It's the nature of government, to build enduring institutions, structures that stay long after their purpose is over. If you pay people to help the poor, you have people who won't be paid if there aren't any poor, so they'll… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
As a means of subsidizing lawyers the present nuclear regulation system is well designed - but is there not perhaps a cheaper way of rewarding legal diligence? It would probably be cheaper to give each law school graduate a guaranteed… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
I think it takes about a million words to make a writer. I mean that you're going to throw away. — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
The American way of war is to build an army, then another, then a third, while building fleets. If the war is still on… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
You see, I used to do a certain amount of market research by going to the local drugstore and seeing what the truck drivers… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
A Dark Age is not just a period in which people no longer know how to do things. The real key is that people… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
Asimov was the reason why we changed some rules in the SFWA, and I'm not convinced we changed it for the best. — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
We have for years been building a society in which everybody plunders everybody, and while we are weary of being plundered, we enjoy the… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
It's not only possible, but likely that the Nobel Prize in economics will go in alternate years to people who disagree on nearly everything… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
So, I guess the answer to your question is very few people can bring off a novel of the future because it's just so… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share Image
Of course most people underestimate the warrior characteristics of the Anglo-Saxon and Norman peoples anyway. It takes a heap of piety to keep a Viking from wanting to go sack a city. — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share
Gates has always understood Moore's Law better than anyone else in the industry. If you can make something run at all, get it out there -it may be slow and clunky, but hardware improvements will bail you out. If you wait until it's running perfectly on the hardware already in the field, it will be obsolete before it's released. This… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share
“Funny thing about this world,” Adams said carefully. “Legally, a sovereign government can protect its interests pretty well as long as it doesn’t start open war and involve the big powers. Certainly a sovereign government can arm merchant ships and protect them against harassment by international gangsters. But there are a lot of sovereigns in name who haven’t the means… — Jerry Pournelle Copy Share
