Warnings About Society Quotes

“Colonel Graff: We won! That's all that matters.
Ender Wiggin: No. The way we win matters.”
― Orson Scott Card, Ender’s Game

“In fact, one of the main lessons to be learned from the collapses of the Maya, Anasazi, Easter Islanders, and those other past societies (as well as from the recent collapse of the Soviet Union) is that a society's steep decline may begin only a decade or two after the society reaches its peak numbers, wealth, and power. In that respect, the trajectories of the societies that we have discussed are unlike the usual courses of individual human lives, which decline in a prolonged senescence. The reason is simple: maximum population, wealth, resource consumption, and waste production mean maximum environmental impact, approaching the limit where impact outstrips resources. On reflection, it's no surprise that declines of societies tend to follow swiftly on their peaks.”
― Jared Diamond, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

“If such things were not so dangerous one would laugh. But one recognizes the technique. Such propaganda always begins with words, but soon it proceeds to deeds. When there are no facts to support lies, facts must be made.”
― Eric Ambler, The Mask of Dimitrios

“If you are living in heaven, invite people to your heaven; if you are living in hell, warn people to stay out of your hell! People need your heaven, not your hell!”
― Mehmet Murat ildan

“It's not the machines you need to fear. It's the people. Other people. The augmented men and women that will come afterwards. The children who use this technology you are creating will not care what it does to your norms and traditions. They will utilize this gift to its fullest potential and leave you begging in the dust. They will break your hearts, murder the natural world, and endanger their own souls. You will rue the day that you created us.”
― Dave Pryor

“Sadly, how often did mankind heed a warning? Gadflies are often swatted unmercifully.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Vocation of a Gadfly

“There is no crime, absolutely none, that cannot be condoned when “our” side commits it. Even if one does not deny that the crime has happened, even if one knows that it is exactly the same crime as one has condemned in some other case, even if one admits in an intellectual sense that it is unjustified—still one cannot feel that it is wrong. Loyalty is involved, and so pity ceases to function. … The nationalist is often somewhat uninterested in what happens in the real world. What he wants is to feel that his own unit is getting the better of some other unit, and he can more easily do this by scoring off an adversary than by examining the facts to see whether they support him.”
― George Orwell, Essays