Quotes About Uncertainty

Waiting for her in reception, pretending to read a paper, he was surprised by his own nervousness; an indication of how little one knew oneself. She

But what is the past? Could it be, the firmness of the past is just illusion? Could the past be a kaleidoscope, a pattern of images that shift with each disturbance of a sudden breeze, a laugh, a thought? And if the shift is everywhere, how would we know?

What sense is there in continuing when one has seen the future?

In a world of fixed future, life is an infinite corridor of rooms, one room lit at each moment, the next room dark but prepared. We walk from room to room, look into the room that is lit, the present moment, then walk on. We do not know the rooms ahead, but we know we cannot change them. We are spectators of our lives.

Heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain. Doctor says, "Treatment is simple. Great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight. Go and see him. That should pick you up." Man bursts into tears. Says, "But doctor...I am Pagliacci.

They say that life's a game, & then they take the board away.

Maybe it was that Hamlet line he referenced, where he wrote about someone who was "protesting" too much.

Man plans and God laughs," said Seth.

was broadcasting his doubts.

We go there with confidence, but we know there is a very fine line between success and failure in this game.

Life. As solid and as strong as a rock one minute, then hanging by a thread the next

But whenever you think, 'this is an exciting idea' and immediately follow that by thinking, 'this is a very stupid idea' then you know you are on to a good thing and that you will regret it if you wimp out.

It's called optimism — but I'm losing the hang of it fast.

No act of knowledge acquisition is entirely without risk.

You're confident he'll have found him, then?" "Well, no. I didn't sat that." "If there's one thing I hate," Volyova said, looking coldly at the other Triumvir, "it's mindless optimism.

All data is stale. The photons reaching your eyes are stale. They tell you that you are looking at something real, but you have no information that the objects before you still exist. They may have vanished into oblivion the instant those photons took wing.

Without risk in our lives, we're scarcely better than machines ourselves.

But it's the greater fate of the Congregation that concerns me more. Our Occupation, and how it will end. I thought it silly of Rackamore to be troubled by such a distant concern, but I find it much harder to dismiss his fears now. What is the point of any deed, good or otherwise, if this little window of civilisation of ours will soon have its end?

All I can say for certain is that, beneath the scrambled chaos of my memories, I feel a driving imperative, a sense of some vital task that I must complete, and which has not yet reached cessation. But I could be completely mistaken. Perhaps I was simply a tourist, ambling his way from sight to sight with no greater goal than to accumulate memories and experience - much like yourselves, in fact.

We all have it in us to be something other than what we are, I thought, but we don't often get a glimpse of what we could have been. Most of us are better off for the not knowing.

All I do know is that in six hours I could be suffering from acute existence failure.

First rule of complex systems," I said. "You can't tell friends from enemies.

If there are three words that need to be used more in American journalism, commentary, politics, personal life... it's the magic words 'I don't know.'

I'm always interested in trying to investigate different personalities. I want to keep myself guessing and keep the fear element alive, so that I don't get too comfortable.