"Hazards of Prophecy: Failure of Imagination" Arthur C. Clarke's Three Laws

From Arthur C. Clarke's "Hazards of Prophecy: Failure of Imagination"
I would replace "elderly scientist" with "many people."

When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is probably wrong.

The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.