“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”
Source: 1984
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George Orwell 473
English author and journalist 1903–1950Related quotes
Coding theorems for a discrete source with a fidelity criterion. IRE International Convention Records, volume 7, pp. 142--163, 1959.
Context: This duality can be pursued further and is related to a duality between past and future and the notions of control and knowledge. Thus we may have knowledge of the past but cannot control it; we may control the future but have no knowledge of it.
“You may have created my past and screwed up my present, but you have no control over my future.”
Variant: The good news is that you may have created my past and screwed up my present, but you havce no control over my future. You don't know me at all.
Source: You Don't Know Me
Source: Living Beyond Your Feelings: Controlling Emotions So They Don't Control You
Spark (2014)
Context: True ideology has vanished, replaced by fear and fantasy. The right wing wants corporate control and a return to a past that never existed. The left wing wants government control and a future that will never exist. Both groups lose sight of the essential questions: how can the individual speak and think and create freely? New ideas are the only evolutionary force that will save us from destruction.
“He who controls the sea controls everything.”
As quoted in Australia Defence http://www.australiandefence.com.au/CE98DE40-F806-11DD-8DFE0050568C22C9
Originally quoted by Cicero in Letters to Atticus http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0008%3Abook%3D10%3Aletter%3D8%3Asection%3D4 (10, 8, 4.): ... cuius omne consilium Themistocleum est. existimat enim qui mare teneat eum necesse esse rerum potiri.
Translation http://perseus.uchicago.edu/perseus-cgi/citequery3.pl?dbname=PerseusLatinTexts&getid=1&query=Cic.%20Att.%2010.8: "On the contrary, his view is entirely that of Themistocles: for he holds that the master of the sea must inevitably be master of the empire."