# Quote — Iain M. Banks, Surface Detail

> He was not what he appeared to be.
>
> He was beginning to wonder if he had ever been.
>
> The ice inside the water planet did not exist; neither did the water planet itself, nor the star it orbited nor the galaxy beyond nor anything of what appeared to be real no matter how far out you might think you were looking. Nor how far in you looked, either. Peer into anything closely enough and you would find only the same graininess that the Real exhibited; the smallest units of measurement were the same in both realms, whether it was of time or extent or mass.
>
> For some people, of course, this meant the Real itself was not really real, not in the sense of being genuinely the last un-simulated bedrock of actuality. According to this view everybody was already in a pre-existing simulation but simply unaware of it, and the faithful, accurate virtual worlds they were so proud of creating were just simulations within a simulation.
>
> That way though, arguably, madness lay. Or a kind of lassitude through acceptance that could be exploited. There were few better ways of knocking the fight out of people than by convincing them that life was a joke, a contrivance under somebody else’s ultimate control, and nothing of what they thought or did really mattered.

- Author: [Iain M. Banks](https://www.leafyquotes.com/iain-m-banks.md)
- Book: [Surface Detail](https://www.leafyquotes.com/iain-m-banks/surface-detail.md)
- Page: 246
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Iain_Banks#Surface_Detail_(2010)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/iain-m-banks/surface-detail/he-was-not

## More from this book

> I’m negotiating a tricky course between the minefield of personal honesty on one side and the rocky coast of operational security on the other.

p. 292 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/iain-m-banks/surface-detail/im-negotiating-a-tricky.md)

> Filhyn smiled. “Is it not always better to tell the truth though, Representative?”
>
> Errun looked at her, shook his head. “The truth? No matter what? For good or ill? Are you mad? I do hope you’re having a joke with me here, young lady….Don’t pretend you are so naive, Filhyn. The truth is not always useful, not always good. It’s like putting your faith in water. Yes, we need the rain, but too much can sweep you away in a flood and drown you. Like all great natural, elemental forces, the truth needs to be channelled, managed, controlled and intelligently, morally allocated.” He glared at her. “You are having a joke with me, aren’t you?”
>
> I might as well be, she thought. She wondered if she would finally be a real politician when she agreed with what Errun was saying.

p. 260 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/iain-m-banks/surface-detail/filhyn-smiled-is-it-not.md)

> “I hear what you say,” Prin told him, keeping calm.… “It’s nonsense, of course, but it is interesting to know that you hold such views.”

p. 446 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/iain-m-banks/surface-detail/i-hear-what.md)