Daniel J. Boorstin Quotes

75 Sourced Quotes

The deeper problems connected with advertising come less from the unscrupulousness of our deceivers than from our pleasure in being deceived, less from the desire to seduce than from the desire to be seduced.

Daniel J. Boorstin
The force of the advertising word and image dwarfs the power of other literature in the 20th century.

Daniel J. Boorstin
If our knowledge is, as I believe, only an island in an infinite sea of ignorance, how can we in our short lifetime find satisfaction in exploring our little island? How can we persuade ourselves to be exhilarated by our meager knowledge and yet not be discouraged by the ocean vistas?

Daniel J. Boorstin
The most refined skills of color printing, the intricate techniques of wide-angle photography, provide us pictures of trivia bigger and more real than life. We forget that we see trivia and notice only that the reproduction is so good. Man fulfils his dream and by photographic magic produces a precise image of the Grand Canyon. The result is not that he adores nature or beauty the more. Instead he adores his camera - and himself.

Daniel J. Boorstin
Books are messengers of freedom. They can be hidden under a mattress or smuggled into slave nations.

Daniel J. Boorstin
A pseudo-events comes about because someone has planned, planted, or incited it. Typically, it is not a train wreck or an earthquake, but an interview.

Daniel J. Boorstin
No agnostic ever burned anyone at the stake or tortured a pagan, a heretic, or an unbeliever.

Daniel J. Boorstin
While the easiest way in metaphysics is to condemn all metaphysics as nonsense, the easiest way in morals is to elevate the common practice of the community into a moral absolute.

Daniel J. Boorstin
The courage to imagine the otherwise is our greatest resource, adding color and suspense to all our life.

Daniel J. Boorstin
Best-sellerism is the star system of the book world. A "best seller" is a celebrity among books. It is a book known primarily (sometimes exclusively) for its well-knownness.

Daniel J. Boorstin
In fast-moving, progress-conscious America, the consumer expects to be dizzied by progress. If he could completely understand advertising jargon he would be badly disappointed. The half-intelligibility which we expect, or even hope, to find in the latest product language personally reassures each of us that progress is being made: that the pace exceeds our ability to follow.

Daniel J. Boorstin
Truth has been displaced by believability as the test of the statements that dominate our lives.

Daniel J. Boorstin
A pseudo event … comes about because someone has planned, planted, or incited it. Typically, it is not a train wreck or an earthquake, but an interview.

Daniel J. Boorstin
The great obstacle to discovering the shape of the earth, the continents, and the ocean was not ignorance but the illusion of knowledge.

Daniel J. Boorstin
We suffer primarily not from our vices or our weaknesses, but from our illusions. We are haunted, not by reality, but by those images we have put in their place.

Daniel J. Boorstin