Quotes from Stanis?aw Lem

excluded from this collection of classic Solariana, whose only connection with the field was that for a lengthy period they researched public opinion, collecting the most ordinary views, the attitudes of non-specialists, and in this way demonstrated the astonishingly close relationship between changes in such views and processes simultaneously taking place among the ranks of scholars.

The "well-informed" think they know something about matters that the experts are reluctant even to speak of. Information at second hand always gives an impression of tidiness, in contrast with the data at the scientist's disposal, full of gaps and uncertainties.

Si uno busca tranquilidad, silencio y serenidad, que no lo busque en su vida ya que encontrará todo y más en el cementerio.

Nie wystarczy, by?my byli szcz??liwi - trzeba jeszcze, by nieszcz??liwi byli inni!

Reverend Father, your line of thought has taken a dangerous path! Just another step, and you'll be telling me offspring can be produced not at the drawing board, by testing prototypes in a laboratory, with the highest concentration of the spirit in the metal, but in a bed, without any templates or training, at random, in the dark, and quite unintentionally . . .

In his most important and most extraordinary work, a mere dozen or so pages long, he sought to demonstrate that even the most seemingly abstract, sublimely theoretical, mathematicized achievements of science have in reality moved only a step or two away from a prehistoric, coarsely sensory-based, anthropomorphic understanding of the world around us.

If the machine is not too bright and incapable of reflection, it does whatever you tell it to do. But a smart machine will first consider which is more worth its while: to perform the given task or, instead, to figure some way out of it.

In science, restraint was necessary: there were questions that one was not allowed to put to the world - and he who nevertheless put them was like one who complained about a mirror whose reflection repeated his every movement but refused to reveal to him the volitional reason behind those movements.

Since, on the other hand, anyone plunging stubbornly into all this literature cannot resist the impression that though he encounters fragments of perhaps brilliant intellectual constructions, these fragments are mixed indiscriminately with the products of utter foolishness bordering on insanity, as an antithesis to the concept of the "oceanic yogi" there arose the idea of the "oceanic idiot.

The amount of information that is necessary for even a general grasp of the questions dealt with in the Project exceeds, to tell the truth, the brain capacity of a single individual. But ignorance, while it checks the enthusiasm of the sensible, in no way restrains the fools; thus in the ocean of published papers that His Master's Voice has called into existence, a man can find whatever suits him, as long as he is not overly concerned about the truth.

Fear not only has big eyes, Mr. Tichy, it has a small brain.

Oto zÅ'o naszej produkcji, kojÄ…ce pragnienia duszy. Oto chemia, która gÅ'adzi grzechy Å›wiata.

Have it compose a poem—a poem about a haircut! But lofty, noble, tragic, timeless, full of love, treachery, retribution, quiet heroism in the face of certain doom! Six lines, cleverly rhymed, and every word beginning with the letter s!!

Dobro mo?e i bywa w niewielkich dawkach dobre, ale jako do?ywocie jest trucizn?.

Want to hear my favorite definition of a human? A creature who likes to talk most about what he knows least.

In his late thirties, pushing forty: the shadow line. Time to accept the terms of the unsigned contract, there without the asking; the knowledge that what binds others applies to you, too, that there are no exceptions to the rule: though it was contrary to nature, one had to grow old.

We are only seeking Man. We have no need of other worlds. We need mirrors. We don't know what do with other worlds. A single world, our own, suffices us; but we can't accept it for what it is. We are searching for an ideal image of our own world: we go in quest of a planet, of a civilization superior to our own but developed on the basis of a prototype of our primeval past.

Eden grew smaller. Beautiful, said the Captain. But, you know, going by the probability curve, there must be others even more beautiful.

The age-old faith of lovers and poets in the power of love, stronger than death, that finis vitae sed non amoris, is a lie, useless and not even funny.

The human mind is only capable of absorbing a few things at a time. We see what is taking place in front of us int he here and now, and cannot envisage simultaneously a succession of processes, no matter how integrated and complementary. Our faculties of perception are consequently limited even as regards fairly simple phenomena.

He began thinking about the innocence of machines, about how man had endowed them with intelligence and, in doing so, had made them an accomplice of his mad adventures. About how the myth of the golem—the machine that rebelled against its creator—was a lie, a fiction invented by the guilty for the sake of self-exoneration.

Because there may be thoughts, intentions and cruel hopes in my mind of which I know nothing, because I am a murderer unawares.

Wpatrzony w ciemniejÄ…ce niebo, w gwiazdy, które byÅ'y tylko widmowym cieniem ziemskich gwiazd, staÅ'em bez ruchu, a w pustce, która zastÄ™powaÅ'a gonitwÄ™ myÅ›li sprzed chwili, rosÅ'a bez sÅ'ów martwa, obojÄ™tna pewno??, ?e tam, dokÄ…d nie mogÅ'em siÄ™gn??, wybraÅ'em ju? i udajÄ…c, ?e nic siÄ™ nie staÅ'o, nie miaÅ'em nawet tyle siÅ'y, ?eby sobÄ… wzgardzi?.

Because even if she were able to leave the Station—alive—still, it's only humans that can land on Earth, and humans are defined by their papers.