269 Quotes by Kim Stanley Robinson

[A] healthy respect for tradition[;]...a kind of default survival behavior

They tell each other what they are thinking. But there is no reason to believe anything they say.

Revolution meant shattering one structure and creating another one, but shattering was easier than creating, and so the two parts of the act were not necessarily fated to be equally successful. In that sense, building a revolution was like building an arch; until both columns were there, and the keystone in place, practically any disruption could bring the whole thing crashing down.

It’s just I finally get what revolution means. It’s maximum volatility with no hedging. And it’s insider trading too! Because, since I know in advance you’re going to default your people, I can buy put options up the wazoo before the IPPI goes down! It’s totally illegal! I finally get why revolution is illegal.

Arguments, speculation-- conspiracy theories of all kind. The usual thing, right? No one is ever simply assassinated any more. Ever since your Kennedys, it is always a matter of how many stories you can invent to explain the same body of facts. That is the great pleasure of conspiracy theory--not explanation, but narrative. It is like Scheherazade.

Utopia is the process of making a better world, the name for one path history can take, a dynamic, tumultuous, agonizing process, with no end. Struggle forever.

It was a mistake to speak one's mind at any time, unless it perfectly matched your political purpose; and it never did. Best to strip all statements of real content, this was the basic law of diplomacy.

So who else did you convince?""Well, I got Joe to potty train himself, and then I convinced Anna to leave the kids at home and go with me on a vacation to Jamaica."Roy laughed heartily. "Dreams are so funny.""Yeah, but bold. So bold. Sometimes I wake up and wonder why I'm not as bold as that all the time. I mean, what have we got to lose?

Even if you want no state, or a minimal state, then you still have to argue it point-by-point. Especially since most minimalists want to keep exactly the economic and police system that keeps them privileged. That's libertarians for you--anarchists who want police protection from their slaves.