Robert A. Heinlein Quotes

We've let too much time go by. We've been busy with war instead of being busy with peace. And that's what space travel is all about. It's all about peace and exploration and wonder and beauty.

I see this as the central issue of our time: how to find a substitute for war in human ingenuity, imagination, courage, sacrifice, patience... War is not inevitable, however persistent it is, however long a history it has in human affairs. It does not come out of some instinctive human need. It is manufactured by political leaders, who then must make a tremendous effort--by enticement, by propaganda, by coercion--to mobilize a normally reluctant population to go to war.

Despite the immense distance between our own solar system (including the earth) and the nearest other solar systems, a journey from one system to another is theoretically possible, once an unlimited source of power is developed.

Don't waste your time on beaming people up or down. Instead, consider gravity waves as advanced physics of the universe that could be used to travel interstellar distances.

We are at the moment looking at space as something to be entered by the tremendous thrust of a rocket because that is the attitude of attacking the unknown. And that causes us not to realize that we are already on the most magnificently equipped spaceship, which could hardly be improved upon. It has got a source of temperature and energy just at the right distance from it. It's beautifully equipped with oxygen, with food supplies, with all kinds of delightful things to do while on the journey.... and it's traveling through space at a colossal speed... and it's called the planet Earth.

I think no matter where we go in space to me the important thing is not only getting there and getting back, but it's also doing research, because that opens up as a possibility with that new distance of travel in space.

The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination.

But I felt certain that if the world would stop indulging wars and famines and other perils, it would be possible for human beings to embarrass each other to death. Our self-destruction might take a little longer that way, but I believe it would be no less complete.

We must move into the universe. Mankind must save itself. We must escape the danger of war and politics. We must become astronauts and go out into the universe and discover the God in ourselves.

Most troubles are unnecessary. We have Nature beaten; we can make her grow wheat; we can keep warm when she sends blizzards. So we raise the devil just for pleasure--wars, politics, race-hatreds, labor-disputes.

There can be no compromise with war; it cannot be reformed or controlled; cannot be disciplined into decency or codified into common sense; for war is the slaughter of human beings, temporarily regarded as enemies, on as large a scale as possible.

It may take endless wars and unbearable population pressure to force-feed a technology to the point where it can cope with space. In the universe, space travel may be the normal birth pangs of an otherwise dying race. A test. Some races pass, some fail.

I just wanted all the wars to be over so that we could spend the money on starships and Mars colonies.

While other [military] alliances have been formed to win wars, our fundamental purpose is to prevent war while preserving and extending the frontiers of freedom.

The greatest curse that can befall a free people, is civil war.

Never think that wars are irrational catastrophes: they happen when wrong ways of thinking and living bring about intolerable situations ... the root causes of conflict are usually to be found in some wrong way of life in which all parties have acquiesced, and for which everybody must, to some extent, bear the blame.

When earth gets good and crowded, like 15th century England, then some new Pilgrims are gonna rocket their Mayflowers to a new solar system.

For me, a rocket is only a means--only a method of reaching the depths of space--and not an end in itself... There's no doubt that it's very important to have rocket ships since they will help mankind to settle elsewhere in the universe. But what I'm working for is this resettling... The whole idea is to move away from the Earth to settlements in space.

Cyber Leader: Daleks, be warned. You have declared war upon the Cybermen. Dalek Sec: This is not war - this is pest control! Cyber Leader: We have five million Cybermen. How many are you? Dalek Sec: Four. Cyber Leader: You would destroy the Cybermen with four Daleks? Dalek Sec: We would destroy the Cybermen with one Dalek! You superior in only one respect. Cyber Leader: What is that? Dalek Sec: You are better at dying.

They all knew the mothership was coming, they all knew it was a flying saucer, they all knew it came from another planet through the vacuum of space. And so what do they do, to the left of that monument? They set up runway lights. And I'm thinking, if you could travel through the vacuum of space, you don't need runway lights. Runway lights are if you're using air for lift. Aliens would not need air for lift.

Arms alone can give the world no permanent peace, no confident security. Arms are solely for defense - to protect from violent assault what we already have. They are only a costly insurance. They cannot add to human progress.

The vast distances that separate the stars are providential. Beings and worlds are quarantined from one another. The quarantine is lifted only for those with sufficient self-knowledge and judgment to have safely traveled from star to star.

Friendship is not diminished by distance or time, by imprisonment or war, by suffering or silence. It is in these things that it roots most deeply.

For it can never be that war shall preserve life, and peace destroy it.

I always wondered why the makers leave housekeeping and cooking out of their tales. Isn't it what all the great wars and battles are fought for -- so that at day's end a family may eat together in a peaceful house?