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Ted Kaczynski has died

nytimes.com

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Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#641

Post by emodendroket »

forgetfreeman wrote: post #620
emodendroket wrote: post #564

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He forced his way into the conversation through terrorism. It seems reasonable enough to reject his ideas out of hand rather than give them respectful hearing.

With respect this is not correct. What you are describing is Ad Hominem driven by some kind of moralist knee-jerk reaction. The absurd extreme of this line of reasoning would be to refuse to acknowledge the existence of snow because Hitler mentioned in passing in a letter or a speech at some point.

A more accurate Hitler analogy would probably be to reject his racial theories out of hand since they led to the world's first industrial-scale genocide.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#642

Post by dredmorbius »

bheadmaster wrote: post #28
mberning wrote: post #14

Blowing people up is wrong. But his manifesto was right about many things. It’s interesting to skim through it every couple years.

> Blowing people up is wrong. So is performing torture experiments on them to see what happens them locking them up when they crack.

For those missing the reference, this being arguably what may have occurred in the present instance:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Murray#Harvard_human_exp...>

Covered in Harvard and the Unabomber : the education of an American terrorist:

https://archive.org/details/harvardunabomber00chas/page/18/m...>

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#643

Post by forgetfreeman »

happytoexplain wrote: post #631
forgetfreeman wrote: post #620

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With respect this is not correct. What you are describing is Ad Hominem driven by some kind of moralist knee-jerk reaction. The absurd extreme of this line of reasoning would be to refuse to acknowledge the existence of snow because Hitler mentioned in passing in a letter or a speech at some point.

Not correct? Ad hominem? Moralist knee-jerk reaction? Absurd? Extreme? There is probably a more reasonable version of this disagreement, to put it lightly. Unlike Hitler's opinions on snow, Ted Kaczynski's murders are inextricably linked to his ideology.

And how would you know what, exactly? Have you actually taken the time to read any of the man's writing? Because I've been picking my way through his manifesto off and on this evening and so far what I'm encountering is calm, lucid, internally consistent, and a fairly accurate critique. Something about this exchange is reminding me of all of the decades of inarticulate hyperventilating about "communism" by individuals who hadn't bothered to so much as read the manifesto, much less examine Marx's writings.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#644

Post by waihtis »

notacoward wrote: post #353
waihtis wrote: post #153

Kaczynski's entire opposition to technology seems to focus purely on amplifying the negative aspects of technological advancement. But after reading David Deutsch, I cannot but think all and any technological advancement is desirable and there's little merit to technological doomerism.

"Any and all"? It's not a particularly surprising attitude to find here, but I think it's a hard one to justify. Does ubiquitous surveillance technology not bother you at all, no matter how it's likely to be used? Are new methods of killing people always good? How about mind control? Not that we have it, but "any and all" would cover it. Is "doomerism" the only alternative you can think of to infinite optimism? That'…

Surveillance tech is usually a derivative of other technological advancements which would still result in a net benefit.

The middle ground between infinite optimism and doomerism seems to be regulation which more often than not results in very subpar conditions. I feel there's really no other position to hold.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#645

Post by forgetfreeman »

emodendroket wrote: post #641
forgetfreeman wrote: post #620

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With respect this is not correct. What you are describing is Ad Hominem driven by some kind of moralist knee-jerk reaction. The absurd extreme of this line of reasoning would be to refuse to acknowledge the existence of snow because Hitler mentioned in passing in a letter or a speech at some point.

A more accurate Hitler analogy would probably be to reject his racial theories out of hand since they led to the world's first industrial-scale genocide.

Rejection out of hand is bankrupt regardless of what motivation one cares to use as a hood ornament. If one can't be assed to even examine the claims in question, one certainly isn't qualified to field a critique thereof. At minimum, one should know one's enemy.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#646

Post by ars »

fsckboy wrote: post #633
tptacek wrote: post #442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When threads about Kaczynski come up, I try to remind people that the guy attempted to take down an American Airlines jetliner. He got a bomb on board in the cargo bay designed to explode at altitude --- and it did indeed explode, caused the plane to lose pressure, and filled the cabin with smoke. There were 78 people on board that flight, and but for the skill of the pilots, Kaczynski would have murdered all of them…

We're talking about someone who suffered from very serious mental illness. And we're talking about stochastic processes. We can agree that killing people or trying to kill people is terrible, but I'd stress the mental illness part so perhaps society will get serious about treating mental illness with seriousness. Our cities are full of mentally ill people living on the streets. Are they a ticking time bomb? was Kaczy…

> And we're talking about stochastic processes.

No we aren't, because that's not a real thing.

That's just something people make up when they want to demonize someone for their words, but don't have any actual evidence that their words are causing harm.

People aren't random agents of evil, that may or may not trigger. That's simply not a description of reality.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#647

Post by cambaceres »

lumb63 wrote: post #567
spencerchubb wrote: post #557

I don't find Ted Kaczynski's manifesto to be insightful. It points out that technology has flaws, which is frankly quite obvious and is a fact that everyone already agrees with. Furthermore, his proposed solution is crap. He proposes that we just go back to wilderness, which is bad for many obvious reasons. Technology and division of labor has allowed us to spend our days improving humanity rather than finding food j…

I had a different take on his writings than yours. Rather than thinking his solution was bad, he encouraged me to question why we “spend our days improving humanity”. What does “improving humanity” even mean? What’s the metric we are optimizing for? Are we, humanity, any happier than we were when we were hunter-gatherer tribes? I don’t think so - we’ve just found new metrics to focus on and to be disappointed in ours…

What is stopping you from moving out in the wilderness if you think it's the best way to get truly happy?

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#648

Post by bbor »

Eisenstein wrote: post #632
bbor wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are we, humanity, any happier than we were when we were hunter-gatherer tribes? I don’t think so - we’ve just found new metrics to focus on and to be disappointed in ourselves in. This seems crazy to me, leaning heavily on the proof that you yourself obviously are not choosing that life when you easily could. It’s possible in the same way that anything is possible, but cmon - the world is objectively less violent,…

> This seems crazy to me, leaning heavily on the proof that you yourself obviously are not choosing that life when you easily could. Can someone do this? Find a place you can live and hunt for free that isn't incredibly difficult to survive in because of its inhospitable climate or lack of resources.

I mean, Africa and LA seem like strong contenders. Most non-rich nations, really. One could say “but I want somewhere safer” but obviously that would be a little bit self-defeating, ideology-wise.

“For free” is also pretty much impossible, especially if you factor in travel, but my intuition tells me that a very modest American or European savings could buy access to land somewhere. Especially if you sold all your possessions, or used credit without intending to pay it back.

Re: resources… I mean that’s kinda the deal? Living immersed in nature without society’s support doesn’t mean relaxing in Eden in the vast vast majority of places, it means fighting like hell. Imo.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#649

Post by emodendroket »

forgetfreeman wrote: post #645
emodendroket wrote: post #641

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A more accurate Hitler analogy would probably be to reject his racial theories out of hand since they led to the world's first industrial-scale genocide.

Rejection out of hand is bankrupt regardless of what motivation one cares to use as a hood ornament. If one can't be assed to even examine the claims in question, one certainly isn't qualified to field a critique thereof. At minimum, one should know one's enemy.

My time and attention is limited and I'd rather not spend it on the scribblings of someone whose intellectual work is only read because of its association with his more famous work sending letter bombs.

Re: Ted Kaczynski has died

#650

Post by MavisBacon »

JshWright wrote: post #505
bkohlmann wrote: post #352

One of my good friend’s dad was brutally murdered by Kaczynski when she was a young teenager. A small bomb in a package that used razor blazes, nails, and other bits of metal to nearly tear his head off while his young family was in the house with him. And it turns out the victim was the “wrong” man, as he didn’t even work on the project Kaczynski wanted to bring “retribution” for. Kaczynski May have said some intere…

Your friend’s dad’s death is also my (very trivial) connection to Kaczynski. That morning our family had gone Christmas tree shopping, and the tree was scheduled to be delivered later that day. As it turned out, the delivery driver was also a Verona volunteer firefighter and ended up responding to the explosion, delaying our tree to the next day. It’s a super trivial connection, but it has always stuck with me.

This surely would stick with me. Wild story.
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