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Ted Kaczynski has died

nytimes.com

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Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#241

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…

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While this is totally understandable, it's also an example of the Identfiable Victim Effect. Kaczysnki's actions are humanly understandable with the ability to impute human motivations. He intentionally maimed and killed people.

Yet, from a utilitarian perspective, I honestly don't know if intent matters when we're talking about third-party maiming and death. Our society disrupts and injures the bodies, minds, and livelihoods of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, if not billions, on a daily basis.

And in that sense, Kaczynski, Ellul, or really any dissident of the status quo could, can, and do point out victims of society that outnumber Kaczynski's by several orders of magnitude. The victims are not directly and immediately visible, don't have power-holding advocates, and have little to no incentive to disrupt their own lives to discover, let alone undo, the causes of their problems. And if they do, they encounter a system most unwilling to listen or change.

All of this contributes to these innocents being left unmourned and the causes of their tragedies, like minefields for future generations, left unresolved (Kaczynski mails mines and dies in prison; Kissinger sows fields of mines and lives to be a centenarian and the eldest diplomat).

For an example directly related to maiming, consider the allegations of SawStop. A technology was invented to prevent serious maiming when operating table saws in 2002. The inventor attempted to license the technology to manufacturers only to (allegedly, their lawsuit was dismissed due to supposed tardiness in filing) encounter a cartel among tool manufacturers that colluded to prevent adoption of the technology because it would become obligate to all models to prevent legal liability, which would largely eliminate budget saw models.

The number of finger or hand amputations in the US annually is in the thousands, for one type of tool.

Or consider meat packing (excluding power-butchering injuries that typically include hand and finger amputation):

"There are many serious safety and health hazards in the meat packing industry. These hazards include exposure to high noise levels, dangerous equipment, slippery floors, musculoskeletal disorders, and hazardous chemicals (including ammonia that is used as a refrigerant). Musculoskeletal disorders comprise a large part of these serious injuries and continue to be common among meat packing workers. In addition, meat packing workers can be exposed to biological hazards associated with handling live animals or exposures to feces and blood which can increase their risk for many diseases."

And this is an industry where undocumented workers are prioritized because they lack the language and advocacy to receive adequate compensation and legal protections.

Even something as benign-seeming as a Nalgene bottle follows a similar kind of delayed statistical violence. BPA, shown to be independently unsafe, gets replaced with Triton, unshown to be anything. Triton is effectively an analog with likely xenoestrogenic and endocrine disrupting capabilities, yet can slip through a loophole with decades of profitability before the externalities start directly emerging.

I lost my grandmother to ovarian cancer, likely caused by long-term use of asbestos-laced baby powder. A certain corporation gets a single $9 billion penalty for poisoning millions over decades; I and countless others lose their family members. This corporation's gross profit last year was something like $64 billion.

Now I also understand the argument that if industrial society has caused these things, they have also enabled untold material prosperity globally and billions of additional lives to live. Maiming, industrial accidents, and toxicity are the price to pay for this and they all "happen" to be the aberration rather than the norm, with constant incremental improvements as circumstances allow.

And yet, I think I'd rather have less sophisticated stuff and fewer unhappy people alive at any present moment if I could guarantee that those living on this planet now and those born in the future could live healthier, happier, and more meaningful lives as a result. Killing and maiming people in retaliation is a terrible way of getting there. As a final note, I'm currently in the process of my own exodus to leave the city (wish me luck!) to follow this path of voluntary simplicity and pacifism, lest anyone accuse me of trying to improve society somewhat.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#243

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.

This also works with some Hitler quotes, what's your point?

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#244

It’s been years since I’ve read Industrial Society and its Future , but I remember it felt like the author was rationalizing his own emotional state into a philosophy supposedly explaining society. It contained many subjective ideas presented as hard fact, as well as some naive romanticization of pre-industrial societies. He was right about one thing, though. No one would give his writings a second look if he wasn’t…

>It contained many subjective ideas presented as hard fact, as well as some naive romanticization of pre-industrial societies.

You may enjoy reading this:

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/ted-kaczynski-the-tr...

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#246

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…

> "Technology bad."

I didn't read it like that, it was more like "I don't want a six lane highway in front of my house", "Oh, you're just against progress and modernism, so shut up", "Ok, maybe I blow your shit up"...

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#247

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…

Agree, Kaczynski did make some good points. Maybe if he had learned to channel that energy better.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#248
he moved into a shack in the mountains searching for tranquility and silence. just to get tormented there by noise from local wood industry and dogs. So, he kills the dogs and then sabotages machinery. for me - he's an unsung hero. may he finally rest in peace now.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#249

His opinions may be credible. His methods to gain attention towards them were absolutely not. A travesty how he was treated in those medical experiments. It's always tragic to find out reasons why people hurt others.

Would his methods be credible if he was doing it in the 40s and they were directed against nazi intelligentsia for example?

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#250
post #146
post #31

His manifesto is worth reading. Although he was obviously a twisted man many of his predictions for the future were eerily prescient. http://editions-hache.com/essais/pdf/kaczynski2.pdf

He’s really not coherent. His premises aren’t grounded in reality, and his conclusions don’t follow logically from his premises. It’s also lacks humanity or empathy. It’s an interesting read, because you can really see a broken mind at work, but there’s really not anything to learn from the ideas themselves. E.g., his mental model of “leftists” is truly bizarre. It would be funny except I know what it lead to.

He can't even define who the leftists are and even admits it.

> Our discussion of leftism has a serious weakness. It is still far from clear what we mean by the word “leftist.” There doesn’t seem to be much we can do about this. To- day leftism is fragmented into a whole spectrum of activist movements ...

> To the extent that it is defined at all, our conception of leftism is defined by the discussion of it that we have given in this article, and we can only advise the reader to use his own judg- ment in deciding who is a leftist.

So yeah, just pick whoever you want as leftist. Some characteristics of the leftists:

> He tends to be for gun control, for sex education and other psychologically “en- lightened” educational methods, for social planning, for affirmative action, for multiculturalism. He tends to identify with victims.

Wow, sounds like those leftists are pretty cool, actually intelligent people!

Seriously, I could make fun of this shit all day, but perhaps I'll do something more productive.

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