If you don't know history, then you don't know anything. You are a leaf that doesn't know it is part of a tree.
I am certain there is too much certainty in the world.
Do you know what we call opinion in the absence of evidence? We call it prejudice.
It's better to die laughing than to live each moment in fear.
God creates dinosaurs, God kills dinosaurs, God creates man, man kills God, man brings back dinosaurs.
The planet has survived everything, in its time. It will certainly survive us.
No one escapes from life alive.
In the information society, nobody thinks. We expected to banish paper, but we actually banished thought.
God created dinosaurs. God destroyed dinosaurs. God created Man. Man destroyed God. Man created dinosaurs. Dinosaurs eat man...Woman inherits the earth.
Let's be clear. The planet is not in jeopardy. We are in jeopardy. We haven't got the power to destroy the planet - or to save it. But we might have the power to save ourselves.
All your life people will tell you things. And most of the time, probably ninety-five percent of the time, what they'll tell you will be wrong.
Discovery is always rape of the natural world. Always.
Absence of proof is not proof of absence.
Books aren't written - they're rewritten. Including your own. It is one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the seventh rewrite hasn't quite done it.
Life is wonderful. It's a gift to be alive, to see the sun and breathe the air. And there isn't really anything else.
Living systems are never in equilibrium. They are inherently unstable. They may seem stable, but they’re not. Everything is moving and changing. In a sense, everything is on the edge of collapse.
All major changes are like death. You can't see to the other side until you are there.
All your life, other people will try to take your accomplishments away from you. Don't you take it away from yourself.
We think we know what we are doing. We have always thought so.
You know, at times like this one feels, well, perhaps extinct animals should be left extinct.
Life will find a way.
Anyone who says he knows God's intention is showing a lot of very human ego.
Everyone has a hidden agenda. Except me!
Praise not the day until evening has come, a woman until she is burnt, a sword until it is tried, a maiden until she is married, ice until it has been crossed, beer until it has been drunk.
It's hard to decide who's truly brilliant; it's easier to see who's driven, which in the long run may be more important.
Sometimes women scare the hell out of me.
You know what's wrong with scientific power? It's a form of inherited wealth. And you know what assholes congenitally rich people are.
Nobody smart knows what they want to do until they get into their twenties or thirties.
Power is neither male or female.
This novel is fiction, except for the parts that aren't.
They didn't understand what they were doing. I'm afraid that will be on the tombstone of the human race.
In the corner store we pulled fat bottles of water from the shelves. No one thinks it's weird that we have to buy clean water, and that's how I know we're going to hell.
Science is as corruptible a human activity as any other.
Friendships are nice. So is competence.
Professor Johnston often said that if you didn't know history, you didn't know anything. You were a leaf that didn't know it was part of a tree.
Geniuses never pay attention.
Nobody dares to solve the problems-because the solution might contradict your philosophy, and for most people clinging to beliefs is more important than succeeding in the world.
Because the history of evolution is that life escapes all barriers. Life breaks free. Life expands to new territories. Painfully, perhaps even dangerously. But life finds a way.
Do you want to understand how to swim, or do you want to jump in and start swimming? Only people who are afraid of the water want to understand it. Other people jump in and get wet.
A man can see by starlight, if he takes the time.
Nobody is driven by abstractions like 'seeking truth.
Discovery, they believe, is inevitable. So they just try to do it first. That's the game in science.
Working inspires inspiration. Keep working. If you succeed, keep working. If you fail, keep working. If you are interested, keep working. If you are bored, keep working.
All human behavior has a reason. All behavior is solving a problem.
The rock, for its part, is not even aware of our existence because we are alive for only a brief instant of its lifespan. To it, we are like flashes in the dark.
You are the reason why he exists on this earth. You don't have the right to abandon him just because he's inconvenient or has trouble in school.
Extrapolating from the statistical growth of the legal profession, by the year 2035 every single person in the United States will be a lawyer, including newborn infants.
He prays because he knows he doesn't control it. He's at the mercy of it.
Human intelligence was more trouble than it was worth. It was more destructive than creative, more confusing than revealing, more discouraging than satisfying, more spiteful than charitable.
Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled.
False fears are a plague, a modern plague!
Life breaks free. Life expands to new territories. Painfully, perhaps even dangerously. But life finds a way.
Increasingly, the mathematics will demand the courage to face its implications.
It is especially difficult for modern people to conceive that our modern, scientific age might not be an improvement over the prescientific period.
You've never heard of Chaos theory? Non-linear equations? Strange attractors? Ms. Sattler, I refuse to believe you're not familiar with the concept of attraction.
Morality must keep up with technology because if a person is faced with the choice of being moral and dead or immoral and alive, they'll choose life everytime.
When you have a strongly held belief, don't you think it's important to express that belief accurately?
Expectation works in mysterious ways---and totally unconsciously.
They always say they didn't. I never heard of one who said, 'You know, I deserve this.' Never happens.
This fascination with computer models is something I understand very well. Richard Feynmann called it a disease. I fear he is right.
And entertainment has nothing to do with reality. Entertainment is antithetical to reality.
For our own species, evolution occurs mostly through our behavior. We innovate new behavior to adapt.
The system didn't screw you. The system revealed you.
Exercise invigorates the body and sharpens the mind.
Obsession is just a variety of addiction ~ Ian Malcolm
Personally, I don't deal much in theory. I have to deal with the facts. And on the basis of facts, I don't see much difference in the behavior of men and women.
At the edge of chaos, unexpected outcomes occur. The risk to survival is severe.
If you gamble long enough, you'll always lose -- the gambler is always ruined.
Most areas of intellectual life have discovered the virtues of speculation, and have embraced them wildly. In academia, speculation is usually dignified as theory.
Although personally, I think cyberspace means the end of our species.
Good novels are not written, they're rewritten!
To apply general tools to specific problems is to fail.
Only assholes put a nickname on their business card.
The academic world was marching toward ever more specialized knowledge, expressed in ever more dense jargon.
The nasty little apes that call themselves human beings can do nothing except run and hide.
