14 January 2026

On Literature: On Analysis (From Fiction to Science-Fiction)

"The simplicity of nature is not that which may easily be read, but is inexhaustible. The last analysis can no wise be made." (Ralph W Emerson, "Essays, First Series", 1841)

"It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious." (Alfred N Whitehead,"Science in the Modern World", 1925)

"The double analysis kills the single analysis, and the treble kills the double, until at last a sufficiency of statistics comes very near to common sense." (Hilaire Belloc," The Silence of the Sea", 1940) 

"The machine is only a tool after all, which can help humanity progress faster by taking some of the burdens of calculations and interpretations off its back. The task of the human brain remains what it has always been; that of discovering new data to be analyzed, and of devising new concepts to be tested." (Isaac Asimov, "I, Robot", 1950)

"The evil are always foolish in the final analysis." (Gene Wolfe, "The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories", 1970)

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." (Robert A Heinlein, "Time Enough for Love", 1973)

"So together they left the office and walked into the uncertainty of the rest of their lives. That, in the final analysis, is the great adventure in which each of us takes part; what more courageous thing is there, after all, than facing the unknown we all share, the danger and joy that awaits us in the unread pages of the Book of the Future [...]" (George Alec Effinger," The World of Pez Pavilion: Preliminary to the Groundbreaking Ceremony", 1983)

"The complexities of cause and effect defy analysis." (Douglas Adams, "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency", 1987)

"Computers bootstrap their own offspring, grow so wise and incomprehensible that their communiqués assume the hallmarks of dementia: unfocused and irrelevant to the barely-intelligent creatures left behind. And when your surpassing creations find the answers you asked for, you can't understand their analysis and you can't verify their answers. You have to take their word on faith." (Peter Watts, "Blindsight", 2006)

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On Literature: On Analysis (From Fiction to Science-Fiction)

"The simplicity of nature is not that which may easily be read, but is inexhaustible. The last analysis can no wise be made." (Ral...