The tribal community lived in the totality of circular time; the farmers of God's universe understood before and after; workers of the clockwork universe lived by the tick; and we creatures of the digital era must relate to the pulse.

One argument against open systems is that they become open to everything, good and bad. Like a Richard Meier skyscraper, the anal retentive, Bauhaus elegance of the Mac does prevent the loose ends and confusion of a less sterile environment. But it also prevents fertility. Apple's development must come from within.

Like the diminishing beauty returns for a facially paralyzed Botox addict, the more forcefully we attempt to stop the passage of time, the less available we are to the very moment we seek to preserve.

We've been taught that the renaissance was one of the great golden ages of civilisation. The renaissance was not a golden age, it was the end of a golden age.

The horrible truth is we are linear beings; we can't multitask, and we shouldn't keep interrupting important connections to each other with the latest message coming in.

The 'looking forward' so prevalent in the late 1990s was bound to end once the new millennium began. Like some others of that era, I predicted a new focus on the moment, on real experience, and on what things are actually worth right now. Then 9/11 magnified this sensibility, forcing America as a nation to contend with its own impermanence.

Our fear of technology is really a fear of empowerment. We now have the ability to design the reality we live in, and we have to step up to the occasion.