“With the rise of Technopoly, one of those thought-worlds disappears. Technopoly eliminates alternatives to itself in precisely the way Aldous Huxley outlined in Brave New World. It does not make them illegal. It does not make them immoral. It does not even make them unpopular. It makes them invisible and therefore irrelevant. And it does so by redefining what we mean by religion, by art, by family, by politics, by history, by truth, by privacy, by intelligence, so that our definitions fit its new requirements. Technopoly, in other words, is totalitarian technocracy.”
Technopoly: the Surrender of Culture to Technology (1992)
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Neil Postman106
American writer and academic 1931–2003Related quotes
Max Planck (1858–1947) German theoretical physicist
Source: Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers
“The greatest work that kindness does to others is that it makes them kind themselves.”
Amelia Earhart (1897–1937) American aviation pioneer and author
Originally Frederick William Faber, sermon "On Kindness in General", found in Spiritual Conferences, a collection of his oratory, ca. 1860
Misattributed
Context: No kind action ever stops with itself. One kind action leads to another. Good example is followed. A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees. The greatest work that kindness does to others is that it makes them kind themselves.
“Some of you say religion makes people happy. So does laughing gas. So does whiskey.”
Clarence Darrow (1857–1938) American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union
In a debate with religious leaders in Kansas City, as quoted in a eulogy for Darrow by Emanuel Haldeman-Julius (1938)
Context: Do you, good people, believe that Adam and Eve were created in the Garden of Eden and that they were forbidden to eat from the tree of knowledge? I do. The church has always been afraid of that tree. It still is afraid of knowledge. Some of you say religion makes people happy. So does laughing gas. So does whiskey. I believe in the brain of man. I'm not worried about my soul.
Steve Blank (1953) American businessman
Forbes "Entrepreneurship is an Art Not a Job" http://www.forbes.com/sites/steveblank/2013/03/29/entrepreneurship-is-an-art-not-a-job/#754e53231d5b. March 29, 2013.
“In the meantime, it just makes it a little harder to smile. But so does the world.”
Amy Goodman (1957) American broadcast journalist, syndicated columnist, investigative reporter and author
Whom the Bell's Palsy Tolls http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20071030_for_whom_the_bells_palsy_tolls/For (referring to her fall 2007 bout of Bell's Palsy).
“So long as he does both he can create: for he is making an outline and a shape.”
G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) English mystery novelist and Christian apologist
Ch I: The Victorian Compromise and Its Enemies (p. 20)
The Victorian Age in Literature (1913)
Context: A man making the confession of any creed worth ten minutes' intelligent talk, is always a man who gains something and gives up something. So long as he does both he can create: for he is making an outline and a shape.