Mark

“Come the hour, come the man.”
― Adrian Tchaikovsky, Children of Time

“Among the elite, Stuarts had given way to Smiths, Sirs to Misters, and family names were no longer of help for guessing social standing. But the foundations of inequity remained intact, since the primal urges that have always led humans to seek ascendancy over their kind run deeper than the ebb and flow of social tide. But for as long as people failed to grasp this simple truth they applauded the power of pigheaded toil and lucky foresight to make moguls out of yokels, and found comfort in the belief that social imbalance was only pernicious if it derived from things other than skill, which was seen as a fair gauge of merit, much like swordsmanship had been regarded as a fair measure of worth in the days when disputes were settled by duels.”
― Jacques St-Malo, Cognition

“In a moral argument, we expect the successful rebuttal of our opponents’ arguments to change our opponents’ minds. Such a belief is analogous to believing that forcing a dog’s tail to wag by moving it with your hand should make the dog happy. ―J. Haidt, The Emotional Dog and Its Rational Tail”
― Jacques St-Malo, Cognition

“In all of our ancestral legends about space travel, didn’t old-time authors envision humanity as the brash young upstarts? Intrepidly setting forth into the unknown, facing dire threats and deadly foes, making countless mistakes, but always persevering, brilliantly, against the odds? Moreover, in myth, weren’t we often assisted by some wise elder race? Admirable, patient beings, unresentful of our success and irreverent gumption. In those early romances, movies and threevees, from Roddenberry space operas to Tolkien fantasies, there were always kindly older brothers, unjealous and dependable; perhaps a bit stuffy and exasperated, but always sagacious, forbearing and kind.”
― David Brin, The Ancient Ones