# The Gods Themselves - Author: [Isaac Asimov](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov.md) - Quotes: 13 - Book page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves ## Quotes > Tritt listened placidly, clearly understanding nothing, but content to be listening; while Odeen, transmitting nothing, was as clearly content to be lecturing. p. 82 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/tritt-listened-placidly.md) > You know that prudery is only the other side of prurience. The words are even on the same page in the dictionary. p. 244 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/you-know-that.md) Topics: [hypocrisy](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/hypocrisy.md) > There are no happy endings in history, only crisis points that pass. p. 287 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/there-are-no-happy.md) Topics: [history](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/history.md) > I know nothing of that directly; I only know what I have been told by other young ones who couldn't have known directly either. I want to find out the truth about them and the wanting has grown until there is more of curiosity in me than fear. p. 104 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/i-know-nothing.md) Topics: [truth](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/truth.md), [knowledge](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/knowledge.md) > "Don't finish, Pete. I've heard it all before. All I have to do is decipher the thinking of a non-human intelligence." > > "A better-than-human intelligence. Those creatures from the para-Universe are trying to make themselves understood." > > "That may be," sighed Bronowski, "but they're trying to do it through my intelligence, which is better than human I sometimes think, but not much. Sometimes, in the dark of the night, I lie awake and wonder if different intelligences can communicate at all; or, if I've had a particularly bad day, whether the phrase 'different intelligences' has meaning at all." > > "It does," said Lamont savagely, his hands clearly bailing into fists within his lab coat pockets. "It means Hallam and me. It means that fool-hero, Dr. Frederick Hallam and me. We're different intelligences because when I talk to him he doesn't understand. His idiot face gets redder and his eyes bulge and his ears block. I'd say his mind stops functioning, but lack the proof of any other state from which it might stop." p. 12 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/dont-finish-pete.md) Topics: [thinking](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/thinking.md) > The easiest way to solve a problem is to deny it exists. p. 236 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/the-easiest-way.md) Topics: [illusions](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/illusions.md) > To Mankind > > And the hope that the war against folly may someday be won, after all. p. 5 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/to-mankind-and.md) Topics: [stupidity](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/stupidity.md), [hope](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/hope.md) > If an interaction is too weak to be detectable or to exert influence in any way, then by any operational definition, it doesn't exist. p. 257 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/if-an-interaction.md) Topics: [science](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/science.md) > He sat in his chair, fingers aimlessly drumming, drumming. Somewhere in the Sun, protons were clinging together with just a trifling additional avidity and with each moment that avidity grew and at some moment the delicate balance would break down . . . "And no one on Earth will live to know I was right," cried out Lamont, and blinked and blinked to keep back the tears. [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/he-sat-in-his.md) Topics: [death](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/death.md) > “It is a mistake,” he said, “to suppose that the public wants the environment protected or their lives saved and that they will be grateful to any idealist who will fight for such ends. What the public wants is their own individual comfort. We know that well enough from our experience in the environmental crisis of the twentieth century.” p. 56 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/it-is-a-mistake.md) Topics: [society](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/society.md) > I fear my ignorance. p. 187 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/i-fear-my-ignorance.md) Topics: [fear](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/fear.md) > I've lived most of my life already and I suppose I can argue myself into believing that I have no great cause to love humanity. However, only a few people have hurt me, and if I hurt everyone in return that is unconscionable usury. p. 250 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/ive-lived-most.md) Topics: [morality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/morality.md) > I don't like anything that's got to be. I want to know why. p. 93 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/isaac-asimov/the-gods-themselves/i-dont-like.md) Topics: [knowledge](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/knowledge.md)