RT Article
T1 A requiem for the Unabomber
JF Contemporary justice review
VO 26
IS 2
SP 171
OP 199
A1 Oleson, James C. 1968-
LA English
YR 2023
UL https://krimdok.uni-tuebingen.de/Record/1879931559
AB Theodore John Kaczynski, better known as the Unabomber, died by suicide in June 2023. One of the most best known criminals of the late twentieth century, and a former Harvard mathematics prodigy with an IQ of 167, Kaczynski is remembered for the 1995 publication of his 35,000-word anti-technology essay, Industrial Society and Its Future. This work called for the rejection of technological civilization and the embracing of wild nature. Its publication led to Kaczynski’s identification, apprehension, and a convoluted set of legal proceedings that culminated in a coerced plea arrangement and his incarceration in the US federal supermax prison. Kaczynski was not permitted to introduce a defense of necessity. Instead, he was labeled as ‘mad’ by the press and his family, and identified as a paranoid schizophrenic by a court-appointed psychiatrist. But several commentators have argued that Kaczynski’s reasoning is sound. Indeed, many of Kaczynski’s observations about technology and the environment have proven to be prescient. Accordingly, a new generation of followers have adopted his anti-technology philosophy. If Kaczynski was correct about technology and the environment, this might warrant a reevaluation of his socio-theoretical writings and reconsideration of his constructed persona as a mad genius.
K1 Unabomber Manifesto
K1 Climate Change
K1 anti-tech
K1 Kaczynski
K1 Unabomber
DO 10.1080/10282580.2023.2279312