There is no adequate defense, except stupidity, against the impact of a new idea.

There is no adequate defense, except stupidity, against the impact of a new idea.

You can't expect to hit the jackpot if you don't put a few nickels in the machine.

You can't expect to hit the jackpot if you don't put a few nickels in the machine.

The great work must inevitably be obscure, except to the very few, to those who like the author himself are read more

The great work must inevitably be obscure, except to the very few, to those who like the author himself are initiated into the mysteries. Communication then is secondary: it is perpetuation which is important. For this only one good reader is necessary.

The facts of the present won't sit still for a portrait. They are constantly vibrating, full of clutter and confusion.

The facts of the present won't sit still for a portrait. They are constantly vibrating, full of clutter and confusion.

Innovators are inevitably controversial.

Innovators are inevitably controversial.

I am sorry to say that there is too much point to the wisecrack that life is extinct on other read more

I am sorry to say that there is too much point to the wisecrack that life is extinct on other planets because their scientists were more advanced than ours.

When the lay public rallies round to an idea that is denounced by distinguished by elderly scientists and supports the read more

When the lay public rallies round to an idea that is denounced by distinguished by elderly scientists and supports the idea with great fervour and emotion, the distinguished but elderly scientests are then, after all, right. -Isaac Asimov.

Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context -- a chair in a room, a room read more

Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context -- a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan. - "Time", July 2, 1956.

Mankind always sets itself only such tasks as it can solve; since, looking at the matter more closely, we will read more

Mankind always sets itself only such tasks as it can solve; since, looking at the matter more closely, we will always find that the task itself arises only when the material conditions necessary for its solution already exist or are at least in the process of formation.