Americans no longer talk to each other, they entertain each other. They do not exchange ideas, they exchange images. They do not argue with propositions; they argue with good looks, celebrities and comercials.

Remember: in order for a perception to change one must be frustrated in one's actions or change one's purpose.

The spectacle we find in true religions has as its purpose enchantment, not entertainment. The distinction is critical. By endowing things with magic, enchantment is a means through which we may gain access to sacredness. Entertainment is the means through which we distance ourselves from it.

The scientific method," Thomas Henry Huxley once wrote, "is nothing but the normal working of the human mind." That is to say, when the mind is working; that is to say further, when it is engaged in correcting its mistakes. Taking this point of view, we may conclude that science is not physics, biology, or chemistry — is not even a ”subject " — but a moral imperative drawn from a larger narrative whose purpose is to give perspective, balance, and humility to learning.

Nothing could be more misleading than the idea that computer technology introduced the age of information. The printing press began that age, and we have not been free of it since.

A book is an attempt to make through permanent and to contribute to the great conversation conducted by authors of the past. […] The telegraph is suited only to the flashing of messages, each to be quickly replaced by a more up-to-date message. Facts push other facts into and then out of consciousness at speeds that neither permit nor require evaluation. (70)

If students get a sound education in the history, social effects and psychological biases of technology, they may grow to be adults who use technology rather than be used by it.