In terms of stories I would buy for a science fiction magazine, if they take place in the future, that might do it.

What were we doing here? Traveling hundreds or thousands of light-years, to break our hearts?

The future depicted in a good SF story ought to be in fact possible, or at least plausible. That means that the writer should be able to convince the reader (and himself) that the wonders he is describing really can come true... and that gets tricky when you take a good, hard look at the world around you.

I'm doing a book, 'Chasing Science,' about the pleasures of science as a spectator sport.

A good science fiction story should be able to predict not the automobile but the traffic jam.

When I sit down to the feast of life ... I'm so busy planning on how to pick up the check, and wondering what the other people think of me for paying it, and wondering if I have enough money in my pocket to pay the bill, that I don't get around to eating.

I did that for 40 years or more. I never had any writer's block. I got up in the morning, sat down at the typewriter - now, computer - lit up a cigarette.