“Though his invention worked superbly [...] his theory was a crock of sewage from beginning to end.”

“Programming went back to the beginning of time. It was a little like the midden out back of his father's castle.”

“[He] was an insect wandering in the cathedral his mind had become.”

“One of his greatest talents was empathy; no sadist can aspire to perfection without that diagnostic ability.”

“Here we begin frank speculation. And since we are speculating, we'll use those powerful pseudo-laws, the Principles of Mediocrity and Minimal Assumption.”

“Sometimes terror and pain are not the best levers; deception, when it works, is the most elegant and the least expensive manipulation of all.”

“Politics is good; when it works properly, disagreements get solved without people beating each other up. But when a regime knows its days are numbered, there's always the chance it may use its position to change the rules and make the debate it is losing irrelevant.”