Relationships deepen not because we necessarily say anything in particular but because we are invested enough to show up for another conversation. In family conversations, children learn that what can matter most is not the information share but the relationships sustained. (pg 107)
Relationships in families are messy and untidy. If we clean them up with technology, we don't necessarily do them justice (pg 130)
Catastrophes have the ring of an act of God. They happen to us and we can't see them coming. When terrorism is presented as a calamity, and it is, it is presented as separate from the history that created it, so that it comes to be more like a natural disaster, a state of evil, rather than something that can be addressed by politics or through a reconsideration of its historical roots. When terror is treated as a natural disaster, all we can do about it is kill terrorists. (pg 301)
"Freedom of the mind requires not only, or not even especially, the absence of legal constraints but the presence of alternative thoughts. The most successful tyranny is not the one that uses force to assure uniformity, but the one that removes awareness of other possibilities." - Alan Bloom quoted on page 307
When she was younger, she was "creeped out" by Facebook having so much information about her, but now she deals with her distrust of Facebook by keeping her posts light (pg 311)
"In the end, we will be defined not only by what we create but by what we refuse to destroy." - John Sawhill quoted on page 317
GUIDEPOSTS
- Remember the power of your phone. It's not an accessory.
- Slow down
- Protect your creativity. Take your time and take quiet time. Find your own agenda and keep your own pace
- Create sacred spaces for conversation
- We teach the capacity for solitude by being quiet alongside children who have our attention
- Think of uni-tasking as the next big thing
- Talk to people with whom you don't agree
- Obey the 7 minute rule (it takes at least 7 minutes to see how a conversation will unfold)
- Challenge a view of the world as apps
- Choose the right tool for the job (often that's not a tech tool)
- Learn from moments of friction
- Remember what you know about life
- Don't avoid difficult conversations
- Try to avoid all or nothing thinking.
- Robots get us to hope for more...for simple salvation (pg 339)
We want more from technology and less from each other. What once would've seemed like "friendly service" at a community market had become an inconvenience that keeps us from our phones. (pg 346)
In our new culture of connection, we are lonely but afraid of intimacy. (pg 357)
Younger people are supposed to be listening. This is the compact between generations. When we celebrate robot listeners that cannot listen, we show too little interest in what our elders have to say. We build machines that guarantee that human stories will fall on deaf ears. (pg 359)