Works in ChatGPT, Claude, or Any AI
Add semantic quote search to your AI assistant via MCP. One command setup.
" "If, as many anthropologists still hold, the making and using of tools as one of the chief sources of primitive man's intellectual development, is it not time that we asked ourselves what will happen to man if he departs as completely as he now threatens to do from his primal polytechnic occupations? Since they can no longer be pursued at a profit, perhaps they will have to be restored as modes of sport and recreation, even more as helpful — increasingly essential — forms of personal service and mutual aid.
Lewis Mumford (19 October 1895 – 26 January 1990) was an American historian of technology and science, also noted for his study of cities.
Biography information from Wikiquote
Add semantic quote search to your AI assistant via MCP. One command setup.
Related quotes. More quotes will automatically load as you scroll down, or you can use the load more buttons.
Sport in the sense of a mass-spectacle, with death to add to the underlying excitement, comes into existence when a population has been drilled and regimented and depressed to such an extent that it needs at least a vicarious participation in difficult feats of strength or skill or heroism in order to sustain its waning life-sense.
Enjoy ad-free browsing, unlimited collections, and advanced search features with Premium.
In surrendering unconditionally to the power system, with its 'automation of automation,' modern man has forfeited some of the inner resources necessary to keep him alive: above all, animal faith in his own capacity to survive and to reproduce his kind, biologically, historically, and culturally. In the act of dismissing the past he has undermined his faith in the future; for it is only by their convergence in his present consciousness that he can preserve continuity through change and embrace change without forfeiting continuity. This and nothing less is the 'way of life.