“Communication technologies are necessary, but not sufficient, for us humans to get along with each other.”
90th Birthday Reflections (2007)
Context: Communication technologies are necessary, but not sufficient, for us humans to get along with each other. This is why we still have many disputes and conflicts in the world. Technology tools help us to gather and disseminate information, but we also need qualities like tolerance and compassion to achieve greater understanding between peoples and nations.
I have great faith in optimism as a guiding principle, if only because it offers us the opportunity of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. So I hope we've learnt something from the most barbaric century in history — the 20th. I would like to see us overcome our tribal divisions and begin to think and act as if we were one family. That would be real globalisation…
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Arthur C. Clarke 207
British science fiction writer, science writer, inventor, u… 1917–2008Related quotes
“Communications tools don’t get socially interesting until they get technologically boring.”
Source: Textual politics: Discourse and social dynamics, 1995, p. 159
In reference to the Alabama Council on Human Relations, an organization which was joined by King, whose church's meeting room was used to hold monthly meetings for the Montgomery chapter the council. Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story (1958)
1950s
Context: Although the Montgomery council never had a large membership, it played an important role. As the only truly interracial group in Montgomery, it served to keep the desperately needed channels of communication open between the races.
Men often hate each other because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don't know each other; they don't know each other because they can not communicate; they can not communicate because they are separated. In providing an avenue of communication, the council was fulfilling a necessary condition for better race relations in the South.
Weggefährten - Erinnerungen und Reflexionen, Siedler-Verlag Berlin 1996, p. 58, ISBN 9783442755158, ISBN 978-3442755158
Source: The Functions of the Executive (1938), p. 82; Highlighted section cited among others in: Dennis K. Mumby (2012), Organizational Communication: A Critical Approach. p. 8
Truman Library address (2006)
Context: Both security and development ultimately depend on respect for human rights and the rule of law.
— Although increasingly interdependent, our world continues to be divided — not only by economic differences, but also by religion and culture. That is not in itself a problem. Throughout history, human life has been enriched by diversity, and different communities have learnt from each other. But, if our different communities are to live together in peace we must stress also what unites us: our common humanity, and our shared belief that human dignity and rights should be protected by law.
Source: On Human Communication (1957), Language: Science and Aesthetics, p.69
“Any sufficiently advanced technology is equivalent to magic.”