Robert A. Heinlein
Robert A. Heinlein
Robert Anson Heinleinwas an American science-fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was an influential and controversial author of the genre in his time...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth7 July 1907
CountryUnited States of America
thinking hands disaster
Circumstances can force your hand. So think ahead!
sex technology computer
Don't explain computers to laymen. Simpler to explain sex to a virgin.
song pain believe
There is an old song which asserts 'the best things in life are free.' Not true! Utterly false! This was the tragic fallacy which brought on the decadence and collapse of the democracies of the twentieth century; those noble experiments failed because the people had been led to believe that they could simply vote for whatever they wanted...and get it without toil, without sweat, without tears. Nothing of value is free. Even the breath of life is purchased at birth only through gasping effort and pain.
vices vice-versa credibility
The truth of a proposition has nothing to do with its credibility. And vice versa.
numbers members stupidest
To assess the intelligence of a committee, divide the IQ of its stupidest member by the number of members.
reading ignorance self-confidence
My folks tried to make a preacher of me and missed by a narrow margin… I would have made a good one if I hadn’t fallen into the fatal folly of reading anything I could lay hands on. With just a touch more self confidence and a liberal helping of ignorance I could have been a famous evangelist.
sarcastic lying able
It’s not enough to be able to lie with a straight face; anybody with enough gall to raise on a busted flush can do that. The first way to lie artistically is to tell the truth — but not all of it. The second way involves telling the truth, too, but is harder: Tell the exact truth and maybe all of it…but tell it so unconvincingly that your listener is sure you are lying.
men animal rational
Man is not a rational animal, he is a rationalizing animal.
loyalty responsibility men
Social responsibility above the level of family, or at most of tribe, requires imagination-- devotion, loyalty, all the higher virtues -- which a man must develop himself; if he has them forced down him, he will vomit them out.
mind swallowing action
The capacity of the human mind for swallowing nonsense and spewing it forth in violent and repressive action has never yet been plumbed.
opportunity men law
My old man claimed that the more complicated the law the more opportunity for scoundrels.
teaching math important
From somewhere, back in my youth, heard Prof say, 'Manuel, when faced with a problem you do not understand, do any part of it you do understand, then look at it again.' He had been teaching me something he himself did not understand very well—something in math—but had taught me something far more important, a basic principle.
trust skeptical
You can go wrong by being too skeptical as readily as by being too trusting.
variables helpful problem
In a dilemma, it is helpful to change any variable, then reexamine the problem.