Kim Stanley Robinson: Trending quotes

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“Economics was like psychology, a pseudoscience trying to hide that fact with intense theoretical hyperelaboration. And gross domestic product was one of those unfortunate measurement concepts, like inches or the British thermal unit, that ought to have been retired long before.”

Kim Stanley Robinson

Source: Blue Mars (1996), Chapter 2, “Areophany” (p. 80)

“But one had to trust instruments over instincts, that was science.”

Kim Stanley Robinson

Source: Blue Mars (1996), Chapter 2, “Areophany” (p. 70)

“Not everyone was as good at creation as they were at complaining.”

Kim Stanley Robinson

Source: Blue Mars (1996), Chapter 2, “Areophany” (p. 64)

“Revolution suspends habit as well as law. But just as nature abhors a vacuum, people abhor anarchy.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 10, “Phase Change” (p. 579)

“Every generation is its own secret society.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 9, “The Spur of the Moment” (p. 480)

“Conspiracy theory was tremendously popular, always and forever. People wanted such catastrophes to mean something more than mere individual madness, and so the hunt was on.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 9, “The Spur of the Moment” (p. 450)

“If enough data points trouble the theory, the theory may be wrong. If the theory is basic, the paradigm may have to change.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 8, “Social Engineering” (p. 410)

“You conceive of science as nothing more than answers to questions?
As a system for generating answers.
And what is the purpose of that?
...To know.
And what will you do with your knowledge?
...Find out more.
But why?
I don’t know. It’s the way I am.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 8, “Social Engineering” (p. 401)

“Nakedness was dangerous to the social order, she thought, because it revealed too much reality.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 7, “What Is to Be Done?” (p. 395)

“Anyone can agree that things should be fair, and the world just. The way to get there is always the real problem.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 7, “What Is to Be Done?” (p. 391)

“When she realized what she was doing she snorted in disgust, at herself and at the pervasiveness of politics—how it could infect everything if you let it.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 7, “What Is to Be Done?” (p. 387)

“Even if you want no state, or a minimal state, then you still have to argue it point by point. Especially since most minimalists want to keep exactly the economic and police system that keeps them privileged. That’s libertarians for you—anarchists who want police protection from their slaves.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 7, “What Is to Be Done?” (p. 370)

““Art is an optimist,” Nadia said to Maya as they walked on.
“Art is an idiot,” Maya replied.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 7, “What Is to Be Done?” (p. 356)

“The resistance begins fighting itself, because that’s the only thing it can beat. Happens every time. You can’t get any movement larger than five people without including at least one fucking idiot.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 6, “Tariqat” (p. 315)

“One sign of a good action is that in retrospect it appears inevitable.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 6, “Tariqat” (p. 296)

“Rituals should have some unpleasantness, or you don’t appreciate them properly.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 6, “Tariqat” (p. 291)

“No step along the way had seemed more than a little thing; but altogether it came to something rather monstrous.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 4, “The Scientist as Hero” (p. 199)

“But nothing lasts, not even stone, not even despair.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 3, “Long Runout” (p. 127)

“In the random flux of universal contingency, nothing mattered; and yet, and yet...”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 3, “Long Runout” (p. 125)

“Continuous expansion is a fundamental tenet of economics. Therefore one of the fundamentals of the universe itself. Because everything is economics. Physics is cosmic economics, biology is cellular economics, the humanities are social economics, psychology is mental economics, and so on.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book Green Mars

His listeners nodded unhappily.
“So everything is expanding. But it can’t happen in contradiction to the law of conservation of matter-energy. No matter how efficient your throughput is, you can’t get an output larger than the input.”
Source: Green Mars (1993), Chapter 2, “The Ambassador” (pp. 76-77)