"Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and dreams are the shadow-truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes, and forgot." --Neil Gaiman, The Sandman #19, (September 1990)
Or what about this quote from one of the grand masters of science fiction?
"To be 'matter of fact' about the world is to blunder into fantasy--and dull fantasy at that, as the real world is strange and wonderful." --Robert A. Heinlein
As writers, we want to entertain. But, if our work is to endure, it must do more than that. Consider for a moment this quote from the composer Handel:
"Milord, I should be sorry if I only entertained them. I wished to make them better." --Handel
As a writer, I want to use science fiction as a tool to make people aware of the dangers of technology. I'm not anti-tech, but I am no scientist either. My philosophy is that no technology can be perfect, because it is made by human beings, and we are not perfect. So I am interested in the ways that science and technology influence a society. That's my philosophy. Come up with your own, and make it live!
Here are some more quotes:
You can't wait for inspiration--you have to go after it with a club.--Jack London
The imaginative child will become the imaginative man or woman most apt to invent, and therefore to foster, civilization.--L. Frank Baum
To know is nothing at all; to imagine is everything.--Anatole France
If a writer has to rob his mother he will not hesitate; the "Ode on a Grecian Urn" is worth any number of old ladies.--William Faulkner
The chief glory of every people arises from its authors.--Samuel Johnson
It's only work if you would rather be doing something else.--Abigail Van Buren, a.k.a. Dear Abby
The wise man reads both books and life itself.--Lin Yutang