 | Douglas Adams |
A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof [is] to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.
There are some people you like immediately, some whom you think you might learn to like in the fullness of time, and some that you simply want to push away from you with a sharp stick.
A scientist must (...) be absolutely like a child. If he sees a thing, he must say that he sees it, whether it was what he thought he was going to see or not. See first, think later, then test. But always see first. Otherwise you will only see what you were expecting.
There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
The major difference between a thing that might go wrong and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong it usually turns out to be impossible to get at or repair.
Numbers written on restaurant bills within the confines of restaurants do not follow the same mathematical laws as numbers written on any other pieces of paper in any other parts of the Universe.
Since every piece of matter in the Universe is in some way affected by every other piece of matter in the Universe, it is in theory possible to extrapolate the whole of creation — every sun, every planet, their orbits, their composition and their economic and social history from, say, one small piece of fairy cake.
Nothing travels faster than the speed of light with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.
Protect me from knowing what I don`t need to know. Protect me from even knowing that there are things to know that I don`t know. Protect me from knowing that I decided not to know about the things that I decided not to know about. Amen.
Once you know what it is you want to be true, instinct is a very useful device for enabling you to know that it is.
It is a well known fact that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it.