Gene Roddenberry Quotes & Sayings

I believe in humanity. We are an incredible species. We're still just a child creature, we're still being nasty to each other. And all children go through those phases. We're growing up, we're moving into adolescence now. When we grow up - man, we're going to be something! — Gene Roddenberry

You can't take this speck of dust in this midst of all this incredible panorama of birth and complexifying and say ... this is the only place that [life] happens. It's like turning your back on the whole idea of growth and evolution. — Gene Roddenberry

It has become a crusade of mine to demonstrate that TV need not be violent to be exciting. — Gene Roddenberry

It is important to the typical 'Star Trek' fan that there is a tomorrow. They pretty much share the 'Star Trek' philosophies about life: the fact that it is wrong to interfere in the evolvement of other peoples, that to be different is not necessarily to be wrong or ugly. — Gene Roddenberry

For Star Trek proves, as faulty as individual episodes could be, is that the much-maligned common man and common woman has an enormous hunger for brotherhood. They are ready for the twenty-third century now, and they are light-years ahead of their petty governments and their visionless leaders. — Gene Roddenberry

I condemn false prophets, I condemn the effort to take away the power of rational decision, to drain people of their free will - and a hell of a lot of money in the bargain. Religions vary in their degree of idiocy, but I reject them all. For most people, religion is nothing more than a substitute for a malfunctioning brain. — Gene Roddenberry

They said God was on high and he controlled the world and therefore we must pray against Satan. Well, if God controls the world, he controls Satan. For me, religion was full of misstatements and reaches of logic that I just couldn't agree with. — Gene Roddenberry

There was much to put out of his mind. Why was it difficult to forget Chekov's astonished delight which greeted him at the command airlock when he boarded. And on the bridge - Kirk! The mere name made Spock groan inwardly as he remembered what it had cost him to turn away from that welcome. T'hy'la! — Gene Roddenberry

Technology would have long ago made privacy impossible, except that this had only made it more precious and desirable
and in the close confines of starship life, respect for another's privacy had become a powerful tradition. — Gene Roddenberry

We have within reach, now, the attainment of almost every dream of mankind. — Gene Roddenberry

Can all this just be an accident? Or could there be some alien intelligence behind it? — Gene Roddenberry

These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five year mission ... to boldly go where no man has gone before. — Gene Roddenberry

'Star Trek' says that it has not all happened, it has not all been discovered, that tomorrow can be as challenging and adventurous as any time man has ever lived. — Gene Roddenberry

Religions vary in their degree of idiocy, but I reject them all. — Gene Roddenberry

It is the struggle itself that is most important. We must strive to be more than we are. It does not matter that we will not reach our ultimate goal. The effort itself yields its own reward. — Gene Roddenberry

Matter of internal security - the age-old cry of the oppressor.
Picard — Gene Roddenberry

Why are we now going into space? Well, why did we trouble to look past the next mountain? Our prime obligation to ourselves is to make the unknown known. We are on a journey to keep an appointment with whatever we are. — Gene Roddenberry

Let me end with an explanation of why I believe the move into space to be a human imperative. It seems to me obvious in too many ways to need listing that we cannot much longer depend upon our planet's relatively fragile ecosystem to handle the realities of the human tomorrow. Unless we turn human growth and energy toward the challenges and promises of space, our only other choice may be the awful risk, currently demonstrable, of stumbling into a cycle of fratricide and regression which could end all chances of our evolving further or of even surviving. — Gene Roddenberry

For me science fiction is a way of thinking, a way of logic that bypasses a lot of nonsense. It allows people to look directly at important subjects. — Gene Roddenberry

If 'Trek' is a hit, we'd love to do a series of films - a regular event. Look at James Bond's films. They've been around since the early sixties. — Gene Roddenberry

If man is to survive, he will have learned to take a delight in the essential differences between men and between cultures. He will learn that differences in ideas and attitudes are a delight, part of life's exciting variety, not something to fear. — Gene Roddenberry

Its seems to me - it's likely that heaven's here right now. If you could take life with its pain and misery, where you fail and you sometimes win, and if you package it into a game, people would pay a fortune to have this game. And I don't know that I'd want it to be resolved so peacefully that the game would be all over. — Gene Roddenberry

For most people, religion is nothing more than a substitute for a malfunctioning brain. If people need religion, ignore them and maybe they will ignore you, and you can go on with your life. It wasn't until I was beginning to do Star Trek that the subject of religion arose. What brought it up was that people were saying that I would have a chaplain on board the Enterprise. I replied, No, we don't. — Gene Roddenberry

When dreams become more important than reality, you give up travel, building, creating; you even forget how to repair the machines left behind by your ancestors. You just sit living and reliving other lives left behind in the thought records.
Vina, "The Menagerie" ("The Cage"), Star Trek, 1966 — Gene Roddenberry

I wanted to send a message to the television industry that excitement is not made of car chases. — Gene Roddenberry

Art is really people asking the eternal question, "What is it all about?" — Gene Roddenberry

I wish I had more control, more like Edgar Rice Burroughs had, but I'm a realist, too. I work in television. I don't know that I would want to spend the rest of my life controlling my characters. — Gene Roddenberry

A man either lives life as it happens to him, meets it head-on and licks it, or he turns his back on it and starts to wither away. — Gene Roddenberry

In the fifth season [of Star Trek: The Next Generation] viewers will see more of shipboard life [including] gay crew members in day-to-day circumstances. — Gene Roddenberry

I handed them a script and they turned it down. It was too controversial. It talked about concepts like, 'Who is God?' The Enterprise meets God in space; God is a life form, and I wanted to suggest that there may have been, at one time in the human beginning, an alien entity that early man believed was God, and kept those legends. But I also wanted to suggest that it might have been as much the Devil as it was God. After all, what kind of god would throw humans out of Paradise for eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. One of the Vulcans on board, in a very logical way, says, 'If this is your God, he's not very impressive. He's got so many psychological problems; he's so insecure. He demands worship every seven days. He goes out and creates faulty humans and then blames them for his own mistakes. He's a pretty poor excuse for a supreme being. — Gene Roddenberry

The human race is a remarkable creature, one with great potential, and I hope that 'Star Trek' has helped to show us what we can be if we believe in ourselves and our abilities. — Gene Roddenberry

The network told me to get rid of Number One, the woman first lieutenant, and also get rid of 'that Martian fellow' ... meaning, of course, Spock. I knew I couldn't keep both, so I gave the stoicism of the female officer to Spock, and married the actress who played Number One. Thank God it wasn't the other way around. I mean Leonard's cute, but ... — Gene Roddenberry

It isn't all over; everything has not been invented; the human adventure is just beginning. — Gene Roddenberry

Reality is incredibly larger, infinitely more exciting, than the flesh and blood vehicle we travel in here. If you read science fiction, the more you read it the more you realize that you and the universe are part of the same thing. Science knows still practically nothing about the real nature of matter, energy, dimension, or time; and even less about those remarkable things called life and thought. But whatever the meaning and purpose of this universe, you are a legitimate part of it. And since you are part of the all that is, part of its purpose, there is more to you than just this brief speck of existence. You
are just a visitor here in this time and this place, a traveler through it. — Gene Roddenberry

We stress humanity, and this is done at considerable cost. We can't have a lot of dramatics that other shows get away with - promiscuity, greed, jealousy. None of those have a place in 'Star Trek.' — Gene Roddenberry

Earth is the nest, the cradle, and we'll move out of it. — Gene Roddenberry

In the 24th century there will be no hunger, there will be no greed, and all the children will know how to read. — Gene Roddenberry

When you get into an airplane by yourself and take off, you find yourself in this lovely, three-dimensional world where you can go in any direction. There is no feeling any more exciting than that. — Gene Roddenberry

Time is the fire in which we burn. — Gene Roddenberry

I have always been reasonably leery of religion because there are so many edicts in religion, 'thou shalt not,' or 'thou shalt.' I wanted my world of the future to be clear of that. — Gene Roddenberry

They say that ninety per cent of TV is junk. But ninety per cent of everything is junk. — Gene Roddenberry

His name is 'Mr. Spock.' And the first view of him can be almost frightening - a face so heavy-lidded and satanic you might almost expect him to have a forked tail. Probably half Martian, he has a slightly reddish complexion and semi-pointed ears. — Gene Roddenberry

Nuclear warfare is not necessary to cause a breakdown of our society. You take a large city like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago-their water supply comes from hundreds of miles away and any interruption of that, or food, or power for any period of time, you're going to have riots in the streets. Our society is so fragile, so dependent on the interworking of things to provide us with goods and services, that you don't need nuclear warfare to fragment us anymore than the Romans needed it to cause their eventual downfall. — Gene Roddenberry

Ancient astronauts didn't build the pyramids. Human beings built the pyramids, because they're clever and they work hard. — Gene Roddenberry

I'm in a period of growth and expansion. I'm taking long, hard looks at the world and what's happening in it, analyzing and thinking. I'm trying to become acquainted with the universe - with the part of it I occupy - and trying to settle, for myself, what my relationship with it is. — Gene Roddenberry

Star Trek was an attempt to say that humanity will reach maturity and wisdom on the day that it begins not just to tolerate, but take a special delight in differences in ideas and differences in life forms. [ ... ] If we cannot learn to actually enjoy those small differences, to take a positive delight in those small differences between our own kind, here on this planet, then we do not deserve to go out into space and meet the diversity that is almost certainly out there. — Gene Roddenberry

The present blitz about drugs - I think it looks very much like how we treated insane people 100 years ago
throw them in the cage - as if that's the whole answer. And it's not the whole answer. — Gene Roddenberry

Star Trek speaks to some basic human needs: that there is a tomorrow - it's not all going to be over with a big flash and a bomb; that the human race is improving; that we have things to be proud of as humans. No, ancient astronauts did not build the pyramids - human beings built them, because they're clever and they work hard. And Star Trek is about those things. — Gene Roddenberry

In a better world, I can do anything. I'll be there in a better world. In a better world, they will not laugh at me or look down their nose at me. — Gene Roddenberry

We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty Humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes. — Gene Roddenberry

Vejur was everything that Spock had ever dreamed of becoming. And yet Vejur was barren! It would never feel pain. Or joy. Or challenge. It was so completely and magnificently logical that its accumulation of knowledge was totally useless. — Gene Roddenberry

PICARD: There is no greater challenge than the study of philosophy.
WESLEY: But William James won't be in my Starfleet exams.
PICARD: The important things never will be. Anyone can be trained in the mechanics of piloting a starship.
WESLEY: But Starfleet Academy
PICARD: It takes more. Open your mind to the past. Art, history, philosophy. And all this may mean something. — Gene Roddenberry

The glory of creation is in its infinite diversity. — Gene Roddenberry

I think God is as much a basic ingredient in the universe as neutrons and positrons. This is the prime force, when we look around the universe. — Gene Roddenberry

To be different is not necessarily to be ugly; to have a different idea is not necessarily to be wrong. The worst possible thing is for all of us to begin to look and talk and act and think alike. — Gene Roddenberry

'Star Trek' is a 'Wagon Train' concept - built around characters who travel to worlds 'similar' to our own, and meet the action-adventure-drama which become our stories. Their transportation is the cruiser 'S.S. Yorktown,' performing a well-defined and long-range Exploration-Science-Security mission which helps create our format. — Gene Roddenberry

The Strength of a civilization is not measured by its ability to fight wars, but rather by its ability to prevent them. — Gene Roddenberry