Daniel J. Boorstin Quotes - Page 2

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• Throught human history, illusions of knowledge, not ignorance, have proven to be the principal obstacles to discovery

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Ignorance, Discovery, Obstacles

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• More appealing than knowledge itself is the feeling of knowledge.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Knowledge, Feelings

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2011). “The Discoverers”, p.92, Vintage

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• Probably no one of us has the True Religion. But all of us together - if we are allowed to be free - are discovering ways of conversing about the great mysteries. The pretense to know all the answers to the deepest mysteries is, of course, the grossest fraud. And any people who declare a Jihad, a holy war on unbelievers - those who do not share their believers' pretended omniscience - are enemies of thinking men and woman and of civilization. I see religion as only a way of asking unanswerable questions, of sharing the joy of a community of quest, and solacing one another in our ignorance.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  War, Ignorance, Men

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• America has been a land of dreams. A land where the aspirations of people from countries cluttered with rich, cumbersome, aristocratic, ideological pasts can reach for what once seemed unattainable. Here they have tried to make dreams come true. Yet now... we are threatened by a new and particularly American menace. It is not the menace of class war, of ideology, of poverty, of disease, of illiteracy, or demagoguery, or of tyranny, though these now plague most of the world. It is the menace of unreality.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Dream, Country, War

  Daniel J. Boorstin (1962). “The Image or What Happened to the American Dream”

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• The hero created himself; the celebrity is created by the media.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Hero, Media

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2012). “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America”, p.61, Vintage

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• Beware of charisma . . . Representative Men; was Ralph Waldo Emerson's 1850 phrase for the great men in a democracy . . . Is there some common quality among these Representative Men who have been most successful as our leaders? I call it the need to be authentic-or, as our dictionaries tell us, conforming to fact and therefore worthy of trust, reliance or belief. While the charismatic has an uncanny outside source of strength, the authentic is strong because he is what he seems to be.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Strong, Successful, Men

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• Knowledge is not simply another commodity. On the contrary. Knowledge is never used up. It increases by diffusion and grows by dispersion.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Knowledge, Commodity, Increase

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• As you make your bed, so you must lie in it.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Lying, Bed, Politics

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• The hero was distinguished by his achievement; the celebrity by his image or trademark. The hero created himself; the celebrity is created by the media. The hero was a big man; the celebrity is a big name.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Sports, Hero, Men

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2012). “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America”, p.61, Vintage

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• Time makes heroes but dissolves celebrities.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Time, Hero, Idols

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• The problem for us is less to discover the way it really is than to see the meaning of the way.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Way, Problem

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2010). “The Americans: The Democratic Experience”, p.896, Vintage

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• In America, communities existed before governments. There were many groups of people with a common sense of purpose and a feeling of duty to one another before there were political institutions.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Government, America, People

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• Disagreement produces debate but dissent produces dissension.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Debate, Produce, Dissent

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• The celebrity is a person who is known for his well-knownness.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Wells, Persons, Known

  The Image ch. 1 (1962)

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• Creators, makers of the new, can never become obsolete, for in the arts there is no correct answer. The story of discoverers could be told in simple chronological order, since the latest science replaces what went before. But the arts are another story- a story of infinite addition. We must find order in the random flexings of the imagination.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Art, Creativity, Simple

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2012). “The Creators: A History of Heroes of the Imagination”, p.16, Vintage

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• The most promising words ever written on the maps of human knowledge are terra incognita, unknown territory.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Maps, Territory, Humans

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2011). “The Discoverers”, p.16, Vintage

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• God is the celebrity author of the world's best seller. We have made god into the biggest celebrity of all, to contain our own emptiness.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Atheism, World, Emptiness

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2012). “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America”, p.183, Vintage

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• I write to discover what I think. After all, the bars aren't open that early.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Writing, Thinking, Bars

  Wall Street Journal, December 31, 1985.

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• There is no known device for artistic contraception.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Artistic, Devices, Contraception

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• The traveler used to go about the world to encounter the natives. A function of travel agencies now is to prevent this encounter.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Travel, Agency, Encounters

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2012). “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America”, p.91, Vintage

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• There is no disinfectant like success.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Success

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• Each living art object, taken out of its native habitat so we can conveniently gaze at it, is like an animal in a zoo. Something about it has died in the removal.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Art, Zoos, Taken

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• We read advertisements... to discover and enlarge our desires. We are always ready - even eager - to discover, from the announcement of a new product, what we have all along wanted without really knowing it.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Knowing, Desire, Advertising

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2012). “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America”, p.232, Vintage

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• While knowledge is orderly and cumulative, information is random and miscellaneous.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Knowledge, Information, Miscellaneous

  "Gresham's Law: Knowledge or Information?". Daniel J. Boorstin's remarks at the White House conference on library and information services in Washington, D.C., November 19, 1979.

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• The hero was a big man; the celebrity is a big name.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Hero, Men, Names

  Daniel J. Boorstin (2012). “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America”, p.61, Vintage

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