"Anyway, the Shanna woman was abrasive, self-obsessed, smug—and those were her good points. Julia suspected that in a pinch the woman might also be careless, the one sin reality never forgave."

"Always keep your words soft and sweet, just in case you have to eat them."

"Definitions, her grandmother once said, had to be like a fat man’s belt—big enough to cover the subject but elastic enough to allow for change."

"Would an alien outsider judge America’s performance by My Lai and Wounded Knee or by Lincoln and Jefferson?"

"“I think,” Jordin said mildly, “a professional biologist would label that aggressive behavior.”"

"“Quite patently artificial,” she said. “Looks like it to me, and I’m just a physicist.” “I thought you were an engineer-pilot.” “Hey, physicists can do anything.” “Um. So they think. But not biology…”"

"She had always admired the way bureaucracies spontaneously produced leaden prose, blandly sliding from the mouths of people who absolutely believed everything they said."

"Nobody out here was going to find an alternative here to Earth’s tiresome clash of selfish individualisms and stifling collectivisms."

"Puzzled frowns in the audience. Science reporters they might be, but high school chemistry was going a bit too deep for most."

"Shanna put on the last movement of Beethoven’s Fifth and turned up the gain. Ludwig von Cornball, they had called him back at Moonbase One. Hipitude: post-postmodern irony. All because she played ol’ Ludwig so much—but who was more appropriate? What spirit better expressed the grandeur of an expedition to the edge of the solar system?"

"He’s an order of magnitude better than mere diplomats. He’s a conniver."

"Not sure. When don’t know, do experiment."

"After weeks of indoor work it actually felt good to be doing something—clean, direct, muscles and mind."

"Exercise erased cares."

"Science was a systematic way to avoid fooling yourself, after all."

"Media bloomed with florid discussions between completely uninformed people about every detail imaginable."

"“Viktor! Don’t tell me you cheated! A gentleman doesn’t cheat at cards.” “Am captain, not gentleman.”"

"That’s absurd. This is real life, not some tabloid fantasy."

"“It was just good luck, last minute luck.” “Your ‘luck’ was mostly sweat and intuition.”"

"All the astronauts were easy on the eyes. No coincidence. NASA didn’t train people the public wouldn’t want to watch."

"That’s how business works. There’s always somebody coming in on your blind side."

"Whole world is sitting on ass, watching glorious Twenty-first century on TV."

"She had long ago stopped counting how many times the 0.38 g of Mars had helped them through crucial moments. It had proved the only useful aspect of the planet."

"“I’ll be thinking of you as they roll me into a grave marked ‘Nobody Special.’”"

"To peer through the quick stubble of mathematics and see the wonders lurking behind was to momentarily live in the infinite, beyond the press of the ordinary world where everyone else dwelled in ignorance."

"Government doesn’t often move quickly, but when they do, it’s like an elephant stampede."

"Minds embodies in strange shapes would still find themselves sharpened against evolution’s ceaseless whetstone. What challenges would they face? In the end the universe as a whole was life’s ultimate opponent."

"Science’s success did not need a God to explain it; the world was enough."

"“Boy, do I hate these holier-than-thou types.” “Clerics.” “Anybody who tries to hem science in, tell it what it can and cannot do. Boundaries are best defined by pushing against them. Expanding our horizons, our sense of wonder.” She smiled. “There’s nothing holier than wow!?”"

"Einstein said that the only incomprehensible thing about the universe was that it was comprehensible. But resorting to God forgets what biology says—that our minds came out of the physical world, y’know, through evolution of early brain stems and neural systems to higher levels of complexity."

"Women lurching around on heels they couldn’t manage (“sexy evening columns” as Frederick’s termed them)—further proof yet again that money can’t buy a clue."

"He whispered, “Honey, it’s good ol’ love makes the world go round.” “Actually, it’s inertia.”"

"Physicists had abandoned God long ago and hoped that firing repeated questions at nature would get to the truth. What scientists really believed in was that the think-check-think-again style of scientific method would yield some species of Truth."

"There were the usual anxieties, starkly revealing the uneasiness that ordinary intellectuals had with science."

"“Sure,” Max said offhand, “there are plenty of archbishops wringing their hands, mumbling philosophers and New Age gab pouring out in the media, but so what?” She laughed. He said New Age as one word, “newage,” rhyming with “sewage.”"

"All the way up through the academic world she had spent a lot of energy fending off the blandly patronizing efforts to enter her in what she termed the Oppression Sweepstakes. Now that she had done something worth noting, blackness attached itself to her like a lamprey."

"Well, this was what dads were for: saying the unsayable when you needed it."

"Given a choice between existential despair and rapt religious fervor, her crowd chose marijuana."

"One of the better aspects of aging was that she no longer practiced dragging on cigarettes before the mirror, striving to get the right dissipated look, or tried on sunglasses until she found the kind the latest hip singer wore. Had she really worn those mirrorshades? Perfect holdovers from the Me Decade, because they let the viewer watch himself."

"Indeed, high-blown rhetoric plus uncheckable consequences were the two sure signatures of the crank."

"Four predictions of the Big Bang Theory have now been verified - surely enough to quench even the most biased critics."

"The beauty of science and the nature of scientific revelations constitute part of the modern theologian's perspective and toolbox."

"Science is paramount, but presents no challenge to a creed that rests on faith-based belief."

"Our knowledge of physics only takes us back so far. Before this instant of cosmic time, all the laws of physics or chemistry are as evanescent as rings of smoke."

"The Infinite has to be a relative concept. Go any distance: an infinite space means that there is more to be explored."

"The left hand of creation"

"Nowadays, cosmology seems rather unexciting."

"One can always find inflationary models to explain whatever phenomenon is represented by the flavour of the month."

"Presumption should never make us neglect that which appears easy to us, nor despair make us lose courage at the sight of difficulties."

"Evil communication corrupts good manners. I hope to live to hear that good communication corrects bad manners."