Selected Quotes

SortA–ZBy birth year

Edward Bernays1891–19952

We are governed, our minds molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of.Propaganda The engineering of consent is the very essence of the democratic process, the freedom to persuade and suggest.The Engineering of Consent

Stewart Brandb. 1938

Information wants to be free. Information also wants to be expensive. That tension will not go away.

Arthur C. Clarke1917–2008

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

JC

John Culkin1928–1993

We shape our tools and thereafter they shape us.A Schoolman's Guide to Marshall McLuhan

Joan Didion1934–2021

We tell ourselves stories in order to live.The White Album

Viktor Frankl1905–1997

He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how.Man's Search for Meaning, quoting Nietzsche

William Gibsonb. 19482

The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed.Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions.Neuromancer

Nathaniel Hawthorne1804–1864

Easy reading is damn hard writing.

Steve Jobs1955–20116

Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.The New York Times It's more fun to be a pirate than to join the navy.You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.Stanford What a computer is to me is it's the most remarkable tool that we have ever come up with. It's the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds.Memory and Imagination People don't know what they want until you show it to them.BusinessWeek Stay hungry. Stay foolish.Stanford

Søren Kierkegaard1813–1855

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.

Edwin Land1909–1991

Don't undertake a project unless it is manifestly important and nearly impossible.

Walter Lippmann1889–19742

News and truth are not the same thing.Public Opinion A free press is not a privilege but an organic necessity in a great society.

David McCullough1933–2022

Writing is thinking. To write well is to think clearly. That's why it's so hard.

Marshall McLuhan1911–1980

The medium is the message.Understanding Media

Blaise Pascal1623–1662

I have made this longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter.

Herbert A. Simon1916–2001

A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.

Socrates470–399 BC

The unexamined life is not worth living.in Plato's Apology

PS

Peter Steinerb. 1940

On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog.The New Yorker

WS

William Strunk Jr.1869–1946

Omit needless words.The Elements of Style

Kurt Vonnegut1922–2007

We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.Mother Night

Simone Weil1909–1943

Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.

Ludwig Wittgenstein1889–19512

The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.Tractatus Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.Tractatus

Image sources

Stewart Brand — cellanr, CC BY-SA 2.0
Arthur C. Clarke — ITU Pictures, CC BY 2.0
Joan Didion — Kathleen Ballard, Los Angeles Times, CC BY 4.0
Viktor Frankl — Prof. Dr. Franz Vesely, CC BY-SA 3.0 de
William Gibson — Gonzo Bonzo, CC BY-SA 2.0
Steve Jobs — MetalGearLiquid, after Matt Yohe, CC BY-SA 3.0
David McCullough — Nrbelex, CC BY-SA 2.5
Blaise Pascal — Gérard Edelinck, CC BY-SA 4.0

The remaining portraits are in the public domain.