---
title: Selected Quotes
description: Quotes collected by Tyler Gold, with sources.
canonical: https://tyler.gold/quotes
last-updated: 2026-09-10
---

# Selected Quotes

Collected by Tyler Gold. The page: https://tyler.gold/quotes

> **“I have made this longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter.”** — Blaise Pascal ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettres_provinciales))

> “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” — Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_Night#:~:text=We%20are%20what%20we%20pretend%20to))

> “We tell ourselves stories in order to live.” — Joan Didion, The White Album ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_White_Album_(book)#:~:text=We%20tell%20ourselves%20stories%20in%20order%20to%20live))

> “Omit needless words.” — William Strunk Jr., The Elements of Style ([source](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/37134#:~:text=Omit%20needless%20words))

> “Easy reading is damn hard writing.” — Nathaniel Hawthorne ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne#:~:text=Easy%20reading%20is%20damn%20hard%20writing))

> “Writing is thinking. To write well is to think clearly. That's why it's so hard.” — David McCullough ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/David_McCullough#:~:text=Writing%20is%20thinking.%20To%20write%20well%20is%20to%20think))

> “The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed.” — William Gibson ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Gibson#:~:text=The%20future%20is%20already%20here%20-%20it%27s%20just%20not))

> “On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog.” — Peter Steiner, The New Yorker ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_you%27re_a_dog#:~:text=On%20the%20Internet%2C%20nobody%20knows%20you%27re%20a%20dog))

> **“Information wants to be free. Information also wants to be expensive. That tension will not go away.”** — Stewart Brand ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_wants_to_be_free#:~:text=Information%20wants%20to%20be%20free.%20Information%20also%20wants%20to))

> **“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”** — Arthur C. Clarke ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke%27s_three_laws#:~:text=Any%20sufficiently%20advanced%20technology%20is%20indistinguishable%20from%20magic))

> “Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions.” — William Gibson, Neuromancer ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sprawl_trilogy#:~:text=Cyberspace.%20A%20consensual%20hallucination%20experienced%20daily%20by%20billions))

> “The medium is the message.” — Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message#:~:text=The%20medium%20is%20the%20message))

> “We shape our tools and thereafter they shape us.” — John Culkin, A Schoolman's Guide to Marshall McLuhan ([source](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2016/06/26/shape/))

> **“A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.”** — Herbert A. Simon ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_economy#:~:text=A%20wealth%20of%20information%20creates%20a%20poverty%20of%20attention))

> “Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” — Steve Jobs, The New York Times ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs))

> “It's more fun to be a pirate than to join the navy.” — Steve Jobs ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs#:~:text=It%27s%20more%20fun%20to%20be%20a%20pirate%20than%20to))

> “You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.” — Steve Jobs, Stanford ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs#:~:text=You%20can%27t%20connect%20the%20dots%20looking%20forward%3B%20you%20can))

> “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.” — Steve Jobs, Memory and Imagination ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs#:~:text=What%20a%20computer%20is%20to%20me,bicycle%20for%20our%20minds))

> “People don't know what they want until you show it to them.” — Steve Jobs, BusinessWeek ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs#:~:text=People%20don%27t%20know%20what%20they%20want%20until%20you%20show))

> “Stay hungry. Stay foolish.” — Steve Jobs, Stanford ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whole_Earth_Catalog#:~:text=Stay%20hungry.%20Stay%20foolish))

> “News and truth are not the same thing.” — Walter Lippmann, Public Opinion ([source](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/6456/pg6456-images.html#:~:text=News%20and%20truth%20are%20not%20the%20same%20thing))

> “A free press is not a privilege but an organic necessity in a great society.” — Walter Lippmann ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Lippmann))

> “Don't undertake a project unless it is manifestly important and nearly impossible.” — Edwin Land ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_H._Land))

> “We are governed, our minds molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of.” — Edward Bernays, Propaganda ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_(book)#:~:text=We%20are%20governed%2C%20our%20minds))

> “The engineering of consent is the very essence of the democratic process, the freedom to persuade and suggest.” — Edward Bernays, The Engineering of Consent ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Engineering_of_Consent))

> **“The unexamined life is not worth living.”** — Socrates, in Plato's Apology ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apology_(Plato)#:~:text=The%20unexamined%20life%20is%20not%20worth%20living))

> “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.” — Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus ([source](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Tractatus_Logico-Philosophicus/5#:~:text=The%20limits%20of%20my%20language%20mean%20the%20limits%20of))

> “Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.” — Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tractatus_Logico-Philosophicus#:~:text=Whereof%20one%20cannot%20speak%2C%20thereof%20one%20must%20be%20silent))

> **“He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how.”** — Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, quoting Nietzsche ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Viktor_Frankl))

> “Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.” — Simone Weil ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simone_Weil#:~:text=Attention%20is%20the%20rarest%20and%20purest%20form%20of%20generosity))

> “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” — Søren Kierkegaard ([source](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/S%C3%B8ren_Kierkegaard#:~:text=Life%20can%20only%20be%20understood%20backwards%3B%20but%20it%20must))

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