Jack McDevitt
American science fiction author.
Our generation faces only one danger, that we might say to ourselves this is not our problem, and that we will pass it off to the distant future. That we might shrug and say to ourselves that a thousand years is a long time. That we will become complacent and conclude that this problem will take care of itself.
But I say to you, we should take no satisfaction in the fact that we ourselves are in no physical danger. This is a hazard to our world, to everything we hope to pass on to future generations. And it is clear that we should act now, while we have the time.
Henry had been around long enough to know better than to disagree. But he forgot to implement.
Sometimes the cost of integrity is the loss of a friend.
The man was either foolish or fearless. Assuming there was a difference.
We can create the appearance of knowledge, the illusion of knowing how to grapple with a problem. Far too many educational systems have done exactly that. The result is generations of mouthpieces who can pour forth approved responses to programmed stimuli that contribute nothing to rational discussion. Dogma is for those who only wish to be comfortable. Catechisms are for cowards; commandments, for control freaks who have so little respect for their species that they are driven to appeal to a higher power to keep everyone in line.
The earliest religious feeling MacAllister could recall was being annoyed at Adam, because it was his fault that girls subsequently had to wear clothes.
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.
He was a decent enough guy, but he was always at his worst when he was trying to be sincere.
During his sixty-odd years, he had found there were as many louts in the patrician classes as there were ignoramuses farther down the social spectrum.
It is not faith per se that creates the problem; it is conviction, the notion that one cannot be wrong, that opposing views are necessarily invalid and may even be intolerable.
The invention of the printing press probably marks the beginning of the decline of civilization. Once you have it, science follows close behind. Next thing you know the idiots have better weaponry. Then atom bombs. Meantime, social organization becomes increasingly dependent on technology, which becomes increasingly vulnerable to error or sabotage. If we can judge by our own experience, it looks as if you get the printing press, then about a thousand years. After that it’s back to the trees.
The reality is, we don’t want our kids to be smart. We want them to be like us. Only more so.
The cultures we can look at had already grasped the essential unity of nature. No board of gods can survive that knowledge.
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.
Katie commented that Americans had lost the ability to enjoy themselves.
“We watch television,” Dave said.
Truth, beaten down, may well rise again. But there’s a reason it gets beaten down. Usually, we don’t like it very much.
Show me what a people admire, and I will tell you everything about them that matters.
“We are not a debating club,” Franklin said. “Our goal is to get at the truth, where that is possible.”
Freedom and idiots make a volatile mix. And the sad truth is that the idiocy quotient in the general population is alarmingly high.
Few of the virtues are really useful. Fidelity leads to lost opportunity, truth-telling to injured feelings, charity to additional solicitations. The least productive, and possibly the most overrated, is faith. The faithful deny reason, close their minds to the evidence of their senses, and remain unfailingly optimistic in the face of disaster. They inevitably get just what they deserve.