[FRIAM] Can you guess the source.

[Phil Henshaw]

No clue, but sounds like a normal view from the 50's 60's 70's 80's or
90's?   Clearly not someone who knew about new classes of promising options
that hadn't been tried yet though...

On 4/11/07, Nicholas Thompson <nickthompson at earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>  I am curious to know if anybody in Friam-land will recognize the
> following passage.  No Fair using google.
>
> It is NOT from the Gettysburg Address.
>
> *"Our work is guided by the sense that we may be the last generation in
> the experiment with living. But we are a minority--the vast majority of our
> people regard the temporary equilibriums of our society and world as
> eternally functional parts. In this is perhaps the outstanding paradox; we
> ourselves are imbued with urgency, yet the message of our society is that
> there is no viable alternative to the present. Beneath the reassuring tones
> of the politicians, beneath the common opinion that America will "muddle
> through," beneath the stagnation of those who have closed their minds to the
> future, is the pervading feeling that there simply are no alternatives, that
> our times have witnessed the exhaustion not only of Utopias, but of any new
> departures as well. Feeling the press of complexity upon the emptiness of
> life, people are fearful of the thought that at any moment things might be
> thrust out of control. They fear change itself, since change might smash
> whatever invisible framework seems to hold back chaos for them now. For most
> Americans, all crusades are suspect, threatening. The fact that each
> individual sees apathy in his fellows perpetuates the common reluctance to
> organize for change. The dominant institutions are complex enough to blunt
> the minds of their potential critics, and entrenched enough to swiftly
> dissipate or entirely repel the energies of protest and reform, thus
> limiting human expectancies. Then, too, we are a materially improved
> society, and by our own improvements we seem to have weakened the case for
> further change.*"
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Research Associate, Redfish Group, Santa Fe, NM (nick at redfish.com)
> Professor of Psychology and Ethology, Clark University (
> nthompson at clarku.edu)
>
>
>
>
>
> ============================================================
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