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Harvard and the Unabomber: The Education of an American Terrorist
Alston Chase presents an interpretation of the infamous Unabomber. He projects Ted Kaczynski's life against the sinister background of the Cold War, when the prospect of nuclear conflict generated a fear of technology and a culture of despair on American college campuses. On these same campuses, federal agencies enlisted psychologists in a covert search for technologies of mind control and encouraged ethically questionable experiments on unwitting students. Harvard University, to postgraduate study and to the edge of the wilderness in Montana, where he put his unthinkable plans into action. His reign of terror is rendered in detail and interwoven with this narrative is the chilling counterpoint of Kaczynki's coded journal entries on the efficacy of materials and techniques - the stark record of a killer's learning curve. A cautionary tale about modern evil, the conditions that provoked Kaczynski's alienation remain in place and may be getting worse as the War on Terrorism replaces the Cold War.
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First published January 1, 2003
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September 9, 2009
One of the best books I have every read. As one of my professors would say, "it will make your fingers burn". It is about Kazcynski but it it more about modernity and modern science. Chase indicates early on that science has lost its telos, or its trajectory and aim. The underlining theme of this book is that a science without a telos or morality is a science that leads to inhuman tragedies. His upbringing, his Harvard experience, the psychological experiments and obviously his personality all played a role in his actions, but more importantly we are all culpable in many of these modern tragedies.
January 5, 2023
This actually constitutes a biography of Ted Kaczynski rather than just being another profile of a criminal. While the Unabomber's crimes are detailed, the exposition is done within a broader sociological context. The author, a philosopher and student of American higher education, treats Kaczynski as an extreme case of a broader social phenomenon which he traces, in part, to curricular reforms and ideological currents in academe. Indeed, he identifies a governmentally funded mind-control study which the young Ted participated in while an undergraduate at Harvard as a likely factor in producing his anti-social pathology, describing that study within the context of the pernicious history of post-war federal funding of such studies commonly identified with the CIA's MK-Ultra program.
While I found this book well-written and quite interesting, I noted a lot of little mistakes such as the misnaming of 'The Port Huron Statement' and, in my opinion, misrepresentation of certain political events of the sixties and seventies. Author Chase is, like Kaczynski, of the generation of the fifties, also a Harvard graduate. Of this, he writes, in part, as an insider. My formative years were a decade later and, as an insider to that, I found my cohort poorly represented by this fellow who, presumably, was teaching my kind during the sixties and seventies.
What this book did do well was to change my understanding of the Unabomber's manifesto published in the NYT. At the time, I found myself in sympathy with much of it, particularly its environmental slant. What I've learned is that that emphasis was likely a cynical ploy of the writer's to elicit such sympathy, that Kaczynski's actual 'political' concerns were actually more along the lines of an extreme right-wing libertarianism fueled by a deep-seated complex of neuroses. Kaczynski was not particularly concerned about the quality of human life on the planet, he was rather exclusively concerned with the quality of his life--and with obtaining revenge on those he identified as being complicit with the factors of his deep unhappiness.
The cable television series on the Unabomber seems to have been based on the theses of this book.
While I found this book well-written and quite interesting, I noted a lot of little mistakes such as the misnaming of 'The Port Huron Statement' and, in my opinion, misrepresentation of certain political events of the sixties and seventies. Author Chase is, like Kaczynski, of the generation of the fifties, also a Harvard graduate. Of this, he writes, in part, as an insider. My formative years were a decade later and, as an insider to that, I found my cohort poorly represented by this fellow who, presumably, was teaching my kind during the sixties and seventies.
What this book did do well was to change my understanding of the Unabomber's manifesto published in the NYT. At the time, I found myself in sympathy with much of it, particularly its environmental slant. What I've learned is that that emphasis was likely a cynical ploy of the writer's to elicit such sympathy, that Kaczynski's actual 'political' concerns were actually more along the lines of an extreme right-wing libertarianism fueled by a deep-seated complex of neuroses. Kaczynski was not particularly concerned about the quality of human life on the planet, he was rather exclusively concerned with the quality of his life--and with obtaining revenge on those he identified as being complicit with the factors of his deep unhappiness.
The cable television series on the Unabomber seems to have been based on the theses of this book.
August 14, 2021
The first of three sections (about 150 pp) gives an absorbing true-crime account of Kaczynski’s bombing career, 1979 – 1995 and goes on to describe his ultimate detection, arrest, and trial. The accounts of the bombings alternate the stories of his victims, law enforcement’s attempts to identify the bomber, and the bomber’s own cold-blooded assessments of his crimes, taken from his coded notebooks.
Part two recounts Kaczynski’s life through his graduation from Harvard in 1962. Chase shows that, while a loner, Kaczynski was not exceptional in this regard, as some degree of isolation was inevitable considering his academic standing and intellectual interest. The author also includes a number of accounts of Kaczynski’s activities and friendships that show him as relatively well-adjusted in high school. He explicitly states that Kaczynski’s father pushed him academically, skipping grades before and in high school and influencing him to take an early admission to Harvard, both against the advice of at least one of his son’s teachers.
Chase also explains Kaczynski’s isolation at Harvard as due at least as much to his youth and working-class background as to his personality and intellectual alienation, citing a number of other public school students, including Chase himself, who found themselves outsiders amid the heavily prep-school oriented student body as well as instructors from the same background.
It is in this section that the university earns its titular placement. Chase, also a Harvard graduate slightly older than his subject, recounts the content and purpose behind Harvard’s mandatory “general education” curriculum, which he considers a fundamental contributing factor to Harvard’s “culture of despair”, in which, under the influence of Postivism, students were taught to credit science as the sole source of truth and to dismiss morality and religious claims as expressions of emotion. He also gives a relatively deep background account of the US military and intelligence services involvement in funding and directing psychological research at US universities. He also gives a lengthy account of the life and career of Henry A. Murray, a Harvard psychology professor who conducted a series of psychological experiments on student volunteers which included Kaczynski during his last 3 undergraduate years. At one point in these experiments, subjects were hooked up to lie-detector-like monitors and filmed while being relentlessly criticized and verbally abused by someone who was supposedly another participant, but was actually an actor planted by the researcher.
Chase gives a lot of weight to the stress caused by these experiments, and considers them an essential factor in the subsequent course of Kaczynski’s life. For him they are the “X factor”, the variable that set Kaczynski’s particular sense of alienation apart from that of many students in similar circumstances. The case as presented didn’t convince me, so that the elaborate background Chase sets up to justify it, while having some intrinsic interest, derails the book to some extent, insofar as it takes the focus off Kaczynski and matters immediately relevant to his life and development.
The third and final section follows Kaczynski’s years in graduate school at the University of Michigan, where he evidently showed promise of a significant career in mathematics, his two years of teaching at Berkley, a position where he showed little promise, and briefly re-tells the story of his bombing career. Like part two, this section frequently takes the focus off Kaczynski in an attempt to fit his crimes into a broader picture of terrorism in the late 20th century. The author again failed to convince me in his claims that Kaczynski somehow presents a kind of archetype of the terrorist mindset, though there are definitely parallels in his conscious prioritization of ideology over human life.
As he admits, Alston Chases’s own life has some parallels with that of Ted Kaczynski. For the reader, this has some advantages and some drawbacks. Like Kaczynski, Chase apparently felt significantly out of place at Harvard, and his degree from that prestigious university failed to provide him with any kind of golden ticket in his subsequent career. The author also moved to rural Montana, where he lived at the time of Kaczynski’s arrest. Chase is able to give the reader a good sense of the milieu of Harvard in the 1950s and fit Kaczynski into the sociology of student life there. His experience in Montana also allows him to correct the impression given by big-city based reporters that Kaczynski’s self-constructed cabin was exceptionally isolated; by Montana standards, it seems, the bomber lived in a relatively populated rural area that gave him, without a car of his own, fairly ready access to transportation. However, I felt the Harvard section suggested an undercurrent of personal resentment toward the school on the part of the author, and it seemed a little too pat to lay the burden of responsibility for the creation of a notorious killer at the doorstep of one of its honored professors and researchers.
Part two recounts Kaczynski’s life through his graduation from Harvard in 1962. Chase shows that, while a loner, Kaczynski was not exceptional in this regard, as some degree of isolation was inevitable considering his academic standing and intellectual interest. The author also includes a number of accounts of Kaczynski’s activities and friendships that show him as relatively well-adjusted in high school. He explicitly states that Kaczynski’s father pushed him academically, skipping grades before and in high school and influencing him to take an early admission to Harvard, both against the advice of at least one of his son’s teachers.
Chase also explains Kaczynski’s isolation at Harvard as due at least as much to his youth and working-class background as to his personality and intellectual alienation, citing a number of other public school students, including Chase himself, who found themselves outsiders amid the heavily prep-school oriented student body as well as instructors from the same background.
It is in this section that the university earns its titular placement. Chase, also a Harvard graduate slightly older than his subject, recounts the content and purpose behind Harvard’s mandatory “general education” curriculum, which he considers a fundamental contributing factor to Harvard’s “culture of despair”, in which, under the influence of Postivism, students were taught to credit science as the sole source of truth and to dismiss morality and religious claims as expressions of emotion. He also gives a relatively deep background account of the US military and intelligence services involvement in funding and directing psychological research at US universities. He also gives a lengthy account of the life and career of Henry A. Murray, a Harvard psychology professor who conducted a series of psychological experiments on student volunteers which included Kaczynski during his last 3 undergraduate years. At one point in these experiments, subjects were hooked up to lie-detector-like monitors and filmed while being relentlessly criticized and verbally abused by someone who was supposedly another participant, but was actually an actor planted by the researcher.
Chase gives a lot of weight to the stress caused by these experiments, and considers them an essential factor in the subsequent course of Kaczynski’s life. For him they are the “X factor”, the variable that set Kaczynski’s particular sense of alienation apart from that of many students in similar circumstances. The case as presented didn’t convince me, so that the elaborate background Chase sets up to justify it, while having some intrinsic interest, derails the book to some extent, insofar as it takes the focus off Kaczynski and matters immediately relevant to his life and development.
The third and final section follows Kaczynski’s years in graduate school at the University of Michigan, where he evidently showed promise of a significant career in mathematics, his two years of teaching at Berkley, a position where he showed little promise, and briefly re-tells the story of his bombing career. Like part two, this section frequently takes the focus off Kaczynski in an attempt to fit his crimes into a broader picture of terrorism in the late 20th century. The author again failed to convince me in his claims that Kaczynski somehow presents a kind of archetype of the terrorist mindset, though there are definitely parallels in his conscious prioritization of ideology over human life.
As he admits, Alston Chases’s own life has some parallels with that of Ted Kaczynski. For the reader, this has some advantages and some drawbacks. Like Kaczynski, Chase apparently felt significantly out of place at Harvard, and his degree from that prestigious university failed to provide him with any kind of golden ticket in his subsequent career. The author also moved to rural Montana, where he lived at the time of Kaczynski’s arrest. Chase is able to give the reader a good sense of the milieu of Harvard in the 1950s and fit Kaczynski into the sociology of student life there. His experience in Montana also allows him to correct the impression given by big-city based reporters that Kaczynski’s self-constructed cabin was exceptionally isolated; by Montana standards, it seems, the bomber lived in a relatively populated rural area that gave him, without a car of his own, fairly ready access to transportation. However, I felt the Harvard section suggested an undercurrent of personal resentment toward the school on the part of the author, and it seemed a little too pat to lay the burden of responsibility for the creation of a notorious killer at the doorstep of one of its honored professors and researchers.
May 5, 2008
Chase wrote what I believe is the best book ever on the politics of ecology, "In A Dark Wood." I was hoping this would be as good. It is written with an eye toward pacing and is consistently interesting. His thesis is that Ted Kaczynski was affected adversely by a) the atmosphere of moral relativism that prevailed at Harvard and b) some psychological experiements in which he was a subject, conducted by an irresponsible researcher.
The problem is that he doesn't make a strong case that the experiments did anything that would have made Kaczynski into a murderer. And the fashionable nihilism at Harvard could have been found at scores of other American universities at the same time.
It may well be that Kaczynski was damaged by his time at Harvard. But I did not find in this book the key to understanding this bizarre and sad serial killer.
The problem is that he doesn't make a strong case that the experiments did anything that would have made Kaczynski into a murderer. And the fashionable nihilism at Harvard could have been found at scores of other American universities at the same time.
It may well be that Kaczynski was damaged by his time at Harvard. But I did not find in this book the key to understanding this bizarre and sad serial killer.
October 30, 2017
This book is so thoroughly researched and well written. It covers American social paradigms (I hope that's the right word) back to 1939. I feel mean for only giving it three stars. It probably deserves four, but there is a big chunk in the middle of the book I felt could have been compressed; I felt that it dragged on, but the author was clearly trying to pack in as much information as possible. The conclusion is thought-provoking and chilling; very relevant to recent terrorism in the US.
December 26, 2012
This is a very interesting book, although I'm not sure I agree with all of it. But the best thing for me was Chase's analysis of the ideas that were prevalent at Harvard during Kaczynski's time there. Various authors in the curriculum thought technology was a scourge and that the "system" reduced human beings to pawns. Sound familiar? It's what Kaczynski thought, too.
In fact, according to Chase, most or all of Kaczynski's ideas have been commonplace in academia and even the general culture for decades. The Unabomber took ideas more seriously than other people, and he was willing to kill for them, but he was not particularly controversial in his ideology.
So why don't other anti-technology people kill for their cause? Chase would say it's for two reasons: 1. They didn't have Kaczynski's life. Although he had a few friends in grad school, he was unable to find a girlfriend and was very sexually frustrated. Apparently he blamed the "system" for making him a genius-freak and he was going to have his revenge. 2. They weren't damaged like Kaczynski was. Chase speculates that the very cruel Murray experiments that Kaczynski underwent over three years at Harvard traumatized him. I don't know whether this is a sufficient explanation, but it is plausible because Kaczynski was very angry about psychologists trying to control human behavior.
This book has a lot of background explanation about Harvard, philosophical and cultural trends and the like. The verge on digressions, but I found them all interesting and worth reading on their own. I look forward to reading Chase's book on environmentalism: In a Dark Wood: The Fight Over Forests & the Myths of Nature
In fact, according to Chase, most or all of Kaczynski's ideas have been commonplace in academia and even the general culture for decades. The Unabomber took ideas more seriously than other people, and he was willing to kill for them, but he was not particularly controversial in his ideology.
So why don't other anti-technology people kill for their cause? Chase would say it's for two reasons: 1. They didn't have Kaczynski's life. Although he had a few friends in grad school, he was unable to find a girlfriend and was very sexually frustrated. Apparently he blamed the "system" for making him a genius-freak and he was going to have his revenge. 2. They weren't damaged like Kaczynski was. Chase speculates that the very cruel Murray experiments that Kaczynski underwent over three years at Harvard traumatized him. I don't know whether this is a sufficient explanation, but it is plausible because Kaczynski was very angry about psychologists trying to control human behavior.
This book has a lot of background explanation about Harvard, philosophical and cultural trends and the like. The verge on digressions, but I found them all interesting and worth reading on their own. I look forward to reading Chase's book on environmentalism: In a Dark Wood: The Fight Over Forests & the Myths of Nature
April 6, 2013
Ted Kaczynski (a.k.a The Unabomber), pursued over a few years a terrorist campaign to undermine modern society. The publication of his manifesto by some media outlets eventually led to his arrest and conviction.
The author of this book, Alston Chase, presents an interpretation of the Unabomber. The author, like Ted Kaczynski, was a student at Harvard, pursued an academic career, but left it and moved to the wilderness in Montana.
The author claims that there were two factors which shaped Ted Kaczynski into the Unabomber. One factor, which I did not know about until I read this book, was that Ted Kaczynski, when he was a Harvard student, was a subject in a highly unethical psychological experiment conducted by Henry A. Murray, a veteran of DoD psychology experimentation. The subjects were deceived about the nature and length of the study, and they underwent highly stressful interrogations.
A second factor, in the author view, was Harvard's curriculum at the time. Alston Chase calls it "a culture of despair." Students had to read analytic philosophers who argued that moral statements were mere expressions of feeling; anthropologists who advocated cultural relativism; and social critics of science and technology.
I'm not convinced about Chase's second factor. Intellectuals, such as Chase (who was a philosophy professor), have a tendency to overrate the influence of ideas.
Nevertheless, I found this book a fascinating study of Ted Kaczynski.
The author of this book, Alston Chase, presents an interpretation of the Unabomber. The author, like Ted Kaczynski, was a student at Harvard, pursued an academic career, but left it and moved to the wilderness in Montana.
The author claims that there were two factors which shaped Ted Kaczynski into the Unabomber. One factor, which I did not know about until I read this book, was that Ted Kaczynski, when he was a Harvard student, was a subject in a highly unethical psychological experiment conducted by Henry A. Murray, a veteran of DoD psychology experimentation. The subjects were deceived about the nature and length of the study, and they underwent highly stressful interrogations.
A second factor, in the author view, was Harvard's curriculum at the time. Alston Chase calls it "a culture of despair." Students had to read analytic philosophers who argued that moral statements were mere expressions of feeling; anthropologists who advocated cultural relativism; and social critics of science and technology.
I'm not convinced about Chase's second factor. Intellectuals, such as Chase (who was a philosophy professor), have a tendency to overrate the influence of ideas.
Nevertheless, I found this book a fascinating study of Ted Kaczynski.
May 6, 2018
Nice read, very complete analysis of Kaczynski's downfall from Harvard to his log cabin in Montana.
December 8, 2019
This is really 2 books. This first half is a good summary of the unabomber’s terrorist activity followed by the trial. It includes a number of journal entries from Ted Kaczynski’s journals. It also comments on the media reporting of the crimes and the trial as well as the commentary on Ted himself. An effective summary as you’ll find. It demonstrates his motive was revenge and a desire to kill.
The second half of the book is centered around the shaping of the Unabomber. Central to this is his time at Harvard in the late 50’s. Entering Harvard as a precocious 16 year old on a scholarship, he was influenced by the milieu of despair. Harvard at the time was a place embracing dualism science as the savior or science as the force of destruction. Central was the value free presentation of classics. The mantra became ‘don’t make value judgements.’ Logical positivism undermined ethics as mere emotion. This tension between the power of science to shape the world as a loss of ethical foundations created a sense of despair and hopelessness. (The author was also at Harvard at the time). The elevation of reason to the role of supreme judge denied any meaning to the world. This philosophy shaped the Unabomber. In his journal, he repeatedly dismissed ethics as mere emotion and the product of “brainwashing”.
The second major factor at Harvard was his involvement in psychological experiments designed to ‘break’ the individual. Performed by Murray, likely as part of CIA research, it involved drawing out the personal philosophy of the subjects and later destroying and demeaning it under interrogation. Murray, a literal sadist, seemed to get a thrill from the process. There is extensive background on the psychological research done not only at Harvard, but at many campuses at the behest of the military. The military was by far the largest finder of psychological research.
Murray himself was interested in the use of psychology to shape the masses to improve democracy. He ultimately wanted a one world government - yes not kidding - and thought one needed to use psychological techniques to make the masses accept it. This use of psychology to control people influenced the Unabomber to reject it and the system it propagated.
Moral relativism and Cold War paranoia both influenced Ted. Ultimately, the provided the intellectual framework for his worldview, but the aren’t the motivating force behind murder. Ted was motivated by a hatred and bitterness to his family, especially his father. He felt mistreated. The dual pressures to excel academically and to fit in socially caused him great pain. How intense the pressure from his father is unknown, but all parents wound their children to some degree. But Ted harbored bitterness. He would not forgive, but instead nursed his anger. This anger spilled over to anger against the system that did not reward him. He felt superior to everyone, yet they did not treat him as superior. His pride bordered on narcissism. Nursing these angers, and accepting no ethical restraint, let to the creation of the Unabomber as revenge against the system and his family.
Knowledge without virtue is dangerous, virtue demands humility.
What this bodes for the future is unclear. Moral relativism is stronger now than ever and humility is a lost virtue. Psychological techniques of conformity are ubiquitous(mob). May society return to it moral heritage and seek and speak truth in and for freedom.
The second half of the book is centered around the shaping of the Unabomber. Central to this is his time at Harvard in the late 50’s. Entering Harvard as a precocious 16 year old on a scholarship, he was influenced by the milieu of despair. Harvard at the time was a place embracing dualism science as the savior or science as the force of destruction. Central was the value free presentation of classics. The mantra became ‘don’t make value judgements.’ Logical positivism undermined ethics as mere emotion. This tension between the power of science to shape the world as a loss of ethical foundations created a sense of despair and hopelessness. (The author was also at Harvard at the time). The elevation of reason to the role of supreme judge denied any meaning to the world. This philosophy shaped the Unabomber. In his journal, he repeatedly dismissed ethics as mere emotion and the product of “brainwashing”.
The second major factor at Harvard was his involvement in psychological experiments designed to ‘break’ the individual. Performed by Murray, likely as part of CIA research, it involved drawing out the personal philosophy of the subjects and later destroying and demeaning it under interrogation. Murray, a literal sadist, seemed to get a thrill from the process. There is extensive background on the psychological research done not only at Harvard, but at many campuses at the behest of the military. The military was by far the largest finder of psychological research.
Murray himself was interested in the use of psychology to shape the masses to improve democracy. He ultimately wanted a one world government - yes not kidding - and thought one needed to use psychological techniques to make the masses accept it. This use of psychology to control people influenced the Unabomber to reject it and the system it propagated.
Moral relativism and Cold War paranoia both influenced Ted. Ultimately, the provided the intellectual framework for his worldview, but the aren’t the motivating force behind murder. Ted was motivated by a hatred and bitterness to his family, especially his father. He felt mistreated. The dual pressures to excel academically and to fit in socially caused him great pain. How intense the pressure from his father is unknown, but all parents wound their children to some degree. But Ted harbored bitterness. He would not forgive, but instead nursed his anger. This anger spilled over to anger against the system that did not reward him. He felt superior to everyone, yet they did not treat him as superior. His pride bordered on narcissism. Nursing these angers, and accepting no ethical restraint, let to the creation of the Unabomber as revenge against the system and his family.
Knowledge without virtue is dangerous, virtue demands humility.
What this bodes for the future is unclear. Moral relativism is stronger now than ever and humility is a lost virtue. Psychological techniques of conformity are ubiquitous(mob). May society return to it moral heritage and seek and speak truth in and for freedom.
March 25, 2009
Fascinating. This book is really only half about Ted Kaczynski and only partly about Harvard. It's about the 1960's and about Terrorism and Henry Murry and the CIA and educational curricula and cultural and chronological primitivism and includes a brief history of Philosophy and more. It's all over the place, but in an organized way. Very intelligent and highly researched book, it even references the Enneagram (Ted was a 5).
December 9, 2022
Alston Chase's "Harvard and the Unabomber" is a thought provoking study into the mind of Theodore Kaczinski, the Unabomber. Chase, a near contemporary of Kaczinski's at Harvard, cogently points to two wellsprings of Kaczinski's rage: a crisis of reason which was coterminous with the instrumentalist philosophy informing the Harvard General Education curriculum; and, the politics of the Cold War, which captured many academic institutions in the 1950s.
Despite the criticisms of Sir Karl Popper, and others, positivism and the criteria of verifiability came to dominate the methodology of the sciences in the mid-century American academy. This frame of reference, combined with Max Weber's call for "value-free" research, left reason unmoored. In a value-free milieu, there can be no rational basis for preferring one value or choice to another. And, if all systems of value have an equal right, no one ought to question, much less repress anyone else's opinion. As a practical matter, this is an abdication of reason, and the enshrinement of unbridled power. In essence, it was the very denouement that American educators sought to avoid.
In terms of the Cold War, the academy was fast to form a Faustian bargain with covert and authoritarian government agencies to obtain funding and prestige. Chase clinically dissects the causes and effects of this, mostly dysfunctional, dynamic- a dynamic which is still in the saddle today.
The author manages to eschew the 'groupthink' mentality endemic to the legacy media in his examination into the sources of Kaczinski's homicidal behavior. Chase's analysis is pointed; if Kaczinski is no more than a raving lunatic, there is no need for Western man to engage in introspection. Likewise, if Kaczinski is merely a staunch environmentalist who overreacted to an eminent threat, he is not too far removed from many mainstream Americans. Instead, Chase assiduously examines Kaczinski's life experiences and words, in order to ascertain the factors which led to the Unabomb tragedy.
"Harvard and the Unabomber" makes a credible case that Harvard's general education curriculum, along with Henry Murray's CIA backed psychological research, in tandem, had a deleterious impact on Kaczinski's life trajectory. In addition, Chase also suggests that Kaczinski's narrow academic choices led him into an intellectual cul-de-sac, from which he could find no escape. This, to me, seems to be pure conjecture. Kaczinski made a number of meaningful discoveries, e.g., while his 1969 paper on the "Boundary Functions of Curvilinear Space" was recondite, it was also well received. In it, he noted " that there exists a bounded continuous complex-valued function f, defined in the interior of a three-dimensional cube, such that the set of curvilinear convergence of f is not a Borel set. " This in turn opened a number of avenues for further study.
Quibbles aside, Chase's work is important and well- documented. His narrative is informed by facts and reasonable inferences. Moreover, his measured prose abjures the sensationalism that accompanied much of the initial reporting which surrounded the Unabomb case.
Kaczinski, in perhaps that which was the most poignant irony of this case, strongly identified with Joseph Conrad, the great Polish born, English novelist. Conrad's "Secret Agent," one of Kaczinski's favorite books, carefully identified moral decay, not science as the most pernicious threat to modernity. Chase reminds us that "Terrorism rather than being a solution to social ills, is a sign of sickness. And those who pursue it...are ultimately consumed by it."
Despite the criticisms of Sir Karl Popper, and others, positivism and the criteria of verifiability came to dominate the methodology of the sciences in the mid-century American academy. This frame of reference, combined with Max Weber's call for "value-free" research, left reason unmoored. In a value-free milieu, there can be no rational basis for preferring one value or choice to another. And, if all systems of value have an equal right, no one ought to question, much less repress anyone else's opinion. As a practical matter, this is an abdication of reason, and the enshrinement of unbridled power. In essence, it was the very denouement that American educators sought to avoid.
In terms of the Cold War, the academy was fast to form a Faustian bargain with covert and authoritarian government agencies to obtain funding and prestige. Chase clinically dissects the causes and effects of this, mostly dysfunctional, dynamic- a dynamic which is still in the saddle today.
The author manages to eschew the 'groupthink' mentality endemic to the legacy media in his examination into the sources of Kaczinski's homicidal behavior. Chase's analysis is pointed; if Kaczinski is no more than a raving lunatic, there is no need for Western man to engage in introspection. Likewise, if Kaczinski is merely a staunch environmentalist who overreacted to an eminent threat, he is not too far removed from many mainstream Americans. Instead, Chase assiduously examines Kaczinski's life experiences and words, in order to ascertain the factors which led to the Unabomb tragedy.
"Harvard and the Unabomber" makes a credible case that Harvard's general education curriculum, along with Henry Murray's CIA backed psychological research, in tandem, had a deleterious impact on Kaczinski's life trajectory. In addition, Chase also suggests that Kaczinski's narrow academic choices led him into an intellectual cul-de-sac, from which he could find no escape. This, to me, seems to be pure conjecture. Kaczinski made a number of meaningful discoveries, e.g., while his 1969 paper on the "Boundary Functions of Curvilinear Space" was recondite, it was also well received. In it, he noted " that there exists a bounded continuous complex-valued function f, defined in the interior of a three-dimensional cube, such that the set of curvilinear convergence of f is not a Borel set. " This in turn opened a number of avenues for further study.
Quibbles aside, Chase's work is important and well- documented. His narrative is informed by facts and reasonable inferences. Moreover, his measured prose abjures the sensationalism that accompanied much of the initial reporting which surrounded the Unabomb case.
Kaczinski, in perhaps that which was the most poignant irony of this case, strongly identified with Joseph Conrad, the great Polish born, English novelist. Conrad's "Secret Agent," one of Kaczinski's favorite books, carefully identified moral decay, not science as the most pernicious threat to modernity. Chase reminds us that "Terrorism rather than being a solution to social ills, is a sign of sickness. And those who pursue it...are ultimately consumed by it."
August 8, 2017
I can't deny the appeal of blaming Harvard for one of America's most notorious serial killers (GO BULLDOGS...whoops, did I say that out loud?), but it just doesn't add up.
Chase earns one star for a concise synopsis of Kaczynski's life and his crimes, one because he does his share to debunk the myth that Kaczynski was a left-winger (in reality his politics were all over the map, and made about as much sense as you'd expect of a serial killer), and one because I really have to admire his effort to provide an explanation beyond "he's a monster".
But that effort really doesn't succeed. Chase makes a good case that Kaczynski had a fairly angst-ridden adolescence, but so have hundreds of millions of other people who never blew anyone up. He makes a number of valid points about disadvantages suffered by the "silent generation," but every generation has unique challenges and unfairnesses, before and since. He somehow hold Harvard's core curriculum responsible for fostering a culture of despair, but I couldn't make head or tail of why. (Amusingly, he lists about a dozen other elite colleges that followed Harvard's lead in that trend - including Grinnell, which is in fact famous for NOT having a core curriculum. Chase should have known that, as he interviewed a retired Grinnell professor at length for the book.)
His case against Harvard psychologist Henry Murray for the sadistic study Kaczynski participated in as an undergrad is the strongest part of Chase's argument. I was persuaded that Murray may well have sown the seeds of the Unabomber. But even Chase himself acknowledges that alone can't explain Kaczynski's crimes, and indeed it doesn't. For all Chase's noble (and partially successful) efforts to clarify the reality of who Kaczynski really was and that the story was more complicated than "he's nuts", I for one was still left with the sense that the root cause of his evil really is that simple.
Chase earns one star for a concise synopsis of Kaczynski's life and his crimes, one because he does his share to debunk the myth that Kaczynski was a left-winger (in reality his politics were all over the map, and made about as much sense as you'd expect of a serial killer), and one because I really have to admire his effort to provide an explanation beyond "he's a monster".
But that effort really doesn't succeed. Chase makes a good case that Kaczynski had a fairly angst-ridden adolescence, but so have hundreds of millions of other people who never blew anyone up. He makes a number of valid points about disadvantages suffered by the "silent generation," but every generation has unique challenges and unfairnesses, before and since. He somehow hold Harvard's core curriculum responsible for fostering a culture of despair, but I couldn't make head or tail of why. (Amusingly, he lists about a dozen other elite colleges that followed Harvard's lead in that trend - including Grinnell, which is in fact famous for NOT having a core curriculum. Chase should have known that, as he interviewed a retired Grinnell professor at length for the book.)
His case against Harvard psychologist Henry Murray for the sadistic study Kaczynski participated in as an undergrad is the strongest part of Chase's argument. I was persuaded that Murray may well have sown the seeds of the Unabomber. But even Chase himself acknowledges that alone can't explain Kaczynski's crimes, and indeed it doesn't. For all Chase's noble (and partially successful) efforts to clarify the reality of who Kaczynski really was and that the story was more complicated than "he's nuts", I for one was still left with the sense that the root cause of his evil really is that simple.
June 2, 2023
It's impossible to feel sorry for a terrorist- however it IS possible to gain insights into the series of events which drove someone over the edge.
In "Harvard And The Unabomber: The Education Of An American Terrorist," Alston Chase describes a series of psychology experiments which had been funded by agencies of the U.S. government which professors at Harvard had been conducting during the 1960's. Ted Kaczynski had been a student at Harvard when these experiments were being conducted, and he'd volunteered to participate in the program. These experiments were impressively reckless, and there was no counseling provided to the people who had been participating in the program after the experiments had concluded.
While this was not the only factor which had pushed Ted Kaczynski to becoming a terrorist, this likely was one of the contributing factors. As Alston Chase points out in this book, there are certain details about the experiments that Ted Kaczynski had participated in which we don't yet know the specific details of because the files which contain the details of that particular experiment are still not available.
The story is tragic, you have to be in a mindset in which you want to read a very morbid story in order to read this book. Ted Kaczynski was in fact a very brilliant mathematician, he'd been one of the top experts in the entire world in a very specialized field of mathematics.
"Harvard And The Unabomber" reveals an extensive series of failures which led to an extensive series of disasters- including the recklessness of the experiments which were conducted on college students, the absence of any counseling that could have been made available to the people who had participated in the experiments as well as how the FBI may have missed clues which could have led them to Ted Kaczynski before he'd been able to send the bombs which ended up injuring and killing the victims.
In "Harvard And The Unabomber: The Education Of An American Terrorist," Alston Chase describes a series of psychology experiments which had been funded by agencies of the U.S. government which professors at Harvard had been conducting during the 1960's. Ted Kaczynski had been a student at Harvard when these experiments were being conducted, and he'd volunteered to participate in the program. These experiments were impressively reckless, and there was no counseling provided to the people who had been participating in the program after the experiments had concluded.
While this was not the only factor which had pushed Ted Kaczynski to becoming a terrorist, this likely was one of the contributing factors. As Alston Chase points out in this book, there are certain details about the experiments that Ted Kaczynski had participated in which we don't yet know the specific details of because the files which contain the details of that particular experiment are still not available.
The story is tragic, you have to be in a mindset in which you want to read a very morbid story in order to read this book. Ted Kaczynski was in fact a very brilliant mathematician, he'd been one of the top experts in the entire world in a very specialized field of mathematics.
"Harvard And The Unabomber" reveals an extensive series of failures which led to an extensive series of disasters- including the recklessness of the experiments which were conducted on college students, the absence of any counseling that could have been made available to the people who had participated in the experiments as well as how the FBI may have missed clues which could have led them to Ted Kaczynski before he'd been able to send the bombs which ended up injuring and killing the victims.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 27, 2023
The American public needs to understand how involved the government is in academia and information. That's a truth and this book does some good work supporting that goal. But otherwise? After a solid analysis of academic trends in the 40s and 50s and a fairly straightforward biography of Kaczynski, the author tries to tie it all together with some very confusing theories about violence as a new tool, lumping leftist, right-wing, post-colonial, and other varieties of terrorism together with no important distinction. And then he wraps it up with a summary chapter in which he casually states that Ritalin is a tool of political correctness. What he doesn't do at any point is explain why Kaczynski alone, among the hundreds of men so experimented upon and among the hundreds of thousands more broadly similar, became a terrorist. It sounds like the author tried hard to get access to the actual experimental records at Harvard and failed, and what he could get wasn't all that shocking. So he decided to try to write the book anyway, theorizing that these experiments were the breaking point for a fragile personality already under massive social pressure. It's a solid theory but this book utterly doesn't substantiate it. I suspected that this book would make me feel more empathetic to Kaczynski, but it didn't. My feelings about Kaczynski are almost unchanged but I am annoyed about this book!
July 1, 2017
This was a pretty engaging read in as much as it offered up some long-view perspectives on philosophical and cultural schools of thought in latter half of the 20th Century. I don't think it painted a complete picture of Ted Kaczynski however nor did it truly convince me that Harvard and Cold War politics turned him into the Unabomber. Yes, he was a student guineas pig in experiments conducted by one of his allegedly evil professors but all the book offered to prove this was circumstantial evidence. We never really see Ted strapped to the interrogation table with electrods stuck to his head, so to speak. That's something I suppose we should infer happened but the book's listing of novels and philosophers found in Kaczynski's reading rack don't convince me that he was a created monster. He may have been born with a bad gene, who knows? I'm still wondering.
November 24, 2020
Inb rief: Outstanding history of not only Kaczynski's troubled youth, but of the intellectual and cultural currents that exacerbated his alienation -- as well of the brutal psychological experiments, funded by the CIA, that no doubt galvanized him into violent reprisal against 'the system'. Many surprises inside, including exposing Kaczynski as only being superficially interested in the environment at best.
Full review:
Ted Kaczynski was hunted fruitlessly by the FBI for eighteen years, until finally being done in by his own need to spread his message. However exceptional his mind, however, Alston Chase argues here that Kaczynski’s philosophy was one espoused by many of his generation — that it was one fomented by the educational culture that Kaczynski’s cohort were immersed in at Harvard. Subtitled The Education of an American Terrorist, Chase’s work is an outstanding and thorough review of not only Kacynski’s life but of the intellectual and cultural currents that exacerbated his alienation — as well of the brutal psychological experiments, funded by the CIA, that no doubt galvanized him into violent reprisal against ‘the system’.
Chase opens with the FBI’s investigation of the UNABOMB case, then shifts to Kaczynski’s background as the son of working-class intellectuals who pushed their son to excel, heedless of the consequences. The better he performed in school, the more of a social misfit he became — especially after he skipped grades and entered college two years early. At home, he’d been pushed in opposite directions — his parents demanded academic achievement, which isolated him, and yet chided him for being estranged socially. At Harvard, his isolation did not improve; he was placed in a residence for especially gifted minds, but he and his housemates all lived solitary lives, and were separated from campus life on the whole.
His university studies offered no hope of a meaningful life; the general studies curriculum which had been drafted to ground and strengthen students in the western tradition was instead used to subvert it. Instead of understanding the US government as being based on natural law, for instance, students were taught that the government rested merely on power; that only statements which could be independently verified held any meaning, making beauty and much of the human condition irrelevant. Everything that students had previously taken for granted — morality, religion, culture, the rule of law — was being actively dismantled. Although the tools of science were being used to render everything else meaningless, there was little hope to be found in science itself, for the students were being steeped in Cold War dread that technology would destroy the world. The growth of ecology indicated that even if the world did not end in a bang, it would end with a whimper as human activity disrupted every natural system which sustained it.
Kaczynski is not the only subject of Harvard and the Unabomber, however, for Chase also introduces us to the strange figure of Henry Murray, a scientist associated with the OSS/CIA and Harvard, a man fascinated by sex and violence (especially together), who called for volunteers to participate in philosophical discussions, and then subjected them to experiments that haunted the memories of many of its subjects years later. What Harvard allowed its students to be subjected by a professorial spook under its aegis is so embarrassing and incriminating that they sealed their records after Chase began his review of them. The section on the CIA’s obsession with mind control — and its contributions to the drug eruption of the sixties — is fascinating and indicates how long that particular organization has been dominated by the dark side of power. (Stephen Kinzer recently produced a history on this particular episode in CIA History: Poisoner in Chief.)
Kaczynski’s treatment in the MKULTRA program left him psychologically troubled, increasingly fixated on revenge against ‘the system’, especially the psychologists who purposed to find ways to better manipulate people within society to conform. His course was already set before he began teaching professionally; that job he engaged in only to raise funds for buying land to escape society. Montana did not offer him peace, however; instead Kaczynski was steeped further in rage against airplanes, loggers, snowmobilers, and the like, and began looking for relief in striking back. His ‘environmentalism’, Chase suggests, was a spin tactic; the budding propagandist against the industrial system wanted public support, and going green struck him as an approach consistent with both his criticism and the student movements of the seventies.
Harvard and the Unabomber is a fascinating cultural and intellectual history of the late fifties and early sixties, a time when social unrest was beginning to simmer. Chase and Kaczynski lived parallel lives — attending Harvard around the same time, and then lived in rural retreats — so his insight into the culture that Kacynski was immersed in is particularly helpful. Although understanding what Kaczynski different is the most valuable contribution made by this book, it’s also generally helpful in putting into perspective the usual narrative lies about Kaczynski — that he was a mental case early on, for instance, and that he had isolated himself in the middle of nowhere. Reporters on the Unabomber case talked to people who barely knew Kaczynski, not his friends; when Chase began doing his own interviews, he found that the ‘rural recluse’ lived four miles from town, right off a main road, and was favorably remembered at the local library.
Harvard and the Unabomber is impressive work, a serious evaluation of Kaczynski, his work, and his times which offers insight into what really destabilized an otherwise brilliant mind.
Full review:
Ted Kaczynski was hunted fruitlessly by the FBI for eighteen years, until finally being done in by his own need to spread his message. However exceptional his mind, however, Alston Chase argues here that Kaczynski’s philosophy was one espoused by many of his generation — that it was one fomented by the educational culture that Kaczynski’s cohort were immersed in at Harvard. Subtitled The Education of an American Terrorist, Chase’s work is an outstanding and thorough review of not only Kacynski’s life but of the intellectual and cultural currents that exacerbated his alienation — as well of the brutal psychological experiments, funded by the CIA, that no doubt galvanized him into violent reprisal against ‘the system’.
Chase opens with the FBI’s investigation of the UNABOMB case, then shifts to Kaczynski’s background as the son of working-class intellectuals who pushed their son to excel, heedless of the consequences. The better he performed in school, the more of a social misfit he became — especially after he skipped grades and entered college two years early. At home, he’d been pushed in opposite directions — his parents demanded academic achievement, which isolated him, and yet chided him for being estranged socially. At Harvard, his isolation did not improve; he was placed in a residence for especially gifted minds, but he and his housemates all lived solitary lives, and were separated from campus life on the whole.
His university studies offered no hope of a meaningful life; the general studies curriculum which had been drafted to ground and strengthen students in the western tradition was instead used to subvert it. Instead of understanding the US government as being based on natural law, for instance, students were taught that the government rested merely on power; that only statements which could be independently verified held any meaning, making beauty and much of the human condition irrelevant. Everything that students had previously taken for granted — morality, religion, culture, the rule of law — was being actively dismantled. Although the tools of science were being used to render everything else meaningless, there was little hope to be found in science itself, for the students were being steeped in Cold War dread that technology would destroy the world. The growth of ecology indicated that even if the world did not end in a bang, it would end with a whimper as human activity disrupted every natural system which sustained it.
Kaczynski is not the only subject of Harvard and the Unabomber, however, for Chase also introduces us to the strange figure of Henry Murray, a scientist associated with the OSS/CIA and Harvard, a man fascinated by sex and violence (especially together), who called for volunteers to participate in philosophical discussions, and then subjected them to experiments that haunted the memories of many of its subjects years later. What Harvard allowed its students to be subjected by a professorial spook under its aegis is so embarrassing and incriminating that they sealed their records after Chase began his review of them. The section on the CIA’s obsession with mind control — and its contributions to the drug eruption of the sixties — is fascinating and indicates how long that particular organization has been dominated by the dark side of power. (Stephen Kinzer recently produced a history on this particular episode in CIA History: Poisoner in Chief.)
Kaczynski’s treatment in the MKULTRA program left him psychologically troubled, increasingly fixated on revenge against ‘the system’, especially the psychologists who purposed to find ways to better manipulate people within society to conform. His course was already set before he began teaching professionally; that job he engaged in only to raise funds for buying land to escape society. Montana did not offer him peace, however; instead Kaczynski was steeped further in rage against airplanes, loggers, snowmobilers, and the like, and began looking for relief in striking back. His ‘environmentalism’, Chase suggests, was a spin tactic; the budding propagandist against the industrial system wanted public support, and going green struck him as an approach consistent with both his criticism and the student movements of the seventies.
Harvard and the Unabomber is a fascinating cultural and intellectual history of the late fifties and early sixties, a time when social unrest was beginning to simmer. Chase and Kaczynski lived parallel lives — attending Harvard around the same time, and then lived in rural retreats — so his insight into the culture that Kacynski was immersed in is particularly helpful. Although understanding what Kaczynski different is the most valuable contribution made by this book, it’s also generally helpful in putting into perspective the usual narrative lies about Kaczynski — that he was a mental case early on, for instance, and that he had isolated himself in the middle of nowhere. Reporters on the Unabomber case talked to people who barely knew Kaczynski, not his friends; when Chase began doing his own interviews, he found that the ‘rural recluse’ lived four miles from town, right off a main road, and was favorably remembered at the local library.
Harvard and the Unabomber is impressive work, a serious evaluation of Kaczynski, his work, and his times which offers insight into what really destabilized an otherwise brilliant mind.
July 4, 2017
Loved this book! Granted, not that I love or agree with Ted Kaczynski, but some of the ideas in this book I can be aligned with and Chase offers insight I wouldn't have thought of or known otherwise. So thought provoking!!!
June 15, 2020
Randomly found this gem in one of those “Little Free Libraries,” and it absolutely blew me away. Not only a thorough and fascinating biography of Ted K., but also a brilliant explanation and analysis of the intellectual and cultural history of 20th century America. Highly recommended.
May 11, 2017
A complete deep dive into all things Unibomber.
February 8, 2019
Read Chapter 12 : “is intelligence evil?” Was incredibly well written and about so much more than the unabomber.
March 24, 2017
Outstanding. Not only a holistic look into a complex and very misunderstood figure, but also a comprehensive look into the philosophy that may or may not have led to his actions. Worth the read just to get the Unabombers reading list.
Read
July 16, 2009A very different perspective from what the media shows you. He is not in fact nuts, despite his lawyers forcing him to plead insanity. A heartless bastard, yes, but insane, no. It shows how messed up the court system is currently. He really was ready to die for his ideas. His ideas are really not so far out of the mainstream (the small minority mainstream, but still the mainstream). He kind of reminds me of a modern John Brown (although in a more cowardly way). I think my main problem with Ted is that he used violence to send his message, and that he did so from secret. Violence only works for a short period of time, (and not always) and those who use it inevitably have it turned against them.
The author's insights were an interesting perspective on why Ted did it. I don't know that the negative attitudes at Harvard or Ted's experience as an outcast there were the driving factors that the author presents. If that were the case how come there weren't more people doing this from that era? Something else pushed Ted over the edge. Probably a combination of small things. We can never know for sure.
The author's insights were an interesting perspective on why Ted did it. I don't know that the negative attitudes at Harvard or Ted's experience as an outcast there were the driving factors that the author presents. If that were the case how come there weren't more people doing this from that era? Something else pushed Ted over the edge. Probably a combination of small things. We can never know for sure.
January 25, 2011
I have a slightly odd interest in Ted Kaczynski as a person because I've spent quite a bit of time in Lincoln, MT. I enjoyed reading about the part of his life that was spent in this interesting place, and reading about his interactions with some people that I have come to know well. I'm not sure that this book answers the question, "How did Kaczynski arrive at the point where extreme violence was the answer?" but it does a very good job explaining many of the circumstances that may have played a part, including what he endured as a partipant in Murray's psychological experiments at Harvard. I do wonder why he continued to participate in the experiment for three years. What a shame that a brilliant mathematical mind turned into an evil genius.
August 24, 2012
This was very interesting non-fiction. It was a good analysis of the deeper story leading up to the bombings and the capture of the Unabomber. There is a surprising connection of the bomber to CIA psychological experiments administered to him during his time as an under graduate at Harvard. The story paints a picture of a deeply troubled person full of knowledge, opinions and rage, who may or may not have been sent over the edge by a number of stressful events and a rigid personality. The author, a Harvard graduate himself, is no kooky conspiracy theorist. He shows us that TK held close to a number of seemingly contradictory values carefully woven into a black and white view of the world. He shows how TK rationalized his sociopathic behavior with ease.
January 28, 2016
I found the author's obvious sympathy for his subject very interesting. It's important to dispel the myth that Kaczynski was simply insane. He wanted to be taken seriously and had internally coherent reasons for what he did. Discontent with industrial civilization is a fairly widespread phenomenon.
However, and here I seem to disagree the author of this book, I think if we do Kaczysnki the courtesy of reading his manifesto it's hard to avoid the conclusion he actually wasn't that brilliant or original of a thinker. Even if we bracket the moral obscenity of sending bombs to people, I just don't find anything very impressive in this analysis. Judge for yourself,
http://editions-hache.com/essais/pdf/...
However, and here I seem to disagree the author of this book, I think if we do Kaczysnki the courtesy of reading his manifesto it's hard to avoid the conclusion he actually wasn't that brilliant or original of a thinker. Even if we bracket the moral obscenity of sending bombs to people, I just don't find anything very impressive in this analysis. Judge for yourself,
http://editions-hache.com/essais/pdf/...
September 19, 2010
I was annoyed to read right at the beginning of the acknowledgments that this book was a compromise from the book he really wanted to write - his view on "how the 1960s changed America". Though at times he employed sweeping generalizations, some of his social history was interesting, and also fairly convincing on how it related to Kaczynski. The information on Kaczynski himself is definitely illuminating.
February 14, 2011
I read this book a while ago, but it was awesome so I thought I'd share. It's a great story about the Unabomber with a well-developed historical background of what life was like for him growing up, and throughout his life. The author seemed to take a really good impartial position, and try to tell what is a very interesting story. Great book.
January 28, 2008
The 3rd in a string of true-crime books I read for book clubs - which made me realize the genre is not for me. Well written, but disturbing.
June 1, 2008
This is a great look into academics and how Harvard, the alma mater of the Unabomber, could be held to blame for his terrorism.
November 27, 2010
Story of David Kaczynski and how Harvard influenced him in a negative way.
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