Arthur C. Clarke Quotes (46 Quotes)

There was nothing left of Earth. They had leeched away the last atoms of its substance. It had nourished them, through the fierce moments of their inconceivable metamorphosis, as the food stored in a grain of wheat feeds the infant plant while it climbs towards the Sun.

There were some things that only time could cure. Evil men could be destroyed, but nothing could be done with good men who were deluded.

Utopia was here at last: its novelty had not yet been assailed by the supreme enemy of a ll Utopias - boredom.

As his body became more and more defenseless, so his means of offense became steadily more frightful.

He did not know that the Old One was his father, for such a relationship was utterly beyond his understanding, but as he looked at the emaciated body he felt a dim disquiet that was the ancestor of sadness.

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

Now, before you make a movie, you have to have a script, and before you have a script, you have to have a story; though some avant-garde directors have tried to dispense with the latter item, you'll find their work only at art theaters.

The confrontation lasted about five minutes; then the display died out as quickly as it had begun, and everyone drank his fill of the muddy water. Honor had been satisfied; each group had staked its claim to its own territory.

The more wonderful the means of communication, the more trivial, tawdry, or depressing its contents seemed to be.

Though the man-apes often fought and wrestled one another, their disputes very seldom resulted in serious injuries. Having no claws or fighting canine teeth, and being well protected by hair, they could not inflict much harm on one another. In any event, they had little surplus energy for such unproductive behavior; snarling and threatening was a much more efficient way of asserting their points of view.

No utopia can ever give satisfaction to everyone, all the time. As their material conditions improve, men raise their sights and become discontented with power and possessions that once would have seemed beyond their wildest dreams. And even when the external world has granted all it can, there still remain the searchings of the mind and the longings of the heart.

Science can destroy religion by ignoring it as well as by disproving its tenets. No one ever demonstrated, so far as I am aware, the nonexistence of Zeus or Thor, but they have few followers now.

Science is the only religion of mankind.

The piece of equipment I'm most found off is my telescope. The other night I had a superb view of the moon.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

The limits of the possible can only be defined by going beyond them into the impossible.

Perhaps, as some wit remarked, the best proof that there is Intelligent Life in Outer Space is the fact it hasn't come here. Well, it can't hide forever - one day we will overhear it.

It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars.

There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum.

New ideas pass through three periods: 1) It can't be done. 2) It probably can be done, but it's not worth doing. 3) I knew it was a good idea all along!

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

If an elderly but distinguished scientist says that something is possible, he is almost certainly right; but if he says that it is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

Our lifetime may be the last that will be lived out in a technological society.

We have to abandon the idea that schooling is something restricted to youth. How can it be, in a world where half the things a man knows at 20 are no longer true at 40 - and half the things he knows at 40 hadn't been discovered when he was 20?

I have a fantasy where Ted Turner is elected President but refuses because he doesn't want to give up power.

How inappropriate to call this planet Earth when it is quite clearly Ocean.

Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases: 1- It's completely impossible. 2- It's possible, but it's not worth doing. 3- I said it was a good idea all along.

Human judges can show mercy. But against the laws of nature, there is no appeal.

The moon is the first milestone on the road to the stars.

The best measure of a man's honesty isn't his income tax return. It's the zero adjust on his bathroom scale.

The realisation that our small planet is only one of many worlds gives mankind the perspective it needs to realise sooner that our own world belongs to all its creatures.

I don't believe in astrology; I'm a Sagittarius and we're skeptical.

Politicians should read science fiction, not westerns and detective stories.

It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value.

This is the first age that's ever paid much attention to the future, which is a little ironic since we may not have one.

The intelligent minority of this world will mark 1 January 2001 as the real beginning of the 21st century and the Third Millennium.

When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

Reading computer manuals without the hardware is as frustrating as reading manuals without the software.

But the only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.

A faith that cannot survive collision with the truth is not worth many regrets.

I don't pretend we have all the answers. But the questions are certainly worth thinking about.

The only real problem in life is what to do next.

The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.

It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God - but to create him.

The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be the hijacking of morality by religion.

Sometimes I think we're alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we're not. In either case the idea is quite staggering.