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THE AMERICAN NIGHTMARE: Technological Obsession in the Age of Experts by Sidney J. Slomich

THE AMERICAN NIGHTMARE: Technological Obsession in the Age of Experts

By

Pub Date: Oct. 18th, 1971
Publisher: Macmillan

An earnest rehearsal of cliches about the evils of the military, the techno-scientific intellect, the Bomb, the cities, and the warmakers. As a cri du coeur by an Ellsbergian type (Slomich used to participate in councils of state, think-tank machinations, etc.) it lacks weight -- its moral force is diminished by its analytic evasions and notions like ""entropy"" and ""repetition compulsion"" and ""death wish"" lack explanatory value. As a political tract it is vacuous: Slomich lists a number of good things to pursue (limiting space exploration to scientifically sound ventures, re-integrating cities and suburbs, constructing mass transit) but his idea of how to get there is waved across home plate with a vague reference to ""taking full advantage of the one-man one-vote potentials,"" and his sociological sophistication may be gauged by the frequency of the telltale ""we."" Just when the book becomes most irritating for its lack of explicit reference to other thinkers, Slomich interpolates a sort of Western Thought C-107 summation: ""But where are Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas. . .?"" he asks in this connection. Where indeed?