"Machines which ape people are tending to encroach on every aspect of people's lives, and that such machines force people to behave like machines. The new electronic devices do indeed have the power to force people to "communicate" with them and with each other on the terms of the machine. Whatever structurally does not fit the logic of machines is effectively filtered from a culture dominated by their use. The machine-like behaviour of people chained to electronics constitutes a degradation of their well-being and of their dignity which, for most people in the long run, becomes intolerable. Observations of the sickening effect of programmed environments show that people in them become indolent, impotent, narcissistic and apolitical. The political process breaks down, because people cease to be able to govern themselves; they demand to be managed."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ivan_Illich
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Ivan Illich
Ivan Illich (4 September 1926 – 2 December 2002) was an Austrian-born Christian anarchist, author, polymath, and polemicist.
63 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Ivan Illich →
Related Quotes
"Nenà štěstà bez závisti."
"The habitual passenger cannot grasp the folly of traffic based overwhelmingly on transport. His inherited perceptions…"
"Universal education through schooling is not feasible. It would be no more feasible if it were attempted by means of …"
"Jesus was an anarchist savior. That's what the Gospels tell us. Just before He started out on His public life, Jesus …"
"Churches also have their problems with a Jesus whose only economics are jokes. A savior undermines the foundations of…"
"Homo economicus was surreptitiously taken as the emblem and analogue for all living beings. A mechanistic anthropomor…"
"Friendship in the Greek tradition, in the Roman tradition, in the old tradition, was always viewed as the highest poi…"
"I intend to discuss some perplexing issues which are raised once we embrace the hypothesis that society can be descho…"
"Most learning is not the result of instruction. It is rather the result of unhampered participation in a meaningful s…"
"In a consumer society there are inevitably two kinds of slaves: the prisoners of addiction and the prisoners of envy."