I like to get paid for doing basic research, so it's pleasant to write some nonfiction about it. Bruce Sterling More Quotes by Bruce Sterling More Quotes From Bruce Sterling If poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world, science fiction writers are its court jesters. We are Wise Fools who can leap, caper, utter prophecies, and scratch ourselves in public. We can play with Big Ideas because the garish motley of our pulp origins make us seem harmless. Bruce Sterling wiseplayideas Worrying about a large institution, especially when it has computers, is like worrying about a large gorilla, especially when it's on fire. Bruce Sterling gorillasfireworry I don't think there's much distinction between surveillance and media in general. Better media means better surveillance. Cams are everywhere. Bruce Sterling mediameanthinking The frontiers of the future will be the ruins of the unsustainable. Bruce Sterling frontiersruins University, as institutions, pre-date the information economy by many centuries and are not for-profit cultural entities, whose reason of existence (purportedly) is to discover truth, codify it through techniques of scholarship, and then teach it. Universities are meant to pass the torch of civilization not just download data into student skulls. Bruce Sterling dataskullscivilization You know what's truly weird about any financial crisis? We made it up. Currency, money, finance, they're all social inventions. When the sun comes up in the morning it's shining on the same physical landscape, all the atoms are in place. Bruce Sterling atomsshiningmorning Anything that can be done to a rat can be done to a human being. And we can do most anything to rats. This is a hard thing to think about, but it's the truth. It won't go away because we cover our eyes. THAT is cyberpunk. Bruce Sterling going-awayeyethinking The future is a process, not a destination. Bruce Sterling destinationprocess When you can’t imagine how things are going to change, that doesn’t mean that nothing will change. It means that things will change in ways that are unimaginable. Bruce Sterling imaginemeanway Everybody wants to disown neocon strategy, including the neocons, because that strategy never worked. Still, it was, in point of fact, a strategy. Nobody else has one. Bruce Sterling strategywantfacts I know that the human condition will be radically changed through technical means. Much of this change will be painful, monstrous and horrible. Most mutations are disgusting failures, most experiments are failures. I accept this and I don't find it frightening. Bruce Sterling mutationpainfulmean Architects thrive after massive urban disasters. The abject collapse of East Berlin gave us the only city in Europe with a mighty host of Postmodern skyscrapers. Bruce Sterling east-berlincitieseurope David Brin is a technological determinist. He thinks that we understand the trend and we need to hop on it. I don't have any such illusions. Bruce Sterling trendsneedsthinking The internet brought many laudable things, but prosperity, stability, accountability and honest politics were not four of them. Bruce Sterling accountabilityhonestfour Don't become a well rounded person. Well rounded people are smooth and ull. Become a thoroughly spiky person. Bruce Sterling smoothbeliefpeople Your attitude determines your altitude. Your ambitions are bigger than life Of course. They must be. They encompass it. Bruce Sterling bigger-than-lifeambitionattitude The Bollywood distribution system is so corrupt that they have trouble making money off movies. So they sell shoes that an actress stepped in. If they turned up the amps some, maybe they could sell the actresses. Bruce Sterling bollywoodshoesmovie War as Napoleon knew it just not possible any more. However, we're very unlikely to accept or recognize "world peace" even when we get it. Bruce Sterling literaturewarpeace Privacy under what circumstance? Privacy at home under what circumstances? You have more privacy if everyone's illiterate, but you wouldn't really call that privacy. That's ignorance. Bruce Sterling ignoranceliteraturehome In a world so redolent with wonder, how can we allow ourselves to conduct our daily lives with so little insight, such absence of dignity? Bruce Sterling dignitylittlesworld
