Dune - Frank Herbert
When my father, the Padishah Emperor, heard of Duke Leto’s death and the manner of it, he went into such a rage as we had never before seen. He blamed my mother and the compact forced on him to place a Bene Gesserit on the throne. He blamed the Guild and the evil old Baron. He blamed everyone in sight, not excepting even me, for he said I was a witch like all the others. And when I sought to comfort him, saying it was done according to an older law of self-preservation to which even the most ancient rulers gave allegiance, he sneered at me and asked if I thought him a weakling.
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Apr 14, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
“You’re thinking I’m the Kwisatz Haderach,” he said. “Put that out of your mind. I’m something unexpected.”
5
Apr 8, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
“When next you find a mirror, study your face—study mine now. The traces are there if you don’t blind yourself. Look at my hands, the set of my bones. And if none of this convinces you, then take my word for it. I’ve walked the future, I’ve looked at a record, I’ve seen a place, I have all the data. We’re Harkonnens.”
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Apr 8, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
She sensed that his mind had leaped ahead of her, that it now saw more in some respects than she did. She had helped train the intelligence which did this, but now she found herself fearful of it.
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Apr 1, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
“We will depend upon ourselves,” he said. “Our immediate concern is our family atomics. We must get them before the Harkonnens can search them out.” “Not likely they’ll be found,” she said, “the way they were hidden.” “It must not be left to chance.” And she thought: Blackmail with the family atomics as a threat to the planet and its spice—that’s what he has in mind. But all he can hope for then is escape into renegade anonymity.
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Apr 1, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
“We will depend upon ourselves,” he said. “Our immediate concern is our family atomics. We must get them before the Harkonnens can search them out.”
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Apr 1, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
The day the flesh shapes and the flesh the day shapes.
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Mar 23, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
“You’ve glimpsed the fist within the Bene Gesserit glove,” she said. “Few glimpse it and live. And what I did was a relatively simple thing for us. You’ve not seen my entire arsenal. Think on that.”
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Mar 23, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
“I have said to you before that we should understand each other,” she said. “I meant you should understand me. I already understand you.
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Mar 23, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
“Whatever rumors you’ve heard about our schools,” she said, “the truth is far greater. If I wished to destroy the Duke … or you, or any other person within my reach, you could not stop me.”
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Mar 23, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
And again, he wondered at her unknown ancestry—a renegade House, perhaps? Some black-barred royalty? She looked more regal than the Emperor’s own blood.
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Mar 17, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
A handful of spice will buy a home on Tupile. It cannot be manufactured, it must be mined on Arrakis.
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Mar 17, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
She said the mystery of life isn’t a problem to solve, but a reality to experience.
2
Mar 16, 2024
Dune - Frank Herbert
‘You, Paul Atreides, descendant of kings, son of a Duke, you must learn to rule. It’s something none of your ancestors learned.’ “Paul opened his eyes, said: “That made me angry and I said my father rules an entire planet. And she said, ‘He’s losing it.’ And I said my father was getting a richer planet. And she said, ‘He’ll lose that one, too.’ And I wanted to run and warn my father, but she said he’d already been warned—by you, by Mother, by many people.”
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Mar 16, 2024
The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu
Two of the three spheres disappeared. The text on the one that remained, which no longer glowed, now seemed dim and dreary. In the end, strategy was where we failed.
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Mar 16, 2024
The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu
“Were you already aware that the universe is a dark forest?” Yes. We knew about it long ago. What’s strange is that you only realized it so late.…
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Mar 16, 2024
The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu
But one of the remaining ten thousand hunters will surely make a choice to fire on that position, because for civilizations at a certain level of technological development, attacking may be safer and less of a hassle than probing. If there’s really nothing at that location, then it’s no loss.
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Mar 16, 2024
The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu
after confirming that it has no life, disregard it. But one of the remaining ten thousand hunters will surely make a choice to fire on that position, because for civilizations at a certain level of technological development, attacking may be safer and less of a hassle than probing.
1
Mar 16, 2024
The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu
“But in this dark forest, there’s a stupid child called humanity, who has built a bonfire and is standing beside it shouting, ‘Here I am! Here I am!’”
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Mar 16, 2024
The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu
“The real universe is just that black.” Luo Ji waved a hand, feeling the darkness as if stroking velvet. “The universe is a dark forest. Every civilization is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound. Even breathing is done with care. The hunter has to be careful, because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him. If he finds other life—another hunter, an angel or a demon, a delicate infant or a tottering old man, a fairy or a demigod—there’s only one thing he can do: open fire and eliminate them. In this forest, hell is other people. An eternal threat that any life that exposes its own existence will be swiftly wiped out. This is the picture of cosmic civilization. It’s the explanation for the Fermi Paradox.”
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Mar 16, 2024