When all actions are mathematically calculated, they also take on a stupid quality.

The first and only principle of sexual ethics: the accuser is always in the wrong.

A pencil and rubber are of more use to thought than a battalion of assistants. To happiness the same applies as to truth: one does not have it, but is in it.

The recent past always presents itself as if destroyed by catastrophes.

He who stands aloof runs the risk of believing himself better than others and misusing his critique of society as an ideology for his private interest. While he gropingly forms his own life in the frail image of a true existence, he should never forget its frailty, nor how little the image is a substitute for true life. Against such awareness, however, pulls the momentum of the bourgeois within him.

Estrangement shows itself precisely in the elimination of distance between people.

The culture industry not so much adapts to the reactions of its customers as it counterfeits them.