Quotes from Kim Stanley Robinson

Turing test is best replaced by the Winograd Schema, which tests one's ability to make simple but important semantic distinctions based on the application of wide general knowledge to a problem created by a definite pronoun. "The large ball crashed through the table because it was made of aerogel.

Genius is not a matter of intelligence, but of spirit; and we cannot speak accurately of the spirit in any language but music.

Reality itself is mortal

Someone should enjoy it," Ann said. When she was angry or bitter her voice became flat and distant, almost as if she were being matter-of-fact. "It won't be here long.

Liberal democracy says that cultural tolerance is essential, but you don't have to get very far away from liberal democracy for liberal democrats to get very intolerant.

But it isn't working fast enough." He tried to compose himself. "If you took your job seriously, you'd be looking into how to make change happen faster. Some things might be against the law, but in that case the law is wrong. I think the principle was set at Nuremberg—you're wrong to obey orders that are wrong.

A talib is a seeker. And the seeker's tariqat is his path, his special path you know, on the road to reality.

Take this moment right here, and ask yourself, What is now lacking?

Frank's French was worse than no French at all, like listening to someone attack the language with a hatchet.

she keeps a shrine to Sol Invictus in her room, performs the pratahsamdhya ceremony, the salute to the sun, every morning

So we were shouted at, we were beat on. "What gives you the right to do this! Who do you think you are!" We replied to this in the thousand-voice chorus, at a volume of 115 decibels: "WE ARE THE RULE OF LAW.

first a wind ensemble playing a transcription of the Appassionata piano sonata; then Beethoven's opus 134, which was his own transcription for two pianos of his Grosse Fugue for string quartet, opus 133. Lastly a string quartet was to play a transcription of their own for the Hammerklavier sonata.

There are four mystical journeys," Dhu said to him. "The first begins with gnosis and ends with fana, or passing away from all phenomenal things. The second begins when fana is succeeded by baqa, or abiding. At this point you journey in the real, by the real, to the real, and you yourself are a reality, a haqq. And after that you move on to the center of the spirit universe, and become one with all others who have done likewise.

We are all alone in our own life-world, flying through the universe at great speed. Humans are lucky not to face that. If they don't.

Please Jeff? You're sounding scary." "I'm just saying! Besides, what's scarier than right now?

What was personal gain but the freedom to do what you wanted to do? And what was power but the freedom to do what you wanted to do? And once you had that freedom, any more wealth or power actually began to restrict one's options, and reduce one's freedom. One became a servant of one's wealth or power, constrained to spend all one's time protecting it.

As with many religious fundamentalists, business for her was part of the religion; the two dogmas were mutually reinforcing, part of the same system. Reason

Money equals power; power makes the law; and law makes government

Hierarchy, you know. And their place in the hierarchy. As long as it's high enough. Everyone bound into their places. It's safer than freedom. And a lot of people are cowards.

As with many religious fundamentalists, business for her was part of the religion; the two dogmas were mutually reinforcing, part of the same system. Reason had nothing to do with it.

The King asked his wise men for some single thing that would make him happy when he was sad, but sad when he was happy. They consulted and came back with a ring engraved with the message 'This Too Will Pass.

It can be nice and still be a prison.

There is just enough time to complete the preparation of a lander," we concluded after summarizing the situation, and the notable incidents of the past dozen years, which we had to confess were nearly nil: we entered the solar system, we hit our marks, people yelled at us, we learned some history, we became disenchanted with civilization, we ran out of fuel.

Hong Kong had been a British city, built on land seized from the Chinese Empire, until Britain ceded it back to China in 1997. But that handover had come with a fifty-year period of semiautonomy attached to it. So now the time to submit to full control from Beijing had come, the turnover had happened just a month before: July 1, 2047.