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.

It seems to me, Golan, that the advance of civilization is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy.

The advance of civilization is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy.

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.

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.

humanity could share a common insanity and be immersed in a common illusion while living in a common chaos.

We abandoned the appearance of power to preserve the essence of it.

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.

A happy wall is a long-lived wall, a practical wall, a useful wall.

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.

Never let your sense of morals keep you from doing what is right.

...the advance of civilisation is nothing but an exercise in the limiting of privacy.

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.

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.

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.

Anyone who displays a capacity for double-dealing must forever be suspected of being capable of displaying it again.

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.