quotery

"Theory does not derive its legitimacy from established facts, but from future events. Its value is..."

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 23:19:00 -0500

““Theory does not derive its legitimacy from established facts, but from future events. Its value is not in the past events it can illuminate, but in the shockwave of the events it prefigures. It does not act upon consciousness, but directly on the course of things from which it draws its energy. It therefore has to be distinguished from the academic practice of philosophy and from all that is written with an eye to the history of ideas.””

- Jean Baudrillard, Cool Memories

"Shut your eyes and see."

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 22:00:00 -0500

“Shut your eyes and see.”

- James Joyce, Ulysses

"Western laziness consists of cramming our lives with compulsive activity, so that there is no time..."

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 11:56:24 -0500

““Western laziness consists of cramming our lives with compulsive activity, so that there is no time at all to confront the real issues.””

- Sogyal Rinpoche (via observedintoexistence)

"The universe does not owe you a sense of hope"

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 23:07:15 -0500

““The universe does not owe you a sense of hope””

- Richard Dawkins (via irrelevantirrelevances)

"I’m a boring speaker and I like it that way… I doubt that people are attracted to..."

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 19:29:44 -0500

“I’m a boring speaker and I like it that way… I doubt that people are attracted to whatever the persona is… People are interested in the issues, and they’re interested in the issues because they are important.”

- Noam Chomsky

"Nobody takes democracy or justice seriously, we are all aware that they are corrupt, but we practise..."

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 20:55:21 -0500

“Nobody takes democracy or justice seriously, we are all aware that they are corrupt, but we practise them anyway because we assume they work even if we don’t believe in them.”

- Slavoj Zizek, Berlusconi in Tehran (2009)

"Totalizing visions, attractive though they may be, can never capture all the meanings and..."

Sat, 17 Sep 2011 11:10:27 -0400

“Totalizing visions, attractive though they may be, can never capture all the meanings and significations of the urban when the landscape is critically read and envisioned as a fulsome geographical text. Not all can be understood, appearances as well as essences persistently deceive, and what is real cannot always be captured even in extraordinary language.”

- Ed Soja, Postmodern Geographies (1989, pp. 247-248)

"Libraries raised me. I don’t believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because..."

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 20:53:39 -0400

“Libraries raised me. I don’t believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because most students don’t have any money. When I graduated from high school, it was during the Depression and we had no money. I couldn’t go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years”

- Ray Bradbury, 91 years old today.

"What is the point of our celebrated freedom of choice when the only choice is between playing by the..."

Sun, 21 Aug 2011 19:20:15 -0400

“What is the point of our celebrated freedom of choice when the only choice is between playing by the rules and (self-)destructive violence?”

- Slavoj Žižek, Shoplifters of the World, Unite!

"The most probable scenario of communication here is that Minitel users gravitate from the screen to..."

Sat, 20 Aug 2011 11:46:22 -0400

“The most probable scenario of communication here is that Minitel users gravitate from the screen to telephone conversations, thence to face-to-face meetings, and … then what? Well, it’s ‘let’s phone each other’, and, finally, back to the Minitel - which is, after all, more erotic because it is at once both esoteric and transparent. This is communication in its purest form, for there is no intimacy here except with the screen, and with an electronic text that is no more than a design filigreed onto life. A new Plato’s retreat whence to observe shadow-forms of bodily pleasure filing past. WHY SPEAK TO ONE ANOTHER, WHEN IT IS SO SIMPLE TO COMMUNICATE?”

- Jean Baudrillard, The Transparency of Evil: Essays on Extreme Phenomena (Verso, 1993, p. 54). Replace “Minitel” (early French WWW) with the dominant media today. ALL CAPS emphasis my own.

"Arab Spring will become the Global Decade and then the Universal Forever."

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 17:56:00 -0400

“Arab Spring will become the Global Decade and then the Universal Forever.”

- Self

"Except for light, all other media come in pairs, with one acting as the “content” of the other,..."

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 19:13:40 -0400

“Except for light, all other media come in pairs, with one acting as the “content” of the other, obscuring the operation of both.”

- Marshall McLuhan

"If you take away hate’s natural predators, it destroys itself."

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 18:52:00 -0400

“If you take away hate’s natural predators, it destroys itself.”

- Jean Baudrillard, The Conspiracy of Art(Semiotext(e), Ames Hodges translation, 2005, p. 150).

"Power does not interest me, and I will not take it."

Sat, 13 Aug 2011 13:18:16 -0400

“Power does not interest me, and I will not take it.”

- Fidel Castro, 1959.

"Violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less..."

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 21:01:00 -0400

“Violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less identity, the more violence.”

- Marshall McLuhan, 1976

"The whole of reality, it’s just it, it’s stupid. It is out there. I don’t care..."

Sun, 07 Aug 2011 15:44:00 -0400

“The whole of reality, it’s just it, it’s stupid. It is out there. I don’t care about it.”

- Slavoj Žižek, in the Atra Taylor documentary film, Žižek!.

"It is really America that has electrocuted itself."

Sun, 07 Aug 2011 15:33:00 -0400

“It is really America that has electrocuted itself.”

- Jean Baudrillard, The Conspiracy of Art (Semiotext(e), Ames Hodges translation, 2005, p. 209).

"Museums are inventions of men, not inevitable, eternal, ideal, nor divine. They exist for the things..."

Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:59:00 -0400

“Museums are inventions of men, not inevitable, eternal, ideal, nor divine. They exist for the things we put in them, and they change as each generation chooses how to see and use those things.”

- Adele Z. Silver (Cleveland Museum of Art), The Art Museum as Educator: A Collection of Studies as Guides to Practice and Policy (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1978, p. 13)

"We are no more committed to one culture … any more than to one book or to one language or to..."

Tue, 02 Aug 2011 15:00:05 -0400

“We are no more committed to one culture … any more than to one book or to one language or to one technology.”

- Marshall McLuhan, The Gutenberg Galaxy (1962 / 2010 University of Toronto edition, p. 31)

"The debt no longer has any meaning but to unite all civilized beings to a same destiny served on..."

Mon, 01 Aug 2011 18:41:00 -0400

“The debt no longer has any meaning but to unite all civilized beings to a same destiny served on credit.”

- Jean Baudrillard, Global Debt and Parallel Universe.