The Unabomber

I read The Unabomber’s manifesto about a year ago. Have you read it? I doubt it.

I heard Ted Kaczynski was a bright guy and thought he might have something interesting to say – apart from the anonymous killing of innocents, of course.

Why am I bringing this up at all? Because Ted and his manifesto are having another moment of fame thanks to Luigi Mangione.

Some things seem profound to twenty-somethings but less so in later life. The writings of Kurt Vonnegut Jr. and Carlos Castaneda come to mind. So, I can imagine that a guy like Luigi, on a mission to right a perceived wrong, might think that Ted has some answers. I would disagree.

Ted Kaczynski was pretty good at describing the problems with modern society. Most of us wouldn’t disagree with him. But it’s a heavy lift to go from identifying a problem to ascribing a cause and proposing a solution.

His reasoning is terrible. It goes something like this: “There’s a problem, and it’s caused by this group of people. If we don’t stop them, the problem will worsen and wind up here.”

OK, Ted. Where’s the proof that Problem A is caused by Group B? None offered, just assertions unsupported by evidence.

Also, Ted, how did you determine that it’s inevitable that Problem A will worsen into Situation C? There is no attempt to build a train of causation. It just “sounds right” that C will result from A.

Why am I talking about a dead guy and his moth-eaten manifesto? Because his big solution to our problems was to bring our modern, technology-heavy society down and (so far as I can tell) return us to the hunter-gatherer era. In the service of this plan, people were killed and maimed. I knew one slightly.

So, fuck you, Ted, for doing such a poor job of going from problem to cause to consequences. And Luigi, do a better job in future picking your mentors.

Your reward for reading is a few photos of interesting rocks taken on our last hike up Tom’s Thumb before leaving Arizona for Washington. The main thing to notice in most photos are the large rocks that look like one good bump could send them down.