Customer Reviews

Life in a Technocracy: What It Might Be Like (Utopianism and Communitarianism)

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I was worried that I would find this book to be outdated but still interesting. Some of the ideas in this book were so far ahead of their time, but even our time now.

As a Technocrat myself, I don't identify with this economic system I think it's to far ahead of it's time. I think maybe in 100 or even 200 years if our civilization ever reaches a "Type I Civilization." If we don't all kill each other first. The economics of any Civilization will have to be re-thought when it can start to make, copy, and or transmit items at the press of a button. This way of thinking was so far out even in the 1970s, we now take this type of thinking for granted thanks to Napster, MP3s, Digital Photos, and thinks like 3D-printers are just the first step.

The true beauty of this book is that Harold Loeb, doesn't try to predict the future but just says what it might be like.

What I do agree with as a Technocrat is I truly believe that 'the only true Technocracy is a Democracy' and with that the people must be educated. I don't see a class of uneducated people voting for (or hiring ) The Best most Educated person for the job; hoe could they?. Dictatorships, Fascism, Theocracies are the opposite of Technocracy stand for.

It posed two interesting questions for me the book asked in the into "Who would want to go to war with a Technocracy?" This questions has already been answered by Michio Kaku in other places. We could ask "who would want to go to war with an advanced civilization like the USA?"; to put it another way.

The other one was who would want to live in a sterilized plane drab mass produced society? Think the movie "Spirit of '76". But Harold Loeb was an art lover and dedicated a good chunk of the book to art. Not at all expected, and I have not read that chapter yet but intend to it's refreshing that he did not just stick to some sort of "Technocracy Inc.," or "Continental Comity on Technocracy" economics systems.