Quote of the Day: Lippmann's "Public Opinion"

Dear Global Media Bloggers,

Goeie môre!

Since this day is under the signs of mass communication, here is a link to Walter Lippmann's "Public Opinion" that you might enjoy. I took the quote from the Chapter "The World Outside and the Pictures in our Heads":

The world that we have to deal with politically is out of reach, out of sight, out of mind. It has to be explored, reported, and imagined. Man is no Aristotelian god contemplating all existence at one glance. […] Yet this same creature has invented ways of seeing what no naked eye could see, of hearing what no ear could hear, of weighing immense masses and infinitesimal ones, of counting and separating more items than he can individually remember. He is learning to see with his mind vast portions of the world that he could never see, touch, smell, hear, or remember. Gradually he makes for himself a trustworthy picture inside his head of the world beyond his reach.

You will find the full text at http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/6456, or at

GoogleBooks: http://books.google.com/books?id=eLobn4WwbLUC&dq=Public+Opinion+Lippmann&hl=de&source=gbs_navlinks_s.

The question is if now, almost a century later, the World has come closer.