True competence is based on one’s own ability to observe.

As long as children and young men and women find pleasure in study, they will continue studying throughout life - and upon that depends their happiness.

So one predicts the future as much as one is cause. The future isn't a pattern laid out to abuse and bully you. The future is a beautiful playground that nobody happens to be combining. You talk about virgin territory - the most virgin territory there is, is the future. You can do anything you want with it. Nobody is doing anything with it.

Y'know, we're all wasting our time writing this hack science fiction! You wanta make real money, you gotta start a religion!

If you want to make a little money, write a book. If you want to make a lot of money, create a religion.

Convince a man that he is an animal, that his own dignity and selfrespect are delusions, that there is no 'beyond' to aspire to, no higher potential self to achieve, and you have a slave. Let a man know he is himself, a spiritual being, that he is capable of the power of choice and has the right to aspire to greater wisdom and you have started him up a higher road.

The best way to know any future is to cause one.