“My own feeling is that human happiness is a very random thing, and bestows itself willy-nilly, and there’s not much deserving about the matter.”
Source: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Alvin Journeyman (1995), Chapter 3.
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Orson Scott Card 586
American science fiction novelist 1951Related quotes
The Paris Review interview (1963)
Context: I do believe in this evolution of consciousness as the only thing which we can embark on, or in fact, willy-nilly, are embarked on; and along with that will go the spiritual discoveries and, I feel, the inexhaustible wonder that one feels, that opens more and more the more you know. It’s simply that this increasing knowledge constantly enlarges your kingdom and the capacity for admiring and loving the universe.
“Happiness is a very pretty thing to feel, but very dry to talk about.”
Source: The Panopticon Writings
Source: The Bankrupt Bookseller (1947), p. 31
Undated
Source: Conversation with Prem Rawat The Prem Rawat Foundation
“[C]ontingency is a thing unto itself, not the titration of determinism by randomness.”
Source: Wonderful Life (1989), p. 51
... The perspective on ourselves that we get when we take the point of view of the universe also yields as much objectivity as we need if we are to find a cause that is worthwhile in a way that is independent of our own desires. The most obvious such cause is the reduction of pain and suffering, wherever it is to be found.
p. 238 http://books.google.com/books?id=BoDMBgAAQBAJ&pg=PT238
Writings on an Ethical Life (2000)