I must have been one of the least surprised people on earth on September 11. I felt very braced for that. I knew something like that was going to come.

It was like being in the eye of a hurricane. You’d wake up in a concert and think, Wow, how did I get here?

While physics and mathematics may tell us how the universe began, they are not much use in predicting human behavior because there are far too many equations to solve. I’m no better than anyone else at understanding what makes people tick, particularly women.

A sudden bold and unexpected question doth many times surprise a man and lay him open.

I am growing handsome very fast indeed! I expect I shall be the belle of Amherst when I reach my 17th year. I don’t doubt that I shall have perfect crowds of admirers at that age. Then how I shall delight to make them await my bidding, and with what delight shall I witness their suspense while I make my final decision.

Those thoughts are truth which guide us to beneficial interaction with sensible particulars as they occur, whether they copy these in advance or not.

I can hear you, the rest of the world can hear you and the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.

The press is still investing itself, it seems to me, in a sort of cynicism. It comes out better for them if they can predict hard times, bogging down, sniping, attrition.

Although almost every theoretical physicist agrees with my prediction that a black hole should glow like a hot body, it would be very difficult to verify experimentally because the temperature of a macroscopic black hole is so low.

I was out of my bed in one second, trembling with excitement, and I dashed to the door and into the adjoining room, where I could watch the streets below from the windows.

At 57, to have a No. 1 album, I wasn’t expecting it.

When I did ‚Bird,‘ it was a surprise to some people, first because I wasn’t in it and second because most of the films I’d been doing were cop movies or westerns or adventure films, so to be doing one about Charlie Parker, who was a great influence on American music, was a great thrill for me.

Nothing is so wretched or foolish as to anticipate misfortunes. What madness is it to be expecting evil before it comes.

I’m always surprised when people respond positively to what I am saying, given its seriousnessness and strange nature.

No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.

On one of my last days at school, the headmaster said I would either end up in prison or become a millionaire. That was quite a startling prediction, but in some respects, he was right on both counts!

For a moment, nothing happened. Then, after a second or so, nothing continued to happen.

My father will anticipate everything. He will leave you and me no chance to do a great and brilliant deed.

Although September 11 was horrible, it didn’t threaten the survival of the human race, like nuclear weapons do.

Occurrences in this domain are beyond the reach of exact prediction because of the variety of factors in operation, not because of any lack of order in nature.

People are always coming up to me and saying, ‚I heard your dad’s speech, and it’s really great.‘ And they’ll mention some place I didn’t even know my dad was going to.

To Sun-tzu and the ancient Chinese, doing something extraordinary had little effect without a setup of something ordinary. You had to mix the two – to fix your opponent’s expectations with some banal, ordinary maneuver, a comfortable pattern that they would then expect you to follow.

Those who have knowledge, don’t predict. Those who predict, don’t have knowledge.

The secret to humor is surprise.

It was not a religion that attacked us that September day. It was al-Qaeda. We will not sacrifice the liberties we cherish or hunker down behind walls of suspicion and mistrust.

Tomorrow belongs to those who can hear it coming.

The Occupy movement is – it was a big surprise.

What we anticipate seldom occurs: but what we least expect generally happens.

Our lifetime may be the last that will be lived out in a technological society.

Sometimes I write stuff that strangely predicts what’s going to happen in my life.

I try to do something the audience might not have seen before. Like if I’m gonna kiss a girl I wanna kiss her like a girl has never been kissed. Like maybe I would kick her legs out from under her and catch her right before she hits the ground and then kiss her.

I always avoid prophesying beforehand, because it is a much better policy to prophesy after the event has already taken place.

It is the flash which appears, the thunderbolt will follow.

I started writing at the kitchen table after midnight. It took ten months to finish that first book; I sent it to a publisher and I got some kind of prize, so it was like a dream – I was surprised to find it happening.

Immediately after 11 September, the U.S. closed down the Somali charitable network Al-Barakaat on grounds that it was financing terror. This achievement was hailed one of the great successes of the ‚war on terror.‘ In contrast, Washington’s withdrawal of its charges as without merit a year later aroused little notice.

Nobody likes to have trouble. The moment we get a hint that it’s coming, a common response is, ‚Oh no! Not again!‘

When I say something’s going to happen, it’s going to happen.

Dread, which is closely related to fear, steals the ability to enjoy ordinary life and makes people anxious about the future. It keeps them from looking forward to the next day, the next month, or the next decade.

I have a deep, deep belief that if I tell you I’m going to crack you with a clean shot to the chin inside one minute of the first round and you will be unconscious, well, then that’s what will happen.

In the wake of the events of 11 September 2001, it now seems clear that the shock of the attacks was exploited in America.

On September 11 2001, America felt its vulnerability even to threats that gather on the other side of the Earth. We resolved then, and we are resolved today, to confront every threat from any source that could bring sudden terror and suffering to America.

He who could foresee affairs three days in advance would be rich for thousands of years.

The backbone of surprise is fusing speed with secrecy.

It is not scientifically possible to accurately predict the outcome of an action. To suggest otherwise runs contrary to historical experience and the nature of war.

This suspense is terrible. I hope it will last.

Everything that is new or uncommon raises a pleasure in the imagination, because it fills the soul with an agreeable surprise, gratifies its curiosity, and gives it an idea of which it was not before possessed.

Democracy as a system has evolved into something that Thomas Jefferson didn’t anticipate.

I can honestly say – and it’s a big surprise to me – that I have never had a dream about being on the moon.

Science has not yet mastered prophecy. We predict too much for the next year and yet far too little for the next 10.

I look forward to death with great anticipation, to meeting God face to face.

An economist’s guess is liable to be as good as anybody else’s.

Who is the wise man? He who sees what’s going to be born.

Society is always taken by surprise at any new example of common sense.

When we got into office, the thing that surprised me most was to find that things were just as bad as we’d been saying they were.

The husband who decides to surprise his wife is often very much surprised himself.

A man’s delight in looking forward to and hoping for some particular satisfaction is a part of the pleasure flowing out of it, enjoyed in advance. But this is afterward deducted, for the more we look forward to anything the less we enjoy it when it comes.

There is no author whose books I look forward to more than Vaclav Smil.

A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen.

Better understated than overstated. Let people be surprised that it was more than you promised and easier than you said.

A friend will tell you she saw your old boyfriend – and he’s a priest.

Well before September 11, it was understood that with modern technology, the rich and powerful will lose their near monopoly of the means of violence and can expect to suffer atrocities on home soil.