
The Choice of Achilles

Isaac Asimov
Suppose that we are wise enough to learn and know—

Isaac Asimov
and yet not wise enough to control our learning and knowledge, so that we use it to destroy ourselves?

Isaac Asimov
Even if that is so, knowledge remains better than ignorance.

Isaac Asimov
It is better to know—

Isaac Asimov
even if the knowledge endures only for the moment that comes before destruction—

Isaac Asimov
than to gain eternal life at the price of a dull and swinish lack of comprehension of a universe that swirls unseen before us in all its wonder.