Isaac Asimov Quotes

Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all—the apathy of human beings.

For evil to take place, the acts of a few people are not sufficient; the great majority also has to remain indifferent.

Men are accomplices to that which leaves them indifferent.

Undoubtedly, to salve your conscience, you have now and then helped some miserable human being, but millions of human beings were murdered and nary a protest was heard.

Hate isn’t the most dangerous thing, he’d said. Indifference is.

The real problem is not the bad guys; it is that good guys have gone to sleep.

What is easy to do is also easy not to do.

Mock mockers after that That would not lift a hand maybe To help good, wise or great To bar that foul storm out, for we Traffic in mockery.

But what force in the galaxy is stronger than she is?" "Indifference." Jerusha surprised herself with the answer. "Indifference, Gundhalinu, is the strongest force in the universe. It makes everything it touches meaningless. Love and hate don't stand a chance against it. It lets neglect and decay and monstrous injustice go unchecked. It doesn't act, it allows. And that's what gives it so much power.

How nice -- to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive.

The pessimist is seldom an agitating individual. His creed breeds indifference to others, and he does not trouble himself to thrust his views upon the unconvinced.

He didn't reject the idea so much as not react to it and watch as it floated away. He thought very broadly of desires and ideas being watched but not acted upon, he thought of impulses being starved of expression and dying out and floating dryly away.

When being is divorced from doing, pious thoughts become an adequate substitute for washing dirty feet.

Christians have no business thinking that the good life consists mainly in not doing bad things. We have no business thinking that to do evil in this world you have to be a Bengal tiger, when, in fact, it is enough to be a tame tabby—a nice person but not a good one. In short, Pentecost makes it clear that nothing is so fatal to Christianity as indifference.

the voluntary relinquishing of responsibility for our lives and our actions is one of the greatest enemies of our time.

For evil to take place, the acts of a few people are not sufficient; the great majority also has to remain indifferent. That is something of which we are all quite capable.

Nobody did nothin' to nobody.

I just don't see anybody that's particularly interested in fixing that.

The opposite of good is not evil, the opposite of good is indifference.

A lot of you cared, just not enough.

The great enemy of morality is indifference.

The man gave a shrug which indicated that, although the world did indeed have many problems, this was one of them that was not his.

Cynicism is just an excuse for not helping.

I don't know about bores. Maybe you shouldn't feel too sorry if you see some swell girl getting married to them. They don't hurt anybody most of them, and maybe they're all terrific whistlers or something. Who the hell knows? Not me.