All normal life, Peter, consciously or otherwise, resent domination. If the domination is by an inferior, or by a supposed inferior, the resentment becomes stronger.
Interpretation
People inherently resist control, especially when it comes from someone perceived as less capable.
In this quote, Isaac Asimov suggests that humans have a natural inclination to resist domination or control over their lives. This resistance is further intensified when the person exerting control is viewed as inferior in capability or status, highlighting the complexities of power dynamics and societal hierarchies in human behavior.
In practice
In a debate about leadership styles, one could use this quote to discuss how people react negatively to authoritarian figures.
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.
Old beliefs die hard even when demonstrably false.
What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
Each activity of daily life in which we stretch ourselves on behalf of others is a prayer in action.
If you belong to an in-group of good, or saved, or elite people, you can only know that youβre in because someone else is out. You cannot live on the right side of the tracks without there being a wrong side of the tracks, so you ought to be grateful to the outside for having the privilege of being on the inside.
I would rather be ignorant than knowledgeable of evils.
The highest spiritual quality, the noblest property of mind a man can have, is this of loyalty ... a man with no loyalty in him, with no sense of love or reverence or devotion due to something outside and above his poor daily life, with its pains and pleasures, profits and losses, is as evil a case as man can be.
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