Hypothetical Situations Quotes

Science fiction writers aren't in the prediction business; they're in the speculation business, using 'hasn't happened' or 'hasn't happened yet' to create entertaining scenarios that may or may not anticipate future realities.

Maybe! Maybe! Maybe if your aunt had a beard, she'd be your uncle.

Doesn't matter. If I would've had a beer before the game, I would've been drunk. So I don't believe in 'if.'

[Science fiction is] that class of prose narrative treating of a situation that could not arise in the world we know, but which is hypothesised on the basis of some innovation in science or technology, or pseudo-science or pseudo-technology, whether human or extra-terrestrial in origin. It is distinguished from pure fantasy by its need to achieve verisimilitude and win the 'willing suspension of disbelief' through scientific plausibility.

I really don't deal with hypotheticals.

Fiction is an easy way to talk about issues: I think it feels less preachy. You can have the students discuss characters in the book as opposed to hypothetical situations, or as opposed to opening up about themselves, unless they really want to.

Might have, could have, may have, should have—the haves and have nots reduced to pointless possibilities.

It's subjunctive history. You know, the subjunctive? The mood used when something may or may not have happened. When it is imagined.

Science fiction is the great opportunity to speculate on what could happen. It does give me, as a futurist, scenarios.

Whenever you look back and say "if" you know you're in trouble. There is no such thing as "if". The only thing that matters is what really happened.

Remember, constantly, that when you talk about 'tense of a subjunctive,' you're not talking about time. You're slipping through degrees of reality.

You can’t say ‘if this didn’t happen then that would have happened’ because you don’t know everything that might have happened. You might think something’d be good, but for all you know it could have turned out horrible. You can’t say ‘If only I’d…’ because you could be wishing for anything. The point is, you’ll never know. You’ve gone past. So there’s no use thinking about it.

I'm not going to put my energy into focusing on things that are hypothetical that we don't know.

Yes, and imagine a world where there were no hypothetical situations.

I like thinking about what could be out there, and I love the questions that sci-fi poses.

If I can't get hold of someone I love, I'll assume they're being tied to a radiator by al-Qaeda rather than their battery's run out. I'm quite a worrier.

That is, a system starts with a group of interrelated propositions which involve reference to empirical observations within the logical framework of the propositions in question.

Yeah, well, if ifs and buts were candy and nuts, then we’d never go hungry. (Syn)

If wishes were horses, beggars could ride.

Memories and possibilities are even more hideous than realities.

it is a lean employment of time to brood on what might have happened along some other turning.

I don't deal with hypotheticals.

Fantasies are things that can't happen, and science fiction is about things that can happen.

I will not discuss future hypothetical situations.