Damon Knight - A for Anything (1959)

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Eagles had made a realist of him. He believed in facts, and in altering your viewpoint to fit them, no matter what they were. That was the way you survived and stayed sane; it was hard, it meant sacrifices—he had already lost many things that he valued deeply—but it was the only way.

Damon Knight
A society that put more emphasis on birth than ability was likely to breed ability out of its ruling class.

Damon Knight
Don't lose your temper, said Ruell evenly. It's your worst fault, except for ignorance.

Damon Knight
Voluntary birth control methods only work on the people who choose to use 'em. A population check that doesn't work on everybody doesn't work at all, because it simply breeds out the ones who use it. The only population check that really works is one that affects everybody, like a limit of space or food.

Damon Knight
We humanitarians, as our name suggests, believe that man has an ethical duty to man. We believe that the value of any system is measured by the consideration given to all human beings, not just to a favored class: and by that standard, our present system is a miserable failure.

Damon Knight
He was going to die. His mind flinched back in horror from that, but it was still there, grinning, implacable. His body would rot under the ground, while delicious things were still happening in the sunlight.

Damon Knight
No progress, either moral or material, can be made in a world which is frozen, like ours, into a rigid mold of suppression of liberties.

Damon Knight