Civilization will reach maturity only when it learns to value diversity of character and of ideas. Arthur C. Clarke More Quotes by Arthur C. Clarke More Quotes From Arthur C. Clarke If I didn't exist, I would have invented myself. Arthur C. Clarke ifs Training was one thing, reality another. Arthur C. Clarke training statistics reality Even if we never reach the stars by our own efforts, in the millions of years that lie ahead it is almost certain that the stars will come to us. Isolationism is neither a practical policy on the national or cosmic scale. And when the first contact with the outer universe is made, one would like to think that Mankind played an active and not merely a passive role-that we were the discoverers, not the discovered. Arthur C. Clarke stars lying thinking No communication technology has ever disappeared, but instead becomes increasingly less important as the technological horizon widens. Arthur C. Clarke communication technology important Magic's just science that we don't understand yet. Arthur C. Clarke magic We always thought the living Earth was a thing of beauty. It isn’t. Life has had to learn to defend itself against the planet’s random geological savagery. Arthur C. Clarke savagery planets earth That's one of those meaningless and unanswerable questions the mind keeps returning to endlessly, like the tongue exploring a broken tooth. Arthur C. Clarke teeth broken mind The difference between machines and human beings is that human beings can be reproduced by unskilled labour. Arthur C. Clarke machines differences technology Space is what stops everything from happening in the same place. Arthur C. Clarke happenings space In the long run, there are no secrets. in science. The universe will not cooperate in a cover-up. Arthur C. Clarke secret running long One of the biggest roles of science fiction is to prepare people to accept the future without pain and to encourage a flexibility of the mind. Politicians should read science fiction, not westerns and detective stories. Arthur C. Clarke future pain science I think in the long run the money that s been put into the space program is one of the best investments this country has ever made . . .This is a downpayment on the future of mankind. It's as simple as that. Arthur C. Clarke simple running country The space elevator will be built about 50 years after everyone stops laughing. Arthur C. Clarke space laughing years I have never grown up, but I will never stop growing. Arthur C. Clarke growing Even by the twenty-second century, no way had yet been discovered of keeping elderly and conservative scientists from occupying crucial administrative positions. Indeed, it was doubted if the problem ever would be solved. Arthur C. Clarke elderly twenties would-be Our lifetime may be the last that will be lived out in a technological society. Arthur C. Clarke lasts may science One can imagine a time when men who still inhabit organic bodies are regarded with pity by those who have passed on to an infinitely richer mode of existence, capable of throwing their consciousness or sphere of attention instantaneously to any point on land, sea, or sky where there is a suitable sensing organ. In adolescence we leave childhood behind; one day there may be a second and more portentous adolescence, when we bid farewell to the flesh. Arthur C. Clarke farewell sky men I also believe - and hope - that politics and economics will cease to be as important in the future as they have been in the past; the time will come when most of our present controversies on these matters will seem as trivial, or as meaningless, as the theological debates in which the keenest minds of the Middle Ages dissipated their energies. Politics and economics are concerned with power and wealth, neither of which should be the primary, still less the exclusive, concern of full-grown men. Arthur C. Clarke men believe past . . . Moon-Watcher felt the first faint twinges of a new and potent emotion. It was a vague and diffuse sense of envy--of dissatisfaction with his life. He had no idea of its cause, still less of its cure; but discontent had come into his soul, and he had taken one small step toward humanity. Arthur C. Clarke moon taken ideas As three laws were good enough for Newton, I have modestly decided to stop there. Arthur C. Clarke three law science