[Social] science fiction is that branch of literature which is concerned with the impact of scientific advance on human beings.

Why is it, I wonder, that anyone who displays superior athletic ability is an object of admiration to his classmates, while one who displays superior mental ability is an object of hatred?

However much the creationist leaders might hammer away at their scientific and philosophical points, they would be helpless and a laughing-stock if that were all they had. It is religion that recruits their squadrons. Tens of millions of Americans, who neither know nor understand the actual arguments for - of even against - evolution, march in the army of the night, their Bibles held high. And they are a strong and frightening force, impervious to, and immunized against, the feeble lance of mere reason.

Self-education is a continuing source of pleasure to me, for the more I know, the fuller my life is and the better I appreciate my own existence

Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world.

The age of the pulp magazine was the last in which youngsters, to get their primitive material, were forced to be literate.

There is no merit to discipline under ideal circumstances. I must have it in the face of death or it is worthless.