Quotes from Foundation's Edge

“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, quote from 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, quote from Foundation's Edge

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

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

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

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

“You show me someone who can’t understand people and I’ll show you someone who has built up a false image of himself—no offense intended.”
― Isaac Asimov, quote from Foundation's Edge

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

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

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

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Popular quotes

“en route to such trees and get up before dawn, something they normally hate to do.”
― Frans de Waal, quote from Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?

“What happened when you gave in to temptation. When you listened to the fallen angels of your nature.”
― Louise Penny, quote from A Great Reckoning

“The reason is that the English language treats a changing entity (a loaded wagon, sprayed roses, a painted door) in the same way that it treats a moving entity (pitched hay, sprayed water, slopped paint). A state is conceived as a location in a space of possible states, and change is equated with moving from one location to another in that state-space. In this way, locative constructions illustrate a second discovery in the hidden world down the rabbit hole, the ubiquity of metaphor in everyday language.”
― Steven Pinker, quote from The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature

“Liquid nitrogen,” said Olaf. “Try not to shoot them.” “Really cold?” “Really explosive.”
― Peter Clines, quote from The Fold

“I am preprogrammed, acting on impulse, dumping a vast memory into a whirling pool and somehow bringing order to it. Building a complex web. I am the spider. This is my venomous bite. I will make them see their folly.”
― A.L. Davroe, quote from Nexis

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About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.