DOUGLAS ADAMS QUOTES
English writer & humorist (1952-2001)
Only a child sees things with perfect clarity, because it hasn't developed all those filters which prevent us from seeing things that we don't expect to see.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
There comes a point I'm afraid where you begin to suspect that if there's any real truth, it's that the entire multidimensional infinity of the Universe is almost certainly being run by a bunch of maniacs.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Salmon of Doubt
In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
The major problem--one of the major problems, for there are several--one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them. To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
I think I use the term radical rather loosely, just for emphasis. If you describe yourself as "Atheist," some people will say, "Don't you mean 'Agnostic'?" I have to reply that I really do mean Atheist. I really do not believe that there is a god -- in fact I am convinced that there is not a god (a subtle difference). I see not a shred of evidence to suggest that there is one. It's easier to say that I am a radical Atheist, just to signal that I really mean it, have thought about it a great deal, and that it's an opinion I hold seriously. It's funny how many people are genuinely surprised to hear a view expressed so strongly. In England we seem to have drifted from vague, wishy-washy Anglicanism to vague, wishy-washy Agnosticism -- both of which I think betoken a desire not to have to think about things too much. People will then often say, "But surely it's better to remain an Agnostic just in case?" This, to me, suggests such a level of silliness and muddle that I usually edge out of the conversation rather than get sucked into it. (If it turns out that I've been wrong all along, and there is in fact a god, and if it further turned out that this kind of legalistic, cross-your-fingers-behind-your-back, Clintonian hair-splitting impressed him, then I would choose not to worship him anyway.)
DOUGLAS ADAMS
American Atheist Magazine, winter 1998-1999
Solutions nearly always come from the direction you least expect, which means there's no point trying to look in that direction because it won't be coming from there.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Salmon of Doubt
All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Salmon of Doubt
There is no point in driving yourself mad trying to stop yourself going mad. You might just as well give in and save your sanity for later.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
You live and learn. At any rate, you live.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
Mostly Harmless
On the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much -- the wheel, New York, wars and so on -- whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man -- for precisely the same reasons.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
I've come up with a set of rules that describe our reactions to technologies: 1) Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. 2) Anything that's invented between when you're fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. 3) Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Salmon of Doubt
Space ... is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly hugely mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
If the Universe came to an end every time there was some uncertainty about what had happened in it, it would never have got beyond the first picosecond. And many of course don't. It's like a human body, you see. A few cuts and bruises here and there don't hurt it. Not even major surgery if it's done properly. Paradoxes are just the scar tissue. Time and space heal themselves up around them and people simply remember a version of events which makes as much sense as they require it to make.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
Mostly Harmless
I don't accept the currently fashionable assertion that any view is automatically as worthy of respect as any equal and opposite view. My view is that the moon is made of rock. If someone says to me, "Well, you haven't been there, have you? You haven't seen it for yourself, so my view that it is made of Norwegian beaver cheese is equally valid"--then I can't even be bothered to argue. There is such a thing as the burden of proof, and in the case of god, as in the case of the composition of the moon, this has shifted radically. God used to be the best explanation we'd got, and we've now got vastly better ones. God is no longer an explanation of anything, but has instead become something that would itself need an insurmountable amount of explaining. So I don't think that being convinced that there is no god is as irrational or arrogant a point of view as belief that there is. I don't think the matter calls for even-handedness at all.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
American Atheist Magazine, winter 1998-1999