Quotes about machine
page 10

Nathanael Greene photo

“Hitherto our principal difficulty has arose from a want of proper supplies of money, and from the inefficacy of that which we obtained; but now there appears a scene opening which will introduce new embarrassments. The Congress have recommended to the different States to take upon themselves the furnishing certain species of supplies for our department. The recommendation falls far short of the general detail of the business, the difficulty of ad justing which, between the different agents as well as the different authorities from which they derive their appointments, I am very apprehensive will introduce some jarring interests, many improper disputes, as well as dangerous delays. Few persons, who have not a competent knowledge of this employment, can form any tolerable idea of the arrangements necessary to give despatch and success in discharging the duties of the office, or see the necessity for certain relations and dependencies. The great exertions which are frequently necessary to be made, require the whole machine to be moved by one common interest, and directed to one general end. How far the present measures, recommended to the different States, are calculated to promote these desirable purposes, I cannot pretend to say; but there appears to me such a maze, from the mixed modes adopted by some States, and about to be adopted by others, that I cannot see the channels, through which the business may be conducted, free from disorder and confusion.”

Nathanael Greene (1742–1786) American general in the American Revolutionary War

Letter to George Washington (January 1780)

“The one job that machines cannot do is be a cruel plutocrat. That’s why humans are still needed.”

James Nicoll (1961) Canadian fiction reviewer

Review of Luna: New Moon by Ian McDonald http://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/i-dont-care-what-happens-to-these-characters, 2015
2010s

Lorin Morgan-Richards photo

“Embrace your imperfections. We are not machines.”

Lorin Morgan-Richards (1975) American poet, cartoonist, and children's writer

Shared on social media on June 22, 2018.
Quotes as Marcil d'Hirson Garron

Qian Xuesen photo

“Without mankind machines are nothing.”

Edmund Cooper (1926–1982) British writer

The Overman Culture (1971)

Roberto Mangabeira Unger photo

“We can establish universally an education that recognizes in every child a tongue-tied prophet, and in the school the voice of the future, and that equips the mind to think beyond and against the established context of thought and of life as well as to move within it. We can develop a democratic politics that renders the structure of society open in fact to challenge and reconstruction, weakening the dependence of change on crisis and the power of the dead over the living. We can make the radical democratization of access to the resources and opportunities of production the touchstone of the institutional reorganization of the market economy, and prevent the market from remaining fastened to a single version of itself. We can create policies and arrangements favorable to the gradual supersession of economically dependent wage work as the predominant form of free labor, in favor of the combination of cooperation and self-employment. We can so arrange the relation between workers and machines that machines are used to save our time for the activities that we have not yet learned how to repeat and consequently to express in formulas. We can reshape the world political and economic order so that it ceases to make the global public goods of political security and economic openness depend upon submission to an enforced convergence to institutions and practices hostile to the experiments required to move, by many different paths, in such a direction.”

Source: The Religion of the Future (2014), p. 29

Vitruvius photo

“Next I must tell about the machine of Ctesibius, which raises water to a height.”

Source: De architectura (The Ten Books On Architecture) (~ 15BC), Book X, Chapter VII, Sec. 1

Tim Powers photo
Eugène Delacroix photo
Mata Amritanandamayi photo
Vannevar Bush photo
Frank Lloyd Wright photo
Henri-Louis Duhamel du Monceau photo

“This Duhamel has invented an infinity of machines which serve no purpose, has written and translated a multitude of books on agriculture, of which it is not known if they have any useful result, that is still awaited.”

Henri-Louis Duhamel du Monceau (1700–1782) French naval engineer, botanist and agronomist

Denis Diderot, Oeuvres complètes de Diderot: revues sur les éditions originales, comprenant ce qui a été publié à diverses époques et les manuscrits inédits, conservés à la Bibliothèque de l'Ermitage, notices, notes, table analytique, Volume 11. Garnier frères, 1767. p. 366

Jack Kerouac photo

“A man needs truth like a machine needs oil.”

Jack Kerouac (1922–1969) American writer

Often attributed to Kerouac's novel Big Sur, the quote cannot be found in that book, nor in any of Kerouac's other published works. It is, in fact, a quote by the Kerouac character in the movie of Big Sur (2013) and therefore composed by the screenplay writer Michael Polish, rather than by Jack Kerouac.
Misattributed

Ken Ham photo

“Since we don’t have a time machine, we can only make educated guesses about the looks, skills, and personality of each individual.… We took great care not to contradict biblical details.”

Ken Ham (1951) Australian young Earth creationist

As quoted in My Encounter with Ken Ham's Giant Ark http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2016/july-web-only/ken-ham-ark-encounter-visit.html?start=1, Christian Post (July 22, 2016)

David Harvey photo

“Massive concentration of financial power, accompanied by the machinations of finance capital, can as easily de-stabilize as stabilize capitalism.”

David Harvey (1935) British anthropologist

Introduction, p. xxxii
The Limits To Capital (2006 VERSO Edition)

Henry Adams photo
Ian McCulloch photo
Vannevar Bush photo
Fernand Léger photo
Iain Banks photo
Theo van Doesburg photo
Camille Paglia photo

“The female body is a chthonian machine, indifferent to the spirit who inhabits it.”

Camille Paglia (1947) American writer

Source: Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson (1990), p. 10

Toby Keith photo
Roger Ebert photo

“On May 17, 1969, a show which was to become the seminal exhibition of video art in the U. S. opened at the Howard Wise Gallery in New York City. That exhibition, "TV as a Creative Medium," effectively pointed to the diverse potential of a new art form and social tool. Subsequently, the show became renowned for the inspiration it provided for many artists and future advocates of video. The artists represented in the show, a few of whom are still involved in the medium today, came from varied backgrounds-painting, filmmaking, nuclear physics, avant-garde music and performance, kinetic and light sculpture-and their approaches presented a primer of the directions which video would soon take. Theoretically, they variously saw video as viewer participation, a spiritual and meditative experience, a mirror, an electronic palette, a kinetic sculpture, or acultural machine to be deconstructed. Ripe with ideas and armed with a heady optimism about the future of communications, these artists used video as an information tool and as a means of gaining understanding and control of television, not solely as an art form. In "TV as a Creative Medium" alternative television was presented as a stepping stone to the promised communications utopia.”

Marita Sturken (1957) American academic

Marita Sturken. " TV as a Creative Medium: Howard Wise and Video Art http://www.vasulka.org/archive/4-30c/AfterImageMay84(1004).pdf," in: Afterimage, May 1984

Anthony Burgess photo
Zygmunt Vetulani photo
Gloria Estefan photo

“For 15 years [Miami Sound Machine and I] recorded and toured to establish a fan base. Now it's time for me to enjoy it.”

Gloria Estefan (1957) Cuban-American singer-songwriter, actress and divorciada

People en Espanol (April, 2004)
2007, 2008

Arthur C. Clarke photo
Poul Anderson photo
Peter DeFazio photo

“The University of Oregon has long been known as a renowned research institution. The Brain, Biology and Machine Initiative continues in that distinguished tradition.”

Peter DeFazio (1947) American politician

Peter DeFazio (June 21, 2006), DeFazio Secures $8 Million For Research At Oregon Universities: He also secured $2.5 million for the Northwest Manufacturing Initiative and $2.7 million for the Metals Affordability Initiative http://www.defazio.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=124&Itemid=65, Website, Congressman Peter DeFazio, United States House of Representatives.

“DNA has been aptly described as the first three-dimensional Xerox machine.”

Kenneth E. Boulding (1910–1993) British-American economist

Source: 1970s, Ecodynamics: A New Theory Of Societal Evolution, 1978, p. 100

Revilo P. Oliver photo
Wassily Leontief photo
Viktor Schauberger photo
Jay Leiderman photo
Jacob Bronowski photo
Gillian Anderson photo

“We shot the first five seasons up in Vancouver, so we were protected from the public mania, and the industry mania, for the most part. I was first exposed to it when I became pregnant in the first season, and I quickly learned the power of the machine; then again when I was trying to negotiate my salary to be closer to equal to what David [Duchovny] was making, rather than a quarter. Yes, it's been an ongoing education, but it continues to astound me.”

Gillian Anderson (1968) American-British film, television and theatre actress, activist and writer

On the wage gap and how The X-Files helped her understand the entertainment industry — Hunger TV "One From The Archives: The Interview: Gillian Anderson" http://www.hungertv.com/feature/interview-gillian-anderson/ (October 19, 2014)
2010s

Zoran Đinđić photo
Henry Hazlitt photo
Charles Bukowski photo

“LSD, yeah, the big parade – everybody's doin' it now. Take LSD, then you are a poet, an intellectual. What a sick mob. I am building a machine gun in my closet now to take out as many of them as I can before they get me.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

in a letter to Steven Richmond (Published in Charles Bukowski: Locked in the Arms of a Crazy Life by Howard Sounes)
Letters

Gordon R. Dickson photo
Jean Chrétien photo
Sarah Palin photo

“He's cool. He's a good guy. He's a good guy, he's so independent. He's independent of like, the party machine. I'm like, "Right on, so am I."”

Sarah Palin (1964) American politician

MTV interview with Dani Carlson, , quoted in * 2009-08-29
Sarah Palin, Republican Vice-Presidential Nominee, Plugs Romney, Paul — But Not McCain — In MTV Interview
MTV Newsroom
MTV
http://newsroom.mtv.com/2008/08/29/sarah-palin-republican-vice-presidential-nominee-plugs-romney-paul-but-not-mccain-in-mtv-interview/
Regarding Ron Paul.
2008

Lorin Morgan-Richards photo

“Imperfectualism: (is) art that cannot be easily replicated by machine. An imperfectualist looks to slow automation through their art.”

Lorin Morgan-Richards (1975) American poet, cartoonist, and children's writer

Coined term on social media on March 16, 2018.
Quotes as Marcil d'Hirson Garron

William Saroyan photo
Michael Swanwick photo
Denis Papin photo
Lee Kuan Yew photo

“At the end of the day, we are so many digits in the machine. The point is – are these digits stronger than the competitors' digits?”

Lee Kuan Yew (1923–2015) First Prime Minister of Singapore

MM Lee Kuan Yew on Singapore workers, History of Singapore, 2005
2000s

Henry Adams photo
Archibald Hill photo
Alastair Reynolds photo
Paul Bourget photo
Laurie Penny photo
Bill Bryson photo
Roger Ebert photo
Osvaldo Pugliese photo
Shamini Flint photo
Otto Ohlendorf photo

“I surrendered my moral conscience to the fact that I was a soldier, and therefore a cog in a relatively low position of a great machine.”

Otto Ohlendorf (1907–1951) German general

Quoted in "Unspeakable: Facing Up to Evil in an Age of Genocide and Terror" - Page 92 - by Os Guinness - 2005.

Lewis Mumford photo

“The clock, not the steam-engine, is the key-machine of the modern industrial age.”

Source: Technics and Civilization (1934), Ch. 1, sct. 2

Daniel Dennett photo
Arthur C. Clarke photo

“What we need is a machine that will let us see the other guy’s point of view.”

Source: The Light of Other Days (2000), Chapter 5

Friedrich Engels photo
Ambrose Bierce photo
Gloria Estefan photo

“Dad joined the US Army by this point [1964], and initially he was stationed in Texas and then South Carolina. But the Vietnam war brought our normal life to an end. Once again, Dad was gone. Communications were very basic back then: Dad couldn't just pick up a cellphone and let us know he was okay. Months would go by without a letter or anything. Eventually he bought two tape recorders -- one he kept with him and one for our house. Dad used to talk into the recorder and send the tapes home. Then we would gather round our machine and tell Dad stories. And I would sing. I still have all the tapes, but I can't listen to them. It hurts too much. After Dad came back from Nam, he wasn't well. He'd been poisoned by Agent Orange and needed quite a lot of looking after. Mum was busy trying to get her Cuban qualifications revalidated by a US university, so I had to take care of Dad and my little sister [Becky]. It was tough. Toward the end, Dad was too far gone and he didn't really know what was hapening around him. I joined Miami Sound Machine in 1975 and we were getting quite successful, but Dad didn't even know who I was. He had to be moved to the hospital. On my wedding day in 1978 [September 2] I went to visit him, still wearing my wedding dress. That was the last time that he said my name. Dad died in 1980, but he touches my life every day. On my last album [Unwrapped] I did a lot of writing while I was looking at a picture of him in his younger days -- so happy and in the prime of his life. I'm not sure if he sees me, but I can feel him all around me. I hope he knows that I am so very proud of him.”

Gloria Estefan (1957) Cuban-American singer-songwriter, actress and divorciada

The [London] Sunday Times (November 17, 2006)
2007, 2008

James Freeman Clarke photo
Richard Quest photo
Jeremy Clarkson photo
Jean Tinguely photo
Alfred Denning, Baron Denning photo

“In June 1970, a big earth-moving machine got stuck in the mud. It sank so far as to be out of sight. It cost much money to get it out. Who is to pay the cost?”

Alfred Denning, Baron Denning (1899–1999) British judge

British Crane Hire Corporation Ltd v. Ipswich Plant Hire Ltd [1970] 1 All ER 1059.
Judgments

Fidel Castro photo

“I am not a dictator, and I do not think I will become one. I will not maintain power with a machine gun.”

Fidel Castro (1926–2016) former First Secretary of the Communist Party and President of Cuba

I Won't Be a Dictator, interview with Ruth Lloyd (January 1959), printed in The Spokesman-Review (24 May 1959)

Ernesto Che Guevara photo
John Rogers Searle photo
Amitabh Bachchan photo
James Nasmyth photo
John Ramsay McCulloch photo
Cyrano de Bergerac photo
Roger Penrose photo
Sinclair Lewis photo
Robert P. George photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
William John Macquorn Rankine photo
Jacques Ellul photo
Max Horkheimer photo