Home > Work > Sleeping Giants (Themis Files, #1)
21 " What I am is very much a function of what I am not. If the "other" is the Muslim world, then I am the Judeo-Christian world. IF the other is from thousands of light-years away, I am simply human. Redefine alterity and you can erase boundaries. "
― Sylvain Neuvel , Sleeping Giants (Themis Files, #1)
22 " Yes. This, all that's happening now, this is your bat mitzvah. You can play with atoms, you can sit with the grown-ups.""What does that mean for us?""That means you won't be forgiven for childhood mistakes anymore. "
23 " It's easier to be just one more soldier in a giant army than being the whole army by yourself. "
24 " I have always been thoroughly bewildered by North Korea. They cannot be threatened, as they feel themselves superior to the one making the threat. They cannot be reasoned with, and most importantly, they are 100 percent convinced of their righteousness, so they cannot be bought. Megalomaniacs with delusions of grandeur are notoriously difficult to handle, but how generations of them can follow one another is beyond me. "
25 " Can you keep an open mind? Are you willing to challenge what you know to be true? "
26 " If you are a scientist you believe that it is good to find out how the world works; that it is good to find out what the realities are; that it is good to turn over to mankind at large the greatest possible power to control the world and to deal with it according to its lights and its values. "
27 " You’re right, I don’t trust people easily, but I have faith in numbers. —Interesting. —I do. I think people are scared, and dumb, and selfish on their own, but put enough of them together and they’ll be half-decent. "
28 " I was never really good at making friends. I liked reading; I liked walking in the woods; I liked being alone. "
29 " Mr. Couture is not an American citizen. He is from Montreal. It is a large city, about the size of Boston, in that very large country just north of here. You may have heard of it. They play hockey. — "
30 " Those are not my words. In fact, I had to look up the exact quote. Like everyone else, I only knew 'I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.' We tend to romanticize good quotes, and I always imagined Oppenheimer uttering those words while staring at the mushroom cloud of a nuclear explosion. In reality, he spoke those words during an interview for an NBC documentary in 1965. He had had twenty years to think about it. "
31 " People who owe me favors are called friends. "
32 " You want to find someone who is more or less unqualified because the people that were actually proficient have all failed. "
33 " Then I am afraid I have nothing to offer. It pains me to say it, but I have always been thoroughly bewildered by North Korea. They cannot be threatened, as they feel themselves superior to the one making the threat. They cannot be reasoned with, and most importantly, they are 100 percent convinced of their righteousness, so they cannot be bought. Megalomaniacs with delusions of grandeur are notoriously difficult to handle, but how generations of them can follow one another is beyond me. "
34 " Deadwood sure isn’t thriving, but it’s still standing. And the landscape is breathtaking. It’s sitting right on the edge of the Black Hills National Forest, with its eerie rock formations, beautiful pine forests, barren rock, canyons, and creeks. I can’t think of a more beautiful place on Earth. I can understand why someone would want to build something there. "
35 " - Love makes people do some crazy things.- Nah. Love makes you get really drunk and punch through a wall. "
36 " We wouldn't really see anything at night, from this altitude, but it still felt good, like a layover in Paris. You never leave the airport, but even so, you're in Paris. "
37 " They find a decent, good-looking man who doesn’t judge them and treats them like a princess. They realize how lucky they are and they never let go. Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work? "
38 " I feel... numb. After something this intense, everything else just... Things that would have had you up in arms before now seem so utterly trivial. Nothing really matters. You start to ignore little things, because they're little things. You compromise. You rationalize. Soon you look at yourself in the mirror and you don't recognize the person staring back at you.But, you know. I'm alive. I'm OK. I wake up every day, and I get out of bed thinking today might be just a bit better than yesterday. Most of the time it is. Show must go on, as they say. "
39 " So we went from the greatest discovery in history, for the betterment of all mankind, blah blah blah, to a weapon for profit? "
40 " If you are a scientist you believe that it is good to find out how the world works; that it is good to find out what the realities are; that it is good to turn over to mankind at large the greatest possible power to control the world and to deal with it according to its lights and its values.” FILE NO. "