Quote

Possession of territory is not primarily about laws and contracts, but first and foremost a matter of movement and circulation.

Paul Virilio

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Paul Virilio
Age: 86 †
Born: 1932
Born: January 4
Died: 2018
Died: September 10
Architect
Art Theorist
Exhibition Curator
Painter
Philosopher
Photographer
Sociologist
Urban Planner
Writer
Paris
France
Law
Circulation
Firsts
Foremost
Matter
Primarily
First
Contracts
Territory
Possession
Laws
Movement

More quotes by Paul Virilio

Image
Let us put it this way, techno-scientific intelligence is presently insufficiently spread among society at large to enable us to interpret the sorts of techno-scientific advances that are taking shape today.
Paul Virilio
Image
Today, almost all-current technologies put the speed of light to work.
Paul Virilio
Image
Whoever controls the territory possesses it.
Paul Virilio
Image
Television was first conceived to be used as some kind of telescope, not for broadcasting. Originally, Sworkin, the inventor of television, wanted to settle cameras on rockets so that it would be possible to watch the sky.
Paul Virilio
Image
I am always concerned with ideas of territory and movement. Indeed, my first book after Bunker Archeology was entitled L'insecurite du territoire (1976).
Paul Virilio
Image
Television exposes the world to the accident. The world is exposed to accidents through television.
Paul Virilio
Image
Today, everything is about speed and real time. We are no longer concerned with real space.
Paul Virilio
Image
I have said many times before, interactivity is the equivalent of radioactivity. For interactivity effects a kind of disintegration, a kind of rupture.
Paul Virilio
Image
I don't believe in simulationism, I believe that the word is already old-fashioned. As I see it, new technologies are substituting a virtual reality for an actual reality. And this is more than a phase: it's a definite change.
Paul Virilio
Image
The field of vision is comparable, for me, to the terrain of an archaeological dig. To see is to be on guard, to wait for what emerges from the background, without any name, without any particular interest: what was silent will speak, what is closed will open and will take on a voice.
Paul Virilio
Image
Under the Occupation, we in Nantes were denied access to the coast of the Atlantic Ocean. It was therefore not until after the War was over that I saw the sea for the first time, in the vicinity of St Nazaire. It was there that I discovered the bunkers.
Paul Virilio
Image
Hence not only the crisis of geopolitics and geostrategy but also the shift towards the emergence and dominance of chronostrategy.
Paul Virilio
Image
I am of course thinking here about new planes such as the Sukhois. There is very little discussion about such developments but, for me, I am constantly astonished by the current developments within the Russian airforce.
Paul Virilio
Image
The atomic bomb provoked a specific accident.
Paul Virilio
Image
GPS not only played a large and delocalizing role in the war in Kosovo but is increasingly playing a role in social life.
Paul Virilio
Image
As I have said many times before, I was among the first people to experience the German Occupation of France during the Second World War. I was 7-13 years old during the War and did not really internalise its significance.
Paul Virilio
Image
If we consider my latest book, Strategie de la deception, what we need to focus on are the other aspects of the same phenomenon.
Paul Virilio
Image
World War Two was a world war in space. It spread from Europe to Japan, to the Soviet Union, etc. World War Two was quite different from World War One which was geographically limited to Europe. But in the case of the Gulf War, we are dealing with a war which is extremely local in space, but global in time, since it is the first 'live' war.
Paul Virilio
Image
From the original watchtower through the anchored balloon to the reconnaissance aircraft and remote sensing-satellites, one and the same function has been indefinitely repeated, the eye's function being the function of a weapon.
Paul Virilio
Image
I could give examples of cabinet ministers, including defence ministers, who have no technological culture at all. In other words, what I am suggesting is that the hype generated by the publicity around the Internet and so on is not counter balanced by a political intelligence that is based on a technological culture.
Paul Virilio