The Player of Games (Culture, #2)

by Iain M. Banks

the true gambler needs the excitement of potential loss, even ruin,

The better I do the worse things get because the more I have to lose.”

“Empires are synonymous with centralized—if occasionally schismatized—hierarchical power structures in which influence is restricted to an economically privileged class retaining its advantages through—usually—a judicious use of oppression and skilled manipulation of both the society’s information dissemination systems and its lesser—as a rule nominally independent—power systems. In short, it’s all about dominance.

Common misconception that; that fun is relaxing. If it is, you’re not doing it right.

“a guilty system recognizes no innocents. As with any power apparatus which thinks everybody’s either for it or against it, we’re against it. You would be too, if you thought about it. The very way you think places you among its enemies. This might not be your fault, because every society imposes some of its values on those raised within it, but the point is that some societies try to maximize that effect, and some try to minimize it.

We are what we do, not what we think. Only the interactions count

conscious cooperation was more efficient than feral competition?