The Sirens of Titan

It’s the great becoming that makes the light and the heat and the motion, and bangs you from hither to yon.

The stake was nineteen feet, six and five thirty-seconds inches high, not counting the twelve feet, two and one-eighth inches of it embedded in the iron. The stake had a mean diameter of two feet, five and eleven third-seconds inches, varying from this mean, however, by as much as seven and one thirty-second inches. The stake was composed of quartz

He could watch the activities on Earth by means of a viewer on the dash panel of his ship.

The Tralfamadorians, according to Salo, manufactured each other. No one knew for certain how the first machine had come into being.

Salo was a messenger from the planet Tralfamadore in the Small Magellanic Cloud.

Old Salo had told his friend Rumfoord a lot of interesting things about the civilization of Tralfamadore, but he had never told Rumfoord about the messages and the techniques of their delivery.

“‘I am not your father,’” said Redwine. “‘Rather call me brother. But I am not your brother. Rather call me son. But I am not your son. Rather call me a dog. But I am not your dog. Rather call me a flea on your dog. But I am not a flea. Rather call me a germ on a flea on your dog.

They weren’t predictable.

The models had spring-driven pumps in their bases. The pumps pumped water from the big bowl at the bottom to the tiny bowls at the top. Then the tiny bowls spilled into the slightly larger bowls below and …