#log

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong. 2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible. 3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. ↗

— Arthur C. Clarke

#magic #possibility #science #technology #science

We've arranged a civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. ↗

— Carl Sagan

#science #technology #science

Americans worship technology. It's an inherent trait in the national zeitgeist. ↗

— Max Brooks

#max-brooks #science-fiction #technology #world-war-z #zombie

The book itself is a curious artifact, not showy in its technology but complex and extremely efficient: a really neat little device, compact, often very pleasant to look at and handle, that can last decades, even centuries. It doesn't have to be plugged in, activated, or performed by a machine; all it needs is light, a human eye, and a human mind. It is not one of a kind, and it is not ephemeral. It lasts. It is reliable. If a book told you something when you were fifteen, it will tell it to you again when you're fifty, though you may understand it so differently that it seems you're reading a whole new book." (Staying Awake: Notes on the alleged decline of reading, Harper's Magazine, February 2008) ↗

— Ursula K. Le Guin

#technology

Before you become too entranced with gorgeous gadgets and mesmerizing video displays, let me remind you that information is not knowledge, knowledge is not wisdom, and wisdom is not foresight. Each grows out of the other, and we need them all. ↗

— Arthur C. Clarke

#wisdom #technology

It's supposed to be automatic, but actually you have to push this button. ↗

— John Brunner

#sociology #technology #technology

Industry, technology, and commerce can thrive only as long as an idealistic national community offers the necessary preconditions. And these do not lie in material egoism, but in a spirit of sacrifice and joyful renunciation. ↗

— Adolf Hitler

#principle #renunciation #sacrifice #spirit #thriving

Meditation is the ultimate mobile device; you can use it anywhere, anytime, unobtrusively. ↗

— Sharon Salzberg

#health #meditation #mind-training #mindfulness #social-media

Technology tends toward avoidance of risks by investors. Uncertainty is ruled out if possible. People generally prefer the predictable. Few recognize how destructive this can be, how it imposes severe limits on variability and thus makes whole populations fatally vulnerable to the shocking ways our universe can throw the dice. ↗

— Frank Herbert

#technology #uncertainty #technology

I hate technology. It provides so many different channels of loneliness. Every time you check your email and don’t see a new message, you know that, even though people have the ability to contact you at any time of the day from anywhere on the planet, no one is interested in doing so. Phones are constant reminders that 160 people you know fairly well have nothing to say to you most of the time. ↗

— Adi Alsaid

#technology