“When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.”
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
“The pursuit of happiness is a most ridiculous phrase; if you pursue happiness you'll never find it.”
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
“Technology is a queer thing. It brings you gifts with one hand, and stabs you in the back with the other.”
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
“A scientist has to be neutral in his search for the truth, but he cannot be neutral as to the use of that truth when found. If you know more than other people, you have more responsibility, rather than less.”
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
"What we need to do is to humanize the scientist and simonize the humanist."
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
"Zeroth law: You must play the game
First law: You can't win
Second law: You can't break even
Third law: You can't quit the game."
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
"Two polar groups: at one pole we have the literary intellectuals, at the other scientists, and as the most representative, the physical scientists. Between the two a gulf of mutual incomprehension."
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
"By the year 2070 we cannot say, or it would be imbecile to do so, that any man alive could understand Shakespearean experience better than Shakespeare, whereas any decent eighteen-year-old student of physics will know more physics than Newton."
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
"What will people of the future think of us? Will they say, as Roger Williams said of the Massachusetts Indians, that we were wolves with the minds of men? Will they think that we resigned our humanity? They will have the right."
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
"The most dreadful thing of all is that many millions of people in the poor countries are going to starve to death before our eyes. We shall see them doing so upon our television sets."
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)
"Nine English traditions out of ten date from the latter half of the nineteenth century."
― C.P. Snow (1905-1980)