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He was at home nowhere, an orphan everywhere.
“Why not? You and I are eccentrics. We’re certainly not typical of the people living on Terminus. As for criminals, that’s a matter of definition. And if criminals are the price we must pay for rebels, heretics, and geniuses, I’m willing to pay it. I demand the price be paid.”
“Perhaps, but even if my pleasures were poverty-stricken, I would keep my own joys and sorrows and be satisfied with them, thin as they are, and be me and not blood brother to the nearest rock.”
It does seem to me that my sole occupation on board ship is subject-changing. Why is that?”
“It seems to me, then, that a robot that can in no way be distinguished from a human being is a human being. If you were such a robot, you would be nothing but a human being to me.”
“Human beings, of course. All parts of Gaia are alive and equal in that respect, but some, like human beings, are obviously more equal than others.”
—There is a kind of free-masonry among males,” Trevize was grinning now, “and one male doesn’t betray another fellow-male. He would even help, if requested. The reasoning, I suppose, is that it might be the helper’s turn next to be helped.
“Ah, a strange world, this Elsewhere. A most unusual collection of human beings are native to it.
Common belief, even universal belief, is not, in itself, evidence.”
“if you wish to call the truth impossible, that is your privilege, but it will get you nowhere.”
“It may be that Comporellon doesn’t search for that very reason. If we fail, or if we find an Earth obviously different from the legends, the reverse would take place. Comporellian legendry in general would be blasted and made into a laughingstock. Comporellon wouldn’t risk that.”
“You have brought misfortune to me, already, for now that I have known you, Comporellian men will seem more sapless still. I will be left with an unappeasable longing. He Who Punishes has already seen to that.”
A planet might deteriorate even if human beings existed upon it, if the society were itself abnormal and did not understand the importance of preserving the environment.”
From that experience, Trevize had emerged with the firm conviction that for some reason known only to the canine mind and its odor-analyzing ability, he was a fixed object of doggish devotion.
“Would you give your life for him, Trevize?” “I might, if I didn’t have time to think. If I did have time to think, I would hesitate and I might funk it. I’m not as good as he is. And because of that, I have this terrible urge to protect and keep him good. I don’t want the Galaxy to teach him not to be good. Do you understand?
“He is an Isolate. He is not selfless because he is a part of a greater whole. He is selfless because he is selfless. Do you understand me? He has all to lose and nothing to gain, and yet he is what he is. He shames me for being what I am without fear of loss, when he is what he is without hope of gain.”
friends. You can keep on pointing out the advantage of Galaxia and I may keep on refusing to accept your arguments, but even so, and despite that, let us be friends.”
“Is this death?” It was Pelorat’s voice. Trevize tried to whisper, and found he could. “Why ask?” he said, with a sense of vast relief. “The mere fact that you can ask shows it is not death.”
They walked through silence, except for the sound of their own steps; through darkness, except for the light in their immediate vicinity; through death, except for their own lives.
If you start dismissing anyone or anything you want to do away with as just a this or just a that, you can destroy anything you wish. There are always categories you can find for them.”
Three seems to be a significant number in these things, perhaps because it is the first odd number so that it is the smallest decisive number.
He sat back in his pilot’s chair and decided, once again, that the one evil of piloting a gravitic ship with a computer so advanced was that one could never—never—pilot any other type of ship again.
It was pure convention, dating back into the primeval mists, and it was followed slavishly. If one looked at a familiar map with south above, one didn’t recognize it. It had to be turned about to make sense. And all things being equal, one turned north—and “above.”
“Easily—when your mind gets sick in the middle of the night and begins searching the vast realm of fantasy for anything that can deepen despair.
“What do you mean by a monumental building?” Pelorat smiled his tight little stretching of the lips. “I scarcely know. Fashions change from world to world and from time to time. I suspect, though, that they always look large, useless, and expensive.
Stored energy had a way of leaking, no matter what was done to stop it. That was another aspect of the all-embracing, irresistible second law of thermodynamics.
“He? Willing to speak?” said Hiroko scornfully. “Thou must ask, rather, if he be ever ready to cease from speaking. He is but a man, and will therefore speak, if allowed, till a fortnight hence, with no pause. I mean no offense, respected sir.”
Trevize muttering the usual male complaint concerning the time the women had taken.
