Frank Herbert citations (182 citations, Page 5)

"Doll Factory, Gun Factory" (1973), essay reprinted in The Maker of Dune : Insights of a Master of Science Fiction (1987), edited by Tim O'Reilly
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“You can say things which cannot be done. This is elementary. The trick is to keep attention focused on what is said and not on what can be done.”

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Frank Herbert

"BuSab [Bureau of Sabotage] Manual"; p. 87
The Bureau of Sabotage series, Whipping Star (1969)

“Learning a language represents training in the delusions of that language.”

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Frank Herbert

"Gowachin Aphorism"; p. 111
The Bureau of Sabotage series, Whipping Star (1969)

“Is it possible this triviality is a code of some sort? the Brain wondered. But how could it be … unless there's more to these emotional inconsequentials and this talk of a God than appears on the surface?
The Brain had begun its career in logics as a pragmatic atheist. Now doubts began to creep into its computations, and it classified doubt as an emotion.”

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Frank Herbert livre The Green Brain

The Green Brain (1966)

“Providence and Manifest Destiny are synonyms often invoked to support arguments based on wishful thinking.”

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Frank Herbert

"From The Wreave Commentary"; p. 136
The Bureau of Sabotage series, Whipping Star (1969)

“Without coming fully awake, Rhin felt his presence beside her, experienced a primitive demand for his protective masculinity. She nestled against him, murmured, "its so hot. Doesn’t it ever cool off?"”

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Frank Herbert livre The Green Brain

The Green Brain (1966)

“Life exists immersed in a sea of unconsciousness", he reminded himself.
"In the drug, these people gain a view of that sea.”

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Frank Herbert livre The Santaroga Barrier

Source: The Santaroga Barrier (1968), Chapter Ten

“Does a population have informed consent when a ruling minority acts in secret to ignite a war, doing this to justify the existence of the minority's forces? […] failure to provide full information for informed consent on such an issue represents an ultimate crime.”

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Frank Herbert

"From The Trial of Trials", p. 246
The Bureau of Sabotage series, The Dosadi Experiment (1977)

“A person cries out against life because it's lonely, and because life's broken off from whatever created it. But no matter how much you hate life, you love it, too. It's like a caldron boiling with everything you have to have — but very painful to the lips.”

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Frank Herbert livre The Green Brain

The Green Brain (1966)

“There are no uncharted isles here where we can run away to sunshine and sparkling white beaches. We have just this one world, and on these pages we're beginning to get a feeling for the gigantic physical project confronting us. Our awakening is touched with dismay; we must come to terms with this world or it will terminate us. When we speak of defending the environment, we are speaking of defending our own lives.”

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Frank Herbert

"Introduction" to New World or No World (1970)
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“Science fiction, because it ventures into no man's lands, tends to meet some of the requirements posed by Jung in his explorations of archetypes, myth structures and self-understanding. It may be that the primary attraction of science fiction is that it helps us understand what it means to be human.”

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Frank Herbert

"Men on other planets", essay in The Craft of Science Fiction, (1976), edited by Reginald Bretnor
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“This group is composed of those for whom belief in saucers is tantamount to religion…They believe men from outer space will step in on Earth "before it's too late," put a stop to the atomic bomb threat "by their superior powers," and enforce perpetual peace "for the good of the universe"…”

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Frank Herbert

On UFO cultists, In "Flying Saucers: Fact or Farce?", San Francisco Sunday Examiner & Chronicle, "People" supplement, (20 October 1963); reprinted in The Maker of Dune : Insights of a Master of Science Fiction (1987), edited by Tim O'Reilly
General sources

“When I was quite young… I began to suspect there must be flaws in my sense of reality. It seemed to my dim sense of confusion that things often blended one into another, and the Law of Excluded Middle merely opened up a void wherein anything was possible. But I had been produced to focus on objects (things) and not on systems”

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Frank Herbert

processes
"Doll Factory, Gun Factory" (1973), essay reprinted in The Maker of Dune : Insights of a Master of Science Fiction (1987), edited by Tim O'Reilly
General sources

“Where is the weapon with which I enforce your bondage? You give it to me every time you open your mouth.”

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Frank Herbert

"Laclac Riddle"; p. 68
The Bureau of Sabotage series, Whipping Star (1969)

“It's rooted in the fears to which all men are heir and, thus, deserves sympathy, not censure or laughter. The dream may be out of touch with history, but it's a good dream, and it doesn't appear to have been used to bilk gullible widows out of their savings. Never mind that we have a consistent record of slaughtering our messiahs. Look beyond the wacky arguments to the motivation — that sense of brotherhood which is all that has ever saved mankind from going over the brink.”

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Frank Herbert

On belief in UFOs, in "Flying Saucers: Fact or Farce?", San Francisco Sunday Examiner & Chronicle, "People" supplement, (20 October 1963); reprinted in The Maker of Dune : Insights of a Master of Science Fiction (1987), edited by Tim O'Reilly
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“Technology is both a tool for helping humans and for destroying them. This is the paradox of our times which we're compelled to face.”

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Frank Herbert

"Conversations in Port Townsend," interview with Tim O'Reilly, 1983. Reprinted in The Maker of Dune: Insights of a Master of Science Fiction (1987), edited by Tim O'Reilly
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“Briefly, the scientists working the Oregon coast found that sand could be controlled only by the use of one type of grass (European beach grass) and by a system of follow-up plantings with other growth. The grass sets up a beachhead by holding down the sand in an intricate lacing of roots. This permits certain other plants to gain a foothold. The beach grass is extremely difficult to grow in nurseries, and part of the solution to the dune problem involved working out a system for propagating and handling the grass.”

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Frank Herbert livre Dune

"They Stopped the Moving Sands" part of a letter to his agent Lurton Blassingame, outlining an article on how the USDA was using poverty grasses to protect Florence, Oregon from harmful sand dunes (11 July 1957); the article was never published, but did develop several of the ideas that led to "Dune"; as quoted in The Road to Dune (2005), p. 266
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