TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY ®  •  TODAYINSCI ®
Celebrating 24 Years on the Web
Find science on or your birthday

Today in Science History - Quickie Quiz
Who said: “The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But America cannot resist this transition, we must lead it... That is how we will preserve our planet, commanded to our care by God. That�s what will lend meaning to the creed our fathers once declared.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Dictionary of Science Quotations > Scientist Names Index A > Isaac Asimov Quotes

Thumbnail of Isaac Asimov (source)
Isaac Asimov
(2 Jan 1920 - 6 Apr 1992)

Russian-American writer and biochemist who was a prolific author and editor of science fiction and non-fiction.


Science Quotes by Isaac Asimov (266 quotes)

>> Click for Isaac Asimov Quotes on | Belief | Biography | Creationist | Death | Fear | Ignorance | Knowledge | Life | Science | Scientist | Solution | Theory | Understanding | Universe |


“Any specialty, if important, is too important to be left to the specialists.” After all, the specialist cannot function unless he concentrates more or less entirely on his specialty and, in doing so, he will ignore the vast universe lying outside and miss important elements that ought to help guide his judgment. He therefore needs the help of the nonspecialist, who, while relying on the specialist for key information, can yet supply the necessary judgment based on everything else… Science, therefore, has become too important to be left to the scientists.
— Isaac Asimov
In 'The Fascination of Science', The Roving Mind (1983), 123. Asimov begins by extending a quote by George Clemenceau: “War is too important to be left to the generals.”
Science quotes on:  |  Become (822)  |  Concentrate (28)  |  Doing (277)  |  Element (323)  |  Everything (490)  |  Function (235)  |  Guide (108)  |  Ignore (52)  |  Important (231)  |  Information (173)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Lying (55)  |  Miss (51)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (72)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Outside (141)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Specialist (33)  |  Specialty (13)  |  Supply (100)  |  Universe (902)  |  Vast (188)  |  Will (2350)

(1) A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
(2) A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the first law.
(3) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
— Isaac Asimov
'The Three Laws of Robotics', in I, Robot (1950), Frontispiece.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Existence (484)  |  First (1302)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Law (914)  |  Long (778)  |  Must (1525)  |  Obey (46)  |  Order (639)  |  Protect (65)  |  Protection (41)  |  Robot (14)  |  Through (846)

[Creationists] make it sound as though a “theory” is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night.
— Isaac Asimov
Remark to the National Center Against Censorship (NCAC)(1980). In Norman A. Johnson, Darwinian Detectives (2007), 27.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Creationist (16)  |  Dream (223)  |  Drunk (10)  |  Something (718)  |  Sound (188)  |  Theory (1016)

[Learning is] the actual process of broadening yourself, of knowing there’s a little extra facet of the universe you know about and can think about and can understand. It seems to me that when it’s time to die, and that will come to all of us, there’ll be a certain pleasure in thinking that you had utilized your life well, that you had learned as much as you could, gathered in as much as possible of the universe, and enjoyed it. I mean, there’s only this universe and only this one lifetime to try to grasp it. And, while it is inconceivable that anyone can grasp more than a tiny portion of it, at least do that much. What a tragedy to just pass through and get nothing out of it.
— Isaac Asimov
'Isaac Asimov Speaks' with Bill Moyers in The Humanist (Jan/Feb 1989), 49. Reprinted in Carl Howard Freedman (ed.), Conversations with Isaac Asimov (2005), 139.
Science quotes on:  |  Actual (145)  |  Certain (557)  |  Do (1905)  |  Facet (9)  |  Gather (77)  |  Know (1539)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1872)  |  Little (718)  |  Mean (810)  |  More (2558)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  Pass (242)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Portion (86)  |  Possible (560)  |  Process (441)  |  Think (1124)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1912)  |  Tiny (74)  |  Tragedy (31)  |  Try (296)  |  Understand (650)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Universe (902)  |  Will (2350)

Clarke's First Law - Corollary: When, however, the lay public rallies round an idea that is denounced by distinguished but elderly scientists and supports that idea with great fervor and emotion—the distinguished but elderly scientists are then, after all, probably right.
— Isaac Asimov
'Asimov's Corollary', Fantasy & Science Fiction (Feb 1977). In collection Quasar, Quasar, Burning Bright (1978), 231.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Arthur C. Clarke (49)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Fervor (8)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  Idea (882)  |  Law (914)  |  Right (473)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Support (151)

A fire eater must eat fire even if he has to kindle it himself.
— Isaac Asimov
In Foundation (1951, 2004), Vol. 1, 137.
Science quotes on:  |  Eat (108)  |  Fire (203)  |  Himself (461)  |  Kindle (9)  |  Must (1525)

A hypothesis may be simply defined as a guess. A scientific hypothesis is an intelligent guess.
— Isaac Asimov
In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 114.
Science quotes on:  |  Definition (239)  |  Guess (67)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Intelligent (109)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Simple (430)

A neat and orderly laboratory is unlikely. It is, after all, so much a place of false starts and multiple attempts.
— Isaac Asimov
[Unverified. Please contact Webmaster if you can identify the primary source.]
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (268)  |  False (105)  |  Laboratory (215)  |  Multiple (19)  |  Neatness (6)  |  Orderliness (9)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Place (193)  |  Start (237)  |  Unlikely (15)

A number of years ago, when I was a freshly-appointed instructor, I met, for the first time, a certain eminent historian of science. At the time I could only regard him with tolerant condescension.
I was sorry of the man who, it seemed to me, was forced to hover about the edges of science. He was compelled to shiver endlessly in the outskirts, getting only feeble warmth from the distant sun of science-in-progress; while I, just beginning my research, was bathed in the heady liquid heat up at the very center of the glow.
In a lifetime of being wrong at many a point, I was never more wrong. It was I, not he, who was wandering in the periphery. It was he, not I, who lived in the blaze.
I had fallen victim to the fallacy of the “growing edge;” the belief that only the very frontier of scientific advance counted; that everything that had been left behind by that advance was faded and dead.
But is that true? Because a tree in spring buds and comes greenly into leaf, are those leaves therefore the tree? If the newborn twigs and their leaves were all that existed, they would form a vague halo of green suspended in mid-air, but surely that is not the tree. The leaves, by themselves, are no more than trivial fluttering decoration. It is the trunk and limbs that give the tree its grandeur and the leaves themselves their meaning.
There is not a discovery in science, however revolutionary, however sparkling with insight, that does not arise out of what went before. “If I have seen further than other men,” said Isaac Newton, “it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants.”
— Isaac Asimov
Adding A Dimension: Seventeen Essays on the History of Science (1964), Introduction.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (299)  |  Air (367)  |  Arise (162)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Behind (139)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (616)  |  Certain (557)  |  Condescension (3)  |  Count (107)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Edge (51)  |  Everything (490)  |  Exist (460)  |  Fad (10)  |  Fallacy (31)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (978)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Giant (73)  |  Grandeur (35)  |  Green (65)  |  Growing (99)  |  Halo (7)  |  Heat (181)  |  Historian (59)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Hover (8)  |  Insight (107)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meaning (246)  |  Mid-Air (3)  |  More (2558)  |  Never (1089)  |  Newborn (5)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Number (712)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Progress (493)  |  Regard (312)  |  Research (753)  |  Revolutionary (31)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Shoulder (33)  |  Sorry (31)  |  Sparkling (7)  |  Spring (140)  |  Sun (408)  |  Surely (101)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1912)  |  Tree (269)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Trunk (23)  |  Twig (15)  |  Vague (50)  |  Victim (37)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Wrong (247)  |  Year (965)

A pawn is the most important piece on the chessboard—to a pawn.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Most (1728)

A scientist is as weak and human as any man, but the pursuit of science may ennoble him even against his will.
— Isaac Asimov
Unverified. Contact webmaster if you know a primary source.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Ennoblement (2)  |  Human (1517)  |  Man (2252)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Weak (73)  |  Weakness (50)  |  Will (2350)

A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value.
— Isaac Asimov
In Steven D. Price, 1001 Smartest Things Ever Said (2005), 163.
Science quotes on:  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Error (339)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Great (1610)  |  Inquiry (89)  |  Rise (170)  |  Thought (996)  |  Truth (1111)  |  Value (397)

A truly wise trapeze artist does not inspect his nails in mid jump.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 132.
Science quotes on:  |  Artist (97)  |  Jump (31)  |  Truly (119)  |  Wise (145)

A woman who doesn’t fuss has no faults.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 95.
Science quotes on:  |  Fault (58)  |  Fuss (4)  |  Woman (160)

All in all, the total amount of power conceivably available from the uranium and thorium supplies of the earth is about twenty times that available from the coal and oil we have left.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to Science: The physical sciences (1960), 371.
Science quotes on:  |  Amount (153)  |  Available (80)  |  Coal (65)  |  Conceivable (28)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Left (15)  |  Oil (67)  |  Power (773)  |  Supply (100)  |  Thorium (5)  |  Time (1912)  |  Total (95)  |  Uranium (21)

Almost in the beginning was curiosity.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man’s Guide to the Physical Sciences (1960, 1968), 1. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 194.
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Origin Of Life (37)

Almost right is no better than wrong.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 189.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (495)  |  Right (473)  |  Wrong (247)

Although the time of death is approaching me, I am not afraid of dying and going to Hell or (what would be considerably worse) going to the popularized version of Heaven. I expect death to be nothingness and, for removing me from all possible fears of death, I am thankful to atheism.
— Isaac Asimov
In John Altson, Patti Rae Miliotis, What Happened to Grandpa? (2009).
Science quotes on:  |  Atheism (11)  |  Biography (254)  |  Death (407)  |  Expect (203)  |  Fear (215)  |  Heaven (267)  |  Hell (32)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  Nothingness (12)  |  Possible (560)  |  Thankful (4)  |  Time (1912)

An atom-blaster is a good weapon, but it can point both ways.
— Isaac Asimov
In The FoundationTrilogy (1951), Vol. 2, 207.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Both (496)  |  Good (906)  |  Point (584)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weapon (98)

An underwater-listening device, the “hydrophone,” has, in recent years, shown that sea creatures click, grunt, snap, moan, and, in general, make the ocean depths as maddeningly noisy as ever the land is.
— Isaac Asimov
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 188.
Science quotes on:  |  Click (4)  |  Creature (244)  |  Depth (97)  |  Device (71)  |  General (521)  |  Grunt (3)  |  Land (134)  |  Listen (81)  |  Listening (26)  |  Moan (2)  |  Noisy (3)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Oceanography (17)  |  Recent (79)  |  Sea (327)  |  Snap (7)  |  Underwater (5)  |  Year (965)

And above all things, never think that you’re not good enough yourself. A man should never think that. My belief is that in life people will take you at your own reckoning.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (616)  |  Enough (341)  |  Good (906)  |  Good Enough (4)  |  Life (1872)  |  Man (2252)  |  Never (1089)  |  People (1034)  |  Reckon (31)  |  Reckoning (19)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1124)  |  Will (2350)

Any increase in knowledge anywhere helps pave the way for an increase in knowledge everywhere.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 243.
Science quotes on:  |  Everywhere (100)  |  Increase (226)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Pave (8)  |  Way (1214)

Anyone can hunt a bear fearlessly when the bear is absent.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 267.
Science quotes on:  |  Bear (162)  |  Hunt (32)

Anyone who writes about science must know about science, which cuts down competition considerably.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 262.
Science quotes on:  |  Competition (45)  |  Cut (116)  |  Down (455)  |  Know (1539)  |  Must (1525)  |  Science And Journalism (3)  |  Write (250)

Apes were invented because politicians were needed.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 55.
Science quotes on:  |  Ape (54)  |  Politician (40)

As far as the meaning of life in general, or in the abstract, as far as I can see, there is none. If all of life were suddenly to disappear from earth and anywhere else it may exist, or if none had ever formed in the first place, I think the Universe would continue to exist without perceptible change. However, it is always possible for an individual to invest his own life with meaning that he can find significant. He can so order his life that he may find as much beauty and wisdom in it as he can, and spread as much of that to others as possible.
— Isaac Asimov
In a book proposal for The Meaning of Life edited by Hugh S. Moorhead, 1989.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Change (640)  |  Continue (180)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Exist (460)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (978)  |  General (521)  |  Individual (420)  |  Invest (20)  |  Life (1872)  |  Meaning (246)  |  Order (639)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possible (560)  |  See (1095)  |  Significant (78)  |  Spread (86)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Think (1124)  |  Universe (902)  |  Wisdom (235)

As new areas of the world came into view through exploration, the number of identified species of animals and plants grew astronomically. By 1800 it had reached 70,000. Today more than 1.25 million different species, two-thirds animal and one-third plant, are known, and no biologist supposes that the count is complete.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to Science: The Biological Sciences (1960), 654. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 320.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Complete (209)  |  Count (107)  |  Different (595)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Identify (13)  |  Known (453)  |  Million (124)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1276)  |  Number (712)  |  Plant (320)  |  Reach (287)  |  Species (435)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Taxonomy (19)  |  Through (846)  |  Today (321)  |  Two (936)  |  View (498)  |  World (1854)

Bad news has the wings of an eagle, good news the legs of a sloth.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 119.
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Eagle (20)  |  Good (906)  |  Leg (35)  |  New (1276)  |  News (36)  |  Sloth (7)  |  Wing (79)

Between not enough and too much is a hair’s breadth.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 198.
Science quotes on:  |  Breadth (15)  |  Enough (341)

Birds sing sweetly; but someone awakened by them at 5 A.M. of a summer morning might dispute the adverb.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 197.
Science quotes on:  |  Adverb (3)  |  Awaken (17)  |  Bird (163)  |  Dispute (36)  |  Morning (98)  |  Ornithology (21)  |  Sing (29)  |  Summer (56)

But of all environments, that produced by man’s complex technology is perhaps the most unstable and rickety. In its present form, our society is not two centuries old, and a few nuclear bombs will do it in.
To be sure, evolution works over long periods of time and two centuries is far from sufficient to breed Homo technikos… .
The destruction of our technological society in a fit of nuclear peevishness would become disastrous even if there were many millions of immediate survivors.
The environment toward which they were fitted would be gone, and Darwin’s demon would wipe them out remorselessly and without a backward glance.
— Isaac Asimov
Asimov on Physics (1976), 151. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Backward (10)  |  Become (822)  |  Breed (27)  |  Century (319)  |  Complex (203)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Demon (8)  |  Destruction (136)  |  Disaster (58)  |  Do (1905)  |  Environment (240)  |  Evolution (636)  |  Fit (139)  |  Form (978)  |  Glance (36)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Long (778)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Old (499)  |  Period (200)  |  Present (630)  |  Produced (187)  |  Remorse (9)  |  Rickety (2)  |  Society (353)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Survivor (2)  |  Technological (62)  |  Technology (284)  |  Time (1912)  |  Two (936)  |  Unstable (9)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1403)

Circumstantial evidence can be overwhelming. We have never seen an atom, but we nevertheless know that it must exist.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 31.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Circumstantial (2)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Exist (460)  |  Know (1539)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Overwhelming (30)  |  See (1095)

Computers are better than we are at arithmetic, not because computers are so good at it, but because we are so bad at it.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 51.
Science quotes on:  |  Arithmetic (145)  |  Bad (185)  |  Better (495)  |  Computer (134)  |  Good (906)

Computers are better than we are at arithmetic, not because computers are so good at it, but because we are so bad at it.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 51.
Science quotes on:  |  Arithmetic (145)  |  Bad (185)  |  Better (495)  |  Computer (134)  |  Good (906)

Considering the difficulties represented by the lack of water, by extremes of temperature, by the full force of gravity unmitigated by the buoyancy of water, it must be understood that the spread to land of life forms that evolved to meet the conditions of the ocean represented the greatest single victory won by life over the inanimate environment.
— Isaac Asimov
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 194.
Science quotes on:  |  Buoyancy (7)  |  Condition (362)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Environment (240)  |  Evolution (636)  |  Extreme (79)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (978)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Inanimate (18)  |  Lack (127)  |  Land (134)  |  Life (1872)  |  Life Form (6)  |  Must (1525)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Represent (157)  |  Single (366)  |  Spread (86)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Understand (650)  |  Understood (155)  |  Victory (40)  |  Water (505)

During the 1930s, Nazi oppression drove numerous scientists to Great Britain and the United States, and they were a key factor in the development of the nuclear bomb—a development widely touted in the United States as based on “Yankee know-how.” Except that virtually all the Yankees had foreign accents.
— Isaac Asimov
In 'Combatting U.S. Scientific Illiteracy', Los Angeles Times (31 Mar 1989).
Science quotes on:  |  Accent (5)  |  Britain (26)  |  Development (442)  |  Foreign (45)  |  Great (1610)  |  Great Britain (2)  |  Know (1539)  |  Nazi (10)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Bomb (7)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Oppression (6)  |  Scientist (881)  |  State (505)  |  United States (31)

During the century after Newton, it was still possible for a man of unusual attainments to master all fields of scientific knowledge. But by 1800, this had become entirely impracticable.
— Isaac Asimov
The Intelligent Man's Guide to Science (1960), 19.
Science quotes on:  |  Attainment (48)  |  Become (822)  |  Century (319)  |  Field (378)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Man (2252)  |  Master (182)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Possible (560)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Still (614)  |  Unusual (37)

Early in my school career, I turned out to be an incorrigible disciplinary problem. I could understand what the teacher was saying as fast as she could say it, I found time hanging heavy, so I would occasionally talk to my neighbor. That was my great crime, I talked in school.
— Isaac Asimov
In In Memory Yet Green: the Autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1920-1954 (1979), 73.
Science quotes on:  |  Biography (254)  |  Career (87)  |  Crime (39)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Early (196)  |  Great (1610)  |  Problem (734)  |  Say (990)  |  School (228)  |  Talk (108)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Time (1912)  |  Turn (454)  |  Understand (650)  |  Understanding (527)

Eating too much kills more quickly than eating too little.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 293.
Science quotes on:  |  Eating (46)  |  Kill (101)  |  Little (718)  |  More (2558)

Every hour a scientist spends trying to raise funds is an hour lost from important thought and research.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 287.
Science quotes on:  |  Fund (19)  |  Funding (20)  |  Hour (192)  |  Important (231)  |  Lose (165)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Spend (97)  |  Thought (996)  |  Trying (144)

Everything about microscopic life is terribly upsetting. How can things so small be so important?
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 156.
Science quotes on:  |  Everything (490)  |  Important (231)  |  Life (1872)  |  Microbiology (11)  |  Microscopic (27)  |  Small (489)  |  Thing (1914)

Experimentation is the least arrogant method of gaining knowledge. The experimenter humbly asks a question of nature.
— Isaac Asimov
[Unverified. Please contact Webmaster if you can identify the primary source.]
Science quotes on:  |  Arrogance (22)  |  Ask (423)  |  Experiment (737)  |  Experimenter (40)  |  Gain (149)  |  Humble (54)  |  Humbly (8)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Least (75)  |  Method (532)  |  Nature (2025)  |  Question (652)

Facts are a heap of bricks and timber. It is only a successful theory that can convert the heap into a stately mansion
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 324.
Science quotes on:  |  Brick (20)  |  Convert (22)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Facts (553)  |  Heap (15)  |  Mansion (4)  |  Stately (12)  |  Success (327)  |  Successful (134)  |  Theory (1016)  |  Timber (8)

For many centuries chemists labored to change lead into precious gold, and eventually found that precious uranium turned to lead without any human effort at all.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov and Jason A. Shulman (eds.), Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Alchemist (23)  |  Century (319)  |  Change (640)  |  Chemist (170)  |  Effort (243)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Find (1014)  |  Gold (101)  |  Human (1517)  |  Labor (200)  |  Lead (391)  |  Precious (43)  |  Transmutation (24)  |  Turn (454)  |  Uranium (21)

From my close observation of writers ... they fall in to two groups: 1) those who bleed copiously and visibly at any bad review, and 2) those who bleed copiously and secretly at any bad review.
— Isaac Asimov
In Gold: The Final Science Fiction Collection? (2003).
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Blood (144)  |  Fall (243)  |  Observation (594)  |  Review (27)  |  Secret (217)  |  Two (936)  |  Writer (90)

Genetics seems to be everything to those who have convinced themselves they have arisen from worthy ancestors.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 104.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Convince (43)  |  Everything (490)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Worthy (35)

Going there may be most of the fun—but only if you get there in the end.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 172.
Science quotes on:  |  End (603)  |  Most (1728)

Good company robs even death of some of its terrors.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 247.
Science quotes on:  |  Company (63)  |  Death (407)  |  Good (906)  |  Terror (32)

Half an imagination is worse than none at all.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 178.
Science quotes on:  |  Imagination (349)

He who is needed must learn to endure flattery.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Learn (672)  |  Must (1525)

How bright and beautiful a comet is as it flies past our planet—provided it does fly past it.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 47.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (273)  |  Bright (82)  |  Comet (65)  |  Fly (153)  |  Past (355)  |  Planet (406)

How often people speak of art and science as though they were two entirely different things, with no interconnection. An artist is emotional, they think, and uses only his intuition; he sees all at once and has no need of reason. A scientist is cold, they think, and uses only his reason; he argues carefully step by step, and needs no imagination. That is all wrong. The true artist is quite rational as well as imaginative and knows what he is doing; if he does not, his art suffers. The true scientist is quite imaginative as well as rational, and sometimes leaps to solutions where reason can follow only slowly; if he does not, his science suffers.
— Isaac Asimov
'Prometheus.' The Roving Mind (1983), Chap 25.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (681)  |  Artist (97)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Cold (115)  |  Different (595)  |  Doing (277)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Follow (390)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Interconnection (12)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Know (1539)  |  Leap (57)  |  People (1034)  |  Rational (97)  |  Reason (767)  |  Scientist (881)  |  See (1095)  |  Solution (285)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Speak (240)  |  Step (234)  |  Step By Step (11)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1124)  |  Two (936)  |  Use (771)  |  Wrong (247)

Human beings can easily destroy every elephant on earth, but we are helpless against the mosquito.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 80.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Being (1276)  |  Destroy (191)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Elephant (35)  |  Entomology (9)  |  Helpless (14)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Mosquito (17)

Human societies are everywhere complex, for living at peace with ourselves requires a vast multiplicity of rules.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Complex (203)  |  Everywhere (100)  |  Human (1517)  |  Living (492)  |  Multiplicity (14)  |  Ourselves (248)  |  Peace (116)  |  Require (229)  |  Rule (308)  |  Society (353)  |  Vast (188)

Humanity has the stars in its future, and that future is too important to be lost under the burden of juvenile folly and ignorant superstition.
— Isaac Asimov
In 'The Deadly Information', Introduction written by Asimov for James Randi, Flim-Flam (1982), xiii.
Science quotes on:  |  Burden (31)  |  Folly (45)  |  Future (467)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Important (231)  |  Juvenile (4)  |  Lose (165)  |  Star (462)  |  Stars (304)  |  Superstition (72)

Isaac Asimov quote: Humanity is cutting down its forests, apparently oblivious to the fact that we may not be able to live witho
Background photo copyright Thomas Nugent (cc-by-sa/2.0) (source)
Humanity is cutting down its forests, apparently oblivious to the fact that we may not be able to live without them.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 101.
Science quotes on:  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Down (455)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Forest (161)  |  Forestry (17)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Life (1872)  |  Live (651)  |  Oblivious (9)

I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I’ve been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow, it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic. I finally decided that I’m a creature of emotion as well as of reason. Emotionally, I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn’t exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn’t that I don’t want to waste my time.
— Isaac Asimov
'Isaac Asimov on Science and the Bible'. In Sidney Hook, et. al. On the Barricades: Religion and Free Inquiry in Conflict (1989), 329.
Science quotes on:  |  Agnostic (10)  |  Atheist (16)  |  Better (495)  |  Biography (254)  |  Creature (244)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Exist (460)  |  Existence (484)  |  God (776)  |  Humanist (8)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Long (778)  |  Prove (263)  |  Reason (767)  |  Say (990)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Suspect (18)  |  Time (1912)  |  Want (506)  |  Waste (109)  |  Year (965)

I am not a speed reader. I am a speed understander.
— Isaac Asimov
In Cris Tovani, Do I Really Have to Teach Reading? (2004), 51
Science quotes on:  |  Read (309)  |  Speed (66)  |  Understanding (527)

I believe in evidence. I believe in observation, measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I’ll believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is, however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.
— Isaac Asimov
After stating he did definitely not believe in flying saucers, ancient astronauts, Bermuda Triangle or life after death, he explained what he would believe in. From editorial, 'Don’t You Believe?', Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine (18 Jan 1982), 6, No. 1, 6. Collected in The Roving Mind (1983), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (616)  |  Confirm (58)  |  Confirmation (25)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Firm (47)  |  Independent (75)  |  Matter (821)  |  Measurement (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Observation (594)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Ridiculous (24)  |  Solid (119)  |  Something (718)  |  Wild (96)  |  Will (2350)

I believe that only scientists can understand the universe. It is not so much that I have confidence in scientists being right, but that I have so much in nonscientists being wrong.
— Isaac Asimov
Webmaster has not yet been able to confirm this attribution. If you know an original print citation, please contact Webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (616)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Nonscientist (3)  |  Right (473)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Understand (650)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Universe (902)  |  Wrong (247)

I could almost wish, at this point, that I were in the habit of expressing myself in theological terms, for if I were, I might be able to compress my entire thesis into a sentence. All knowledge of every variety (I might say) is in the mind of God—and the human intellect, even the best, in trying to pluck it forth can but “see through a glass, darkly.”
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov on Physics (1976), 146. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 279.
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Darkly (2)  |  Glass (94)  |  God (776)  |  Habit (174)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Intellect (32)  |  Intellect (252)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Mind (1380)  |  Myself (211)  |  Point (584)  |  Say (990)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  See (1095)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thesis (17)  |  Through (846)  |  Trying (144)  |  Variety (138)  |  Wish (217)

I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them.
— Isaac Asimov
As quoted, without further citation, in 'The Age of Miracle Chips', Time (20 Feb 1978), 45. The article introduces a special section on 'The Computer Society.' Please contact Webmaster if you know an earlier, primary source.
Science quotes on:  |  Computer (134)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fear (215)  |  Lack (127)

I don't believe in an afterlife, so I don't have to spend my whole life fearing hell, or fearing heaven even more. For whatever the tortures of hell, I think the boredom of heaven would be even worse.
— Isaac Asimov
In Rosemarie Jarski, Words from the Wise (2007), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Afterlife (3)  |  Atheist (16)  |  Boredom (11)  |  Heaven (267)  |  Hell (32)  |  Life (1872)  |  More (2558)  |  Spend (97)  |  Think (1124)  |  Torture (30)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whole (756)

I prefer rationalism to atheism. The question of God and other objects-of-faith are outside reason and play no part in rationalism, thus you don't have to waste your time in either attacking or defending.
— Isaac Asimov
In Isaac Asimov and Janet Asimov (ed.), It's Been a Good Life (2002), 21. Attribution uncertain. If you know an original print citation, please contact Webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Atheism (11)  |  Attack (86)  |  Defend (32)  |  Faith (210)  |  God (776)  |  Object (442)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  Question (652)  |  Rationalism (5)  |  Reason (767)  |  Time (1912)  |  Waste (109)

I write for the same reason I breathe—because if I didn't, I would die.
— Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov, Stanley Asimov (ed.), Yours, Isaac Asimov: a Lifetime of Letters (1995), 8.
Science quotes on:  |  Breathe (49)  |  Death (407)  |  Life (1872)  |  Reason (767)  |  Write (250)

I’m gradually managing to cram my mind more and more full of things. I’ve got this beautiful mind and it’s going to die, and it’ll all be gone. And then I say, not in my case. Every idea I’ve ever had I’ve written down, and it’s all there on paper. And I won’t be gone; it’ll be there.
— Isaac Asimov
'Isaac Asimov Speaks' with Bill Moyers in The Humanist (Jan/Feb 1989), 49. Reprinted in Carl Howard Freedman (ed.), Conversations with Isaac Asimov (2005), 139.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (273)  |  Biography (254)  |  Cram (5)  |  Death (407)  |  Down (455)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Idea (882)  |  Learning (291)  |  Mind (1380)  |  More (2558)  |  Paper (192)  |  Say (990)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Write (250)

I’m sure that science can’t ever explain everything and I can give you the reasons for that decision … I believe that scientific knowledge has fractal properties; that no matter how much we learn, whatever is left, however small it may seem, is just as infinitely complex as the whole was to start with. That, I think is the secret of the universe.
— Isaac Asimov
In It’s Been a Good Life (2009), 258, cited as from I. Asimov: A Memoir (1994), 481.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (616)  |  Can�t (16)  |  Complex (203)  |  Decision (98)  |  Everything (490)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fractal (11)  |  Infinite (244)  |  Learn (672)  |  No Matter (4)  |  Property (177)  |  Reason (767)  |  Remain (357)  |  Science (41)  |  Scientific Knowledge (11)  |  Secret (217)  |  Seem (150)  |  Small (489)  |  Start (237)  |  Think (1124)  |  Universe (902)  |  Whole (756)

Isaac Asimov quote It’s the bees and the flowers.
Macro photo of bee by Forest Wander (cc by-sa 2.0) (source)
I’m tired of that stupid phrase, “the birds and the bees” which is supposed to represent “the facts of life” or the beginnings of the sex instruction of the young. … Well for heaven’s sake, has anyone ever tried to explain sex by talking about the birds and the bees? What have the birds and the bees to do with it? IT’S THE BEES AND THE FLOWERS. Will you get that through your head? IT’S THE BEES AND THE FLOWERS. The bee travels to one flower and picks up pollen from the stamens. The pollen contains the male sex cells of the plant. The bee then travels to another flower (of the same species) and the pollen brushes off onto the pistil, which contains the female sex cells of the plant. … Now in the human being … we don’t rely on bees to do it for us.
— Isaac Asimov
From Isaac Asimov’s letter in 'Hue and Cry' letter column in magazine, James L. Quinn (ed.), IF: Worlds of Science Fiction (Dec 1957), 7, No. 6, 119
Science quotes on:  |  Bee (44)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bird (163)  |  Do (1905)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Facts (553)  |  Female (50)  |  Flower (112)  |  Heaven (267)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Life (1872)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Plant (320)  |  Pollen (6)  |  Represent (157)  |  Sake (61)  |  Science And Education (17)  |  Sex (68)  |  Species (435)  |  Stamen (4)  |  Stupid (38)  |  Talking (76)  |  Through (846)  |  Travel (125)  |  Will (2350)  |  Young (253)

If arithmetical skill is the measure of intelligence, then computers have been more intelligent than all human beings all along. If the ability to play chess is the measure, then there are computers now in existence that are more intelligent than any but a very few human beings. However, if insight, intuition, creativity, the ability to view a problem as a whole and guess the answer by the “feel” of the situation, is a measure of intelligence, computers are very unintelligent indeed. Nor can we see right now how this deficiency in computers can be easily remedied, since human beings cannot program a computer to be intuitive or creative for the very good reason that we do not know what we ourselves do when we exercise these qualities.
— Isaac Asimov
In Machines That Think (1983).
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Answer (389)  |  Being (1276)  |  Chess (27)  |  Computer (134)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Deficiency (15)  |  Do (1905)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Existence (484)  |  Feel (371)  |  Good (906)  |  Guess (67)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Insight (107)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intelligent (109)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Know (1539)  |  Measure (242)  |  More (2558)  |  Ourselves (248)  |  Problem (734)  |  Reason (767)  |  Right (473)  |  See (1095)  |  Situation (117)  |  Skill (116)  |  View (498)  |  Whole (756)

If asking politely is useless, take.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 30.
Science quotes on:  |  Asking (74)

If entropy must constantly and continuously increase, then the universe is remorselessly running down, thus setting a limit (a long one, to be sure) on the existence of humanity. To some human beings, this ultimate end poses itself almost as a threat to their personal immortality, or as a denial of the omnipotence of God. There is, therefore, a strong emotional urge to deny that entropy must increase.
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov on Physics (1976), 141. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 279.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Denial (20)  |  Deny (71)  |  Down (455)  |  Emotion (106)  |  End (603)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Existence (484)  |  God (776)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Immortality (12)  |  Increase (226)  |  Limit (294)  |  Long (778)  |  Must (1525)  |  Omnipotence (4)  |  Running (61)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Setting (44)  |  Strong (182)  |  Threat (36)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Universe (902)

If ever an equation has come into its own it is Einstein’s e = me2. Everyone can rattle it off now, from the highest to the lowest.
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov on Physics (1976), 96. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 212.
Science quotes on:  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Equation (138)  |  Quote (46)

If Freud is not the Pasteur of mental illness, he is at least its Hippocrates.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to Science: The Biological Sciences (1960), 723. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 220.
Science quotes on:  |  Sigmund Freud (70)  |  Hippocrates (49)  |  Illness (35)  |  Mental (179)  |  Mental Illness (4)  |  Louis Pasteur (85)

If God meant for us to fly he would have given us propellers on our noses.
— Isaac Asimov
on The Dick Cavett Show, February 24, 1971.
Science quotes on:  |  Fly (153)  |  God (776)

If I am right, then (religious fundamentalists) will not go to Heaven, because there is no Heaven. If they are right, then they will not go to Heaven, because they are hypocrites.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Fundamentalist (4)  |  Heaven (267)  |  Hypocrite (6)  |  Religious (134)  |  Right (473)  |  Will (2350)

If I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Atheist (16)  |  Basis (180)  |  Belief (616)  |  Choose (116)  |  God (776)  |  Honest (53)  |  Live (651)  |  Pattern (117)  |  People (1034)  |  Preacher (13)  |  Prefer (27)  |  Save (126)  |  Think (1124)  |  Totality (17)  |  TV (2)  |  Word (650)

If my doctor told me I had only six minutes to live, I wouldn’t brood. I’d type a little faster.
— Isaac Asimov
Life (1984).
Science quotes on:  |  Death (407)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Faster (50)  |  Little (718)  |  Live (651)  |  Minute (129)  |  Physician (284)  |  Type (171)

If the current flow is taking you where you want to go, don’t argue.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 136.
Science quotes on:  |  Current (122)  |  Flow (90)  |  Want (506)

If the earth’s population continues to double every 50 years (as it is now doing) then by 2550 A.D. it will have increased 3,000-fold. … by 2800 A.D., it would reach 630,000 billion! Our planet would have standing room only, for there would be only two-and-a-half square feet per person on the entire land surface, including Greenland and Antarctica. In fact, if the human species could be imagined as continuing to multiply further at the same rate, by 4200 A.D. the total mass of human tissue would be equal to the mass of the earth.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to Science: The Biological Sciences (1960), 117. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 237.
Science quotes on:  |  Antarctica (8)  |  Billion (105)  |  Continue (180)  |  Doing (277)  |  Double (18)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Greenland (2)  |  Human (1517)  |  Imagine (177)  |  Increase (226)  |  Land (134)  |  Mass (161)  |  Multiple (19)  |  Multiply (40)  |  Person (366)  |  Planet (406)  |  Population (115)  |  Reach (287)  |  Reproduction (74)  |  Species (435)  |  Square (73)  |  Surface (223)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Total (95)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (965)

If the words of a wise man are few, they are nevertheless worth listening to.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 242.
Science quotes on:  |  Listening (26)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Wise (145)  |  Wise Man (17)  |  Word (650)  |  Worth (173)

If there is a just God, how humanity would writhe in its attempt to justify its treatment of animals.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 334.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Attempt (268)  |  God (776)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Justify (26)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Writhe (3)  |  Zoology (38)

If trouble were as easy to get out of as into—life would be one sweet song.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 280.
Science quotes on:  |  Easy (213)  |  Life (1872)  |  Song (41)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Trouble (117)

If we sink to the biochemical level, then the human being has lost a great many synthetic abilities possessed by other species and, in particular, by plants and microorganisms. Our loss of ability to manufacture a variety of vitamins makes us dependent on our diet and, therefore, on the greater synthetic versatility of other creatures. This is as much a “degenerative” change as the tapeworm’s abandonment of a stomach it no longer needs, but since we are prejudiced in our own favor, we don’t mention it.
— Isaac Asimov
In 'The Modern Demonology' (Jan 1962). Collected in Asimov on Physics (1976), 150.
Science quotes on:  |  Abandon (73)  |  Ability (162)  |  Being (1276)  |  Biochemistry (50)  |  Change (640)  |  Creature (244)  |  Degenerative (2)  |  Diet (56)  |  Favor (69)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Loss (118)  |  Manufacture (30)  |  Mention (84)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plant (320)  |  Possess (158)  |  Sink (38)  |  Species (435)  |  Stomach (40)  |  Synthesis (58)  |  Synthetic (27)  |  Tapeworm (2)  |  Variety (138)  |  Versatility (5)  |  Vitamin (13)

If we were blind for one day each year, how we would enjoy the other three hundred and sixty-four.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 123.
Science quotes on:  |  Blind (98)  |  Day (43)  |  Enjoy (48)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Light (636)  |  Other (2233)  |  Year (965)

If you are dangling from a rope over an abyss, don’t bother snatching at he coin that falls out of your pocket.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 261.
Science quotes on:  |  Abyss (30)  |  Fall (243)  |  Rope (9)

If you do something, it’s worth doing well; except to bureaucrats. to them, if you do something, it’s worth doing cheaply.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 170.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Something (718)  |  Worth (173)

If you find a gold key without a lock, don’t throw it away. The gold is also sufficient.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 153.
Science quotes on:  |  Find (1014)  |  Gold (101)  |  Sufficient (133)

If you have nothing to lose, gamble freely.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 275.
Science quotes on:  |  Lose (165)  |  Nothing (1002)

If you must pull a tooth, it is mistaken kindness to pull it slowly.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 53.
Science quotes on:  |  Kindness (14)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Must (1525)  |  Pull (43)  |  Slowly (19)  |  Tooth (32)

If you want to hear, you must begin by listening.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 238.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Hear (146)  |  Listening (26)  |  Must (1525)  |  Want (506)

If you want to know if water is boiling, don’t test it by hand.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 157.
Science quotes on:  |  Know (1539)  |  Test (221)  |  Want (506)  |  Water (505)

Imagine the people who believe such things and who are not ashamed to ignore, totally, all the patient findings of thinking minds through all the centuries since the Bible was written. And it is these ignorant people, the most uneducated, the most unimaginative, the most unthinking among us, who would make themselves the guides and leaders of us all; who would force their feeble and childish beliefs on us; who would invade our schools and libraries and homes. I personally resent it bitterly.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Roving Mind (1983), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (616)  |  Bible (105)  |  Bitter (30)  |  Childish (20)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Feeble (28)  |  Force (497)  |  Guide (108)  |  Home (186)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Ignore (52)  |  Imagine (177)  |  Invade (5)  |  Leader (51)  |  Library (53)  |  Mind (1380)  |  Most (1728)  |  Patient (209)  |  People (1034)  |  Resent (4)  |  School (228)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Uneducated (9)  |  Unthinking (3)

In 1900 however, he [Planck] worked out the revolutionary quantum theory, a towering achievement which extended and improved the basic concepts of physics. It was so revolutionary, in fact, that almost no physicist, including Planck himself could bring himself to accept it. (Planck later said that the only way a revolutionary theory could be accepted was to wait until all the old scientists had died.)
— Isaac Asimov
(1976). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 324.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Achievement (187)  |  Basic (144)  |  Concept (242)  |  Die (95)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Himself (461)  |  Improve (65)  |  Old (499)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (568)  |  Max Planck (83)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Revolutionary (31)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Theory (1016)  |  Towering (11)  |  Wait (66)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1403)

In a sense, the galaxy hardest for us to see is our own. For one thing, we are imprisoned within it, while the others can be viewed as a whole from outside… . Furthermore, we are far out from the center, and to make matters worse, we lie in a spiral arm clogged with dust. In other words, we are on a low roof on the outskirts of the city on a foggy day.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to the Physical Sciences (1960, 1968), 64. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 185.
Science quotes on:  |  Arm (82)  |  Center (35)  |  City (88)  |  Clog (5)  |  Dust (68)  |  Galaxy (54)  |  Hardest (3)  |  Imprison (11)  |  Lie (370)  |  Low (86)  |  Matter (821)  |  Observation (594)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  Outskirts (2)  |  Roof (14)  |  See (1095)  |  Sense (785)  |  Spiral (19)  |  Thing (1914)  |  View (498)  |  Whole (756)  |  Word (650)

In life, unlike chess, the game continues after checkmate.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Checkmate (2)  |  Chess (27)  |  Continue (180)  |  Game (104)  |  Life (1872)

In the true triumph, however, there are no losers.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 316.
Science quotes on:  |  Loser (3)  |  Triumph (76)

Increasingly, our leaders must deal with dangers that threaten the entire world, where an understanding of those dangers and the possible solutions depend on a good grasp of science. The ozone layer, the greenhouse effect, acid rain, questions of diet and of heredity--all require scientific literacy. Can Americans choose the proper leaders and support the proper programs if they are scientifically illiterate?
— Isaac Asimov
articles.latimes.com/1989-03-31/news/vw-543_1_scientific-literacy
Science quotes on:  |  Acid (83)  |  Acid Rain (2)  |  Choose (116)  |  Danger (127)  |  Deal (192)  |  Depend (238)  |  Diet (56)  |  Effect (414)  |  Good (906)  |  Greenhouse Effect (5)  |  Heredity (62)  |  Illiteracy (8)  |  Illiterate (6)  |  Layer (41)  |  Leader (51)  |  Literacy (10)  |  Must (1525)  |  Ozone (7)  |  Ozone Layer (3)  |  Possible (560)  |  Program (58)  |  Proper (150)  |  Question (652)  |  Rain (70)  |  Require (229)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Solution (285)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Support (151)  |  Threat (36)  |  Threaten (33)  |  Understand (650)  |  Understanding (527)  |  United States (31)  |  World (1854)

Increasingly, our leaders must deal with dangers that threaten the entire world, where an understanding of those dangers and the possible solutions depends on a good grasp of science. The ozone layer, the greenhouse effect, acid rain, questions of diet and heredity. All require scientific literacy. Can Americans choose the proper leaders and support the proper programs if they themselves are scientifically illiterate? The whole premise of democracy is that it is safe to leave important questions to the court of public opinion—but is it safe to leave them to the court of public ignorance?
— Isaac Asimov
In Los Angeles Times (31 Mar 1989).
Science quotes on:  |  Acid (83)  |  Acid Rain (2)  |  America (144)  |  Choose (116)  |  Court (35)  |  Danger (127)  |  Deal (192)  |  Democracy (36)  |  Depend (238)  |  Dependence (47)  |  Diet (56)  |  Effect (414)  |  Good (906)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Greenhouse Effect (5)  |  Heredity (62)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Illiteracy (8)  |  Illiterate (6)  |  Importance (299)  |  Layer (41)  |  Leader (51)  |  Literacy (10)  |  Must (1525)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Ozone (7)  |  Ozone Layer (3)  |  Possible (560)  |  Premise (40)  |  Program (58)  |  Proper (150)  |  Public (100)  |  Question (652)  |  Rain (70)  |  Require (229)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Safe (61)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Scientific Illiteracy (8)  |  Solution (285)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Support (151)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Threat (36)  |  Threaten (33)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1854)

Individual science fiction stories may seem as trivial as ever to the blinder critics and philosophers of today–but the core of science fiction, its essence, the concept around which it revolves, has become crucial to our salvation if we are to be saved a
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Become (822)  |  Blind (98)  |  Concept (242)  |  Core (20)  |  Critic (21)  |  Crucial (10)  |  Essence (85)  |  Individual (420)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Revolve (26)  |  Salvation (13)  |  Save (126)  |  Science Fiction (35)  |  Seem (150)  |  Story (122)  |  Today (321)  |  Trivial (59)

Inspect every piece of pseudoscience and you will find a security blanket, a thumb to suck, a skirt to hold. What does the scientist have to offer in exchange? Uncertainty! Insecurity!
— Isaac Asimov
Past, Present, and Future (1987), 65.
Science quotes on:  |  Blanket (10)  |  Exchange (38)  |  Find (1014)  |  Insecurity (4)  |  Offer (143)  |  Pseudoscience (17)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Security (51)  |  Suck (8)  |  Thumb (18)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Will (2350)

Intelligence is a valuable thing, but it is not usually the key to survival. Sheer fecundity ... usually counts. The intelligent gorilla doesn't do as well as the less intelligent but more-fecund rat, which doesn't do as well as the still-less-intelligent but still-more-fecund cockroach, which doesn't do as well as the minimally-intelligent but maximally-fecund bacterium.
— Isaac Asimov
'Fifty Million Big Brothers'. The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (Nov 1978), 55, No. 5, 93.
Science quotes on:  |  Bacteria (50)  |  Cockroach (7)  |  Count (107)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fecund (2)  |  Gorilla (19)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intelligent (109)  |  More (2558)  |  Rat (37)  |  Still (614)  |  Survival (105)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Usually (176)

Intelligence is an extremely subtle concept. It’s a kind of understanding that flourishes if it’s combined with a good memory, but exists anyway even in the absence of good memory. It’s the ability to draw consequences from causes, to make correct inferences, to foresee what might be the result, to work out logical problems, to be reasonable, rational, to have the ability to understand the solution from perhaps insufficient information. You know when a person is intelligent, but you can be easily fooled if you are not yourself intelligent.
— Isaac Asimov
In Irv Broughton (ed.), The Writer's Mind: Interviews with American Authors (1990), Vol. 2, 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Absence (21)  |  Cause (564)  |  Combine (58)  |  Concept (242)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Correct (95)  |  Draw (141)  |  Exist (460)  |  Flourish (35)  |  Fool (121)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Good (906)  |  Inference (45)  |  Information (173)  |  Insufficient (10)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intelligent (109)  |  Kind (565)  |  Know (1539)  |  Logic (313)  |  Memory (144)  |  Person (366)  |  Problem (734)  |  Rational (97)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Result (700)  |  Solution (285)  |  Subtle (37)  |  Understand (650)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Work (1403)

It is a common rule in theoretical physics, one accepted by many physicists, that anything not forbidden by the basic laws of nature must take place.
— Isaac Asimov
In 'The Ultimate Speed Limit', Saturday Review of Sciences (8 Jul 1972), 56.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Basic (144)  |  Common (447)  |  Forbidden (18)  |  Happen (282)  |  Law (914)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2025)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (568)  |  Rule (308)  |  Theoretical (27)  |  Theoretical Physics (26)

It is a great deal easier to believe in the existence of parapsychological phenomena, if one is ignorant of, or indifferent to, the nature of scientific evidence.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 207.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (616)  |  Deal (192)  |  Easier (53)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Existence (484)  |  Great (1610)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Indifferent (17)  |  Nature (2025)  |  Parapsychology (3)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Scientific (957)

It is a sign of our power, and our criminal folly, that we can pollute the vast ocean and are doing so.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 186.
Science quotes on:  |  Criminal (18)  |  Doing (277)  |  Folly (45)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Ocean Pollution (10)  |  Oceanography (17)  |  Pollution (53)  |  Power (773)  |  Sign (63)  |  Vast (188)

It is change, continuing change, inevitable change, that is the dominant factor in society today. No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account not only the world as it is, but the world as it will be … This, in turn, means that our statesmen, our businessmen, our everyman must take on a science fictional way of thinking.
— Isaac Asimov
In 'My Own View', Robert Holdstock (ed.), The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (1978). As cited in Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations (1993), 129.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (196)  |  Change (640)  |  Decision (98)  |  Dominant (26)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (588)  |  Must (1525)  |  Sensible (28)  |  Society (353)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Today (321)  |  Turn (454)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1854)

It is easy to be generous with someone else’s money.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 130.
Science quotes on:  |  Easy (213)  |  Generous (17)  |  Money (178)

It is good to be at the head of the table, even if only one other sits with you and there is but a bowl of cabbage soup to share.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 130.
Science quotes on:  |  Bowl (4)  |  Cabbage (5)  |  Good (906)  |  Head (87)  |  Other (2233)  |  Share (82)  |  Sit (51)  |  Soup (10)  |  Table (105)

It is hard to describe the exact route to scientific achievement, but a good scientist doesn’t get lost as he travels it.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 290.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Describe (133)  |  Exact (75)  |  Good (906)  |  Hard (246)  |  Lost (35)  |  Route (16)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Travel (125)

It is more important to know the thing than the name.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 277.
Science quotes on:  |  Know (1539)  |  More (2558)  |  Name (360)  |  Thing (1914)

It is not equal time the creationists want. ... Don't kid yourself. They want all the time there is.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Roving Mind (1983), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Creationist (16)  |  Equal (88)  |  Time (1912)  |  Want (506)

It is only at the beginning of the age of the dinosaurs that the deep sea, hitherto bare of organisms, was finally invaded by life.
— Isaac Asimov
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 136.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Bare (33)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Deep (241)  |  Deep Sea (10)  |  Dinosaur (26)  |  Life (1872)  |  Marine Biology (24)  |  Organism (231)  |  Sea (327)

It is only when a child has learned to hold still that it can be considered a creature of sense.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 170.
Science quotes on:  |  Child (333)  |  Consider (430)  |  Creature (244)  |  Hold (96)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Sense (785)  |  Still (614)

It is quite possible that mathematics was invented in the ancient Middle East to keep track of tax receipts and grain stores. How odd that out of this should come a subtle scientific language that can effectively describe and predict the most arcane aspects of the Universe.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 265.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Arcane (4)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Describe (133)  |  Grain (50)  |  Invent (57)  |  Language (310)  |  Mathematics (1399)  |  Middle East (3)  |  Most (1728)  |  Possible (560)  |  Predict (86)  |  Science And Mathematics (10)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Store (49)  |  Tax (27)  |  Track (42)  |  Universe (902)

It is slower, but better, to creep along the downward path that to leap over the cliff.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 144.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (495)  |  Cliff (22)  |  Creep (15)  |  Leap (57)  |  Path (160)

It is strange, but rocks, properly chosen and polished, can be as beautiful as flowers, and much more durable.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 159.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (273)  |  Choice (114)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Durable (7)  |  Flower (112)  |  Mineralogy (24)  |  More (2558)  |  Polish (17)  |  Rock (177)  |  Strange (160)

It is tempting to wonder if our present universe, large as it is and complex though it seems, might not be merely the result of a very slight random increase in order over a very small portion of an unbelievably colossal universe which is virtually entirely in heat-death. Perhaps we are merely sliding down a gentle ripple that has been set up, accidently and very temporarily, in a quiet pond, and it is only the limitation of our own infinitesimal range of viewpoint in space and time that makes it seem to ourselves that we are hurtling down a cosmic waterfall of increasing entropy, a waterfall of colossal size and duration.
— Isaac Asimov
(1976). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 331.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Colossal (15)  |  Complex (203)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Death (407)  |  Down (455)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Heat (181)  |  Increase (226)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Large (399)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Merely (315)  |  Order (639)  |  Ourselves (248)  |  Pond (17)  |  Portion (86)  |  Present (630)  |  Quiet (37)  |  Random (42)  |  Range (104)  |  Result (700)  |  Ripple (12)  |  Set (400)  |  Small (489)  |  Space (525)  |  Space And Time (39)  |  Temporary (25)  |  Tempting (10)  |  Time (1912)  |  Time And Space (39)  |  Universe (902)  |  Viewpoint (13)  |  Waterfall (5)  |  Wonder (252)

It is the easiest thing in the world to deny a fact. People do it all the time. Yet it remains a fact just the same.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 97.
Science quotes on:  |  Deny (71)  |  Do (1905)  |  Easy (213)  |  Fact (1259)  |  People (1034)  |  Remain (357)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1912)  |  World (1854)

It may not be admirable to be a coward if someone has the muscles and mind of an ox, but it’s no crime for a weakling to be one.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  Crime (39)  |  Mind (1380)  |  Muscle (47)  |  Weakling (3)

It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for subtlety.
— Isaac Asimov
In Foundation (1951), 88.
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Reputation (33)  |  Subtle (37)  |  Subtlety (19)

It seems to me that God is a convenient invention of the human mind.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Convenience (54)  |  God (776)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Invention (401)  |  Mind (1380)  |  Seem (150)

It was not until 1901 that humanity knew that nuclear energy existed. It is understandable now—but useless—to wish that we still lived in the ignorance of 1900.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 176.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Energy (25)  |  Energy (374)  |  Exist (460)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Know (1539)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Energy (18)  |  Still (614)  |  Understandable (12)  |  Wish (217)

It’s humbling to think that all animals, including human beings, are parasites of the plant world.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 39.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Being (1276)  |  Botany (63)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Humble (54)  |  Parasite (33)  |  Plant (320)  |  Think (1124)  |  World (1854)

John Dalton's records, carefully preserved for a century, were destroyed during the World War II bombing of Manchester. It is not only the living who are killed in war.
— Isaac Asimov
In Anu Garg, Another Word a Day (2005), 210. If you know a primary print source, please contact Webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Bomb (21)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Century (319)  |  John Dalton (25)  |  Destroy (191)  |  Kill (101)  |  Life (1872)  |  Living (492)  |  Manchester (6)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Record (161)  |  War (234)  |  World (1854)

Knowledge is indivisible. When people grow wise in one direction, they are sure to make it easier for themselves to grow wise in other directions as well. On the other hand, when they split up knowledge, concentrate on their own field, and scorn and ignore other fields, they grow less wise–even in their own field.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Roving Mind (1983), 116.
Science quotes on:  |  Concentrate (28)  |  Direction (185)  |  Easier (53)  |  Field (378)  |  Grow (247)  |  Ignore (52)  |  Indivisible (22)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1034)  |  Scorn (13)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  Wise (145)

Later is usually too late.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 245.
Science quotes on:  |  Late (119)  |  Usually (176)

Life is a journey, but don’t worry, you’ll find a parking spot at the end.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  End (603)  |  Find (1014)  |  Journey (48)  |  Life (1872)  |  Park (10)  |  Spot (19)  |  Worry (34)

Life is one thing—we all lose it sooner or later. Sanity is quite another.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 89.
Science quotes on:  |  Life (1872)  |  Lose (165)  |  Thing (1914)

Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It’s the transition that’s troublesome.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 71.
Science quotes on:  |  Death (407)  |  Life (1872)  |  Pleasant (22)  |  Transition (28)  |  Trouble (117)

Life originated in the sea, and about eighty percent of it is still there.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 134.
Science quotes on:  |  Life (1872)  |  Marine Biology (24)  |  Originate (39)  |  Sea (327)  |  Still (614)

Life would be unbearable if death were not worse yet.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 274.
Science quotes on:  |  Death (407)  |  Life (1872)

Mammals in general seem to live, at best, as long as it takes their hearts to count a billion. To this general rule, man himself is the most astonishing exception.
— Isaac Asimov
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 336.
Science quotes on:  |  Astonishing (29)  |  Best (467)  |  Billion (105)  |  Count (107)  |  Exception (74)  |  General (521)  |  Heart (244)  |  Himself (461)  |  Human (1517)  |  Live (651)  |  Long (778)  |  Mammal (41)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Rule (308)  |  Zoology (38)

Methane is released by bogs, and some 45 million tons of the same gas, it has been calculated, are added to the atmosphere each year by the venting of intestinal gases by cattle and other large animals.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to the Physical Sciences (1960, 1968), 120. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 155.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Bog (5)  |  Calculate (59)  |  Cattle (18)  |  Gas (89)  |  Intestine (16)  |  Large (399)  |  Meteorology (36)  |  Methane (9)  |  Million (124)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ton (25)  |  Vent (2)  |  Year (965)

Naturally, some intriguing thoughts arise from the discovery that the three chief particles making up matter—the proton, the neutron, and the electron—all have antiparticles. Were particles and antiparticles created in equal numbers at the beginning of the universe? If so, does the universe contain worlds, remote from ours, which are made up of antiparticles?
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to the Physical Sciences (1960, 1968), 222. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 138.
Science quotes on:  |  Antiparticle (4)  |  Arise (162)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Chief (99)  |  Create (252)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Electron (96)  |  Equal (88)  |  Making (300)  |  Matter (821)  |  Neutron (23)  |  Number (712)  |  Particle (200)  |  Proton (23)  |  Remote (86)  |  Thought (996)  |  Universe (902)  |  World (1854)

Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Doing (277)  |  Let (64)  |  Moral (203)  |  Never (1089)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Right (473)  |  Sense (785)

No knife can be honed as sharp as a woman’s tongue.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 152.
Science quotes on:  |  Knife (24)  |  Tongue (44)  |  Woman (160)

No one has a sorrier lot than the weatherman. He is ignored when he is right, but execrated when he is wrong.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 151.
Science quotes on:  |  Ignore (52)  |  Lot (151)  |  Meteorology (36)  |  Right (473)  |  Sorry (31)  |  Wrong (247)

No voyage is dangerous to the one who waves from the shore.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 104.
Science quotes on:  |  Dangerous (109)  |  Wave (112)

Now any dogma, based primarily on faith and emotionalism, is a dangerous weapon to use on others, since it is almost impossible to guarantee that the weapon will never be turned on the user.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Foundation Trilogy (1951), 155.
Science quotes on:  |  Danger (127)  |  Dangerous (109)  |  Dogma (49)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Faith (210)  |  Guarantee (30)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Turn (454)  |  Use (771)  |  User (5)  |  Weapon (98)  |  Will (2350)

Of all extinct life-forms, dinosaurs are the most popular. Why that should be is not clear.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 202.
Science quotes on:  |  Dinosaur (26)  |  Extinct (25)  |  Form (978)  |  Life (1872)  |  Life Form (6)  |  Life-Form (6)  |  Most (1728)  |  Paleontology (32)  |  Popular (35)  |  Why (491)

On tomorrows feast, we can starve today.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 188.
Science quotes on:  |  Feast (5)  |  Today (321)  |  Tomorrow (63)

Once the sun sets, it grows dark; don’t let that catch you by surprise.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 265.
Science quotes on:  |  Dark (145)  |  Grow (247)  |  Set (400)  |  Sun (408)  |  Surprise (91)

Only simpletons go to fortune-tellers. Who else would be in such a hurry to hear bad news.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 165.
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Hear (146)  |  Hurry (16)  |  New (1276)  |  News (36)

Our sun, by the way … may become a white dwarf some day but apparently will never become a supernova.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Intelligent Man's Guide to the Physical Sciences (1960, 1968), 56. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 316.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (822)  |  Never (1089)  |  Sun (408)  |  Supernova (7)  |  Way (1214)  |  White (132)  |  White Dwarf (2)  |  Will (2350)

Outside intelligences, exploring the solar system with true impartiality, would be quite likely to enter the sun in their records thus: Star X, spectral class G0, 4 planets plus debris.
— Isaac Asimov
Essay 16, 'By Jove!'. In View From a Height (1963), 227.
Science quotes on:  |  Alien (40)  |  Class (168)  |  Debris (7)  |  Enter (145)  |  Impartiality (7)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Outside (141)  |  Planet (406)  |  Plus (43)  |  Record (161)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Star (462)  |  Sun (408)  |  System (545)

Part of the inhumanity of the computer is that, once it is competently programmed and working smoothly, it is completely honest.
— Isaac Asimov
In Change! (1983). Quoted in Reader's Digest (1987), 131, Nos. 783-787, 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Completely (137)  |  Computer (134)  |  Honest (53)  |  Inhumanity (3)  |  Program (58)  |  Smooth (34)

People are entirely too disbelieving of coincidence. They are far too ready to dismiss it and to build arcane structures of extremely rickety substance in order to avoid it. I, on the other hand, see coincidence everywhere as an inevitable consequence of the laws of probability, according to which having no unusual coincidence is far more unusual than any coincidence could possibly be.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Planet That Wasn't (1976), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Arcane (4)  |  Avoid (124)  |  Build (212)  |  Coincidence (20)  |  Conincidence (4)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Disbelief (4)  |  Dismiss (12)  |  Everywhere (100)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Law (914)  |  More (2558)  |  Order (639)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1034)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Probability (135)  |  See (1095)  |  Structure (365)  |  Substance (253)  |  Unusual (37)

People are ready enough to laugh at you. Don’t make funny faces in order to encourage them.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Encourage (45)  |  Enough (341)  |  Face (214)  |  Laugh (51)  |  Order (639)  |  People (1034)

Physics is the basic science. One can easily argue that all other sciences are specialized aspects of physics.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 210.
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Basic (144)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (568)  |  Specialized (9)

Pierre Curie, a brilliant scientist, happened to marry a still more brilliant one—Marie, the famous Madame Curie—and is the only great scientist in history who is consistently identified as the husband of someone else.
— Isaac Asimov
View from a Height (1963), 119.
Science quotes on:  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Consistency (31)  |  Consistently (8)  |  Marie Curie (37)  |  Pierre Curie (3)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  History (719)  |  Husband (13)  |  Identification (20)  |  Marriage (40)  |  More (2558)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Still (614)

Properly read, the Bible is the most potent force for atheism ever conceived.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Atheism (11)  |  Bible (105)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Force (497)  |  Most (1728)  |  Potent (15)  |  Properly (21)  |  Read (309)

Psychology marks the triumph of human evolution. How many other species would need a science of the mind?
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 223.
Science quotes on:  |  Evolution (636)  |  Human (1517)  |  Mind (1380)  |  Other (2233)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Species (435)  |  Triumph (76)

Radiation, unlike smoking, drinking, and overeating, gives no pleasure, so the possible victims object.
— Isaac Asimov
As given in The Journal of NIH Research (1990), 2, 30
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Drinking (21)  |  Giving (11)  |  Object (442)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Possible (560)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Smoking (27)  |  Unlike (9)  |  Victim (37)

Reaching the Moon by three-man vessels in one long bound from Earth is like casting a thin thread across space. The main effort, in the coming decades, will be to strengthen this thread; to make it a cord, a cable, and, finally, a broad highway.
— Isaac Asimov
In 'The Coming Decades in Space', Boy’s Life (Jun 1972), 8. Reprinted in The Beginning and the End (1977), 203.
Science quotes on:  |  Across (32)  |  Bound (120)  |  Broad (28)  |  Cable (11)  |  Cast (69)  |  Casting (10)  |  Coming (114)  |  Cord (3)  |  Decade (66)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effort (243)  |  Finally (26)  |  Highway (15)  |  Long (778)  |  Main (29)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moon (252)  |  Reach (287)  |  Space (525)  |  Strengthen (25)  |  Thin (19)  |  Thread (36)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Will (2350)

Religion cannot object to science on moral grounds. The history of religious intolerance forbids it.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 273.
Science quotes on:  |  Forbid (14)  |  Ground (222)  |  History (719)  |  Intolerance (8)  |  Moral (203)  |  Object (442)  |  Religion (370)  |  Religious (134)  |  Science And Religion (337)

Religion considers the Universe deterministic and science considers it probabilistic—an important distinction.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 221.
Science quotes on:  |  Consider (430)  |  Deterministic (2)  |  Distinction (72)  |  Important (231)  |  Probability (135)  |  Religion (370)  |  Universe (902)

Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world.
— Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 78.
Science quotes on:  |  Amusement (38)  |  Change (640)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Fascination (35)  |  World (1854)

Science can be introduced to children well or poorly. If poorly, children can be turned away from science; they can develop a lifelong antipathy; they will be in a far worse condition than if they had never been introduced to science at all.
— Isaac Asimov
[Unverified. Please contact Webmaster if you can identify the primary source.]
Science quotes on:  |  Antipathy (2)  |  Children (201)  |  Condition (362)  |  Develop (279)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Lifelong (10)  |  Never (1089)  |  Poor (139)  |  Science Education (16)  |  Turn (454)  |  Well (14)  |  Will (2350)  |  Worse (25)

Science doesn’t purvey absolute truth. Science is a mechanism, a way of trying to improve your knowledge of nature. It’s a system for testing your thoughts against the universe, and seeing whether they match.
— Isaac Asimov
'Isaac Asimov Speaks' with Bill Moyers in The Humanist (Jan/Feb 1989), 49. Reprinted in Carl Howard Freedman (ed.), Conversations with Isaac Asimov (2005), 143-144. Bill Moyers asked “What’s real knowledge?” Asimov replied, “Well, we can’t be absolutely certain.” He continued answering as in the quote above.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (154)  |  Against (332)  |  Improve (65)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Match (30)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Nature (2025)  |  Seeing (143)  |  System (545)  |  Test (221)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (996)  |  Truth (1111)  |  Try (296)  |  Trying (144)  |  Universe (902)  |  Way (1214)

Science fiction writers foresee the inevitable, and although problems and catastrophes may be inevitable, solutions are not.
— Isaac Asimov
'How Easy to See the Future'. In Asimov on Science Fiction (1981), 86.
Science quotes on:  |  Catastrophe (35)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Problem (734)  |  Science Fiction (35)  |  Solution (285)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Writer (90)

Science in the service of humanity is technology, but lack of wisdom may make the service harmful.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 321.
Science quotes on:  |  Harm (43)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Lack (127)  |  Service (110)  |  Technology (284)  |  Wisdom (235)

Science is complex and chilling. The mathematical language of science is understood by very few. The vistas it presents are scary—an enormous universe ruled by chance and impersonal rules, empty and uncaring, ungraspable and vertiginous. How comfortable to turn instead to a small world, only a few thousand years old, and under God's personal; and immediate care; a world in which you are His peculiar concern.
— Isaac Asimov
The 'Threat' of Creationism. In Ashley Montagu (ed.), Science and Creationism (1984), 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Age Of The Earth (12)  |  Care (203)  |  Chance (245)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Complex (203)  |  Complexity (122)  |  Concern (239)  |  Creationist (16)  |  Empty (83)  |  Fear (215)  |  God (776)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Language (310)  |  Mathematics (1399)  |  Old (499)  |  Peculiar (116)  |  Present (630)  |  Religion (370)  |  Rule (308)  |  Scary (3)  |  Small (489)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Turn (454)  |  Understood (155)  |  Universe (902)  |  Vista (12)  |  World (1854)  |  Year (965)

Science is dangerous. There is no question but that poison gas, genetic engineering, and nuclear weapons and power stations are terrifying. It may be that civilization is falling apart and the world we know is coming to an end. In that case, why no turn to religion and look forward to the Day of Judgment, ... [being] lifted into eternal bliss ... [and] watching the scoffers and disbelievers writhe forever in torment.
— Isaac Asimov
The 'Threat' of Creationism. In Ashley Montagu (ed.), Science and Creationism (1984), 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Civilization (222)  |  Coming (114)  |  Creationist (16)  |  Dangerous (109)  |  End (603)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Fear (215)  |  Forever (112)  |  Forward (104)  |  Gas (89)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetic Engineering (16)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Know (1539)  |  Lift (57)  |  Look (584)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Power (16)  |  Nuclear Weapon (17)  |  Nuclear Weapons (2)  |  Poison (47)  |  Power (773)  |  Question (652)  |  Religion (370)  |  Station (30)  |  Torment (18)  |  Turn (454)  |  Weapon (98)  |  Weapons (57)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1854)

Science is uncertain. Theories are subject to revision; observations are open to a variety of interpretations, and scientists quarrel amongst themselves. This is disillusioning for those untrained in the scientific method, who thus turn to the rigid certainty of the Bible instead. There is something comfortable about a view that allows for no deviation and that spares you the painful necessity of having to think.
— Isaac Asimov
The 'Threat' of Creationism. In Ashley Montagu (ed.), Science and Creationism (1984), 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Bible (105)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Creationist (16)  |  Deviation (21)  |  Disillusionment (2)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Method (532)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Observation (594)  |  Open (277)  |  Quarrel (10)  |  Religion (370)  |  Revision (7)  |  Rigid (24)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Something (718)  |  Subject (544)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Theory (1016)  |  Think (1124)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Turn (454)  |  Uncertain (45)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Untrained (2)  |  Variety (138)  |  View (498)

Science must be taught well, if a student is to understand the coming decades he must live through.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 255.
Science quotes on:  |  Coming (114)  |  Decade (66)  |  Live (651)  |  Must (1525)  |  Science And Education (17)  |  Student (317)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Through (846)  |  Understand (650)

Scientific apparatus offers a window to knowledge, but as they grow more elaborate, scientists spend ever more time washing the windows.
— Isaac Asimov
[Unverified. Please contact Webmaster if you can identify the primary source.]
Science quotes on:  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Elaborate (31)  |  Grow (247)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  More (2558)  |  Offer (143)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Spend (97)  |  Time (1912)  |  Washing (3)  |  Window (59)

Scientific theories can always be improved and are improved. That is one of the glories of science. It is the authoritarian view of the Universe that is frozen in stone and cannot be changed, so that once it is wrong, it is wrong forever.
— Isaac Asimov
Essay, 'The Nearest Star', The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (Oct 1989), collected in The Secret of the Universe (1991), 82.
Science quotes on:  |  Authoritarian (2)  |  Change (640)  |  Forever (112)  |  Freeze (7)  |  Glory (67)  |  Improve (65)  |  Scientific (957)  |  Stone (169)  |  Theory (1016)  |  Universe (902)  |  View (498)  |  Wrong (247)

Self-education is, I firmly believe, the only kind of education there is.
— Isaac Asimov
In Science Past, Science Future (1975), 208.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (616)  |  Education (423)  |  Kind (565)  |  Self (268)

Since the Universe is defined as including all that exists, it is useless to ask what lies beyond it.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 328.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (423)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Definition (239)  |  Exist (460)  |  Include (93)  |  Lie (370)  |  Universe (902)  |  Useless (38)

Since we all must die, what better can we ask for than a quick and sudden death?
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 143.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (423)  |  Better (495)  |  Death (407)  |  Die (95)  |  Must (1525)  |  Quick (13)  |  Sudden (70)

Small can be beautiful: an eagle may at time go hungry; a pet canary, never.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (273)  |  Eagle (20)  |  Never (1089)  |  Small (489)  |  Time (1912)

Society is itself a kind of organism, an enormously powerful one, but unfortunately not a very wise one.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 301.
Science quotes on:  |  Enormously (4)  |  Kind (565)  |  Organism (231)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Society (353)  |  Sociology (46)  |  Unfortunately (40)  |  Wise (145)

Some might accept evolution, if it allowed human beings to be created by God, but evolution won’t work halfway.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Being (1276)  |  Create (252)  |  Evolution (636)  |  God (776)  |  Halfway (2)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Origin Of Life (37)  |  Work (1403)

Stars look serene, but they are incredibly violent furnaces that occasionally erupt in incredibly violent explosions.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 309.
Science quotes on:  |  Explosion (52)  |  Furnace (13)  |  Incredibly (3)  |  Look (584)  |  Occasional (23)  |  Serene (5)  |  Star (462)  |  Stars (304)  |  Violent (17)

Such is the respect for physicians that most people are astonished when one of them falls sick—and yet they do.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 140.
Science quotes on:  |  Astonish (39)  |  Astonished (10)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fall (243)  |  Illness (35)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Most (1728)  |  People (1034)  |  Physician (284)  |  Respect (212)  |  Sick (83)

Suppose that we are wise enough to learn and know—and yet not wise enough to control our learning and knowledge, so that we use it to destroy ourselves? Even if that is so, knowledge remains better than ignorance. It is better to know—even if the knowledge endures only for the moment that comes before destruction—than to gain eternal life at the price of a dull and swinish lack of comprehension of a universe that swirls unseen before us in all its wonder. That was the choice of Achilles, and it is mine, too.
— Isaac Asimov
Widely seen on the Web, but always without citation, so regard attribution as uncertain. Webmaster has not yet found reliable verification. Contact Webmaster if you know a primary print source.
Science quotes on:  |  Achilles (2)  |  Better (495)  |  Choice (114)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Control (185)  |  Destroy (191)  |  Destruction (136)  |  Dull (59)  |  Endure (21)  |  Enough (341)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Gain (149)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Know (1539)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Lack (127)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1872)  |  Mine (78)  |  Moment (260)  |  Ourselves (248)  |  Price (57)  |  Remain (357)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Swirl (10)  |  Universe (902)  |  Unseen (23)  |  Use (771)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  Wise (145)  |  Wonder (252)

Suppose we take a quantity of heat and change it into work. In doing so, we haven’t destroyed the heat, we have only transferred it to another place or perhaps changed it into another energy form.
— Isaac Asimov
From 'In the Game of Energy and Thermodynamics You Can’t Even Break Even', Smithsonian (Aug 1970), 1, No. 5, 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Change (640)  |  Conservation Of Energy (30)  |  Destroy (191)  |  Doing (277)  |  Energy (374)  |  Form (978)  |  Heat (181)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Thermodynamics (40)  |  Transfer (21)  |  Work (1403)

Surely no child, and few adults, have ever watched a bird in flight without envy.
— Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov and Jason A. Shulman, Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Adult (24)  |  Aeronautics (15)  |  Bird (163)  |  Child (333)  |  Envy (15)  |  Flight (101)  |  Surely (101)  |  Watch (119)  |  Watching (11)

The Principia Mathematica developed an overall scheme of the universe, one far more elegant and enlightening than any the ancients had devised. And the Newtonian scheme was based on a set of assumptions, so few and so simple, developed through so clear and so enticing a line of mathematics that conservatives could scarcely find the heart and courage to fight it.
— Isaac Asimov
In Entry 231, 'Newton, Sir Isaac', Asimov’s Biographical Encyclopedia of Science and Technology (2nd rev ed., 1982), 152.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Clear (111)  |  Conservative (16)  |  Courage (82)  |  Develop (279)  |  Devise (16)  |  Elegant (37)  |  Enlighten (32)  |  Few (15)  |  Heart (244)  |  Mathematics (1399)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Principia Mathematica (2)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Simple (430)  |  Universe (902)

The body knows what it needs. That’s why some things taste good.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 78.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Good (906)  |  Know (1539)  |  Taste (93)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Why (491)

The card-player begins by arranging his hand for maximum sense. Scientists do the same with the facts they gather.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 318.
Science quotes on:  |  Arrange (34)  |  Begin (275)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Facts (553)  |  Gather (77)  |  Hand (149)  |  Maximum (16)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sense (785)  |  Taxonomy (19)

The dangers that face the world can, every one of them, be traced back to science. The salvations that may save the world will, every one of them, be traced back to science.
— Isaac Asimov
In Today and Tomorrow (1974), 304.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Danger (127)  |  Face (214)  |  Salvation (13)  |  Save (126)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1854)

The difference between electricity and electronics is the difference between a toaster and a television set.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Difference (355)  |  Electricity (169)  |  Electronics (21)  |  Set (400)  |  Television (33)  |  Toaster (2)

The Earth has no business possessing such a Moon. It is too huge—over a quarter Earth’s diameter and about 1/81 of its mass. No other planet in the Solar System has even nearly so large a satellite.
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov on Physics (1976), 46. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 166.
Science quotes on:  |  Business (156)  |  Diameter (28)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Huge (30)  |  Large (399)  |  Mass (161)  |  Moon (252)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Other (2233)  |  Planet (406)  |  Possess (158)  |  Satellite (30)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Strange (160)  |  System (545)

The earth is a book in which we read not only its history, but the history of the living things it has borne.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 108.
Science quotes on:  |  Book (414)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Geology (240)  |  History (719)  |  Life (1872)  |  Living (492)  |  Read (309)  |  Thing (1914)

The earth is the only home that any of us have—so far; anyway.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 61.
Science quotes on:  |  Earth (1076)  |  Home (186)

The earth, formed out of the same debris of which the sun was born, is extraordinarily rich in iron—iron which once may have existed at the center of a star that exploded many billions of years ago.
— Isaac Asimov
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 220.
Science quotes on:  |  Billion (105)  |  Birth (154)  |  Center (35)  |  Debris (7)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Exist (460)  |  Explode (15)  |  Exploded (11)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Form (978)  |  Iron (101)  |  Planet (406)  |  Rich (66)  |  Star (462)  |  Sun (408)  |  Year (965)

The fact that the general incidence of leukemia has doubled in the last two decades may be due, partly, to the increasing use of x-rays for numerous purposes. The incidence of leukemia in doctors, who are likely to be so exposed, is twice that of the general public. In radiologists … the incidence is ten times greater.
— Isaac Asimov
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 233.
Science quotes on:  |  Decade (66)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Due (143)  |  Exposed (33)  |  Fact (1259)  |  General (521)  |  Greater (288)  |  Last (425)  |  Leukemia (4)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Purpose (337)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Ray (115)  |  Time (1912)  |  Two (936)  |  Use (771)  |  X-ray (43)

The facts, gentlemen, and nothing but the facts, for careful eyes are narrowly watching.
— Isaac Asimov
In Fact and Fancy (1962), 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Care (203)  |  Eye (441)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Facts (553)  |  Gentleman (26)  |  Narrowly (4)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  Watch (119)

The fertilized ovum of a mouse and a whale look much alike, but differences quickly show up in the course of their development. If we could study their molecules with the naked eyes, we would see the differences from the start.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 73.
Science quotes on:  |  Alike (60)  |  Course (415)  |  Development (442)  |  Difference (355)  |  Embryology (18)  |  Eye (441)  |  Fertilize (4)  |  Look (584)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Mouse (33)  |  Naked Eye (12)  |  Ovum (4)  |  See (1095)  |  Show (354)  |  Start (237)  |  Study (702)  |  Whale (45)

The fertilized ovum of a mouse and a whale look much alike, but differences quickly show up in the course of their development. If we could study their molecules with the naked eyes, we would see the differences from the start.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 73.
Science quotes on:  |  Alike (60)  |  Course (415)  |  Development (442)  |  Difference (355)  |  Eye (441)  |  Look (584)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Mouse (33)  |  Naked Eye (12)  |  See (1095)  |  Show (354)  |  Start (237)  |  Study (702)  |  Whale (45)

The force of gravity—though it is the first force with which we are acquainted, and though it is always with us, and though it is the one with a strength we most thoroughly appreciate—is by far the weakest known force in nature. It is first and rearmost.
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov On Physics (1976, 1988), 56. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 113.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquaint (11)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  First (1302)  |  Force (497)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Know (1539)  |  Known (453)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2025)  |  Strength (139)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Weak (73)

The greatest difficulty comes at the start. It’s called "getting ready."
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 119.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (782)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Start (237)

The greatest inventors are unknown to us. Someone invented the wheel—but who?
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 117.
Science quotes on:  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Inventor (81)  |  Unknown (198)  |  Wheel (52)

The human mechanism is marvelous. But why not—it is the result of three-and-a-half billion years of tinkering.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Billion (105)  |  Human (1517)  |  Marvelous (31)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Result (700)  |  Tinker (6)  |  Tinkering (6)  |  Why (491)  |  Year (965)

The law of conservation of energy tells us we can't get something for nothing, but we refuse to believe it.
— Isaac Asimov
In Isaac Asimov's Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 75.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (616)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Conservation Of Energy (30)  |  Energy (374)  |  Law (914)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  Refuse (45)  |  Something (718)  |  Tell (344)

The living human being seems to consist of nothing more than matter and energy. Spirit is merely an assumption.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 214.
Science quotes on:  |  Assumption (96)  |  Being (1276)  |  Consist (224)  |  Energy (374)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Living (492)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mere (86)  |  Merely (315)  |  More (2558)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  Spirit (278)

The longer it takes to get to a point, the blunter it turns out to be.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 237.
Science quotes on:  |  Point (584)  |  Turn (454)

The mere existence of nuclear weapons by the thousands is an incontrovertible sign of human insanity.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 180.
Science quotes on:  |  Existence (484)  |  Human (1517)  |  Incontrovertible (8)  |  Insanity (8)  |  Mere (86)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Weapon (17)  |  Sign (63)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Weapon (98)  |  Weapons (57)

The Moon and its phases gave man his first calendar. Trying to match that calendar with the seasons helped give him mathematics. The usefulness of the calendar helped give rise to the thought of beneficent gods. And with all that the Moon is beautiful, too.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 164.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (273)  |  Beneficent (9)  |  Calendar (9)  |  First (1302)  |  God (776)  |  Man (2252)  |  Match (30)  |  Mathematics (1399)  |  Moon (252)  |  Phase (37)  |  Rise (170)  |  Season (48)  |  Thought (996)  |  Trying (144)  |  Usefulness (92)

The most exciting part of any trip is reaching home again.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 230.
Science quotes on:  |  Exciting (50)  |  Home (186)  |  Most (1728)

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' (I found it!) but 'That's funny....'
— Isaac Asimov
In Ashton Applewhite, William R. Evans and Andrew Frothingham, And I Quote (2003), 467
Science quotes on:  |  Eureka (13)  |  Exciting (50)  |  Hear (146)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1276)  |  Phrase (61)

The most hopelessly stupid man is he who is not aware that he is wise.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Foundation Trilogy (1951), Vol. 2, 96.
Science quotes on:  |  Aware (36)  |  Hopeless (17)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Stupid (38)  |  Wise (145)

The nations may be divided in everything else, but they all share a single body of science.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 270.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Divided (50)  |  Everything (490)  |  Nation (208)  |  Science And Politics (16)  |  Share (82)  |  Single (366)

The rainbow, “the bridge of the gods,” proved to be the bridge to our understanding of light—much more important.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 189.
Science quotes on:  |  Bridge (49)  |  God (776)  |  Important (231)  |  Light (636)  |  More (2558)  |  Optics (24)  |  Prove (263)  |  Rainbow (17)  |  Understand (650)  |  Understanding (527)

The rockets that have made spaceflight possible are an advance that, more than any other technological victory of the twentieth century, was grounded in science fiction… . One thing that no science fiction writer visualized, however, as far as I know, was that the landings on the Moon would be watched by people on Earth by way of television.
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov on Physics (1976), 35. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 307.
Science quotes on:  |  20th Century (40)  |  Advance (299)  |  Century (319)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Ground (222)  |  Know (1539)  |  Landing (3)  |  Moon (252)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1034)  |  Possible (560)  |  Rocket (52)  |  Science Fiction (35)  |  Space Flight (26)  |  Technological (62)  |  Technology (284)  |  Television (33)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Victory (40)  |  Visualize (8)  |  Watch (119)  |  Way (1214)  |  Writer (90)

The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.
— Isaac Asimov
IIsaac Asimov's Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 281.
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Faster (50)  |  Gather (77)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Life (1872)  |  Right (473)  |  Sadness (37)  |  Society (353)  |  Wisdom (235)

The significant chemicals of living tissue are rickety and unstable, which is exactly what is needed for life.
— Isaac Asimov
As shown, without citation, in Randy Moore, Writing to Learn Science (1997), 226.
Science quotes on:  |  Chemical (303)  |  Exactly (14)  |  Life (1872)  |  Living (492)  |  Need (323)  |  Rickety (2)  |  Significant (78)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Unstable (9)

The Sun is all in all to us, the center from which all arises, but look wider, and it is only one of countless billions.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 315.
Science quotes on:  |  Arise (162)  |  Billion (105)  |  Center (35)  |  Countless (39)  |  Look (584)  |  Sun (408)

The sure thing about anything that goes without saying is that someone is bound to say it.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 206.
Science quotes on:  |  Bound (120)  |  Say (990)  |  Thing (1914)

The time for offense is when a man, once he has cooled down, repeats an insult he has offered in his rage.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 182.
Science quotes on:  |  Cool (15)  |  Down (455)  |  Insult (16)  |  Man (2252)  |  Offense (4)  |  Offer (143)  |  Rage (11)  |  Repeat (44)  |  Time (1912)

The trouble with economizing is that it can be very expensive.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 58.
Science quotes on:  |  Economize (2)  |  Expensive (10)  |  Trouble (117)

The trouble with triumph is that you may be on the other side.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 299.
Science quotes on:  |  Other (2233)  |  Side (236)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Trouble (117)

The true delight is in the finding out rather than in the knowing.
— Isaac Asimov
Quoted, without citation, in Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology (1997), 25, 4. Various other instances of the quote published later also show no citation. Please contact Webmaster if you know a primary print source.
Science quotes on:  |  Delight (111)  |  Finding Out (6)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1653)

The wall that says "welcome, stranger" has never been built.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 210.
Science quotes on:  |  Never (1089)  |  Say (990)  |  Wall (71)  |  Welcome (20)

The whole premise of democracy is that it is safe to leave important questions to the court of public opinion—but is it safe to leave them to the court of public ignorance?
— Isaac Asimov
In 'Combatting U.S. Scientific Illiteracy', Los Angeles Times (31 Mar 1989).
Science quotes on:  |  Court (35)  |  Democracy (36)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Important (231)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Premise (40)  |  Public Opinion (2)  |  Question (652)  |  Safe (61)  |  Whole (756)

The wish to believe, even against evidence, fuels all the pseudosciences from astrology to creationism.
— Isaac Asimov
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Astrology (46)  |  Belief (616)  |  Creationism (8)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Pseudoscience (17)  |  Wish (217)

The work of Planck and Einstein proved that light behaved as particles in some ways and that the ether therefore was not needed for light to travel through a vacuum. When this was done, the ether was no longer useful and it was dropped with a glad cry. The ether has never been required since. It does not exist now; in fact, it never existed.
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov on Physics (1976), 85. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 212.
Science quotes on:  |  Cry (30)  |  Dropped (17)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Ether (37)  |  Exist (460)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Light (636)  |  Never (1089)  |  Particle (200)  |  Max Planck (83)  |  Prove (263)  |  Require (229)  |  Required (108)  |  Through (846)  |  Travel (125)  |  Useful (261)  |  Vacuum (41)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1403)

The worlds of our solar system are widely different, but all share a common gravitational tie to the sun.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 218.
Science quotes on:  |  Common (447)  |  Different (595)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Planet (406)  |  Share (82)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Sun (408)  |  System (545)  |  Tie (42)  |  World (1854)

The young specialist in English Lit, having quoted me, went on to lecture me severely on the fact that in every century people have thought they understood the Universe at last, and in every century they were proved to be wrong. It follows that the one thing we can say about our modern “knowledge” is that it is wrong.
The young man then quoted with approval what Socrates had said on learning that the Delphic oracle had proclaimed him the wisest man in Greece. “If I am the wisest man,” said Socrates, “it is because I alone know that I know nothing.” The implication was that I was very foolish because I was under the impression I knew a great deal.
Alas, none of this was new to me. (There is very little that is new to me; I wish my correspondents would realize this.) This particular theme was addressed to me a quarter of a century ago by John Campbell, who specialized in irritating me. He also told me that all theories are proven wrong in time.
My answer to him was, “John, when people thought the Earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the Earth was spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the Earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the Earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together.”
— Isaac Asimov
In The Relativity of Wrong (1989), 214.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (325)  |  Answer (389)  |  Both (496)  |  Century (319)  |  Deal (192)  |  Delphic (4)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Fact (1259)  |  Flat (34)  |  Follow (390)  |  Foolish (41)  |  Great (1610)  |  Impression (118)  |  Know (1539)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Last (425)  |  Learning (291)  |  Lecture (112)  |  Little (718)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modern (405)  |  New (1276)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  People (1034)  |  Proclaim (31)  |  Realize (157)  |  Say (990)  |   Socrates, (17)  |  Specialist (33)  |  Theme (17)  |  Theory (1016)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1124)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (996)  |  Time (1912)  |  Together (392)  |  Understood (155)  |  Universe (902)  |  View (498)  |  Wish (217)  |  Wrong (247)  |  Young (253)

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that “my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”
— Isaac Asimov
In 'A Cult of Ignorance', Newsweek (21 Jan 1980), 19. As cited in Igor Ž. Žagar and Polona Kelava, From Formal to Non-Formal: Education, Learning and Knowledge (2014), 74.
Science quotes on:  |  Cult (5)  |  Culture (157)  |  Democracy (36)  |  False (105)  |  Good (906)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Notion (120)  |  Politics (123)  |  United States (31)

There is a single light of science, and to brighten it anywhere is to brighten it everywhere.
— Isaac Asimov
In Erin Gruwell and Frank McCourt, The Gigantic Book of Teachers' Wisdom (2007), 578.
Science quotes on:  |  Everywhere (100)  |  Light (636)  |  Single (366)

There is an art to science, and science in art; the two are not enemies, but different aspects of the whole.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 251.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (681)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Different (595)  |  Enemy (86)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Two (936)  |  Whole (756)

There is no belief, however foolish, that will not gather its faithful adherents who will defend it to the death.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Stars in Their Courses? (1971), 36.
Science quotes on:  |  Adherent (6)  |  Belief (616)  |  Death (407)  |  Defend (32)  |  Faith (210)  |  Foolish (41)  |  Gather (77)  |  Will (2350)

There is no drink like pure water, provided one realizes that it is alcohol that is the purifying agent.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 220.
Science quotes on:  |  Agent (74)  |  Alcohol (23)  |  Drink (56)  |  Provide (79)  |  Pure (300)  |  Purify (9)  |  Realize (157)  |  Water (505)

There is no duress like one’s own conscience and it is that which makes life so needlessly bitter.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 252.
Science quotes on:  |  Bitter (30)  |  Conscience (52)  |  Life (1872)

There is no point in trying to teach a thief to steal.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 198.
Science quotes on:  |  Point (584)  |  Teach (301)  |  Thief (6)  |  Trying (144)

There is no question but that man’s heart outperforms all other hearts in existence. (The tortoise’s heart may last longer but it lives nowhere near as intensely.) Why man should be so long-lived is not known, but man, being what he is, is far more interested in asking why he does not live still longer.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Human Body: Its Structure and Operation (1963), 321. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 216.
Science quotes on:  |  Asking (74)  |  Being (1276)  |  Existence (484)  |  Heart (244)  |  Human (1517)  |  Intensity (34)  |  Interest (416)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Live (651)  |  Long (778)  |  Long-Lived (2)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Question (652)  |  Still (614)  |  Tortoise (10)  |  Why (491)

There is nothing frightening about an eternal dreamless sleep. Surely it is better than eternal torment in Hell and eternal boredom in Heaven.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Better (495)  |  Boredom (11)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Fright (11)  |  Heaven (267)  |  Hell (32)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Surely (101)  |  Torment (18)

There is something particularly human about using tools; the first and most important tool being language.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 125.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  First (1302)  |  Human (1517)  |  Important (231)  |  Language (310)  |  Linguistics (39)  |  Most (1728)  |  Particularly (21)  |  Something (718)  |  Tool (131)

There is very little flexibility in the behavior of the Universe. What it does once, it does again.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 167.
Science quotes on:  |  Behavior (132)  |  Flexibility (6)  |  Little (718)  |  Natural Law (46)  |  Universe (902)

There seems to be a feeling that anything that is natural must be good. Strychnine is natural.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 171.
Science quotes on:  |  Feeling (259)  |  Good (906)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (811)

There’s something about a pious man such as he. He will cheerfully cut your throat if it suits him, but he will hesitate to endanger the welfare of your immaterial and problematical soul.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Cheerfully (2)  |  Cut (116)  |  Endanger (3)  |  Hesitate (24)  |  Immaterial (6)  |  Man (2252)  |  Pious (4)  |  Something (718)  |  Soul (237)  |  Suit (12)  |  Throat (10)  |  Welfare (30)  |  Will (2350)

Thinking is the activity I love best, and writing to me is simply thinking through my fingers. I can write up to 18 hours a day. Typing 90 words a minute, I’ve done better than 50 pages a day. Nothing interferes with my concentration. You could put an orgy in my office and I wouldn't look up—well, maybe once.
— Isaac Asimov
When accepting the James T. Grady award from the American Chemical Society. As quoted in Something About the Author (1981), Vol. 26, 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Best (467)  |  Better (495)  |  Concentration (29)  |  Finger (48)  |  Hour (192)  |  Interfere (17)  |  Look (584)  |  Love (328)  |  Minute (129)  |  Nothing (1002)  |  Office (72)  |  Orgy (3)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Word (650)  |  Write (250)  |  Writing (192)

Those who reject biological evolution do so, usually, not out of reason, but out of unjustified vanity.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 86.
Science quotes on:  |  Biological (137)  |  Biology (234)  |  Do (1905)  |  Evolution (636)  |  Reason (767)  |  Reject (67)  |  Usually (176)  |  Vanity (20)

Those who say "a penny for your thoughts" are usually being overgenerous.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 229.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Say (990)  |  Thought (996)  |  Usually (176)

Though science can cause problems, it is not by ignorance that we will solve them.
— Isaac Asimov
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Cause (564)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Problem (734)  |  Solve (146)  |  Will (2350)

To be saved from the jaws of a wolf by a hungry bear is no great cause for gratitude.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 227.
Science quotes on:  |  Bear (162)  |  Cause (564)  |  Gratitude (14)  |  Great (1610)  |  Wolf (11)

To get a human being takes a moment of pleasure, but to get a horse costs money.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 126.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Cost (94)  |  Horse (78)  |  Human (1517)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Moment (260)  |  Money (178)  |  Pleasure (191)

To insult someone we call him “bestial.” For deliberate cruelty and malice, “human” might be the greater insult.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal Behavior (10)  |  Bestial (3)  |  Call (782)  |  Cruelty (24)  |  Deliberate (19)  |  Greater (288)  |  Human (1517)  |  Insult (16)  |  Malice (6)

To introduce something altogether new would mean to begin all over, to become ignorant again, and to run the old, old risk of failing to learn.
— Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov, Patricia S. Warrick, Martin Harry Greenberg, Machines That Think: The Best Science Fiction Stories About Robots and Computers? (1984), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (822)  |  Begin (275)  |  Fail (193)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Learn (672)  |  Mean (810)  |  New (1276)  |  Old (499)  |  Risk (68)  |  Run (158)  |  Something (718)

To make still bigger telescopes will be useless, for the light absorption and temperature variations of the earth’s atmosphere are what now limits the ability to see fine detail. If bigger telescopes are to be built, it will have to be for use in an airless observatory, perhaps an observatory on the moon.
— Isaac Asimov
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 284.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Absorption (13)  |  Airless (3)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Big (55)  |  Build (212)  |  Detail (150)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Fine (37)  |  Light (636)  |  Limit (294)  |  Moon (252)  |  Observatory (18)  |  See (1095)  |  Still (614)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Use (771)  |  Useless (38)  |  Variation (93)  |  Will (2350)

To many of us, the first law of dietetics seems to be: if it tastes good, it’s bad for you.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Dietetic (4)  |  First (1302)  |  Good (906)  |  Law (914)  |  Quip (81)  |  Seem (150)  |  Taste (93)

To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today.
— Isaac Asimov
In The Roving Mind (1983), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (782)  |  God (776)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Premature (22)  |  Remain (357)  |  Surrender (21)  |  Today (321)

To test a perfect theory with imperfect instruments did not impress the Greek philosophers as a valid way to gain knowledge.
— Isaac Asimov
The New Intelligent Man's Guide to Science (1965), Vol. 1, 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Gain (149)  |  Greek (109)  |  Imperfect (46)  |  Impress (66)  |  Instrument (159)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Perfect (224)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Test (221)  |  Theory (1016)  |  Valid (12)  |  Way (1214)

To want peace and quiet above all else is to want death.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 158.
Science quotes on:  |  Death (407)  |  Peace (116)  |  Quiet (37)  |  Want (506)

True literacy is becoming an arcane art and the nation [United States] is steadily dumbing down.
— Isaac Asimov
In I. Asimov: a Memoir (1994), 46.
Science quotes on:  |  Arcane (4)  |  Art (681)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Down (455)  |  Literacy (10)  |  Nation (208)  |  State (505)  |  Steady (45)

Unfortunately, in many cases, people who write science fiction violate the laws of nature, not because they want to make a point, but because they don't know what the laws of nature are.
— Isaac Asimov
In Carl Howard Freedman (ed.), Conversations with Isaac Asimov (2005), back cover.
Science quotes on:  |  Know (1539)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Law (914)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Nature (2025)  |  People (1034)  |  Point (584)  |  Science Fiction (35)  |  Unfortunately (40)  |  Violation (7)  |  Want (506)  |  Write (250)

Until I became a published writer, I remained completely ignorant of books on how to write and courses on the subject ... they would have spoiled my natural style; made me observe caution; would have hedged me with rules.
— Isaac Asimov
In Isaac Asimov and Janet Asimov (ed.), It's Been a Good Life (2002), 38.
Science quotes on:  |  Book (414)  |  Caution (24)  |  Completely (137)  |  Course (415)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Natural (811)  |  Observe (181)  |  Publication (102)  |  Remain (357)  |  Rule (308)  |  Spoil (8)  |  Style (24)  |  Subject (544)  |  Write (250)  |  Writer (90)

Vehemence was no guarantee of truth.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 303.
Science quotes on:  |  Guarantee (30)  |  Truth (1111)  |  Vehemence (2)

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.
— Isaac Asimov
In Foundation: Foundation and Empire: Second Foundation (1951, 2010), 104
Science quotes on:  |  Incompetent (4)  |  Last (425)  |  Refuge (15)  |  Violence (37)

Wait a thousand years and even the garbage left behind by a vanished civilization becomes precious to us.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Archaeologist (18)  |  Become (822)  |  Behind (139)  |  Civilization (222)  |  Garbage (10)  |  Precious (43)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Vanished (3)  |  Wait (66)  |  Year (965)

We all know we fall. Newton’s discovery was that the moon falls, too—and by the same rule that we do.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 112.
Science quotes on:  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fall (243)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Know (1539)  |  Law Of Gravitation (23)  |  Moon (252)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Rule (308)

We are always certain that the decision we have made iswrong.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 88.
Science quotes on:  |  Certain (557)  |  Decision (98)  |  Wrong (247)

We then got to Westminster Abbey and, moving about unguided, we found the graves of Newton, Rutherford, Darwin, Faraday, and Maxwell in a cluster.
— Isaac Asimov
(1980). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 294.
Science quotes on:  |  Cluster (16)  |  Michael Faraday (91)  |  Grave (52)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Sir Ernest Rutherford (55)  |  Westminster Abbey (2)

We’ve lost all geographical frontiers on Earth, but new and far larger ones exist at Earth’s doorstep.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 301.
Science quotes on:  |  Doorstep (2)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Exist (460)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Geographical (6)  |  Lost (35)  |  New (1276)  |  Space Exploration (15)

What can be more important than the science of life to any intelligent being who has the good fortune to be alive?
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 36.
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (98)  |  Being (1276)  |  Biology (234)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Good (906)  |  Important (231)  |  Intelligent (109)  |  Life (1872)  |  More (2558)

What counts is the person, not the name.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 63.
Science quotes on:  |  Count (107)  |  Name (360)  |  Person (366)

What makes it so hard to organize the environment sensibly is that everything we touch is hooked up to everything else.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 64.
Science quotes on:  |  Ecology (81)  |  Environment (240)  |  Everything (490)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hook (7)  |  Organize (34)  |  Sensible (28)  |  Touch (146)

Whatever else astronomy may or may not be who can doubt it to be the most beautiful of the sciences?
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Beautiful (273)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Most (1728)  |  Whatever (234)

Isaac Asimov quote: When I read about the way in which library funds are being cut and cut
Background: Trinity College Library, Dublin by Irish Welcome Tours CC BY 2.0 (source)
When I read about the way in which library funds are being cut and cut, I can only think that the door is closing and that American society has found one more way to destroy itself.
— Isaac Asimov
In I. Asimov: a Memoir (1994), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  America (144)  |  Being (1276)  |  Cut (116)  |  Destroy (191)  |  Door (94)  |  Fund (19)  |  Library (53)  |  Money (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Read (309)  |  Society (353)  |  Think (1124)  |  Way (1214)

When only one course of action is possible, there is no difficulty in deciding what to do.
— Isaac Asimov
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 282.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (343)  |  Course (415)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Do (1905)  |  Possible (560)

When the practice of farming spread over the earth, mankind experienced its first population explosion.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 8.
Science quotes on:  |  Agriculture (78)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Experience (494)  |  Explosion (52)  |  Farming (8)  |  First (1302)  |  Mankind (357)  |  Population (115)  |  Population Explosion (2)  |  Practice (212)  |  Spread (86)

When you say, “The burned child dreads the fire, “ you mean that he is already a master of induction.
— Isaac Asimov
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 132.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Burn (99)  |  Child (333)  |  Dread (13)  |  Fire (203)  |  Induction (81)  |  Logic (313)  |  Master (182)  |  Mean (810)  |  Say (990)

Where any answer is possible, all answers are meaningless.
— Isaac Asimov
Referring to speculations (on “Not as We Know It” alien lifeforms) made in the total absence of evidence. In 'Fifty Million Big Brothers', The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (Nov 1978), 55, No. 5, 86.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Meaningless (17)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Speculation (137)

While knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them.
— Isaac Asimov
In Asimov's New Guide to Science (1984), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Create (252)  |  Ignorance (256)  |  Knowledge (1653)  |  Problem (734)  |  Solution (285)  |  Solve (146)  |  Through (846)



Quotes by others about Isaac Asimov (2)

How quickly do we grow accustomed to wonders. I am reminded of the Isaac Asimov story “Nightfall,” about the planet where the stars were visible only once in a thousand years. So awesome was the sight that it drove men mad. We who can see the stars every night glance up casually at the cosmos and then quickly down again, searching for a Dairy Queen.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accustom (52)  |  Accustomed (46)  |  Awesome (15)  |  Casually (2)  |  Cosmos (64)  |  Dairy (2)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Drive (62)  |  Glance (36)  |  Grow (247)  |  Mad (54)  |  Night (133)  |  Planet (406)  |  Queen (14)  |  Quickly (21)  |  Remind (16)  |  Search (175)  |  See (1095)  |  Sight (135)  |  Star (462)  |  Stars (304)  |  Story (122)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Visible (87)  |  Wonder (252)  |  Year (965)

I’ve never made a discovery myself, unless by accident. If you write glibly, you fool people. When I first met Asimov, I asked him if he was a professor at Boston University. He said no and … asked me where I got my Ph.D. I said I didn’t have one and he looked startled. “You mean you’re in the same racket I am,” he said, “you just read books by the professors and rewrite them?” That’s really what I do.
Quoted in Sally Helgeson, 'Every Day', Bookletter (6 Dec 1976), 3, No. 8, 3. As quoted and cited in Dana Richards, 'Martin Gardner: A “Documentary”', collected in Elwyn R. Berlekamp and Tom Rodgers (ed.) The Mathemagician and Pied Puzzler: A Collection in Tribute to Martin Gardner (1999), 8-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Ask (423)  |  Biography (254)  |  Book (414)  |  Boston (7)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  First (1302)  |  Fool (121)  |  Glib (2)  |  Look (584)  |  Mean (810)  |  Myself (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  People (1034)  |  PhD (10)  |  Professor (133)  |  Read (309)  |  Startle (6)  |  University (130)  |  Write (250)

Isaac Asimov quote: When I read about the way in which library funds are being cut and cut
Background: Trinity College Library, Dublin by Irish Welcome Tours CC BY 2.0 (source)
Isaac Asimov quote It’s the bees and the flowers.
Macro photo of bee by Forest Wander (cc by-sa 2.0) (source)

See also:

Carl Sagan Thumbnail In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion. (1987) -- Carl Sagan
Quotations by:Albert EinsteinIsaac NewtonLord KelvinCharles DarwinSrinivasa RamanujanCarl SaganFlorence NightingaleThomas EdisonAristotleMarie CurieBenjamin FranklinWinston ChurchillGalileo GalileiSigmund FreudRobert BunsenLouis PasteurTheodore RooseveltAbraham LincolnRonald ReaganLeonardo DaVinciMichio KakuKarl PopperJohann GoetheRobert OppenheimerCharles Kettering  ... (more people)

Quotations about:Atomic  BombBiologyChemistryDeforestationEngineeringAnatomyAstronomyBacteriaBiochemistryBotanyConservationDinosaurEnvironmentFractalGeneticsGeologyHistory of ScienceInventionJupiterKnowledgeLoveMathematicsMeasurementMedicineNatural ResourceOrganic ChemistryPhysicsPhysicianQuantum TheoryResearchScience and ArtTeacherTechnologyUniverseVolcanoVirusWind PowerWomen ScientistsX-RaysYouthZoology  ... (more topics)
Sitewide search within all Today In Science History pages:
Visit our Science and Scientist Quotations index for more Science Quotes from archaeologists, biologists, chemists, geologists, inventors and inventions, mathematicians, physicists, pioneers in medicine, science events and technology.

Names index: | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |

Categories index: | 1 | 2 | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |
Thank you for sharing.
- 100 -
Sophie Germain
Gertrude Elion
Ernest Rutherford
James Chadwick
Marcel Proust
William Harvey
Johann Goethe
John Keynes
Carl Gauss
Paul Feyerabend
- 90 -
Antoine Lavoisier
Lise Meitner
Charles Babbage
Ibn Khaldun
Euclid
Ralph Emerson
Robert Bunsen
Frederick Banting
Andre Ampere
Winston Churchill
- 80 -
John Locke
Bronislaw Malinowski
Bible
Thomas Huxley
Alessandro Volta
Erwin Schrodinger
Wilhelm Roentgen
Louis Pasteur
Bertrand Russell
Jean Lamarck
- 70 -
Samuel Morse
John Wheeler
Nicolaus Copernicus
Robert Fulton
Pierre Laplace
Humphry Davy
Thomas Edison
Lord Kelvin
Theodore Roosevelt
Carolus Linnaeus
- 60 -
Francis Galton
Linus Pauling
Immanuel Kant
Martin Fischer
Robert Boyle
Karl Popper
Paul Dirac
Avicenna
James Watson
William Shakespeare
- 50 -
Stephen Hawking
Niels Bohr
Nikola Tesla
Rachel Carson
Max Planck
Henry Adams
Richard Dawkins
Werner Heisenberg
Alfred Wegener
John Dalton
- 40 -
Pierre Fermat
Edward Wilson
Johannes Kepler
Gustave Eiffel
Giordano Bruno
JJ Thomson
Thomas Kuhn
Leonardo DaVinci
Archimedes
David Hume
- 30 -
Andreas Vesalius
Rudolf Virchow
Richard Feynman
James Hutton
Alexander Fleming
Emile Durkheim
Benjamin Franklin
Robert Oppenheimer
Robert Hooke
Charles Kettering
- 20 -
Carl Sagan
James Maxwell
Marie Curie
Rene Descartes
Francis Crick
Hippocrates
Michael Faraday
Srinivasa Ramanujan
Francis Bacon
Galileo Galilei
- 10 -
Aristotle
John Watson
Rosalind Franklin
Michio Kaku
Isaac Asimov
Charles Darwin
Sigmund Freud
Albert Einstein
Florence Nightingale
Isaac Newton


by Ian Ellis
who invites your feedback
Thank you for sharing.
Today in Science History
Sign up for Newsletter
with quiz, quotes and more.