"(T)he idealized world Ayn Rand has created to facilitate her wishful theorizing has no more logical connection to our…"

"The problem with aging is not that it’s one damn thing after another—it’s every damn thing, all at once, all the time…"

"I had never seen so many old people in one place at one time. Neither had Harry. “It’s like Wednesday morning at the …"

"What’s the point of being in charge if you can’t indulge in pointless favoritism."

"The recruit was Sam McCain; in one of our lunch sessions I recalled Sarah O’Connell describing him as more mouth than…"

"In this universe, experience counts."

"I’m not sure I like their plan for converting us to their religion, seeing as it involves dying and all."

"“Obviously, the Rraey have some way to predict, with a high degree of accuracy, where our ships are going to skip. Ho…"

"“I’m not insane, sir,” I said. “I have a finely calibrated sense of acceptable risk.”"

"The failure mode of clever is “asshole.”"