Arthur C. Clarke
Arthur C. Clarke
Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, FRASwas a British science fiction writer, science writer and futurist, inventor, undersea explorer, and television series host...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth16 December 1917
fate revision ruthless
All human plans [are] subject to ruthless revision by Nature, or Fate, or whatever one preferred to call the powers behind the Universe.
reality years isaac
Isaac Asimov is, in reality, based on something I had invented a few years previously.
statistics possibility refutation
It was one thing to have guessed it, another to have had that guess confirmed beyond possibility of refutation.
childhood gullible possibility
There is the possibility that humankind can outgrow its infantile tendencies, as I suggested in Childhood's End. But it is amazing how childishly gullible humans are.
taken theory spaceships
One theory which can no longer be taken very seriously is that UFOs are interstellar spaceships.
art avant-garde stories
Now, before you make a movie, you have to have a script, and before you have a script, you have to have a story; though some avant-garde directors have tried to dispense with the latter item, you'll find their work only at art theaters.
climbing hydrogen-bomb space
Deep beneath the surface of the Sun, enormous forces were gathering. At any moment, the energies of a million hydrogen bombs might burst forth in the awesome explosion.... Climbing at millions of miles per hour, an invisible fireball many times the size of Earth would leap from the Sun and head out across space.
thinking machines astonishment
I sometimes think that the universe is a machine designed for the perpetual astonishment of astronomers.
running long firsts
The creation of wealth is certainly not to be despised, but in the long run the only human activities really worthwhile are the search for knowledge, and the creation of beauty. This is beyond argument, the only point of debate is which comes first.
mountain sometimes moses
Moses Kaldor had always loved mountains; they made him feel nearer to the God whose nonexistence he still sometimes resented.
believe thinking self
I believe any malevolent supercivilisation would have rapidly self-destructed as we may be in the process of doing ourselves. If we do have contact, physical contact with aliens, I think it will be benign.
differences diversity fundamentals
Whether we are based on carbon or on silicon makes no fundamental difference we should each be treated with appropriate respect.
stars patriotic men
It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars.
intelligent space forever
Perhaps, as some wit remarked, the best proof that there is Intelligent Life in Outer Space is the fact it hasn't come here. Well, it can't hide forever - one day we will overhear it.