A dictionary of Marshall McLuhan’s quotations

Compiled by William Kuhns
©2026 Marshall McLuhan Estate

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Why do people assume that there's an absolute, static fixed value inherent in some pre- existing situation, while they spend all their time and energy creating new situations which will surely liquidate the pre-existing one?
Letter to Claude Bissell, December 14, 1960, in Letters of Marshall McLuhan (1987), p 275
Quote #5997
Year: 1960
Chapters: Law of Implementation | Rear View Mirror
↪ Also at #3305

Drawn to McLuhan #3

Digital illustration of a large glass bowl on a dark surface containing a miniature two-story dollhouse interior at night; a family watches TV in a lit living room downstairs while a baby sleeps in a nursery upstairs.
"As we transfer our whole being to the data bank, privacy will become a ghost or echo of its former self."
Satirical gilt-framed oil painting hanging in a gallery, depicting a shirtless man on horseback against a mountainous steppe landscape, with a plaque reading "Riders on the Steppe, V. Rutin.
"It is a characteristic of all social processes that they become manifest and conspicuous at the moment of their demise."
Comic-style illustration of a TV news reporter and cameraman interviewing near a jungle clearing where a safari hunter crouches with a rifle beside scattered papers, while a giant bearded stone head on a long serpentine neck looms in the trees with a small monkey nearby.
"Never hunt anything small."
Black-and-white halftone illustration of three guitar cases leaning against a brick wall beside a "Stage Entrance" sign, with band posters mounted on the wall above.
"The future of consciousness is already assuming a very different pattern, a very different character."
Illustration of an anthropomorphic smartphone with a smiling face, arms, and legs, cupping three small human figures in its hands, each absorbed in staring at their own phone, on a park path with a city skyline behind them.
"The tools we shape, reshape us."
Watercolor-style illustration of a barefoot woman wearing a VR headset, reaching out with both hands as if touching an unseen object, standing in an empty room with a bare wood floor.
"There is no inside or outside under electronic conditions."
Illustrated portrait of a bespectacled man in a suit and cardigan pulling apart a glowing yin-yang symbol with both hands, set against a bookshelf of philosophy titles and vintage televisions.
"To give both sides tends to ignore the possibility that there may be more sides than two."
© The Estate of Marshall McLuhan