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1d938d4
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It had been virtually shattered by two inventions, which were, ironically enough, of purely human origin and owed nothing to the Overlords. The first was a completely reliable oral contraceptive: the second was an equally infallible method--as certain as fingerprinting, and based on a very detailed analysis of the blood--of identifying the father of any child. The effect of these two inventions upon human society could only be described as ..
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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0967334
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Much had been lost during the centuries, for men seldom bother to preserve the commonplace articles of everyday life.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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9fbbc81
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Hello, Dave," said Hal presently. "Have you found the trouble?" This"
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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b514b7a
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There was little work left of a routine, mechanical nature. Men's minds were too valuable to waste on tasks that a few thousand transistors, some photo-electric cells, and a cubic meter of printed circuits could perform.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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1496653
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First rule of government of the people, by the people, for the people: Never tell the people!
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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ffd5ba2
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But the characteristic that is truly special about our species...[is] our ability to model our world and understand both it and where we fit into its overall scheme....
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human-life
life
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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246649f
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Otsusta minu ule mu tegude jargi, ehkki neid on vahe, mitte mu sonade jargi, kuigi neid on palju.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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5e0a390
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He broke open the first of the meal packets, and inspected it without enthusiasm. The name on the label--SPACETASTIES--was enough to put him off. And he had grave doubts about the promise printed underneath: 'Guaranteed crumbless'.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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f841725
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Pero nadie pensaba que llegaria muy lejos, porque ni siquiera creo que fuera capaz de integrar e elevado a x. - ?Es posible tal ignorancia? - pregunto alguien con asombro. - Puede que este exagerando. Digamos x por e elevado a x.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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6d27e07
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And even if it never makes it to the big screen, millions of people have watched a very impressive version of the opening in the box office hit Independence Day. So when/if Childhood's End is finally made into a movie, the popcorn set will undoubtedly think we've ripped off I.D.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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564b2fd
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In my life I have found two things of priceless worth: learning and loving. Nothing else--not fame, not power, not achievement for its own sake--can possibly have the same lasting value.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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71f117e
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wonder if he can feel pain? Bowman thought briefly. Probably not, he told himself; there are no sense organs in the human cortex, after all. The human brain can be operated on without anesthetics. He
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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5bdc3f9
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the next day the government of South Africa announced that full civil rights would be restored to the white minority.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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683de56
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That suggested two possibilities. It was either too unintelligent to understand him--or it was very intelligent indeed, with its own powers of choice and volition. In that case, he must treat it as an equal. Even then he might underestimate it--but it would bear him no resentment, for conceit was not a vice from which robots often suffered.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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462bc70
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We're particularly anxious to get our hands on Pioneer 10--the first man-made object to escape from the Solar System.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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fce0a29
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On the placidly flowing river of time, he wished only to make a few ripples: he shrank from diverting its course.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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a7a39eb
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There's nothing left to struggle for, and there are too many distractions and entertainments. Do you realize that every day something like five hundred hours of radio and TV pour out over the various channels? If you went without sleep and did nothing else, you could follow less than a twentieth of the entertainment that's available at the turn of a switch! No wonder that people are becoming passive sponges - absorbing but never creating. D..
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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14e4d6a
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Do you believe in ghosts, Dim?" "Certainly not: but like every sensible man, I'm afraid of them. Why do you ask?"
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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4259194
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No group can survive, let alone thrive, unless what is good for the overall community is more important than individual freedom. Take, for example, resource allocation. How can anyone with any intelligence possibly justify, in terms of the overall community, the accumulation and hoarding of enormous material assets by a few individuals when others do not even have food, clothing, and other essentials?" In"
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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404258b
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But there was no substitute for reality; one should beware of imitations.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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bb51bc2
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No one worried except a few philosophers. The race was too intent upon savoring its new-found freedom to look beyond the pleasures of the present. Utopia was here at last: its novelty had not yet been assailed by the supreme enemy of all Utopias--boredom. Perhaps
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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31939d6
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Historically, both fear and public opinion were notoriously unconcerned about morality.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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df77cd2
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Ladies and gentlemen, those flames from the port engines are perfectly normal. The stewardess will be coming around in a moment to serve coffee, tea, or milk. I'm sorry we don't have anything stronger on this flight--regulations don't permit it.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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c34eb4d
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Even by the twenty-second century, no way had yet been discovered of keeping elderly and conservative scientists from occupying crucial administrative positions. Indeed, it was doubted if the problem ever would be solved.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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8178ec5
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He knew now that when power and ambition and curiosity were satisfied, there still were left the longings of the heart.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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1572b19
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For well-bred people do not, after all, care to read about the social gaffes of others.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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6b4e31e
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Finally, I would like to assure my many Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Jewish, and Muslim friends that I am sincerely happy that the religion which Chance has given you has contributed to your peace of mind (and often, as Western medical science now reluctantly admits, to your physical well-being). Perhaps it is better to be un-sane and happy, than sane and un-happy. But it is best of all to be sane and happy.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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2bbb1f2
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After all, it wasn't science that had transformed the world, but the marriage of technology and capitalism. The ignorant might blame science for the ills and evils of the modern era, but that was a case of mistaken identity--no research scientist had ever polluted a water table with a PCB, or performed a third-trimester abortion, or denied someone insurance based on a genetic screening, or turned the Internet into a covert way of peering in..
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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d77f0b7
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Dr. Brown considered all engineers to be nothing more than glorified carpenters and plumbers.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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233f54c
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We wanted you to have a feel for the size of your habitat, in case you needed that to be more comfortable with the design process.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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dfd027d
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The time has come," said Dr. Dimitri Moisevitch to his old friend Heywood Floyd, "to talk of many things. Of shoes and spaceships and sealing wax, but mostly of monoliths and malfunctioning computers."
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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c7238a6
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One hemisphere was a giant bull's-eye, a series of concentric rings where solid rock had once flowed in kilometer-high ripples under some ancient hammer blow from space.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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27f4173
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throbbed into silence... "And that's the way it was--goodbye, wonderful and terrible Twentieth"
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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0bfd521
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They found it hard to imagine the smog-choked cities of the Twentieth Century, and the waste, greed, and appalling environmental disasters of the Oil Age.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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739d685
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He was now probably the world's leading authority on the greatest explorer of all time,
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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334bc1f
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Tranquillity was not a state of mind that could be sustained for long.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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c4ac8a4
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Anything that had happened once on Earth should be expected millions of times elsewhere in the Universe; that was almost an article of faith among scientists.
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science
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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8a9d3d8
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One sample is poor statistics, my math prof used to say.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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4e46864
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Each had its own two-digit reference; when he punched that, the postage-stamp-size rectangle would expand until it neatly filled the screen and he could read it with comfort. When he had finished, he would flash back to the complete page and select a new subject for detailed examination.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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92b807f
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like everything that was worth doing, that would take time and practice.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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7480dd3
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Reliability depended on redundancy and automatic checking, and human intervention was much more likely to do harm than good.
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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39405e6
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there's something fundamentally wrong with the wiring of our brains, which makes us incapable of consistent logical thinking. To make matters worse, though all creatures need a certain amount of aggressiveness to survive, we seem to have far more than is absolutely necessary. And no other animal tortures its fellows as we do. Is this an evolutionary accident--a piece of genetic bad luck?
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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c1c2de0
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He felt confident that when he pulled open the drawer of that desk, he would find a Gideon Bible inside it....
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Arthur C. Clarke |
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a0ad093
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History never repeats itself--but historical situations recur." As"
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Arthur C. Clarke |