I had thought that the magic of the information age was that it allowed us to know more, but then I realized the magic of the information age is that it allows us to know less. It provides us with external cognitive servants-silicon memory systems, collaborative online filters, consumer preference algorithms and networked knowledge. We can burden these servants and liberate ourselves.
The meritocracy defines “community” as a mass of talented individuals competing with one another.
Researchers have done a lot of work over the past few years analyzing social networks. It turns out almost everything is contagious. If your friends are obese, you are more likely to be obese. If your friends are happy, you’re more likely to be happy. If your friends smoke, you smoke. If they feel lonely, you feel lonely.
Friends usually bring out better versions of each other. People feel unguarded and fluid with their close friends.
Everybody is comparing the oil spill to Hurricane Katrina, but the real parallel could be the Iranian hostage crisis. In the late 1970s, the hostage crisis became a symbol of America’s inability to take decisive action in the face of pervasive problems. In the same way, the uncontrolled oil plume could become the objective correlative of the country’s inability to govern itself.
Her genius derives from the fact that she was capable of the deepest feeling but also of the most discerning and disciplined thought.
Emotion assigns value to things, and reason can only make choices on the basis of those valuations. The human mind can be pragmatic because deep down it is romantic.
In 1948, psychologists asked more than 10,000 adolescents whether they considered themselves to be a very important person. At that point, 12 percent said yes. The same question was asked in 2003, and this time it wasn’t 12 percent who considered themselves very important, it was 80 percent.
You lose the ability to say a hundred noes for the sake of one overwhelming and fulfilling yes.
The struggle against the weakness in yourself is never a solitary struggle. No person can achieve self-mastery or his or her own.
A person who is interrupted while performing a task takes 50% more time to complete it and make 50% more errors.
Online life is so delicious because it is socializing with almost no friction.
While it pretends not to, it subliminally sends the message that those who are smarter and more accomplished are actually worth more than those who are not.
Humility is awareness that you are an underdog in the struggle against your own weakness.
The imagination offers up ideal visions of experiences which then leave us disappointed when the visions don’t come true.
The imagination simplifies our endless desires and causes us to fantasize that they can be fulfilled.
People tend to want to live up to their friends’ high regard.
New is America’s oldest tradition.
It is possible to have a complex human relationship without words.
Young Arab men are not going to walk away from extremism because they can suddenly afford a Slurpee. They will walk away when they can devote themselves to a some call to serve a cause that connects nationalism to dignity and democracy and transcends a lifetime.