We imagine "pure" cybernetic systems, but we can prove only that we know how to build fairly dysfunctional ones. We kid ourselves when we think we understand something, even a computer, merely because we can model or digitize it.

There were studies that asked people in different cultures to draw pictures of their enemies, and the pictures all looked remarkably the same. They always had exaggerated canine teeth and a certain sort of expression. That led to speculation about whether at an earlier stage in the human experience we were hunted by some sort of carnivore.

Pop culture has entered into a nostalgic malaise. Online culture is dominated by trivial mashups of the culture that existed before the onset of mashups, and by fandom responding to the dwindling outposts of centralized mass media. It is a culture of reaction without action.

When you have a global mush, people lose their identity, they become pseudonyms, they have no investment and no consequence in what they do.

Individuals achieve optimal stupidity when they're given substantial powers while being insulated from the results of their actions.

The network by itself is meaningless. Only the people were ever meaningful.

A real friendship ought to introduce each person to unexpected weirdness in the other.