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C00002 00002	TECHNOLOGY AND IDEOLOGY - AD HOMINEM REMARKS
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TECHNOLOGY AND IDEOLOGY - AD HOMINEM REMARKS


	For those who know  even less Latin than I do,  an ad hominem
argument  is aimed  at  the man  rather than  his  case.   Ad hominem
arguments are traditionally regarded as bad since attacking  a person
does not refute his position.  However, they have become more popular
lately, because  Marxists say, "You disagree with me, because you are
a lackey of the bourgeoisie", psychoanalysts say,  "you disagree with
me, because you have a neurotic block", and J. K. Galbraith sometimes
says, "they disagree with me,  because their tastes have been  formed
by advertising".  A case that relies entirely on ad hominem arguments
should be dismissed  without further thought, because it is an appeal
to your dislikes rather than to your reason. 

	In this book  so far, I  believe I have  managed to avoid  ad
hominem remarks  almost completely, but  now I  would like to  try to
account  for  anti-technological  views so  that  the  reader  who is
inclined to such views for non-rational reasons will be able to avoid
them and so  that he will be able to  detect these irrationalities in
others. 

	Anti-technological and anti-modern views have a long history. 


	1. The liberal arts fraud. 

	2. Lawyers and two sides to every question. 

	3. Manipulation of guilt and its conversion into hate. 

	4. Those who took the easy  way in college wish to  denigrate
their betters. 

	5. Snobs and effete snobs. 

	6. Usually a cynical  view of the motives of  some group will
dominate a conversation  compared to a favorable view.  If a listener
is offended by the view, he is more likely to counterattack against a
rival group  than to  defend the  group attacked.   This  response is
especially prevalent among young people and working class people.  So
far as I know, this is not a recent phenomenon. 

	7. Fashionable pessimism and archaism dates back  at least to
the eighteenth century.   Voltaire (I think) has dialogues on whether
the ancients were  better than  moderns.   As far  as I  can see  the
arguments  that  the  world  is  deteriorating  had  then  a  similar
psychological  basis to  the present  ones, although  I must  admit I
can't specify what this basis is. 

	9. The main source of  human unhappiness is the shortness  of
life.