"There is no difference between machine autonomy and the abdication of human responsibility."

Jaron Lanier Technology See all quotes by Jaron Lanier →

React to this quote

More by Jaron Lanier

“The quest to rationally prove the possibility of sentience in a computer is the modern version of proving God's existence. ...eventually a cybernetically minded twenty-first century version of Kant will appear in order to present a tedious "proof" that such adventures are futile.”

“People are demonstrably insane when it comes to assessing human sentience.”

“The problem is that in every example we know, a layer that can change fast also can't change very much.”

“The great thing about crummy software is the amount of employment it generates.”

“Digital information is really just people in disguise.”

“The greatest crime of Marxism wasn't simply that much of what it claimed was false but that it claimed to be the sole and utterly complete path to understanding life and reality.”

Resonant Thoughts

"I believe with all my heart that jimcrow is wicked and I know that it is a rotten core in our society. I know that we cannot say that we are a full democracy so long as jimcrow exists anywhere in our …"

— Pearl S. Buck

Literature1892–1973

#Human Nature

"There are only two divisions in the world to-day — human beings and Germans. And the German knows it. Human beings have long ago sickened of him and everything connected with him,of all he does, says,…"

— Rudyard Kipling

Literature1865–1936

#philosophy

"Without free, self-respecting, and autonomous citizens there can be no free and independent nations. Without internal peace, that is, peace among citizens and between the citizens and the state, there…"

— Václav Havel

Literature1920–1979

#freedom

"I believe that I've got an almost built-in optimism. And I occupy myself more with problems of understanding and conviction than with problems of feelings or depression. On the contrary, I think that …"

— Abimael Guzmán

Social Activism1934–2021

#faith