Ian Malcolm – Character Quotes

— This is magnificent.
— Yeah. " Ooh, ah," that's how it always starts. But then later there's running and screaming.

— You're married?
— Occasionally. I'm always on the lookout for a future ex-Mrs. Malcolm.

— Our scientists have done things which nobody has ever done before.
— But your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn't stop to think if they should.

— This is just a delay. That's all it is. All major theme parks have delays. When they opened Disneyland in 1956, nothing worked.
— If the Pirates of the Caribbean breaks down, the pirates don't eat tourists.

— Don't worry. I'm not making the same mistakes again.
— No, you're making all new ones.

Remind me to thank John for a lovely weekend.

Think they'll have that on the tour?

Eventually you do plan to have dinosaurs on your dinosaur tour, right?

But, again, how do you know they're all female? What, does somebody go out in the park and pull up the dinosaurs' skirts?

— I don't even know this woman.
— You've known Karen for 10 years.
— She doesn't have Sega. She's such a troglodyte.
— Cruel, but good word use.

— The Tyrannosaur doesn't obey any set patterns or park schedules. The essence of chaos.
— I'm still not clear on chaos.
— It simply deals with unpredictability in complex systems. The shorthand is the Butterfly Effect. A butterfly can flap its wings in Peking and in Central Park you get rain instead of sunshine. Was I going too fast? I missed it. I did a fly-by. Give me that glass of water. We'll conduct an experiment. We should be still. The car's bouncing. That's okay. It's just an example. Put your hand flat like a hieroglyphic. A drop of water falls on your hand. Which way will the drop roll off? Which finger? Thumb, I'd say. Freeze your hand. Don't move. I'll do the same thing, start with the same place again. Which way, now?
— Let's say back the same way.
— It changed. Why?
— Because tiny variations, the orientation of the hairs on your hands...
— Alan, look at this.
— The amount of blood distending your vessels, imperfections in the skin...
— «imperfections in the skin»?
— Just microscopic, never repeat and vastly affect the outcome. That's what? Unpredictability. There. Look at this. See? I'm right again. Nobody could predict that Dr. Grant would suddenly jump out of a moving vehicle.
— Alan? Alan!
— And there's another example. See, here I am now by myself, talking to myself. That's Chaos Theory.

I hate being right all the time.

— Dr. Sattler, Dr. Grant, you've heard of Chaos Theory?
— No.
— No? Non-linear equations? Strange attractors? I refuse to believe that you aren't familiar with the concept of attraction.
— I bring scientists. You bring a rock star.

— Hammond's check cleared, or I wouldn't go on this wild-goose chase.
— You're going to the only place where the geese chase you.