“The more local and settled a culture, the better it stays put, the less the damage. It is the foreigner whose road of excess leads to a desert... a man with a machine and inadequate culture... is a pestilence. He shakes more than he can hold.” MenCultureMachinesLocalsDesertDamageShakesExcessForeignersInadequatePestilence Author:Wendell Berry
“The human brain became large by natural selection (who knows why, but presumably for good cause). Yet surely most "things" now done by our brains, and essential both to our cultures and to our very survival, are epiphenomena of the computing power of this machine, not genetically grounded Darwinian entities created specifically by natural selection for their current function.” KnowsHumansDoneCultureCausesNaturalBrainEssentialsSurvivalMachinesFunctionCurrentsEntityGroundedSelectionNatural SelectionHuman BrainComputingGood Causes Author:Stephen Jay Gould
“It is now very clear that techniques of machine-human interfacing, pharmacology of the synthetic variety, all kinds of manipulative techniques, all kinds of data storage, imaging and retrieval techniques - all of this is coalescing toward the potential of a truly demonic or angelic kind of self-imaging of our culture... And the people who are on the demonic side are fully aware of this and hurrying full-tilt forward with their plans to capture everyone as a 100% believing consumer inside some kind of a beige furnished fascism that won't even raise a ripple.” PeopleBelieveHumansKindSelfCultureSidesClearPlansMachinesRaisesTechniqueAll KindsVarietyDataConsumersCaptureFascismRippleAngelicStorageDemonicHurryingManipulativeSyntheticTiltImagingPharmacology Author:Terence McKenna
“The drug war has nothing to do with making communities livable or creating a decent future for black kids. On the contrary, prohibition is directly responsible for the power of crack dealers to terrorize whole neighborhoods. And every cent spent on the cops, investigators, bureaucrats, courts, jails, weapons, and tests required to feed the drug-war machine is a cent not spent on reversing the social policies that have destroyed the cities, nourished racism, and laid the groundwork for crack culture.” WarWholeKidsCultureSocialBlackCommunityJusticeCitiesPolicyDrugCreatingWeaponsRacismTestsMachinesResponsibleCourtContraryDestroyedDecentNeighborhoodCracksJailCentsCopProhibitionDealerBureaucratsWar On DrugsInvestigatorsGroundworkSocial Policy Book:No More Nice Girls: Countercultural Essays Source: No More Nice Girls: Countercultural Essays
“Only a well-oiled machine runs smoothly.” WellsRunningCultureMachinesService CultureWell Oiled Machines Author:Ron Kaufman
“I didn't much like Las Vegas. The noise of the place and the whole 24-hour, 'let's play the slot machines all night' culture of the place just left me cold.” PlayWholeNightCultureLeftHoursColdMachinesNoiseAll NightVegasLas VegasSlot Machines Author:James Nesbitt
“I was always intrigued when I was growing up, and then in engineering school, with the idea of a perpetual machine. I think of the Wal-Mart culture as that.” ThinkingIdeasSchoolCultureGrowing UpGrowingMachinesEngineeringPerpetualIntrigued Author:Mike Duke
“Ours has been called a culture of narcissism. The label is apt but can be misleading. It reads colloquially as selfishness and self-absorption. But these images do not capture the anxiety behind our search for mirrors. We are insecure in our understanding of ourselves, and this insecurity breeds a new preoccupation with the question of who we are. We search for ways to see ourselves. The computer is a new mirror, the first psychological machine. Beyond its nature as an analytical engine lies its second nature as an evocative object.” WayFirstsHas BeensSelfLyingCultureUnderstandingBehindsObjectsAnxietyComputerMachinesMirrorsPsychologicalLabelsSelfishnessWho We AreInsecurityCaptureEnginesNarcissismInsecureMisleadPreoccupationAbsorptionSelf Absorption Book:The Second Self: Computers and the Human Spirit Source: The Second Self: Computers and the Human Spirit
“We live in a culture that paces itself to the speed of machines. We are trying like good little robots to match our speed with theirs. Humans cannot move at the same rate as machines. When we attempt to, we lose contact with our own humanness.” TryingHumansLittlesMovingCultureLosesMachinesRateSpeedContactPaceRobotsHumanness Author:Tian Dayton