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Ted Kaczynski has died

nytimes.com

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Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#111

Post by krapp »

znpy wrote: post #64
hnuser847 wrote: post #52

It’s fun to drop verbatim quotes from his manifesto into random internet discussions without attribution. A lot of people agree with his ideas without realizing it.

one of the funniest things for me is the fact that many left-wing people add Kaczynski quotes without realizing that left-wing people are basically the first people to be criticized and almost mocked in Ted's main piece, "Industrial society and its future"

His "criticisms" of the left read like something a denizen of /pol/ or Reddit would come up with. It's entirely possible to see the merits of his arguments against technology while dismissing his deranged hatred of leftists, feminists, etc.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#112

Post by arp242 »

DirectorKrennic wrote: post #27
veave wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Not really. It's a lot of disorganized nonsense with a high noise-to-signal ratio. Random excerpts: > 14. Feminists are desperately anxious to prove that women are as strong and as capable as men. Clearly they are nagged by a fear that women may NOT be as strong and as capable as men. > 15. Leftists tend to hate anything that has an image of being strong, good and successful. They hate America, they hate Western civi…

Reading Kaczynski is a little bit like reading the Bible: you shouldn't take everything literally but instead think about what's trying to be said, and you should ignore some bits.

e.g. paragraph "15" is excessive and inflammatory, but he wasn't wrong that some people will try to find fault for anything that happens in the West while ignoring much greater crimes in other countries. See e.g. all the HN posters who trivialize China's problems while attacking the US (I'm sure this thread will have some of those types of comments, too). This point also wasn't original to Kaczynski, e.g. George Orwell also wrote about it, as did many others.

Also remember much of this was written an era when people were literally collaborating with the USSR and East-Germany out of "socialist ideals" and (rightful) anger over the shady activities of the CIA or FBI, while also ignoring that those countries were significantly worse in almost every way.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#113

Post by jscipione »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #81
bigmattystyles wrote: post #11

No mention of MKUltra, it doesn’t excuse his behavior but does explain why he may have been pushed over the edge.

You'd have a point if other subjects of MK-Ultra allowed a similar trajectory as Kaczynski. Were there other cases of self-destruction? I don't even know how many people were subjected to these experiments.

Brittney Spears comes to mind, she is still under a conservatorship after her mk-ultra caused mental break.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#114

Post by anon291 »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #81
bigmattystyles wrote: post #11

No mention of MKUltra, it doesn’t excuse his behavior but does explain why he may have been pushed over the edge.

You'd have a point if other subjects of MK-Ultra allowed a similar trajectory as Kaczynski. Were there other cases of self-destruction? I don't even know how many people were subjected to these experiments.

Yes quite a few mass murderers were purported subjects of mkultra. Of course we do not know with certainty the full scale.

Sirhan sirhan and Charles Manson come to mind.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#115

Post by [deleted] »

Convolutional wrote: post #90
californiadreem wrote: post #32

Anyone who disagrees with Kaczynski's ideas because they came from a convicted terrorist should read the works of Jacques Ellul instead, of which Kaczynski's was largely a popular reduction. The Technological Society is the clearest influence on Kaczynski's manifesto, but Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes is possibly more pertinent in this day and age. Ellul was a professor, a pacifist, and a Christian ana…

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#116

Post by coldtea »

murderberry wrote: post #86
moffkalast wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't suppose anyone has a short summary?

"Technology bad." It's really that. He falls for the same trap many modern critics of progress do: the nostalgia for a world that never existed, when men lived meaningful lives in peaceful harmony with nature... juxtaposed with all the purported moral, societal, and environmental decay of today. Many people find it alluring today, but the themes are evergreen. They crop up in ancient Greece, in the Middle Ages, and t…

>He falls for the same trap many modern critics of progress do: the nostalgia for a world that never existed

There's the opposite problem most have: the inability to understand that there are people who have actually experienced the past (within their lives) and might prefer it for reasons other than the cliche "they were young then, that's why they like it" compared to the present.

And that, depending on your inclinations and ideas about how to live, it's not true that nothing better "ever existed".

>is that the prescription for returning to that utopian bygone era inevitably involves force: the premise is that our minds are too corrupted to understand what's right

Well, the future comes at people with force too. People thrown out of employment into poverty because of technology and being told "just learn to code" for example.

Or things getting integrated with the state and business world, and becoming increasingly necessary to have, even if you don't want them.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#117

Post by rough-sea »

murderberry wrote: post #86
moffkalast wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't suppose anyone has a short summary?

"Technology bad." It's really that. He falls for the same trap many modern critics of progress do: the nostalgia for a world that never existed, when men lived meaningful lives in peaceful harmony with nature... juxtaposed with all the purported moral, societal, and environmental decay of today. Many people find it alluring today, but the themes are evergreen. They crop up in ancient Greece, in the Middle Ages, and t…

Thank you. It’s depressing to find so many people on HN expressing sympathy for the nonsense written in the manifesto.

People should read “Beginning of Infinity” for a strong counter argument.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#118

Post by drones »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #61
drones wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are way more Ted K's running around today - it's just that you don't need to kill people to get heard anymore. Nowadays the spectacle of ruining your own life is enough to get noticed. Anyone with an internet connection today has access to world stage provided they are interesting enough. Back then you'd need to catch the eye of a producer for a mainstream news broadcast to get any coverage. Now you can just fi…

You seem to suggest that Kaczynski murdered as a kind of marketing strategy for his ideas. I highly doubt that.

Terrorism isn't marketing? Marketing is all about advertising your ideas and changing people's ideas. 9/11 wasn't marketing for Al-Quaeda?

Even if he was purely driven out of self-interest and ego, the result of his actions is that today we are discussing his ideas when we should be working.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#119

Post by anon291 »

ajhurliman wrote: post #36
reaperman wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I don’t think it excuses it at all but I wonder at what point it would? If MKUltra had removed 70% of his brain, would that excuse his actions?

This line of thinking has always puzzled me. At some point one’s brain must be so compromised that we really can’t expect them to function as a human, but most people’s reaction to that is “excusing” their behavior. If you’re willing to admit that they don’t really have self-agency at that point, don’t they become an object at that point? Like we would have no problem putting down a dog that bit a child, let alone a…

Well .. I think prison was a good place for him but I also think his manifesto is coherent and should be more widely read.
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