Sherry Turkle

“Technology challenges us to look at our human values. We can try to use technology to cure Parkinson's or Alzheimer's, which would be a blessing, but that blessing is not a reason to move from artificial brain enhancement to artificial intimacy.”

“The way we contemplate technology on the horizon says much about who we are and who we are willing to become.”

“There are moments of opportunity for families; moments they need to put technology away. These include: no phones or texting during meals. No phones or texting when parents pick up children at school - a child is looking to make eye contact with a parent!”

“It's too late to leave the future to the futurists.”

“Boredom is your imagination calling to you.”

“Everybody wants a robot that will do psychotherapy. But If you don't have empathy, you don't have psychotherapy. The robot doesn't know about life.”

“I have to fight the impulse to use my phone as an alarm clock rather than leaving it in another room. If I don't, I will wake up in the middle of the night and think, 'I'll check my messages. Or the number of my book on Amazon.'”

“Teenagers would rather text than talk. They feel calls would reveal too much.”

“It used to be that we imagined that our mobile phones would be for us to talk to each other. Now, our mobile phones are there to talk to us.”

“Teenagers talk about the idea of having each other's 'full attention.' They grew up in a culture of distraction. They remember their parents were on cell phones when they were pushed on swings as toddlers. Now, their parents text at the dinner table and don't look up from their BlackBerry when they come for end-of-school day pickup.”

“I am a single mum. I raised my daughter, and she was very listened to.”

“We have to love technology enough to describe it accurately. And we have to love ourselves enough to confront technology's true effect on us.”

“This is what technology wants, it wants to be a symptom. Like all psychological symptoms, it obscures a problem by "solving" it without addressing it.”

“I am a partisan for conversation. To make room for it, I see some first, deliberate steps. At home, we can create sacred spaces: the kitchen, the dining room. We can make our cars 'device-free zones.' We can demonstrate the value of conversation to our children. And we can do the same thing at work.”

“What is so seductive about texting, about keeping that phone on, about that little red light on the BlackBerry, is you want to know who wants you.”

“In solitude, we find ourselves; we prepare ourselves to come to conversation with something to say that is authentic, ours.”

“As adults, we can develop and change our opinions. In childhood, we establish the truth of our hearts.”

“I am not anti-technology; I am pro-conversation.”

“Face-to-face conversation unfolds slowly. It teaches patience.”

“Technology doesn't just do things for us. It does things to us, changing not just what we do but who we are.”