"Straightforward preaching spoils the effectiveness of a story. If you can't resist the impulse to improve your fellow human beings, do it subtly."

Isaac Asimov Science See all quotes by Isaac Asimov →

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“To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today.”

“Milton Ashe is not the type to marry a head of hair and a pair of eyes.”

“Creationists don't want equal time, … they want all the time there is.”

“Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.”

“If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them.”

“The unwritten motto of United States Robot and Mechanical Men Corp. was well-known: “No employee makes the same mistake twice. He is fired the first time.”

Resonant Thoughts

"We are human, and nothing is more interesting to us than humanity. The appeal of literature is that it is so thoroughly a human thing — by, for and about human beings. If you lose that focus, you obvi…"

— M. H. Abrams

Literature1912–2015

#Human Nature

"Theological disputations are a favorite hobby of mine, but even the most eloquent and learned disputant finds his abilities wane before the persuasiveness of the thumb-lock, the nose-pincers and the m…"

— Lin Carter

Literature1930–1988

#philosophy

"The refined simplicity should develop out of the complex. It would have been more logical if silent pictures had grown out of the talkie instead of the other way around."

— Mary Pickford

Entertainment1892–1979

#philosophy

"The point, being indivisible, occupies no space. That which occupies no space is nothing. The limiting surface of one thing is the beginning of another."

— Leonardo da Vinci

Mathematics1452–1519

#philosophy