“Posthuman. It was a word from advertising copy, breathless and empty, and all hed ever thought it really meant was that the people using it had a limited imagination about what exactly humans were ...”

“Part of his mind was screaming, but it was a distant one and easy to ignore.”

“War without end. Well, what was history without that? And how would having the stars change anything?”

“Nothing lasted forever. Not peace. Not war. Nothing.”

“The messages coming back flooded the comm buffers with rage and sorrow, threats of vengeance and offers of aid. Those last were the hardest. New colonies still trying to force their way into local ...”

“Because we can't just blow up enough things that this becomes a good situation.”

“During my time in high altitude astronomy, I routinely witnessed workers breathing medical oxygen, industrial carbon dioxide, nitrogen and helium gas as part of their daily work routine.”

“At the W.M. Keck Observatory on the very high altitude summit of Mauna Kea, there was no routine monitoring of mental functioning, blood oxygen levels, blood pressure or heart rate of workers.”

“The summit of Mauna Kea should never have been developed as it is not safe for humans up there. I am now locked into an endless loop of doctors visits for what appears to be classic very high altit...”

“Live a life of friction. Let yourself be disturbed as much as possible, but observe.”

“There are stars in the night sky that look brighter than the others, and when you look at them through a telescope you realize you are looking at twins. The two stars rotate around each other, some...”