" However, I will confess to the distinct and unsettling feeling that very large, very ponderous and most momentous wheels have been set in motion. When that happens I believe the lessons of history tend to indicate that it is best not to be in their way. Even without meaning harm, the workings and progress of such wheels are on a scale which inevitably reduces the worth of individual lives to an irrelevance at best.”
“At best?”
“At best. At worst, lives, their sacrifice, provide the oil required to make the wheels move. "

― Iain M. Banks , The Algebraist