To introduce something altogether new would mean to begin all over, to become ignorant again, and to run the old, old risk of failing to learn.
Interpretation
Introducing something entirely new requires starting from scratch and risks repeating past mistakes.
This quote by Isaac Asimov highlights the challenges associated with innovation and the pursuit of new knowledge. It suggests that creating something novel necessitates a regression to a state of ignorance, where the risk of repetition and failure to learn from previous experiences is significant. Asimov emphasizes the importance of understanding and building upon existing knowledge rather than completely discarding it in the quest for the new.
In practice
This quote could be used in a lecture about the importance of research and learning from past experiences.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation. Human dignity cannot survive it. Convenience and decency cannot survive it. As you put more and more people into the world, the value of life not only declines, but it disappears. It doesn't matter if someone dies.
Science does not promise absolute truth, nor does it consider that such a thing necessarily exists. Science does not even promise that everything in the Universe is amenable to the scientific process.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation.
Although the time of death is approaching me, I am not afraid of dying and going to Hell or (what would be considerably worse) going to the popularized version of Heaven. I expect death to be nothingness and, for removing me from all possible fears of death, I am thankful to atheism.
A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value.
During the century after Newton, it was still possible for a man of unusual attainments to master all fields of scientific knowledge. But by 1800, this had become entirely impracticable.
I am still a consumer; the consumer world was the world I emerged into, whose air I breathed for a very long time, and its assumptions still dominate my psyche—but maybe a little less each year....There are times when I can feel the spell breaking in my mind….There are times when I can almost feel myself simply being.
Love of the republic in a democracy, is a love of the democracy; love of the democracy is that of equality. Love of the democracy is likewise that of frugality.
You seek identity in the midst of indistinguishab le chaos, in sprawling nameless reality.
I put my head out of my window and see how much the wind’s knife wants to slice it off. On this unseen guillotine, I’ve placed the eyeless head of all my desires.
I find only freedom in the realms of eccentricity.
Trade is the best cure for prejudice.
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