“They don't cover what to do with a dead hooker. That's a whole different program. Political science, I think.”

“You're the one with almost an MBA," Barry, the short balding one, said to Lash."You should know what to do.""They don't cover what to do with a dead hooker," Lash countered. "That's a wholedifferent program. Political science, I think.”

“I don't think humanity just replays history, but we are the same people our ancestors were, and our descendants are going to face a lot of the same situations we do. It's instructive to imagine how they would react, with different technologies on different worlds. That's why I write science fiction -- even though the term 'science fiction' excites disdain in certain persons.”

“Once in a while a new government initiates a program to put power to better use, but its success or failure never really proves anything. In science, experiments are designed, checked, altered, repeated-- but not in politics... We have no real cumulative knowledge. History tells us nothing. That's the tragedy of a political reformer.”

“You can't know now what the results will be in the future. So for now, don't even think about it. Think about what you want to do and what you can do. That's very different from 'running away'. What do you want to do?”

“When graves are covered with stones, the dead can no longer get out. But the dead can’t go out anyway! What difference does it make whether they’re covered with soil or stones?”