Novelists From England

"Only the final choice would require a human decision: enter the Link, or decline to do so? It occurred to Chan that perhaps this was the choice that humans were least qualified to make. He recognized in himself the tendency to say, we’ve come so far, we can’t possibly change our minds now. People following that philosophy died climbing mountains, they signed disastrous contracts, they flew into hurricanes, and they embarked on lifelong commitments to the wrong mates. Perhaps they headed to the stars for the same reason."

"Humans were inexplicable only if you assumed that they were logical."

"Logic was good, but too much logical analysis inhibited action. Darya had heard it seriously suggested that the original human cladeworld, Earth, had degenerated to an ineffectual backwater of a planet because computer trade-off analysis had increasingly been used as the basis for decision making. On purely logical grounds, no one would ever explore, invent, rejoice, sing, strive, fall in love, or take physical and psychological risks of any kind. Better to stay in bed in the morning; it was much safer."

"When a person was so consistently wrong, it was time to give up having opinions."

"Nothing in life produce a more powerful joy than a near miss by the Angel of Death."

"One form of insanity bears the name curiosity."

"Trouble comes in a thousand different ways. Not usually anything you expect, either. That’s why it’s trouble."

"Didn’t anything scare the two aliens? Sometimes she wondered if humans were the only beings in the universe with a sense of cowardice (be charitable, and call it and instinct for self-preservation)."

"He was a professional trouble-shooter. That was a fancy name for an idiot."

"He realized a profound truth: there is no one so generous as a bureaucrat spending other people’s money."

"Theories were a dime a dozen. The partition that separated science and wishful thinking was evidence: observations and firm facts."

"Science wasn’t a show-business talent, conducted in large halls and decided by audience applause."

"“Professor Lang’s important work, with all due respect, does not answer that question.” The knife, sliding in hidden behind the compliment. “With all due respect” meant “with no respect at all.”"

"“How did you do that?” The Hymenopt inclined her head. “With respect, Professor Lang, great intellectual power, even at the level you possess it, is not always a substitute for humble practical experience.”"

"“To a logical entity, such as myself, the behavior of organic intelligences such as yourself, provides many anomalies. For example, the history of humanity, the species concerning which my data banks have most information, is replete with cases where humans, on little or no evidence, have believed in impossibilities. They have accepted the existence of a variety of improbable entities: of gods and demons, of fairies and elves, of ‘good luck’ charms, of magic potions, of curses and hexes and evil eyes.” “Tally, if you’re going to blather about—” “But at the same time, humans and other organic intelligences often seem unwilling to accept the implications and consequences of their own legitimate scientific theories.”"

"His sin was something that scientists had done for thousands of years. Scientists didn’t usually change data, not unless they were outright charlatans. But when facts didn’t agree with theory, there was an awful temptation to find reasons for rejecting the offending data and and hanging on to the theory. Ptolemy had done it. Newton had done it. Darwin had done it. Einstein had done so explicitly."

"Improbable as it seems, I think she admires you more than me."

"Are we perhaps guilty of temporal chauvinism, believing that our own time is uniquely important, as all generation tend to think that their time is of unique importance?"

"What I found was worse than diversity—it was insanity."

"Darya had a few moments of wild hope before logic intruded."

"Nothing was more fascinating than information. It was infinite in quantity, or effectively so, limited only by the total entropy of the universe; it was vastly diverse and various; it was eternal; It was available for collection, anywhere and anytime. And, perhaps best of all, E. C. Tally thought with the largest amount of self-satisfaction that his circuits permitted, you never knew when it might come in useful."

"Hans Rebka sat on a rounded pyramid never designed for contact with the human posterior, and thought about luck. There was good luck, which mostly happened to other people. And there was bad luck, which usually happened to you. Sometimes, through observation, guile, and hard work, you could avoid bad luck—even make it look like good luck, to others. But you would know the difference, even if no one else did. Well, suppose that for a change good luck came your way. How should you greet that stranger to your house? You could argue that its arrival was inevitable, that the laws of probability insisted that good and bad must average out over long enough times and large enough samples. Then you could welcome luck in, and feel pleased that your turn had come round at last. Or you could hear what Hans Rebka was hearing: the small, still voice breathing in his ear, telling him that this good luck was an impostor, not to be trusted."

"If you win too easy, better ask what’s going on that you don’t know about."

"But no one, no matter how intelligent, could make good inferences from bad data."

"Darya was beginning to understand why she might be ruined forever for academic life. Certainly, the world of ideas had its own pleasures and thrills. But surely there was nothing to compete with the wonderful feeling of being alive, after knowing without a shadow of doubt that you would be dead in one second."

"“We’re all here,” said Louis Nenda’s voice. “Where’s here? Can you see?” “Not a thing. Black as a politician’s heart.”"

"Kallik’s explanation was neat, logical, and complete. Like most such explanations, it was, in Hans Rebka’s view, almost certainly wrong. That was not the way the real world operated."

"His mind was as furiously active as his hormones."

"The answers come pat and fast. You see, what the downsiders want isn’t an explanation; it’s a catchphrase they can use instead of an explanation."

"Darya found the logic of her thought processes so compelling that it never occurred to her that others might have a different reaction. But they did."

"Old habits did not just die hard. They refused to die at all."

"Once you were committed to a course of action, you didn’t waste your time looking back and second-guessing the decision, because every action in life was taken on the basis of incomplete information. You looked at what you had, and you did all you could to improve the odds; but at some point you had to roll the dice—and live or die with whatever you had thrown."

"Happy endings were for children’s stories and fool. You live in misery, and then you die. Life, by definition, was not designed to end happily. Louis continued aft. No happy ending, then. That was a fact, certain as death itself. He was living at the moment in a dream, an imagined world where everything went right. But—dreams are real while they last. Could you say more of life? A dream sequence was no more than a happy interlude, but maybe a happy interlude could last for an awful long time."

"Somehow he felt more resigned than surprised. Things had been going far too well for far too long. Just when you thought you had the universe by the tail, it turned round and bit you on the ass."

"Don’t confuse caution with cowardice."

"Darya stood up, heard her voice rising, and knew she was doing what she insisted what a scientist should never do: allowing passion and the defense of personal theories to interfere with logical analysis."

"“We’re just too nosy, Commander,” he went on. “Most humans have their patience level set a little too low, and their curiosity a bit too high.”"

"We are creatures of conditioning, Commander. We assume that what we know is easy, and we find mysterious whatever we do not."

"What does one do when a madman suggests an appealing course of action? One worries—but probably goes along with it."

"Be an optimist! It’s the only way to live."

"It might be an impossible task, but at least it was a well-defined one. The rules for performance were no problem. He had learned them long ago on Teufel: you succeed, or you die trying. Until you succeed, you never relax. Until you die, you never give up."

"The partners were there; gravity was calling the changes, and the cosmic dance was ready to begin."

"That’s what logic says. But I say, phooey, who wants logic? Not you, and not me. We want results."

"No purpose is served by making private suffering into a public event."

"Mathematics is universal. But very little else is."

"Human culture is built around four basic elements: sexual relationships, territorial rights, individual intellectual dominance, and desire for group acceptance. The H’Sirin model using just these four traits as independent variables enables accurate prediction of human behavior patterns. On the basis of this, human culture is judged to be of Level Two, with few prospects for advancement to a higher level. —From the Universal Species Catalog (Subclass: Sapients)"

"Everyone was polite; no one was happy."

"Human history extends for approximately ten thousand years before the Expansion, with written records available for roughly half that time. Unfortunately, the human tendency for self-delusion, self-aggrandizement, and baseless faith in human superiority over all other intelligent life-forms renders much of the written record unreliable. Serious research workers are advised to seek alternative primary data sources concerning humans. —From the Universal Species Catalog (Subclass: Sapients)"

"“It is my personal belief that nothing can exceed light speed,” said Sy at last. “I will mistrust anyone, government or Immortal, man or woman, human or alien, who attempts to tell me otherwise without providing convincing evidence.”"

"“I’ve been testing Kallen’s Law—my name for it, not his. Remember what he said? ‘Anything that can be put into a data bank by one person can be taken out of it by another, if you’re smart enough and have enough time.’ That’s one problem with a computer-based society, and one reason why computers were so tightly controlled on Pentecost: it’s almost impossible to prevent access to computer-stored information.”"