Rather than write an obituary of Clarke, who died Wednesday, I thought I'd reproduce some quotes of his that caught my eye:
CNN is one of the participants in the war. I have a fantasy where Ted Turner is elected president but refuses because he doesn't want to give up power.
There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum.
A hundred years ago, the electric telegraph made possible - indeed, inevitable - the United States of America. The communications satellite will make equally inevitable a United Nations of Earth; let us hope that the transition period will not be equally bloody.
Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases: 1- It's completely impossible. 2- It's possible, but it's not worth doing. 3- I said it was a good idea all along.
It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars.
I don't pretend we have all the answers. But the questions are certainly worth thinking about.
1 comment:
He also described religion as "a necessary evil in the childhood of our particular species" and stated that "..no religious rites of any kind, relating to any religious faith, should be associated with my funeral."
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