Some men see things as they are and ask why.
Robert F. Kennedy, 1968
I dream of things that never were and ask why not.
I’ve known this quote from RFK all my life, but only recently learned that he was paraphrasing lines from Back to Methuselah by playwright George Bernard Shaw, from 1921. Also that his brothers had done similarly before him. But what caught my attention is that the lines from Shaw are spoken to Eve, by the Serpent! This puts a whole new spin on the quote. It makes one wonder whether ‘asking why not’ is visionary… or reckless. There’s surely plenty of discussion out there, but I haven’t dug into it yet. It does, however, bring to mind another quote, which I think is perhaps more useful:
There are two kinds of fool.
John Brunner, The Shockwave Rider, 1975
One says, “This is old, and therefore Good.”
And one says “This is new, and therefore Better.”