![]() |
Robert Heinlein
(7 Jul 1907 - 8 May 1988)
American author who is one of the foremost of the science fiction novelists, noted for maintaining plausibility in his treatment of science in his stories.
|
Science Quotes by Robert Heinlein (43 quotes)
A fake fortuneteller can be tolerated. But an authentic soothsayer should be shot on sight. Cassandra did not get half the kicking around she deserved.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 265.
A touchstone to determine the actual worth of an “intellectual”—find out how he feels about astrology.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 268.
A zygote is a gamete’s way of producing more gametes. This may be the purpose of the universe.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 262.
A “critic” is a man who creates nothing and thereby feels qualified to judge the work of creative men. There is logic in this; he is unbiased—he hates all creative people equally.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 365.
A “pacifist male” is a contradiction in terms. Most self-described “pacifists” are not pacific; they simply assume false colors. When the wind changes, they hoist the Jolly Roger.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 258.
Always listen to experts.They’ll tell you what can’t be done, and why. Then do it.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 256.
Always store beer in a dark place.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 256.
Any priest or shaman must be presumed guilty until proved innocent.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 256.
Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human. At best he is a tolerable subhuman who has learned to wear shoes, bathe and not make messes in the house
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 265.
But does Man have any “right” to spread through the universe? Man is what he is, a wild animal with the will to survive, and (so far) the ability, against all competition. Unless one accepts that, anything one says about morals, war, politics, you name it, is nonsense. Correct morals arise from knowing what man is, not what do-gooders and well-meaning old Aunt Nellies would like him to be. The Universe will let us know—later—whether or not Man has any “right” to expand through it.
— Robert Heinlein
In Starship Troopers (1959), 186.
By the data to date, there is only one animal in the Galaxy dangerous to man—man himself. So he must supply his own indispensable competition. He has no enemy to help him.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 256.
Certainly the game is rigged. Don’t let that stop you; if you don’t bet, you can’t win.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 256.
Cheops’ Law: Nothing ever gets built on schedule or within budget.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 259. Note: Cheops built the Great Pyramid at Giza. Of course, exceptions do exist, for example, the Empire State Building was built speedily, and under budget.
Delusions are often functional. A mother’s opinions about her children’s beauty, intelligence, goodness, et cetera ad nauseam, keep her from drowning them at birth.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
Everything is theoretically impossible, until it is done. One could write a history of science in reverse by assembling the solemn pronouncements of highest authority about what could not be done and could never happen.
— Robert Heinlein
…...
Expertise in one field does not carry over into other fields. But experts often think so. The narrower their field of knowledge the more likely they are to think so.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 367.
Get a shot off fast. This upsets him long enough to let you make your second shot perfect.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
If it can’t be expressed in figures, it is not science; it is opinion.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough For Love: the Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
It has long been known that one horse can run faster than another—but which one? Differences are crucial.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
It is better to copulate than never.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 259.
It is said that God notes each sparrow that falls. And so He does … because the Sparrow is God. And when a cat stalks a sparrow both of them are God, carrying out God’s thoughts.
— Robert Heinlein
Stranger in a Strange Land. Quoted in Kim Lim (ed.), 1,001 Pearls of Spiritual Wisdom: Words to Enrich, Inspire, and Guide Your Life (2014), 141
Men are more sentimental than women. It blurs their thinking.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 256.
Most “scientists” are bottle washers and button sorters.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
Moving parts in rubbing contact require lubrication to avoid excessive wear. Honorifics and formal politeness provide lubrication where people rub together.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 265.
No storyteller has been able to dream up anything as fantastically unlikely as what really does happen in this mad Universe.
— Robert Heinlein
Time Enough For Love: the Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 51.
Nursing does not diminish the beauty of a woman’s breasts; it enhances their charm by making them look lived in and happy.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 258.
Of all the strange “crimes” that humanity has legislated out of nothing, “blasphemy” is the most amazing—with “obscenity” and “indecent exposure” fighting it out for second and third place.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 259.
One man’s “magic” is another man’s engineering. “Supernatural” is a null word.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 269.
The difference between science and the fuzzy subjects is that science requires reasoning while those other subjects merely require scholarship.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough For Love: the Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 366.
The greatest productive force is human selfishness.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 366.
The phrase is self-contradictory; “sense” is never “common”.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 47.
The truth of a proposition has nothing to do with its credibility. And vice versa.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 265.
There are hidden contradictions in the minds of people who “love Nature” while deploring the “artificialities” with which “Man has spoiled ‘Nature.’” The obvious contradiction lies in their choice of words, which imply that Man and his artifacts are not part of “Nature”—but beavers and their dams are.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 263.
There is no conclusive evidence of life after death. But there is no evidence of any sort against it. Soon enough you will know. So why fret about it?
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
There ought not to be anything in the whole universe that man can't poke his nose into—that’s the way we’re built and I assume that there's some reason for that.
— Robert Heinlein
Methuselah's Children, revised (1958). In The Past Through Tomorrow: 'Future History' Stories (1967), 666.
This Universe never did make sense; I suspect that it was built on government contract.
— Robert Heinlein
The Number of the Beast (1980), 14. In Carl C. Gaither, Physically Speaking (1997), 340.
To stay young requires unceasing cultivation of the ability to unlearn old falsehoods.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough For Love: the Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 364.
Touch is the most fundamental sense. A baby experiences it, all over, before he is born and long before he learns to use sight, hearing, or taste, and no human ever ceases to need it.
— Robert Heinlein
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 366.
When an apparent fact runs contrary to logic and common sense, it’s obvious that you have failed to interpret the fact correctly.
— Robert Heinlein
In Orphans of the Sky (1963, 1964), 169.
You live and learn. Or you don’t live long.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 269.
Your enemy is never a villain in his own eyes. Keep this in mind; it may offer a way to make him your friend. If not, you can kill him without hate—and quickly.
— Robert Heinlein
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 259.
“Logic” proved that airplanes can't fly and that H-bombs won't work and that stones don't fall out of the sky. Logic is a way of saying that anything which didn't happen yesterday won't happen tomorrow.
— Robert Heinlein
Glory Road (1963)