#materialism

Further, in the modern story, reality is that which is observable, measurable, and repeatable - the kinds of phenomena available, accessible, and verifiable to the five senses. Thus, reality comes to equal the scientific method. It should come as no surprise that in such a world the life of the spirit is ignored or marginalized (as well as a great many other nonmaterial things.) This view of life subsequently birthed in human beings a ravenous materialism as matters of the soul were ignored or reinterpreted within this tightly controlled version of reality. When the life of the spirit is ignored, people will seek to feed the hunger of a neglected soul with the only nourishment available: in our context, the consumptive acquisition of material goods. ↗

— Tim Keel

#materialism #modernity #science #spirituality #equality

I cannot live without brainwork. What else is there to live for? Stand at the window here. Was ever such a dreary, dismal, unprofitable world? See how the yellow fog swirls down the street and drifts across the duncoloured houses. What could be more hopelessly prosaic and material? ↗

— Arthur Conan Doyle

#sherlock-holmes #the-sign-of-four #materialism

Jem knotted his fingers in the material of Will's sleeve. "You are my parabatai," he said, "You said once I could ask anything of you. ↗

— Cassandra Clare

#jem-carstairs #will-herondale #materialism

After 1980, you never heard reference to space again. Surface, the most convincing evidence of the descent into materialism, became the focus of design. Space disappeared. ↗

— Arthur Erickson

#again #became #convincing #descent #design

Materialism has never been so ominous as now in North America, as management takes over. ↗

— Arthur Erickson

#been #management #materialism #never #north

This great, though disastrous, culture can only change as we begin to stand off and see... the inveterate materialism which has become the model for cultures around the world. ↗

— Arthur Erickson

#become #begin #change #culture #cultures

I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news ↗

— John Muir

#materialism #mountains #nature #wildness-is-a-necessity #life

The materialist theory of history, that all politics and ethics are the expression of economics, is a very simple fallacy indeed. It consists simply of confusing the necessary conditions of life with the normal preoccupations of life, that are quite a different thing. It is like saying that because a man can only walk about on two legs, therefore he never walks about except to buy shoes and stockings. ↗

— G.K. Chesterton

#life

Needs multiply as they are met. Woe to the man who would live a disentangled life. Be on guard, my soul, of complicating your environment so that you have neither time nor room for growth! ↗

— Elisabeth Elliot

#materialism #life

Sophia sat in meditation on the riverbank when a student bent down to place two enormous pearls at her feet as a gift. She opened her eyes to see the pearls. She picked one up, but dropped it. It rolled down the hill upon which she was sitting and into the river. The student chased after it and looked all afternoon, diving, coming up for air, diving back down. “Sophia,” he asked. “Could you show me where it went in? I can’t find it.” “Right there,” she said throwing the other pearl in the river. ↗

— David W. Jones

#letting-go-of-stuff #materialism #wisdom #love