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Many Short-sighted Fools Think That Going To The Moon Was Just A Stunt. But The Astronauts Knew The Meaning Of What They Were Doing, As Is Shown By Neil Armstrong's First Words In Stepping Down Onto The Soil Of Luna: "one Small Step For A Man, One Giant Leap For Mankind."

-Robert A. Heinlein

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Many Short-sighted Fools Think

Robert A. Heinlein

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Many Short-sighted Fools Think That Going To The Moon Was Just A Stunt. But The Astronauts Knew The Meaning Of What They Were Doing, As Is Shown By Neil Armstrong's First Words In Stepping Down Onto The Soil Of Luna: "one Small Step For A Man, One Giant Leap For Mankind."

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Reason Is Poor Propaganda When Opposed By The Yammering, Unceasing Lies Of Shrewd And Evil And Self-serving Men.

Every Time We Killed A Thousand Bugs At A Cost Of One M.i. It Was A Net Victory For The Bugs. We Were Learning, Expensively, Just How Efficient A Total Communism Can Be When Used By A People Actually Adapted To It By Evolution; The Bug Commisars Didn't Care Any More About Expending Soldiers Than We Cared About Expending Ammo. Perhaps We Could Have Figured This Out About The Bugs By Noting The Grief The Chinese Hegemony Gave The Russo-anglo-american Alliance; However The Trouble With 'lessons From History' Is That We Usually Read Them Best After Falling Flat On Our Chins.

Your Enemy Is Never A Villain In His Own Eyes.

If I Don’t Start Having Service I’m Going To Swap You All For A Dog And Shoot The Dog.

There Are Hidden Contradictions In The Minds Of People Who "love Nature" While Deploring The "artificialities" With Which "man Has Spoiled Nature.'" The Obvious Contradiction Lies In Their Choice Of Words, Which Imply That Man And His Artifacts Are Not Part Of "nature" : But Beavers And Their Dams Are.

Anything Free Is Worth What You Pay For It.

Violence, Naked Force, Has Settled More Issues In History Than Has Any Other Factor.

Gratitude: An Imaginary Emotion That Rewards An Imaginary Behavior, Altruism. Both Imaginaries Are False Faces For Selfishness, Which Is A Real And Honest Emotion.

Never Crowd Youngsters About Their Private Affairs - Sex Especially. When They Are Growing Up, They Are Nerve Ends All Over, And Resent (quite Properly) Any Invasion Of Their Privacy. Oh, Sure, They'll Make Mistakes - But That's Their Business, Not Yours. (you Made Your Own Mistakes, Did You Not?)

There Is Solemn Satisfaction In Doing The Best You Can For Eight Billion People. Perhaps Their Lives Have No Cosmic Significance, But They Have Feelings. They Can Hurt.

All Human Behavior, All Human Motivations, All Man’s Hopes And Fears, Were Heavily Colored And Largely Controlled By Mankind’s Tragic And Oddly Beautiful Pattern Of Reproduction.

Death Is The Lot Of Us All, And The Only Way That The Human Race Has Ever Conquered Death Is By Treating It With Contempt. By Living Every Golden Minute As If One Had All Eternity.

Autobiography Is Usually Honest But It Is Never Truthful.

When He Kisses You He Isn't Doing Anything Else. You're His Whole Universe, And The Moment Is Eternal Because He Doesn't Have Any Plans And Isn't Going Anywhere. Just Kissing You ... It's Overwhelming.

I Wanted The Feeling Of Romance And The Sense Of Wonder I Had Known As A Kid. I Wanted The World To Be What They Had Promised Me It Was Going To Be - Instead Of The Tawdry, Lousy Fouled-up Mess It Is.

A "critic" Is A Man Who Creates Nothing.

May You Live As Long As You Wish And Love As Long As You Live.

But Space Travel Can't Ease The Pressure On A Planet Grown Too Crowded Not Even With Today's Ships And Probably Not With Any Future Ships-because Stupid People Won't Leave The Slopes Of Their Home Volcano Even When It Starts To Smoke And Rumble. What Space Travel Does Do Is Drain Off The Best Brains: Those Smart Enough To See A Catastrophe Before It Happens, And With The Guts To Pay The Price-abandon Home, Wealth, Friends, Relatives, Everything-and Go. That's A Tiny Fraction Of One Percent. But That's Enough.

I Believe That This Hairless Embryo With The Aching, Oversize Brain Case And The Opposable Thumb, This Animal Barely Up From The Apes, Will Endure --will Endure Longer Than His Home Planet, Will Spread Out To The Other Planets, To The Stars, And Beyond, Carrying With Him His Honesty, His Insatiable Curiosity, His Unlimited Courage --and His Noble Essential Decency. This I Believe With All My Heart.

Don't Explain Computers To Laymen. Simpler To Explain Sex To A Virgin.

I've Found Out Why People Laugh. They Laugh Because It Hurts So Much . . . Because It's The Only Thing That'll Make It Stop Hurting.

Oh, You Have To Charge 'em, Jubal. The Marks Won't Pay Attention If It's Free.

I Don't Trust A Man Who Talks About Ethics When He Is Picking My Pocket. But If He Is Acting In His Own Self-interest And Says So, I Have Usually Been Able To Work Out Some Way To Do Business With Him.

The Bible Is Such A Gargantuan Collection Of Conflicting Values That Anyone Can Prove Anything From It.

You Do Not Truly Own Anything That You Can't Carry In Both Arms At A Dead Run

Always Tell Her She Is Beautiful, Especially If She Is Not.

It's Amazing How Much 'mature Wisdom' Resembles Being Too Tired.

His Older Self Had Taught His Younger Self A Language Which The Older Self Knew Because The Younger Self, After Being Taught, Grew Up To Be The Older Self And Was, Therefore, Capable Of Teaching.

There Ought Not To Be Anything In The Whole Universe That Man Can't Poke His Nose Into-that's The Way We're Built And I Assume That There's Some Reason For That.

Does History Record Any Case In Which The Majority Was Right?

If You Pray Hard Enough, Water Will Run Uphill. How Hard? Why, Hard Enough To Make Water Run Uphill, Of Course!

A Competent And Self-confident Person Is Incapable Of Jealousy In Anything. Jealousy Is Invariably A Symptom Of Neurotic Insecurity.

It Would Take Centuries And He Must Grow And Grow And Grow, But He Was In No Hurry--he Grokked That Eternity And The Ever-beautifully-changing Now Were Identical.

A Boy Who Gets A C- In 'appreciation Of Television' Can't Be All Bad.

A Fool Cannot Be Protected From His Folly. If You Attempt To Do So, You Will Not Only Arouse His Animosity But Also You Will Be Attempting To Deprive Him Of Whatever Benefit He Is Capable Of Deriving From Experience. Never Attempt To Teach A Pig To Sing; It Wastes Your Time And Annoys The Pig.

If I Had A Boy Scout I Could Make A Fire By Rubbing His Hind Legs Together.

If Men Were The Automatons That Behaviorists Claim They Are, The Behaviorist Psychologists Could Not Have Invented The Amazing Nonsense Called 'behaviorist Psychology.'

The Right To Figure Things Out For Yourself Is The Only True Freedom Everyone Shares. Go Use It.

A Society That Gets Rid Of All Its Troublemakers Goes Downhill.

Sin Is Cruelty And Injustice, All Else Is Peccadillo.

I Don't See Why Human People Make Such A Heavy Trip Out Of Sex. It Isn't Anything Complex, It Is Simply The Best Thing In Life, Even Better Than Food.

The Most Ridiculous Concept Ever Perpetrated By Homo Sapiens Is That The Lord God Of Creation, Shaper And Ruler Of The Universes, Wants The Saccharine Adoration Of His Creations, That He Can Be Persuaded By Their Prayers, And Becomes Petulant If He Does Not Receive This Flattery. Yet This Ridiculous Notion, Without One Real Shred Of Evidence To Bolster It, Has Gone On To Found One Of The Oldest, Largest And Least Productive Industries In History.

Most Neuroses And Some Psychoses Can Be Traced To The Unnecessary And Unhealthy Habit Of Daily Wallowing In The Troubles And Sins Of Five Billion Strangers.

It Was Better To Live With Disappointment And Frustration Than To Live Without Hope.

There Is No Such Thing As 'social Gambling.' Either You Are There To Cut The Other Bloke's Heart Out And Eat It -- Or You're A Sucker. If You Don't Like This Choice -- Don't Gamble.

The Shamans Are Forever Yacking About Their Snake Oil Miracles. I Prefer The Real Mccoy, A Pregnant Woman.

Theology Is Never Any Help; It Is Searching In A Dark Cellar At Midnight For A Black Cat That Isn't There. Theologians Can Persuade Themselves Of Anything.

Contemplation Must Bring Forth Right Action In Order To Permit Further Growth.

Evolution Is A Process That Never Stops. Baboons Who Fail To Exhibit Moral Behavior Do Not Survive; They Wind Up As Meat For Leopards.

Never Own More Than You Can Carry In Both Hands At A Dead Run.

A Long And Wicked Life Followed By Five Minutes Of Perfect Grace Gets You Into Heaven. An Equally Long Life Of Decent Living And Good Works Followed By One Outburst Of Taking The Name Of The Lord In Vain- Then Have A Heart Attack At That Moment And Be Damned For Eternity. Is That The System?

Victory In Defeat, There Is None Higher. She Didn't Give Up, Ben; She's Still Trying To Lift That Stone After It Has Crushed Her. She's A Father Working While Cancer Eats Away His Insides, To Bring Home One More Pay Check. She's A Twelve-year-old Trying To Mother Her Brothers And Sisters Because Mama Had To Go To Heaven. She's A Switchboard Operator Sticking To Her Post While Smoke Chokes Her And Fire Cuts Off Her Escape. She's All The Unsung Heroes Who Couldn't Make It But Never Quit.

Take Big Bites. Anything Worth Doing Is Worth Overdoing.

Anything Worth Doing

Coffee Comes In Five Descending Stages: Coffee, Java, Jamoke, Joe, And Carbon Remover.

Animals Can Be Driven Crazy By Placing Too Many In Too Small A Pen. Homo Sapiens Is The Only Animal That Voluntarily Does This To Himself.

Once Upon A Time There Was A Martian Named Valentine Michael Smith.

Stranger In A Strange Land

If You Happen To Be One Of The Fretful Minority Who Can Do Creative Work, Never Force An Idea; You'll Abort It If You Do. Be Patient And You'll Give Birth To It When The Time Is Ripe. Learn To Wait.

Some People Insist That "mediocre" Is Better Than "best." They Delight In Clipping Wings Because They Themselves Can't Fly. They Despise Brains Because They Have None.

Morals - All Correct Moral Laws - Derive From The Instinct To Survive. Moral Behavior Is Survival Behavior Above The Individual Level.

Always Listen To Experts. They'll Tell You What Can't Be Done, And Why. Then Do It.

Never Force An Idea; You'll Abort It If You Do.

In The Absence Of Clearly-defined Goals, We Become Strangely Loyal To Performing Daily Trivia Until Ultimately We Become Enslaved By It.

When Any Government, Or Any Church For That Matter, Undertakes To Say To Its Subjects, This You May Not Read, This You Must Not See, This You Are Forbidden To Know, The End Result Is Tyranny And Oppression No Matter How Holy The Motives.

Women Seem To Have Almost Unlimited Capacity For Forgiveness. (since It Is Usually A Man Who Needs Forgiveness, This Must Be A Racial Survival Trait.

Every Law That Was Ever Written Opened Up A New Way To Graft.

There Are A Dozen Different Ways Of Delivering Destruction In Impersonal Wholesale, Via Ships Or Missiles Of One Sort Or Another, Catastrophes So Widespread, So Unselective That The War Is Over Because That Nation Or Planet Has Ceased To Exist. What We Do Is Entirely Different. We Make War As Personal As A Punch In The Nose. We Can Be Selective, Applying Precisely The Required Amount Of Pressure At The Specified Point At A Designated Time. We've Never Been Told To Go Down And Kill Or Capture All Left-handed Redheads In A Particular Area, But If They Tell Us To, We Can. We Will.

Marriage Is A Psychological Condition, Not A Civil Contract And A License. Once A Marriage Is Dead, It Is Dead, And It Begins To Stink Faster Than A Dead Fish.

The Hardest Part Of Gaining Any New Idea Is Sweeping Out The False Idea Occupying That Niche.

My Vocal Cords Lived Their Own Life, Wild And Free.

When A Place Gets Crowded Enough To Require Id's, Social Collapse Is Not Far Away. It Is Time To Go Elsewhere. The Best Thing About Space Travel Is That It Made It Possible To Go Elsewhere.

A Woman Is Not Property, And Husbands Who Think Otherwise Are Living In A Dreamworld.

I Took Up Writing Because I Needed Money. And I Continued To Write Because It's Safer Than Stealing And Easier Than Working.

It Takes Two To Create A Heaven, But Hell Can Be Accomplished By One.

It's A Man's Business To Be What He Is, And To Be It In Style.

Women And Cats Will Do As They Please, And Men And Dogs Should Relax And Get Used To The Idea.

Never Appeal To A Man's 'better Nature.' He May Not Have One. Invoking His Self-interest Gives You More Leverage.

A Dying Culture Invariably Exhibits Personal Rudeness. Bad Manners. Lack Of Consideration For Others In Minor Matters. A Loss Of Politeness, Of Gentle Manners, Is More Significant Than Is A Riot.

Butterflies Are Not Insects,' Captain John Sterling Said Soberly. 'they Are Self-propelled Flowers.

I Believe In My Neighbors. I Know Their Faults And I Know That Their Virtues Far Outweigh Their Faults.

Die Trying" Is The Proudest Human Thing.

Television Leaves No External Scars.

I Have Spent Too Much Of My Life Opening Doors For Cats—i Once Calculated That, Since The Dawn Of Civilization, Nine Hundred And Seventy-eight Man-centuries Have Been Used Up That Way. I Could Show You Figures.

Whether The Authorities Be Invaders Or Merely Local Tyrants, The Effect Of Such [gun Control] Laws Is To Place The Individual At The Mercy Of The State, Unable To Resist.

If You've Got The Truth You Can Demonstrate It. Talking Doesn't Prove It.

It's A Long Story. Want A Refill?" "no, Let's Start The Steak. Where's The Button?" "right Here." "well, Push It." "me? You Offered To Cook." "ben Caxton, I Will Lie Here And Starve Before I Will Get Up To Push A Button Six Inches From Your Finger" "as You Wish." He Pressed The Button. "but Don't Forget Who Cooked Dinner.

Most Gods Have The Manners And Morals Of A Spoiled Child.

Analogy Is Even Slipperier Than Logic.

More People Worry Themselves To Death Than Bleed To Death.

At Least Once Every Human Should Have To Run For His Life, To Teach Him That Milk Does Not Come From Supermarkets, That Safety Does Not Come From Policemen, That 'news' Is Not Something That Happens To Other People. He Might Learn How His Ancestors Lived And That He Himself Is No Different--in The Crunch His Life Depends On His Agility, Alertness, And Personal Resourcefulness.

It's Better To Copulate Than Not.

The Correct Way To Punctuate A Sentence That States: "of Course It Is None Of My Business, But -- " Is To Place A Period After The Word "but." Don't Use Excessive Force In Supplying Such A Moron With A Period. Cutting His Throat Is Only A Momentary Pleasure And Is Bound To Get You Talked About.

Each Man Is His Own Prisoner, In Solitary Confinement For Life.

Mighty Little Force Is Needed To Control A Man Whose Mind Has Been Hoodwinked; Contrariwise, No Amount Of Force Can Control A Free Man, A Man Whose Mind Is Free. No, Not The Rack, Not Fission Bombs, Not Anything - You Can't Conquer A Free Man; The Most You Can Do Is Kill Him.

But, If There Ever Was A Time In History When "peace" Meant That There Was No Fighting Going On, I Have Been Unable To Find Out About It.

You Obviously Don't Know What An Old Man Of The Sea Great Wealth Is. It Is Not A Fat Purse And Time To Spend It. Its Owner Finds Himself Beset On Every Side, At Every Hour, Wherever He Goes, By Persistent Pleaders, Like Beggars In Bombay, Each Demanding That He Invest Or Give Away Part Of His Wealth. He Becomes Suspicious Of Honest Friendship--indeed Honest Friendship Is Rarely Offered Him; Those Who Could Have Been His Friends Are Too Fastidious To Be Jostled By Beggars, Too Proud To Risk Being Mistaken For One.

It Is A Truism That Almost Any Sect, Cult, Or Religion Will Legislate Its Creeds Into Law If It Acquires The Political Power To Do So, And Will Follow It By Suppressing Opposition, Subverting All Education To Seize Early The Minds Of The Young, And By Killing, Locking Up, Or Driving Underground All Heretics.

Premenstrual Syndrome: Just Before Their Periods Women Behave The Way Men Do All The Time.

And Suddenly I Knew I Was People And Could Not Stop Laughing.

Being Sorry Won't Get You Into Heaven. Get Happy, Son. Get That Old Spring Into Your Step And Stay On Your Toes.

Budget The Luxuries First.

Man Is Not A Rational Animal, He Is A Rationalizing Animal.

Faith Strikes Me As Intellectual Laziness.

Never Pick Up A Stray Kitten . . . Unless You've Already Made Up Your Mind To Be Owned By It.

What A Wonderful World It Is That Has Girls In It!

We Learned Not To Waste Ammo Even On Warriors Except In Self-protection

The Greatest Fallacy Of Democracy Is That Everyone's Opinion Is Worth The Same.

To Assess The Intelligence Of A Committee, Divide The Iq Of Its Stupidest Member By The Number Of Members.

It May Take Endless Wars And Unbearable Population Pressure To Force-feed A Technology To The Point Where It Can Cope With Space. In The Universe, Space Travel May Be The Normal Birth Pangs Of An Otherwise Dying Race. A Test. Some Races Pass, Some Fail.

On Two Subjects The Overwhelming Majority Of People Regarded Their Own Opinions As Absolute Truth, And Sincerely Believed That Anyone Who Disagreed With Them Was Immoral, Outrageous, Sinful, Sacrilegious, Offensive, Intolerable, Stupid, Illogical, Treasonable, Actionable, Against The Public Interest, Ridiculous, And Obscene. The Two Subjects Were (of Course) Sex And Religion.

Jill: 'i Don't Pay Attention To Politics.' Ben: 'you Should. It's Barely Less Important Than Your Own Heart Beat.' Jill: 'i Don't Pay Attention To That, Either.'

I Think That Science Fiction Has A Distinct Therapeutic Value Because All Of It Has As Its Primary Postulate That The World Does Change. I Cannot Overemphasize The Importance Of That Idea.

Never Underestimate The Power Of Human Stupidity.

If You Don't Like Yourself, You Can't Like Other People. -- Lazarus Long.

Sin Lies Only In Hurting Others Unnecessarily. All Other "sins" Are Invented Nonsense.

Love Is That Condition In Which The Happiness Of Another Person Is Essential To Your Own... Jealousy Is A Disease, Love Is A Healthy Condition. The Immature Mind Often Mistakes One For The Other, Or Assumes That The Greater The Love, The Greater The Jealousy.

High Frontier Places A Bullet-proof Vest On Our Bare Chest. High Frontier Is As Non-aggressive As A Bullet-proof Vest. There Is No Way To Kill Anyone With High Frontier - All That High Frontier Can Do Is To Keep Others From Killing Us.

Men Are Not Potatoes!

Thinking Doesn't Pay. Just Makes You Discontented With What You See Around You.

From Somewhere, Back In My Youth, Heard Prof Say, 'manuel, When Faced With A Problem You Do Not Understand, Do Any Part Of It You Do Understand, Then Look At It Again.' He Had Been Teaching Me Something He Himself Did Not Understand Very Well—something In Math—but Had Taught Me Something Far More Important, A Basic Principle.

If An Elderly Respected Expert In A Given Field Tells You That Something Can Be Done He Is Almost Certainly Right. If An Elderly Respected Expert In A Given Field Tells You That Something Is Impossible, He Is Almost Certainly Wrong.

The Supreme Irony Of Life Is That Hardly Anyone Gets Out Of It Alive.

Love Is What Still Goes On When You're Not Horny.

Never Tease An Old Dog; He Might Have One Bite Left.

Decency Is Not News; It Is Buried In The Obituaries - But It Is A Force Stronger Than Crime.

My Old Man Taught Me Two Things: 'mind Own Business' And 'always Cut Cards.'

How Can I Possibly Put A New Idea Into Your Heads, If I Do Not First Remove Your Delusions?

My Folks Tried To Make A Preacher Of Me And Missed By A Narrow Margin… I Would Have Made A Good One If I Hadn’t Fallen Into The Fatal Folly Of Reading Anything I Could Lay Hands On. With Just A Touch More Self Confidence And A Liberal Helping Of Ignorance I Could Have Been A Famous Evangelist.

Self Confidence

A Child's Life Is Like A Piece Of Paper On Which Every Person Leaves A Mark.

Gratitude Is A Euphemism For Resentment.

It Seems To Me That The Secret Of True Happiness In Life Is To Know What You Are And Then Be Content To Be That, In Style, Head Up And Proud, And Not Yearn To Be Something Else.

But If You Didn't Have More Urgent Things To Do After Supper [in Boot Camp], You Could Write A Letter, Loaf, Gossip, Discuss The Myriad Mental Shortcomings Of Sergeants And, Dearest Of All, Talk About The Female Of The Species (we Became Convinced That There Was No Such Creatures, Just Mythology Created By Inflamed Imaginations - One Boy In Our Company Claimed To Have Seen A Girl, Over At Regimental Headquarters; He Was Unanimously Judged A Liar And A Braggart).

Money Is A Powerful Aphrodisiac But Flowers Work Almost As Well.

The Country And Culture Commonly Known As "america" Had Had A Badly Split Personality All Through Its History. Its Overt Laws Were Almost Always Puritanical For A People Whose Covert Behavior Tended To Be Rabelaisian; Its Major Religions Were All Apollonian In Varying Degrees---its Religious Revivals Were Often Hysterical In A Fashion Almost Dionysian.

There Is No Such Thing As Luck; There Is Only Adequate Or Inadequate Preparation To Cope With A Statistical Universe.

Darling, A True Lady Takes Off Her Dignity With Her Clothes And Does Her Whorish Best. At Other Times You Can Be As Modest And Dignified As Your Persona Requires.

Once There Was A Race, Quite Unlike The Human Race - Quite. I Have No Way Of Describing To You What They Looked Like Or How They Lived, But They Had One Characteristic You Can Understand: They Were Creative. The Creating And Enjoying Of Works Of Art Was Their Occupation And Their Reason For Being.

If You Do Not Believe That A Man Will Commit Murder For One Can Of Tomatoes, Then You Have Never Been Hungry.

Anything Free Costs Twice As Much In The Long Run Or Turns Out Worthless.

Limiting The Freedom Of News 'just A Little Bit' Is In The Same Category With The Classic Example 'a Little Bit Pregnant.

Luck Is A Tag Given By The Mediocre To Account For The Accomplishments Of Genius.

Must Be Yearning Deep In Human Heart To Stop Other People From Doing As They Please.

Whores Perform The Same Function As Priests, But Far More Thoroughly.

I Woke Up In Bed With A Man And A Cat. The Man Was A Stranger; The Cat Was Not

Art Is The Process Of Evoking Pity And Terror, Which Is Not Abstract At All But Very Human. What The Self-styled Modern Artists Are Doing Is A Sort Of Unemotional Pseudointellectual Masturbation . . . Whereas Creative Art Is More Like Intercourse, In Which The Artist Must Seduce -- Render Emotional -- His Audience, Each Time.

God Created Men To Test The Souls Of Women.

Don't Ever Become A Pessimist... A Pessimist Is Correct Oftener Than An Optimist, But An Optimist Has More Fun, And Neither Can Stop The March Of Events.

Learning . . . Is - Also An End In Itself.

Once A Man Gets A Reputation As A Liar, He Might As Well Be Struck Dumb, For People Do Not Listen To The Wind.

Democracy Is A Poor System Of Government At Best; The Only Thing That Can Honestly Be Said In Its Favor Is That It Is Eight Times As Good As Any Other Method The Human Race Has Ever Tried.

But Does Man Have Any 'right' To Spread Through The Universe? Man Is What He Is, A Wild Animal With The Will To Survive, And (so Far) The Ability, Against All Competition. Unless One Accepts That, Anything One Says About Morals, War, Politics, You Name It, Is Nonsense. Correct Morals Arise From Knowing What Man Is, Not What Do-gooders And Well-meaning Old Aunt Nellies Would Like Him To Be. The Universe Will Let Us Know - Later - Whether Or Not Man Has Any "right" To Expand Through It.

It Was Equally Imperative That This Chain Of Reactions Should Always Tend To Dampen, To Die Out. It Must Not Build Up, Or The Uranium Mass Would Explode Within A Time Interval Too Short To Be Measured By Any Means Whatsoever. Nor Would There Be Anyone Left To Measure It.

An Invention Is Something That Was "impossible" Up To Then That's Why Governments Grant Patents.

Any Group Is Weaker Than A Man Alone Unless They Are Perfectly Trained To Work Together.

Working Together

Delusions Are Often Functional. A Mother's Opinions About Her Children's Beauty, Intelligence, Goodness, Et Cetera Ad Nauseam, Keep Her From Drowning Them At Birth.

Behind Every Mystery Lies Another Mystery.

Around The Time Of The Terran Caesar Augustus, A Martian Artist Had Been Composing A Work Of Art. It Could Have Been Called A Poem, A Musical Opus, Or A Philosophical Treatise; It Was A Series Of Emotions Arranged In Tragic, Logical Necessity. Since It Could Be Experienced By A Human Only In The Sense In Which A Man Blind From Birth Might Have A Sunset Explained To Him, It Does Not Matter Which Category It Be Assigned.

With Eternity To Draw On There Could Be No Reason For Hurrying - 'hurry' Was Not A Concept In Martian.

A Man Who Marries At My Age Isn't Taking A Wife, He's Indenturing A Nurse.

A Slave Cannot Be Freed, Save He Do It Himself. Nor Can You Enslave A Free Man; The Very Most You Can Do Is Kill Him!

His Was Not A Small Mind Bothered By Logic And Consistency.

Long Human Words (the Longer The Better) Were Easy, Unmistakable, And Rarely Changed Their Meanings . . . But Short Words Were Slippery, Unpredictable, Changing Their Meanings Without Any Pattern.

You Live And Learn. Or You Don't Live Long.

God Split Himself Into A Myriad Parts That He Might Have Friends. This May Not Be True, But It Sounds Good, And Is No Sillier Than Any Other Theology.

A Brute Kills For Pleasure. A Fool Kills From Hate.

There Is An Old, Old Story About A Theologian Who Was Asked To Reconcile The Doctrine Of Divine Mercy With The Doctrine Of Infant Damnation. 'the Almighty,' He Explained, 'finds It Necessary To Do Things In His Official And Public Capacity Which In His Private And Personal Capacity He Deplores.

Death Is An Old Friend; I Know Him Well. I Lived With Him, Ate With Him, Slept With Him; To Meet Him Again Does Not Frighten Me Death Is As Necessary As Birth, As Happy In Its Own Way.

A Managed Democracy Is A Wonderful Thing... For The Managers... And Its Greatest Strength Is A 'free Press' When 'free' Is Defined As 'responsible' And The Managers Define What Is 'irresponsible'.

Circumstances Can Force Your Hand. So Think Ahead!

You Got The Impression That He Never Needed To Sleep - Just Ten-thousand-mile Checkups And Dust Him Off Occasionally.

There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch." A Libertarian Movement Slogan - The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, 1907.

There Comes A Time In The Life Of Every Human When He Or She Must Decide To Risk ‘his Life, His Fortune And His Sacred Honor’ On An Outcome Dubious. Those Who Fail The Challenge Are Merely Overgrown Children, Can Never Be Anything Else.

The Two Highest Achievements Of The Human Mind Are The Twin Concepts Of "loyalty" And "duty". Whenever These Twin Concepts Fall Into Disrepute, Get Out Of There Fast! You May Possibly Save Yourself, But It Is Too Late To Save That Society. It Is Doomed.

The Ethics Of Sex Is A Thorny Problem. Each Of Us Is Forced To Grope For A Solution He Can Live With - In The Face Of Preposterous, Unworkable, And Evil Code Of So-called 'morals.' Most Of Us Know The Code Is Wrong, Almost Everybody Breaks It. But We Pay Danegeld By Feeling Guilty And Giving Lip Service. Willy-nilly, The Code Rides Us, Dead And Stinking, An Albatross Around The Neck.

We Came Here For A Small, Informal Meeting. We Find You've Turned It Into A Circus. Well, If You're Going To Have A Circus, You've Got To Have Elephants.

Small Change Can Often Be Found Under Seat Cushions.

If A Grasshopper Tries To Fight A Lawnmower, One May Admire His Courage But Not His Judgement.

Money Is The Sincerest Of All Flattery. Women Love To Be Flattered. So Do Men.

There Are No Dangerous Weapons; There Are Only Dangerous Men.

Never Cast Pearls Before Swine.

Another Ingredient In A Happy Marriage: Budget The Luxuries First!

If A Country Can't Save Itself Through The Volunteer Service Of Its Own Free People, Then I Say : Let The Damned Thing Go Down The Drain!

A Religion Is A Source Of Happiness And I Would Not Deprive Anyone Of Happiness. But It Is A Comfort Appropriate For The Weak, Not For The Strong--and You Are Strong. The Great Trouble With Religion--any Religion--is That The Religionist, Having Accepted Certain Propositions By Faith, Cannot Thereafter Judge These Propositions By Evidence. One May Bask At The Warm Fire Of Faith Or Choose To Live In The Bleak Uncertainty Of Reason--but One Cannot Have Both.

To Permit Irresponsible Authority Is To Sell Disaster.

Happiness Consists In Getting Enough Sleep. Just That, Nothing More.

I Believe That Almost All Politicians Are Honest. For Every Bribed Alderman There Are Hundreds Of Politicians, Low Paid Or Not Paid At All, Doing Their Level Best Without Thanks Or Glory To Make Our System Work. If This Were Not True, We Would Never Have Gotten Past The Thirteen Colonies.

Some Things, The More You Understand The More You Loathe Them.

Love Is That Condition In Which The Happiness Of Another Person Is Essential To Your Own.

The Ten Commandments Are For Lame Brains. The First Five Are Solely For The Benefit Of The Priests And The Powers That Be; The Second Five Are Half Truths, Neither Complete Nor Adequate.

By The Data To Date, There Is Only One Animal In The Galaxy Dangerous To Man -- Man Himself. So He Must Supply His Own Indispensable Competition. He Has No Enemy To Help Him.

Sin Is Cruelty And Injustice, All Else Is Peccadillo. Oh, A Sense Of Sin Comes From Violating The Customs Of Your Tribe. But Breaking Custom Is Not Sin Even When It Feels So; Sin Is Wronging Another Person.

You Can Sway A Thousand Men By Appealing To Their Prejudices Quicker Than You Can Convince One Man By Logic.

Since When Was An Emotional Argument Won By Logic?

Do Not Confuse "duty" With What Other People Expect Of You; They Are Utterly Different. Duty Is A Debt You Owe To Yourself To Fulfill Obligations You Have Assumed Voluntarily. Paying That Debt Can Entail Anything From Years Of Patient Work To Instant Willingness To Die. Difficult It May Be, But The Reward Is Self-respect.

Pacifism Is A Shifty Doctrine Under Which A Man Accepts The Benefits Of The Social Group Without Being Willing To Pay; And Claims A Halo For His Dishonesty.

Churches Thrive On Martyrdom And Persecution.

Nowhere On Earth Was Sex So Vigorously Suppressed As In America--and Nowhere Else Was There Such A Deep Interest In It.

If Satan Should Ever Replace God He Would Find It Necessary To Assume The Attributes Of Divinity.

Most People Who Sneer At Technology Would Starve To Death If The Engineering Infrastructure Were Removed.

Magic Is Not Science, It Is A Collection Of Ways To Do Things Ways That Work But Often We Don't Know Why.

The Most Expensive Thing In The World Is A Second-best Military Establishment, Good But Not Good Enough To Win.

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