Quotes from Arthur C. Clarke

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong. 2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible. 3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

the newspapers of Utopia, he had long ago decided, would be terribly dull.

In this single galaxy of ours there are eighty-seven thousand million suns. [...] In challenging it, you would be like ants attempting to label and classify all the grains of sand in all the deserts of the world. [...] It is a bitter thought, but you must face it. The planets you may one day possess. But the stars are not for man.

When in doubt, say nothing and move on.

Open the pod bay doors, Hal.

Then he [The Star Child] waited, marshaling his thoughts and brooding over his still untested powers. For though he was master of the world, he was not quite sure what to do next. But he would think of something.

The time was fast approaching when Earth, like all mothers, must say farewell to her children.

I don't believe in God but I'm very interested in her.

If such a thing had happened once, it must surely have happened many times in this galaxy of a hundred billion suns.

But he knew well enough that any man in the right circumstances could be dehumanised by panic.

Humor was the enemy of desire.

If he was indeed mad, his delusions were beautifully organized.

The creation of wealth is certainly not to be despised, but in the long run the only human activities really worthwhile are the search for knowledge, and the creation of beauty. This is beyond argument, the only point of debate is which comes first.

Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out.

Now I can rejoice that I knew you, rather than mourn because I lost you.

The Devil in the Dark] impressed me because it presented the idea, unusual in science fiction then and now, that something weird, and even dangerous, need not be malevolent. That is a lesson that many of today's politicians have yet to learn.

ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS, EXCEPT EUROPA. ATTEMPT NO LANDING THERE. USE THEM TOGETHER. USE THEM IN PEACE.

They would never know how lucky they had been. For a lifetime, mankind had achieved as much happiness as any race can ever know. It had been the Golden Age. But gold was also the color of sunset, of autumn: and only Karellen's ears could catch the first wailings of the winter storms.

And because, in all the Galaxy, they had found nothing more precious than Mind, they encouraged its dawning everywhere. They became farmers in the fields of stars; they sowed, and sometimes they reaped. And sometimes, dispassionately, they had to weed.

Now times had changed, and the inherited wisdom of the past had become folly.

It is a bitter thought, but you must face it. The planets you may one day possess. But the stars are not for man.

Religion is a by-product of fear. For much of human history it may have been a necessary evil, but why was it more evil than necessary? Isn't killing people in the name of god a pretty good definition of insanity?

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Two possibilities exist: Either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.

Unlike the animals, who knew only the present, Man had acquired a past; and he was beginning to grope toward a future.