I, ROBOT - ISAAC ASIMOV

I, Robot - Pg 192

   "Stephen, how do we know what the ultimate good of Humanity will entail? We haven't at our disposal the infinite factors that the Machine has at its! Perhaps, to give you a not unfamiliar example, our entire technical civilization has created more unhappiness and misery than it has removed. Perhaps an agrarian or pastoral civilization, with less culture and less people would be better. If so, the Machines must move in that direction, preferably without telling us, since in our ignorant prejudices we only know that what we are used to is good—and we would then fight change. Or perhaps a complete urbanization, or a completely caste-ridden society, or complete anarchy, is the answer. We don't know. Only the Machines know, and they are going there and taking us with them."

I, Robot - Pg 181

   "We've got confidence out here, Byerley, and that's the secret. Confidence! We've got new land that's been waiting for us for thousands of years, while the rest of the world was being ripped apart in the lousy fumblings of pre-atomic time. We don't have to eat yeast like the Eastern boys, and we don't have to worry about the stale dregs of the last century like you Northerners.
   "We've wiped out the tsetse fly and the Anopheles mosquito, and people find they can live in the sun and like it, now. We've thinned down the jungles and found soil; we've watered the deserts and found gardens. We've got coal and oil in untouched fields, and minerals out of count.
   "Just step back. That's all we ask the rest of the world to do. —Step back, and let us work."

I, Robot - Pg 172

   "Every period of human development, Susan," said the Co-ordinator, "has had its own particular type of human conflict——its own variety of problem that, apparently, could be settled only by force. And each time, frustratingly enough, force never really settled the problem. Instead, it persisted through a series of conflicts, then vanished of itself,——what's the expression,——ah, yes 'not with a bang, but a whimper,' as the economic and social environment changed. And then, new problems, and a new series of wars. ——Apparently endlessly cyclic."

I, Robot - Pg 142

   The white thread that might have been Powell heaved uselessly at the insubstantial eons of time that existed all about him—and collapsed upon itself as the piercing shriek of a hundred million ghosts of a hundred million soprano voices rose to a crescendo of melody:

   "I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal, you.
   "I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal, you.
   "I'll be glad—"

I, Robot - Pg 142

   Something writhed within him and struggled against a growing blanket of ice, that thickened.
   Something broke loose and whirled in a blaze of flickering light and pain. It fell—
   —and whirled
   —and fell headlong
   —into silence!
   It was death!
   It was a world of no motion and no sensation. A world of dim, unsensing consciousness; a consciousness of darkness and of silence and of formless struggle.
   Most of all a consciousness of eternity.
   He was a tiny white thread of ego—cold and afraid.

I, Robot - Pg 77

   Powell said, "Mike—you're right."
   "Thanks, pal. I knew I'd do it some day."
   "All right, and skip the sarcasm. We'll save it for Earth, and preserve it in jars for future long, cold winters."

I, Robot - Pg 52

      "Look at you," he said finally. "I say this in no spirit of contempt, but look at you! The material you are made of is soft and flabby, lacking endurance and strength, depending for energy upon the inefficient oxidation of organic material—like that." He pointed a disapproving finger at what remained of Donovan's sandwich. "Periodically you pass into a coma and the least variation in temperature, air pressure, humidity, or radiation intensity impairs your efficiency. You are makeshift."

I, Robot - Pg 50

   The red glow of the robot's eyes held him. "Do you expect me," said Cutie slowly, "to believe any such complicated, implausible hypothesis as you have just outlined? What do you take me for?"
   Powell sputtered apple fragments onto the table and turned red. "Why damn you, it wasn't a hypothesis. Those were facts."
   Cutie sounded grim, "Globes of energy millions of miles across! Worlds with three billion humans on them! Infinite emptiness! Sorry, Powell, but I don't believe it. I'll puzzle this thing out for myself. Good-by."

I, Robot - Pg 25

   The radical generalization offered it, i.e., its existence, not as a particular object, but as a member of a general group, was too much for it. Loyally, it tried to encompass the concept and half a dozen coils burnt out. Little warning signals were buzzing.

I, Robot - Pg 13

   "You're an air-coaster, Robbie, you're a big, silver air-coaster. Hold out your arms straight. —You got to, Robbie, if you're going to be an air-coaster."
   The logic was irrefutable. Robbie's arms were wings catching the air currents and he was a silver 'coaster.
   Gloria twisted the robot's head and leaned to the right. He banked sharply. Gloria equipped the 'coaster with a motor that went "Br-r-r" and then with weapons that went "Powie" and "Sh-sh-shshsh." Pirates were giving chase and the ship's blasters were coming into play. The pirates dropped in a steady rain.
   "Got another one. —Two more," she cried.
   Then "Faster, men," Gloria said pompously, "we're running out of ammunition." She aimed over her shoulder with undaunted courage and Robbie was a blunt-nosed spaceship zooming through the void at maximum acceleration.

I, Robot - Pg 8

   I felt her glance slide through me and out my occiput and knew that I was uncommonly transparent to her; that everybody was.

I, Robot - Pg 7

   She was a frosty girl, plain and colorless, who protected herself against a world she disliked by a mask-like expression and a hypertrophy of intellect. But as she watched and listened, she felt the stirrings of a cold enthusiasm.