Foundation's Edge Quotes

“You show me someone who can't understand people and I'll show you someone who has built up a false image of himself.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“It seems to me, Golan, that the advance of civilization is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“The advance of civilization is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“Pelorat sighed. 'I will never understand people.'
'There's nothing to it. All you have to do is take a close look at yourself and you will understand everyone else.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“The Library was outmoded and archaic—it had been so even in Ebling Mis's time—but that was all to the good. Pelorat always rubbed his hands with excitement when he thought of an old and outmoded Library. The older and the more outmoded, the more likely it was to have what he needed. In his dreams, he would enter the Library and ask in breathless alarm, 'Has the Library been modernized? Have you thrown out the old tapes and computerizations?' And always he imagined the answer from dusty and ancient librarians, 'As it has been, Professor, so it is still.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“humanity could share a common insanity and be immersed in a common illusion while living in a common chaos.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“There’s no record in the history of the Galaxy of any society being so foolish as to use nuclear explosions as a weapon of war.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“The closer to the truth, the better the lie, and the truth itself, when it can be used, is the best lie.’ ”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“Anyone who displays a capacity for double-dealing must forever be suspected of being capable of displaying it again.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“He didn’t believe that, surely.” “Of course not! But he had to pretend he did, as otherwise he would have had no choice but to be insulted. And since there would be nothing he could do about that, being insulted would only lead to humiliation. And since he didn’t want that, the simplest path to follow was to believe what I said.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“We abandoned the appearance of power to preserve the essence of it.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“the eye were no more than sense organs. The brain was no more than a central switchboard, encased in bone and removed from the working surface of the body. It was the hands that were the working surface, the hands that felt and manipulated the universe. Human beings thought with their hands. It was their hands that were the answer of curiosity, that felt and pinched and turned and lifted and hefted. There were animals that had brains of respectable size, but they had no hands and that made all the difference.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“A happy wall is a long-lived wall, a practical wall, a useful wall.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“A wall is happy when it is well designed, when it rests firmly on its foundation, when its symmetry balances its part and produces no unpleasant stresses. Good design can be worked out on the mathematical principles of mechanics.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“When one’s home has a really excellent computer capable of reaching other computers anywhere in the Galaxy, one scarcely needs to budge, you know.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“You underestimate the depths to which mysticism can bury rationality, Golan.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation’s Edge

“Never let your sense of morals keep you from doing what is right.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“Toda humanidade pode compartilhar a mesma insanidade e estar imersa em uma ilusão comum enquanto vive em um caos comum.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.’ ”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“Well, besides, I’ve arranged with the computer that anyone who doesn’t look and sound like one of us will be killed if he—or she—tries to board the ship. I’ve taken the liberty of explaining that to the Port Commander. I told him very politely that I would love to turn off that particular facility out of deference to the reputation that the Sayshell City Spaceport holds for absolute integrity and security—throughout the Galaxy, I said—but the ship is a new model and I didn’t know how to turn it off.”
“He didn’t believe that, surely.”
“Of course not! But he had to pretend he did, as otherwise he would have had no choice but to be insulted. And since there would be nothing he could do about that, being insulted would only lead to humiliation. And since he didn’t want that, the simplest path to follow was to believe what I said.”
“And that’s another example of how people are?”
“Yes. You’ll get used to this.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“All you have to do is take a close look at yourself and you will understand everyone else.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“Golan, spuse Pelorat, am impresia ca progresul civilizatiei nu reprezinta nimic altceva decat un exercitiu de limitare a intimitatii.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“I gave it directions—to work out a course through hyperspace to a position near Sayshell Planet, the capital of the Sayshell Union. It did, and charted a course in twenty-nine steps, which is arrogance of the worst sort.” “Why arrogance?” “The error in the first Jump makes the second Jump that much less certain, and the added error then makes the third Jump pretty wobbly and untrustworthy, and so on. How do you calculate twenty-nine steps all at once? The twenty-ninth could end up anywhere in the Galaxy, anywhere at all. So I directed it to make the first step only. Then we could check that before proceeding.” “The cautious approach,” said Pelorat warmly. “I approve!” “Yes, but having made the first step, might the computer not feel wounded at my having mistrusted it? Would it then be forced to salve its pride by telling me there was no error at all when I asked it? Would it find it impossible to admit a mistake, to own up to imperfection? If that were so, we might as well not have a computer.” Pelorat’s long and gentle face saddened. “What can we do in that case, Golan?” “We can do what I did—waste a day. I checked the position of several of the surrounding stars by the most primitive possible methods: telescopic observation, photography, and manual measurement. I compared each actual position with the position expected if there had been no error. The work of it took me all day and wore me down to nothing.” “Yes, but what happened?” “I found two whopping errors and checked them over and found them in my calculations. I had made the mistakes myself.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“There are always tales and there is always a patriotic refusal to disbelieve, even though the tales are never in the least credible and are never believed by anyone not of the world that produces them.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“You are now too old to be made a scholar after my fashion, but you are never too old to learn more than you already know and to become able to do more than you already can.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation’s Edge

“Ideally there should be no detectable connection between any two Observers, so that the loss of one would not entail the loss of any other.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation’s Edge

“I have always found in my own work – quite different from yours, of course, but possibly we may generalize – that zeroing in tightly on a particular problem is self-defeating. Why not relax and talk about something else, and your unconscious mind – not labouring under the weight of concentrated thought – may solve the problem for you.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation’s Edge

“Pelorat said, ‘It seems to me, Golan, that the advance of civilization is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation’s Edge

“Societies create their own history and tend to wipe out lowly beginnings, either by forgetting them or inventing totally fictitious heroic rescues.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge

“All humanity could share a common insanity and be immersed in a common illusion while living in a common chaos.”
― Isaac Asimov, Foundation's Edge