Val

“Prior to the age of telegraphy, the information-action ratio was sufficiently close so that most people had a sense of being able to control some of the contingencies in their lives. What people knew about had action-value. In the information world created by telegraphy, this sense of potency was lost, precisely because the whole world became context for news. Everything became everyone's business. For the first time, we were sent information which answered no question we had asked, and which, in any case, did not permit the right of reply.”
― Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business

“What the advertiser needs to know is not what is right about the product but what is wrong about the buyer.”
― Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business

“Humanity today is like a waking dreamer, caught between the fantasies of sleep and the chaos of the real world. The mind seeks but cannot find the precise place and hour. We have created a Star Wars civilization, with Stone Age emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology. We thrash about. We are terribly confused by the mere fact of our existence, and a danger to ourselves and to the rest of life.”
― Edward O. Wilson, The Social Conquest of Earth

“The problem is not that television presents us with entertaining subject matter but that all subject matter is presented as entertaining, which is another issue altogether. To”
― Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business