling through. It is what makes conviction so egregious.
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When do we reach a point where people become responsible for their own actions?
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But, come to think of it, there was no need to wait. Time travelers don’t have to wait for anybody.
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The idiots always rose to the top and made policy.It explained a lot of things.
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He took particular delight in neutralizing those who desperately needed to be neutralized, those overblown, self-important, arrogant half-wits who were always running about dictating behavior, morals, and theology to everyone else. And he never looked back.