A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. — Robert A. Heinlein
生而为人,应该能够换尿布、策划入侵、杀猪、开船、造房子、写十四行诗、算账、建墙、正骨、抚慰临终之人、接受命令、下达命令、合作、独行、解决方程式、分析新问题、清理马粪、编程、烹饪美食、高效战斗、英勇牺牲。专业分工是给昆虫准备的。
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Don’t worry about what anybody else is going to do. The best way to predict the future is to invent it. — Alan Kay
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Reform our infantilized society. Give people the tools to resist and destroy consumer culture (ubiquitous emotionally-manipulative branding and advertising, materialism, artificial fashions) and the corporation’s oligarchical control over employment, entertainment, and creativity. Return power, dignity, and responsibility to the individual. — Bret Victor: Long-term Goal
改造我们的低幼化社会。为人们提供工具,用以抵抗和摧毁消费主义文化(全方位的品牌包装与广告对人的情感操弄,物质主义,生造的时尚潮流),以及大企业对工作、娱乐和创造力的寡头控制。将权力、尊严和责任感还给个人。
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Interface matters to me more than anything else, and it always has. I just never realized that. I’ve spent a lot of time over the years desperately trying to think of a “thing” to change the world. I now know why the search was fruitless – things don’t change the world. People change the world by using things. The focus must be on the “using”, not the “thing”. Now that I’m looking through the right end of the binoculars, I can see a lot more clearly, and there are projects and possibilities that genuinely interest me deeply. — Bret Victor
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拳击是血与泪的蓝调。 —— 寺山修司
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我们看见「万物联网」。愿我们将智慧联网。
我们看见「虚拟实境」。愿我们将实境共享。
我们看见「机器学习」。愿我们能协力学习。
我们看见「用户体验」。愿我们能体验人际。
我们听到「奇点即将接近」。但愿我们惦记:「众点」就在这里。
—— 唐凤
When we see “internet of things”, let’s make it an internet of beings. When we see “online democracy”, let’s make it deliberative democracy. When we see “virtual reality”, let’s make it a shared reality. When we see “new economy”, let’s make it a dignified economy. When we see “machine learning”, let’s make it collaborative learning. When we see “digital identity”, let’s make it intersectional identity. And when we hear “the singularity is near”, let us remember: the Plurality is here. — Glen Weyl
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Questions to ask of a new technology: What is the problem to which this technology is the solution? Whose problem is it? What new problems might result from solving this problem? Which people and institutions might be harmed by this solution? How does the new technology change our language, and what are the implications of that? What people and institutions gain economic or political power because of the technological change? — Neil Postman: Technology and Society
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Every technology has a prejudice. Like language itself, it predisposes us to favor and value certain perspectives and accomplishments. In a culture without writing, human memory is of the greatest importance, as are the proverbs, sayings and songs which contain the accumulated oral wisdom of centuries. That is why Solomon was thought to be the wisest of men. In Kings I we are told he knew 3,000 proverbs. But in a culture with writing, such feats of memory are considered a waste of time, and proverbs are merely irrelevant fancies. The writing person favors logical organization and systematic analysis, not proverbs. The telegraphic person values speed, not introspection. The television person values immediacy, not history… Every technology has a philosophy which is given expression in how the technology makes people use their minds, in what it makes us do with our bodies, in how it codifies the world, in which of our senses it amplifies, in which of our emotional and intellectual tendencies it disregards. This idea is the sum and substance of what the great Catholic prophet, Marshall McLuhan meant when he coined the famous sentence, “The medium is the message.” — Neil Postman: Five Things We Need to Know About Technological Change
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不要落入「以牙还牙」的陷阱。 —— 我的妈妈
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我童年时,家中有一组水墨画,每幅均描绘同一片山在四季递嬗中的不同景致。我总对那些山峦感到惊艳叹绝,因此想以坚强、柔韧、巍峨,自迷雾中拔起的群山比喻这些香港女性艺术家。 —— Shirley Wu
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You have to keep a dozen of your favorite problems constantly present in your mind, although by and large they will lay in a dormant state. Every time you hear or read a new trick or a new result, test it against each of your twelve problems to see whether it helps. […] The worthwhile problems are the ones you can really solve or help solve, the ones you can really contribute something to. […] No problem is too small or too trivial if we can really do something about it. — Richard Feynman
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[前奏:莫扎特 D 小调安魂弥撒曲——进堂咏] 何も言うことはない
Non ho niente da dire
Ich habe nichts zu sagen
No tengo nada que decir
Je n’ai rien à dire
有时很懊恼
有时也感到骄傲
有时不后悔曾这样表达愤怒
今夜我可以吃更多雪糕
想像明天中午会被捕
还有些心愿未做
还未去埃及希腊秘鲁
还未跟你曾相处得更好
外面进行着的夜
无穷的远方
无数的人们
都和我有关
今夜我可以走八千里路
想像明天会特赦全部
今夜我可以
想像明天中午
—— my little airport 今夜雪糕
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But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought. 如果思想可以败坏语言,那语言也同样可以败坏思想。 — George Orwell: Politics and the English Language
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There is no other world. There’s just another way to live. — Jacques Mesrine
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I wish schools could make homework so joyful that students want to do it themselves, rather than let ChatGPT have all the fun. — Andrew Ng