Lukasz

“Math is poetry, kid,” she growled. “Math is sex in the head. All that work of making your mind stroke the
numbers? It’s a natural series of touches you already know by instinct. Once you get over your inhibitions, you
can sit in class or lie in bed and practice formulae and sums, caress the equation till you find the climax of an
elegant solution.”
― Raymond St. Elmo, In Theory, it Works

“Marissa Theodora took out her journal, put it on her lap so Mr. Alva would not see. She penciled thoughts as they came. ‘Picture the classroom plunged into dark,’ she wrote. A touchable darkness, like the fur of a black cat. A thick fog of ink. You can move through it; just not quickly. Can’t shout through it; only talk in low soft tones.’ She frowned. Why ‘plunged into dark’? Why not ‘opened’? Darkness was already everywhere. Under the floor, between the walls. Up in space and below the earth. Everyone’s pockets were full of Dark. Our heads? Stuffed with the stuff. Close your eyelids and roll your eyes inward, and gaze into the cavern of your skull. Behold: your secret vault of Dark. Marissa considered writing that. Decided not. It sounded gloomy, even creepy.”
― Raymond St. Elmo, In Theory, it Works

“But during that time, all the wise scholars and profound thinkers who ran the place fell to brooding on the nature of human society, and came to the conclusion that, left to itself, it didn’t work terribly well. And why? Because, they argued, plausibly enough, it tends to be run by idiots; kings (ruled by their own base desires and hopelessly interbred) or dictators (anyone who seizes power by that very act disqualifies himself from being trusted with it) or oligarchies (irredeemably self-serving and corrupt) or, God help us, democracies (in the republic of the stupid, the half-witted man is prime minister) – there had to be a better way, and to the wisest men in the known world, it was painfully obvious what it was. If a job needs doing, do it ourselves.”
― K.J. Parker, Saevus Corax Deals with the Dead

“Why?"

A great question had been asked, Matthew thought. The ultimate question, which might be asked only by explorers who would not return to share their knowledge of a new world.”
― Robert R. McCammon, Speaks the Nightbird