David Foster Wallace Quotes

Every technology, including the printing press, comes at some price.

In the end the question is: Who is to be master, man or his machines? As long as the control over technology rests primarily on economic calculation, the victor is not likely to be man.

Science and technology have amplified the effects of the dysfunction of the human mind in its unawakened state to such a degree that humanity, and probably the planet, would not survive for another hundred years if human consciousness remains unchanged.

Technology is probably the single biggest driver of productivity gains for the developed countries. For example, I think it's much more important than free trade.

Technology is knowledge of how the universe works that enables you to change the world.

The shock of twentieth-century technology numbed our brains and we are just beginning to notice the spiritual and social debris that our technology has strewn about us.

The mediated world has approached us from a lot of different directions and we have freely chosen our automobiles and our skyscrapers and our televisions and our telephones and our computers because they have given us power and freedom. Now we are beginning to notice there's a price to pay for them. It's all interconnected, the good stuff and the bad stuff comes together.

Technology made large populations possible; large populations now make technology indispensable.

Where the world is going and what technology is leading us to in terms of the evolution of humanity is an incredibly valuable thing to understand.

There are dangers, but only dangers if people don't understand where technology is taking us.

Technology, under all circumstances, leads to planning; in its higher manifestations it may put the problems of planning beyond the reach of the industrial firm. Technological compulsions, and not ideology or political will, will require the firm to seek the help and protection of the state.

I've been gratified to see over the twenty or so years of my writing life the West become less of a colony of the East; maybe new technologies and too much travel undermine the idea of provinciality.

Smart technologies are not just disruptive; they can also preserve the status quo. Revolutionary in theory, they are often reactionary in practice.

The Republic of Technology where we will be living is a feedback world.

You can't do anything interesting with cutting-edge technology except not make it cutting-edge.

It's worth remembering that all technology leaves a footprint. For example, our own technology is leaving a footprint in terms of global warming, which could be detected from a long way away. One assumes that a very advanced civilization that has been around maybe millions and millions of years would have an even bigger footprint that might extend beyond its planet to its immediate astronomical environment.

We now have in our hands—really, in our libraries—the technology to feed, clothe, and supply energy to an ever-growing population for the next seven billion years.

For the first time in history it is now possible to take care of everybody at a higher standard of living than any have ever known. Only ten years ago the 'more with less' technology reached the point where this could be done. All humanity now has the option to become enduringly successful.

Technology changes the medium. I grew up on watching a box in my living room that made my parents happy. After something is gone, the dust will settle and I'll see what's next.

Humans change themselves through technology.

In 30 years time, as technology moves forward even further, people are going to look back and wonder why offices ever existed.

Technology brought in the mass media and technology is now taking it away.

It is a commonplace of modern technology that problems have solutions before there is knowledge of how they are to be solved.

With the advent of radical and accessible technology, each one of us, for the first time in history, is creating an influential mark forever - we are all mini-digital celebrities and heroes to someone.

An unfolding technology has increased our economic strength and added to the convenience of our lives. But that same technology-we know now-carries danger with it. From the great smoke stacks of industry and from the exhausts of motors and machines, 130 million tons of soot, carbon and grime settle over the people and shroud the Nation's cities each year. From towns, factories, and stockyards, wastes pollute our rivers and streams, endangering the waters we drink and use.