Second Foundation (Foundation, #3)

by Isaac Asimov

Where history concerns mainly personalities, the drawings become either black or white according to the interests of the writer.

“May I sit down,” said Channis, “and explain something to you in picture drawings? Please.”

Finished products are for decadent minds. His was an evolving mechanism and the Second Foundation was the instrument of that evolution.

“Well, he used to say that only a lie that wasn’t ashamed of itself could possibly succeed. He also said that nothing had to be true, but everything had to sound true.

“Do you mind, sir? How old is she?” “Fourteen, day before yesterday.” “Fourteen? Great Galaxy— Tell me, has she ever said she expects to marry someday?” “No, she hasn’t. Not to me.” “Well, if she ever does, shoot him. The one she’s going to marry, I mean.” He stared earnestly into the older man’s eyes. “I’m serious. Life could hold no greater horror than living with what she’ll be like when she’s twenty.

Speech, originally, was the device whereby Man learned, imperfectly, to transmit the thoughts and emotions of his mind. By setting up arbitrary sounds and combinations of sounds to represent certain mental nuances, he developed a method of communication—but one which in its clumsiness and thick-thumbed inadequacy degenerated all the delicacy of the mind into gross and guttural signaling.

Every human being lived behind an impenetrable wall of choking mist within which no other but he existed. Occasionally there were the dim signals from deep within the cavern in which another man was located—so that each might grope toward the other. Yet because they did not know one another, and could not understand one another, and dared not trust one another, and felt from infancy the terrors and insecurity of that ultimate isolation—there was the hunted fear of man for man, the savage rapacity of man toward man.

The most hopelessly stupid man is he who is not aware that he is wise.

Remember, to be truly effective, it is not necessary to hold the mind under a tight, controlling barrier which to the intelligent probe is as informative as a naked mentality. Rather, one should cultivate an innocence, an awareness of self, and an unselfconsciousness of self which leaves one nothing to hide.

“It is that of a civilization based on mental science. In all the known history of Mankind, advances have been made primarily in physical technology; in the capacity of handling the inanimate world about Man. Control of self and society has been left to chance or to the vague gropings of intuitive ethical systems based on inspiration and emotion. As a result, no culture of greater stability than about fifty-five percent has ever existed, and these only as the result of great human misery.”

The crowds surged about the little group with the true indifference of disconnected crowds everywhere. They were effectively alone.

“How well can any individual know any other? Obviously, my knowledge is inadequate.”

It’s always easy to explain the unknown by postulating a superhuman and arbitrary will.