Key ideas: "Industrial Society and Its Future", also known as the "Unabomber Manifesto") was printed verbatim by The New York Times and The Washington Post on September 19, 1995.
The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race...
The continued development of technology will worsen the situation. It will certainly subject human beings to greater indignities and inflict greater damage on the natural world, it will probably lead to greater social disruption and psychological suffering, and it may lead to increased physical suffering—even in "advanced" countries.
Human beings have a need (probably based in biology) for something that we will call the "power process." ...
The power process has four elements. The three most clear-cut of these we call goal, effort and attainment of goal. (Everyone needs to have goals whose attainment requires effort, and needs to succeed in attaining at least some of his goals.) The fourth element is more difficult to define and may not be necessary for everyone...
[P]ower is not enough. One must have goals toward which to exercise one's power.Everyone has goals; if nothing else, to obtain the physical necessities of life: food, water and whatever clothing and shelter are made necessary by the climate...
Nonattainment of important goals results in death if the goals are physical necessities, and in frustration if nonattainment of the goals is compatible with survival...
Thus, in order to avoid serious psychological problems, a human being needs goals whose attainment requires effort, and he must have a reasonable rate of success in attaining his goals. The power process is the process of satisfying the [human] drives at the cost of serious effort.
By "freedom" we mean the opportunity to go through the power process, with real goals not the artificial goals of surrogate activitie...