(I) IMA'S READING...
i.e., snippets from ✶ so human an animal (rené dubos, 1968)
— warnings? some potentially triggering (flippant) use of sexual assault terminology.
FOREWORD
"All thoughtful persons worry about the future of the children who will have to spend their lives under the absurd social and environmental conditions we are thoughtlessly creating" (xi)
"...the physical and mental characteristics of mankind are being shaped now by dirty skies and cluttered streets, anonymous high rises and amorphous urban sprawl, social attitudes which are more concerned with things than with men" (xi).
"...withdrawing from the present economic system will not suffice to change the suicidal course on which we are engaged" (xii).
"A constructive approach cannot be only political or social" (xii).
1. THE UNBELIEVABLE FUTURE
— Rebels in Search of a Cause
"Environmental ugliness and the rape of nature can be forgiven when they result from poverty, but now when they occur in the midst of plenty and indeed are produced by wealth" (3).
"Our collective sense of guilt comes from a general awareness that our praise of human and natural values is hypocrisy as long as we practice social indifference and convert our land into a gigantic dump" (4).
"Society cannot be reformed by creating more wealth and power" (4).
"...mankind is becoming disturbed by increasing dehumanization" (5).
"...as long as there are rebels in our midst, there is reason to hope that our societies can be saved" (5).
"This society has more comfort, safety, and power than any before it, but the quality of life is cheapened by the physical and emotional junk heap we have created" (6).
"...the acknowledgment of guilt is not enough" (7).
"We cannot transform the world until we eliminate from our collective mind the concept that man's goals are the conquest of nature and the subjection of the human mind" (7).
"The creation of an environment in which scientific technology renders man completely independent of natural forces calls to mind a dismal future in which man will be served by robots and thereby himself become a robot" (8).
— The New Pessimism
"...social regimentation and loss of privacy may soon reach levels incompatible with the traditional ways of civilized life" (10).
"American philosopher John Dewey in his warning that a culture which permits science to destroy traditional values, but which distrusts its power to create new ones, is destroying itself" (10-11).
"...dashing expressions do not constitute an adequate substitute for the responsibility of making value judgements" (12).
started on nov 25, 2025 & completed on [??]
