Cixin Liu: The Three Body Problem

The most surprising aspect of the Earth-Trisolaris Movement was that so many people had abandoned all hope in human civilisation, hated and were willing to betray their own species, and even chrished as their highest ideal the elimination of the entire human race, including themselves and their children.  

“No, emptiness is not nothingness. Emptiness is a type of existence. You must use this existential emptiness to fill yourself.”

It was impossible to expect a moral awakening from humankind itself, just like it was impossible to expect humans to lift off the earth by pulling up on their own hair. To achieve moral awakening required a force outside the human race.

“To effectively contain a civilization’s development and disarm it across such a long span of time, there is only one way: kill its science.” 

“Maybe in the future this theory will be disproven. But two great cosmological discoveries of this century—Hubble’s law, and observation of the cosmic microwave background–show that the big bang theory is currently the most plausible explanation for the origin of the universe.”

“Pan-Species Communism. It’s an ideology I invented. Or maybe you can call it a faith. Its core belief is that all species on Earth are created equal.”

“Even if God were here, it wouldn’t do any good. The entire human race has reached the point where no one is listening to their prayers.”

The creation myths of the various peoples and religions of the world pale when compared to the glory of the big bang.

"It was not a good idea for the human race as a whole to make contact with extraterrestrials. The impact of such contact on human society would be divisive rather than uniting, and would exacerbate rather than mitigate the conflicts between different cultures. In summary, if contact were to occur, the internal divisions within Earth civilization would be magnified and likely lead to disaster."

But one always awoke from a dream, just like the sun—which, though it would rise again, brought no fresh hope.