- When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
- The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
- Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
— Arthur C. Clarke
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Corollary to Clarke’s First Law — When, however, the lay public rallies round an idea that is denounced by distinguished but elderly scientists and supports that idea with great fervor and emotion—the distinguished but elderly scientists are then, after all, probably right.
— Isaac Asimov
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Corollary to Clarke’s Third Law — Any sufficiently rigorously defined magic is indistinguishable from technology.
— Larry Niven
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Corollary to Niven’s Law — There is a technical, literary term for those who mistake the opinions and beliefs of characters in a novel for those of the author. The term is “idiot.”
— S. M. Stirling
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Clarke’s Second Law of Egodynamics — For every expert there is an equal and opposite expert.
— Arthur C. Clarke
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Finagle’s corollary to Murphy’s Law — Anything that can go wrong, will—at the worst possible moment.
— John W. Campbell, Jr.
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Hanlon’s Razor — Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
— Robert J. Hanlon
[Note, however, that this law is considered a later development of Ingham’s Maxim — Many journalists have fallen for the conspiracy theory of government. I do assure you that they would produce more accurate work if they adhered to the cock-up theory. —Sir Bernard Ingham]
“Murphy was an optimist”.