Correspondence between Theodore (Ted) John Kaczynski and Lutz Dammbeck (In English)

Leader

Everything starts with a piece of paper. In 1997, while researching for my film “The Master Game”, I noted a suspicion by the Austrian investigative authorities that there could also be a lead in the USA in the bombings of the “Bavarian Liberation Army (BBA), to the so-called “Unabomber”. A connection Vienna — Montana? That seemed so absurd and foreign to me at the time that I soon forgot about it. When I started researching my film “The Network,” it came up again in the first preliminary conversation in New York with the publisher John Brockman Name “Unabomber.” One of the authors represented by John Brockman, the computer scientist David Gelernter, was a victim of the so-called “Unabomber” (a pseudonym invented by the FBI: university and airline bombings).. On April 3, 1996, former mathematics professor Theodore J. Kaczynski (54) was called the “Unabomber” by FBI officials in the state of Montana been arrested. He had lived there since 1971 in a cabin near Lincoln, a small town in Montana near Great Falls. He was suspected of being the bomber who had been wanted for 18 years as well as the author of an anti-technology manifesto entitled “Industrial Society and its Future”. The 35,000-word manuscript was anonymously sent to several major American newspapers for printing in June 1995. In return, the senders, a group signed with “FC”, promised to stop the long-standing bomb terrorism. Now that seemed interesting to me for the film I was researching for. I wanted to contact Ted Kaczynski, whether he was the Unabomber or not.

Back from New York, I read an article in the Berliner Zeitung entitled “The Unabomber’s Pen Pal” about the Berlin author Dr. Gabriele Yonan. I met with her and she advised me to simply write a letter to Ted Kaczynski, but first to look for friends and supporters who would vouch for me. Because he is not only rather short in stature, but also very suspicious and complicated.

Then I read in the Austrian news magazine “profil”, because I was simultaneously following the media aftermath of the trial against the alleged BBA bomber Franz Fuchs, an article about the WTO summit in Seattle, where there were violent protests against globalization and the associated destruction of nature had given.

John Zerzan, a radical neo-primitivist author, anarchist and radio operator at the University of Eugene, was described as one of the intellectual leaders. In his work, he criticized civilization as inherently oppressive and contrasted it with life forms of prehistoric populations as a symbol of a free society . He was described in the article in “profil” as a friend and confidant of the “Unabomber”. And through further research I also came across the conceptual artist Lydia Eccles in Boston, who had initiated a campaign with a friend, Chris Korda, called UNAPACK (The Unabomber for President Political Action Committee) called “Unabomber for President” so that the “ Unabomber” could be elected as a write-in candidate in the 1996 presidential election.

Lydia Eccles seemed influenced by the ideas of the Situationist International and, like Chris Korda, belonged to a scene of anarchists, hardcore punks, eco-socialists, pacifists, militants and primitivists such as the “Church of Euthanasia”. Lydia and John were in close correspondence with Ted Kaczynski and even seemed to be friends with him. During further research trips, on which I was accompanied as a translator and assistant director by the German filmmaker Dietmar Post, who lived in New York, we visited John in Eugene and Lydia in Boston several times and we had good conversations. I tried to make it clear to both of them that my interest in contacting Ted Kaczynski was not of a journalistic nature, but of an artistic-philosophical nature, and that I would like to integrate him into my film as a character in an ensemble that discusses the pros and cons of technology and science. Both found my project interesting.

Lydia gave me Ted’s address and I wrote him a letter in August 2000. For a long time there was no answer. Then, after we had already started filming, I received the first letter from him. And then an exchange of letters developed that lasted until 2006.

1) August 2, 2000

Attn.: Theodore John Kaczynski
US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I’m writing to you because I feel you might be able to give me the answers to some questions. First of all I would like to introduced myself to you and to give you some information about myself and my work as an artist for the fine arts. This is the reason why I am contacting you. I am enclosing some information about my personal and my artistic biography. For some years I have been working with various artistic techniques in order to describes the cuts between art, science, technology, power and ideology. During this work I came across the Austrian scientist Viktor Schauberger and his ideas and works for the ecological revival of nature. I think that there is a close connection between Schauberger’s ideas and the ideas of Pythagoras, Leonardo da Vinci, Joseph Beuys and other “Gnostiker” and the clearly show the connection of art and natural science which accompanied the development of mankind since the classical antiquity and which nowadays (heutzutage) seems (scheint) to have got lost extensivly. (im großen Umfang). Through Schauberger I came across some interesting ideas for a new definition of the proportion of ground, air and water and how to deal with technology and that it is neccessary to look critically at the results of present research. I was very surprised to find thoughts and elements in your Manifesto which reminded me of this. Recently I have been working on problems of “cyberspace”. So I am very interested in the thesis in your Manifesto and in which way or whether at all your views have changed in the last view years. What’s your opinion about the demonstrations at the WTO summit in Seattle and Prague? Do you think that actions like this lead to a turning point in the harmful development in nature and the people living in it? Can you see basic differences between the development in the USA and Europe? As you can imagine I first heard about you and your biography through the media. The reports were very spectactular of course. I have no idea how you live in prison in Florence and whether (ob) it is possible to have a free exchange of views and whether you are interested at all.

I would be glad to hear from you and I would you send you more details then.

Unfortunately my English is not good enough yet to express my thoughts precisely.

It’s been a long time since I went to school and learned English.

An acquaintance is helping me which motivates me to improve my own English.

I wish you a happy new year and I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Yours truly

2.8.2000

Lutz Dammbeck

February 24, 2001, to Dietmar Post NY

As discussed over the phone, Theodore Kaczynski — the “UNABOMBER” — has not yet responded. The website: www.thesmokinggun.com provides information about his attitude towards interview requests. There is a reference in the letter from wired to “a reply from Quin Denvir?” I want an interview with Kaczynski. To find out whether this could generally work, perhaps cautious questions:

— the officer responsible in the prison (does he see a chance, whether... how)

— the author Mello

— the author Alston Chase (Harvard and the Making of The Unabomber), who, however, has not yet finished his book about Ted, is he cooperative? My interest continues here, see the few pages of translation from the preprint: towards “Murray Experiment”, “Milgram Experiment”, Psycho-War, OSS and LSD (Tomothy Leary and the Californian hacker hippies of the 60s). There is talk of film footage of the experiments. If that doesn’t help, get in touch again and maybe visit in April:

— but above all: John Zerzan, 57, lives in an anarchist housing cooperative, leader of the “Anarchists of Eugene”, anarchotheorist, studied literature at the University of Oregon, “Civilization is the root of all evil”, books: Future Primitive, says in an interview about Ted: “...when you could still visit him in prison...” — so not anymore? “...last week I received a letter from him...you can practically no longer visit him” (February 01), was involved in the formation of the NGOs against globalization, Corporate America, the World Bank and the WTO summit in Seattle , Prague, Nice. Language regulation if there are any questions about what I’m interested in, could be: Film about THE NET as a cultural and economic/economic project and metaphor for modern civilization — what is it, who owns it, who set it in motion, when and why — supporters and Opponent = Internet critic, international. Communication guerrilla, NGO’s = new forms of resistance and theories of subversion, forms of resistance against prevailing conditions and the technical development towards cyberspace new economy/today’s civilization. With and against THE NET (the networks). Ted could also be classified as a fundamental critic

— also call Lydia in Boston again

Supermax — ADX Florence

The official name of the Supermax is United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility, Florence, from which its abbreviation is derived: ADX Florence.

Supermax is a maximum security prison run by the US government. It is located south of the city of Florence, in Fremont County, Colorado.

As the flagship of the four institutions that are grouped together in a large complex (the FCC — Florence Federal Correctional Complex), the Supermax is the furthest away from the street. More than 20% of its approximately 400 inmates are accused of killing a fellow prisoner in another prison.

The Supermax opened in 1994 (construction cost: $60 million) and is designed to house inmates considered the most dangerous in America. The list of its inmates contains the names of the most important prisoners in the United States convicted of acts of terrorism. But various leaders of national gangs, some mafia bosses, multiple murderers and leaders of racist groups that propagate white superiority are also serving life sentences here. The most closely guarded prisoners are denied any contact with other people — with the exception of their guards. You are in solitary confinement for up to 23 hours a day, in a 3.5 x 2 meter acoustically isolated cell.

2) April 2, 2001

Attn.: Theodore Kaczynski
Federal Register Number 04475–046
US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226
U S A

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I am writing you in regard of my letter from January 13^th 2001.

I hope, you have got my letter. Since then my intellectual and artistic investigations about THE NET have led towards a film project (documentary) about the same subject matter. This letter shall serve as a little introduction.

I am preparing a film which aims to investigate THE NET as a form of current technological development and tendencies towards globalisation.

The film is to present various positions on the subject, also those which see dangers in this development, reject or criticise it. I also see this including criticism of THE NET which develops and uses current forms of dissidence, opposition and subversion.

In this connection, I encountered your ideas.

I view you and your fundamental criticism as part of a Net criticism, which also includes new forms of opposition and the theories of subversion of an international “communications guerilla force”, committed to oppose developments towards cyberspace, globalisation, the New Economy and today’s civilisation.

My interest in you is not inspired journalistically, but by cultural criticism.

I would like to invite you to be (an important) part of this project.

The film is being sponsored by various regional film promotion institutions (Hamburg, Saxonia, Berlin-Brandenburg and Nordrhein-Westfalen) in Germany, including the French tv- culture channel arte.

It was not easy to got the support for such a project.

I have heard that you had only spoken to one reporter (J.Dubner) and that you had rejected requests for an interview put to you in numerous letters from talkmasters, TV channels and news magazines, and also that recently you gave this letters to a special library available to the University of Michigan.

On the one hand, I have great sympathy for your attitude, but I am still somewhat at a loss

as to how I could convey my intentions to you in a serious manner.

I also have contacted Lydia Eccles who will sending you another letter in this regard.

To make further arrangements you can send a letter to my attention in Hamburg (Germany)

or to my personal assistant in New York, Mr. Dietmar Post, 304 Boerum Street # 44

Brooklyn, NY 11206

I hope for your interest

All the best

Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, April 2^nd 2001

1) Ted Kaczynski an Lutz Dammbeck

April 17, 2001

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK c/o DIETMAR POST

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I would probably be interested in seeing the results of the investigation thast you describe in your letter of April 2, 2001, but I am not interested in participating in your project. I know very, very little about the Internet, and I would not be able to help you in any significant way.

You have my best wishes for the success of your film.

Sincerely yours,
Ted Kaczynski

3) May 21, 2001 English

Attn.: Theodore Kaczynski
Federal Register Number 04475–046
US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter.

Of course, it is true that you are not an Internet specialist. No, I think you know a great deal about the role of computers and their effects, and about what happens when these are connected together, which is what people call the Internet today.

I consider you to be one of the most important and knowledgeable scientists and intellectuals in this respect.

I am afraid that up until now, I may have provided an inadequate explanation for my interest in contacting you. Originally, I was merely interested in a chance to speak to you, without any specific intentions. The questions with which you have concerned yourself were among those upon which my artistic work to date had focused, and so I wrote my first letter.

I then tried again with a more general second letter; this lay, perhaps, in my uncertainty regarding just how openly I could write to you (I know that all your letters are read), since I did not want to cause you any difficulties.

Now a three week journey through the USA — during which I also became acquainted with Lydia Eccles and some other people you know — has helped me to order my thoughts, and has also altered my purpose to some extent. Lydia Eccles encouraged me to write you a completely open letter. And I shall try to do just that.

I am not interested in a depiction of the Internet in technical terms.

In my first letter, I asked you whether you know Viktor Schauberger. I think that in many passages his ideas on the relation between man and nature, on the role of the scientist and his description of the role of civilisation, the modern age and technology in the destruction of air-water-soil coincide with your own ideas in the “Manifesto” (about Technology). As Viktor Schauberger sees it, the world requires a “new order” oriented on the example of nature, where this order is already given. He saw his research as continuing the Greek nature tradition of Heraclitus, Thales of Milet, Pythagoras, Leonardo and Kepler, and he was involved in the foundation of the green, ecological movements in Austria after 1945, making suggestions for a change in man’s way of handling the resources of the earth and of nature.

Now my research centres around the question of what causes there are for the “inverted relations” in which we live today, in both Europe and the USA. Is the world in which we live at present a “modern age” which is fulfilling itself, only functioning — after the collapse of the eastern block — according to the regulations of money-market capitalism? (Ironically, according to the German philosopher Oskar Negt, at the moment in which capitalism — victorious over Marxism — begins to sing in triumph, capital will function in the way Marx described in his “Capital” for the first time in its historical development: “... capitalist production, therefore, only develops technology and combinations of social production processes by simultaneously undermining the sources of all wealth: the earth and the workers.” In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of January 1997)

How did this come about, and what role was played in it by technology and science, the true “spirit of the modern age”?

In this context, I am interested in Utopias and models of thought for an “ideal society” which prepared the necessary climate and atmosphere long before the technical “nets”, indeed, which first made the technical nets possible.

I am thinking here of the ideas of the Enlightenment, the French Revolution and the artistic avant-garde / modernists. (Interestingly enough, the advertising of dotcoms today makes use of the keywords in the “klassischen” avant-garde manifestos).

In recent years, an explosion took place in the field of technological development.

This created the preconditions for the current globalisation of the world — in particular the mechanisms of regulation and control necessary for it, the most important element here surely being the computer.

Without the computer, all these simulations, calculations, mechanised processes of regulation and control would be inconceivable. So is this machine now the most important part, or is it just an arbitrary tool among many?

The role of artists and scientists also comes into play here, and of course an old series of problems: do artists, philosophers or scientists have a moral responsibility for those of their ideas which are then misused by others or understood as instructions for a course of action? (see Berthold Brecht’s play “Galileo Galilei” or the play about Oppenheimer and the A- bomb, also Viktor Schauberger and his research for the German military during 1942–45).

That is why I am also interested in the “run-up”: the “Zeitgeist” of the 50s and 60s, when the ideas of “interactivity” or “networks” were developed, the period of the Cold War or the Psycho War, when tools of regulation or control like the computer were commissioned and developed — as part of the ideology of an “ideal world order”. I am interested in the early Utopias of the “Net” (those of the Hippies in the 60s appear different to those of Cage and the New York art scene, or those at MIT or Stanford — or were there overlaps?) and what has emerged from these today.

I am interested in the pioneering theorists and those who commissioned these Utopias, and in those who see this development as wrong and want a change: in favour of nature, of a different concept of life with nature and of a different understanding of technology. People who think about alternatives and who draw the consequences of their insights. It was in this context that I came across you.

During my research about pioneering theorists of the Net I came across books by David Gelernter and his entire role in this connection, and I learnt that you had sent him a bomb. This, and your attacks on flight networks (as route networks of a specific kind) appeared to me to be both a symbolic action and a “real deed” — not an attack on people, but on a principle (as with Raskolnikov) and on a scientist who bore the responsibility for it.

A scientist who did not seem to have contemplated the consequences of his actions, or perhaps believed he did not need to contemplate them. Or were Gelernter’s person and his ideas not so important for you?

On my journey through the USA, I also visited the MIT and Harvard, wandering around there and taking in the atmosphere — and it provoked some irritation in me.

I experienced an uncritical atmosphere of agreement and of general acceptance of what is — a liaison between avant-garde, science and power. A well-ordered and unquestioned network of scientific research, privilege, elitism and power.

I also visited the museum in the MIT.

No, it was not the mechanical games of the robots which were disturbing (they reminded me of a museum of Swiss cuckoo clocks, of 19^th century mechanics, they were also physically unpleasant and disturbing), the cause for fear lies in what is not shown: science’s attack on the human cell nucleus, an alteration of man from within. Of course, that opens the doors to hell. A hell of Modern.

I have already mentioned an explosion in the technological field during the last decades, and of course there has also been an explosion in the social and political field in recent years; in the development of new forms of opposition such as the “nonprofits” and the NGOs, a media guerrilla movement and hackers, “anti-capitalist activists” and non-state actors. In part, as far as I perceive it, this has been inspired by the remnants of leftist thinking, on the other hand, interestingly, it appears to have also been partly stimulated by ideas and strategies of the 60s artistic avant-garde (Paris 1968, Guy Debord, Situationism). I know that you have contacts with such activists — something which I find interesting and significant -, and this leads me to the question of how you judge these activities (Seattle, Prague etc.).

According to the things I have perceived, a number of these activists only “act” within the symbolic, rhetorical and artificial field of art and the media (like “fashion2). Their repertoire is already exhausted once they have finished spraying a perfume named “Revolt”, and the “revolution with the mouse” lacks true consistency. By contrast, I see you as a person and a scientist who has drawn the radical consequences from his insights. For a “change”.

Which now touches on the question of the role of violence in a struggle for “change”. I believe that the evaluation of violence in connection with upheaval and revolutions is different in Europe to the one in the USA, and that this may be explained historically. Here in Germany, the question of the use of violence is currently discussed on the basis of the history and role of the RAF (Red Army Faction); after a certain historical distance has been attained, the time now seems ripe for this discussion. For me, this “revolutionary movement” is a reflection of and remnant of fascism in Germany — fascism repeated in the sons and daughters (naturally with the fiercest animosity towards the fathers and their fascism, and with a leftist label) and let loose in an Americanised Germany of the economic miracle, where it dissolved some time afterwards.

Some people say, 1989 is also the end of “left” and “right”, og “Kommunismus” und “Konservatismus”. Is it?

Your “Manifesto” has also reached and moved many people in Europe. I hope that a small Hamburg publisher will be producing a German edition very soon.

In conversations I had on my journey through the USA, however, when I mentioned you in the context of my subject and interests, the people I spoke to often reacted with uncomprehending looks, and they were by no means prepared to see you as part of the game, preferring to classify you as a “crazy criminal”, as “Dr. Strangelove”.

But I see you as a man who drew the consequences from his insights: as a sane, radical critic of a technological development which would not have been possible without computers. Your consistency reminds all those who perhaps share your opinion, but who do nothing and keep quiet, of their own lack of consistency or of their opportunism in an unpleasant way.

At one of the most important technological centres in Germany, comparable to the MIT, a symposium entitled “Have computers changed our lives” was recently held. The answers to this question “sailed as computer-animated paper ships on a sea of words: Playthings for the machine (the computer) which can no longer be questioned...”.

But questions concerning the computer, the NET and how much power or influence over and access to the private sphere of the individual and of groups these “machines” have, are becoming increasingly important and more urgent.

You made an attempt at raising these questions with your texts and your actions.

For that reason, you have become increasingly important for me and my work on this theme. I would very much like to make your thoughts and insights on the subject accessible to other people, and to show that you are not a monster, but an intellectual, a scientist (is that true, do you still view yourself as a scientist?) a human being who has a face.

I am interested in your entire biography and not only in the spectacular parts in connection with the bombs.

I would very much like to exchange ideas with you regarding the many questions I have mentioned here and others, but I do not want to put any pressure on you. I would leave the decision on this to you, and let you dictate the pace.

So I am interested, among other things, in the “Zeitgeist” of the 50s and 60s, and the extent to which this contributed to the forerun to THE NET. That also interests me, because as a post-war child in the east of Germany = Russian influence (part of the family lived in western Germany = American influence) I was confronted with the effects of the political development after 1945 in a very concrete way. It also influenced my biography and that of my family.

In my artistic work, which also includes documentary films, I have been concerned with the question of connections between technical, scientific and artistic innovation and their consequences for a long time now.

The film project which I mentioned and on which I continue to work is not a journalistic project or a TV project like those which are common in the USA, but is part of my artistic work.

In the meantime, I have read more about you (my students are now translating the “Manifesto”, and Lydia told me about Joseph Conrad and your interest in this author). I am interested in your concept of “a different life”, and would like to find out what stimulated and inspired this for you.

In Eugene, I saw your photo and the initials FC worn by mainly young people; you are an important figure for them to relate to. That moved me and my wife, who was accompanying me, as did our visit to Florence and the landscape around the penitentiary with its postmodern design. From the (permitted ) distance this recalls a design by the English architect Sir Norman Forster.

I should be delighted if — with these lines — I had managed to convey my interest and my sympathy with you and your ideas more successfully than before, and had thus awoken your interest in an exchange of ideas and contact by letter.

I shall try to send you an English copy of the book by Callum Coats, Living Energies — Viktor Schauberger’s brilliant work with natural energy explained. Unfortunately it is out of print at the moment, and will only be available again in July. But before I shall try to send you another book about Schauberger by Olof Alexanderson, it’s a little bit older, but available. I hope that the books will reach you as soon as possible and that the material interests you. Please write me a few lines to let me know that you have received it.

I wish you all the very best and continued strength, in the name of my wife as well,

Yours,
Lutz Dammbeck

3) 21.05.2001 in deutscher Übesetzung:

Attn.: Theodore Kaczynski
Federal Register Number 04475–046
US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski, thank you for your letter.

Yes, it’s true, you are not an Internet specialist. No, I think you know a lot about the impact and role of computers and what happens when they are connected together to form what we now call the Internet.

I consider you to be one of the important and knowledgeable scientists and intellectuals.

I am afraid that I have so far not adequately described my interest in contacting you. Originally I was only interested in talking to you, without any further intentions. The questions that you were dealing with were in the focus of the questions that I had previously dealt with in my artistic work, and I wrote my first letter.

I then tried a second letter, which was more general, which may have been due to my uncertainty about how openly I can write to you (I know that all your letters are read), because I didn’t want to get you into any trouble.

Now a three-week trip through the USA, during which I also met Lydia Eccles and another person you know, helped me bring more clarity to my thoughts and also changed my plans. Lydia Eccles encouraged me to write to you openly.

I want to try that now.

I’m not interested in a representation of the technical Internet.

In my first letter I asked you whether you knew Viktor Schauberger. I found that his thoughts on the relationship between man and nature, the role of the scientist and his description of the role of civilization, modernity and technology in the destruction of air-water-soil in many passages touch on your thoughts in the “Manifesto”.

For Viktor Schauberger, the world needs “a new order” that is based on the example of nature, where this order is already given. With his research he saw himself as the successor to the Greek natural tradition, from Heraclitus, Thales of Miletus, Pythagoras, Leonardo and Kepler, was involved in the founding of the green-ecological movements in Austria after 1945 and made suggestions for a change in how people interact with the resources of the earth and nature.

The focus of my interest now is the question of the causes of the “twisted conditions” in which we live today, in Europe and the USA. Is the world in which we currently live now a fulfilling “modernity” that, after the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, only functions according to the rules of money market capitalism? (Ironically, according to the German philosopher Oskar Negt, at the moment when victorious capitalism sings triumphant songs over Marxism, capital functions for the first time in its historical development as Marx described it in his Capital: “...capitalist production therefore only develops the technology and combinations of the social production process while at the same time undermining the sources of all wealth: the earth and the worker.” in: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung from January 1997)

How did it get to this point and what role does technology and science play in this, this true “spirit of modernity”?

In this context, I am interested in utopias and mental models of an “ideal society” that, long before the technical networks, prepared the necessary climate and atmosphere that then made the technical networks possible.

I’m thinking here of ideas from the Enlightenment, the French Revolution and the artistic avant-garde/modernism. (Interestingly, dotcom advertising today uses the keywords of the early manifestos of the classical avant-garde).

In recent years there has been an explosion in the area of technological development. This created the conditions for the current globalization of the world and the necessary management and control mechanisms, the most important element of which is probably the computer.

Without computers, all of these simulations, calculation operations, mechanized and control processes would be unthinkable. Isn’t this “apparatus” the most important part? Or just any one of many tools?

This is where the role of artists and scientists comes into play, and at the same time an old problem: do artists, philosophers or scientists have a moral responsibility for their ideas, which are then understood or misused by others as instructions for action? (see Berthold Brecht’s play “Galileo Galilei” or the play about Oppenheimer and the A-bomb, and also Viktor Schauberger and his research for the German military in 1942–45).

That’s why I’m also interested in the “leading edge”: the “zeitgeist” of the 50s and 60s, where ideas of “interactivity” or “networks” were developed, the time of the Cold War or Psycho War, where control and control tools such as the computer Commissioned and developed — as part of an ideology of an “ideal world order”. I’m interested in the early utopias of the “Net” (those of the hippies in the 60s seem to be different from those of Cage and the New York art scene or at MIT or Stanford, or are there overlaps?) and what has become of them today.

I am interested in the pioneers and clients of these utopias as well as those who consider this development to be wrong and want a “change”: in favor of nature, a different idea of life with this nature and a different understanding of technology. People who think about alternatives and draw conclusions from their findings.

It was in this context that I came across you.

During my research on “thought leaders” on the Internet, I also came across books and the role of David Gelernter and learned that you sent him a bomb. This and your attacks on the flight networks (as special kind of path networks) seemed to me to be a symbolic act and a “real act” at the same time — not an attack on people, but on a principle (like Raskolnikov) and a scientist who made it possible. A scientist who seemed not to have considered the consequences of his actions or believed he did not have to consider them. Or was Gelernter’s person and ideas not that important to you?

During my trip through the USA I also visited MIT and Harvard, among others. I walked around there, took in the atmosphere and was irritated.

I felt there an uncritical atmosphere of agreement and general acceptance of what is — a liason between avant-garde, science and power. A well-ordered and unquestioned network of scientific research, privilege, elite and power.

I also visited the museum at MIT.

It wasn’t the mechanical shenanigans of the robots that were disturbing (reminded me of a Swiss cuckoo clock museum, also of the mechanics of the 19^th century, but were also physically unpleasant and unsettling), but what was frightening was what wasn’t shown: the attack of science on the human cell nucleus, the change in people from the inside out. Of course, the gates to hell are opened here.

I have previously spoken of an explosion in the technological sphere in recent decades; there has also been an explosion in the social and political sphere in recent years

area, in the emergence of new forms of resistance such as “nonprofits” and NGOs, in a “media guerrilla” and in hackers, in “anticapitalist activists and nonstate actors. In my opinion, this is partly inspired by remnants of left-wing thought, but on the other hand, interestingly enough, it also seems to have been inspired by ideas and strategies of the artistic avant-garde of the 1960s (Paris 1968, Guy Debord, Situationism)

I know that you have contact with such activists, which is very interesting and significant to me and leads to the question of how you view these activities (Seattle, Prague, etc.).

In my opinion, a number of these activists only operate in the symbolic, rhetorical and artificial areas of art and media (fashion). With the spraying of the perfume “Revolte” the repertoire is exhausted, the “Revolution with the Mouse” lacks any real consequence.

I see you, on the other hand, as a scientist who has consistently and radically drawn the consequences from his insights.

This now touches on the question of the role of violence in achieving “change”.

I believe that in Europe there is a different, historically explainable understanding of the assessment of violence in connection with upheavals and revolutions than in the USA.

The question of the use of force is currently being discussed here in Germany based on the history and role of the RAF (Red Army Faction), for which the time now seems ripe after a certain historical distance. For me, this “revolutionary movement” is a reflection and conclusion of fascism in Germany, which is repeated again in the sons and daughters (of course in the sharpest hostility to these fathers and their fascism and under a left-wing label) and in an Americanized economic miracle Germany is released, where it dissolves.

Your Manifesto also reached and moved many people in Europe.

I hope that a small Hamburg publisher will bring out a German edition very soon.

In the conversations during my trip through the USA, however, my interlocutors often reacted with blank looks when you were mentioned in the context of my subject and interest and did not want to see you as part of the game, but rather as a “crazy criminal”. “Dr. Strange”.

But, for me, you are a scientist who has drawn the consequences from his findings: as a non-madman and a radical critic of a technological development that would not have been possible without computers. Your consistency is an unpleasant reminder of their own inconsistency or opportunism to those who may also agree with you but do nothing and remain silent.

A symposium entitled “Has the computer changed life” was recently held at one of the most important technology centers in Germany, comparable to MIT. The answers to this question “sailed as computer-animated paper boats on a sea of words: game material for the device (computer) that can no longer be questioned.”

But questioning the computer, the NET and how much power, influence and access these “devices” have over the privacy of individuals and groups is becoming increasingly important and urgent.

You tried this with your texts and actions.

That’s why you’ve become increasingly important to me on this topic.

I would like to make your thoughts and insights available to other people and show that you are not a monster, but an intellectual, a scientist (is that true, do you still consider yourself a scientist?) and a person with a face. I’m interested in your whole biography and not just the spectacular parts related to the bombs.

I would like to exchange ideas with you about the various and other questions raised, but I don’t want to pressure you but leave the decision to you and also to determine the pace.

Among other things, I am interested in the question of the extent to which the “zeitgeist” of the 50s and 60s contributed to creating the lead-up to DAS NETZ. I’m also interested in this because, as a post-war child in East Germany = Russian influence (part of the family lived in West Germany = American influence), I was very specifically confronted with the effects of political developments after 1945. This also influenced my biography and that of my family.

In my artistic work, which also includes documentaries, I have long been concerned with the question of the connections between technical, scientific and artistic innovation and their consequences.

The film project that I spoke about and that I am continuing to work on is not a journalistic television project or TV project, as is common in the USA, but part of my artistic work.

I have now read more about you (my students are currently translating the Manifesto and Lydia pointed me to Joseph Conrad and your interest in this writer). I’m interested in your idea of “another life” and what inspired and stimulated it for you.

In Eugene I saw your photo and the initials FC, especially among young people, for whom you are an important reference figure. This touched me and my wife, who accompanied me, as did the visit to Florence and the landscape around the prison in its postmodern design, which from a (permissible) distance was reminiscent of a design by the English architect Sir Norman Forster.

I would be very happy if, with these lines, I had better described my interest and sympathy for you and your ideas as before, and thus also aroused your interest in an exchange of ideas and correspondence.

I will try to send you an English copy of Callum Coats’ book Living Energies — Viktor Schauberger’s brilliant work with natural energy explained.

Unfortunately it is currently out of stock and will not be available again until July. I hope that the book reaches you as soon as possible and that you are also interested in the subject matter. Please write to me briefly when you have received the book.

So I remain with the best wishes for you, wish you all the best and lots of strength, also on behalf of my wife

Best regards
Lutz Dammbeck

2) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

May 23, 2002

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

In your letter you claimed that I was the so-called “Unabomber”. Since I was still in open proceedings, I thought it would be unwise to exchange letters with you. But now my trial is over and I can exchange letters with you without risk.

I’m not a scientist. Thirty years ago I was a mathematician, but I have forgotten most of what I knew about mathematics.

Aside from mathematics, I never knew much about science.

Paragraph 3 (pages 1 — 2). I received Viktor Schauberger’s book and I looked through it. I mean that Viktor Schauberger is what we call a “crackpot” in English. A crackpot is a person who stubbornly answers unreasonable theories.

Paragraph 4 (page 2). I don’t understand what Oskar Negt is saying. Industrial production is worryingly damaging to the environment and giving workers an unsatisfactory life, and the capitalist economic system and the Marxist economic system are the same in this respect. I think that the competition between capitalism and Marxism has achieved nothing.

Paragraph 5 (page 2).

I think that the idea of a “utopia” is insane and dangerous. The belief that human society can be rationally improved is also very dangerous. The problems caused by technology would also arise if there had been no utopian ideas. But because of the misconception that the development of society can be rationally directed, it is very difficult to ignite resistance to the technological system.

This would be easier if everyone recognized that it is impossible to regulate the development of human society. You can’t set up society to use only the good technology and not the bad technology.

Technology is a very idiosyncratic and therefore extremely dangerous force that leads us where it needs/wants to lead us.

Paragraph 7 (pages 2–3).

Moral judgments are not based on facts, they are arbitrary. But if you want to hear my own verdict: any scientist who works in an obviously dangerous field (for example, computer science or biotechnology, and biotechnology is the most dangerous and terrible part of modern science) is a criminal of the worst kind. Even Hitler or Stalin would be horrified by some of the latest research, because neither Hitler nor Stalin could have imagined anything so dangerous and terrible.

Paragraph 9 (page 3).

I don’t want to talk about myself. Let’s talk about the matters that matter. Details of my life are not important.

Paragraph 11 (page 4).

I don’t know exactly what you mean by a “neoluddite.” If this is a person who wants to eliminate modern civilization, or all civilization, then I have exchanged letters with some Neoluddites and read their magazines.

Their letters are almost useless as a source of information.

My information about these movements mostly comes from their magazines, but it is certainly insufficient.

(If you could give me news about these people it would be very useful to me). The movement against civilization is leaning towards the left and is concerned too much with left-wing things, for example the rights of women, homosexuals, or animals. Therefore it is not very effective against the technology. I like ELF (Earth Liberation Front), but they don’t choose their targets well.

I believe that the fight against globalization distracts from the more important problems caused by modern technology.

Paragraph 12 (page 4).

Violence is the highest source of power. When it’s a fight between two irreconcilable value systems — whoever refrains from violence commits it

Defeat.Left and right are psychological types. The questions they argue about change. But their type remains the same.

Paragraphs 13 and 19 (pages 4 and 6). (The translation of the so-called “Manifesto.”) All published versions of the MANIFESTO are incorrect because they contain many serious errors. If you want to get a proper version of the manifesto, I can provide it to you.

Paragraph 14 (page 5).

They say that many Americans think I’m a crazy criminal. Yes, the American propaganda system did its job very well with the help of my lawyers.

Paragraph 16 (page 5).

My biography is unimportant and I don’t want to talk about it.

Paragraph 16 (page 5).

Yes, you can continue to write to me in German.

Did your ancestors perhaps come from Poland?

I wonder if it is possible that you are a distant relative of mine. My mother’s name is spelled “Dombeck” in English and is pronounced like “Dammbeck”. The name means “little oak”.

Sincerely,

TK

4) June 22, 2002

Attn.: Theodore Kaczynski

Federal Register Number 04475–046

US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum

PO Box 8500

Florence, CO 81226 USA

Dear Ted Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter of May 23, 2002, which I was very pleased about. I was surprised because I no longer expected an answer to my letters to you. I was even more surprised by the question at the end of your letter as to whether my family comes from Poland. That electrified me. Up until this point I had not given this question any further thought. I was of the opinion that my father’s family came from Berlin and my mother’s family came from Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, which is in north-east Germany. I now questioned an aunt in more detail, who told me that my grandfather’s family came from Silesia. I really want to try to find out where in Silesia and where the family lived before.

In which part of Poland did your family live?

It would be more than just coincidence if there really were family connections.

Do you or your family still have contacts in Poland?

Or were all connections to the European roots severed after immigrating to America?

There is another detail that complements the “casa polski”: I learned Polish for four years at high school in the GDR. The high school was an experimental school where the students completed school and vocational training up to the Abitur and there were special “language classes”. Unfortunately, apart from some rather strange vocabulary, I have forgotten almost everything because I haven’t practiced it. I visited Poland a few times during my studies and afterwards (Warsaw, Krakow and Lodz), but I mostly spoke English or German there.

Thank you for your replies to my letter of June 11, 2002, which I found a bit laborious and stilted when I read it a year later. I now also notice that I tried to persuade you to do an interview as quickly as possible.

I’m still interested in this, but my recent trips to the USA, many conversations and some thinking have changed my perspective on the topic.

I am sure that in the long term you and your concerns have provoked a greater disruption of American (technological) society in a more lasting and essential way than the events of September 11^th. Hence the strong defensive reflexes and the effort to let it slowly sink into oblivion without adequate public reflection. So, not to allow you to go to trial.

I really hope we can talk about some interesting questions.

If you allow me, I would like to respond to your answers according to the paragraph marking you used:

Paragraph 1 (page 1):

I read that you wrote your (very well-rated and award-winning) thesis/dissertation on the topic “Limit functions in mathematics”. When I did a bit of research into the “Vienna Circle” view of science and, above all, into the impact of logic and mathematics on aesthetics and art, especially music, I also came across Fritz Gödel and his “incompleteness theorems”.

This fascinated me, without knowing much about mathematics. Because this small leak in the foundation of the mighty edifice of the rational, logic-based scientific world view seems to show that this edifice is “shaky” — and can collapse.

And the question then arises as to whether it is responsible to establish technological systems on such a “shaky” foundation and let them grow ad infinitum, which intervene so deeply and effectively in the existing structure of nature and people. (I have attached a page that formulates this in a little more detail; I apologize for any mistakes made by a mathematical layman).

And I was wondering whether your mathematical expertise might have made you more informed about the possible risks of a technology that would not have been possible to develop without logic and mathematics.

My questions:

Are my assumptions about this correct?

What gave the impetus and was decisive in developing your view of the dangers of technology, what were concrete examples?

Is your thesis available in your archives at the University of Michigan? Or the other scientific articles you have published in mathematical journals?

Have you ever enjoyed or enjoyed mathematics? Working with numbers, with empiricism and the abstraction of processes?

The imagination of a mathematician is a big mystery to me; I myself think in pictures. How does a mathematician imagine something? Does he “see” something? Are images important to make something “understandable”? There is Niels Bohr’s dictum against images in physics, but also drawings by Richard Schrödiger, for example, that particles make a wave. But maybe you’re no longer interested in that because you wrote to me that today you’ve completely forgotten what you once knew about it (about mathematics). I myself imagine it as with art: if you choose something so extreme (art or mathematics) as your profession, an umbilical cord is always preserved. Doesn’t such an intensive occupation and such an intensive training in thinking and scientific work leave a mark for a long time, if not forever?

Paragraph 3 (pages 1–2):

Viktor Schauberger. I came across Schauberger through a thesis published as a book by the Faculty of Technical Mathematics at the University of Vienna, in which the author “...recognized the connection of Schauberger’s spiral curves to the harmonic fundamentals that are most clearly found in music (harmonics, overtone series). can be reflected and verified.

What speaks against your classification as a “crackpot” is that Schauberger not only has followers in the area of obscurantism and esotericism, but strangely enough also among studied physicists and mathematicians.

Maybe this is the same phenomenon as “Esalen” in the 70s? This mix of esotericism, spirituality, computer science and neurophysiology: Gregory Bateson, Heinz von Foerster, Buckminster Fuller, Magret Mead and John Lilly?

Paragraph 4 (page 2):

The battle between communism and capitalism (like you, I see many moments where the two “enemy” systems had the same roots and manifestations) is decided, there is only one world system for the foreseeable future: money market capitalism, which is dominated by the USA.

I think Oskar Negt means that capitalism itself is working on its abolition, and that intelligent capitalists know that too. Because through globalization and ever-increasing miniaturization, workers are being thrown out of the economic cycle completely (this goes hand in hand with the theses of sociologists/philosophers like Niklas Luhmann, who proclaims the “disappearance of the subject”), which is of course terrible: practical dismissed from the company and theoretically declared irrelevant) — and because this globalization is increasingly destroying the earth/nature. Globalization also destroys the nation state, abolishes governments, abolishes borders and limitations, destroys national characteristics, traditions and roots — and ultimately destroys capitalism and its foundations.

This self-destructive development is an almost poetic metaphor: every cell also has a death program = apoplexy, just as every data packet has a self-destruction program implanted into it.

You write on page 3, at the end of paragraph 11 (page 4), that

“...the fight against globalization diverts attention from the more important problem of technology.” But isn’t technology an (important) part and driver of globalization? So technology is just a tool for a concept (globalization) in order to, well, make a profit?

You can read all of this very nicely in Marx’s Grundrisse der Political Economy, but of course (as in every “Bible”) this is a matter of interpretation.

I am not a philosopher or sociologist and have to go to the “scribes” with various questions in order to have some things explained to me. However, and curiously: despite the harassment with Marx in the GDR, I have recently returned to Marx because he offers explanations for the phenomena of the information and computer society that I have not found elsewhere.

It is still the old, ordinary capitalism and the unchanged question of whether it should be abolished or reformed. In my opinion, this has nothing to do with “left” or “right” today.

But here we come to the question of violence or the topic of “neo-Luddites” or “neo-primitivists”.

Paragraph 5 (page 2):

By “enlightenment” I meant what was prepared by the “scientific world view”, whose followers then opened up a field in the 19^th century as physicists, mathematicians and philosophers, from which all those inventions and research emerged after the Second World War came that enabled today’s technology to accelerate significantly. Without mathematics, logical empiricism and “enlightenment”, the visions, theories and fundamentally new technologies that have dominated and shaped the questions since 1940 for the next decades (and probably the next decades) would not have been possible.

For me there are three scientists in particular whose work lays the foundations for this “field”.

Norbert Wiener with his research in cybernetics, control and regulation technology John von Neumann in the area of the development of computer machines, their architecture and design, AI, cybernetics, cognitive science and systems theory Warren McCulloch in the area of neuroscience, in the connection of logic,

Brain and neural network.

I find your comment that the concept of “a utopia is insane and dangerous” very interesting and provocative. How come? There are also positive utopias? I find it hard to imagine how people can survive without utopias (or ideals). However, the hope that technology will produce new ideals and utopias has already been destroyed.

Also the hope that technology will take the place of the old and secularized religions.

But what should take this place? Something retrospective, from the fund of religious, spiritual or art history?

So what could come after the “resistance to the technological”? And what can we do if there are no ways to sensibly guide the development of society? Back?

Back to primitivism, as John Zerzan recommends?

But, even if the dismantling of technology succeeds, on what foundations and essentials in morals, philosophy, art and science (what should be included in this? Is science dispensable for you?) should this other society rest? Reason is out of the question? Undoing the Enlightenment (Do you also attribute the “false belief that society can be governed sensibly” to the mechanisms that Jaques Ellul, among others, analyzed in “Propaganda”?

Paragraph 7 (pages 2–3):

What do you consider “facts” to be? Could you define what you mean by that in more detail? Data obtained through observation? Knowledge gained through mathematical calculation? Predictions confirmed by experiments?

Moral = feeling? Science = Facts? Does this touch on the area of metaphysics — anti-metaphysics for you? That of (religious) faith?

-7-

Paragraph 11 (pages 4):

There are a number of interesting texts on this topic, some of which also refer to you and your Manifesto, for example by KIRKPATRICK SALE. Or that are simply very interesting like the text Is It OK To Be A Luddite? by Thomas Pynchon from 1984. Or an essay by Raymond Kurzweil The Law of Accelerating Returns, in which he refers, largely critically but also approvingly, to you and your Manifesto em> quoted. I would love to send you these texts. Is it permitted to send you copies of such texts?

In my view, the neo-Luddites or neo-promitivists mentioned are small groups, a subculture with prophets like Hakim Bey from New York, and European adepts and offshoots like Luther Blisset in Italy and Germany.

The activities are mostly limited to acting on the Internet and at universities. It is true that most of these groups have a neo-Marxist core and old left positions try to “hibernate” in the stage (a term from the war, meaning not directly on the front line).

The actions have even less impact than “monkeywrenching”, more comparable to the character in a Charly Chaplin film who throws the wrench into a huge machine.

Paragraph 12 (page 4):

The question of violence is a particularly important question, a key question, I agree with you. Artists have always propagated violence in texts, films and works of art of all kinds, but as a sublime, aesthetic dimension.

The agreement was never to cross the line between IMAGINATION and ACTION. This transgression of boundaries in practice was and is punished.

In the socialist dictatorship and the Western democracy, both of which I have come to know so far, the monopoly of violence rested and lies with the state.

It is an important and sensitive area and I do not feel entitled to ask you direct questions about it at the moment.

Without being evasive, I would like to quote from a conversation I had a week ago the attack on November 11^th. in New York with a Hamburg philosopher. His political stance is “anti-capitalist & pro-nationalist & pro-technology”.

There is an O in front of his statements and a D in front of my questions:

“O: So the World Trade Center was really in the middle of Manhattan and New York and was really an important center and in a certain way stood as a symbol of a world system. This is what the assassins attacked and destroyed, thereby destroying the truth of the sign.

D: To paraphrase Karl Marx, they attacked the “natural form”, but not the “traffic form”...

O: They didn’t destroy all trading centers or destroy world trade, but rather wiped out a few companies whose data has now been destroyed, but copies of which are on some servers. But a system was hit at the center, a landmark of that system was materially destroyed. The Twin Towers are the “natural form”. The fact that financial transactions are made and values are exchanged is the “form of transport”. And you can’t hit that materially, you can only hit that mentally, because, as Marx says so beautifully: “No matter how threadbare the cloth is, it is now a use value that is somewhat worn out, but I still can’t find any exchange value in it recognize.”

D: And how do you hit the “traffic form”, what should the Unabomber have attacked, for example?

O: You don’t see the “traffic form”, it’s a thought form.

D: Yes, how do you attack them?

O: Not with terror, that would be wrong. Terror, or material violence, that targets “natural forms” is the wrong form of struggle. That’s why it’s more effective

To attack the “form of traffic”, i.e. the form of thought, in such a way that it is abolished. The thought is indestructible; it can only be abolished in a higher, more complex thought, i.e. invalidated. But of course also recognizing one’s right and preserving it, that is also what “repealing” means. So it’s this dialectical category...and this is only mental. So in my opinion this is a more important bomb and has greater destructive power in the long term than real bomb explosions.

D: But if the attack on the “natural form” sets in motion a mental process that in the long term attacks the “traffic form”, can’t that be exactly right? Isn’t it much more impressive to see the images of the attacks, which trigger thoughts or comments about whether developments, for example those in technology, are going in the wrong direction? Isn’t that, taking into account the attention multiplied by the media, more powerful than just a text or a thought?

O: I just find it cruel to attack the “natural form”. It’s destruction, it’s brutality. Truly spiritual beings can avoid such cruelty, and I would also spare my opponents the same, which is why I would never use it.

D: But how do you intensify the class struggle so that a new, post-capitalist society is achieved? How should the necessary redistribution come about? How do you abolish computerized capitalism, which frees up masses of people who are no longer needed in the work process?

O: That is exactly the question: what do you do with the industrial reserve army, with the millions of pensioners, with the unemployed, with the young people who have been kept in the education system for far too long and who are also kept away from productive activity. Every question of power is decided by whether the people can be put to work. And a larger quantity than before...”

Thanks for your offer. Please be sure to send me an authentic version of the Manifesto.

Is there also a version in German? A small publisher in Berlin wanted to publish a German version this year, but withdrew it for reasons unknown to me.

I wrote to you in an earlier letter that I had begun translating a Manifesto version (Jolly Roger Press 1995) with two students from my class. But we failed because of some terms and phrases. I think that the text is more complex than our previous translation. Receiving a version authorized by you would therefore be a very important thing.

Being able to write to you in German obviously makes it easier for me to formulate my thoughts and questions.

I’ve been trying to improve my English over the last few months, but I keep noticing that I “think in German”. Of course, this is not conducive to the learning process.

But you write and formulate surprisingly well in German. Where did you learn German so well? Did you also speak German in your family? Or is it perhaps related to the fact that at the time you were studying at Harvard, many mathematics, physics or geometry textbooks were written in German? Have you ever visited Germany yourself? I’m very interested in all of this.

Of course you notice that it is your second language. I suspect that despite your good knowledge there are some small ambiguities creeping in. Maybe it’s not only safer but also interesting to work with 2 frames? One in German and one in English? This way I could also improve my English. So a few days later I will send you an English translation of this letter, which I will have translated for me by an English woman living in Hamburg.

I feel a bit helpless trying to write you something sensible. Because I can’t understand your situation or even remotely imagine it. The only thing I know about life in prison are the stories of a friend who spent 4 years in prison in the GDR for trying to cross the border guards.

I saw the outside of Florence prison during a visit last year.

But I have no idea how you feel in there.

Or even about what you are really interested in or what you have completely finished with. Although some of it would certainly be extremely interesting to find out. You have accomplished your work, some of it is documented, in varying quality, some (or much) is still unknown.

I have the feeling that this work affects me and my own work and I would like to find out why. Of course, I would also be interested in your idea of why I am writing to you or what interests me in writing to you in such detail.

I hope I didn’t ignore your situation with my letter. It’s certainly not more like an attempt to grope my way forward. Is there something that you would enjoy and that interests you that I can send you?

I would be very happy if we stayed in touch and if you answered me again.

Best regards
Sincerely

Lutz Dammbeck

3) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

July 23, 2002

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

In your last letter you asked me so many questions that I cannot answer all of them in this letter. But I’ll try to answer a few.

My mother’s family came from Galicia. I don’t know how to spell “Galicia” in German, but it is the province of Poland in which Krakow is located. I believe that my grandparents lived next to the Carpathian (Carpathian?) mountains. Therefore, they immigrated to the United States.

My father’s parents came from the part of Poland that was then ruled by Russia. Probably didn’t live very far from Warsaw. I believe that my father’s parents maintained some connections with their relatives in Poland, but they died and my parents left all such connections a long time ago. My parents severed all ties there a long time ago.

I have never had such connections.

The origin of your name, which you explained in your letter, shows that the similarity to my mother’s family name is only coincidental. Therefore there is no reason to assume that our families are related to ours.

Your idea that the structure of science and mathematics is shaky because of Gödel’s theorem is erroneous. Gödel’s theorem just says that there are some problems in mathematics that can never be solved. It does not at all say that one should doubt the correctness of the solutions to the problems in mathematics that have already been solved.

(By the way, you called Gödel “Fritz Gödel”. He is usually called “Kurt Gödel”. Maybe he has two first names?)

To answer another one of your questions. Yes, fifty years ago in the United States there was an unconditional belief in science and technology.

On pages 4 and 5 of your letter you suggest that the real problem is not technology, but globalization (of capitalism).

But what do you mean by the word “globalization”?

They use it as if globalization and technology were the same. For example, you write that “this globalization is destroying nature more and more.” But technology doesn’t need globalization to destroy the earth. Technology began destroying the earth a very long time ago and would continue to do so even if it did not happen globally but in each country on earth isolated from one another. Globalization accelerates the destruction process a little, but that is all.

So I cannot answer your questions about globalization unless you explain to me exactly the meaning in which you use the word “globalization”.

You would also have to explain to me exactly the meaning in which you use the word “capitalism”. Do you think capitalism existed in the former Soviet Union? Or did the technology exist without capitalism in the Soviet Union? Was the technology existing in the Soviet Union less evil than the technology of the capitalist countries?

In the last paragraph on page 6 of your letter you ask several interesting questions.

When I wrote to you that the concept of a utopia is insane and dangerous, I did not mean that all ideals are insane and dangerous. What is insane and dangerous is the belief that a society can be created according to a certain ideal pattern. And even if it were possible to create a utopia, creating it would be a selfish and even totalitarian act.

You undoubtedly have your own ideas about a utopia.

Another person has different ideas about what a utopia is, which may be very different from yours. Maybe his utopia would be a hell for you, as yours would be for him. Would you like him to impose his utopia on you?

Do you have the right to impose your utopia on him?

I would like to write more about these and other questions of yours, and I wanted to ask you some questions about the German language and especially about German word order, but some serious problems have arisen that I am very concerned about. That’s why I have to end this letter here. I will write to you more later.

Meanwhile, at the end of your letter, you offered to send me something that would make me happy.

I gladly accept this offer. My German dictionary is small, bad and tattered. I would be happy to receive a good German-English dictionary. But, if you send me a dictionary whose cover is stiff or hard, you must put the cover aside, because the rules of this prison prohibit prisoners from receiving books whose cover is hard.

(In English: If you send me a hardcover dictionary, you must remove the cover, for the rules of this prison prohibit inmates from receiving hardcover books.)

Please excuse me for not writing this letter carefully. I’m in a hurry because of the problems mentioned above.

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski

July 23, 2002

5) August 15, 2002

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter dated July 23, 2002.

I hope and wish that the serious problems that you mention at the end of your letter and that worry you can be solved.

Yes, I asked you a lot of questions and I’m looking forward to your answers. As I write this, I am sitting at the window, listening to the weather report on the radio, which speaks of torrential rain that is devastating large parts of Germany, but also Bohemia and the Balkans. My university in Dresden (located on the Elbe, which comes from Bohemia) is surrounded by water, the telephone is down in large parts of the city and the train station and bridges are closed.

In Hamburg we are now waiting for the tidal wave from Dresden to arrive here in a few days. The discussion is now underway as to whether these storms are the result of global warming caused by CO2 emissions and overexploitation of nature. A professor is currently on the radio calling for “a second technical revolution” and that “creative scientists and engineers must develop new visions for new forms of energy.” The only irritating thing is that much more terrible flood disasters took place in the past (1342 on the Rhine), when there was no greenhouse effect yet.

But about your letter. Her mother comes from Galicia, if the information about Silesia is correct, these areas are really far apart. A direct relationship is rather unlikely, but I want to wait for an aunt to research the origins of my father’s family.

Your reply to my question about “Gödel’s theorem” hasn’t completely convinced me. To better explain what I mean, I have attached a page. I summarized and “collaged” information from various publications. I’m not a mathematician or scientist like you, but as an artist I would go crazy (if I found a system for my art) if I didn’t know (as in a picture or an installation or a film) every detail of a form or a content would have been “clarified” accordingly. Of course this never works, but it is precisely these “imperfections” that are what make art so interesting, enigmatic and mysterious.

Naively, I think that science and mathematics are about clarifying everything and not leaving anything “inexplicable”. Because otherwise it would be similar in science to art = you use facts, results of empiricism and your own experiences for an invention, for imagination, and use them to invent a story.

I have the vague feeling that you are defending science and mathematics against this kind of “ambiguity”. If that is the case, I am missing the “link” to your fundamental criticism of an industrial society whose technologies are essentially based on the laws of mathematics/physics.

And it is precisely this “overlooking the missing links in the theoretical structure” of the scientists/positivists/materialists that seems to me to be a serious problem with consequences that cannot yet be foreseen.

Or can you research, develop and live just fine with a theoretical structure that is full of holes?

How can one even reflect on science and technology separately? Good science — bad technology?

Isn’t technology just the materialization of scientific ideas in the form of tools? And yet is it inextricably linked to science? In other words: isn’t science and its world views and ethics more “guilty”? And so the technology is more “innocent”? Like a child who just needs to be told the right path? (e.g. to renewable environmental technologies that copy natural systems and return used energy in a circular system).

And here may be an opportunity to ask you for your definition of “technology.” What do you mean by “technology”? Was the hand ax also included? Did its use also have the destructive effects you mentioned? For you, where is the “beginning” where technology begins to destroy the earth?

You are of course right about “Fritz” Gödel. I only noticed that when the letter was already gone and I was a bit annoyed (that means: annoyed).

Your question about “globalization” is not easy to answer.

Depending on where you are located in the political spectrum, the definitions vary. First of all, I would like to distinguish between “world” and “globality”. A differentiated world market, for example, is tied to national economies that can transact sovereignly. Against each other, but also with each other in their foreign trade policy. Or the “world” also includes individuals with all their rights. And if you negate this and create a “unitary market”, a worldwide one, then you have “globalism” or “globalization”.

This is a global standard market on which goods, ideas and opinions are traded and which functions according to “market laws”.

And on which, for example, standardized ways of life are carried to every corner of the world. This globalization is at the same time the negation of “world”.

The prerequisite for this to work are globally operating functional systems that are increasingly digitalized and are used in all important areas. And these are based on calculating machines and their character production and processing.

This automation shifts the boundaries of the community into the people themselves. In order for this to develop, the development of certain ones was necessary

Theoretical models and the associated technology/machines are necessary, I would call this “thought and language of modernity”.

This certainly includes the emergence of “role theory” in sociology in America in the 1950s. This describes nothing other than that society inserts itself into the individual.

And the countermovement is then the “integrists”, today an ideological insult. They don’t want a split consciousness, no fears caused by the threat of the extinction of reality, or that people are separated from reality, from corporeality, etc...

When someone says, like the German sociologist Niklas Luhmann, “we don’t need the subject anymore,” isn’t that a declaration of war? Or to say that we only use the form (Laws of Form, George Spencer Brown) or that we formalize language so that machines can work with it.

Doesn’t that mean saying to the other person: We no longer need subjectivity, you are completely unnecessary, I will cancel you in the next moment as data waste, as environmental pollution! This all sounds very theoretical, but it might be a good way to understand the terms and their interpretations.

I would describe capitalism as a system that is defined by terms such as capital, workers, machines, market, surplus value, accumulation.

The relationships between these terms (and the people, material and spiritual things that are referred to by them, including scientists and scientific ideas) are determined by the economic. Laws of capitalism are defined and subjected to. As I said, this concerns the economy, and of course there are also psychological-psychic or transcendental aspects that influence the whole thing

a rather complicated web because there are many connections and references and mutual influences.

An important concept of the capitalism system is CAPITAL.

The invention of capital and the capital function of money (by Marx) was certainly a revolution. Profit is the engine for development and the drive for enrichment. Marx describes it something like this: the first discoverers of something, the entrepreneurs who dare to try something new, usually go bankrupt.

They are brilliant, like Konrad Zuse, for example, who kept going bankrupt with his computer factories after the war.

But he was really one of the inventors of the programmable calculating machine. And only those who then bought up his inventions cheaply and rationalized them, and applied capitalist commercial techniques and relied on this new technology, of course, then made the big profits. And then a whole wave is created and at some point it breaks. As currently observed.

So there is a new technology in spurts and a new market, but everything is and remains part of ordinary capitalism and is subject to the nature and mechanisms of market laws. Whether biological, digital, analogue: when such a product is on the market, market law applies with all its consequences, even if it is only fractions of pennies that are created and transferred in value (possibly compensated for by the mass size).

I think Marx is right.

Capitalism certainly did not exist as a defining feature in the Soviet Union. This does not exclude the possibility that there were capitalist characteristics such as enrichment or profit, as a surrogate or as an ingredient. But capital and the key industries were socialized and there was no real market.

But here we already have an example of the utopia you are talking about, which is imposed on everyone whether they want it or not.

In the Soviet Union they also wanted growth (like in the West), but with redistribution and domestication of the drive for enrichment and egoism — under the banner of an ideal of “Egalité-Fraternité-Humanité”. That went wrong. But in my opinion not because of the technology. But because of the nature of the system in which technology was applied. This means that technology would not be bad or good a priori, but would have to be used in a system that better defines the growth or character of this technology — such as the relationships between people etc. etc.

That does not try to “improve”, control, “automate” or “standardize” people, neither physically nor psychologically.

Do you know what’s funny? In the GDR and the Soviet Union, Norbert Wiener was a very popular man; cybernetics was considered the key to the future.

Of course, the communists were fascinated by the idea of having a control science in their hands, cybernetics, with which they could “plan and direct” everything, as it was called in Eastern jargon at the time.

I remember that as a 14-year-old, at the “Youth Consecration,” which was an obligatory state ceremony for the “initiation” of children as “young socialists,” I was presented with the book Space-Earth-Man . In the book, cybernetics and nuclear power formed the final chapter, as the (communist) path to the future.

What do you think, is a “system” even necessary?

To find your way around, to organize everyday life and society?

Do you need data, empiricism and their evaluation, for which a “system” or an idea of a system forms the framework?

Because nature also works with biological, perfect systems?

In this context, was the work of Bertalannfy (Open, Systems Theory) in the 1960s of interest to you?

However, after all my personal experiences with social systems, I am skeptical and at a loss as to how things could work better.

You are right about the “hell of utopia” as you describe it.

I reject forcing someone else to participate in the realization of their own utopia. But how do you defend yourself against such coercion? Is there a right to take violent action against this? Isn’t this also a form of coercion against others that nullifies one’s own good intentions? Who is generally entitled to set “right”?

I would therefore definitely like to read an authentic version of the Manifesto soon, which you promised me.

So, I wrote down the text in one go and now I feel a bit exhausted. I think there is enough material for further reflection and discussion.

Separately from this letter I am sending you a dictionary and hope that it arrives safely and is useful and helpful to you.

Unfortunately, all good German editions had a hard cover.

I would have had to remove it with the risk that the book might soon fall apart. I did not want.

Please feel free to write me any questions about the German language and word sequences, which I will be happy to answer.

Dear Ted Kaczynski, I hope that the problems mentioned at the end of your last letter do not cause any inconvenience.

I hope you have the opportunity to write to me again soon and until then I remain with you with the best wishes for your health and well-being

Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, August 15, 2002

4) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

August 15, 2002

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

Because I now have a little more time, I am continuing my response to your letter of June 23^rd.

In the last paragraph on page 6 of your letter you ask: “What can we do if there are no ways to rationally direct the development of society?” Perhaps we could destroy the current society. We cannot know what will come next.

That is why we cannot know “on what foundations and essentials in morals, philosophy, art and science” the society that follows will rest. (Page 7 of your letter).

When all modern technology is abolished, all we know is that there will be no more biotechnology, no computers, no atomic bombs, etc. Whatever society comes after the destruction of the technological system will not be as horrific as today’s.

I think you didn’t read the manifesto carefully. Please read paragraphs 106–108, 182–184 and 207–212. If you had read these paragraphs carefully, you wouldn’t have to ask me these questions. I just want to add that John Zerzan is a fool. He believes in ridiculous theories, and his idealized picture of the life of prehistoric people hinders the development of an effective revolutionary movement.

I read Jaques Ellul’s book Propaganda many years ago, but I don’t remember its contents. That’s why I can’t answer the question you asked about this book. I just want to point out that the belief that the development of society can be sensibly directed naturally comes from the naively optimistic modern idea of progress. (I don’t know if the German word “Forttritt” corresponds exactly to the English word “Progress”, but what I want to say is “Progress”.)

The rest of what you wrote on page 7 consists of abstractions that are meaningless to the problems caused by the technology.

(The rest of what you have written on page 7 consists of abstractions that are irrelevant to the practical problems brought on by technology.)

Let’s stick to what is practical and concrete:

Would you like it if people lived in a virtual world?

That machines are smarter than people? That people would therefore become useless and superfluous? If you don’t like that, then computer science is obviously dangerous for you. Would you like people, animals and plants to be products of technology in the future?

Or that some accident or some miscalculation on the part of scientists would release destructive genes into the environment and a catastrophe would ensue?

If you don’t like these things, then life science is obviously dangerous to you. Even if it does not bring about catastrophe, modern technology, of which computer science and biotechnology are the most transformative parts, will fundamentally change everything on earth, and the consequences of this will be quite incalculable. If you don’t like such changes, then computer science, biotechnology, and all modern technology are obviously dangerous to you.

The foregoing dangers are very simple and have no relation to morality, Gödel’s theorem, any “fundamental contradiction,” or other abstract philosophical questions.

Regarding the second and third paragraphs on page 8 of your letter, I refer you to the article about “Critter” that appeared in the New York Times Sunday Magazine, April 7, 2002. Furthermore, I only say that every revolutionary movement must initially be small and weak.

I cannot predict whether an effective revolutionary movement will emerge, but the more irresponsible the technological system becomes, the more likely an effective revolutionary movement will appear. (the more irresponsible the technological system becomes, the more likely is the appearance of an effective revolutionary movement.)

Regarding the final paragraphs of your letter on page 8, I just ask you this question: When the Indians of North America attacked the invading Europeans, when the black slaves revolted against their white masters, when the Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto fought the German soldiers: Do you think they asked themselves who legitimizes their use of violence, who sets the boundaries, or who allows the border crossing?

On page 9 of your letter you mention your desire for a copy of the authentic version of the manifesto. I’ll send you a copy, but I can’t do it right away. I only have a barely legible photocopy of the authentic version, which I am currently using to make a good and easy-to-read handwritten copy. I don’t know when I will finish this tedious task because I don’t have the time to work on it. But I will finish it one day, and then I will send you a copy immediately.

I think that some Swiss made a German version of the manifesto three or four years ago, but I don’t remember it for sure. I suspect that his translation was bad. If you like it, I can answer your questions about the “terms and phrases” that failed you when you tried to translate the manifesto.

On page 9 you praise my German; but they’re fun. However, the English of your friend who translated your letter is excellent. It would take too much effort for us to write two versions of our letters. I believe that the following procedure would be easier:

I will write in German, but if I doubt whether you could understand a particular sentence well, I will also write the doubtful sentence in English between brackets.

You may write to me in either German or English, depending on your preference. If you doubt whether I can understand a sentence well, you can repeat the sentence in the other language between brackets.

But I can usually easily understand your words, because it is easier to read a foreign language than to write it well. (But I sometimes can’t understand your abbreviations — for example, “ua” on page 7 of your letter. And what does the word “past talk” mean on page 10 of your letter?

I can’t find it in my dictionary. — But I just looked up the English translation of your letter; “ua” means “for example,” and “vorbeireden” means “to miss the point of.” Is that right?

On page 10 you ask me what I think, why you write to me in such detail and what actually interests you. But I have no idea about it.

So, tell me: why are you writing to me in such detail, and what are you actually interested in? And please give me a detailed answer.

If you like it, you could correct my linguistic errors.

In this way I would learn to write the German language better.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

6) September 11, 2002

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg

Attn.: Theodore Kaczynski
Federal Register Number 04475–046
US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

our last letters crossed each other.

I hope the dictionary has reached you safely by now. If you allow me, I will respond in turn to the questions and answers to your letter of August 15, 2002.

Paragraph 184 of the Manifesto states:...there is no need to create a special (new?) type of social system; it is only necessary to get rid of industrial society...”

You’re right, we can’t know what will come next.

Does that mean that we can and must continue to use the existing foundations and essentials? Religion? Christianity? What about capitalism, about property? How much technology should/may/must be retained after the fall of the technological system?

Who decides that?

Who sets the boundaries and determines new rules?

Which existing essentials would you personally consider useful for the time after the disappearance of today’s technological society?

Should this be decided by the “brilliant individual” or should it be left to committees, however elected?

Before the destruction of the present, wouldn’t it be important to have a clear idea of the “after” in order to make the activities required for it more attractive (for many other “activists”)?

>TJK biotechnology, computers, atomic bombs etc., still page 1:

You are right that after the elimination of all modern technology

the tools and devices mentioned would no longer exist.

But what would science then be concerned with?

For what goals should scientists then use their rationality and their scientific skills?

Do you mean: Gödel or not, by discussing such “abstractions” I am unnecessarily putting myself on the level of those who are complicit in the problems caused by technology by converting “real life” into “abstractions”?

Instead of cutting through the “Gordian knot”, “simple” and “brutal” because the dangers are very easy to describe and understand? Do you think that everything else is just unnecessary “hair-splitting”?

I’ll get the item, it might take a while.

What do you mean by revolutionary movement? In terms of the Marxist-Leninist definition of “revolutionary movement”?

In the sense of the Weathermen or the Green Anarchists?

Who do you think could be a potential supporter of such a movement?

>TJK Regarding the last paragraphs on page 8...

Yes, that is an important question. You are right about the examples you gave. The use of force was legitimized by previous use of force that violated the law. In the case of the partisans in World War II it becomes more difficult. But what about the confrontation between individual and state legal concepts today?

In the case of, for example, the German terrorists of the RAF (Red Army Faction) in the 70s and 80s, the actors and their lawyers tried to obtain the status of combatants. That is, to define themselves as political fighters and prisoners who are in a state of war.

The “war” they waged saw “imperialism” on one side

of international capital and its agents” and, on the other hand, “the liberation movements practicing proletarian internationalism”.

Because this is the case, RAF and lawyers argued, RAF fighters should be treated as prisoners of war under the rules of the Geneva Convention, as a “subject of international law”.

This was not recognized by the state and the RAF was treated and tried as a “criminal organization”. Some actors have been in prison since the mid-1970s. Allow me to ask you this: do you see yourself as a political prisoner?

Yes, I would like an authentic version of the Manifesto.

But what you write is crazy to make a handwritten copy of. Aren’t you allowed to make photocopies of them and send them to me?

An authentic German translation would also be very important.

Therefore, I would like to accept your offer to ask about the meaning of some terms where I have the feeling that my attempts at translation are inaccurate. I believe they are key terms, without whose correct translation the entire text cannot be understood.

For example: LEFTIST. Probably a very important term that I haven’t heard before. Translating this as LEFT or LEFT-DIRECTED is certainly wrong and inaccurate, since liberals or supporters of ecology movements can apparently also be included.

In colloquial German we have the term “do-gooders”.

These are people who are actually quite nice, very politically correct in the sense of being multicultural and anti-fascist, but they close their eyes to certain realities and are a bit annoying (get on your nerves). Is that true?

The Manifesto also mentions LEFTISTS of the 19^th and 20^th centuries, who does this mean? The enlightenment’s?

I understand it this way: the LEFTIST is a figure of modernity, but rejects rationality and scientific reason. But maybe you’re a fan of gametheory or chaostheory? Could you give any well-known examples that fall under this term? So does the author of the Manifesto portray an archetype? or the psychogram of this archetype?

And what is the difference between LEFTIST and MODERN MAN (e.g. Chapter 57)?

For example: POWER PROCESS (= power process)?

I also have difficulties in translating the term and the four elements of the “power process”. Is “need for power” equivalent, or close, to Nietzsche’s “will to power”?

Thinking in the context of AUTONOMY: is it about self-determination, as opposed to external determination?

What does “When one does not have adequate opportunity to go throughout the power process…” mean exactly?

Or is POWER PROCESS more synonymous with “self-realization” in the sense of “to realize yourself”?

I find the formulations in Chapter 37 of the Manifesto convincing.

Nowadays, in modern society, the “I” and its interests (including the almost obsessive demand for self-realization + authenticity) are at the center of all activities.

How does this relate to the needs described in Chapter 37 “a human being need goals whose attainment requires effort...and he must have a reasonable rate of success in achieving these goals”?

Is that interpreted correctly: the possibility of being able to achieve these goals is one of the most important things for humans. And technological society prevents people from living the way they want. And forces a series of substitute activities that ultimately make the world and people sick?

For example SURROGATE AVCTIVITIES

(= substitute satisfaction, substitute action)?

Can I define and understand this in terms of psychoanalysis?

>TJK page 5: my abbreviations

Yes, “to miss the point of” isn’t bad. “Talking past each other” also means being able to understand the meaning of what is said or written, but saying or writing the wrong thing because the person being addressed has other problems or interests. He understands it, but he doesn’t care.

“ua” means: “among other things” — e.g. Among other things, I also went to the house in question...

“eg” means: “for example”

“etc.” means: “et cetera” = and so on

As you know, I am an artist. Painting and film tell stories about the world.

These stories take place in a so-called “image space” that exists objectively, whether in a film, a painted image or a three-dimensional installation.

Geometry, for example, provides “security” in space so that one can locate oneself. As an artist, I also have to clarify and organize my pictorial space.

Every line on the canvas (Albrecht Dürer speaks of the “elevation that opens up the pictorial space”) creates an imaginary and metaphorical deep space in which we have to find our way. Perspective was a tool to “order” the pictorial space; values were determined through the perspective of meaning, etc.

The computer and other digital media have apparently changed this significantly, and not just in art.

The production of images today is dominated by digital image media, where place, time and space can be constructed and changed at will. Some talk about future “mirror worlds” (David Gelernter for example). In these “mirror worlds” not only the previously familiar space, but also the previous image of humanity would dissolve into particles and “Is” that could be constructed and collaged as desired.

As a person and as an artist, I felt existentially affected by such visions, not to say attacked.

That’s why I was interested in who thinks and writes such things and why. That’s how I came across David Gelernter. In this context I also found information about the Manifesto and the “Unabomber”, which in turn led me to an essay by a lady from Berlin about these things, which I found very interesting.

Then I researched further on the Internet and found a lot of very different material, the focus of which was Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber and the Manifesto.

All of these things touch on my artistic work and the questions that I have been grappling with for years.

Why did I try to get in touch with you now?

I consider the Manifesto to be an unusual and exciting description and criticism of society. I agree with many of the ideas expressed there or attributed to you in the media.

Where I disagree, I am very interested in the counterarguments.

For me you are a person in contemporary history.

These were sufficient reasons for me to seek contact with you.

The fact that I write in such detail is also due to the complexity and diversity of the problem.

Furthermore, I find it bad that your request for a retrial was not met and that you are sitting in prison without due process.

At the beginning I talked about the nature of the image and that images always tell stories about the world. Authenticity is very important. The stories that exist about you in the press and on the Internet are all second hand, I suspect. I distrust such stories, from personal + professional experience. I am interested in first-hand information.

They can only come from you.

I would therefore like to continue talking to you, find out more about your views and deepen my knowledge.

I could also imagine recording such a conversation or interview with a video camera at some point. I’m sure this would be an important document.

You know, I’m a filmmaker and therefore have a fundamental interest in it.

First, I would like you to let me know whether I can send you photocopied pages from books or individual pages from magazines in the original.

I hope you are doing well given the circumstances and look forward to your next letter.

So I stay

With best wishes and greetings to you from Hamburg
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

Sep 11 2002

5) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

September 22, 2002

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I have not received a response from you to my letters dated July 23, 2002 and August 15, 2002. It is possible that you have not yet written me an answer or that you no longer want to correspond with me.

But it is also very possible that you sent me a letter that I did not receive.

I have learned that at least four letters recently sent to me have disappeared without my seeing them. They were sent through different post offices, so they apparently disappeared into this prison’s mail system.

Of course it is possible that other letters addressed to me will disappear. That’s why I have to write to each of my correspondents to tell them that if they sent me a letter and didn’t get a reply, I probably wouldn’t have received the letter and they should write to me again.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

6) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

October 31, 2002

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I have just received your letter dated 10/6/02 along with copies of your letters dated 8/15/02 and 9/11/02.

I have received the dictionary you sent me, which I informed you of in my letter of August 30, 2002, but to date I had not received your letters of August 15, 2002 and September 11, 2002.

So far, at least eight letters addressed to me have disappeared during the last five months: four sent to me from Germany, two from Massachusetts, one from New York, and one from North Carolina.

I notice that all the missing letters were sent from the East. As far as I know, no letter sent to me from the West has disappeared. So I suspect that the source of the problem lies not within the prison, but within the postal service. In any case, you should send all letters that you want to send to me as registered mail.

Unfortunately you will have to wait a while until I can answer your letters.

I’m extremely busy{1} trying to arrange the storage of my documents.

And that’s not as easy as you might think.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski 10/31/02

7) November 1, 2002

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg

Attn.: Theodore Kaczynski
Federal Register Number 04475–046
US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your last letter.

I hope you’ve got my answer. I think you will also receive the mentioned letters dated 15Aug + 11Sept 02, maybe a little bit later, because they are written in German and certainly they have to translate.

Please write me a few lines to let me know that you have received it.

And I’m eager for your answer to my questions.

I wish you all the very best and continued strength, in the name of my wife as well,

Yours,
Lutz Dammbeck

7) Ted Kaczynski an Lutz Dammbeck

15.November 2002

Sehr geehrter Herr Dammbeck:

Ich habe Ihren Brief vom 1.11.02 erhalten.

At least I think the date is 11/1/02, but it’s hard to read because it’s not written clearly. In any case, your letter that I’m pointing out is the one that is written in English and begins with the words “Thank you very much for your last letter.”

In this letter you write: “I think you will soon receive the mentioned two letters.” I have your letter from October 6^th, 2002 with the two enclosed letters* (Or should you write: “the enclosed two letters”?) from August 15^th. 02 and received from 9/11/02.

I informed you of this in my letter dated October 31, 2002. I will answer these letters when I have some more time. In the meantime, I’ll just say that I haven’t seen the Alston Chase book you mentioned, but I know that Mr. Chase is a liar, and that’s why I can’t recommend his book.

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski

11/15/02

8) November 16, 2002

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you for your letter dated October 31, 2002, which I received on November 12. I am pleased to learn from this letter that the dictionary has been given to you.

However, I did not receive the letter from August 30, 2002 that you mentioned. So far I have received 6 letters from you which were dated as follows:

April 17, 2001 — May 23, 2002 — July 23, 2002 — August 15, 2002 — September 22, 2002 — October 31, 2002.

Yes, I will be patient until you have time to respond to my questions and thoughts. But I’m very excited to see what you’ll write to me. Yesterday I had a very interesting telephone conversation with a historian (History of Science), which resulted in a dispute about the Manifesto, “spiritual mathematics” and the abolition of Descart’s separation of mind and matter. In many conversations I notice that the discussion always, almost inevitably, leads to the question of the use of force and then quickly to a point where opinions differ.

Unfortunately I have to keep it brief today (*regarding the requested word order:

“I am extremely busy organizing the storage of my documents.” Or possible: “I am currently very busy arranging the storage/archiving of my documents.”

Well, this little example gives you an idea of the scope there is when translating from one language into another, and also for possible over-, mis- or misinterpretations. That’s why additional information such as facial expressions, tone of voice or gestures are so important.

I hope you are doing well given the circumstances

Greetings from Hamburg
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

November 16, 2002

8) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

1.12.02

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I don’t have the time and I always have too much to do, but I will try to at least partially answer your letters from August 15, 2002, September 11, 2002 and October 6, 2002.

In your letter dated October 6, 2002, you included a short quote from a conversation “...with the Hamburg philosopher O.”, in which you asked this philosopher:

Anything built on this foundation containing this speck of dust is then “unproven” or “shaky”? And is it dangerous to build tall and complex buildings on these “shaky” foundations?...”

And the philosopher replies: “Well, sure.. “.

But remember that oral communication tends to be imprecise; because you have little time to choose your words and often the listener does not understand well what is being said to him and he does not have the time to think it over before answering.

Therefore, I suggest you this course of action: Send the philosopher O. a copy of the same sheet that you sent me, but underline the words that I underlined in red above. Ask the philosopher the following questions:

1. Do these words have a clear and definite meaning?

2. How would he explain the meaning of these words?

3. Does he agree with these words? 2 (Does he agree with these words?)

And ask him to answer these questions in writing.

In your letter dated August 15^th. ask on page 2:

“Is it generally possible to research, develop and live in science with a holey theory structure?”

Just to continue the discussion, let us assume for the sake of argument that you were right when you said that the theoretical structure of science is “holey”.

Then scientists have always researched, developed and lived “with a holey theory structure”. Did they do “great” research?

That depends on how you interpret the word “prima”. But then (for example) Gauss, Poincare, Einstein and even Gödel did “great” research with it.

What do you mean when you say that the theoretical structure of science is “shaky” or “holey”? What do you fear about Gödel’s theorem? Are you afraid that because of this sentence the planes will suddenly stop flying? That the electric light stops shining and the nuclear power plants no longer work? That’s ridiculous. What do you think? What practical consequences of Gödel’s theorem do you fear?

You write (8/15/02, page 2): “You defend science and mathematics against this kind of “ambiguity.” If that is the case, I am missing the “link” to your fundamental criticism of an industrial society...”.

The criticism of industrial society was explained in the Manifesto □, and it has no relation (no connection?) to Gödel’s theorem.

Let’s imagine that I criticize a criminal because he wants to kill me. Someone say, “This criminal is weak.” I defend his strength and say, “No, he is strong.” Would that contradict my criticism of the criminal for his desire to kill us? The stronger he is, the more dangerous he is. Likewise, the more perfect, powerful and infallible the technology, the more dangerous it is.

The criticism presented in the manifesto was based not on the alleged weakness of the technology, but on its excessive power.

Would you like to live in a world in which scientists and experts, or perhaps superhumanly intelligent machines, knew everything and understood everything and therefore ordered and regulated everything?

If you don’t like that, why complain that science doesn’t know everything and has holes in the theory. Instead, you should worry that science knows too much.

When I was young and naive, I feared that technology would create a completely orderly, regular and perfect world. Today I think that such an outcome is unlikely. But the reason for my change of opinion is by no means Gödel’s theorem, but rather the unpredictability of the behavior of complex systems. (the unpredictability of the behavior of complex systems).

The consequences of any change introduced into a complex system are usually incalculable. I suspect that the unforeseeable consequences of technology’s attempts to regulate nature would become increasingly severe until the technological system collapses.

If that happens, I will like it better than the creation of a scientifically regulated, orderly, perfect world.

Freedom is more valuable than security, slavery is worse than death.

But the overthrow of the system should be brought about as soon as possible, because the larger the system grows, the more catastrophic its overthrow will be.

On page 3 of your letter dated August 15, 2002, you ask me for my definition of the word “technology.” Some people call “technology” only the physical tools or machines that are the visible signs of applied science. Other people give this word another meaning:

They call “technology” not just the physical tools or machines, but the set of techniques or methods that a given society uses to achieve stated goals.

I prefer this broader definition, and I believe that it corresponds to the most common current use of the word “technology.” For example, what is called “genetic engineering” is not a physical tool, but a set of techniques or methods.

According to this definition, the handaxe (or more precisely, the ability to make a handaxe), fire (the ability to use fire), and other techniques of prehistoric man are also technologies.

But very often the word “technology” is used to specifically refer to modern technology (that is, technology that has been developed since the Industrial Revolution).

One must recognize 4 (one must infer from the context) whether “technology” means all technology or just modern technology.

Of course, one can avoid all doubt by saying either “modern technology” or “technology including primitive technology”.

You ask (08/15/02, page 3):

“How can you even think about science and technology separately?”

I do not believe that modern technology can be separated from science. I have in no way suggested that science is good and (modern) technology is bad.

You mention (8/15/02, page 3) the idea that technology just needs to be shown the right path. This means that the technology only needs to be used in good ways and not in bad ways.

(Technology must be used only in good ways and not in bed ones.)

But don’t we agree that the development of a society cannot be steered rationally? (Are we not agreed that one cannot rationally guide the development of a society?)

And if you can’t direct society’s development, how can you ensure that society only uses technology in good ways? If you can invent a practical means of ensuring that the technology is used only in good ways, announce it publicly, please, and you will astonish the whole world.

If you want to understand how difficult it would be to guarantee that technology would only be used in good ways, consider the problem of nuclear weapons.

Nuclear weapons were invented almost sixty years ago. No one (except perhaps some dictators) doubts that nuclear weapons are evil and that the world would be happier without them.

Nevertheless, very little progress has been made toward eliminating nuclear weapons over sixty years. (Nevertheless, in sixty years very little progress has been made towards the elimination of atopmic weapons.).

How can you believe that all the other uses of technology can be regulated so that it can only be used in good ways and not in bad ways? Such belief would be ridiculous. All the more so because there is no general agreement about which applications of technology (except for some extreme cases such as nuclear weapons) are good and which are bad. (All the more because, apart from a few extreme cases like that of atomic weapons, there is no general agreement as to which applications...of technology are good and which are bad.) How could you express this well in German?)

* * *

I have to stop here. I received your letter dated November 16, 2002. In it you provide the details of the letters I have received from you. You have received all my letters until 10/31/02 except the one dated 8/30/02.

But I also sent you a letter dated November 15, 2002. The missing letter from August 30, 2002 was just a few lines thanking you for the dictionary. So I repeat: Thank you for the dictionary.

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski 7.12.02

Attachment: Christmas card, December 8, 2002

1. Or should I have written: “Oral communication tends to be imprecise…”?

2. Did I say that correctly?

3. Is this sequence of words correct? Or do you have to write: “...that the planes would suddenly stop flying because of this sentence.”

4. Did I say that correctly?

5. Is “about” the correct preposition here?

6. Is “for” the right preposition here?

Annex Christmas card in the same letter

9) TED KACZYNSKI to LUTZ DAMMBECK

December 8, 2002

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

Merry Christmas!

Lydia Eccles made me this greeting card. I have photocopies made of them and I use them for *Christmas cards, birthday cards, etc.

In another envelope I will send you a copy of the article about “Critter” that I mentioned on page 3 of my letter dated 8/15/02.

On page 3 of your letter dated 9/11/02, you ask me why I cannot send you a photocopy of an authentic version of the manifesto.

I don’t have an authentic version of the manifesto.

I have two photocopies of the original manuscript, but both are partially illegible. I also have two fully readable transcriptions of the manifesto, but both contain errors.

I’m in the process of making an authentic version of the manifesto by comparing the four versions mentioned, but I haven’t been able to complete this work yet (3) because I don’t have the time... because I have to answer so many letters!

So if you want to get an authentic version of the manifesto, don’t ask me so many questions!

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

Is “for” the right preposition here?

9) December 21, 2002

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, 21Dec02

10) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

3.1.03

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I continue my reply to your letters.

What you wrote on the first 25 lines of page 4 of your letter dated August 15, 2002 is confused and almost meaningless.

Maybe I would understand these lines better if you translated them into English. But that’s not likely.

For example, you write “This automation shifts the boundary of the community into the human being himself.” I can translate that very easily into English: “This automation shifts the boundary of the community into the human being himself.” But I can’t understand what that means.

I suggest you an experiment: give these twenty-five lines to three intelligent people and ask them to explain the meaning of these lines in their own words, independently of each other, without discussing it with each other and without any help make by you. Then compare the results. If the three explanations of meaning do not agree, ask yourself whether your words have a meaning that anyone but you could understand.

If I understand correctly what you write at the top of page 6 (8/15/02), you mean that modern technology could be good if it existed within a system that “does not try to improve people , to control, to “automate” or “standardize”, neither physically nor psychologically.

But the characteristics of a society do not exist randomly and independently of one another; all are connected. Therefore, one cannot say: “We will make a society that has such and such properties,” as if one could arbitrarily specify the properties of the society.

How do you know that a system is possible in which modern technology exists without attempts to improve people, control them, etc.?

In fact, it is very unlikely that such a system would be possible.

There are several reasons for this, of which I will only explain the following:

There is a type of “natural selection” that also operates within human society. (I am not relying on any theory of “social Darwinism” or anything like that. What I present here consists only of simple and obvious common sense results ¹.

For example, in the battle between capitalism and communism, capitalism won. Is the reason for this that people chose capitalism freely and sensibly? Or is the cause somewhat philosophical or ideological?

Absolutely not! The reason for the victory of capitalism is simply that capitalism has shown itself to be more efficient, or more effective, or more efficient (I want to say: “more efficient”). Because of its higher efficiency, capitalism was stronger and more powerful than communism. If communism had shown itself to be more efficient (economically, technologically and propagandistically) than capitalism, it would have defeated capitalism.

So the victory of capitalism was not the result of any human choice, but the result of an “objective” fact, namely, the greater efficiency of capitalism.

And why was capitalism more efficient than communism?

Probably because “natural selection” was able to operate more freely in the capitalist system than in the communist one. ²

In the communist system, every company belonged to the state.

When a company proved inefficient, the government tried to improve the company, usually with little success. But if a company proves to be inefficient in the capital system, it goes under and is then replaced by a more efficient company. This type of natural selection develops very efficient companies within the capitalist system.

Because of natural selection, it is probably impossible to have a system that has modern technology without using it to manipulate people.

Because the groups that successfully manipulate people within the system will thrive better than the groups that do not manipulate people.

Therefore, the latter will perish and the former will replace them. In the United States, for example, all major organizations (corporations, political parties, labor unions, humanitarian organizations, etc.) use propaganda. Why?

Because most people love propaganda? Because some philosophy or ideology tells us to have the propaganda? Certainly not!

The ability to manipulate people through propaganda brings power. The more effectively an organization uses propaganda, the more powerful it is. The organizations that use propaganda most effectively thrive and grow, while the organizations that do not use it effectively languish and decline.

If a manufacturing firm does not advertise its goods effectively, it will lag behind in the competition against other manufacturers; If a political party does not campaign effectively for its candidates, it will not win an election; and so forth.

In this way, natural selection ensures that organizations (those that survive) use propaganda more and more effectively. Therefore, the growth of propaganda is inevitable as long as the necessary tools exist, such as electronic communication media, computers, the means of collecting enormous amounts of information, and so on. The only way to end modern propaganda would be to eliminate the technological tools that make it possible.

In this way we see that the development of a society is largely determined by objective and almost mechanical factors (e?)³. Compared to these factors, the influence of philosophy and people’s preferences is very weak. But I do not postulate any rigid historical determinism.

I just want to draw your attention to how difficult it is to overcome the objective factor(s?).

Of course, the conclusions of the kind of argument I have just presented are not entirely certain.

Such reasoning usually provides only probability, rather than complete certainty.

Let us therefore assume, although it is very unlikely, that a system would be possible under certain circumstances that possessed modern technology without manipulating people and without suffering from the other evil effects of technology.

Yet we know nothing at all about what these circumstances would be, or how we might bring about such circumstances. So we don’t understand how to create such a system. It’s just an impossible dream.

In fact, history shows that all attempts to create a society with predetermined characteristics have failed. As I have emphasized again, the development of a society cannot be steered rationally.

On the other hand, there are previous examples of the overthrow of a society through revolutionary efforts. The revolution is a realistic goal.

On page 6 (8/15/02) you ask whether a system is necessary or whether “data, empiricism and their evaluation” are needed. (What does “empiricism” mean? I can’t find that word in the dictionary.) It’s obvious that you don’t need data (in the scientific and technological sense of the word).

Until recent centuries, no one had such data. But surely you couldn’t have modern technology without “data and its assessment.” And what do you mean by “system”? When a few people live together, they always develop a system or customs, and you could call that a “system.”

But prehistoric people didn’t have a system like capitalism or socialism or anything like that.

Regarding “Utopia” you ask on page 7: “But how do you resist such coercion? Is there a right to take violent action against it?”

I believe that the use of violence against the imposition of a utopia, especially the “utopia of modern technology,” is only self-defense. Of course, one could dispute this opinion. If you believe the violence is immoral or immoral, then do not use it.

But when it comes to violence, ask (June 23, 2002, page 8) who legitimizes the violence. Who other than the state could legitimize the violence?

Do you believe that state-sanctioned violence is moral and non-state-sanctioned violence is immoral?

In relation to this, I ask you two questions:

1) What is the purpose of morality? That is, why should one behave morally? Because moral behavior promotes the good of humanity? Or is there another reason why one should behave morally?

2) Which type of violence has caused more harm throughout human history? The violence authorized by the state? Or the violence committed by individuals without authorization?

You ask (August 15, 2002, page 7): “Who is generally entitled to say “right”?”

Of course, this question is very closely linked to the above-mentioned question stated on page 8 of your letter dated June 23, 2002. But how would you answer this question?

For my part, I claim that no one is generally entitled to set the “right”.

In civilized societies it is usually assumed that the state establishes the “law”. In “uncivilized” societies, customs or customs determine the law.

When one denies the standard of law established by the state and customs and proceeds accordingly, it is called revolution. Of course, no one authorizes the revolution. If you think this is immoral, don’t take part in a revolution. But revolution is the only means by which one can resist the technological system.

Now I have to ask you a question about German word sequences. To correct an error of mine, you wrote on page 1 of your letter dated November 16, 2002: “I am excessively busy arranging the storage of my documents.” Could you also write: “I am excessively busy with this... “?

Or is it necessary to put “so” after “excessively”?

Is there a general rule that determines the position of a word of the form “Da (preposition)” within the sentence? Must such a word always be placed either at the end of the main clause or immediately before the verb at the end of the main clause if such a word points to a subsequent subordinate clause beginning with “that”?

For example:

I’m worried about not having any money. (Correct?)

I’m worried about not having any money. (Incorrect?)

I let him know clearly that I was home. (Right?) I let him know clearly that I was home. (Incorrect?)

I will address further questions from you later.

In the meantime I have to do other work.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

3.1.03

1. I want to say: “What I set forth here consists only of simple common-sense observations,” but I don’t know how to say that well in German.

2. Is this sequence of words correct? Or should I have written: “because natural selection was able to operate more freely in the capitalist system than in the communist one.”

3. What is the plural of “factor”? The dictionary doesn’t give it.

4. My old dictionary, which I threw away, said that the German word “Harm” was equivalent to the English word “harm”. But I can’t find the German word “Harm” in the new dictionary. Was the old dictionary right?

10) February 13, 2002

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your detailed letter dated January 3, 2003.

First of all, I would like to pay you a big compliment because of your remarkable progress in dealing with the German language.

Perhaps German was also spoken from time to time in your family? Or did you take German courses at school?

Furthermore, your letter shows me that I absolutely need a German translation of the Manifesto. I have the version published by Jolly Rogers Press, but I have not compared it with the many versions circulating on the Internet. With the help of friends, I have now started a translation into German and am sending you a few chapters in the appendix.

I would be very grateful if you would let me know whether the translation is meaningful and correct.

Regarding your letter, page 1, line 8 “This automation shifts the boundaries of the community into the people themselves...”.

Well, your comment about the quality of the first 25 lines of my letter dated August 15, 2002 is very critical.

I also have to correct a typo: it says “community” instead of “community”, i.e. “...into the boundaries of the community.”

What do I mean by community? The smallest community is the I. The I is in community with itself. The community is a subject like the individual. Communities and individuals make up society. There must be a boundary between individuals, like a boundary between communities.

Shifting this “border of the community” into the person/individual itself would mean that the I becomes a MANY things,

I myself now become everything that was MANY before. So: now I have/am several I’s at the same time.

So, I consist of different functions, professions, identities, ethnicities and play multiple roles — machines, implantations and various prostheses (the “natural form”) help me with this.

These different roles are of course always present, for example when the Manifesto describes what life could look like in the small scales: the I am hunter, fisherman, berry picker, poet or thinker.

But, there is only one ME. No I that is consciously composed of several I’s.

In Germany, political advertising/propaganda has currently created a word for this: ICH AG (AG = stock corporation). This is intended to express that the individual is his or her own factory, or office, company, network, etc., and carries out a wide variety of functions and activities independently; It plays several roles and is boss, worker, designer and what else, all in one.

Above all, this ICH AG is responsible for one thing — responsible for its own failure and the fact of being superfluous. If I am correctly informed, this “multiple personality” was “discovered” around the same time (known in the USA as role theory, around 1936, forerunners and pioneers Simmel or Dilthey) in which she studied and taught at Harvard and Berkeley have. Accordingly, there is no longer a “subject”. Everything (biographies, culture, society) can be put together and assembled artificially — as in modern collage techniques in art.

I find it very interesting what you write on line 31 of the same page in relation to “the characteristics of society” and continue on page 2, line 8 in relation to “natural selection” and continue on page 3 from line 5 carry out.

I would like to ask you a question: if it is as you write, that this “natural selection” is determined by “objective and mechanical factors (you correctly used the plural of “factor” yourself a line later) and cannot be changed, then perhaps the elimination of “the technological tools” would make propaganda disappear, but the objective facts (“natural selection”) would not be overcome.

That would remain and would it still be the real problem?

So you would have to abolish, regulate or change these objective circumstances that are responsible for “natural selection”, for example.

How should this limitation or abolition take place?

Attempts with Christian morality and the educational concepts of Rousseau or Thoreau have not worked in order to commit individuals and society to morality, morality and ethics that are binding for the entire world.

And do you know who also aspired to such noble goals?

The participants of the Macy conferences, cyberneticists like Wiener or anthropologists like Margaret Mead or psychiatrists like Gregory Bateson, Gestalt psychologists like Kurt Lewin or his admirer, the psychologist Henry A. Murray.

They all wanted to save the world. To do this, certain tests and experiments had to be carried out, the effects of which are critically described in the Manifesto.

But how would you personally deal with these objective factors in a community or society where modern technology no longer exists?

What if these always lead to competitive situations and there is a risk that everything will start all over again?

For example, what does an intellectual and scientist like you, with an IQ of 170, do in such a simple community set up in harmony with nature without modern technology?

What does he use his intelligence and energy for, what goals does he direct his drive for innovation towards? What would scientists like you research in such a society? How would you limit the urge and energy of your equally intelligent colleagues who may not be as insightful as you?

How do you want to direct or even eliminate their “objective” urge for innovation and knowledge so that modern technology is not invented and built again to make this simple (but also uncomfortable and hard) life easier?

Don’t you then also have to introduce propaganda and behavior control so that this “simple life” does not develop again into the well-known spiral of inventions and innovations that led to modern technology?

The ideas of the New Frankfurt School, the ideas of cybernetics and systems theory, of controlling society and changing consciousness also had the aim of making people happy and content so that they could live harmoniously in harmony with themselves and their neighbors.

Out of fear of the “authoritarian matrix,” all of these methods and procedures described in the Manifesto in the chapters on behavior control and brainwashing were developed, applied and perfected.

These scientists certainly saw the need to change objective factors and human circumstances and thus adapt them to their own philosophical-scientific concepts (and their idea of the future world as an “open system”).

How can one prevent that the alternative to today’s “system” outlined in the Manifesto does not have to use the same methods to force people to be happy?

If you are personally convinced that these objective factors exist, in my opinion the alternative described in the Manifesto can only work if these objective factors are also changed.

How can this happen without coercion, propaganda and the means of modern technology?

And I have to ask you something else: Do you believe that people can overcome or destroy the “system” outlined in the Manifesto without being part of that system?

Even you, who tried to lead an autonomous life in a self-built cabin in Lincoln, Montana, remained part of this system.

As cynical as it sounds, despite (or perhaps because of) your radical criticism, you have made an important contribution to the further development and perfection of this system.

For example, to possibly provide further justification for tightening security and surveillance systems in the Internet or computer sector.

You, or I, whether we like it or not, are not only useful to the system, we are also the system ourselves.

The system is now so intelligent and elastic that it can easily convert critical potential into energy supply or use it to repair leaks. This is really maddening, but it is true.

In this context, I would like to address your comments in the letter dated December 1, 2002 about “Gödel’s Theorem” and your question as to whether science can conduct “prima” research with a hole in the theory/axioms.

You ask me: “What are the practical consequences of Gödel’s theorem?” What are you afraid of?”

I’m afraid of living in a world in which “mad scientists and politicians” want to — are allowed to and can — realize everything a brain can think up.

I really hope that I’m not getting on your nerves with “Gödel”, but it’s not just “holes in the theory”, but rather “system errors”, possibly with serious consequences.

Let us take the “unity science” of the Vienna Circle, developed in Vienna at the turn of the 19^th and 20^th centuries, which was then further developed by Wiener, McCulloch and Rosenblith and others in the USA.

As I understand it, their “scientific worldview” is a declaration of war on religion, metaphysics and irrationality, all things that are associated with inexplicable, mystical and rationally incomprehensible phenomena and circumstances.

In contrast, reliable provability, mathematical precision and logical clarity should be set in order to illuminate the “dark corners of the irrational” in order to be able to understand the entire world as a logical-mathematically calculable model and to be able to understand and control it as a “scientific world order”.

Proof of consistency becomes a criterion for existence, in the hope of finally having security and orderly conditions by setting up logical and mathematically provable systems.

This is an ideological declaration of war and at the same time the scientific and philosophical basis for the development of the technology whose effects the Manifesto rightly complains about so bitterly.

A “hole in the theory”, a doubtful and unprovable gap or an “inconclusiveness” certainly does not lead to a plane crashing or computer networks collapsing, but it is a hole or a flaw in the ideology.

Practice should be the realization of theory.

For representatives of a “scientific world order”, of course the realization of the “correct” theory, their own. This is the “new priesthood” that doesn’t want to/can’t make mistakes.

Apparently a mathematician like you can live well with axioms or “unprovable and doubtable holes” that would be a disaster for a philosopher (because he has to prove everything).

For me this is confusing: If a scientific approach that makes provability its maxim must allow for non-provability, has it failed?

If this model is then transferred to other disciplines such as biology, psychology, life sciences or music in an “interdisciplinary” manner and on this basis modern technologies are developed that continue to develop into nature (and people) — that is not dangerous , ultimately even fatal?

Unified science was a pragmatic “fighting concept”, like Minsky’s “Artificial Intelligence (AI)” later, in order to get the research money. The theoretical self-image was shaped by the anti-religious, enlightened attitude: I myself am God and creator.

The ideas of Norbert Wiener and Warren McCulloch, the research of Marvin Minsky and the social scientists, behavioral scientists and psychologists in the 50s and 60s were inspired by this concept of science and this sense of mission.

These scientists themselves didn’t know whether this would work. They also felt uneasy (scary) because they knew they were opening Pandora’s box. This certainly has its appeal, but it also creates fear that increasingly complex systems will collapse (as you yourself wrote in your letter).

If you have a hole in the fuel line of a rocket, it’s bound to crash.

Gödel’s Thorem is one of these holes.

I have recently been involved in the so-called “Macy Conferences” where the ideas for transferring model worlds from cybernetics, mathematics and logic to social sciences, psychology and life sciences were presented and discussed for the first time.

So I would like to include a quote from a book about the Macy conferences:

“Logical systems based on formulas, such as the Pitts-McCulloch model, as well as machines that functioned according to these models, are subject to Gödel’s theorem and other mathematical theorems that show inherent limitations.

As human thought and brains began to be described, it was an open question for Macy participants familiar with mathematical logic whether and how these limitations would manifest themselves. “

Doesn’t the Manifesto describe the effects and consequences of these “limitations”? And doesn’t a “hole in the theory” put this “scientific worldview” on the same level as the “unscientific (irrational) worldview” that is being fought?

The one and the other are perhaps just a “beautiful invention”, like Gödel’s theorem?

To further ask: is mathematics perhaps just l’art pour l’art, like fine art, for example? Is an axiom the same as an abstract image or the music of John Cage? Like Thoreau’s philosophy?

On the other hand, the effects of such findings or formulations such as Gödel’s theorem, Wiener’s cybernetics or Minsky’s dreams about AI were not just l’pour l’art.

The effects were real and demonstrable. And the influence of the social sciences, psychiatry and behavioral scientists such as Skinner and other behaviorists is also demonstrable.

The influence on psychologists like Henry A. Murray, in whose test series and experiments at Harvard you had to take part as a “subject”, also.

Was the relevance of these “assessment for men” experiments and the context in which they took place already clear to you at the time?

In this context, I noticed in the Manifesto that many chapters refer to “leftists” and “leftism” as well as “behavioral control, i.e. brainwash and mind control”.

The author of the Manifesto must have hated “leftists”. The term “leftist” is not known in German. Is my assumption correct that the leftists and scientists described in the Manifesto had their role models at the universities of the 1960s at Harvard, Berkeley or Stanford?

When you yourself studied at Harvard and taught at Berkeley, you must have met and known such types and therefore be able to judge from your own experience who and what exactly is meant.

What were your impressions during these years?

From the student unrest, the anti-Vietnam demonstrations, the drugs on campus or the beginnings of brainwashing and behavior control?

Did you notice anything about it, were you informed?

What was it for you then, and for you personally today?

important?

When you were at Harvard, scientists and people like Dr. Richard Albert or Dr. Timothy Leary had a role that appealed to the public (e.g. because they administered LSD to undergraduates). Or Dr. BF Skinner, and the cult of behaviorism, which apparently had maximum following (if the literature is to be believed)...”

Could it be that “leftists” mean people like Skinner, Murray or Leary? Does the term “Leftist” serve to distinguish it from the term “Left”?

In my opinion, “left-wing” or “left-wing effect” refers to behavior that wants to change existing conditions and attacks authorities, including with rebellion and violence. “Leftist” would then be behavior that only pretends, an “as if”?

For me, these years were the time when I began to be interested in art, pop music and film and found the “left-wing anti-authoritarian effect” very attractive.

Back then, being against the authorities in the East (the GDR) meant rebelling against the socialist-communist state that defined itself as “left-wing.” Seen from today’s perspective, it’s confusing and strange at the same time. It wasn’t until much later that I became interested in the connections between science and politics.

I read that you received a Bachelor of Arts degree at Harvard, does that have anything to do with “art” or “art history”?

Before I answer your questions about some grammatical and orthographic formulations, I would like to ask you something else.

Through acquaintances I received a large number of recordings of the programs that were broadcast on US television on various channels on the subject of the Unabomber — Ted Kaczynski — Manifesto.

When you were preparing for your trial in Sacramento, did you have any information about how you were portrayed and portrayed by the media?

If I understand correctly, Judy Clarke and Quin Denvir were public defenders. When did you notice that the legal team was pursuing the strategy of declaring you “mentally ill”?

And wasn’t there an opportunity at an earlier stage to hire lawyers who agreed with your own defense concept?

If you allow me, I would now like to address your questions.

Basically, it can be said that in German the sentence order is free, but there are constellations that “sound” better than others.

My suggestion for the positions in your letter dated January 12, 2002, page 1:

“But remember that oral communication tends to be inaccurate because you...

“Oral communication tends to be inaccurate because you...”

12/1/02, page 2:

“Does he agree with this meaning of the words?”

12/1/02, page 3:

“Are you afraid that airplanes will stop flying because of this sentence (by Gödel)?” “or fall out of the sky?”

12/1/02, page 6:

“You have to determine/decide based on the context/context whether “technology” means all technology or just “modern technology”.”

12/1/02, page 7:

“But don’t we agree that one should…”

“Yet very little progress has been made in eliminating nuclear weapons over (the last) 60 years.”

12/1/02:

New Year’s card (whose good idea was it, yours or Lydia’s?):

“I have photocopies made of them and use/use them for...”

1/3/03, page 2:

“What I am presenting here are just simple (and obvious) common sense observations.” Or: “For what I am presenting here I have only used my common sense.” Or: “For the following statements I have I just used my common sense.”

1/3/03, page 3:

“How do you know that selection could work more freely in the capitalist system than in the communist system? Or: “In the capitalist system, natural selection was able to develop more freely/unhindered than in the communist system.”

1/3/03, page 4:

Factor is already clear = factors

1/3/03, page 6:

This is very interesting. In my opinion, “harm” is Old High German and is included in the root of “harmlessness,” meaning to be “harmless,” for example “a harmless dog doesn’t bite.” Being without “harm” can also mean being without fear or anxiety. The old dictionary is right.

1/303, page 7:

“I’m worried that I don’t have any money.”

“I let him know clearly that I was home.”

In your last letters you write that you are very busy and have a lot to do.

I would like to ask you curiously, what does that mean?

What do you think about writing a short text in German, perhaps a short description of your daily routine or your activities, and then I correct the text?

A Duden, which is a classic German dictionary with spelling explanations, would certainly also be useful for you. Let’s see if I can find something like that and send it.

Well, that was another long letter, I’m looking forward to your answer.

(sorry for Gödel again).

I hope you are doing well.

With best regards from Hamburg
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

February 13, 2003

and here are our first attempts to translate the manifesto:

-------------------------------------------------

Wir hoffen, daß wir den Leser davon überzeugen konnten, daß man das System nicht durch Reformen verändern kann, um so Freiheit und Technologie in Einklang zu bringen.

Der einzige Ausweg ist, das gesamte industriell-technologische System abzuschaffen.

Das bedeutet Revolution, eine radikale und fundamentale Veränderung der gesamten Gesellschaft.

Seit es Zivilisation gibt, haben organisierte Gesellschaften physischen oder psychischen Druck auf Menschen ausgeübt, damit der soziale Organismus funktionieren konnte.

In der Vergangenheit hat sich die menschliche Natur kaum oder nur geringfügig verändert. Deshalb konnte auf Menschen nur begrenzt Druck ausgeübt werden. Sind die Grenzen erreicht, was Menschen an Druck ertragen können, dann entstehen Aufruhr, Verbrechen, Korruption, Arbeitsverwei-gerung, Depression odere andere mentale Probleme, erhöht sich die Todesrate, gibt es Geburtenrück-gang. Es tritt etwas ein, das den Niedergang oder Zusammenbruch der Gesellschaft zur Folge hat oder sie dermaßen schwächt, daß sie von einer leistungsfähigeren Gesellschaft abgelöst wird.¹

Auf diese Weise hat die menschliche Natur in der Vergangenheit der Entwicklung von Gesellschaften gewisse Grenzen gesetzt. Der Mensch konnte nur bis zu einem bestimmten Punkt Druck ertragen. Gegenwärtig setzt eine Veränderung ein, weil die moderne Technologie Wege gefunden hat, die menschliche Natur zu verändern.

Man stelle sich eine Gesellschaft vor, die Menschen Lebensbedingungen unterwirft, die sie sehr unglücklich machen: Daraufhin verabreicht sie ihnen Drogen, die ihr Unglück beseitigen.

Science fction? Dies ist bereits in gewissem Umfang in unserer Gesellschaft üblich.

Weithin bekannt ist, daß die Anzahl von Menschen mit klinischen Depressionen in den letzten Jahrzehnten dramatisch gestiegen ist. Dieser Anstieg von Depressionen ist auf jeden Fall das Ergebnis EINIGER Lebensbedingung-en in der heutigen Gesellschaft. Anstelle die Ursachen dafür zu beseitigen, erhalten sie antidepressive Medikamente. Damit wird der innere Zustand der Person so verändert, daß er nun die sozialen Bedingungen aushalten kann, die sonst nicht zu ertragen wären.

(Ja, wir wissen, daß Depression oft rein genetisch bedingt sein kann. Wir beziehen uns hier auf die Fälle, in denen die Umwelt (Gesellschaft?) dafür verantwortlich ist).

Drogen, die auf das Bewußtsein einwirken, sind nur ein Beispiel für die Methoden, Kontrolle über menschliche Verhaltensformen zu erlangen. Werfen wir einen Blick auf andere Methoden.

Zuerst die Überwachungstechniken. Versteckte Kameras werden in den meisten Läden und an vielen anderen Orten zur Überwachung benutzt. Üblich ist der Einsatz von Computern, um in großem Ausmaß Informationen über Personen zu sammeln und auszuwerten.

Mit den auf solche Weise gesammelten Informationen läßt sich verstärkt Druck ausüben (i.e. Rechtsvollstreckung).² Dann gibt es die Propagandamethoden der Massenmedien. Es wurden wirksame Methoden entwickelt, um Wahlen zu gewinnen, um Produkte zu verkaufen, oder die öffentliche Meinung zu beeinfussen. Die Unterhaltungsindustrie dient als wichtiges psychologisches Werkzeug des Systems, auch dann (vor allem dann?), wenn ihre hauptsächlichen Themen Sex und Gewalt sind. Unterhaltung ermöglicht dem modernen Menschen, seiner Realität vorübergehend zu entfiehen.

Der primitive Mensch dagegen ist im Einklang mit sich selbst und der Welt.

Er kann deshalb, wenn er seine Arbeit getan hat, stundenlang herumsitzen ohne etwas zu tun.

Der moderne Mensch dagegen muß immer beschäftigt oder unterhalten werden, sonst fühlt er Langeweile, d.h. er wird unruhig, er fühlt sich unbehaglich und gereizt.

Andere Techniken gehen weiter als die zuvor beschriebenen. Es ist inzwischen eine wissenschaftliche Aufgabe, die Entwicklung eines Kindes zu überwachen. “Mentale Gesundheitsprogramme”, Methoden der Vermittlung, Psychotherapie u.a. wurden vorgeblich zum Nutzen der Menschen entwickelt. In Wirklichkeit dienen sie dazu, das Denken und Verhalten der Menschen dem System anzupassen. (Hierin liegt kein Widerspruch: eine Person deren Verhalten zu Konfikten mit dem System führt, stellt sich gegen eine Macht, die sie nicht überwinden und der sie nicht entkommen kann. Somit wird sie unter psychischem Druck, Niedergeschlagenheit und Frustration leiden. Sie hat es wesentlich leichter, wenn sie sich so verhält und denkt, wie das System es erfordert.

In diesem Sinne handelt das System für das Wohlergehen des Einzelnen, wenn es ihn durch Gehirnwäsche dem Anpassungsprozeß unterzieht. In allen Kulturen wird Kindesmißbrauch in seinen erschreckenden und offensichtlichen Formen verurteilt und als grundlose Gewalt gegen Kinder abgelehnt. Viele Psychologen haben aber eine weitergehende Auslegung von Mißbrauch entwickelt.

Ist Prügel als Teil eines bewußt eingesetzten Mittels zur Disziplinierung eine Form des Mißbrauchs? Diese Frage wird letztlich dadurch entschieden werden, ob Prügelstrafe dazu dient, das Verhalten einer Person dem Gesellschaftssystem anzupassen.

Das Wort “Mißbrauch” wird in der Praxis für alle Arten von Kinderaufzucht (-erziehung?) benutzt, die nicht System-gemäßes Verhalten fördern.

Wenn sie also über das Verhindern von offenbar sinnloser Grausamkeit hinausgehen, dienen Programme zur Verhinderung von “Kindesmißbrauch” der Kontrolle von Verhalten, zugunsten des Systems.

Vermutlich werden Forschungen sich verstärkt damit befassen, die Leistungsfähigkeit psychologischer Methoden zur Kontrolle menschlichen Verhaltens zu verbessern. Wir denken aber, daß psychologische Methoden allein nicht ausreichen werden, um die Menschen einer Gesellschaft anzupassen, die durch moderne Technologie bestimmt wird. Man wird wahrscheinlich auch biologischen Methoden anwenden müssen. Wir haben bereits den Gebrauch von Drogen in diesem Zusammenhang erwähnt. Neurologie könnte ein anderer Weg zur Veränderung des menschlichen Bewußtseins sein. Genetische Manipulation des Menschen wird bereits in Form von “Gentherapie” angewendet, es gibt keinen Grund anzunehmen, daß solche Methoden nicht auch angewendet werden, um bestimmte körperliche Aspekte zu verändern, die einen Einfuß auf mentale Funktionen haben.

Die heute sichtbare gesellschaftliche Zerstörung ist keineswegs Ergebnis eines Zufalls, sondern ist Ergebnis der Lebensbedingungen, die das System den Menschen auferlegt hat. (Wie wir bereits dargelegt haben, ist einer der Hauptgründe die Zerstörung der Selbstverwirklichung.) Wenn es dem System gelingen sollte, menschliches Verhalten einer totalen Kontrolle zu unterwerfen, würde die Menschheitsgeschichte in ein neues Stadium eintreten. Während in früheren Gesellschaften die Grenzen der menschlichen Natur die Begrenzung des Drucks vorschrieben ( wie wir in Paragraphen 143,144 erklärten), ist die industrielle-technologische Gesellschaft bald in der Lage, diese Grenzen zu überschreiten, indem sie Menschen verändert, sei es durch psychologische oder biologische Methoden oder durch Anwendung beider Methoden.

In Zukunft werden technologische Systeme nicht mehr den menschlichen Bedürfnissen, sondern die Menschen den Bedürfnissen des Systems angepaßt werden.³

Im allgemeinen läßt sich sagen, daß technologische Kontrolle über menschliches Verhalten nicht unbedingt aus totalitären (ideologischen?)^ Gründen eingeführt wird oder aus einem bewußten Verlangen, die menschliche Freiheit zu beschränken.⁴

Jeder Schritt dieser Kontrolle über menschliches Bewußtsein wird eine rationale Antwort auf ein Problem sein, mit dem die Gesellschaft konfrontiert ist, wie z.B. der Kampf gegen Alkoholismus, gegen die Verminderung der Kriminalität oder für die Motivation der Jugend zum Studium von Wissenschaft und

Technik. In den meisten Fällen wird es eine humanitäre Rechtfertigung geben.

Zum Beispiel: wenn ein Psychiater einem depressiven Patienten ein antidepressives Medikament verschreibt, tut er es, um ihm zu helfen. Es wäre geradezu unmenschlich, demjenigen das Medikament vorzuenthalten, der es benötigt. Wenn Eltern ihre Kinder in ein Lern-Center schicken, damit sie dort zum Lernen motiviert werden, dann tun sie das zum Wohle ihrer Kinder. Vielleicht sind einige Eltern der Meinung, daß es besser wäre, ihre Kinder müßten nicht wegen der Perfektion am Computer auf diese Weise manipuliert und einer Gehirnwäsche unterzogen werden. Aber was bleibt ihnen übrig? Sie können die Gesellschaft nicht ändern, und ihre Kinder bekommen vielleicht keine Arbeit, wenn sie nicht bestimmte Fähigkeiten gelernt haben. So werden sie also ihre Kinder in das Lernzentrum schicken.

153.

Somit wird Kontrolle über menschliches Verhalten nicht als vorsätzliche Entscheidung von Behörden eingesetzt, sondern erfolgt im Zuge des gesellschaftlichen Entwicklungsprozesses (SCHNELLE Entwicklungen). Es ist unmöglich, sich diesem Prozeß entgegenzustellen, weil jeder Fortschritt für sich gesehen nützlich ist, oder wenigstens wird das im Fortschritt enthaltene Schlechte von Nutzen scheinen, oder der Nachteil wird scheinbar den Vorteil nicht überwiegen (vgl. § 127). Propaganda wird beispielsweise für viele gute Zwecke benutzt, wie gegen Kindesmißbrauch oder Rassenhaß. Sexuelle Erziehung ist zweifellos nützlich, dennoch wird durch sexuelle Erziehung (wenn sie erfolgreich ist) der Familie die Einfußnahme auf sexuelles Verhalten genommen und dem Staat als Vertreter des öffentlichen Schulsystems übertragen.

156.

In § 127 haben wir festgestellt, daß wenn der Nutzen einer neuen technologischen Erfndung ANFANGS optimal ist, er nicht immer so BLEIBEN muß, weil die neue Technologie die Gesellschaft dahingehend verändert, daß es schwierig oder unmöglich für den einzelnen wird, ohne diese Technologie auszukommen. Das läßt sich auch auf Verhaltenstechnologien anwenden. In einer Welt, in der die meisten Kinder mittels eines Programms zum Lernen motiviert werden, werden Eltern weitgehend gezwungen, ihre Kinder einem solchen Programm zu unterziehen. Würden sie das nicht tun, wären ihre Kinder vergleichsweise ungebildet und würden später keine Arbeit fnden.

Angenommen, man würde eine biologische Behandlungsmethode entdecken, die keine unerwünschten Nebenwirkungen hätte und mit der die psychologischen Belastungen weitgehend verringert werden könnten, unter denen ein großer Teil der Menschen in unserer Gesellschaft leidet. Wenn ein großer Teil der Menschen sich dieser Behandlung unterziehen würde, wäre damit der allgemeine Grad der Belastung vermindert und das System hätte einen größeren Spielraum, den psychologischen Druck zu erhöhen. Tatsächlich ist dies in unserer Gesellschaft bereits geschehen, nämlich durch die Massenunterhaltung, die als psychologisches Mittel bei Menschen Stress reduziert ( oder wenigstens vorübergehend entlastet) (vgl. § 147). Unser Gebrauch der Massenunterhaltung ist “optimal”: kein Gesetz zwingt uns dazu, fernzusehen, Radio zuhören, Zeitungen zu lesen. Dennoch ist Massenunterhaltung ein Mittel, den Stress zu verringern, der die meisten von uns belastet. Jeder beschwert sich über die schlechten Fernsehsendungen, aber jeder sieht sie sich an. Nur wenige sehen prinzipiel nicht mehr fern, und jemand, der überhaupt KEINE Form der Massenunterhaltung wahrnimmt (in der Menschheitsgeschichte haben die meisten bis vor kurzem keine andere Unterhaltung gekannt, als in ihrer eigenen Gemeinschaft und waren damit zufrieden), ist sehr selten. Ohne die Unterhaltungsindustrie würde das System nicht in der Lage sein, uns in diesem Ausmaß einer Stressbelastung auszusetzen.

157.

Angenommen, daß die industrielle Gesellschaft überlebt, wird die Technologie wahrscheinlich in der Lage sein, menschliches Verhalten total zu kontrollieren. Es gibt keinen rationalen Zweifel daran, daß menschliches Bewußtsein und Verhalten vor allem eine biologische Grundlage hat. Wie Versuche gezeigt haben, können Gefühle wie Hunger, Freude, Ärger und Angst durch elektrische Stimulierung gewisser Gehirnteile abgestellt oder hervorgerufen werden. Das Erinnerungsvermögen kann zerstört werden, indem man Teile des Gehirns auslöscht oder durch elektrische Stimulation wiederbelebt.

Halluzinationen und Stimmungen können durch Drogen verändert werden.

Möglicherweise gibt es eine immaterielle menschliche Seele, die aber nicht in dem Maße wie die biologischen Mechanismen auf das Verhalten einwirkt.

Wenn dies der Fall wäre, würden die Forscher nicht in der Lage sein, menschliche Gefühle und Verhalten mittels Drogen und Elektroschocks so leicht zu manipulieren.

158.

Vermutlich wäre es nicht durchführbar, allen Menschen Elektroden einzupfanzen, damit sie von den Behörden kontrolliert werden können. Aber die Tatsache, daß das menschliche Bewußtsein und Gefühlsleben biologischen Eingriffen offensteht, macht deutlich, daß es sich bei der Kontrolle menschlichen Verhaltens lediglich um ein technisches Problem handelt: nämlich ein Problem von Neuronen, Hormonen und komplexen Molekülen. Diese Problemstellung ist mit wissenschaftlichen Mitteln zu lösen, und die bisherigen Leistungen der Gesellschaft bei der Lösung technischer Probleme machen es wahrscheinlich, daß auch bei der Verhaltenskontrolle große Fortschritte erzielt werden.

159.

Würde öffentlicher Widerstand die Einführung technologischer Kontrolle über menschliches Verhalten verhindern? Dies könnte durchaus möglich sein, wenn eine solche Kontrolle ganz plötzlich umfassend eingesetzt würde. Da aber eine technologische Kontrolle nur ganz allmählich in verschiedenen Abschnitten eingeführt wird, ist es unwahrscheinlich, daß es nachhaltigen öffentlichen Widerstand dagegen geben wird. (vgl. § 127, 132, 153.)

160.

Wir möchten diejenigen, die meinen daß sich alles hier gesagte zu sehr nach Science Fiction anhört, daran erinnern, daß die Science Fiction von gestern die Tatsachen von heute sind. Die Industrielle Revolution hat die Umgebung und die Lebensweise des Menschen radikal verändert. Deshalb ist zu erwarten, daß je mehr die Technologie sich mit dem menschlichen Körper und Bewußtsein befaßt, der Mensch sich genauso radikal verändern wird wie seine Umwelt und seine Lebensweise.

⁴ (§ 152) Einige Psychologen haben eine öffentliche Stellungnahme abgegeben, daß sie menschliche Freiheit mißachten und der Mathematiker Claude Shannon wird in Omni (August 1987) zitiert:

“Ich stelle mir eine Zeit vor, in der Roboter Menschen auf die gleiche Weise betrachten, wie Menschen heute Hunde. Und ich stimme für die Maschinen.1”

Oder ist besser:

„Ich stelle mir vor, dass Roboter in Zukunft Menschen auf die gleiche Art und Weise betrachten, wie Menschen heute Hunde. Und ich bin damit einverstanden. 2 Und sie haben recht. 3

Welche Variante finden sie besser?

Es ist ein Unterschied, ob man mit Laborversuchen psychologische und biologische Techniken zur Manipulation menschlichen Verhaltens durchführt oder diese Techniken in ein Gesellschaftssystem zu integrieren versucht. Das letztere ist weitaus schwieriger.

Ein Beispiel: obwohl die psychologische Erziehung in den sogenannten “Lab Schools”, wo sie entwickelt wird, sehr gut funktioniert, ist es doch schwierig, diese Methode in das allgemeine Erziehungssystem einzuführen. Wir wissen alle, was an unseren Schulen heute los ist.

Die Lehrer sind damit beschäftigt, den Kindern die Messer und Waffen wegzunehmen und ihnen beizubringen, mit Computertechnik umzugehen.

Somit ist das System bisher trotz aller Fortschritte nicht sehr erfolgreich in der Kontrolle menschlichen Verhaltens. Die Menschen, deren Verhalten bereits weitgehend vom System kontrolliert wird, sind die sogenannten “Bourgeois”. Es wächst die Zahl der Menschen, die gegen das System rebellieren: Wohlfahrtsempfänger, Jugendbanden, Sektenanhänger, Satanisten, Nazis, radikale Umweltschützer u.a.

163.

Wenn das System die Krise in den nächsten Jahrzehnten übersteht, wird es ihm gelungen sein, in diesem Zeitraum die Anpassung der Menschen an das System zu kontrollieren und die Menschen gefügig zu machen, so daß ihr Verhalten nicht länger eine Bedrohung für das System bedeutet.

Ist das einmal erreicht, gäbe es kein weiteres Widerstandspotential (?), die Entwicklung der Technologie aufzuhalten. Dies würde als logische Konsequenz die totale Kontrolle über alles auf der Erde, einschließlich der Menschen und aller wichtigen Lebensformen bedeuten.

Das System würde dann eine einheitliche, monolithische Organisation darstellen, oder aus nebeneinander existierenden Organisationen bestehen, die kooperieren und im Wettbewerb stehen, wie heute die Regierung mit Aktiengesellschaften und großen Organisationen miteinander konkurrieren.

Menschliche Freiheit wird es dann nicht mehr geben, weil einzelne Personen und kleine Gruppen gegenüber den mit Supertechnologien und einem Arsenal von neuesten

psychologischen und biologischen Methoden zur Manipulation von Menschen, neben Instrumenten zur Beobachtung und Anwendung von physischem Zwang ausgerüsteten großen Organisationen völlig machtlos sind. Nur eine kleine Gruppe von Menschen hat dann wirkliche Macht, und selbst diese haben nur begrenzte Freiheit, denn auch ihr Verhalten wird reguliert und genormt werden, wie heute unsere Politiker und einfußreiche Aufsichtsräte ihre Machtpositionen nur so lange innehaben, wie sie ihr Verhalten den vorgegebenen gesellschaftlichen Normen anpassen können.

164.

Man sollte nicht glauben, daß das System aufhören wird, weitere Techniken für

Verhaltenskontrolle über Menschen und Natur zu entwickeln, wenn die Krise der nächsten Jahrzehnte überwunden ist.

Im Gegenteil, wenn diese schwierigen Zeiten vorüber sind, wird das System seine Kontrolle über Menschen und Natur schnell verstärken, um nicht erneut aufgehalten zu werden.

Der Wille zum Überleben ist aber nicht das Hauptmotiv für die ausgedehnte Kontrolle.

Wie wir in § 87–90 erklärt haben, stellt die Arbeit der Wissenschaftler und Techniker für sie selbst eine Ersatzhandlung dar, sie befriedigen ihr eigenes Machtbedürfnis indem sie technologische Probleme lösen. Sie werden damit bei ungemindertem Enthusiasmus fortfahren. Die interessantesten und herausforderndsten Problemen stellen für sie dabei die Erforschung des menschlichen Körpers und Bewußtseins dar, sowie Möglichkeiten, deren Entwicklung zu beeinfussen. Natürlich alles “im Namen der Humanität”.

170.

“Oh”! sagen die Verfechter der Technologie, “die Wissenschaft bringt das alles in Ordnung! Wir werden Hunger überwinden und psychologische Krankheiten bekämpfen, jeder wird gesund und glücklich sein!” Sicher, das haben sie schon vor 200 Jahren gesagt. Die Industrielle Revolution sollte Armut beseitigen und jedermann glücklich machen. Aber das heutige Ergebnis ist ganz anders. Die Verfechter der Technologie sind hoffnungslos naiv und betrügen sich selbst in ihrem Verständnis gesellschaftlicher Probleme. Sie merken nicht, oder wollen nicht wissen, daß große Veränderungen der Gesellschaft, die anfangs nützlich zu sein scheinen, auf lange Sicht zu anderen Veränderungen führen, die nicht vorhersehbar sind (§ 103). Es ist sehr wahrscheinlich, daß die Anhänger der Technologie bei dem Versuch, Armut und Krankheit zu beenden, Gesellschaftssysteme schaffen werden, die viel schlimmer sind als die heutigen. Zum Beispiel brüsten sich Wissenschaftler damit, daß sie Hunger beenden und neue genetisch manipulierte Nutzpfanzen schaffen werden. Aber damit könnte die menschliche Bevölkerung unendlich weiter anwachsen, und es ist bekannt,

daß Menschenmengen zu Stress und Aggression führen. Das ist nur ein Beispiel von den VORAUSSAGBAREN Problemen, die sich ergeben werden. Wir möchten betonen, daß vergangene Erfahrungen gezeigt haben, daß technischer Fortschritt zu anderen neuen Problemen führt, die für die Zukunft NICHT voraussagbar sind (§103).

Seit der Industriellen Revolution hat die Technologie viel schneller neue Probleme für die Gesellschaft geschaffen als alte gelöst. So wird es eine lange und schwierige Periode von Prüfungen und Irrtümern für die Verfechter der Technologie geben, in der sie die Irrtümer ihrer Schönen Neuen Welt wieder in Ordnung bringen müssen (falls sie das jemals tun werden). Das wird große Leiden verursachen. Deshalb ist es nicht sicher, ob das Überleben der industriellen Gesellschaft weniger Leiden bringt als ihr Zusammenbruch. Die Technologie hat die Menschheit an sich gefesselt und es sieht nicht so aus, als würde ein Entkommen daraus einfach sein.

171.

Vorausgesetzt, daß die industrielle Gesellschaft in den nächsten Jahrzehnten überlebt und das System von den Fehlern weitgehend befreit werden könnte, stellt sich die Frage, was für eine Art von System es dann wäre? Wir wollen verschiedene Möglichkeiten betrachten.

172.

Zuerst wollen wir von der Voraussetzung ausgehen, daß es den Computerwissenschaftlern gelingt, intelligente Maschinen zu entwickeln, die alle Dinge besser als der Mensch tun können. In diesem Fall könnten hochorganisierten Maschinensysteme alle Arbeiten verrichten, und dadurch Menschenkraft überfüssig machen

Es könnten dann zwei Dinge geschehen: Maschinen entscheiden ohne vom Menschen beaufsichtigt zu werden, oder der Mensch behält die Kontrolle über die Maschinen.

173.

Wenn Maschinen ihre eigenen Entscheidungen treffen können, dann ist das Ergebnis nicht voraussehbar, weil es unvorstellbar ist , wie Maschinen sich verhalten werden.

Wir können lediglich feststellen, daß das Schicksal der Menschheit dann von den Maschinen abhängen würde. Man könnte entgegnen, daß die Menschheit niemals so wahnsinnig wäre, ihre Macht an Maschinen abzugeben. Wir behaupten weder, daß die Menschheit das freiwillig tun würde, noch daß die Maschinen sich willentlich die Macht aneignen würden.

Was wir behaupten ist, daß die Menschheit einfach in die Situation solcher Abhängigkeit von Maschinen geraten kann, so daß sie keine andere Wahl hat, als alle Entscheidungen der Maschinen zu akzeptieren. Da die Gesellschaft und ihre Probleme immer komplexer und Maschinen immer intelligenter werden, werden die Menschen den Maschinen immer mehr Entscheidungen überlassen müssen, einfach deshalb, weil deren Entscheidungen besseren Ergebnisse erzielen werden als menschliche Entscheidungen. Möglicherweise wird man eine Stufe erreichen, auf der zur Erhaltung des Systems notwendigen Entscheidungen so komplex werden, daß Menschen dann wegen ihrer begrenzten Intelligenz gar nicht mehr in der Lage sein sind, diese Entscheidungen zu treffen. Wenn diese Stufe erreicht ist, werden die Maschinen die Kontrolle erlangt haben. Der Mensch wird dann nicht mehr fähig sein, die Maschinen einfach abzuschalten, weil er so abhängig geworden ist, daß ein Abschalten kollektiver Selbstmord bedeuten würde.

174.

Es ist aber auch möglich, daß der Mensch die Kontrolle über die Maschinen behält. In diesem Fall wird der Durchschnittsbürger die Kontrolle über bestimmte Maschinen in seinem Privatbesitz haben, wie über sein Auto oder seinen Computer, aber die Kontrolle über die großen Maschinensysteme wird in der Hand einer kleinen Elite sein, wie heute auch. Jedoch mit zwei Unterschieden: wegen der fortgeschrittenen Technik wird die Elite eine umfassendere Kontrolle über die Massen ausüben. Da keine menschliche Arbeit mehr notwendig ist, sind die Massen überfüssig und eine unnütze Bürde für das System.

Wenn die Elite unbarmherzig ist, wird sie einfach die Entscheidung zur Ausrottung der Menschenmasse treffen. Ist sie human, dann wird sie mit Hilfe von Propaganda und anderen psychologischen oder biologischen Techniken die Geburtenrate soweit senken, bis die Menschheit ausstirbt und die Welt der Elite überlassen bleibt.

Sollte die Elite aus weichherzigen Liberalen bestehen, dann könnte sie sich für die Rolle des guten Hirten entscheiden, der über die Menschheit wacht.

Dann wird sie versuchen, die natürlichen Bedürfnisse aller zu befriedigen und die Aufzucht der Kinder unter psychologisch-hygienischen Bedingungen überwachen.

Jeder wird (muß dann?)Q irgendein Hobby haben, das ihn beschäftigt. Wer unzufrieden ist, muß sich einer “Behandlung” unterziehen, um sein “Problem” zu lösen.

Natürlich wird das Leben so sinnlos sein, daß die Menschen biologisch oder psychologisch manipuliert werden müssen, um das natürliche Bedürfnis nach Selbstverwirklichung zu ersetzen und durch ein harmloses Hobby zu sublimieren.

Diese manipulierten Menschen mögen sich vielleicht in einer solchen Gesellschaft glücklich fühlen, ihre Freiheit haben sie aber gänzlich verloren. Ihr Zustand hat sich auf die Ebene von Haustieren reduziert.

175.

Angenommen aber, daß die Computerwissenschaft nicht in der Lage ist, künstliche Intelligenz zu entwickeln, so bleibt menschliche Arbeit weiterhin notwendig.

Selbst dann werden Maschinen verstärkt einfache Arbeiten übernehmen und damit einen Überschuß an menschlichen Arbeitskräften schaffen. (Diese Tendenz ist bereits heute sichtbar. Es gibt inzwischen viele Menschen, die keine Arbeit fnden, weil sie aus intellektuellen oder psychologischen Gründen nicht den nötigen Ausbildungsstand haben, der sie brauchbar für das gegenwärtige System macht.) An Arbeitnehmer werden immer höhere Anforderungen gestellt. Sie benötigen weitere Ausbildung, größere Fähigkeiten, sie müssen zuverlässiger und anpassungsfähiger werden, weil sie nur noch Zellen in einem riesigen Organismus sind. Ihr Aufgabenbereich spezialisiert sich immer stärker, durch die Konzentration auf ihren winzigen Bereich verlieren sie den Bezug zur Realität.

Das System muß dann alle psychologischen und biologischen Mittel anwenden, um die Menschen anpassungsfähig zu machen und ihre Bedürfnisse nach Selbstbestimmung zu “sublimieren”. Die zukünftige Gesellschaft könnte den Wettbewerb einsetzen, indem sie Wettbewerbsverhalten in solche Bahnen lenkt, die dem System nützen.

Wir können uns eine zukünftige Gesellschaft vorstellen, in der es endlose Konkurrenzkämpfe um Positionen, Prestige und Macht gibt. Aber nur wenige werden an der Spitze der eigentlichen Macht stehen (§ 163). Sehr abstoßend ist eine Gesellschaft, in der jemand seine Machtbedürfnisse dadurch befriedigen kann, daß er viele andere aus dem Weg räumen und DEREN Machtstreben besiegen muß.

176.

Man kann sich Szenarien ausmalen, die Aspekte mehrerer anderer Möglichkeiten enthalten als jene, die wir hier diskutiert haben. So könnte es möglich sein, daß Maschinen vor allem die wichtigsten Arbeiten übernehmen, während die Menschen unwichtige Tätigkeiten verrichten und dadurch beschäftigt werden. Es wurde bereits vorgeschlagen, daß durch weitere Entwicklung des Dienstleistungssektors mehr Arbeitsplätze geschaffen werden. Dies würde bedeuten, daß Menschen ihre Zeit damit verbringen, einander Schuhe zu putzen, als Taxifahrer einander herumzufahren, handwerkliche Arbeiten für einander auszuführen, einander in Restaurants zu bedienen etc. Dies scheint uns ein menschenunwürdiger Weg zu sein und wir zweifeln daran, daß viele Menschen ein erfülltes Leben in solcherart sinnlosen Beschäftigungstherapien fnden.

Sie würden dann andere gefährliche Auswege suchen (Drogen, Verbrechen, Sekten, Haßgruppen) bis man sie biologisch oder psychologisch so manipuliert, um sie dem gesellschaftlichen Leben anzupassen.

177.

Es versteht sich von selbst, daß mit den hier aufgezeigten Szenarien nicht alle Möglichkeiten erschöpft sind. Sie sollten nur die uns am wahrscheinlichsten scheinenden Folgen aufzeigen. Wir könnten leicht andere einleuchtenden Beispiele fnden, als die beschriebenen. Es ist wahrscheinlich, daß das industrielltechnologische System in den nächsten 40 bis 100 Jahren überleben wird. Dann hätte es bestimmte allgemeine Merkmale hervorgebracht: Einzelpersonen werden mehr als jemals von großen Organisationen abhängig sein (zumindest der Bourgeois, der hauptsächlich für das Funktionieren des Systems verantwortlich ist und deshalb die Macht ausübt). Sie werden mehr als je zuvor “angepaßt” sein, ihre physischen und mentalen Eigenschaften werden aber vor allem Resultat künstlicher Manipulationen sein und nicht mehr Ergebnis des Zufalls (des göttlichen Willens oder was immer sonst). Die Überreste der ursprünglichen Natur wird man zum Zwecke wissenschaftlicher Studien unter Aufsicht und Verwaltung von Wissenschaftlern stellen (damit verliert auch dieser Rest seine Ursprünglichkeit).

Auf Dauer (einige Jahrhunderte von jetzt an) ist es wahrscheinlich, daß weder die Menschheit noch andere wichtige Lebensformen in der heutigen Form fortbestehen werden. Die einmal vorgenommene Veränderung durch genetische Manipulation wird nicht an einem speziellen Punkt gestoppt und deshalb fortgeführt werden, bis der Mensch und andere Lebensformen völlig umgestaltet sind.

178.

Was immer eintreten mag, eines ist sicher: die Technologie schafft für die Menschen eine neue biologische (?) und soziale Umwelt, die sich radikal von der Umwelt unterscheidet, aus der die Menschheit physisch und psychisch hervorgegangen ist.

Wenn der Mensch sich nicht durch künstliche Manipulation an diese neuen Umwelt anpaßt, dann wird er durch einen langen, schmerzhaften Prozeß der natürlichen Auslese dazu gezwungen werden. Das erstere ist wesentlich wahrscheinlicher als das letztere.

179.

Es wäre besser, das ganze verrottete System zu beseitigen und die Folgen auf sich zu nehmen.

183.

Wenn man für eine Ideologie begeisterte Unterstützung bekommen will, muß sowohl ein positives wie ein negatives Ideal existieren, das FÜR etwas und GEGEN etwas steht.

Das von uns vorgeschlagene positive Ideal ist die Natur, nämlich die URSPRÜNGLICHE Natur, die Lebensformen der Erde, die unabhängig von menschlicher Lenkung, Eingriffen und Kontrolle existieren. Zur ursprünglichen Natur gehört auch der Mensch, wobei wir die

physischen Aspekte des menschlichen Individuums meinen, die nicht einer Regulierung durch die organisierte Gesellschaft unterliegen, sondern vom Zufall, dem freien Willen, oder von Gott (je nach den religiösen und philosophischen Vorstellungen) abhängig sind.

184.

Die Natur ist aus verschiedenen Gründen ein perfektes Gegenbild zur Technologie.

Natur (die außerhalb der Macht des Systems existiert), ist der Technologie (die ihre Macht innerhalb des Systems (Frage: technologisches System?) unendlich auszuweiten sucht) entgegengesetzt. Die meisten Menschen werden darin übereinstimmen, daß Natur schön ist; sie hat eine unglaubliche Anziehungskraft.

Die radikalen Umweltschützer haben SCHON eine Ideologie, die die Natur als erstrebenswertes Ziel der Technologie entgegensetzt.¹ Um der Natur willen ist es nicht notwendig , eine phantastische Utopie oder eine neue Gesellschaftsordnung zu entwerfen.

Die Natur sorgt für sich selbst. Sie war eine spontane Schöpfung, die lange vor jeder menschlichen

Gesellschaftsordnung existiert hat, und Jahrhunderte lang haben viele Gesellschaften im Einklang mit der Natur gelebt, ohne große Zerstörungen anzurichten.

Erst durch die industrielle Revolution haben die Auswirkungen der menschlichen Gesellschaft in der Natur unermeßlichen Verwüstungen angerichtet. Um die Natur von diesem Druck zu befreien, ist es nicht nötig, ein besonderes Gesellschaftssystem zu schaffen, sondern sich von der industriellen Gesellschaft zu befreien. Natürlich werden damit nicht alle Probleme gelöst.

Die industrielle Gesellschaft hat der Natur bereits unermeßlichen Schaden zugefügt, und es wird lange dauern bis diese Narben verheilt sind. Auch vorindustrielle Gesellschaften können der Natur bedeutenden Schaden zufügen. Dennoch wird erst durch das Verschwinden der industriellen Gesellschaft etwas Wesentliches erreicht werden.

Damit wird die Natur vom schlimmsten Druck befreit, so daß die Narben verheilen können.

Die organisierte Gesellschaft wird nicht mehr fähig sein, die Natur zu kontrollieren (einschließlich die menschliche Natur).

Ganz gleich welche Gesellschaft nach der industriellen Gesellschaft entstehen wird:

die meisten Menschen werden dann in der Natur leben, denn eine fortgeschrittene Technologie wird es nicht mehr geben, die Menschen KÖNNEN dann nicht anders leben. Um sich zu ernähren, müssen sie Bauern, Hirten, Fischer oder Jäger sein.

Die lokale Autonomie wird zunehmen, wenn es keine Technologie, großen Organisationen und schnelle Kommunikation mehr gibt, um lokale Gemeinwesen zu kontrollieren.

185.

Was die negativen Folgen angeht — nun ja, man kann nicht zwei Dinge zugleich haben — um das eine zu bekommen, muß man das andere aufgeben.

10) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

February 27, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I received your letter dated 1/14/03 or 2/13/03 today. (The data you put on this letter contradict each other).

There is no way I can answer your questions until at least four or five months have passed. I am too busy. For example, my lawyers sent my friend fourteen large boxes of papers.

A partial list of the contents of these boxes is a stack of paper about an inch thick. I have to read the entire volume and tell my friend what she should do with each certificate. And that’s just one of the many tasks I have to do.

As for the last page of your letter, you don’t have to send me a dictionary!

The Federal Bureau of Prisons has implemented a new rule about sending in books, and if you sent me any book, the authorities would probably send it back to you because of this rule.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

2/27/03

11) February 17, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

After I sent my letter on February 14^th, I went through your letter of January 3^rd again and discovered a few passages to which I replied, but where I was suddenly unsure whether I could use your German formulations interpreted and read inaccurately.

So that there are no misunderstandings, I have written down your text again (abridged) and also answered your other questions from January 3, 2003. Please tell me if your text is reproduced correctly:

Page 1, line 26:

If I understand correctly what you write at the top of page 6 (8/15/02), you mean that modern technology isn’t bad after all if it exists within a system that doesn’t try to improve people to control, standardize and automate, neither physically nor psychologically.

But the characteristics of a society do not exist randomly and independently of one another; all are connected.

That’s why you can’t say, “We’re going to make a society that has such and such characteristics” and pretend that you can determine and determine the characteristics of the society at will.

It is very unlikely that such a system is possible.

There are several reasons for this, of which I would only like to cite the following: There is a type of “natural selection” that also works within human society. (But I don’t mean a theory of “social Darwinism” or anything like that).

My thoughts are just the result of applying common sense...

... For example: In the battle between capitalism and communism, capitalism has won. Because people freely and consciously chose capitalism?

Or does this have philosophical or ideological reasons? Not at all. The victory of capitalism was the result of an “objective” fact, namely the greater efficiency of capitalism. Why was capitalism more efficient? Because “natural selection” was allowed to develop more freely under capitalism...Because of this “natural selection,” it is impossible to have a system that owns modern technology and does not use it to manipulate people. The groups that successfully manipulate people within the system will always be more successful than the groups that do not.

In the USA, all major parties, companies or organizations use propaganda. Why? (does propaganda = manipulation for you?)

Because most people love propaganda? Because some philosophy or ideology tells us to have propaganda? Certainly not! Manipulating people through propaganda brings power. The more efficiently an organization uses propaganda, the more powerful it is. The political party or corporation that manipulates propaganda most effectively and successfully will survive. As long as propaganda has this importance for the survival of these organizations, the necessary tools will also exist, such as electronic communication media, computers and the possibility of collecting enormous amounts of information and data.

They can only end/abolish modern propaganda if they destroy the electronic tools necessary for it.

You see that the development of a society is largely determined by objective and almost mechanical factors (?).

In comparison, the influence of philosophy and people’s natural advantages (characteristics) is very small. But I do not postulate rigid historical determinism.

I just want to draw your attention to how difficult it is to overcome the “objective factors”.

Is your text reproduced correctly? If so, it would help me to understand better if you could explain in more detail how you define “natural selection”.

Doesn’t this “faster than...” — “smarter than...” — “better than...” correspond exactly to the spirit of a society that only revolves around things? Isn’t this “having orientation” characteristic “of the spirit and philosophy of Western industrial society, in which the greed for money, fame and power became the dominant theme of life” (Ernst Fromm) — and doesn’t this orientation also apply to a science, whose focus is not on people but on matter?

Where everything is just clusters of cells, communication nodes, feedback systems and “objective factors”?

But that is only one way of interpreting the world, a scientific-materialistic one.

But there are other perspectives, for example: “... less “alienated societies such as those of the Middle Ages or the Zuni Indians or certain African tribes that are not yet infected by the ideas of today’s “progress”... Western man may not understand the spirit of a society not built on property or greed. In fact, Meister Eckhart is as difficult to understand as Basho or Zen, but Eckhart and Buddhism are really just two dialects of the same language.”

So “objective” is just relative, and just one point of view?

Let’s assume that these “objective” factors were undoubtedly present, why do you think that “the destruction/abolition of tools (computers, etc.) and the product that can be produced with them (propaganda) means that these factors disappear” such as:

“natural selection”?

Page 5, line 12:

You ask, “What does empiricism mean?” = “scientific experience”

Page 5, line 19:

You ask, “What do you mean by system”?

In the Manifesto the term is used several times, as “technological system” or just

as a “system”. I understand it in the sense of the “systems theory” that emerged in the 1960s (Bertalannfy, General Systems Theory, etc.)

Page 5, line 30:

They ask about the lawful use of violence, as a right to self-defense.

In the version of the Manifesto I found the following remark:

96. Our constitution guarantees freedom of the press. However, the average citizen has little use of freedom of the press. The mass media is largely controlled by large organizations that are themselves part of the system. Anyone can have something printed or published on the Internet for money, but it will hardly have any effect because it will be lost in the mass of media information. This makes it impossible for most individuals or small groups to make a difference. Let’s take us (FC), for example. We could have offered the manifesto to a publisher. If he had accepted and published the manuscript, hardly any readers would have been interested in it, because it is more enjoyable to watch entertainment programs on television than to read a treatise of this kind. But even if this text had found many readers, most of them would soon have forgotten what they read because their memories are overloaded by the daily flood of information from the mass media. In order for us to have any chance of publishing our message with a lasting impact, we had to kill people.

If this remark is authentic, it is unacceptable to me.

The bombs only attacked symbolic targets of the “system” to a limited extent.

Many of the goals were of local importance (owner of a small computer store) and were not suitable for drawing the desired national or even global attention to the goals formulated in the Manifesto. In addition, the “political message” only came 17 years later, in the form of a manifesto and various letters.

How should the public associate the bombs with any idea?

How should the message of the bombings be “read”? Why weren’t really symbolic targets attacked? The scientist James McConnell*, whose experiments with flatworms that eat themselves must have been at least as disgusting as Skinner’s experiment of putting one’s own baby in a Skinner box, and was perhaps as symbolic a goal? But only for initiated people. Who could have the specialized knowledge to decipher the message within? Who knew anything about these experiments and their context in the broader public?

In the 1960s, US scientists began looking for a mechanism discovered by, among others, psychology professor James McConnell: when flatworms (planarians), which had been taught a specific task, were chopped into small pieces (to inhibit regeneration ) and then fed to untrained flatworms, the “cannibals” completed the task faster. In 1966, Jacobson, Fried, and Horowitz published results showing that it was possible to remove RNA from trained flatworms and inject it into untrained specimens, which then learned a conditioned task more quickly. This suggested that RNA may have been the important biomolecule for the transmission of memory. McConnel now hoped that such behavioral changes and learning progress could also be achieved in humans. The result was one of the most discussed neuroscientific memory theories of the 1960s — On June 15, 1985, James McConnell received a package in the mail at his home in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The sender was a “Ralph Kloppenburg from the University of Utah.” An attached letter said: “I want you to read this book. Everyone in your position should read this book.” When the package was opened, a letter bomb exploded.

So the attacks only appeared as undefined terror, and seemed like a montage of different strategies, or even like a collage of different strategies from different actors. I wonder how much experienced insult, perceived or real rejection and bitterness led to not only replaying such attacks in my mind, but also realizing them.

Page 6, line 4:

You ask, why should one behave morally?

It is a distinction between humans and animals. A process of awareness and the

Reason. First of all, for your own good and the good of those closest to you. If everyone does that, society will also do well. Every person should define their own concept of morality and set their own boundaries of morality, if they are unable to do so (from

Whatever the reasons) he can follow given/prefabricated moral concepts and standards.

You ask, who has caused more harm through violence in human history, the state or individuals?

Probably the state. But, I ask you: Can violence be justified by violence? Can one injustice be justified by another injustice?

But I think we could only discuss this using concrete examples.

Do you know what I admire? We discuss things here in an almost “academic” manner and it is not clear what situation one of the discussants, you, is in. I find that very remarkable and shows that you have a lot of strength. You must have something that gives you that strength.

It is clear from your letters that you are not “crazy” as your lawyers and some media outlets have claimed.

I saw the outside of the prison you’re in with my wife. It looks very modern, pastel colors. You don’t immediately realize that it is a maximum security prison. I have no idea what it looks like inside. Most Colorado prisons are featured on the Internet, but this one is not.

Please write to me if you could use a DUDEN.

Awaiting your next letter

With best regards and wishes
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, February 17, 2003

12) April 26, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you for your letter dated February 27, 2003.

They confirm receipt of my letter dated January 14, 2004, which actually has the date February 13, 2003 in the header, somewhat misleadingly.

The reason is: I had to interrupt the letter and could only finish it later, hence the two different dates.

I sent an additional letter dated February 17, 2003 (header date February 18, 2003), which added some of the things that seemed unclear to me in the first letter. I hope you have also received this letter and would ask you to confirm it.

You write that you cannot answer my letter (dated January 14, 2003) before 4–5 months because you are too busy.

Excuse my curiosity, but what are you so busy with?

And what are these papers that you need to read through and prepare for archiving? Is there already an archive where such papers are accessible (University of Michigan?). Or is one planned?

You have probably noticed that your last letters gave me an opportunity and inspiration to continue with some of the ideas discussed.

I have therefore answered you in great detail and unfortunately I could not do so without asking you new, resulting questions. It’s exciting and interesting, and one thing leads to another.

I am therefore very much looking forward to your answers, both to my new questions (e.g. “Leftist”, Harvard/Berkeley-Sixties, your Batchelor in Art, etc.) and to your opinion on the translated passages from the Manifesto.

You write that the published Manifesto (several slightly different versions can be found on the Internet) is incorrect and not authentic. How do you think this could have happened? Who changed the original text?

A lot has happened in world politics in the meantime. Can you follow current events in Iraq?

Perhaps you will soon have time and opportunity for a reply and a new letter.

I hope you are doing well. With best regards
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, April 26, 2003

11) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

April 1, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

In your letter dated June 23, 2002, page 3, you asked me about the mathematician’s world of ideas. This is a very sensitive question and I have been thinking very seriously for a long time whether I should answer it.

At last I have decided, but not without doubt and hesitation, that I may dare to reveal to you the shameful truth:

You probably think that mathematicians are very serious, learned people who think mostly about intellectual things. They assume that the mathematician is always in the habit of imagining something mathematical.

But that is not true.

Only the young and inexperienced students of mathematics often think about their field.

The experienced mathematicians rarely think about mathematics. Most of the time they imagine the flowers, the sunshine and the birds singing in spring. Maybe they imagine women sometimes, but they don’t do that often because their hearts are pure.

You will ask how it is possible that mathematicians do not think about mathematics. That’s why I have to tell you that mathematicians are not scientists, but artists. (Didn’t I tell you in my previous letters that I was not a scientist?)

Apart from the most elementary mathematics, for example arithmetic and high school algebra, two times two makes four, x times x is x2, and so on, the symbols, formulas and words of mathematics have no meaning at all. The entire structure of higher mathematics is a tremendous fraud, a practical joke. Mathematicians only amuse themselves with their symbols and formulas, which they manipulate according to some arbitrary rules that resemble the rules of a child’s game.

Yes! That’s all there is to higher mathematics! A mere game, a frivolous amusement. They will ask how it is possible that everyone believes that mathematics is an important science and why scientists are paid large salaries so that they can only amuse themselves with their meaningless formulas.

But this is very simple: If a person who is not a mathematician looks at the formulas of mathematics and finds no meaning or meaning in them, he believes that mathematics only appears meaningless to him because he lacks the specialist knowledge that is necessary to understand the mathematics.

Only mathematicians understand mathematics, therefore only mathematicians can know that mathematics is a fraud, and of course mathematicians do not want to acknowledge that.

When a university student begins to study mathematics, he first studies algebra, and he understands it. Then he studies elementary differential calculus and integral calculus, and he doesn’t understand them very well.

And the further he goes into mathematics, the less he understands, and before he has finished his third or fourth year of mathematics, he can no longer understand anything.

He believes that the reason for this is that he is too stupid to understand higher mathematics and he abandons the study of mathematics.

But the real reason why he cannot understand mathematics is that higher mathematics has no meaning at all and is just a big child’s game and a fraud.

But if students leave mathematics because of their inability to understand it, where do the new mathematicians come from to replace the old ones when the latter die?

When the professors find an unusually promising student, they take him at midnight to the dungeon of an ancient castle, or in America, where there are no ancient castles, they take him to a dark forest or to the shadow of a huge, wild rock where the Bats fly back and forth, and the owls sing “hu, hu,” and there they make him take a terrible oath, and sign it with blood instead of ink (Faust, Mephistopheles, Goethe) (Beautiful Mind) that he will never the secret will be revealed that mathematics is just a big fraud. And in this way the student becomes a real mathematician. When I took my oath, I was too poor to pay for the professors to travel to a distant place, and there were no ancient castles or wild rocks near Ann Arbor, and we had to let the university’s orchard serve as a dark forest.

We didn’t bring flashlights because that would have been too unromantic, and as we walked through the Baumgarten, we repeatedly stumbled upon lovers lying on the ground: because the Baumgarten was the favorite place of students who wanted to have sex. This happened so often that we left the tree garden and went behind the house of one of the professors, and I took my oath under the stairs. It was dark there, although not as dark as the dungeon of an ancient castle.

But you will ask how mathematicians can keep such a secret hidden. Is there no renegade who will reveal the truth? Yes, of course, that could happen, but it wouldn’t matter because the fact is so unbelievable that no one could take it seriously.

For example, I have just revealed the secret to you, but you think that I was only joking, and even if I told you that I was speaking seriously, you would still think that I was only joking.

So the secret is in no danger.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

April 1, 2003

13) May 25, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter of April 1, 2003, which I would describe as good-natured. However, when I read it more closely, I found the text a bit scary in places.

But first things first. I am not surprised by your revelations about the “Prankster of Higher Mathematics.” This is something that “normal” people secretly suspect and suspect, but of course don’t dare to say. That’s why something like that, when a (former) mathematician says it, has weight. But there’s one thing I don’t understand.

You write:

“Apart from the most elementary mathematics, for example arithmetic and high school algebra, two times two makes four, x times x is x2, and so on, the symbols, formulas and words of mathematics have no meaning at all.

The entire structure of higher mathematics is a tremendous fraud.”

Good. But where is the boundary between these simple elements of mathematics and higher mathematics? And where does the dizziness start?

Up to what point is it “serious”, “justifiable” and “provable”, and at what point does “art”, i.e. free invention, begin?

So, up to what point is mathematics relevant, to be taken seriously and necessary, so that a plane doesn’t crash, for example, and at what point is it no longer relevant (higher mathematics Gödel) and it is a free game, without any consequences?

Does a scientist or mathematician have a sense of how “serious” the matter is? Does he know when it becomes dangerous? How come? Is he learning that? Is it intuition? Very interesting questions for me.

But why (sorry for Gödel again) does his “invention”, or “beautiful poetic story”, the incompleteness theorem, lead to a fundamental crisis in mathematics? Is this similar to an argument in the art world about abstract or representational painting? And that was it?

You write that “mathematicians are not scientists, but artists. (Didn’t I tell you in my previous letters that I’m not a scientist?),” that really surprised me.

I know that in art history there have always been mathematicians who “changed camp” and became artists (Marcel Duchamp, for example). Or, if I take up your thoughts, which followed their actual purpose.

But the fact that you write that...when in your previous responses to my questions you seemed to me to be closer to the perspective of logic, reason and mathematics on things than to the perspective of art.

Would you please write me more about this, I’m very interested.

You received your Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard in 1962, does that have anything to do with it? What does it mean to work “freely” with the subject (mathematics)? What role does aesthetics play?

For me, one of the tasks of art is to invent “beautiful stories” in response to questions that cannot be answered (e.g. by science).

In this context, would you agree with the following thought, which may apply to scientists and artists:

“Anyone who asks questions that cannot be answered must be satisfied with a “nice story” as an answer. Anyone who wants more is in danger. He reaches a limit beyond which there is only truth or paranoia. Paranoia is salvation is from logic.”

When did you notice the “mathematics fraud” and what was the specific trigger? You still published in scientific mathematics journals when you were at Berkeley? Already aware of perpetuating the “swindle”? Or were you still serious about mathematics?

At the beginning of this letter I wrote that your last letter also seemed a bit scary to me. That was the passage when you write about the secret society of mathematicians into which the young, talented mathematics student is accepted. Of course, this reminded me very much of Goethe’s “Faust” and the pact between Mephistopheles and Faust.

But also the story of Nash and his work for the secret service in the 1960s. (At Harvard I was once able to look for 10 seconds into the dining room of the large building, which looks like a church, with glass windows, and the inside looks like the clubhouse of a German fraternity. I found that quite creepy, and seemed both medieval and very “ Bündisch.”)

It somehow reminded me of the mysterious, dark German romanticism with all its serapion brotherhoods and secret societies. Finding something like that at Harvard surprised me.

That was Timothy Leary + Middle Ages = also a picture.

As I write this, I’m sitting on the train from Hamburg to Dresden, and Dresden is one of the main locations of Romanticism.

So in your case it was “blood” instead of ink, and the oath was taken under the stairs. All of this points to a dark secret, an entanglement, something hidden. Or am I overinterpreting this?

In any case, it makes me curious. What’s behind it? Is there something behind it?

You gave me the freedom to correct the German of your letters. I am enclosing the corrected version of your last letter. Overall, you are making good progress, especially considering that we don’t have small talk.

I would like to ask you further questions, for example what your laborious work does with the different versions of the Manifesto.

But I don’t want to keep you from things that are important to you.

Just answer however you feel like it.

I would just like to assure you again that I am looking forward to your letters and that it is very stimulating and interesting for me to answer you.

So, I hope you are doing well under the circumstances and can get your archives sorted as you mentioned, as necessary.

So I stay

Best regards
Her

Lutz Dammbeck

Attachment correction letter TJK April 1^st 03

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

In your letter dated June 23, 2002, page 3, you asked me about the mathematician’s world of ideas. This is a very sensitive question and I have been thinking very seriously for a long time whether I should answer it. At last I have decided, not without doubt and hesitation, that I can dare to reveal to you the shameful truth.

You probably think that mathematicians are very serious and learned people who think mostly about intellectual things. They assume that the mathematician always imagines something mathematical. But that is not true. Only the young and inexperienced students of mathematics often think about their field. The experienced mathematicians rarely think about mathematics. Most of the time they imagine the flowers, the sunshine and the birds singing in spring. Maybe they imagine women sometimes, but they don’t do that often because their hearts are pure.

You will ask how it is possible that mathematicians do not always think about mathematics? I must inform you that mathematicians are not scientists, but artists. (Didn’t I tell you in my previous letters that I am not a scientist?)

Apart from the most elementary mathematics, for example arithmetic and high school algebra (two times two makes four, x times x is x2 and so on), the symbols, formulas and words of mathematics have no meaning at all. The entire structure of higher mathematics is a tremendous fraud, a practical joke. Mathematicians amuse themselves with their symbols and formulas, which they manipulate according to some arbitrary rules that resemble the rules of a child’s game. Yes! That’s all there is to higher mathematics! A mere game, a frivolous amusement.

You may ask, how is it possible that everyone believes that mathematics is an important science? And, why pay scientists big salaries to mess around with their formulas.

The explanation is very simple. When a person who is not a mathematician looks at the formulas of mathematics and finds no meaning or meaning in them, he believes that mathematics appears meaningless to him only because he lacks the technical knowledge to understand mathematics. Only mathematicians understand mathematics. Therefore only mathematicians can know that mathematics is a fraud. Of course the mathematicians don’t want to admit this.

When a university student begins to study mathematics, he first studies algebra, and that is what he understands. Then he studies elementary differential calculus and integral calculus, and he doesn’t understand them very well. And the further he progresses in the study of mathematics, the less he understands, and before he has finished his third or fourth year of mathematics he can no longer understand anything. He believes the reason for this is that he is too stupid to understand higher mathematics and he gives up the study of mathematics.

But the real cause of his lack of understanding is that higher mathematics has no meaning at all and is just a big child’s game and a fraud.

But if students leave because of their inability to understand mathematics, where do the new mathematicians come from when the old ones die?

When the professors find an unusually promising student, they take him at midnight to the dungeon of an ancient castle, or in America, where there are no ancient castles, they take him to a dark forest or to the shadow of a huge, wild rock, where the bats fly back and forth, and the owls sing “hu, hoo,” and there they make him take a terrible oath, and sign it with blood instead of ink, that he will never reveal the secret that mathematics is only one is a big dizziness.

In this way the student becomes a real mathematician.

When I took my oath, I was too poor to pay for the professors to travel to a distant place. There were no ancient castles or wild rocks near Ann Arbor, and we had to use the university’s tree garden as a dark forest.

We didn’t bring flashlights because that would have been too unromantic, and as we walked through the Baumgarten, we repeatedly stumbled upon lovers lying on the ground: because the Baumgarten was the favorite place of students who wanted to have sex. This happened so often that we left the tree garden and went behind the house of one of the professors, and I took my oath under the stairs. It was dark there, although not as dark as the dungeon of an ancient castle. But you may ask, how could mathematicians keep such a secret? Was there or is there no renegade who reveals the truth? Yes, of course it can happen, but it won’t change anything because the fact is so unbelievable that no one will take it seriously. For example, I just revealed the secret to you, but you think I’m just joking.

Even if I told you that I was speaking completely seriously, you would think that I was just joking. So the secret is not at risk. (Alternative: So the secret is in no danger).

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski

April 1, 2003

12) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

June 19, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I received your letters dated 2/17/03, 4/26/03 and 5/25/03, but I don’t know when I will be able to reply to them.

In fact, I didn’t even read the letters completely. In one of your letters (I don’t remember which one) you asked me what I was so busy with. I’m busy trying to fully answer this question.

But I will tell you this:

You are by no means the only person who wants to exchange letters with me.

The correspondence takes up a lot of my time. But if it was just a matter of correspondence, I would have already answered your letters. There are also other matters that take up too much of my time. (Or should I have said: “which require too much time for me”?)

For example, I think I would have told you before that I wanted to force the state to give me back my papers; and if you saw how I have spent countless hours carefully reading the relevant law books* (perhaps I should have written “the relevant law books”?), you wouldn’t ask what I was busy doing! *

You may ask, since I am so busy, why I didn’t have the time to write you my letter of April 1, 2003. But even when you’re very busy, you have to have a little fun sometimes. Not true?

You need a little fun to make your work easier. I believe that you have the same custom in Germany as in America of doing pranks on April 1^st (April Fool’s Day). Is that right?

And there may still be a legal problem.

The prison authorities prevented me from sending an article I wrote outside of prison. This is not an unbearable catastrophe because the article is not very important.

But what’s worse is this:

You will remember that I was in the process of writing an authentic or corrected version of the manifesto. I have finally completed this task, which took me a lot of time and effort. But when I tried to send someone a copy of this version of the manifesto two or three weeks ago, the authorities stopped it so they could look at it and decide whether they should allow me to send this version from prison.

If they forbid me from sending out the corrected version of the manifesto, it will be a real catastrophe, and I will have to fight this in the courts, and such a fight will cost me a tremendous amount of time and effort.

So I have to close this letter now because I have so much work to do.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

6/19/03

13) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

June 23, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I assume that you received my letter dated June 19, 2003.

I learned yesterday that the authorities finally let the copy of the corrected version of the manifesto leave the prison.

In fact, my friend has already received the copy.

If you want the corrected manifesto I will be happy to send you a copy, but it will be a bit expensive. I have to pay 10c (1/10^th of a dollar) for each sheet that I have photocopied. The corrected version of the manifesto consists of 185 sheets, so it costs me $18.50 ($18 1/2) to have a copy made.

The weight of one copy is approximately 30 or 31 ounces, therefore the postage will be $13.30, and the total cost, $18.50 + $13.30 = $31.80 ($31.80).

Please tell me if you are willing to pay these costs to obtain a copy of the corrected manifesto. Meanwhile, I will inquire what kind of money order you would have to send in order for the prison authorities to accept the same.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

6/23/03

14) July 23, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your last two letters.

The way you cleverly left open whether and how serious you are with your “revelations” by referring to the date of April 1^st (and the custom associated with it) is a very elegant response to my questions.

But as I wrote to you, if your “revelations” were serious, they would not be so sensational, since I know mathematicians who consider themselves “artists” and really see things as “revealed” by you.

Nevertheless, for some of my questions to you it doesn’t matter whether it was an April Fool’s joke or not. Maybe you’ll still find the time to think about it.

I am very pleased and interested that you have completed a corrected version of the “Manifesto”.

Yes, of course I am interested in a copy of the version of the “Manifesto” that you corrected. A friend in New York could send you a check for the above amount to cover the copying and postage costs. Please let me know if you want the lady to send the check to you personally or to someone else.

With which version of the previously published “manifesto” should I compare your version? I own the version published by Jolly Rogers Press.

Can I send you anything that interests you or would make you happy? Then please let me know.

I understand what you say about your extensive and arduous work organizing your archives and papers. What is the legal situation after a plea bargin?

All items in the cabin are your property? Or was it confiscated by the court and stored somewhere like the cabin? The cabin actually belongs to you and you could decide what happens to it?

I will close here. I broke my right finger and joint three weeks ago. Unfortunately, a very complicated fracture, a pile of rubble held together with many screws, a real “Minsky finger”.

At the moment it’s still plaster and typing and writing is laborious.

But anyway

I hope you are doing well

Greetings from Hamburg
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

15) October 2, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500

Florence, CO^ 81226–8500

U S3 A

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I hope you received my last letter (July 23, 2003) with the great interest expressed in the version of the “Manifesto” that you have completed.

I was happy to hear that you were able to send a copy of the Manifesto to your friend. I would like to have a copy as you offered.

Have you already found out how I can pay for the copies?

Since I haven’t heard from you for a while, I was a little worried about whether you were okay, but then I figured you must be spending a lot of time archiving your documents.

It makes you curious to read how you sort, evaluate and prepare the vast amounts of material for archiving. What are your criteria for this work, how do you go about it? What should happen to all this material later? Will it be made scientifically accessible in the foreseeable future? Where?

My injured hand is feeling better again, there are titanium screws and wires left in one finger, which is a strange, foreign feeling. I had a lot of work at the university during my convalescence. The students were completing their final papers for a big exhibition and were of course very excited.

But I was also able to complete my own projects.

I have often sent you information about my artistic work. For example, together with my students I developed an installation that also integrated a replica of a cabin that was inspired by both Thoreau’s cabin and the cabin you built. The installation was until recently in Aachen Cathedral{2}, as part of an exhibition that deals with the history of knowledge since the early Middle Ages.

Part of my installation includes various material, such as copies from the published print version of the Manifesto, from Walden and from Jaques Ellul, which visitors were able to take with them. This was used eagerly, so that these sheets had to be re-copied twice. The installation can be seen there in the context of a chapter on questions of “Enlightenment and Modernity”. In the medieval cathedral of Emperor Charlemagne, a fascinating Carolingian architecture with quotations of Moorish and oriental ornaments, precious historical exhibits from all over the world and modern contemporary works of art, among other things, show the development from the early medieval “knowledge bazaars” in the Orient and schools of learning in Europe up to the “Opening Pandora’s Box” told in modern times.

The installation I mentioned was described in the reporting as, among other things, a commentary on the development of “knowledge and power” in modern (technological) society.

In this case I see myself as the artist, but also as a “transformer”, “assembler” or “transporter” of ideas from third parties.

This corresponds to my main working principle, assembly.

For many visitors to the exhibition it will perhaps be an opportunity to further engage with their thoughts and the problems they raise.

The work will soon be shown, slightly modified, in an exhibition in Berlin. The film, which I have informed you about several times, is now finished and will soon be presented to the public.

As I wrote to you at the beginning, your thoughts and views are very important in this context. I worked hard on it for over two years, against a lot of resistance and clichés (caused by superficial media reports).

It has become a very personal discourse about the development of modern technology and science since the 1940s and about the conflict that has developed as a result. It was clear to me from the start that your thoughts and your philosophical and content-related position on a “technological utopia” were very important for the film, and I tried to incorporate them as correctly, responsibly and authentically as possible.

Our correspondence was very helpful and explanatory because it made understandable and interesting thoughts from you, some of which I quoted (in excerpts), accessible to every viewer. This is only about questions of philosophical content. The reaction, especially from younger people, at the first test demonstrations was impressive. They were touched, thoughtful and wanted to talk about it afterwards.

This thoughtfulness is also reinforced by a series of accidents and collapses of technical networks in the USA and Europe. I thought of you when the power grid went out on the East Coast and in Canada a while ago. I was surprised it didn’t happen on the West Coast. People are disturbed by things like this.

Last week the power grid collapsed in Italy, on August 28^th in London, on September 23^rd in Sweden and Denmark.

Scenarios are being discussed in the newspapers as to whether such “black outs” could be caused by computer viruses in the future. In the USA, the analog network controllers are apparently currently being replaced by digital systems — “and are therefore vulnerable

for hackers and electricity saboteurs,” as a German newspaper commented. According to this newspaper, the fault in the disaster in Italy was due to an incorrectly programmed control computer.

I hope and wish that there will be great public interest in my film, lots of discussions and I’m looking forward to the reactions. I will keep you informed about this.

Now I’m waiting for your message about the copy of the Manifesto, and I hope you’re well.

Best regards
Her

Lutz Dammbeck

14) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

September 12, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

I am very sorry that you broke your finger so badly, and I say this not only because politeness requires it, but also because I sincerely regret your injury; because it seems to me that you are a very friendly and nice person.

You ask me if your friend from New York should send me a check so that I can send you a copy of the corrected version of the manifesto. Yes, she could do that, and she should send the check to me personally and not to someone else, but I won’t be able to spend the money until the check clears the bank.

I don’t understand how to say this in German, but that means that I wouldn’t be able to spend the money until the check arrived in the bank and the bank paid the money to the prison.

I won’t be able to pay for the photocopying and postage until I can spend the money. So I may have to wait two weeks after I receive the check before I can have the photocopies made. If you wish to receive a copy of the corrected version more quickly, you may send me an International Money Order{3}, provided that such International Money Order is payable in American dollars.

This means you must convert the money into American dollars before purchasing the money order. I made an inquiry and the prison authorities told me that they would accept an International Money Order payable in American dollars and, if I am not mistaken, I will be able to spend the money immediately. As I told you in my letter as of June 23, 2003, the costs will be as follows:

Photocopying:

185 sheets (handwriting) at 1/10 dollar per sheet: $18.50 (18.5 dollars)

The weight is approximately 0.166 ounce per sheet;

approximately 30.7 ounces, postage:

Whether you are sending an International Money Order or having your girlfriend send a check, my Register Number, 04475–046, must be written on it next to my name.

You could also obtain a copy of the corrected version of the manifesto in another way.

Julie Herrada, the Curator of the Labadie Collection at the University of Michigan, has a copy of the corrected version and could provide you with a copy of it, and perhaps you would be able to obtain a copy from Ms. Herrada more quickly than from me.

On the other hand, I suspect the cost would be higher if you obtained Ms. Herrada’s copy.

Ms. Herrada’s address is: Julie Herrada Curator, Labadie Collection, 711 Hatcher Library, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor MI 48109 — 1205, USA Your telephone number. is: 734 — 764 — 9377.

If my memory serves me correctly, you asked me in one of your letters who was to blame for the numerous errors in the published versions of the Manifesto.

The people who transcribed the manifesto carelessly and carelessly are to blame for this.

All published versions of the manifesto are based directly or indirectly on the version published by The Washington Post newspaper. Due to the negligence of the employees of this newspaper, many errors, especially the omission of parts of some sentences and even whole sentences, appeared in this version.

For example, in “Note 1” the word “not” has been omitted and as a result the meaning of the “Note” is the opposite of the intended meaning.

Each time someone has transcribed the manifesto again, they have copied the errors from the Washington Post version and also contributed some errors of their own, so that the published versions have become progressively worse.

The person who edited the Jolly Roger Press version has claimed that he corrected the errors. But that was impossible because all the versions he had available were based on the Washington Post version, so he couldn’t correct the errors in that version.

But in reality, the Jolly Roger Press version is worse than the Washington Post

You ask me which version of the manifesto you should compare the corrected version with. It doesn’t matter, you can compare it with any version you like. I don’t understand why you want to compare the corrected version with another.

I don’t know what you mean by “plea bargin.”

Are you asking about the possibility of resolving the dispute between me and the state over my property?

Until now I don’t know anything about it. The situation is very complicated and it would be too tedious to explain it.

Suffice it to say that the state has a claim on my property to pay the restitution I owe to my so-called victims according to my conviction and the cabin no longer belongs to me.

Regarding mathematicians who consider themselves artists: That’s ridiculous. Of course, mathematics is an art in the sense that this word can mean a mere skill. But the fine arts can express many different feelings or emotions.

Ask your math friends whether mathematics can express joy, sadness, love, hate, fear, anger, triumph, humor, or calm. The idea that (the mathematicians are artists) mathematics is an art is just a ruse used to cover up the emptiness of what the Manifesto calls a “surrogate activity”. activity”).

I hope that your broken finger will heal very quickly.

Yours truly, Ted Kaczynski

9/12/03

16) October 8, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Two days after I took my last letter to you to the post office, your letter arrived, dated 9/12/03.

First of all, thank you for your concern regarding my hand injury.

That’s very nice, but compared to other things, this injury, which thankfully heals well, isn’t that big of a deal.

Thank you very much for the good news regarding the copies of the Manifesto.

I immediately tried to send out an “international money order” like you suggested. But, although there is also a Western Union company in Hamburg, they do not carry out such orders from Germany. So I’m going to ask my friend in New York to buy a money order in your name from the post office in the relevant amount and send it to you by post. If that doesn’t work, you’ll have to try a check.

You gave me Julie Herrada’s name and address.

I assume this lady is someone you trust?

And is involved in the archiving of your papers and documents at the University of Michigan (in the Labadie Collection)?

You ask me what I mean by the term “plea bargin.”

The term was given to me to explain the legal process that led to your conviction. A process that was described to me as “typical American horse-trading between defense, prosecutors, court and defendant” with the aim of avoiding a regular court hearing. So a deal in the interests of everyone involved. Is that right? There is no equivalent for “plea bargin” in German criminal law.

At the end of your letter you ask me to ask my mathematician friends whether mathematics can express feelings. One of these friends would definitely say: Yes. But one must remember that the idea and classification of what is called “art” has changed significantly since the 50s and 60s of the last century.

The so-called “open” or “unlimited” concept of art led to the boundaries between art and non-art being dissolved, materials, ideas and objects that were previously alien to art finding their way into museums and galleries (e.g. also computers), and works of art “ “de-materialized” or “infinitely copyable”, and in the context of so-called conceptual art, mathematical formulas, calculations or theorems also became worthy of art. All of this became common practice, now has its own history with the formation of legends, and continues to grow rhizomatically, towards the total dissolution and mixing of everything with everything.

It is an image (or a replica) of something that originally developed in science and technology and that today gives us globally networked machine systems whose essence is determined by mathematics, logic and binary codes.

Describing the idea of “mathematician as artist” as a “surrogate activity” could be true. The terms you listed, such as joy, sadness, love, hatred, fear or anger, on the other hand, lead to what really seems important and has so far been the field of art. And also lead to terms such as “nature” and “creation”. Art has always tried to describe and clarify people’s relationship to it.

Terms such as devotion, emotion, humility and powerlessness in the face of nature and creation are certainly also part of it. And, all of the artist’s attempts to “educate” are still measured against the example of this nature, conceptual art or not.

From a certain point onwards, science challenged art (and religion) for sovereignty over these fields. Now there should be a new nature, made by human hands. Man becomes God and creates a software-based nature (Mirror Worlds, David Gelernter), which he designs and controls as he wishes. This will fail, like the dreams of Rabbi Löw’s “Golem” in the 1926 film of the same name, which is still worth seeing. Everything seems to have already been foreseen there.

Another of my mathematician friends would say that mathematics is the queen of the sciences. In his opinion, today it is about developing a spiritual, imaginary mathematics, which he sees approaches for in Gödel and Sheldrake. To get out of the prison of purely material positing. Otherwise nothing will come of it other than that technology is a prison for people.

The main question that concerns him is: where does nature come from?

Today’s science today only takes the world apart in order to explain its phenomena, but only refers to one half of the whole: the material consciousness, and splits off another half: the spiritual consciousness. This leads to the loss of moral and spiritual values. Of course, says this friend, science must remain. But the moral component should be added and the separation of spirit and materiality/matter (which has existed since Descartes) should be abolished again.

So there needs to be a setting from a spiritual point of view.

According to my mathematician friend, the further he penetrates into his material, the mathematician/logician gets into ever greater disorder and chaos, into a seemingly ever darker forest. Like real nature, it is messy, dangerous and incalculable.

Nature is not always just “friendly”, “kind” and “beautiful”, but also “cruel”, “merciless” and “hard”. (Permit me to make a comment here: You yourself have lived in your cabin for many years under very simple and harsh conditions in and with this nature, and you know about it from your own experience. It is unimaginable to me how you, for example, have dealt with these difficulties a harsh, snowy winter. How you, as a scientist and intellectual, were able to work intellectually under such harsh conditions and retain the unbroken spiritual strength and humor that emerge from your letters.)

People today, my mathematician friend continues, are cut off from their sensory perception and spiritual consciousness. “He can’t see the forest for the trees.” (= a German proverb).

Her last letter was written on the back of copies.

I have studied these carefully. It is certainly of the utmost importance and importance for you to be able to visit the library. Will you be allowed to do this? Are you allowed to listen to and watch radio and television programs?

Unfortunately I have to close here. I would be happy if you found time to answer again soon and hope that the copies will work soon.

I wish you the best
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

15) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

October 15, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

Today I received forty dollars from your friend, Sabine Schenk.

On Monday, October 20^th, I will give the corrected version of the manifesto to the counselor or case manager to photocopy it (or them?).

I will probably receive the corrected version back with the photocopy of it on Tuesday, October 21^st, and then I will be able to send you the photocopy on Wednesday, October 22^nd.

If I did the math correctly, the weight of the package will be a little less than 32 ounces, so the postage will be $13.30 ($13.30). If the paper weighs a little more than I thought, then the weight of the package may be more than 32 ounces, so the postage will be $14.50. In any case, the total cost will not be more than $33.00 ($33.00) because it will cost me $18.50 ($18.50) to have the photocopy made.

If you want to get the excess back, I believe the prison authorities would allow me to send you the money.

But it would probably be easier if I sent the money to your friend, Sabine Schenk.

I hope that your injured finger has healed very well.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

10/15/03

16) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

October 26, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I regret that I was not able to send you the corrected version of the manifesto as quickly as I thought. I had forgotten that I don’t have enough stamps for that. (Or should I write: “that I don’t have enough stamps for that”?).

I have ordered more stamps from the Commissary, I should receive them on Monday (October 27, 2003), and I will be able to send you the corrected version with this letter by Tuesday (October 28, 2003) at the latest.

Unfortunately, I noticed an error in my “corrected” version!

This annoys me because I worked out this version so carefully and with so much effort. I discovered the error on page 37. The sentence, which is partly on page 36 and partly on page 37, reads: “Advertising and marketing techniques have been developed that make many people they need things that their grandparents never desired or even dreamed of.”

This sentence is missing the verb! The verb should probably be “feel”, so the sentence should read: “Advertising and marketing techniques have been developed that make many people feel they need things that their grandparents never desired or even dreamed of.” I’m sure that that the verb “feel” gives the correct meaning to the sentence, but I am not entirely sure that “feel” is the same verb that was used in the original version of the manifesto.

I no longer have with me the versions of the manifesto that I used to make the corrected version. I sent these frames to the Labadie Collection because I thought I no longer needed them.

I have to write to Julie Herrada to confirm that the verb “feel” is the correct one. When I receive your reply, I will write to you about it. By now you can assume that the sentence should read as I indicated above.

By the way, you are right on page 1 of your letter dated October 8, 2003: Julie Herrada is in charge of archiving my papers. She is actually the curator of the Labadie Collection. I can’t find the word “curator” in the dictionary, but it means: a person whose duty is to look after the exhibits in a museum, or documents or rare books in a library, or something like that.

After I noticed the error, I read the corrected version twice more and I found another error, although it is very small.

On page 2, paragraph 4, line 11, I wrote “It’s” where I should have written “Its.”

I hope there are no more errors.

Now I have to finish this letter. I just want to mention that I also received your letter dated October 3, 2003 and that I am pleased that your injury has healed well.

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski

10/26/03

Investments:

Calculation of costs

Statement on the corrected version of the manifesto:

“Concerning the May 31, 2003, draft of “Industrial Society and Its Future”

The corrected version of the manifesto

Diagram

17) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

November 4, 2003

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

On October 28, 2003 I sent the envelope containing the corrected version of the manifesto, but it was returned to me today with a customs declaration form that I had to fill out. I have filled out the customs declaration form and will send the envelope again tomorrow. Hopefully you will receive the corrected version without any further difficulties. Please tell me if you receive it.

The weight of the package was written on the customs declaration form; it was 1 pound 15.4 ounces, that is, 31.4 ounces. So I overestimated the weight a little. The postage is not $14.50 but only $13.30. But the stamps have already been stuck to the envelope.

In your letter dated October 8, 2003, on page 2, you write: “The so-called “open” or “unlimited” concept of art led to the boundaries between art and non-art dissolving...,” and so on.

I do know that the boundaries between art and non-art have been dissolved. In 1978 I knew a Swede named Hakan Edwardson, although we used to spell his name as “Hoken.”

He had studied philosophy. Once I caught a fly that by chance remained alive in my hand, and the Swede saw it and said excitedly: “Oh, you have a fly! Behold, I will show you something.” Then he took a long, blonde hair from his wife’s head, and he asked me to hold the fly’s legs while he tried to tie the hair around the fly’s neck, but it he didn’t succeed. Then he held the bow tie while I tried to tie the hair around her neck; and I didn’t succeed either. But after various unsuccessful attempts, we finally managed to tie the hair around the neck of a fly. Then you could hold the end of the hair between your fingers while the fly flew around as if it were a bitch and the hair was a dog leash.

It was an entertaining performance, very funny. But the Swede claimed that it was art. (By the way, this Swede used to eagerly read the comic books written for children. He claimed that he found philosophical statements in them. I once asked him whether he believed that the philosophical statements in them were intentionally used by the comic writers, or that he even create the philosophical statements from the content of the comic books. He replied that he didn’t want to discuss that.)

There was a nineteenth-century Englishman — if my memory serves me correctly, his name was Thomas De Quincy — who wrote a treatise on murder, which he considered one of the fine arts. I believe that Mr. De Quincy did not write this treatise entirely seriously. But my father told me about 25 years ago about an exhibit in an art museum that consisted of the artist himself lying naked and motionless on a pane of glass.

So, according to the modern view, what is not art?

Isn’t any thing art? I could fart and call it art.

Could you prove that I was wrong? But if everything is “art,” then the word is meaningless. But the foregoing is not important.

I believe that the following is more important: You write (10/8/03, page 3): “Man becomes God and creates a software-based nature... which he shapes and controls at his own will.”

But tell me: which person are you pointing out? Who is “Man” who “controls” “software-based nature”. Are you this person? Is that me? Is this person the President of the United States or the CEO of Microsoft? Who is he?

Kind regards, yours truly

Ted Kaczynski

11/4/03

18) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

November 30, 2003

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZDAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

Merry Christmas!

I hope that you have received the corrected version of the manifesto that I recently sent you. In my letter dated October 26, 2003, on page 1, I informed you that the corrected version contained an error. The sentence, which is partly on page 36 and partly on page 37, should read: “Advertising and marketing techniques have been developed that make many people feel they need things that their grandparents never desired or even dreamed of.”

However, I’m not entirely sure that this is correct. But now I have confirmed that this is correct: This sentence should read exactly as I just wrote it.

I am pleased that your film is finished, as you told me in your letter of October 2, 2003, and I hope and believe that it will arouse a lot of public interest. By the way, I congratulate you on the success of your installation in the exhibition in Aachen Cathedral.

But the “spiritual mathematics” your mathematician friend is talking about is just a new kind of escapism that locks man more tightly in his prison. Just like religion, various unreasonable ideologies, and so on. When I read your mathematician friend’s comments, I thought: “The Germans are crazy.” But then I remembered certain American beliefs and I thought: “Yes, and the Americans are at least as crazy as they are.” the Germans!”

I believe that you did not understand well the most important lesson of the Manifesto: there is only one means by which man can break out of the prison of technology, and that means is the destruction of the infrastructure and devices of modern technology. But that requires too much courage.

That’s why people take refuge in dreams like “spiritual mathematics” and other philosophical nonsense (in Germany), or fundamentalist religion, various political ideologies, and so on (in America).

In your letter dated October 8, 2003, on page 4, you write that I lived under “hard conditions and with this nature”. And so you continue: “I can’t imagine how you, for example, dealt with these difficulties in a harsh, snowy winter. How it was possible for you, as a scientist and intellectual, to work intellectually under such harsh conditions and to retain the unbroken spiritual strength and humor that emerge from your letters.”

I have to answer this. First, however, I must point out that I have repeatedly told you that I am not a scientist. I am also not an intellectual if an intellectual is a person who highly values intellectual activities (e.g., studying, thinking, writing, art, etc.) and prefers to spend his life in such activities. For me intellectual activities are just a means or a mere amusement and I would rather do without them.

But unfortunately, studying and thinking are necessary as means to pursue certain ends; and even if they were not necessary as means, I would still need something to occupy myself with in this prison.

But now I address your comment about the “harsh conditions” in which I lived. Such conditions are not at all harsh, provided that one is used to them and adapted to them.

Imagine a future society in which all people grew up in motorized wheelchairs from birth, so that their legs would be extremely weak and they would barely be able to walk. These people would look back on the twentieth century and think, “What hardships the people of that century had to endure! If they wanted to go from the kitchen to the bathroom, they had to walk! If they wanted to get into the car, they had to walk at least five or six meters! How could they endure such harsh conditions?” Of course we would feel sorry for such people; we would think them unfortunate cripples.

But we ourselves resemble such cripples to some extent. Our “wheelchair” is modern civilization, in which we grow up so pampered that we become weak, and the conditions in which prehistoric people lived comfortably seem harsh to us.

The harsh conditions that oppress us are mostly psychological; they are especially the worries, the stress. I believe that prehistoric people would usually have suffered little from stress or worry even if they lived in danger. It is difficult to prove this conclusively because (as far as I know) there has been little objective study of this question among the prehistoric people who survived into the modern age. And now it is too late, because there are no more prehistoric people whose culture has not been severely damaged by the intervention of modern civilization.

But I remember reading about a study somewhere that concluded that the Bushmen of South Africa suffered exceptionally little stress.

In his book; Life in the Rocky Mountains, Warren Angus Ferris, who lived among the Indians during part of the decade 1840–1850, said that an Indian could sometimes be seen smoking his pipe and very serious and walking back and forth in front of his hut, looking thoughtful. But if you asked this Indian, “What are you thinking about?”, he would answer, “Nothing.”

In one of his books, Will Durant recounted that Arctic explorer Peary once asked an Eskimo, “What are you thinking about?” The Eskimo replied, “I have plenty of meat.” I don’t need to think.”

We may be inclined to smile at such anecdotes, but they prove that those people were not troubled.

In 1938, the researcher Paul Schebesta wrote about the pygmies of the African jungle that this human race was characterized by “an unusually rough naturalness and freshness of life, a cheerfulness and carefreeness that is unparalleled.”

(Paul Schebesta, The Bambuti - Pygmies from Ituri, Volume I, Institut Roal Colonial Belge, Brussels, 1938. Page 205.)

Gontran de Poncins, der ungefähr 1938 oder 1940 unter gewissen Eskimos wohnte, schrieb: “I...sat here clad in the skins and furs of animals in a shelter built of snow, in a land and a season where a temperature of forty degrees below zero was the normal thing — and I was relaxed, content, happy. I was at peace with myself; and surely of all things in the world the rarest is a civilized man at peace with himself.” (Gonran de Poncins, Kabloona, Time-Life Books, Alexandria, Virginia, 1980. Seite XXVI.)

“(The Eskimo) had proved himself stronger than the storm. Like the ailor at sea, he had met it tranguilly, it had left him unmoved...In mid-tempest this peasant of the Arctic, by his total impassivity, had lent me a little of his serenity of soul.” (a.a.O. Seiten 212 — 213.)

“(T) ime meant nothing to them; their minds were at rest, and they sleep of the unworried.” (a.a.O. Seite 273.)

“Of course he wouldn’t worry. “He was an Eskimo.” (ibid. page 292.)

Historian James Axtell discusses the reasons why many whites preferred to live among the Indians two or three centuries ago, but not the other way around.

He writes: “Indian life was attractive (because it offered, among other perfect freedom, the ease of living, (land) the absence of those cares and corrading solicitudes which so often prevail with us.” (James Axtell,The Invasion Within: The Contest of Cultures in Colonial North America, Oxford University Press, 1985. Pages 326 — 27.)

Of course there are exceptions: the Ainu often suffered from anxiety.

But the cause of this was not “harsh conditions” but their superstitions. (Carleton S.Coon, The Hunting Peoples, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, Toronto, 1971. Page 372.)

So the primitive living conditions you call “hard” are actually not hard at all. On the contrary, they are not physically hard and mentally and psychologically very comfortable if you are used to such a way of life. And because there is very little stress and worry, such a way of life offers ideal conditions for thinking. On the other hand, because one is too psychologically comfortable, one is tempted not to think; for one has no motive to think if one has no worries.

Please forgive me that this letter is messy.

I’m in a bit of a hurry.

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

11/30/03

Postscript: Happy New Year! -TJK

17) December 3, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

The copies of the version of the manifesto you authorized have arrived!

I was really happy because I felt like I got something special that was more than just a stack of copies. I am in the process of reading through the text and comparing it with the version I have so far. I still need some time for this because at the end of the year at the art school there are always various other tasks and accounts that need to be completed.

They asked me why I wanted to compare the authentic version with any other version. Well, it is important to check whether there have been any falsifications of the content, and if so, what tendency they have.

You mention a balance of the $40 that Sabine sent you. I ask that you use this remainder as you see fit. I have a guilty conscience anyway because you have already spent a lot of money on postage for your letters to me.

That was also the reason for asking you if I could send you something in return that would please you and be useful to you. If there is such a thing, please let me know.

Your German is getting better and better; you sometimes use difficult tenses, which can sometimes be very tricky in German.

In the letter dated October 26, 2003 you write: I had forgotten that I don’t have enough stamps for this. (Or should I write: “that I don’t have enough stamps for that”?). The former is correct. For example, this is one of the tricky grammatical passages I’m talking about.

Your story with the fly, which is led on a leash like a puppy with a hair around its neck, is at first glance a funny image, but then quickly becomes a sad, then a terrible image. The hair could also be a wire, a cable, a wire?

And then it could be an image that you use to describe your situation and how you feel. And the more you look at this picture, you realize: it is a picture that could describe anyone’s situation. Everyone is on the wire, and all these wires that cross and are continually linked together are one/the NETWORK.

(There was a feature film in the 70s by the German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder that was called, very prophetically, “People on a Wire.”)

Your picture of the fly beautifully describes one of the main problems of today, the relationship between the individual and the “system”. What is this “system”? There are different possibilities. For you it is “the technological system”, I would add “systemic thinking” or “thinking in systemic model worlds” or “systematizing nature” as a description, and describe that as part of an attitude that leads to a pose and attitude the arrogance of power over creation.

Representatives of this are, representatively, Marvin Minsky or the members of the Macy group: “Everything can be done and changed, you are what you want to be.”

At the end of your last letter, you ask me questions about a passage in my letter of October 8, 2003: “From a certain point in time, science disputed the sovereignty of art (and religion) to interpret these fields.

Now there should be a new nature, made by human hands.

Man becomes God and creates a software-based nature (Mirror Worlds, David Gelernter), which he shapes and controls according to his own wishes.

For me, “the human being” represents the attitude of mind described above — scientific understanding — belief in science. Machines and machine systems of various kinds are the concrete results of this thinking. By personally using these machines and machine systems, I am part of this system and support it.

For example, by writing this letter on my laptop.

But you too, by attacking this system, were and are part of this system — are part of a feedback system, an endless loop.

That would be a different picture than that of the fly on a hair-thin wire, but an even more dangerous one. The wafer-thin hair has now bent into a feedback loop, in the shape of an 8. Now no one needs to hold the wire — the wafer-thin hair — it does it all by itself, so that the fly, always in an infinite loop, “ in the system”.

I mean, an individual is entitled to defend themselves against the “system” by setting a limit. It can and must be allowed to defend this self-imposed limit.

But how? Where is this border? Is it the respective personal environment? The whole system”? What if this system is “infinite,” limitless?

And what should the tactics look like if every attack on this system only results in new energy being supplied to this system, which optimizes it and allows it to function better?

I would like to ask you two more things:

Do you know Robert Kaplan’s book The Story of 0?

And what meaning do numbers have for you? Do you think numbers have their own reality?

Once I’ve studied the manifesto carefully, I’ll get back to you.

I hope you are doing well. So I remain with best regards to Florence
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, December 3, 2003

18) December 21, 2003

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I received your letter dated November 30^th, 2003, the letter apparently crossed paths with my letter dated December 3^rd, 2003. Have you received my letter dated December 2, 2003? To be on the safe side, I would like to confirm that I received the copies of the manifesto and that I was very pleased about them.

Your letter dated November 30, 2003 contains very interesting ideas, especially

1) in the passages where you think about the necessity or superfluity of thinking and mental pursuits, and

2) where you reprimand me again for not correctly understanding the manifesto and point out once again that man can only break out of the prison of technology by destroying the infrastructure and devices of modern technology.

Allow me to ask the following question:

Would time have been destroyed if Martial Bourdin had managed to blow up the Royal Observatory in Greenwich Park in 1894?

It was a real attack on the devices used to measure time, but the category of the spiritual would have been unaffected by the destruction of these devices.

A thought is indestructible; it can only be abolished in a higher, more complex thought, i.e. invalidated. However, the right of the previous thought is recognized and preserved until it is “cancelled” by a new thought. A new and stronger thought is, in my opinion, more important than a bomb and has greater long-term destructive power than an explosion will ever have.

What would be gained if we switched off or switched off thinking, the mechanics of the spiritual sphere?

Can this be done without deforming people into a bunch of cells, as some bioengineers want to do? But you would have to do that in order to prevent the creation of, for example, the utopia of a technological society.

As you write, thinking in prison is important for you in order to survive (and to be able to reinvent yourself again and again.) The other side of this coin is the fact that everything that can be thought can apparently also become reality .

I’m currently reading a small, narrow book that an acquaintance from Hamburg wrote. (Thorwald Proll/Daniel Dubbe We came from the other star About 1968, Andreas Baaader and a department store, Nautilus-Press) At a young age, as a student, Proll was part of a political movement that then partly turned to terrorism and has now largely dissolved.

Although for you these people are probably “leftists” who view you very critically, I would like to quote a passage that really touched me and made me think of you.

The author, Thorwald Proll, describes himself and his colleagues (from the so-called RAF = Red Army faction around Baader-Meinhoff) as dropouts “...we were dropouts, drops on hot stones”.

About his time in prison he says:

Question: What did you do in prison?

“I read the newspapers. Studied the newspapers. I have never read newspapers in such detail as I did in a cell like that back then. I read a lot of books and wrote a diary, lived out my linguistic skills and tried to survive, and that was also a source of stability for me. I published it later.

The visits were particularly nice. The visits were something precious. They were always a cut, a section from outside. The visits were as nice as the letters.

Of course I also received an endless number of letters. It’s like being in a children’s home, where you’re sent away and receive letters.

Yes, it’s like being in a home too. If the whole thing loses its certain rigor or its anonymity, the threat, then the whole thing is a kind of subculture. You get the hang of it and know how it works. Finally, the letters that I received from outside while in prison were part of my actual 1968. They were evidence of affection and solidarity for a lonely person in his cell. They should comfort me and encourage me. They inspired me and gave me material. They made me feel like I wasn’t sitting in vain, that they were the hand gesture that precedes the closed fist.”

With that in mind, I wish you a Merry Christmas

and a healthy New Year
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, December 21, 2003

19) February 16, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I haven’t heard from you for a long time, your last letter was dated November 30, 2003.

Do you have my letters from December 3^rd? and received from 12/21/03? I was a little worried about how you were doing, or whether I might have unconsciously upset or hurt you with a comment or question. I hope you are doing well given the circumstances.

I would very much like to tell you in more detail about my experiences with the film so far, but that would be better told than written. One thing is remarkable: there is great curiosity and interest in talking about the questions and problems raised. Many additional questions arise.

And, on the other hand, there is an eloquent silence.

They kindly wished me good luck for the film.

For me that would be to create a platform for discussions about the problems you raise in the manifesto.

I’m working on it, the first steps have been taken. It is not easy to place a documentary (that deserves the word) on these topics in the face of a media reality where, even in Europe, everything is increasingly served in short bites like NBC, Channel 4 or HGBO.

With additional accompanying material, I would like to offer even more information than before, which will make it easier to access the questions and problem areas addressed in the film and provide even more comprehensive information.

Can I use the authentic version of the Manifesto? I would ask for your consent for this. And if you have any ideas for people, material or institutions that might be equally interested, I would be grateful if you could let me know. Accompanying discussions and forums are absolutely important.

To something else. I recently came across a text by the American author Hakim Bey that reminded me of some passages in your last letter of November 30, 2003. I would be interested to know what you think of this. Do you know the author? I’ll send you a short summary reduced to a few key sentences.

Hakim Bey, The Temporary Autonomous Zone »Disappeared to Croatan«

In grade school we were taught that the first settlements in Roanoke were failures; the colonizers took off and left behind only the cryptic message: “Gone to Croatan.” Later reports of “grey-eyed Indians” were dismissed as legends. The school textbooks said that what really happened was the massacre of the helpless settlers by the Indians. However, “Croatan” was not just any Eldorado, but the name of a neighboring tribe of friendly Indians. So the first colony in the New World preferred to break the contract with Prospero (Dee/Raleigh/the Empire). Its inhabitants defected to the savages with Caliban.

They got out. They became “Indians,” “natives,” choosing chaos rather than the terrible misery of forced labor for the plutocrats and intellectuals of London.

(-)

While North America emerged where “Turtle Island” once was, Croatan remained firmly anchored in its collective psyche. Beyond the settlement borders (frontier), the “natural” state still prevailed (ie no state) — and in the consciousness of the settlers there was always the option of wildness, the temptation, church, farm work, education, taxes — all the burdens of civilization — to leave behind, and in one way or another “disappear to Croatan”.

(-)

That old occult shadow still hangs over the remnants of our forests (which, incidentally, have expanded since the 19^th century as farmland became scrub forest. Thoreau dreamed on his deathbed of the return of “...Indians... Forests ... «: the return of the oppressed). Whenever an American wants to get out or go back to nature, he always “becomes an Indian.”

What do you think of it?

At the beginning you wrote to me: “I don’t want to talk about myself. Let’s talk about the issues that matter.”

I believe there is an audience that is interested in this — in these matters that are important (from your perspective).

What does your job do to archiving your documents? You are probably still very busy with this. Do you still have time for your own texts? In the way you wrote in your answer to my questions about the “hard life” in the forest, or in the story about “the fly on the hair”?

As I write this to you, snow is falling again. But you can clearly feel that spring is coming soon. Every now and then the birds can be heard again.

I hope you are doing well.

Many greetings from my wife too. Sabine, who sent you the check and lives in NY, has now read the manifesto. She is actually an absolute supporter of the new technologies that she needs for her daily work. Now she has become thoughtful and is asking me complicated questions. Just like I did to you in my letters.

Many greetings from Sabine too

sincerely
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, February 16, 2004

19) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

March 6, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZDAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

I received your letter dated February 16, 2004 yesterday. I received your letters dated December 3^rd, 2003 and December 21^st, 2003.

Please forgive me for not writing to you for a long time.

I’m usually too busy, so it’s very difficult for me to keep up with my correspondence. And now it’s harder for me than usual because my lover has cancer.

She underwent surgery on February 23^rd and I don’t even know how she is doing now because my communication with her has been cut off.

It would be too boring to tell you about these difficulties. I myself don’t fully understand what happened. I just want to say that I cannot call my beloved for the time being and have not received any news about her current condition. Of course I worry a lot about it. So I can’t write you much now.

By the way, yesterday was my lover’s birthday. She is now only fifty-one years old. That’s very young to get cancer, isn’t it?

In answer to the questions you ask on page 2 of your letter dated February 16^th: Yes, of course you may use the authentic version of the Manifesto as you see fit.

I have heard a little about Hakim Bey, although I have not read any of his works. I believe that he is probably similar to the “anarcho-primitivists” (such as John Zerzan). This means that his opinion about prehistoric people contains some truth, but is still fundamentally irrational or unreasonable.

They offered to send me something that would be useful to me two or three times. I thank you for that. The thing that would be most useful to me is money because I find it very difficult to pay the postage of my correspondence.

In this context we have a good example of the madness and inconsistency of bureaucrats.

After I sent you the corrected version of the manifesto, I offered to another person; to send him a photocopy of the corrected version, provided that he pays the postage and photocopying. That’s why the prison authorities arrested me (although very easily), because they claimed that I had violated the rule prohibiting prisoners from running a business.

No doubt, this seems ridiculous to you. But one must remember that the logic of bureaucrats is different from the logic of ordinary people.

So I can’t ask anyone to pay the postage for my correspondence with him because the authorities might accuse me of running a business.

After all, anyone can send me money.

Once again I wish you much success for your film

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

6.3.04

20) April 11, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I am very sorry that your friend became so seriously ill and had to have surgery.

It must be very difficult for you not to be able to talk to her and not know how she is doing. Hopefully you can get back in touch with her soon to put an end to this uncertainty.

Thank you for finding the time to answer me despite these stressful circumstances.

I thank you very much for your consent to publish the authentic version of the manifesto.

I’m always asked why I didn’t do an interview with you for the film or why I didn’t make a film where you and your point of view are the focus.

I always point out that after a certain point you basically stopped working with the media (I think there was a newspaper interview, right at the beginning) because you had bad experiences.

But the film makes many, especially young viewers, very curious about you as a person. They want to hear and know more from you.

I always say that you point out that everything was explained exhaustively in the Manifesto, but still: there is always this desire to experience your view of things audio-visually.

You wrote to me in an earlier letter: “I don’t want to talk about myself. Let’s talk about the issues that matter.” But there is an audience that is interested in just that.

So please forgive me for asking you again if you would be interested in speaking to me in front of a camera about “the matters that matter.”

We could talk about it in German and/or English.

If I am correctly informed, something like this is possible with your consent. If I get a sign from you, I would offer this unusual portrait to the German-French cultural television (they broadcast across Europe), there is a fundamental interest.

I would come to Florence with a small team whenever you want.

Please don’t blame me for bringing this up with you again. But I am firmly convinced of the great significance and importance of this type of document.

But I definitely don’t want to pressure you. You probably have other things to worry about at the moment. Please take your time with your answer. In any case, the matter can only succeed if you are internally ready for it and have trust.

I hope your friend’s surgery was successful and she is feeling better. I wish you the best.

Many greetings from my wife too

Heartfelt
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

20) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

April 13, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

Yesterday I received fifty dollars from you through Sabine Schenk. Thank you! They are very friendly and unusually generous.

When someone gives me money, they usually only send me about ten, twenty, maybe twenty-five dollars. Very rarely do people send me more than fifty dollars. But recently a woman sent me a hundred and twenty dollars! I believe that she is very stupid, perhaps a little mentally retarded and not completely responsible for her actions. That’s why I had to write to her telling her to stop sending me large amounts. Anyway, I’m relatively rich at the moment.

However, I cannot spend this money on photocopies because these people have decided that they will no longer make photocopies to prisoners, except photocopies of papers that have to be sent to the court, and not of such papers if they are made by hand can copy.

This is a big problem...

I am happy to inform you that the operation my beloved underwent ended well. Doctors now say there is a 60 or 80 percent chance that she will live at least five more years.

After the operation, my lover was very weak, but her strength is gradually coming back. She is undergoing chemotherapy to reduce the risk of the cancer coming back, and her hair has fallen out because of the chemotherapy. But they should grow back later. She endures this torment with a lot of courage.

Thank you again for your gift.

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski

4/13/04

21) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

April 15, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I received a letter from an Italian group called “Prometeo”.

She wants to publish an Italian version of the manifesto, “Industrial Society and Its Future,” and of course she should have the corrected version of the same.

I cannot send her a copy of the corrected version because the guards in this part of the prison refuse to make any more photocopies to the prisoners, as I told you in my letter dated April 13, 2004.

So I suggested to these Italians that they write to you and offer to pay you the postage and photocopying costs if you sent them a copy of the corrected version of “Industrial Society and Its Future.”

I am writing you these few lines so that you know that if these Italians asked you for the corrected version of the manifesto, I would have no objection to you sending them a copy of it.

Yours truly, Ted Kaczynski

22) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

May 4, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I received your letter dated April 11, 2004 today. Hopefully you received my letters dated April 13, 2004 and April 15, 2004.

There are two difficulties with your suggestion that you interview me.

First: If I let you do an interview with me and the same thing appeared on television, it might seem that I want to create a cult of personality. Then the best people would no longer have respect for me, and as a result they would no longer listen to my words. Nevertheless, I will consider your suggestion. But,

Secondly, even if I decided to let you conduct an interview with me, it would still be questionable whether the prison authorities would allow it. The first prerequisite would be that you come here as a representative of a newspaper, a magazine, a television station or something similar. This prerequisite would be met if you came as an official representative of German-French cultural television.

However, the authorities may refuse to allow you to interview me. A prisoner who is somewhat famous told me that they refused him an interview with a television station without telling him the reason. These bureaucrats do whatever they want, and if they believe, for example, that the interview might cause negative publicity about the Bureau of Prisons, they will not allow the interview.

I hope everything is going well for you. Please. Send my kindest regards to your madam.

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski

23) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

May 11, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

Regarding the interview you suggested to me:

It occurred to me that I would be able to make a better decision if I knew the content of your film. Unfortunately, the authorities would not allow me to receive the film, and even if I received the film, I would have no means of seeing it.

But I’m wondering if it would be possible for you to send me a transcript of the words in the film. If that were possible, I could partially understand the content of your film and consider it in order to better decide whether I should conduct an interview with you.

(If the authorities allowed it).

Your devoted one

Ted Kaczynski

PS Hopefully you received my letters dated April 13, 2004, April 15, 2004 and May 4, 2004. -TJK

“Schroeder Ulle”

U-SCHROEDER@arte-tv.com

Date: 4. June 2004 18:06:26 CEST

To: “Lutz Dammbeck” <lutz.dammbeck@hamburg.de>

Subject: RE: ushr-net

Dear Lutz, we can’t do that — even less than Martina.

We never put money into it directly, it would simply be wrong to write something like that.

Do you understand?

Greetings from Ulle

---- Message d’origine----

De: Lutz Dammbeck [mailto:lutz.dammbeck@hamburg.de]

Envoyé: Mercedi June 2, 2004 5:47 p.m

À: Schroeder Ulle

Objet: Re: ushr-net

Dear Ulle, that’s pretty much how I would imagine it. can you support me there?

Quote from Ted’s last letter: “... Second: If I also decided to send you a

To allow an interview to be conducted with me, it would still be questionable whether the authorities of the

prison would allow this. The first prerequisite would be that you

here as a representative of a newspaper, a magazine, a television station or

something like that would come. This prerequisite would be met if you were using one

Letters of recommendation from the German-French cultural television would come.

However, the authorities may refuse to allow you to interview me. “

I would like to try it.

greetings lutz

RECOMMANDATION

To whom It May concern

RE: Interview with THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI, Reg.N. 04475–046

Dear Sirs,

the German-French cultural TV channel is planning a feature story about this

topic “Future and problems of modern technology”. is the author and director

Lutz Dammbeck from Hamburg.

For this project he would like to conduct an interview with Mr. Theodore John Kaczynski.

The film deals with questions about the opportunities and problems of

Science and technology today and has an exclusively cultural and scientific interest in this topic and the person of Mr. Kaczynski.

Lutz Dammbeck is one of the most famous German authors and directors

The field of artistic documentary film and has also worked as a professor for

new media at the University of Fine Arts in Dresden/Saxony

This topic has already been dealt with artistically and scientifically.

We kindly ask you to grant Lutz Dammbeck an interview with Mr. Kaczynski

allow. Thank you very much for your kind support of the project

On May 17, 2004 at 3:20 p.m. wrote Martina.Zoellner@swr.de:

Dear Lutz,

I’m not entirely sure whether I can write a letter like that. Because I can’t broadcast the interview with TK. The most I can do is describe it in general terms that we support something like that or something similar. Would that be enough? Kind regards, Martina

PS: You can also assume that the SWR and arte support network events in the academy and the ZKM through presence, logo, etc.

21) June 11, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter of May 4^th.

I also received your letters from April 13, 2004 and April 15, 2004.

I am pleased with several things you have shared with me in these letters. On the one hand, that your friend is feeling better and that you are in contact with her again. Also that you received the money. I thought: You have spent a lot of money on postage for letters to me and would like to compensate you for that.

The “Italians” have contacted us by letter and I will send the requested copy. Who are these people, are they artists?

At a recent screening of the film, I was approached by a gentleman who specializes in Italian literature. He pointed me to a book by the Italian writer Mauro Covacichi called Lapoetica dell’unabomber. Have you heard about this book? I will try to find out if there is an English or German translation of it.

You asked me questions and shared your concerns regarding my question about the possibility of a conversation with you being filmed.

I understand and respect your concerns about disappointing the people you care about by appearing on a “personality show” that obscures your actual concerns.

I think I understand that well because I couldn’t afford such a lapse in my work. My work as a documentary filmmaker and visual artist is valued by the people who are important to me precisely because I try to avoid cheap and day-to-day effects and to reflect and document something substantial that lasts and is important beyond the day.

There is an audience for it. Certainly the general trend in the editorial offices of newspapers and television stations is towards a presentation that reduces the complexity of the subject matter and focuses on sensationalism, quickly understandable clip and magazine aesthetics and interchangeable plot points. But there are still ways to work differently. A conversation with you would appear within a cultural, scientific and contemporary historical context.

I already wrote to you that I get a lot of questions about both your philosophy and the manifesto, which I try to answer as best I can.

Of course it would be better if I could pass on these questions personally.

Please consider my suggestion carefully.

I hope you are doing well.

So I remain with best regards from Hamburg, my wife and Sabine also send greetings

Your Lutz Dammbeck

June 21, 2004

22) June 25, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter of May 11, 2004, which unfortunately I can only respond to today.

Your request is a bit problematic for me. A film consists of images, sound (music, noises, speech) and texts and is a synthetic work of art. Even a video copy only gives a limited and reduced impression of what can be seen, heard and overall perceived in a cinema room during a film screening, for example.

I’m afraid that removing an element like the text might give the wrong impression. Additionally, my suggestion for filming a conversation with you is about a new project in which you would be the focus. Formally, these recordings would be determined by the place where they take place. In terms of content, for me this would be consistent with our previous correspondence. From my questions you could certainly see the spectrum of what interests me.

I would like to summarize this again so that you have a concentrated idea of what I would like to talk to you about.

If you have topics or things that you don’t want to talk about, I would of course be just as interested in hearing about them as topics and things that you would like to talk about. The conversation could stand on its own, as a self-contained film document.

It would also be conceivable to make a thematic film that addresses the topic more broadly.

But the focus here should also be on your personal statements.

It is important that we discuss these issues before further steps can be taken. If necessary, I could certainly submit a letter from Cultural Television that legitimizes me and the project.

I hope you are well and your friend’s recovery continues to progress.

So I remain with best regards from Hamburg
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

June 25, 2004

24) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

July 9, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

Thank you for your letter dated June 11, 2004. You ask me about the Italians who asked for a copy of the corrected version of the Manifesto. They write: “Who are these people, are they artists?” They are not artists, but anarchists who want to translate and publish some of my works, including the manifesto, in Italian.

You mention a book by the Italian writer Mauro Covacichi called “La poetica de ll’Unabomber” and you ask me if I have heard of it before.

Before I received your letter I had not heard of this book, and I would rather never have heard of it because it is very likely that Mr. Covacichi misrepresented me. In fact, it is certain that Mr. Covacichi has misrepresented me, because little precise information about me is planned to be made public. Too much nonsense about me has already been published, and I don’t like the appearance of additional nonsense.

I hope that you received my letter dated May 11, 2004, in which I...

TJK to LUTZ DAMMBECK 7/09/04

a transcript of the words of your film.

Please send my greetings to your wife and Sabine Schenk

Your devoted,

Ted Kaczynski

Von: “malandrini-\@libero\.it” <malandrini-@libero.it>

Datum: 13. Juli 2004 12:39:16 MESZ

An: “lutz\.dammbeck” <lutz.dammbeck@hamburg.de>

Betreff: PROMETEO

Hi Lutz

It’s a long time ago, when we wrote our last letter for you, Do you remember? We’re PROMETEO!

Since we’ll have a lot of things to do (translation etc.) and we’ve not yet received the text we like to know if you’ve had some problems, we hope that you have not changed your idea about your will to send us a copy of the corrected version of I.S. and I.F.

Morever we don’t know how to pay you back the photocopies.

We hope to hear about you as soon as possible.

Ciao by PROMETEO!

23) August 15, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Yesterday I received your letter dated July 9^th, 2004. Since you ask me again for “a transcript of your film”, I assume that you did not receive my letter dated June 25^th, 2004?

Therefore, I am enclosing a copy of the letter, which also contains a response to your request. In the meantime I was also able to find out a little more about the Italian author and his text La poetica dell ‘unabomber. The text seems to be a free paraphrase both of the case of the Unabomber and of a mysterious and as yet unsolved series of bombs on Italy’s beaches, which concerns the public in Italy (if one follows the newspaper reports).

The author does not comment on you personally; in my opinion, he uses what he learned from press reports about the case of the so-called “Unabomber” as the starting point for a free literary paraphrase on the topic as he sees it.

I sent the copies to the Italians, I hope everything arrives safely. How is your girlfriend, how are you, how is the organization of your documents and archives going? I hope everything is or runs to your satisfaction.

So I remain with best regards, also from my wife and Sabine, and am looking forward to your answer regarding the recordings
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, August 15, 2004

25) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

August 26, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck:

I have just received your letters dated August 15, 2004 and August 17, 2004 (postmark).

Through the methods that Michael Ventris used to decipher the Linear B script

Crete, I managed to read your handwriting in the letter dated August 17, 2004. I received all the letters you mention in your most recent letters earlier.

But I only received the letter dated June 25, 2004 after I had sent you my letter dated July 9, 2004.

Please forgive me for putting off my reply to your letter of 6/25/04 for so long, but I didn’t know how to respond. We have an expression in English: “to buy a pig in a poke”.

When you buy a pig in a sack you can’t see it, so you don’t know whether it’s a good pig or a bad pig. Currently I know almost nothing about your art, so I would be buying a pig in a poke if I let you interview me.

That’s why I have to give you a negative answer for the time being. However, I do not rule out the possibility that one day I would allow you to film a conversation with me. This would be more likely if it were just a recording of a conversation and nothing more. (As you wrote in your letter dated June 25, 2004: “The conversation could stand on its own, as a self-contained film document.”)

In this case too, I would like to postpone the interview, for which there are certain reasons that do not need to be explained here.

On the other hand, this question may be meaningless because it is all too possible that the “Warden” (the prison administrator) would not approve the interview.

In your letter dated August 15, 2004 you ask about my girlfriend. Unfortunately she is doing very badly. The cancer hasn’t come back, thank God, but she has sharp pains in her hands and the doctor recommended that she see a hand disease specialist. But there is something worse: she may have thyroid disease. This can be very worrying. But my friend is strong and she endures all these sufferings without losing her cheerful disposition.

As far as health is concerned, I’m doing well.

What I’m not doing well is organizing my documents. Julie Herrada, the librarian to whom my documents are entrusted at the Michigan Library, appears to have lost the entire contents of an envelope I sent her.

I have to wonder how many other papers Miss Herrada may have lost. I can no longer rely on them and would like to find another library.

Kind regards to your wife and Sabine Schenk and to you, yours truly, Ted Kaczynski

Postscript, August 29, 2004: I just spoke to my girlfriend on the phone. She has undergone a medical examination which has proven that she does not have any thyroid disease. This is very pleasant news! -TJK

24) September 17, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500 USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter dated August 26, 2004.

I understand your concerns, hesitation and skepticism about filming.

Also because, if I may say so, I know the problem from both sides — as an interviewee and as an interviewer.

As a filmmaker and artist, I know the basic possibilities of montage. And I also heard a lot about your personal and specific experiences with the media so far.

Of course you don’t want to “buy a pig in a poke” (as they say in German). It’s a question of trust.

That’s why I suggested the form of a conversation as a film document, which initially seems unspectacular because it’s very reduced, sparse and in stark contrast to the current development of documentary films, which are developing more and more towards infotainment. But I could imagine that the quiet, unspectacular and “classic” documentary method is appropriate to the given reduced and concentrated situation and allows a person to watch you speak and think.

There would be a clearly identifiable beginning, progression, and end. I would hire a cameraman who is one of the best German documentary cameramen heard, and is experienced, sensitive and good enough for such a task. The TV channel Arte is still interested.

You also write that you know little or not enough of my “art” to be able to decide. In the case of a documentary/documentary, and this is what we are talking about, it is about something completely different, such as a visual artistic work or a feature that is “freer” in its handling of the material.

The “art” of filming with you would be to find a thread of conversation, develop it together and, for me, then listen to you.

You would need time for that. How long do you think, assuming you agree and the warden gives his approval, the time for such recordings would be granted? It would be good to be able to visit you several times, on two or three days in a row or perhaps with a week’s break in between. Do you think something like this is realistic and possible?

You managed to surprise me again with your reference to the Linear B font from Crete. I had to look it up in encyclopedias. I would like to jokingly ask you: did I really write with such hieroglyphs that you had to use Michael Ventris’ methods to decipher them?

But seriously: what kind of methods are you mentioning, how does it work in detail?

I only found out that around 1950 (1953 in other sources) the English architect Michael Ventris deciphered the characters of a mysterious script called Linear -B-. There are said to have been 89 different characters. Ventris discovered that each character represented a syllable and that the panels were intended to represent inventory lists. Of course that makes me curious: when and why did you study these methods? During the study? Or are you currently working on early Greek history?

I don’t know much about these connections, except that when I was researching a film about the art of the 1930s, I also came across references to Greek and Doric art, and references to the Hittites in architecture or Pindar in field of humanities. (There was a neo-classical revival throughout Europe and also in the USA during these years; in Germany it culminated in the figures of Arno Breker and the architecture of Albert Speer.)

I was also surprised because I had judged you to be a strict rationalist. Now science recognizes what is actually provable and verifiable, and these things lead us into the realm of the legends and myths of peoples, right up to the realm of the miraculous and miraculous. Over the year 3,000 a. Z. or around 1200 AD, there is only speculation about the Aztecs and Maya, the Atlantic, the Olmecs or an alleged relationship between the Dorians and the Germans and their settlement in Canaan and Lebanon. There are currently no even remotely comprehensible explanations for the beginning of man as a spiritually capable, culture-creating being, as there are for the many unclassifiable finds of lost cultures on our globe. What was/or is your interest in dealing with things as far back as Linear B writing? That sounds exciting.

I’m very happy to hear that your friend is doing better and the cancer hasn’t come back.

What you wrote about the Ann Arbor librarian losing documents sounds really disturbing. Are there any ways for you to check what condition the archive and your papers are in? Are the papers already publicly available?

Here in Germany, one of the main topics in the media at the moment is the upcoming election in the USA. Today I read about the insecure technology of the voting machines some states work with touch screens. Since there is no longer a ballot paper or control printout on paper, any software error or manipulatory intervention can significantly change the result. Both parties have reportedly hired an army of lawyers to address expected objections from the other side and to submit objections of their own. Election chaos is expected. Do you even have the opportunity to vote?

Do you follow current events such as developments in Iraq?

I sent a birthday card on May 14^th. Did this card arrive?

I hope you are doing well and I would like to send my best regards to you and your friend. My wife also sends her warmest regards
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

26) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

October 30, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

Thank you for your letter dated October 14, 2004.

Regarding your suggestion to interview me to make a documentary, I like the idea of a documentary, but as I said in my letter dated August 26, 2004, I would like to postpone such interview.

There are certain things I want to say, but I don’t want to say them now, I want to say them later. If I gave you an interview too soon, I wouldn’t be allowed to say these things, and if we wanted to do a second interview later, the Warden probably wouldn’t allow it.

We could probably just have a single interview.

So I prefer to do our first and probably only interview later.

You ask: “How long would time be allowed for such recordings?

It would be good to be able to visit you several times, on two or three days in a row or perhaps with a week’s break in between.”

I don’t know exactly, but I suspect that we would only be allowed an hour, maybe three hours at the most. After a week had passed, we might be allowed another hour (or three hours), but I don’t think that was likely. So we have to assume we would only have between one and three hours. Before the authorities were more generous with the interviews, but now I think they are very restrictive. I’m afraid that they wouldn’t allow us to be interviewed.

But tell me: who would pay the costs of travel, equipment, etc. associated with your visit if you came here as a representative of the

TV company came to do an interview with me?

The reason I ask this question is this: If the television company pays the costs, then I suspect they will control the content of what is broadcast on television. The company will decide which parts of the film you have recorded will be broadcast on television, the company can edit the film according to their preference.

On the other hand, if you pay the costs, if you also come as a representative of the company, then I suspect you can control the editing of the film, you can control what is actually directed on television.

Or is it irrelevant (irrelevant) who pays the costs? Anyway, who will control the content of what is actually directed on television?

As for Michael Ventris and the Linear B script, I’m not particularly interested in it and I’m not interested in early Greek history. In fact, I know very little about the late Mr. Ventris and the Linear B font.

When I wrote that I had used Mr. Ventris’ methods. To read your letter dated August 17, 2004, I just wanted to jokingly tell you that I had a lot of difficulty reading your handwriting, so I would like you to write more carefully.

Regarding the other questions you asked me: Most of my papers that are in the archive are already publicly available, but some of them are still private. I can’t really control what condition the archive and my papers are in. I can only negotiate this with Julie Herrada and the library authorities. I probably wouldn’t be able to vote in the upcoming election, but I don’t know for sure because I have no desire to vote and haven’t researched the possibilities. I follow current events, but not very closely.

Yes, I received the birthday card you sent me on 5/14/04. Thank you for that. And please forgive me for forgetting to thank you for this until now.

Kind regards to you and your wife

Ted Kaczynski

27) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

October 30, 2004

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

Merry Christmas ! I hope you and your wife would enjoy the holiday very much.

I also hope that your film has great success. You have undoubtedly received my letter dated October 30, 2004.

Best regards
Ted Kaczynski

25) December 12, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you for your letter dated October 30, 2004.

First of all, I am pleased that you said that you like the idea of a documentary film.

Then you write that “there are certain things I want to say, but I don’t want to say them now, I want to say them later. If I gave you an interview too soon, I wouldn’t be allowed to say these things..... So I prefer, our first and probably only interview

to lead later.”

That sounds exciting and of course makes you curious about what kind of things these could be. Can’t you give me a few clues or hints as to what this is about?

I think your questions about practical implementation are good.

You ask, “Who would pay the travel, equipment, etc. costs associated with your visit?”

Well, I would come as a representative of my own company, but with legitimacy from television. As a rule, I make films according to the following principle: I’m interested in something, I develop an idea and a concept for it and suggest it to a television station. Since these are generally not journalistic topics, but rather philosophical, artistic or historical topics, only certain ones are used

Television stations (such as the German-French broadcaster Arte or the cultural editorial departments of Südwestrundfunk in Baden-Baden) as well as certain editorial departments and editors are considered as contacts.

If they are interested in my proposal, the television station will pay a certain part of the budget necessary to produce the film and will then be allowed to broadcast the film once or twice in their program within a certain time window. Either the budget comes entirely from the TV station, or, which is my preferred model, I get part of the budget from the regional film funding of the individual federal states (Germany is a federal structure made up of 16 federal states, such as Saxony, Hamburg and North Rhine-Westphalia , Baden-Würtemberg, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, etc.).

Some of these federal states have regional film funding, where committees made up of directors, critics, representatives of other art disciplines and film professionals such as editors or cameramen decide which film projects receive funding. Above all, artistically demanding projects are supported with the hope that certain themes, values and cinematic signatures will not disappear from the market due to the pressure of commercialization.

The funding of the projects does not involve any influence on the content; the applicant, i.e. the producer, author or director, is solely responsible for the content. In this case that is me.

With this model, the fact that the TV station doesn’t pay for everything means I have an equal position vis-à-vis the broadcaster. This is particularly advantageous when it comes to controversial topics.

Of course, this description misses the sometimes long periods of time it takes to get the budget together for a longer documentary.

You can perhaps imagine how many young filmmakers and film school graduates, but also many well-known filmmakers and producers, now also from other European countries (this is a result of European unification), are applying for these funds. This preparation phase can take several months.

Yes, then you have the funds that you have calculated and have a part available as an advance payment to be able to pay for research, travel costs and the team. The producer is also required to make their own contribution to the budget. This usually happens by only paying yourself a portion of the fee and initially advancing certain costs.

That’s not so risky if you know that television like Arte or a German television station wants to participate in the project later and has given a declaration of intent.

This is a model that exists in several other European countries besides Germany and is unknown in the USA.

That’s why, in my opinion, the television program in these countries looks different (better) than in the USA, because this model means that films and documentaries can be made available and shown that would be very difficult to produce without this financial support.

Of course, as an author, director and producer, I am also required to provide certain assurances that, for example, the interview partners I have named are actually willing to take part in the film project and that I can document this.

Specifically, I can answer your question about the control in such a way that the version that I assembled and am responsible for is broadcast on television. As a successful company, it is also entirely possible for me to pre-finance certain services, in which case I bear full responsibility and control anyway.

I think it’s important that we talk about things like this, because if I want to make such commitments, I have to be sure that you will take part in the film and trust me to process the resulting material seriously.

As far as Michael Ventris and the Linear B font are concerned, you have managed to lead me astray again. I didn’t notice your joke and, in Germany, you would say, took it “extremely seriously.” Like your April Fool’s joke! (Although, I think that the text from April 1^st unintentionally makes something clear that goes beyond “right and wrong” or “serious” and “funny” in the text of the letter, but unfortunately can only be understood in the film). But, My handwriting isn’t that bad, but you write in very clear handwriting. A friend told me that it looks like the handwriting of scientists who write down their experimental results.

Or, maybe I didn’t notice your joke because I may have had my head full of certain clichés from movies and literature; what it’s like in a prison like this and that everything there is dark, serious, difficult, oppressive and dangerous. It’s really difficult for me (I) to imagine what your daily routine is like. Is the course of a day prescribed for you down to the last detail? Can you have specific times to choose what you want to do? How does a day like this go for you? For example, can you leave the cell? Watch TV shows, use video or the Internet? Or are such questions naive? I also hope I’m not asking questions like these that will cause you difficulty.

But there is certainly something like an “inner field” that no one but you can enter, into which you can “emigrate”. In German there are terms and ideas that have something to do with “inwardness” and the desire and idea that there is “a mysterious path that goes inwards. “Eternity is within us. The outside world only casts its shadows into this realm of light.” Do such metaphysically colored thoughts seem rather strange to you, or are they alien to you? However, in some of your texts I thought I discovered something that comes close to this attempt to find a way inward. Otherwise, I’ve been very busy the last few weeks preparing some screenings of the film and other material.

I will inform you about the results early next year.

I very much hope to be able to make important topics and your views public and open for discussion.

This is also good for further promoting interest in you and your thoughts.

Since we live in a media society in which topics and fates are dragged more and more quickly into the spotlight and then pushed back into the darkness, it requires great clarity and intensity/quality not only to make oneself heard in this cacophony, but also to create something that lasts the day.

So for today I’m left with best wishes to you and your friend (how is she?), also from my wife.

I hope you are doing well, I wish you lots of strength and health
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, December 12, 2004

Marco Camenisch

PF3143

8105 Regensdorf

SWITZERLAND

Dear Marco Camenisch,

Thank you very much for your letter dated November 21, 2004 and the enclosed material.

It’s good that John (Zerzan) made the contact.

What we have been trying to organize for some time are discussions and events to draw attention to the film “The Network” and the topics and questions it addresses. Let’s see if we can do that.

John and Ted’s positions are important and interesting (and of course controversial), I’m curious to hear the pros and cons.

John’s texts and work are largely unknown in Germany.

Since I am more of a filmmaker and visual artist myself, it is difficult for me at the moment to estimate the extent to which there is interest and opportunities to become active. But I’ll ask around and if John is in Germany, there’s of course a chance that something will happen.

Since I have no idea what the conditions are like in the Swiss prison system, I have to ask a few questions: can you receive newspapers, copies of texts or books? TV? use the internet? Get videotapes sent to you and watch them?

What I didn’t fully understand about cooperation in distributing John’s texts: You write about your “weak knowledge of the English language”, so does the cooperation offered relate more to the supervision and editing of translations of these texts available in German?

I was particularly interested in the enclosed text “The journey into the void....”.

In my own work, the question of the “beginning time”, i.e. the point where something starts to go wrong, plays an important role.

I might have to add that I have been working with several artistic media since my time as a student at the art academy in Leipzig: earlier with painting, graphics and animated film, then later more with photography, spatial media collages made from photos, film, dance and music, and then more later and currently mainly with documentary films and art projects, where journalistic methods and increased research also play a role.

The film project, which I also visited and got to know John as I was preparing, deals with the interface between art, science and technology and asks about the “beginning” of a post-war modernity.

The synopsis for the film says:

“In 1930, the Viennese mathematician Kurt Gödel shook the foundations of mathematics with his incompleteness theorems. In 1968, the physicist and engineer Heinz von Foerster worked on the fusion of digital and biological systems in his Biological Lab at the University of Illinois. In 1995, the FBI arrested former mathematics professor Theodore J. Kaczynski in the Montana wilderness as the “Unabomber.” What connects these people, places and ideas into a network? The search for an answer leads back to the 1940s to 1960s, where the horizons of science, art and technology seemed to be opening up in all directions. The foundations of modernity are being reset with cybernetics, multimedia art and military research. This will be the basis for today’s globally networked machine systems that are determined by mathematics, logic and binary codes. “The Network” shows designers, machinists and agents of these systems. Someone gets out and tries to stop the machines. But at what cost?

So of course I’m very interested in Red Sloan’s question, which is quoted in the text you sent along: “What’s the problem with modernity?”, which John expands on with questions about the role of language and abstraction.

This is exciting and makes you think: what caused fear and tension within

social life, and what role did culture and later art play as a means of alleviating tensions and as a balance for tensions that were suddenly (?) created and felt.

Even if it is of course vulnerable as a thesis that may only be based on projections from today back into a society and time that we really can’t know anything about, it is still exciting.

And leads to the question of inequality. For sharing something that was previously seemingly viewed and felt as “whole”.

And leads to the question in your text about the battle on “the field of the symbolic”.

I would like to first make contact with these short comments and would be happy if we could exchange ideas further.

When January is over I will get back to you and let you know how things went with John and the film.

I hope you are doing well given the circumstances

and stay for today with kind regards from Hamburg

Lutz Dammbeck

December 12, 2004

Marco Camenisch: The son of a customs officer attended high school in Schiers and left school without a qualification. In the 1970s he was active in the anti-nuclear power movement and became a militant opponent of nuclear energy. In 1979 and 1980, together with accomplices, he carried out several explosive attacks on high-voltage pylons and transformers at power plants in Switzerland. Camenisch was sentenced to ten years in prison by the Chur cantonal court. In December 1981, he and five fellow prisoners managed to escape from the Regensdorf prison. The escapees shot a guard and injured another. Camenisch became one of the most wanted people in Switzerland. In November 1991, Camenisch was arrested in Tuscany. In 1993, Camenisch was sentenced to twelve years in prison in Italy for assault and explosives offenses and was extradited to the Swiss authorities on April 18, 2002. On March 10, 2017, Camenisch was conditionally released from prison. This ends one of the longest chapters in Swiss judicial history.

26) December 30, 2004

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I too wish you a Merry Christmas, and a healthy and happy one too

New Year. Thank you for your good wishes for the success of the film.

For me, a success would be if we managed to get a discussion going about the questions and problems raised in the film.

If you succeed, then it would be your success too. Because if the film is interesting, it is not least because of you and your thoughts.

Have you already received my last letter from December 12^th?

So I remain with warm greetings from Hamburg, also from my wife, and please say hello to your friend from us too
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, December 30, 2004

Attachment: Art postcard with the graphic “Angelus Novus”, whom Walter Benjamin described as the “Angel of History”.

28) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

TED KACZYNSKI
to

LUTZ DAMMBECK

February 8, 2005

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

Thank you for your letters from 12/12/04 and 12/30/04.

Firstly, I want to tell you that I received a letter from an American filmmaker who wanted to do an interview with me. I told him that I had to give you the first opportunity to interview me because I have been corresponding with you for a long time. This American filmmaker is Avi Weider and his company is Loop Filmworks, 45 Maion Street, Suite 504, Brooklyn NY 11201, USA

Do you know anything about him?

I like what you wrote in your letter dated December 12, 2004, that the version of our interview broadcast on television will be the version you edited.

You also write “if I make such commitments, I want and need to be sure that you will take part in the film..... “.

If I promise to take part in the film, I will certainly do so.

I don’t want to break a promise, and that’s why I hesitate instead of telling you outright that I would do the interview. I have to be absolutely sure that I want to do the interview before I make a promise.

But you must always remember that the Warden can refuse to allow the interview even if I agree to do so.

We also have to have an interpreter because I speak German so poorly that we can only do a fraction of the interview in German, and Lydia Eccles told me that you would have had to speak to her through an interpreter. So three people besides me have to be present at the interview: you, the interpreter, and the cameraman, and I’m not sure the authorities would allow that many people to be present.

On page 4 of your letter dated December 12, 2004, you ask me about my life in this prison.

They ask if I can leave the cell. No.

The prisoners in the row of cells where I live are always locked in their respective cells, except that every day (except Saturday and Sunday), we are offered the opportunity to have rec (recreation, entertainment, relaxation).

If the prisoner accepts the rack, the guards put the shackles on his wrists and lead him either to an inner rack room or to the outer rack yard.

On alternating days we have indoor and outdoor reporting. When you’re in an indoor prison room, you can’t talk to any other prisoners. That’s why you don’t usually do anything else in the indoor gym other than gymnastics, running or the like.

The outer yard is divided into cages made of wire mesh, and the guards place one prisoner in each cage so that the prisoners cannot fight with each other. But the prisoners can talk to each other.

Most of the prisoners just talk to each other in the outside yard, but some also do gymnastics or run, although it is not possible to run comfortably as the dimensions of the cages are only 4 meters x 6 meters at most.

After the prisoners have been in the inner prison room or the outer prison yard for about an hour and a half or two hours, the guards put the shackles back on their wrists and take them back to the cells.

Other than the foregoing, or a visit to the dentist or something like that, the prisoners always stay in the cells, and only one prisoner lives in each cell.

Because the prisoners are so separated from each other, there is no danger here.

Otherwise this prison would be quite dangerous, because the most dangerous prisoners are sent here.

When the prisoner is in his cell, he is allowed to do whatever he wants.

He doesn’t have the opportunity to use video, internet or anything like that, but he can watch TV shows. However, I never watch TV shows, but I listen to a radio station that plays classical music.

I understand what you write about the “inner field” into which one can “emigrate”, and I have such an inner field. However, I do not consider this topic to be metaphysical but rather psychological. In any case, the opportunity to “emigrate” to the inner field may be a temptation that should be resisted. For some people it is easier to retreat into the inner field than to fight external circumstances, and if they fail to fight external evils, they can ultimately overcome them in the inner field.

To give a simple example, there are psychological techniques used to force a prisoner of war to provide information. The purpose of these techniques is to break the prisoner’s will, and it is said that few people could successfully resist these techniques.

They ask me how my friend is doing. Luckily she’s feeling a little better. I sent her your greetings and she sends her greetings to you too.

As for your letter of 12/30/04, thank you for writing so clearly and carefully. But who was Walter Benjamin?

Kind regards to you and your wife

Ted Kaczynski

PS I would like to ask you a question.

What does the word “tree rock hyrax” mean? I can’t find it in the dictionary. Paul Schebesta writes in his work, The Bambuti — Pygmies from Ituri, Volume I, pages 72 — 73: “Deep silence descends on the jungle with the black night. It has become so quiet all around that you can clearly hear every falling branch in the forest and the drops falling from the trees after a rain. Suddenly, however, a piercing scream tears through the deep silence

Night: first it screams from somewhere far away in the forest, then it gets closer and closer. It becomes quiet again, but after about an hour the same screams again, which go through your bones, this time from the other side, then again further and further away. It blares and screams for a while, then falls silent again. The frightening screams that are well known to the Mombuti are repeated almost every hour. They don’t bother him, he would miss them if they weren’t there, yes, he’s even happy about them. They are the calls of the rock hyrax.”

So, what kind of animal is the rock hyrax?
- TJK

27) February 23, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D- 22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you for your letter dated February 8, 2005, which I received on February 21, 2005. I was just starting my letter to you when the mail came and your letter was there. So in my letter I will now combine what I wanted to write to you before with the answers to your questions.

You mention that you have received a letter from an American filmmaker who wants to do an interview with you and ask me if I know anything about Avi Weider and his company Loop Filmworks.

Thanks to my partner in NY, Sabine Schenk, who has her company in NY and is very knowledgeable about the film and media industry, I can tell you the following.

1) She doesn’t believe that Loop Filmworks is Avi Weidner’s company. In 1998 he made a short film, which was advertised on the Internet by saying that one of the actors became known for his role in a Broadway play in which the fate of a homosexual was used to explain the collapsed GDR to the Americans — very spectacular and in Sabine’s opinion, more of a boulevard.

Then Avi Weider worked as a web designer, designing the website for a “Jewish Film Festival” in Brooklyn, a very small and possibly no longer existing festival. Sabine doesn’t know anything about longer films.

Loop FILMWORKS is a company that produces animated films, commercials and clips and, to a lesser extent, documentaries. On their website it says:

“LOOP FILMWORKS is responsible for award-winning network branding for dozens of “A” list clients, such as, HBO, Bravo Network, MTV, Noggin and many others, as well as supplying a plethora of fine work to the Commercial Industry. We offer the ability to deliever projects from pitch to post-production, whether it is live action, traditional animation or digital.

Please check out our Digital Division, LOOP Digitalworks. It is responsible for creating efficient and attractive e-solutions for various clients.

Trio Network’s Tentpole Stunt, “Uncovered TV” was just designed and produced by the capable folks here at LOOP. Inevitable press is in the near future and we are all aglow Just delivered the next installment of the Invention Submission Co.’s Caveman

campaign. Comeback in the near future for QTs.” Und so weiter.

In my opinion, Avi Weider offered Loop FILMWORKS a topic and the company would produce it, I assume, to then offer it for sale to the networks mentioned. Sabine knows that Avi Weider’s circle also includes German filmmakers who commute between Germany and New York, and we assume that he or they have seen my film, which is currently showing in arthouse cinemas.

Maybe this is how I got the idea to write to you.

To be fair, I have to say about Loop NETWORKS’ company profile that it is very difficult to exist as a film company in the USA without advertising or making formal concessions to the market, which are essentially concessions to the requirements of new technologies (media technology = more and more channels, ever greater fight for attention, therefore ever faster pace of narrative, more and more outdoing in the emphasis on sensation, thrill, spectacle, more and more mixture of document and fiction, increasing staging of reality also in documentary films, accompanied by music so no remain in “quiet” and “quiet” places that disturb the audience or cause them to switch off or switch, etc.)

In Germany and other European countries, if you compare it with the USA, there are still paradisiacal conditions, thanks to a possible financing mix of LD to funds from cultural television (such as from Arte) and the regional film boards in the respective federal states such as Hamburg or Saxony, for example to maintain freedom in terms of content or form and art.

The production conditions in the German private TV channels are the same as in the USA, and television is just pure business.

Arte, for example, like German “public television”, on the other hand, is financed from the fees that people who have registered a TV have to pay (this is mandatory). This means that these funds can be used for the program and are not dependent on advertising. (Of course the pressure on this model and these freedoms is growing, but I would have to go into too much detail to elaborate).

So I would advise you to be careful and thank you for informing me that if you agreed to an interview you would be giving me first right and exclusivity.

Of course I would be able to determine the content as well as the style and artistic form of the film we are talking about.

Not only because, as an author, director and producer, I have acquired a solid reputation and respect for the German-French TV channel Arte through the success of my previous films, which grants me this status, but also because I am able to do so through co-financing from my own Funds + that regional film boards can limit the influence of television.

It is true, as you write, that you have to be absolutely sure that you want to do the interview before you make a promise.

An interpreter’s question. It is true that I visited Lydia Eccles with an assistant who translated more on the first visit and later less. But I conducted the interviews for the film alone and accordingly LD to

prepared. Of course, it is safer to have someone there who has both a technical function (sound recording) and is available as an interpreter. That could be Sabine Schenk.

In terms of size, it would be a normal small team, and the authorities would certainly accept that because we wouldn’t be more than usual.

We could also correspond beforehand and agree on the content.

It would also be important to know how much time is available. You also have to take into account the time spent setting up and dismantling the equipment. Although there isn’t that much in documentary filmmaking and my people are quick and professional, you have to subtract that from the total time approved and calculate it exactly.

Now I come to what I originally wanted to write to you:

namely to inform you a little about the reactions to the screenings of my film. The reactions are very contradictory and range from great enthusiasm and approval to very strong rejection, insults and even hateful insults.

The main accusation is that I disagree with your position and your views

a) give too much space

b) presents it too uncritically or

c) portray you and your views too positively.

Here are a few excerpts from the reactions:

“A road movie between LSD cybernetics and technophobia. Lutz Dammbeck’s film illuminates the fascination for that positive vision of global networking, in the world through the prism of the negative. In a genre mixture of road movie and criminal investigation, he demonstrates how cybernetics, systems theory, psychology and military programs produce networked machine systems by playing through the arguments of the technology opponents of the “Freedom Club.”

“Kaczynski is the main character in Dammbeck’s film. The film comes to life thanks to the questions it raises: Where is the boundary between man and machine? Will humans, animals and plants only be products of technology in the future? Where is the morality in computer and life sciences?”

“The film is a Taliban criticism of technology and a paranoid representation of the history of cybernetics more or less from the perspective of the Unabomber Ted Kaczinsky... the resurrection of the good old GDR propaganda film from the Cold War era.”

“Dammbeck’s explosive collage revolves around a science that only wants good and often creates evil.... Computers should “take us into a renaissance of the human world

lead,” is one of the visions. Kaczynski, however — and perhaps not he alone — saw the danger of humanity’s dependence on the knowledge machines and their programmers looming... He asks Dammbeck which type of violence brought more suffering to humanity, the state or the individual violence.

So, you see, there is a lot of discussion and argument, and that’s a good thing.

For example, the film was the opening film of an important anti-globalization festival in Berlin called “globale05,” where films and videos from around the world were shown that dealt with issues such as globalization, the role of technology and new forms of resistance.

The screening was overcrowded, many people were still standing outside and didn’t get tickets. One of the young visitors wrote to me afterwards: “I still have a small objection to Ted Kaczynski’s stance on the issue of violence. I don’t know whether it is actually the state that harms more people with its violence than the sum of the individual individuals, or whether that is even a serious comparison. First of all, every state consists of individual people. Everyone has to manage their morals at all times. And then: When I think about the individual use and abuse of violence in the family and in relationships, it hits me

Feeling that in the end this could even be the cause of state violence, the violence of a state whose top position in a capitalist — open system, mind you — is often those who have learned to deal with violence.

Something has to be done.”

Just like these, I have been asked a number of other questions that only you can actually answer. In my opinion it would be important and the right time for you to do this as soon as you are sure.

There were also several invitations from other anti-globalization organizations and festivals to show the film in Croatia, London, Austria, Switzerland and also Poland.

This also brought me into contact with Marco Camenisch, who thinks very highly of you, who had heard about the film from friends in Italy and Switzerland and has written to me several times since then. He has very interesting thoughts on the subject of radical ecologism (his story is clearly told in Attention Bandits! Lecologismo radicale di Marco Camenisch by Piero Tognoli, Nautilus). Do you know him?

What is also important for the work with the film and the many discussions is that we finally have a German translation of the manifesto ready.

A small publisher published it with a text about the film. This is very important for the discussions and I know that the manifesto in this German version is distributed primarily in schools and universities and is used as teaching material in some seminars.

I will also try to encourage people in Poland to translate the text into Polish and will provide them with the corrected version.

So please don’t be surprised if Sabine sends you small amounts of money from time to time. Or would you rather send it to your girlfriend? You could also write to me about something that is useful to you or makes you happy, and I or Sabine will then send it to you.

So that’s all in the process and there are very interesting reactions to be observed that bring up what is known or has already been published, but which is now put in a new context and provokes reflection and questions.

What you write about everyday prison life sounds very harsh. I understand that you don’t watch TV shows, given your knowledge of American television programming.

Which radio station do you listen to every day? Is this a regional program in the state of Colorado?

You ask: Who was Walter Benjamin? Here is a small encyclopedic compilation of some important data:

born July 15, 1892 — September 27, 1940. W.B. was a German Jewish Marxist literary critic and philosopher.Benjamin was known during his life primarily for his philosophical essays and as a critic. As a sociological and cultural critic he combined ideas of Jewish mysticism with historical materialism in a body of work which was an entirely novel contribution to Marxist philosophy. As a literary scholar, he translated texts written by Marcel Proust and Charles-Pierre Baudelaire, and Benjamin’s essay “The Task of the Translator” is one of the best-known theoretical texts about translation. His most important writings were: “Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit” (The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility / 1936), “Geschichtsphilosophische Thesen” (Theses on the Philosophy of History / 1939, published posthumously).

“The Passagenwerk” or “Arcades Project,” Benjamin’s lifelong project, was to be an enormous collection of writings on the city life of Paris in the 19^th century, especially concerned with the roofed outdoor “arcades” which created the city’s distinctive street life and culture of flânerie. The project, which many scholars believe might have become one of the great texts of 20^th-century cultural criticism, was never completed; it has been posthumously edited and published in many languages in its unfinished form...Benjamin corresponded extensively with Theodor Adorno and Bertolt Brecht and occasionally received funding from the Frankfurt School under Adorno’s and Horkheimer’s direction. Benjamin committed suicide in Port Bou at the Spanish-French border, while attempting to escape from the Nazis, when it appeared that his party would be denied passage across the border to freedom. The rest of the group was allowed to cross the border the next day, possibly because their desperation was made clear by Benjamin’s suicide.

At this point I would like to go back to the beginning of your last letter. If you have decided to agree to the filming, please let me know immediately so that I can contact the Warden (via Sabine) and then formally present my request for official approval from the prison management. I’ll wait for that.

Another question that may be naive or foolish: is it possible for prisoners to be allowed to make phone calls? Or can someone (Sabine, me) call you from outside the prison at certain times? Or are you allowed to make phone calls outside? (You sometimes see scenes like this in films).

I hope this letter is not too long and confusing. You probably receive a lot of mail (I’m guessing 10 letters a day?) and need a lot of time to read or even answer them all.

I very much hope that you can maintain your “inner field” and successfully resist all attempts to change something from the outside.

I should send you greetings from Sabine and my wife. Please send my greetings to your friend as well.

So I remain with the best wishes for lots of strength and health, Best regards
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, February 23, 2005

PS: You asked: what does the word “tree rock hyrax” mean? I have to admit, I had never heard the word before. However, upon research, I found the following:

the SCHLIEFER superclass: jawed moths (Gnathostomata)

Series:Terrestrial vertebrates (Tetrapoda)

Class: Mammals (Mammalia)

Subclass: Higher Mammals (Eutheria)

Superorder: Afrotheria

Order: Hyrax (Hyracoidea)

Genera

Tree hyrax (Dendrohyrax)

Bush hyrax (Heterohyrax)

Rock hyrax (Procavia)

The hyraxes (Hyracoidea) form an order of rabbit-sized, marmot-like mammals (mammalia). Although they may not seem so, they are close relatives of the elephants (Proboscidea) and manatees (Sirenia), with which they are sometimes grouped as Uranotheria, and are now classified in the very heterogeneous group of Afrotheria. The hyraxes reach a weight of around 3.5 kilograms. But there were even larger species in the Ice Age. They live in Africa, south and east of the Sahara in tropical rainforests and dense forest islands in the savannahs to stony steppes. There are species that live at altitudes of up to 3,700 m.

Hyraxes are very robust, stocky animals. They are all characterized by a muscular, massive, short neck and a long, upwardly arched body. Their color varies by genus and species and ranges from light brown to dark brown. The English name is Dassie or Hyrax, the French Daman.

All species living today are grouped into the climbing hyrax family (Procaviidae), which is further divided into three genera:

The tree or forest hyraxes (Dendrohyrax) include three species: steppe forest tree hyraxes (D. arboreus), actual tree hyraxes (D. dorsalis) and mountain forest tree hyraxes (D. validus).

— The bush or steppe hyraxes (Heterohyrax) include two species: H. antineae and H. brucei.

— The rock hyrax or desert hyrax (Procavia) consists of only one species Procavia capensis. However, a division into two species is being considered based on genetic characteristics.

General:

Even though the hyraxes are rabbit-sized, marmot-like fur-bearing animals, they are still close relatives of the elephants and manatees. After much back and forth, it was recognized that it belonged to the pre-hoofed animals. They have peculiarities that clearly show that they are related to ungulates: the structure of the “claws”, the rhinoceros-like structure of the molars, a scent gland on the back that is reminiscent of the South American umbilical pigs and the constantly growing incisors like elephants.

The hyraxes reach a weight of 2.5 to 4.5 kg. But there were even larger species in the Ice Age. The original hyraxes were long-snouted, today’s ones are rounded with a blunt-conical head and small, rounded ears.

The hyraxes have no canine teeth. The two incisors of the upper jaw have no roots and can therefore be used constantly.

The neck is short, the torso plump and stocky. There is an area in the middle of the back with different fur color. This is a bald patch of skin surrounded by a ring of erect hairs. This bare area is a glandular field. This dorsal gland appears particularly well during threatening and imposing behavior. The secretion that is secreted there has a honey-colored, milky-white appearance and is often strongly scented. For example, some forms may smell like freshly burned sugar.

The hyrax’s legs are short. They have 4 toes on their front paws and 3 on their hind paws. There are flat, black nails on the rounded fingertips, some of which extend significantly to the underside of the toes, so that you can see how the real hoof of ungulates might once have developed. Only on the inner back toe is there a long, curved claw that serves as a cleaning tool. The underside of the foot consists of rubbery, elastic skin pads that are riddled with numerous sweat glands and are poorly adapted to digging activities. Because of the adhesion of their feet, hyraxes are good climbers.

The tail is short, stubby and not visible externally. The fur is short and dense and usually uniformly black-brown to sand-colored without any strong markings. Tufts of long whiskers are found on the head. Smell and vision are excellent.

Distribution:

They live in Africa, south and east of the Sahara. The habitat ranges from tropical rainforests, gallery forests and dense forest islands in the savannahs to loose, rocky steppes. Scree surfaces and stone deserts. The rock hyrax grows in the mountains up to an altitude of 3700 m.

Way of life:

The hyraxes have different lifestyles. There are diurnal animals (rock hyraxes and bush hyraxes) and nocturnal animals (tree hyraxes). They are either solitary or social. They are territorial and loyal to their location. They live in earth and tree cavities and rock crevices. The hyraxes have one main enemy, the leopard. Outside the burrows, individual animals can constantly be found standing guard, emitting quiet alarms and shrill warning whistles when an enemy approaches. Different species of hyrax can also live side by side in the same habitat.

Nutrition:

Tree hyraxes, which live in the rainforest, feed on juicy leaves, buds and young shoots. The other hyraxes eat herbs, grasses and perennials. During the dry season they also eat bark and leaves, or in the mountains they eat lichens and mosses and in deserts they eat desert grasses and acacia leaves.

Reproduction:

Fierce fights take place during the mating season. Harem families and bachelor groups then form, which always cause trouble. The gestation period is probably 7–9 months. Between 1 and 4 young are born that are fully developed. The young animals are cared for together in mother families. The males are bitten away before birth. Sexual maturity occurs at the age of 16–17 months.

This seems like a strange animal. Were there similar species in your area in Lincoln? This brings me to a final question:

Did you have a camera with you in the forest? And did you also take photos during your explorations and explorations of nature? Or just drawing and taking written notes? What did you use as a guide? Were there any suggestions or role models from historical researchers and explorers?

Are the many thousands of pages of notes you made in the woods and your house near Lincoln in the archives at the University of Michigan, with Julie Herrada?

29) Ted Kaczynski to Lutz Dammbeck

March 2, 2005

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

As an attachment I am sending you a copy of a letter from me to Avi Weider dated March 1, 2005, because I suspect that you would be interested in the information it contains about the interviews conducted with prisoners.

I hope you received my letter dated February 8, 2005.

Best regards
Ted Kaczynski

Copy:

TED KACZYNSKI
to
AVI WEIDER

March 1, 2005

Dear Avi, Mr. Weider: (See Postscript)

Thanks for your letter of February 4. To answer your questions about the process of getting an interview with me — —

I’ve given only three interviews in the past, all in 1999. One was with a prepresentative of the radical Earth First! Journal, another was with a prepresentative of a small local newspaper in Montana, and the third was with Stephen Dubner, who came as a representative of Talk Magazine, though his article ended up being published not in Talk but in Times. These interviews were easy to get; but in 1999 we had a different warden here. Warden Pugh was not all bureaucrat, he was part human being.

As far as I’m able to tell, our present warden, Warden Hood, is all bureaucrat. It’s also possible that in regard to me Warden Hood may be more subject than Warden Pugh was to restraint by people above him in the B.O.P. (Bureau of Prisons) hierarchy. I’ll explain about that below. For the moment let me just say that of the three interviews mentioned above, I don’t thinkl I would have been allowed to do the first two under present circumstances. The third would be questionable. Prisoners have a constitutional right to communicate, and that includes communication with the news media. Federal courts have held, however, that that right does not go beyond communication by letter. There is no constitutional right to give in — person interviews.

According to B.O.P. policy, federal inmates can give interviews to representatives of the news media if the warden gives his approval. Wardens are probably given guidelines to follow in deciding whether to allow interviews, but I doubt that such guidelines are accessible to the public. Moreover, wardens may be subject to pressure or control from above, regardless of any guidelines.

It’s my impression that during the last few years the B.O.P. has been growing more restrictive in its treatment of inmates, I know a prisoner here — — I would’nt be allowed to mention his name, but his case was a very high — profile one — — who had an offer of an interview from an foreign TV station, and to judge from what he told me it seemed that there were good reasons for allowing the interview and no legitimate reason for refusing to allow it. Yet he was not permitted to have the interview.^ Like all bureaucracies, the B.O.P. has only one objective, namely, its own survival and well — being. It is interested in fulfilling its ostensible public functions only to the extent that it is to the B.O.P.’s advantage to fulfill them. Since the well-being of the B.O.P. and its officials depends to a great extent on the public’s perception of the way the B.O.P. fulfills its functions, the B.O.P. is very concerned with its public image, and is very sensitive to any negative publicity. Especially in the current political atmosphere, you can see why the B.O.P. would be leery of allowing controversial inmates to give interviews in which they might say something that would people get upset.

Until two or three years ago I was allowed to publish articles under my own name in small radical periodicals, and I did in fact publish four articles that way. Nobody in the B.O.P. cared. Then the Washington Post found out about one of my articles, called the prison about it, and printed an article of their own on that subject. Of course, you know how some people react to that sort thing: “You mean the B.O.P. actually lets this horrible person publish articles!?” So the prison authorities go upset over the risk of negative publicity and dug up an obscure rule — — one that obviously is not consistently enforced — — according to which federal prisoners are not allowed to “publish under a byline”.

Some staff members here are more communicative than others, and one of these relatively communicative staff members has told me that the B.O.P. intentionally makes many of its regulations vague so that B.O.P. officials can do more or less what they want and still claim that they are operating within the rules. Anyway, I requested clarification of the rule prohibiting inmates from publishing under a byline, and here’s what I got: A federal inmate can’t publish an article with his name attached in a periodical. (such as a newspaper or magazine). But he is free to write a letter — to — the — editor with his own name, and he is free to publish under his own name in a non — periodical, such as a book or pamphlet. I was given this interpretation of the rule orally; the staff declined to put it in writing for me. (Another relatively communicative staff member has told me that, apart from routine matters, a B.O.P. staff member never wants to put anything in writing if he can avoid it, because he can be held responsible for what he puts in writing.) I subsequently was allowed to publish an article in a radical journal that arguably might be called a periodical, using not my own name but the psyeudonym “Nikto”, which is Russian for “nobody”. Later however a Fellow offered to put things on the Internet for me, and I tried to send him an article that he was to put on the Internet under the name “Nikto”. The prison authorities refused to let the article go out, which meant that they were now stretching the meaning of the word “byline” to include a pseudonym like “Nikto”, and were stretching the meaning of “periodical” to include the Internet.

Normally when something that a prisoner tries to mail but is returned to him, he is given a written notice stating the reasons for its return. But in this case the article was returned to me informally, without the usual written notice. This suggests that the prison authorities felt unsure of their justification in turning back the article and therefore preferred not to put their reasons in writing.

The rationale the the B.O.P. has used in federal court to justify the nop — byline rule is that an inmate who publishes a series of articles in his own name may thereby acquire notoriety among other inmates; he may-become a “big wheel” in the prison and have a dangerous degree of influence over the other inmates. This rationale has no application in my case because: (i) Any notoriety I might acquire by publishing articles would be insignificant in comparison with the notoriety that I already have as a result of publicity over the Unabom case. (i) I am kept isolated on “celebrity row”, a range of eight cells accupied by high — profile inmates. I am never allowed contact with any inmates other than those on “celebrity row”, and the guys here are all “big wheels” themselves and wouldn’t be impressed by the fact that I had published some articles. (III) Even in the highly unlikely wevent that I acquired influence over the other seven inmates on this range there would be no security risk, because we would be unable to do anything dangerous given the extremely rigorous conditions under which we are confined.

That the B.O.P. itself is not worried about this type of security risk in my case is shown by the fact that I was allowed to publish under a byline until the B.O.P. got some negative attention from the Washington Post for letting me do so. It’s pretty clear that what the B.O.P. is worried about is not prison security, but the risk of negative publicity. This by the way is the opinion also of one of those relatively cummunicative staff members whom I mentioned. Anyway, since the flap with the Washington Post, I think it’s possible that decisions concerning my communications with the media may not be left to the warden alone, but may be subject to oversight from above.

I’ve gone through all this just to show you why I’m not optimistic about getting permission to do an interview, wether with you or with Herr Dammbeck.

The way I figure it, the B.O.P. is likely to think that it has nothing to lose by refusing to allow the interview, whereas if it does let me do an interview there’s always some risk of negative publicity. The one thing we may have going for us is this: If the B.O.P. refuses to allow you to interview me, you presumably will state the fact at the appropriate point in your film, and that in itself will make the B.O.P. look bad In that respect you may have an advantage over Herr Dammbeck: The fact that a European filmmaker was refused permission to interview me is unlikely to mentioned publicly in the United States. On the other hand, Herr Dammbeck has the advantage that he apparently has all the right connections and will have no difficulty in getting a contract with a European TV station according to which the TV station will not receive his raw footage, but only the right to show his finished film. By the way, if you do get a chance to see Herr Dammbeck’s film, “Das Netz”, I would be interested in anything you might be able to tell me about it. Do you know enough German to be able to understand the film it it’s not available with English subtitels? I wouldn’t be able to understand it myself. I can read and write German — — at a snails pace and with the help of a dictionary — — but I can’t understand the spoken language unless it’s spoken very slowly.

I’d like to comment on a couple of other points in your letter. Professor Lessig’s claim that copyright law will prevent the development of intelligent machines is absurd. No law is ever going to stop technological progress, except perhaps locally and for a relatively short time. In the first place, if someone feeds a lot of copyrighted material into a machine on order to develop artificial intelligence, who is ever going to be able to prove it? People may know that the machine has superhuman intelligence, and they may infeer that the machine’s owners must have fed the machine copyrighted material, but the owners can’t be sued for copyright infringement unless the copyright holder of a specific piece of copyrighted text can prove that that specific text was fed to the machine.

In the second place, in view of the fantastic powers that superhuman intelligence will put in the hands of its possessors, there are plenty of people and plenty of organizations that will simply ignore copyright law in order to develop such intelligence. If they owe a hundred million dollars in damages for copyright infringement, so what?

A superintelligent machine will make billions for them. Certain government agencies such as the CIA are well known to operate outside the law at times. Does Professor Lessig seriously believe that the CIA or other government intelligence agencies will allow copyright laws to prevent them from developing superintelligent computers? Also --and this is something about which you might ask Profesor Lessig — — it may be that the U.S. government is immune to lawsuits for copyright infringement.

In the third place, even if we make the wildly improbable assumption that copyright laws could prevent the development of superhuman intelligence in the U.S., that certainly will not be the case throughout the world copyright laws will not deter the Russians, the Chinese, the North Koreans or the Iranians from developing artificial intelligence. These other countries would then simply be so much smarter than the U.S. that the U.S. would rapidly fall behind.

Of course, what will happen in practice will be that as soon as the U.S. realizes that its copyright laws are causing it to the fall behind, Congress will change those laws so as to permit the development of artificial intelligence in this country.

You end your letter with the question, “what...are the costs of trying to make a machine that would pass the Turing test?” I’m much more worried about the costs of having a machine that would pass the Turing test. The costs of having superintelligent machines will be, quite simply, the end of the human race. It’s the iron law of natural selection: Once machines surpass humans in intelligence, people will be only useless baggage and a heavy burden on the system. Nations or other organizations that allow themselves to be weighed down by this useless baggage will be at a serious competitive disadvantage vis-a-vis nations or organizations that get rid of their useless baggage as soon as possible. Consequently, those nations or organizations that dispense with people will destroy or absorb those that try to retain (vetain) people. See The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, 15^th edition, 2003, Vo. 27, article “Social Structure and Change”, page 369:”These processes were not inevitable in the sense they corresponded to any “law” of social change. They had the tendency, hoever, to spread whenever they occured. For example, once the set of transformations known as the agrarien revolution had taken place anywhere in the world, their extension over the rest of the world was predictable. Societies that adopted these innovations grew in size and became powerful. As a consequence, other societies had only three options: to be conquered and incorporated by a more powerful agrarian society; to adopt the innovations; or to be driven away to marginal places of the

TJK to AVI WEIDER 3/1/05 5.

globe. Something similar might be said of the Industrial Revolution and other power-enhancing innovations, such as bureaucratization and the introduction of more destructive weapons.”

The same obviously will apply to the replacement of humans by superintelligent computers, if and when such machines are developed.

Sincerely yours,
Ted Kaczynski

P.S. Since you addressed me a “Ted” in your letter of February 4, I felt obliged to address you as “Avi” at the head of this letter so as not to seem cold. But then I thought, why should I conform to the modern American custom, which I find irritating, of using First names with people whom one hardly knows? I’m old-Fashioned enough to feel that the use of first names should be a sign of real familiarity. Si I changed the “Avi” at the head of this letter to “Mr.Weider”. No coldness is implied. — TJK

28) 03. März 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
P.O. Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
U S A

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

As an addendum to my letter dated February 27, 2005 with the results of the research on the “tree rock hyrax,” I would like to send you these printouts with some photos of the animal.

With best regards
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, March 3, 2005

29) March 24, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you for your letter dated March 1^st with a copy of your letter to Avi Weider.

Am I correctly interpreting your letter to Mr. Weider that you are personally willing to be interviewed and it is mainly about the consent of Warden Mr. Hood?

Did you receive my letters dated February 25, 2005 and March 3, 2005?

“The Network” continues to be very successful and has received the prize at a European international festival. The film has now also been shown in Asia and South America and will soon (April) in Paris and San Francisco. American organizers and distributors are now showing increased interest, and I will have my partners in the USA check this.

As you already wrote, the great attention so far for “The Network” has sparked interest in a film about you, in which you and your personality are the focus. There are already a few US TV documentaries (some of which I’ve seen), but I’m always asked why I don’t make a new film and interview you for it.

It was supposed to be a German-European film that would be shown internationally, of course also in the USA. So I would like to ask the Warden for permission to interview you for a film soon.

I’m initially optimistic that this will be approved because the planned film has a cultural and philosophical background and I therefore see no reason for the BOP’s possible concerns.

For your information, I am enclosing two of the many published reviews of the film “The Network”, and I will also ask the publisher to send you a copy of the book, which contains the German translation of the Manifest. I hope you like it and would be happy if we can do the interview soon and that you give me the first/exclusive opportunity to do it (as you wrote to me recently). The TV station supporting the project is very interested in this. I hope you and your friend are doing well

With best regards
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

PS: I am also enclosing a draft English version of the letter, which I see as a first step towards the request to the Warden.

30) TED KACZYNSKI to LUTZ DAMMBECK

March 25, 2005

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

I received your letter dated February 23, 2005 a week ago; I received the one dated March 3, 2005 today. Thank you for the very interesting information about the rock hyrax. There were no similar animals where I lived in Montana.

Thank you also for the information about Avi Weider. I hope that you have received my letter of March 2, 2005, to which I have enclosed a copy of my letter of March 1, 2005 to Mr. Weider.

The success of your film, “The Network,” is proof of your great artistic ability. But I’m worried about this movie. It is perhaps harmful for two reasons.

Firstly, on page 4 of your letter you write: “The main criticism is that I give too much space to your position and your views…”. If someone says that, they are probably right. If one wants to raise serious and intelligent opposition to the technological idol (long-haul truck), one must reject any tendency to focus too much attention on a single personality{4}.

Your film shouldn’t have had a star.

Secondly, the prison authorities don’t like the publicity. If you gave me too much space in your film, and the film is shown in the United States and gets some publicity, then perhaps the prison authorities will be upset. Perhaps you will look for an excuse to further restrict my communication with the outside world.

Because of the foregoing, I will not interview you if you do not send me a transcript of the words of your film. Without such a transcript, I will not be able to know whether you gave me excessive space in the film.

If you had done that and I gave you an interview, it could only worsen the situation because it would appear that they were trying to create a cult of personality. So the transcript is an indispensable prerequisite, without which we will not conduct an interview.

On page 5 of your letter you write: “So please don’t be surprised if Sabine sends you small amounts of money from time to time.”

But you and Sabine don’t have to send me any money. There’s a crazy woman who’s already sending me too much money. It would be better if you saved the money mentioned and had it in a bank so that you could provide me with a lawyer if the authorities blocked my communication with the outside world because of your film.

You also write on page 5 that Marco Camenisch “respects and admires me very much,” and you ask me: “Does the name mean anything to you?”

The name doesn’t mean anything to me. Unfortunately, most of the people who admire and appreciate me are leftists who don’t understand what I actually said.

They talk about the importance of a German translation of the manifesto. Yes, a German translation would be desirable. A few years ago a Swiss man sent me a German translation of the Manifest.

I probably sent the same one to Julie Herrada. I have not read this translation and do not know whether it is a good or bad one.

In any case, I can’t help you much with the translation because I don’t speak German well. For example, you once asked me how to translate the word “leftist.” But the manifesto explains in detail what a “leftist” is. If you can’t find a German word that expresses this idea well, surely I can’t find such a word.

On page 7 of your letter you ask me if I can make a phone call outside.

Yes, I can call outside three times a month, but all my calls are reserved for my girlfriend.

No one except lawyers can call me from outside prison.

On page 4 of your information about the hyrax, you ask me if my records are in the archives at the University of Michigan. Yes, there are photocopies of most of the records there (some of the photocopies may be illegible), but they are closed and no one can see these records until 2050.

Best regards
Ted Kaczynski

From: RShenk@aol.com

Date: April 3, 2005 02:25:12 CEST

To: lutz.dammbeck@hamburg.de

Subject: Re: The Net

Dear Lutz, I just had to translate some résumés of people for whom we (for the production that I look after in Florida) are applying for visas — I have also read your name often — with the cameraman Eberhard Geick little world everywhere and always .

So, here are the corrections, for the warden I would ask the editor to write the following:

RE: documentary “nature and technology” (working title)

Dear Mr Hood:

Süwestrundfunk ARD/Arte France is planning a documentary which will

be a feature length, to be broadcast on German public television and and on the tvchannel Arte, which is a public cultural channel airing in Germany and France.

For this documentary we would like to ask you if it is possible to interview Mr. Theodore J. Kaczynski. We’d like to record the interview with him on a video camera and use the footage in the documentary. This interview would be an important part of the film. The topic of the documentary is science and technology and the film will have a general scientific and artistic tone.

The filmmaker for our documentary is Prof. Lutz Dammbeck, one of our most highly acclaimed directors for documentary films. Mr. Dammbeck is known for his serious and sensitive work and has won many awards for previous programs. He is also a teaching professor at one of Germany’s best universities.

We’d highly appreciate if you could let us know soon if our interview request can be granted.

You can contact us.....

I’m looking forward to hearing from you.

Thanks for your cooperation.

Sincerely

Do you think that’s enough? Shouldn’t more be explained about the film??? I do not know either.

Now it’s late and I’m super hungry.

So, see you later, Sabine

30) April 8, 2005

THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500 USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I would like to inform you about some news. Recently, Mr. Avi Weider contacted me via email. I answered him and also asked him what kind of film he was planning and spoke openly about my own project and that I had been in contact with them for a long time. Mr. Weider then told me a few things about his film project, which you probably already know from him: The genesis of the project is a bet made between two technologists, Ray Kurzweil and Mitch Kapor as to whether a machine or computer will pass the Turing Test by the year 20290. The film is exploring the facets of rapidly accelerating technology and its effects on society as we approach the year 2029. I’m interviewing many scientists, futurists, computers and everyday people to get reaction on the topic — and ( if possible) also you.

This reaction and the way Mr. Weider answered doesn’t sound unsympathetic. What he is trying to do seems to be similar to what I did in my film “The Network”, with the difference that the aspect of technology criticism, represented by you, seems to occupy a more extensive place in my work.

Now I would like to go a step further in the new film and try to describe it again here. It should be a film where you, your philosophy and also the periods of your life where you tried to live according to these ideas — in Montana — are the focus — very concentrated, reduced and limited to the essentials.

Your views and the philosophy that you have expressed so clearly and pointedly in your letters to me and your texts should have their say.

I would like to listen to what you have to say now, looking back after all your experiences, and also ask a few questions about your texts and your philosophy, which made you a decisive critic of technology and a technological society and about your ideas, where this development will lead.

From some of the comments in your letter to Mr. Weider (a copy of which you sent to me), I understand that you prefer or feel more confident if we communicate in English. Therefore, from now on I will send you both a German and an English version of the respective letter.

From your last letters to me as well as your letter to Mr. Weider and Mr. Weider’s e-mails to me, I can see that you now agree in principle to an interview. Am I interpreting this correctly?

Then I would like to contact the Warden together with my partners in the USA (Sabine Schenk, Schenk Productions, Inc. in NY). Does your promise in the letter of February 8, 2005 remain true that you will give me priority or the first opportunity over other potential interested parties? The project is funded, and also has great potential to be shown not only in Europe but also in the USA, which is my interest.

I hope you are doing well, please also say hello to your girlfriend, many greetings from my wife and Sabine Schenk
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, April 8, 2005

PS: Did you receive my letters from February 25^th, March 3^rd and March 24^th 2005?

E version:

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I would like to pass on some recent news. A short time ago, Mr. Avi Weider contacted me via email. I replied and asked him what kind of film he is planning, and spoke openly about my own project. I mentioned that I have been in contact with you for some time now. Following this, Mr. Weider told me something of his own film project, but I am sure you already know much about it from him. The genesis of the project is a bet made between two technologists, Ray Kurzweil and Mitch Kapor, as to whether a machine or a computer will pass the Turing Test by the year 2029. The film explores the facets of rapidly accelerating technology and its effects on society as we approach the year 2029. He is interviewing many scientists, futurists, computer experts and everyday people to get their reactions to the topic — and (if possible) he would also like to talk to you. The reaction and the way that Mr. Weider responded sounded quite sympathetic. What he is planning appears to be similar to what I did in my film “The Net”.

Now, in my new film I would like to go a step further, and I shall try to describe it again here. It is to be a film focusing more on you and your philosophy. I want it to be very dense, reduced and restricted to the essentials. The idea is to express your views and the philosophy that you sum up so clearly and pointedly in your letters to me and your texts.

I would like to listen to you and to know what you have to say now — in retrospect, after all your experiences — and also to pose some questions about your texts and your philosophy, about what made you into such a decisive critic of technology and the technological society, and your ideas as to where the present developments will lead and which meaning this will be have for society, nature and all human beings.

I assume from some of your remarks in your letter to Mr. Weider (of which you sent me a copy) that you would prefer it if we communicated in English — that it would make you feel more secure.

From now on, therefore, I will send both German and English versions of each letter.

I gather from you recent letters to me, your letter to Mr. Weider, and from Mr. Weider’s emails that you are now prepared to give an interview, in principle. Do I interpret that correctly? If this is so, I would like to contact ““official” the Warden, together with my partners in the USA (Sabine Schenk, Schenk Productions Inc., in New York). Does the promise given in your letter of 8^th February 2005 still apply, when you said that you would give me precedence, or the first opportunity, before any others who might be interested? The project is already funded, and it has great potential to be shown not only in Europe, but also in the USA.

I hope that you are well.

Please give our regards to your partner, too, and greetings from my wife and Sabine Schenk

Sincerely yours

P.S.: Did you get my letters dated Feb 25^th, March 3^th and March 24^th?

Von: Lutz Dammbeck

<lutz.dammbeck@hamburg.de>

Datum: 19. April 2005 12:11:14 MESZ

Betreff: Re: The Net-Avi Weider

Hi Avi,

thanks very much for your message. Yes, the contact with Mr. Kaczynski

brings together very different people. For example, I came in contact with Italian anarchists and people who are living in illegally occupied houses in England.

Yes, we had and still have a lot of press and discussions with the audience after each screening.

My new project is a full lenght documentary in which Mr. Kaczynski, his philosophy and also his criticism of technology and science will be in the center; very pure and concentrated on him. I’m interested only in his life story in connection with his thoughts and I only want to focus on periods of his life that are important for his philosophy and writings. I’m not interested in a film about the story of his life as it’s been done by various TV-feateures in the us (and i think he also isn’s interessted in anything like it).

Unfortunately there is no NTSC tape with English subtitles of “The Net”.

But if when the film is shown in New York (I hope that will happen) I will inform you immediately. Who is the professor you mentioned through whom you’ve got in contact with Mr. Kaczynski? All the best

Lutz Dammbeck

31) April 26, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter of March 25^th, which surprised me a bit.

My film “The Network” and the planned interview with you are not about you as a “star” or about a cult of personality, but about ideas and personal attitudes.

They write: “If one wants to raise serious and intelligent resistance to the technological idol, one must reject any tendency to focus too much attention on a single personality.” This is certainly true.

On the other hand, isn’t it a “personality cult” to interview someone to record what they have to say and what they think?

I did not give your person and your views “excessive space” in the film “The Net,” as you seem to fear, but rather the space that is necessary to make the position you represent somewhat understandable and comprehensible to the audience.

In the film, this is in relation and in discourse with the positions of other people who, for example, are diametrically opposed to yours. Every viewer can form his or her own opinion, and it will vary greatly.

There is a lot of controversial discussion after the screenings. That’s good. I can’t imagine anyone in our correspondence since the beginning of 2001 or in the film

To have given rise to the fact that, as you suggest and seem to fear, you might be inconvenienced.

I hope you are doing well

Best regards
Her

Lutz Dammbeck

E version:

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your latter dated 25^th March, which rather surprised me. In my film “The Net” and in the planned interview with you, it is not a matter of you as a “star” or of a cult of personality, but of ideas and personal attitudes. You wrote: “If one wants to arouse serious and intelligent opposition to the technological idols, one must reject any tendency to direct too much attention towards one individual personality.” ^ I am sure that is right. On the other hand, surely it is not yet a “cult of personality” to interview someone, to record what he has to say and what he thinks? I did not give “excessive space” to your person and your attitudes in the film “The Net”, as you seem to fear — but the space that was necessary in order to at least begin to make the position you represent comprehensible and logical to the audience. In the film, this is quite balanced and set in a discourse that includes the standpoints of other people who, for example, represent diametrically opposite views. In this way, every viewer can form his own opinion, and those opinions certainly do differ. After the screenings, there are always hefty and controversial discussions, which is a good thing. I cannot imagine that in our exchange of letters since the beginning of 2001, or in the film The Net, I have given cause for you to experience any trouble, which you appear to suggest and to fear.

I hope you are well, yours sincerely

Marco Camenisch-Centi

PO Box 3143

8105 Regensdorf SWITZERLAND

Dear Marco Camenisch,

I would have liked to get back in touch sooner, but since the film is going well and there were many different performances linked to discussions, I was just traveling too much. That’s why I haven’t yet gotten around to sending you back a version of your translations of John’s texts, where I’ve noted minor suggested changes. John was back in Europe in the meantime, in the former Yugoslavia.

I am enclosing the catalog that was created in connection with an exhibition and accompanies the film, which will hopefully soon be shown in Switzerland.

So I remain with the best regards from Hamburg
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

June 18, 2005

32) July 10, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500 USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I haven’t heard from you since your letter of March 25^th.

How are you doing? Are you okay? Your girlfriend too?

I was a bit worried, also because I felt like I sensed something like discomfort and worry in your last letter.

The film continues to attract great interest both in Germany and internationally. I also went to screenings and discussions in Poland, Krakow, Wroclaw and Warsaw, for example, and since June the film has been shown on DVD at a number of events in the ecological and green-oriented scene in England, probably at one in August EarthFirst! gathering.

Did you receive my letters dated April 24^th and 26^th, 2005?

There was just a two-day conference at the university in Berlin, where there were two items on the program: on the one hand, the film “The Network,” and on the other hand, the book by a scientist that deals with the history of the Macy conferences and new technologies between 1945 and 1980 . The title of the conference was “Travesties of Cybernetics”, and there were heated discussions about the question of pro- or anti-technology and how this should be dealt with in the future. The various positions were fierce and hotly contested. But it was very interesting and lasting.

So I wish you all the best and look forward to hearing from you again soon.

What will happen to the interview about which we have already corresponded several times?

It is not so easy to maintain interest in such important things given the flood of current events that flood the media every day.

I hope you are doing well, please also say hello to your girlfriend, many greetings from my wife and Sabine Schenk
Her
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg July 10, 2005

33) July 22, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter dated May 21, 2005, which I received on July 13, 2005.

My last letter to you was dated July 10^th 2005.

In your letter you ask me again for “the words spoken in the film”, and I am happy to fulfill this request. However, I’m curious (and a little worried) whether this will give you the right idea of the film. Because it is not so easy for a “film layman” (please excuse this term) to imagine the overall effect based only on the text — i.e. without all other important elements such as images, music, original sounds and editing.

I’m surprised that the book you mentioned didn’t arrive.

I’ll be back in Hamburg at the end of August and will look into it again.

I haven’t heard from Avi Weider since May.

I hope you are doing well. What does your job involve organizing and editing your archival material?

So I remain with the best wishes and greetings, also from my wife and Sabine Schenk, greetings also to your friend
Her
Lutz Dammbeck

Original text film “THE NETWORK”

PROLOGUE (written title on scene)

In 1930, the Viennese mathematician Kurt Gödel shook the foundations of mathematics with his incompleteness theorems.

He proves that in every formal-logical system there are problems that cannot be solved or decided.

Truth is superior to evidence.

(white writing on black background)

1 THE NETWORK

2 A FILM BY LUTZ DAMMBECK

ON THE PLANE FROM HAMBURG TO NEW YORK

(network drawings on a writing pad/laptop/voice-over)

I got into a strange thing with this film...

one of the most spectacular criminal cases in the USA.

It started harmlessly.

I had noticed

that the environment around my new computer was full of terms that I already knew from other contexts:

multimedia, virtuality,

Border crossings and revolutions of all kinds:

That was also part of the program in the 1960s

revolting art avant-garde,

who wanted to dissolve all boundaries between art and life: CHANGE NOW!

So a cocktail of revolt, rock and pop... fascinating.

The message was:

everything is possible — reality can be changed at will —

you are what you want to be...

Strange how these two worlds touched:

Computers and art.

Why did artists and scientists use this when building their

Machines apparently have similar patterns and terms?

Was there a secret basic pattern and system?

While researching I come across a publisher in New York...

In the 1960s, John Brockman was part of the New York multimedia scene around John Cage, Jonas Mekas and Andy Warhol.

He became rich and famous in the 80s, when multimedia art and new technologies became a business area.

Brockman becomes an agent for the books

of physicists, genetic researchers and computer scientists, whom he markets like pop stars.

His publishing house was the center of a global network in the 1990s

by scientists, artists and media managers, whom he calls DIGERATI...

a “cyber elite” that successfully combines multimedia, computing and business.

In 1993, John Brockman’s network is attacked in a bomb attack.

The victim is computer scientist David Gelernter...

The FBI arrested Ted Kaczynski, a former mathematics professor and graduate of Harvard University, as the perpetrator.

Why does a mathematician apparently become a terrorist?

John Brockman is my first conversation partner.

In 1963 he came to New York and started a career as an investment banker...

(INTERVIEW MIT JOHN BROCKMANN)

I was walking through Central Park one day, playing my banjo and along comes Jonas Mekas with his little 8 mm camera and he strarts filming me. And we started to talk, and within a day I was the new director of Filmmaker’s Cinemathek. And I quit my job and he said he wanted to put together a festival based on cinema but incorporating other acts.

And,that was the mandat, he made some suggestions, we thought about it, talked about it, and It was up to me to put it together, so I called it the Expanded Cinema Festival. And, I went to Rauschenberg, Oldenburg, Nam June Paik, the Usco-Group, Carolee Schneemann, dancers, artists, poets, audio-visual people. And the only requirement was cinema somehow was incorporated into the piece...just a totally re-aranging the senses, you didn’t know just what you were looking at.

And all these people were experimenting with media, they were dealing with technological stuff, you know, ah, nobody was talking about cybernetics at the time, but they were all reading McLuhan...Rauschenberg told me about McLuhan...then Cage handed me a copy of Cybernetics by Norbert Wiener and said: This is something for you...because I was extremely interested in notions of feed-back and non-liniarity...

I got a call from A.K. Salomon, who was head of biophysics at Harvard and he had read

about the Expanded Cinema festival, he said: You know, well we have all these

scientists up here at Harvard and MIT and a group of us would like to invite a group of

artistists to spend a couple of days in a seminar, you know, and talk about mutual

interests. So, I was invited to put this together, which I did...and then they took us to see THE computer!

There was a room, and everybody there was wearing white coats, and they were cold, and we were cold, watching the computer... with all these cards, and,

you know, file cards...and I just stood there like a kid with my nose against the window, and it was so exciting, and I have no idea why.

J.Z.Young, an Oxford biologist, in his book “Doubt, Incertainty and Science”

said “We create tools and then we mold ourselves to are use of them”, and I read that in 1964 and something went off and I suddenly realized that reality isn’t this thing in front of us at the persidium stage stage, it is a movable feast. We are creating technologies, then we are the technologies, it’s not your heart is like a pump, your heart is a pump, it’s not, your brain is like a computer, your brain is a computer until the next thing comes along. Now you’re a neural net or now you are an information system...

...and the circles widened...

...so, there was Heinz von Foerster, who was the dean of the World Cyberneticists, there was Gregory Batson, Stuart Brand...almost all these people were authors, as I was, I read all their books, and ah, no one in New York had a clue that there was something happening, that there was a conciousnes or mind set that evolved and you could connect all these people...like you can connect this and this, you know, there are ways to put it together...and to (seek?) of keys of (as a) whole (?), and they were bestselling authors, and they were getting screwed by the publishing industry, so I was dragooned into becoming an agent, because I had business background and they said: Well why don’t you just go back and look after our interest, you know, it’ll take you an hour a day. And I thought it would be a nice way to pick up some money while I wrote books, and I found out very quickly that I was sitting on an oil well and, I couldn’t control, and that was 30 years ago.

Question: In 1993 someone attacked your network, we talked about your network, and David Gelernter, one of your fabolous writers, received a letterbomb from the Unabomber.

Right.

Question: Why, do you think, he was a target?

Well, I know he was a target...this mad man, criminal mad man would read the New York Times, and a lot of the people he picke...these targets were people that John Markoff had profiled. So, Gelernter was the subject of one of the biggest profiles ever in the Times in 1991, and I’m sure that had something to do with it.

Question: But the Unabomber, he studied in Harvard, and he was a Mathematician...

Yeah, and he’s a sick criminal...I wouldn’t have a serious discussion about this guy you know, he doesn’t rise to the level. I think he’s a guy that wrote his manifesto

which he couldn’t possibly get published because it’s written so badly and is so flawed, and so, in order to get published he killed people. End of the story. People can have arguments about environment and science, and, but you don’t need to kill people to make a point, and I wouldn’t dignify him by discussing him any further. Let’s change the subject.

So, call a car!

EASY-INTERNET CAFÉ NEW YORK

(Computerscreen im Internetcafe — Archivmaterial / Netzzeichnung / Off-Kommentar)

John Brockmans Reaktion auf meine Frage nach Ted Kaczynski überrascht mich. Was ist das für ein “Manifesto”, das er erwähnt?

Between 1978 and 1995, a series of bomb attacks shook the USA, three people died and 23 were injured, some seriously. The targets of the bombs are managers of major airlines and scientists from various elite universities...

The FBI investigators assume that there is an intelligent lone perpetrator, whom they give the code name “Unabomber”, the computer abbreviation from “Universities” and “Airlines”...

In 1995, the New York Times and the Washigton Post received letters describing a previously unknown terrorist group “FC”, short for “Freedom Club”,’

demands the publication of a MANIFESTO and in return offers to stop the attacks.

Published with permission from the FBI on August 2, 1995

the preprint of the 56-page manifesto, and leads to the arrest of the mathematician Ted Kaczynski.

After reading his brother David, he believes he recognizes quotes from his brother Ted and, at his wife’s urging, calls the FBI.

In 1996, the FBI arrested Ted Kaczynski in the Montana wilderness, where he had lived in a self-built cabin for 25 years.

SAUSALITOD CA (archive footage (Kesey) / voiceover) My next interviewee is John Brockman’s friend and client Stewart Brand. We meet in Sausalito, a former fishing village near San Francisco.

In the 1960s, Stewart Brand was part of a scene of hippies and artists who lived on a houseboat complex on the edge of Sausalito.

A central figure in this scene is the writer Ken Kesey. In 1960 he was one of the student guinea pigs on whom LSD was tested on behalf of the American government. Later he is “on the road” with musicians and the theater group Merry Prankster to promote LSD and other drugs in so-called “acid tests” that transform consciousness into an “open system”...an alternative form of cybernetics.

Stewart Brand was one of these “alternative cyberneticians” and still has a small office and studio in Sauselito...

------------------------------------------------- --------------------------End of roll 1

Brand is the inventor of the term “personal computer” and, in the 1960s, editor of the WHOLE EARTH CATALOG, a mail-order catalog for alternative lifestyles.

In den 80er Jahren installiert er auf einem Hausboot in Sausalito das erste alternative Computernetzwerk der Welt: THE WELL... in den 90er Jahren ist er Berater für die californische Computerindustrie.

Wie kommen Computer, LSD und Hippies zueinander?

(INTERVIEW MIT STEWART BRAND)

In 1960 and 61 I was a lieutenant in the US army, based in Fort Dixon in New Jersey... and on week ends, when I could get away, I went to the Lower East Side of New York and hang out with artists, because by then I’d been hanging out with artists in San Francisco in 1959 and 60. John Brockman was part of that, a fellow named Steve Durkey, a poet named Gerd Stern and a group of artists and engineers called Usco, was taking shape about then, standing for “us company”...

The mechanism of meeting Ken Kesey was very straight forward. It was through indians. By chance I was a photo journalist then and I got a job through a friend photographing indians in Oregon at the Warm Springs Indian Reservation...So I photographed these guys , I thought this was a real interesting different America that I didn’t know about, that is fundamental and profound, and then Kesey’s book came out “One flew over a Cuckoos Nest” which had a character in it named Chief Broom, and Chief Broom was portrayed as an Indian from the reservation from where I had been working. So, I was moved by that, and it sort of gave me the rest of the permission to think what I was thinking that Indians were important. And so I sent Kesey photographs, through a mutual friend I knew his address, that I’d taken, and he basically sent back a note: come on down...and I just was welcomed right in and blended in and became part of it...

...Being on the bus, going from acid test to acid test basically, which was Kesey’s form of performance art using...a band was a group called “The Warlocks” whichlater became the “Grateful Dead”, a number of people around the group were ex-army like I was, a number of them were artists, and it was an intensely improvisational...

Was it a moving laboratory? Yes. In Kesey’s mind it was a moving laboratory, he said the scientists talk about doing research, that’s really all they’re doing, it’s “research”. We’re doing “search”. And if we don’t “boil rocks” and drink the water, how do we know that it (what?) won’t make strong drunk? And what we do is “boil rocks”, that was try any damn thing. And some of them were pretty interesting experiments, one for example would be take a whole bunch of garden hose, people were sitting around basically stoned, 15 people, take a bunch of garden hose, cut it up into 8 or 10 foot lengths, tie it all together in a knot, grab 2 pieces, talk into one and listen to another, and everybody was doing this, and so you know who you’re hearing, but you don’t know who you’re talking to, and this is happening at a group of 15 people, just to see what happens. That was search.

The Whole Earth Catalogue project certainly had all that frame of reference but it specificly came out of an LSD afternoon where I was on a roof top with about 200 micrograms of LSD in me, hadn’t better to do, and thinking about in context of lectures I recently I had heard by Buckminster Fuller... and Fuller like McLuhan was one of the people we were paying attention to then...and...

...Wiener was in there, Cage was a little bit in there...

...the initial audience in my mind was communes, was people trying to re-invent civilization and I was trying to provide the tools for this to re-invent civilization, and it turned out, a lot of people were interested in that...

The communes that tried to go back to basics, you know, just farm... made a really good try doing that, some of them learned a fair amount of serious farming, a book that we purveyed in the Whole Earth Catalog called Goat Husbandery was a very popular book, it’s a good book, you know, get the book, get a goat,and you can do it, milk and everything.

But it didn’t play out very far, it was basically a different kind of dead end from what drugs were. Whereas some of the technology, some of the alternative energy technology showed real promise, solar energy basically took off gradually and it takes off to this day, computer technology obviously and... because the counter culture hippie frame of reference was there for outlaws of all kinds, that basically swept right through the outlaw computer people, hackers, and became their frame of reference, then in a kind of gifty, ecommie, optimistic approach became then the basis for personal computers, personal computer software, then the internet and the web and on and on. And that’s the main legacy from the 60s, as far as lam concerned: is the open system approach to everything having to do with computers.

Question: Stewart...you offered two lines in the catalog: how to use a computer and how to built a cabin in the woods like Thoreau, one of the American icons...one one side you offered technology, and on the other side anti-technology, in one book..

Hmm, I’m agree...

Question: Was there a discussion about that among the users of the cataloge... or, was it a conflict? What was your position in this time?

We came down on one side of the conflict between technology and anti-technology, we came down on the side of technology, basically on the theory that the way to make technology work for you is: just grab it and run with it and do whatever you want with that technology. And if that happens, and everybody does that and these technology is basically get democratized, then they will work out OK. If you fail to do that and just say they are very, very evil and I will not touch them, then they have complete freedom to be as evil as they want.

Well, you know the one who built Thoreaus cabin was the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski, he was saying this is evil, evil, evil, evil, and I’ll prove it by killing some of the people who do it. And then that line leads to Bill Joy, saying Ted Kaczinsky is right about a few things, you read his stuff and there’s some sensible

crtitique in there, that we need to take seriously, because what if we democratize weapons of mass destruction, is that a good thing? It is OK to democratize personal computers and the internet, but what about weapons of mass destruction, it’s a fair question and thats one that we’re now dealing with in the early 21^st century. I think it will eventually sort out, but it’s a real question.

Oh well, he was saying the culture is going a whole direction here, and I think it’s a dangerous direction I will personally prevent it from going there. And he got heard, by vile means, but he got heard.

BUCHLADEN “BOUNDD TOGETHER” SAND FRANCISCO

(Kauf eines “Manifesto”) Dann:

(Autofahrt über die Golden Gate Brigde , auf dem Screen des Laptops während der Autofahrt Archivbilder der “Battle of Seattle”, dazu im Off-Kommentar Auszüge aus dem Manifesto)

“Industrial society and its future...by “FC”...

The consequences of the Industrial Revolution are a catastrophe for humanity. That’s why we advocate a revolution against the technological system.

Continued scientific and technological progress will destroy the freedom of the individual.

Soon there will no longer be a place where an individual can be

can hide from surveillance by supercomputers and mind control.

It would be hopeless

attack the system without using modern technology themselves. We must use all media to spread our message:

Nature is opposite to technology, and the perfect alternative to this system.

The sooner this system collapses, the better for humanity.

HOTEL ROOM INO BOSTON (MITD HOTEL)

(LETTERS 1 / archive material / network drawing / voiceover)

Florence, Colo

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

Thank you for your letter and your questions, which I will try to answer.

I take this opportunity to improve my knowledge

to improve the German language. I’m not a scientist.

Thirty years ago I was a mathematician, but I have forgotten most of what I knew about mathematics.

I believe that “utopias” are insane and dangerous, especially those of a technological society.

Technology is a very idiosyncratic and extremely dangerous force that leads us where it needs to take us.

This will happen neither by chance nor by the arbitrariness of arrogant bureaucrats,

Politicians or scientists determine it, but the technological system simply has to adapt human behavior to its own requirements.

You also ask me a few things about the “Manifesto”.

All published versions of the Manifesto are incorrect because they contain serious errors.

If you want to get a proper version of the Manifesto, I can provide it to you.

You can also continue to write to me in German.

WITH ARCHIVES, Boston

(Archive material, photos, film clips, etc., voiceover)

How is a utopia created?

If something like this comes about by chance, there is one or more inventors...

or is there a plan?

The elite of American and international engineers and scientists are trained at MIT. MIT is also pioneering a close partnership between the military and universities.

This collaboration begins in World War I and continues in World War II, where technology becomes crucial to the war.

On August 13, 1940, the German Air Force opened the “Battle of Britain”.

Shortly after the German attacks began, the mathematician and physicist Norbert Wiener, born in Chicago in 1886, offered his knowledge for the defensive fight against fascism.

Wiener teaches at MIT as a professor of mathematics,

and already dealt with questions of ballistics and artillery during the First World War.

How can you build a machine

the movements of hunters are calculated in advance so that they can then be shot down?

------------------------------------------------- ------------End reel 2

Wiener has to take into account the nature of technological war, where people, ships and planes are just abstract white dots and symbols on the radar screen.

The pilot merges with his machine, the boundary between man and machine becomes blurred and an anonymous, mechanized counterpart emerges, whose actions are now modeled and calculated in the war laboratories.

Although Wiener’s machines could not be used until the end of the war, he used them to develop the model of a new science that became known as cybernetics.

Cybernetics deals with the question of how message transmission works in machines and living beings.

The basis of cybernetics is the assumption that the human nervous system does not represent reality, but rather calculates it.

Humans now appear as an information processing system...

thinking as data processing

and the brain as a meat machine.....

The brain is no longer the place where the “I” and “identity” are mysteriously formed through memory and consciousness...it is a machine made up of switching and control circuits...feedback loops.... and consists of communication nodes.

A black box in which, in a cycle, the cause is the effect and the effect is the cause...

a closed feedback system with input and output that can be controlled and calculated...

no longer based, as before, on the view of nature, but on indubitable mathematics and logic.

Wiener’s future vision of a coming cybernetic society now provides scientific legitimacy for the new political-military status of the USA as a superpower:

Cybernetics is becoming the new global leading science, which will henceforth be further developed under changing labels.

A theory becomes global practice.

CAR RIDE (THROUGH THE SILICON VALLEY) (LETTER 2, voiceover) Florence

Because I now have a little more time, I will continue my reply to your letter.

You ask, “What should a post-technological society look like?” Well, when all modern technology is abolished, all we know is that there will be no more biotechnology, no computers, no atomic bombs, etc.

Let’s stick to what is practical and concrete:

Do you like it if people live in a virtual world?

That machines are smarter than people?

That people, animals and plants will be products of technology in the future?

If you don’t like this, this is for you

the computer and life sciences science is obviously dangerous.

This is very simple and has no relation to morality, Gödel’s incompleteness theorem, or other abstract philosophical questions.

You offered to send something that would make me happy.

I gladly accept this offer.

My German dictionary is small, bad and tattered. I would be happy to receive a good German-English dictionary.

Aber, Sie dürfen keines mit hartem Einband schicken.

SILICON VALLEY — COMPUTERMUSEUMD MOUNTAIND VIEW

(Ein Museumsmitarbeiter erklärt die Exponate)

With the cold war, with world war II over now as turning our attention to the Russians, we needed various ways to 1. literally protect our skys and 2. to give our, the people of the United States a sort of a feeling of security, and that’s where SAGE came in. SAGE is the largest computer ever made, and this is only one portion, and all of this is another portion... and we have less than 10% of one SAGE machine.

First wide scale use of modems was on this machine, and how it worked was: you would actually see a blip on the screen that was moving and you would access that blip with the light gun by actually clicking on it.

And if there was any information in air traffic control it would show up in one area, but if not the intercept technician would have to have it shut down... and you can see the large screen here and first wide scale use of modems it was a decentralized network, so if a bomb was to take out one of them, you could still control the out put, ah, the inputs from another station, so it was very influencied on the early days of the Arpanet..with the whole concept to be able keep the network going if you lose one of the nodes.

...and then you would have to indicate what was coming...and then you could scramble jets or even launch missiles from the ground...you can also see that you have the ability to dial up other sectors and control their airspace also. And if you wanted to zoom in and just deal with a specific devision and you can access that and it would actually give you a full screen of that, very, very advanced system and see you would have standby, off, power, or you can just keep the cooling(?) to it at any time. You also had a cigarette lighter and a ashtray, so if you were smoking you could keep you from going insane.

HOTEL IM SIILICON VALLEY

(Archivmaterial auf dem Screen des Laptops, Bücher, Zeitungsausschnitte, Off-Kommentar)

Zurück zu Ted Kaczynski.

1958 beginnt der 16jährige mit einem IQ von 170 das Mathematikstudium an der Harvard Universität...

In 1967 he became a professor of mathematics at the University of Berkeley.

Why does Ted end up in the anti-technology camp and not become an enthusiastic computer hippie like Stewart Brand or John Brockman?

Where does his later fear of computers and psychological control techniques like those developed in the secret laboratories of the US Army come from?

WOODSIDE, SILICON VALLEY

(voice-over)

How do individual computers become global computer networks?

This is the task that former NASA engineer Robert Taylor was working on at the end of the 1960s. Taylor is one of the young engineers and scientists who are enthusiastic about Norbert Wiener’s cybernetics and the first computers.

The rocket specialist will soon move from NASA to the Pentagon as a science manager.

There he can decide

how much money university laboratories, companies or individual scientists receive from the Ministry of Defense for their research projects.

He decides who is there and who is not.

The “Arpanet” developed under his leadership in the 1970s is the original form of today’s Internet and all communication networks for the fully electronic battlefield of today.

INTERVIEW WITH ROBERT TAYLOR

Arpa was founded in 1957/58 as a result of sputnik. Sputnik appeared in October ‘57 and it greatly surprised the United States. We had no idea.

In ‘58, very soon after Sputnik, Eisenhower, who was President then, asked the department of defence to set up a special agency, called Arpa, the Advanced Research Projects Agency, to look for research projects, that had a longer term-expectations associated with, so, in a hope that we would not get surprised again, like the Russians surprised us. So, the initial Arpa-programs were all space-related, not computer-research by (en-?) large. Then in 1960 Nasa was formed by Kennedy. All the Arpa spaceprograms were transformed to Nasa. That left Arpa, — by ,61/62 — , that left Arpa an opportunity to do some other things. And one of the things they decided to get into was computer-research.

For my office in Arpa and for some of the other offices in Arpa, the policy was: go find people with really big ideas that you think might work, and if they do work, the pay-off will be very large.

QUESTION: And then, there were people, labs, offices and companies..

Yes..

QUESTION: ...and...how...could you draw a sketch for me: how evolved then a network...

Okay, so — , so — this group here has it’s own computer and this group has it’s own computer and this group and so on. But these computers can not talk, — communicate with one another unless you put a little translator next to each one of these. So, this computer is sending something over here; it goes through this translator. The translator sends, — translates this language if you will or these bits into a common language, that he can understand and he can understand, but he can’t and he can’t.

And so the translation goes through here, it comes here; — this guy then translates this stuff into something that this guy can then receive. And the same is true over here and over here and even over here. — So then everything is sort of multiple connected.

But, some historians have looked at this and said, well, the reason that ARPA build the ARPAnet was in the case of nuclear disaster ... — No! — that’s not the reason we build the ARPAnet. We build the ARPAnet to enable people in different places, who had common interest, to share those interests. The Internet is simply a evolution of the ARPAnet, both — both in philosophy and in technology .

All that took place from- over the period 1971 to 1976 or so and we had the first internet up and running in ‘75 or ‘76 when we put the Ethernet and the Arpanet together. So, those were good years, there was a lot do, and it was obvious, what to do, and all these different things had to fit together, nicely, had to work together. That was a lot of fun.

QUESTION: Robert, for you it was a lot of fun but other people are afraid of these growing networks, for them it seems like cancer or a machine which we, perhaps, could’nt control...what do you think about such critics like Ted Kaczynski?

He’s crazy! We have people like that in our society.

QUESTION: But he was a mathematician, he studied in Harvard

Yeah, and Hitler was an artist, studied in Vienna.

Question: Did you read the “Manifesto”?

You mean “Mein Kampf”?

Frage: No, the “Manifesto” by the unabomber..

No, I didn’t read it. I didn’t read “Mein Kampf” either.

What am I afraid of? I’m afraid of the Al Qaida, I’m afraid of cancer.

But I don’t know enough. If we knew how to cure cancer, if we had more knowledge in other words, about cancer, then we wouldn’t be afraid of it!

Frage.: But, you know, cancer is an illnes of the modern society, is an illness of the civilisation...

Yeah, but -but some day, we -I believe we will understand how to cure cancer. Or prohibit cancer. I think that will happen long before we’ll have an electronic battlefield or a machine that we can’t control. And when we know how to cure or prohibit cancer, we will no longer be afraid of it. It’s a question of knowledge; of iliminating ignorance; ignorance is a state of no knowledge. Ig-no-rance. Not stupidity! That’s something else.

Ignorance...causes fear.

------------------------------------------------- Ende Rolle 3

RESTAURANTD NEWD YORK

(Laptop, Archivmaterial, Skizzenblock, Netzzeichnungen)[ Was habe ich bisher: ich habe einen ehemaligen Mathematiker,

whose criticism of the system none of my interviewees want to talk about... and I have engineers and artists who are obsessed with technology. All of this obviously belongs to a system, the contours of which I’m only beginning to glimpse. Apparently an ingenious feedback system that detects every attack

and immediately uses every disruption as a source of energy for further perfection. Who needs something like that?

Who would think of something like that?

Between 1946 and 1953, leading scientists from various disciplines met at the Beekman Hotel in New York at the invitation of the Josiah Macy, Jr. Foundation:

including Norbert Wiener, Margaret Mead, Gregory Bateson, Kurt Lewin and John von Neumann.

The goal of these confidential meetings, later known as “Macy Conferences,” which occasionally include CIA officials, is to develop a science that makes it possible to predict and control human behavior.

This is a weapon that America desperately needs in the new battlefield of the subconscious in the “Cold War.”

The “Macy Group” is therefore paying attention

the 1950 study “The Authoritarian Personality”

of the International Institute of Social Research, a new founding of the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research around Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno.

The study is the most comprehensive social profl of a society to date, the USA, and is intended to provide a scientific explanation for religious and racist prejudices.

Thousands of interviews create a huge data collection that is evaluated using state-of-the-art computers and is intended to answer one question in particular:

How does authoritarian behavior come about as a mass phenomenon?

The authors see the cause in the “authoritarian matrix” of humans, which offers the key to the psychology of fascism and totalitarian systems in general.

This matrix is formed through education and tradition and is seemingly inextricably linked to the metaphysical idea of a “supernaturally created nature”.

How could susceptibility to fascism and racism, especially against Jews, be specifically tracked down and proven?

To do this, the sociologists constructed a scale to measure fascist potential, the so-called “F scale”{5}.

In addition, the latest psychological procedures are intended to

For example, the tests carried out by the American psychologist Henry A. Murray, one of the fathers of today’s assessment centers, reveal previously hidden personality tendencies.

In order to prevent fascism and anti-Semitism forever, it seems necessary to change human nature and its cultural patterns so that this authoritarian matrix would disappear forever.

How can you bloodlessly and without surgery

penetrate deeply into people’s personality and consciousness in order to then specifically change it?

How does aggression become harmony?

According to the Gestalt psychologist Kurt Lewin, a member of the Macy Group, the old values and balances must first be destroyed in order to make the situation “floating”.

Then new balances and values can be established.

These must then be permanently fixed through self-regulation... Re-education should turn into self-re-education...

This will transform the world into a post-national, multi-ethnic global society without fixed borders.

The “Macy Group” believes it can offer the necessary tools and blueprints for this new world order: new and faster computing machines — system theory and cybernetic model worlds with which all areas of science, culture and politics appear to be controllable and steerable.

This is also what the programming of “new people”... “anti-authoritarian people” promises.

CAR RIDE WEST COAST CALIFORNIA (TO ESALEN)

(LETTERS 3 / voiceover / laptop)

Florence

In your last letter you asked me so many questions that I can’t answer them all straight away.

When I wrote to you,

that the concept of a utopia is insane and dangerous, I did not mean that all utopias are insane and dangerous, but above all the utopia that one could create a society according to a certain ideal pattern.

You yourself undoubtedly have your own idea of a utopia.

Another person has a different idea, which may be very different from yours. Would you like him to impose his utopia on you?

Do you have the right to impose your utopia on him?

I’d like to give you more answers to these and other questions, but some serious issues have emerged that I’m very concerned about.

Therefore I will end the letter here.

I’ll write you more later.

ESALEN AND THE WEST COAST OF CALIFORNIA

(Photos from the location / laptop archive material / books / photos)[

In places like here in Esalen,

In an esoteric and conference center on the California coast, artists met with participants of the Macy conferences in the 1970s.

It’s about a new spirituality using cybernetics and drugs... and the popularization of Macy’s visions.

Participants include Stewart Brand and John Brockman

also avant-garde gurus such as John Cage or Buckminster Fuller.

It is through such meetings that the ideas of cybernetics come through

and systems theory into the international networks of bohemia...

and thus receive a different — a non-military — aura.

At one of the meetings in Esalen

The physicist and philosopher Heinz von Foerster also takes part.

Foerster was born in Vienna in 1911

Even as a student, he had contact with the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein and the scientists of the “Vienna Circle”, the early pioneers of cybernetics and systems theory.

In 1953 Heinz von Foerster moved to the USA

Secretary of the Macy Conferences...and thus has access to the inner circle of the American scientific elite.

Foerster is one of the pioneers of the theory of constructivism, according to which we humans construct our own reality. There is no objective reality that exists independently of the observer.

In the 1960s, Heinz von Foerster ran his own research laboratory, the “Biological Computer Lab” at the University of Illinois.

On behalf of the research departments of the American Navy and Air Force, he is working on, among other things, the further fusion of digital and biological systems.

Heinz von Foerster never had his own computer because he apparently believed he was one himself.

IMO HAUSO FROM FOERSTER (WHICH IMO WHEELCHAIR IS SITTING)

(joint: viewing an interview on a demo laptop)o

Heinz von Foerster (archive sound from laptop): “...I came across the Vienna Circle by chance, and the lectures that were held there made a deep impression on me...

HvF (original sound):...that was the last time, yes...

HvF Archivton:... I came across a Viennese philosopher by chance, his name was Ludwig Wittgenstein...

HvF: I’m wearing the same blue shirt, so I’m still the same Heinz...

HvF Archivton: When I read this “Tractatus Logico Philosophicus” for the first time, I was completely blown away. I immediately memorized the entire Tractatus, but I couldn’t find anyone to talk to about it.

Only when some philosophical sentences were spoken in our family at home did I say: No, it doesn’t work that way! Ludwig Wittgenstein says: “Proposition four point five two, so and so and so is the case!” And my poor parents and relatives said, what can we do with this poor boy who is completely “brainwashed” by Wittgenstein? Find someone who can help him get out of this trap. On the contrary, I slipped deeper and deeper into this trap.

HvF Archivton: What I see, and what I think delves into your complex of questions, is that science, or “sciencia” in Latin, has had an unheard of success in these two thousand years since Aristotle. And what does “Sciencia” retreat to? The Indo-European original word for “sciencia” is a word that means: “scy”, and that is in “science”, and “sciencia” and “scicophrenia” and in “scism”, which is the word for “separate. And “Systemics” is exactly a parallel development, just the opposite of “Science”, it is integrated.

So if you think about today, all this systems theory and systems researchers that are emerging in both art and science. I would no longer call it “science”, I would just call it “systemics”.

Today’s science has transitioned to an attitude that sees things together: systemics. So from “Science” to “Systemics” I see today’s steps.

INTERVIEWED WITH HEINZD VOND FOERSTER

HvF: Over the course of my life, the more I deal with physics, I realized that I am actually a “meta-physicist”.

And then I played with it more and more.

And if you ask me, dear Heinz von Foerster, what is a metaphysician, then I will say the following:

Among the questions we ask about the world, there are those that can be answered. “Heinz von Foerster, how old are you?” You can answer that, you can look it up in the catalog, so he was born in 1911 — is he 91 or you can ask questions that aren’t

can be answered...such as “Heinz von Foerster, tell me, how did the universe come into being?” Well, I can recite one of the 35 different theories. And I ask a star expert and he says: “There was that big bang 20 million years ago”...or I ask a good Catholic: “Everyone knows how that came about, that’s when God created the world...and After 7 days he was tired and took a break, that was Sunday... so there are various very interesting hypotheses as to how the universe came into being. That is, there are so many hypotheses because the question cannot be answered. So it just depends on how interesting is the story someone makes up about how life came about in space...

Question D: Of course you are very close to art... when it comes to inventing a good story... a poetic story...

HvF: Exactly, exactly.....that’s the thing. There is a duel, or a

Three-way battle or a decathlon between the different poets. Who invents a funny, amusing or interesting story where everyone immediately believes: that’s how it must have been!

Question D: But science, including your own research... these aren’t just inventions... or nice stories? That’s based on mathematics, on numbers, on provability, on scientifically indubitable data...?

HvF:D Yes...well, yes, but there is already so much data that you can no longer fit all the data into your “story”...and then artificial data is invented...that is for example particles,

Particles, particles are invented that do things we don’t understand. So in my opinion, particles are always solutions to problems that we cannot solve in any other way. So inventions to explain certain problems. These are particles.

Question D: Now I have to ask a stupid question...

HvF: Yes, I understand that. Yes, let me explain it a little better.

Let’s say there’s a gap in my theory that I can’t jump over. So I just say: well, here are new particles that are either green, yellow or I don’t know what...they replace the hole in my theory. So I claim: every particle we read about in physics today is the answer to a question we cannot answer.

Question: But that’s terrible...how can you... on the basis of a theory that apparently has holes in it? ..... well, on such a shaky one

Foundation...so, machine systems...worldwide, machine systems that expand worldwide...can grow virtually indefinitely?

Isn’t that dangerous?

HvF: Yes. In this globally functioning machine system, all statements are correct, and that is of course what you would like to have. And why are they correct? Because they can all be derived from other statements. Question D: Where does this lead? How does this continue?

HvF: Always continue to derive.

D: Yes, but there are limits somewhere.

HvF: Not at all, that’s the nice thing, you can always move on.

D: In logic.

HvF: Yes, exactly.

D: But in reality?

HvF: Where is reality? Where did you get them?

HOTEL ROOM BOSTON

(laptop / archive material / books / photos)

In 1971, mathematics professor Ted Kaczynski quits his professorship at the University of Berkeley and builds a cabin in the forests of Montana. Did he take too seriously the non-binding offer that Stewart Brand’s Whole Earth Catalog makes for a “different, simple life” in harmony with nature?

In a strict self-experiment, is he looking for real experiences and a reality that has dissolved into abstract mathematical structures and formulas in the limitless space of mathematics and logic?

When does this experiment reach a limit and require an “increase”?

When does it click?

and becomes the escape from mathematics and logic

to an escape into paranoia...as the American media insinuates?

...in paranoia like his mathematician colleague Kurt Gödel,

who, with his formula of the “incompleteness theorem”, asks one of the questions that cannot be answered... and also reaches a limit beyond which there is only paranoia — or truth.

On the Internet I find a preprint of a book with references to secret drug experiments by the CIA

At Harvard University in the early 1960s.

One of the test subjects is mathematics student Ted Kaczynski.

The experiment is led by psychologist Henry A. Murray, co-founder of the Department of Social Relations at Harvard.

HARVARD CAMPUS, CAMBRIGDE

(Shots of life on campus, mathematics lessons with a group of students at a blackboard outside, inside the mathematics department)

BRIEFD 4, voiceover)

Florence

Your idea that the foundations of science and mathematics are shaky because of Gödel’s theorem is erroneous.

Gödel’s theorem just says that there are some problems in mathematics that can never be solved.

When I was young and naive, I feared that technology would create a completely orderly, regular and perfect world.

Today I think...that such an outcome is unlikely.

But the reason for my change of opinion is not at all Gödel’s incompleteness theorem, but rather the unpredictability of the behavior of complex and open systems.

Would you like to live in a world in which scientists and superhumanly intelligent machines know and understand everything and can therefore organize and regulate everything?

If you don’t like that, why do you complain that science doesn’t know everything and has holes in the theory? Instead, you should worry that science knows too much.

I have to stop here. Thank you for your dictionary.

HARVARDD ARCHIVES

(laptop / archive material / books / photos / voiceover)

In 1958, Ted Kaczynski and 20 other Harvard students were selected as subjects for studies on the personality structure of highly gifted male college students.

All students receive a codename...

Ted Kaczynski’s is LAWFUL, law-abiding.

The head of the series of experiments is the psychologist Henry A. Murray, a highly decorated major in the American army during World War II.

For the psychological warfare department of the OSS, the Office of Strategic Service, a forerunner of the CIA, Murray developed a system of tests to examine the leadership qualities of officers.

The tests take place in the secret station “S”, a villa near Washington, and are intended to show how elites behave under psychological pressure.

But Murray sees bigger tasks for psychology...

Like the authors of the study on the “Authoritarian Personality” who work with his test procedures, Murray sees psychology and the new social sciences as having a duty to make a contribution so that the world can live in peace and harmony: in a new world order...with world laws ...a world police... and a world government.

“The United States,” said Murray, “is the abstraction of the ONE WORLD now awaiting its creation.

The fate has fallen on the United States to take the lead in conducting this final and most difficult experiment, a global campaign of good against evil.

By fully committing ourselves to one world government, we refresh the hearts of all people on earth with the prospect of security that can counteract the spell of any form of totalitarianism.

The “national man” is obsolete and must be transformed into a “world man.”

For this transformation, scientists commissioned by the CIA also use LSD 25, a new synthetic drug developed by the Sandoz company in Switzerland.

How can you use the drug to penetrate deep into a person’s subconscious in order to then reprogram it?

Henry A. Murray himself is obsessed with

to develop a “superego” in his institute at Harvard, which is intended to immunize the planned “worldly person” against all types of totalitarianism.

He develops a system of tests in which students are subjected to extreme psychological stress.

The goal is the total exploration of personality and behavior in order to then be able to create and control desirable character structures.

At the same time, LSD appears on the Harvard University campus, distributed in the form of sugar cubes.

The young psychology professor Timothy Leary has established an LSD research project at Harvard, with the approval of Henry A. Murray, which is co-controlled by the CIA.

Murray takes part in drug trips with Leary.

As claimed on the Internet, he is now continuing his earlier experiments for the OSS for the CIA, which had special psychological control techniques developed between 1953 and 1964 under code names such as “MK-ULTRA” or “Artichoke”, and involved scientists from all American elite universities?

What is the goal of Murray’s planned use of the SACRED MEXICAN MUSHROOM, a drug mushroom native to Mexico and the model for the synthetic drug LSD?

All of Murray’s experiments are filmed. The films, like all the test results relating to Ted Kaczynski, have disappeared, says the head of the Murray archives and shows me stacks of empty film cans in the basement. When some American media published Ted Kaczynski’s code name “Lawful”, all test results relating to Ted Kaczynski were blocked from publication.

COLLAGE FROM TV ARCHIVE MATERIAL

“Tonight the trial of Ted Kaczynski, when mental illness meets the law!”

“It was a crazy beginning for the Unabomber-trial, and crazy seems to be the right word...” “Prosecutors believe he is linked to as many as sixteen bombings...bombings that killed three people and insured twenty three others in states across the nation...”“The former hermit has refused all court ordered mental tests. His attorneys say, he is afraid of psychiatrists, gets upset at the near mention of their profession...” “Paranoid delusional thinking dictates Mr. Kaczynski’s life. Kaczynski has concern over governement agents, satellites, electrodes and mind control.” “It’s not surprising to me, that a bornfight/bornfied paranoid

scyzophrenic person believes their delusions are reality. And in terms of Ted Kaczynskis selfappointed ventions(?) mission: if he is be considered insane than everything he is done have no political effect and it will have no meaning to societies...attorneys and psychiatrists agree, Ted Kaczynski clearly is not like the rest of us!” “Thanks for joyning us on this Friday evening. Now its ether a bomb-factory or the home of a scizophrenic? That what attorneys on both side in the Unabombertrial are saying about Ted Kaczynski’s cabin, which arrived on the back on a big truck just before noon today...”

“...mean-while a key piece of evidence is on its way to Sacramento... Kaczynskis cabin leaving Great Falls Montana this morning been brought here as a piece of evidence for the defense...”

“...expected to take three days for the driver to complete the eleven hundred miles trip to Sacramento...the cabin which will be stored at Major Field is important for the defense strategy to portraying Kaczynski as mentally disturbed...”

“ The cabin measures just ten by twelve feet, there is no electricity, no running water, inside FBI investigators found volums of evidence connceting the former professor to nearly all the Unabomb-crimes...

“Ted Kaczynski had more then one cabin! His own laywers maintained the governement was supposed to find other secret shacks that Kaczynski had built apparently to escape civilisation...”

FLUGD NACHD HELENA

(Laptop / Bücher über Montana / Autofahrt nach Lincoln)

(Brief 5, OFF-Ton): FLORENCE erster April,

In your last letter you asked me about the mathematician’s world of ideas.

You probably assume that mathematicians always imagine something mathematical.

But that is not true.

The experienced mathematicians rarely think about mathematics.

Most of the time they imagine the flowers, the sunshine and the birds singing in spring.

Maybe they imagine women sometimes, but they don’t do that often because their hearts are pure.

Why is it, you may ask, that mathematicians don’t always think about mathematics?

I have to tell you that mathematicians don’t have any

They are not scientists, but artists.

Do you remember when I initially wrote to you that I was not a scientist?

Apart from the most elementary mathematics, for example arithmetic or high school algebra, the symbols, formulas and words of mathematics have no meaning at all.

The entire structure of higher mathematics is a tremendous fraud, a mere game, a frivolous practical joke.

You will ask, is there no renegade who will reveal the truth?

Yes, of course, but the fact is so unbelievable that no one will take it seriously.

So the secret is in no danger.

***LINCOLN MONTANA

(Pictures from the location / voice-over)

In 1971, Ted Kaczynski became a citizen of the community of Lincoln, Montana.

His neighbors are sawmill owner Butch Gehring and Lincoln piano teacher Chris Waits.

Butch and his friend Chris help the FBI agents monitor and arrest their neighbor Ted.

On behalf of the FBID, Chris searches for and finds Ted’s second hut: supposedly his secret bomb-making workshop...

This is key evidence for the FBI’s theory: Ted Kaczynski is the Unabomber.

INTERVIEWS BUTCH & CHRIS

(both show a self-made video and show photos and copies of, among other things, FBI documents)

Ted’s home cabin...there came more and more people.

More people moving in. There was noise, he wasn’t — he didn’t have the privacy he had when he first moved here,

I told you before... when Ted moved here in 1971, there was only four people living up here around, and so Ted had things pretty private.

Well, as the time of his arrest, Butch and all kinds of neighbours move in and Ted liked to be by himself, where he could work without being surprised, having somebody knock on his door or just show up or somebody come by, so he built this little cabin where he could go out into the woods and live off -43- the land and be completely content and not have to be worried or to be surprised by anybody. -You’ll see here there’s kind of a scrap pile right here, and right underneath of this tin, there was quite a few links, short links of pipe that had been drilled, the beginnings of explosive device, bombs.

-------------------------------------------------------- Ende Rolle 5

Question: And who is the photographer?

Chris: Me

Chris: But I got some FBI photos, too.

This was the cabin before...

Butch: Anything happened...

Butch: When I talked to the FBI agents, just about everytime Max Noel... and I were in constant contact — prior to the arrest — I worked with him for about thirty days doing photography missions, taking video, catching Ted out behind the house, but never on the camera, all just sounds.

This was Ted’s map, and this is — Question: Ted’s map?

Chris: Yes this is his writing, right down here what it says is, “routes followed on foot from late autumn ,71”.

Chris: All these black lines , handwritten lines are Ted’s trails. Now Butch...

Butch: Written in by Ted!

Chris: Yes written in by Ted.

It’s -it’s an enigma, that’s the best word I can come up with because, everything that he did, he did experiments on and he wrote down very systematically.

Err — and not just bomb-experiments but other things -very scientifically, would write how much of this and that did he used what — how successful it was. And in the areas of his bombs he was very maticolous when he was — was — would come up with a new mixture a new type of det-nating-cap. you know..he would write down ranges and how affective they were and -and all of those kinds of things.

Chris: And when then later on finally after the FBI finally started to cooperate with me, then they gave me some copies of some of his writings about some of his camps... and he writes — uses words like: my most favorite place, my most sacred place...

Butch: We just looked at these a minute ago..

Chris: Yeah, I brought those along.

Butch: In fact, you have some of them right here

Chris: I’ve got the coded, I’ve got a bunch of coded...

Butch: This is coded! And he can read to you as Ted writes it... It’s all down right here and it’s amazing.

Question: And the FBI group, they are waiting here in Lincoln, they are sitting here and waiting...?

Butch: The FBI were scattered all around in the surrounding area hiding.

Chris: Yeah, they had.

Butch: Posing as geologist, posing as truck-drivers, posing as this or that, very low cover. Little did we know out up the 7up Ranch, there were 70 more -on computers! And working other areas. So they covered it real well. In the field right around here there were probably what .15?, that were pretty regular...

Chris: Oh, yeah, yeah!

Butch:..I’d say...Max called me the night before the arrest, he said: is it OK if I use the mill as a staging area for the arrest, he says I think I’ve got enough. And I asked him, I said , Max, how much do you expect to happen tomorrow, what do you have involved? He says, it’s gonna be overwhelming. There’s gonna be press, there’s gonna be a lot of press.

And on the arrest deal he said, how do you get him out of the house? And I said, well just have Jerry, the forest service man carry him out of the house, and stand on the road and just yell at Ted and say: Hey Ted! four or five times, and he’ll come out. And he’ll come to you and you don’t have to go to him, he’ll come to you and once he gets close enough to you, you’ll be able to grab him.

And that’s exactly what they did.

And it worked just great.

WALDSTÜCK OUTSIDE OF LINCOLNthe former location of the “cabin”)

PICTURES DESD PLATZESD WOD TEDD KACZYNSKISD CABIND STAND / DERD PLATZD WAS FENCED BY THE FBI — : AMD ZAUND ISTD A SCHIILDD WITHD DERD INSCRIPTION “DANGER”

DRIVING THROUGH MONTANAD TOWARD HELENA

(BRIEFD 6, voiceover)

Florence

You ask me: “How do you defend yourself against the pressure to take part in the realization of some utopia?” “Who gives me the right to take violent action against it?”

I think the use of violence, for example against the realization of the utopia of a technological society, is only self-defense.

Of course you can dispute that.

If you think this is immoral or immoral, then don’t use violence.

I would like to ask you a question:

What type of violence has caused more “harm,” or distress, in human history: the violence sanctioned by the state?

Or the violence that was used by individuals without authorization?

I will address further questions from you later.

Until then I have to do other work.

NEW HAVEN CT

(Company “Mirror Worlds”, inside, voiceover)

In 1993, the computer scientist David Gelernter received the award

a letter bomb; the explosion causes him to lose an eye and his right hand.

David Gelernter is a professor of computer science at Yale University

and chief scientist of the company “MIRROR WORLDS”, “Spiegelwelten”, the software for electronic commerce

and produces new information technologies.

“Mirror Worlds” is also the title of the book that made Gelernter famous

made: the vision of a future virtual society that is only based on software.

Gelernter is a sharp critic of the American media, which he accuses of destroying America’s moral value system through its greed for sex, blood and violence.

INTERVIEW’ WITH DAVID GELERNTER

The idea of Mirror Worlds the book was that the institutions and the organisations that we deal with every day, that are becoming more complicated all the time would be mirrored in software, so that if I wanted to know what’s happening at the university, I could look at the software image at the university and find out what is being taught and who is saying what and what is happening today and so forth, if I needed to deal with a government agency or with a company or with a hospital or with any organization, the organization would be reflected in software like a building reflected in the water, and the software version of the organization would be easier for me to understand and to deal with...

it seemed to me that with the rise of global computer networks and more and more powerful desktop computers, that this would inevitably emerge.

Nobody can control it, that’s true, but it’s not necessarily bad. It’s an organic system, it’s a distributed system, it’s a system made of many 10s and 100s and millions of human beings, each one making his own decisions, and the uncontrolability is not necessarily bad, it makes things interesting. Certainly, on, there are conflicting trends, for a long time a quality of American journalism declined because...we at Yale university and American universities were not training students, high schools are not training students, because computers made it easier and easier to have fancy pictures instead of good writing, but on the other hand we are now seeing new, it’s easier to have a new TV station, it’s easier to have a new newspaper...and computers have a lot to do with that also, because now you don’t need a factory and a lining typemachine and it’s much easier to produce a newspaper and to make it available, sell it on the internet or the web. So technology helps to correct the errors and right the wrongs that technology created in the first place, the pendulum swings, an old theory, but nevertheless...

Frage: But David, what’s the outcome of more and more TV stations?’When you got a letter bomb, that wasn’t virtual, it was reality...and you, the victim, and the supposed perpetrator...were a real feast for the media...you were even portrayed together in a fictive dialogue.

Why did you criticise the media for that?

It strikes me as always dangerous to approach human life as if it were no moral component. As if a murderer and a normal human being are comparable and interchangeable, that’s a point of view with catastrophic implications, moral rela vism, which I am implacably against and always will be.

Frage: As I prepaired the film I had a talk also with Stewart Brand...you know him, he is also a “Digerati”...and he said to me: This is a genuin “counterculture-phenomenon”, that the Unabomber was doing. He was just saying, culture is going in the wrong direction, I will fight it...

I think that’s a contemptable, that’s a dispicable thing to say, that’s a dispicable thing to say. We’re talking about somebody who murdered human beings. If he had met the widows and the children as I have, of men this criminal has murdered, he would be less eager to describe him as a mere countercultural phenomenon. Now that’s the sort of thing that makes me angry.

Frage: For you its no attack in a political language...you know in the history...

Once a man is a murderer I don’t give a damn what his opinions are, his opinions are of no interest to me. What I know about him is, that he is a murderer, a creator of pain and suffering, and his opinions are disqualified from being of interest to any civilized human beings.

HOTEL ROOM FLORENCE

(Laptop, books, web drawings — then drive past the prison)

(BRIEFD 7, voiceover)

Florence

Dear Mr. Dammbeck, I am continuing my response to your letters.

They ask: “Who has the right to make the law?”

I maintain that no one has the right to do this.

In civilized societies it is usually assumed that the state determines the law.

In non-civilized societies, customs and habits set the law.

When one rejects the standard of law set by the state and customs and takes action against it, it is called REVOLUTION.

Of course, no one gives you the right to do that. If you think it’s immoral, don’t take part in a revolution.

But revolution is the only means by which one can resist the technological system.

You ask me why I haven’t given you a copy

the authentic version of the MANIFESTO.

But I don’t have an authentic version yet.

I have two photocopies of the original manuscript, but some of them are illegible.

I have two easy-to-read transcriptions of the MANIFESTO, but both contain errors.

I’m in the process of making an authentic version of the MANIFESTO by comparing the four versions mentioned, but I don’t have the time to finish it...

because I have to answer so many letters!

So, don’t ask me so many questions.

My biographer is unimportant and I don’t want to talk about it.

Let’s talk about the matters that matter.

Yours faithfully, Ted Kaczynski

EPILOGUE

(white writing on black background)

The mathematician Kurt Gödel died in 1978 as a result of his paranoia.

The mathematician Ted Kaczynski was sentenced to life in prison in 1998. Against his will, an agreement is reached between the defense, public prosecutor and court before the trial begins:

no regular trial, no psychiatric hospitalization, no death sentence and no possibility of pardon.

To this day, Ted Kaczynski refuses to be called the “Unabomber.”

(ROLLING TITLE — ALL CREDITS)

END OF FILM

31) TED KACZYNSKI to LUTZ DAMMBECK

TED KACZYNSKI
to
LUTZ DAMMBECK

August 15, 2005

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

The person who formerly reviewed letters written in German is no longer at this prison, and consequently any letter that I receive or write in German must be sent to another prison to be reviewed. This involves inconvenience for the staff, and delay.

Therefore I write to you in English.

On August 11 I received your letter dated July 10.

On May 23 I sent you a latter dated May 21, whoch apparently you have not received.

The substance of that letter was as follows:

You wrote to me that you were going to have a copy pf your book (related to your film)

sent to me from the publisher. I have not yet received the book.

I have asked you at least twice for a transcript of the words of your film- I have not yet received the transcript.

If and when I receive a copy of your book and a transcript of your film, then we can discuss further the question of an interview. But until I receive the book and the transcript, I will not waste my time by writing to you again.

Yours truly

Ted Kaczynski

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

the person who used to check letters in German is no longer in this prison, and consequently every letter I receive or write in German must be sent to another prison for checking. This causes inconvenience for staff and delays. Therefore, I am writing to you in English. On August 11^th I received your letter dated July 10^th. On May 23^rd I sent you a second one dated May 21^st, which you apparently did not receive. The content of this letter was as follows: You wrote to me that you would have the publisher send me a copy of your book (accompanying your film). I haven’t received the book yet.

I have asked you at least twice for a transcript of the words in your film — I have not yet received the transcript. If and when I receive a copy of your book and a transcript of your film, we can further discuss the question of an interview. But until I receive the book and transcript, I will not waste my time writing to you again.

Best regards
Ted Kaczynski

34) August 28, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I received your letter dated 15^th August, and because of the new situation — which means that you apparently receive letters written in German after a considerable delay (the same applying to your letters to me) — I will send you everything in English from now on.

The following, therefore, is a repeat of my letter dated 22^nd July 2005.

I hope that by now you will have received the film script — that there hasn’t been a delay in handing it over to you because of the parts in German.

I will get in touch with the publisher again and ask about the book.

He shall send it again. However, the book is all in German.

Do you suppose all of it will be read, translated and checked before it is handed on to you? That could take a very long time.

In my last letters I mentioned some planned screenings of the film in England (UK), especially at the TECHNOPOLIS-conference in Leeds. The feedback which I’ve got sounds interesting and frustrating at the same time, I will report you in a following letter more about the discussions there between pro- and contra-technologists.

to TJK 28 August 2005 Seite 2

Anyway, here is — first of all — my letter to you dated 22^nd July, which ought to have a German postmark from the 25^th July, and included the textlist of the film.

Yours,
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, August 30^th 2005

Brief vom 22. Juli 2005 in englischer Sprache:

“Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Thank you very much for your letter dated 21^st May 2005, which I received on 13^th July 2005. My last letter to you was written on 10^th July 2005. In your letter, you asked me once again for the “words spoken in the film” and I am very happy to fulfil your request. However, I am intrigued (and also a little worried) as to whether this will give you the right impression of the film. After all, it is not so easy for a “film layman” (please excuse me calling you this) to imagine the overall effect on the basis of the script alone — without all the other important elements such as pictures, music, original sounds and montage.

I am surprised that the book which you mentioned has not yet reached you. I will be back in Hamburg at the end of August and will look into the matter then. I have heard no more from Avi Weider since the end of May.

I hope you are well. How is the work organising and processing your archive material coming along? With best wishes and greetings — also from my wife and Sabine Schenk — to you and to your partner, I remain

Yours,

Enclosure: Film script in original language German/English

Because of the mentioned reasons I think it’s useful to send the textlist — all parts complete in English- again. I hope you are well and wish you all the very best and continued strength, in the name of my wife as well, Yours,

35) 24^th October 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
P.O. Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
U S A

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I received your letter dated October 5, 2005.

The problems with the many disappearing letters that you describe are certainly very annoying. Did you, for example, get the newspaper criticism that I included in one of my recent letters? It was reviews of the book and the film that appeared in one of Germany’s largest, most important newspapers, which is also well-known and read in America.

My last letter to you was dated 30^th August 2005.

As the publisher confirmed to me yesterday, the book has been sent a second time — posted in Hamburg on 8^th September 2005. The publisher is called “Nautilus Verlag Hamburg”. But the fact that you have received the film texts does seem to indicate that the officials found nothing dangerous that might have caused them to hold back the texts.

I had promised to tell you about the screenings in England at the Earth First! gathering.

Here’s what my acquaintance from England wrote on the subject:

“During the 90s, Earth First! was quite a big network with a few dozen local groups, and there was even an EF!-network in Germany from 1994 to 96; villages of huts in protest against motorway projects and fields of genetically manipulated plants.

The Reclaim-the-Street-Party in London in 1999 was the high point of the English protest movement and the EF!-Network in the UK. (-) But today the “technology critics” within the radical scene are a disappearing minority, and people smile at them as naive. TECHNOPOLIS, the conference in Leeds, was discouraging. The main theme was nanotechnology, which appears to be the next industrial revolution after the mass exploitation of natural oil and computerisation. The perspectives are frightening; probably the final, physically manifest consequences of cybernetics, and yet we (the opponents of technology) were a tiny group of people without the slightest idea of what to do to stop things. It almost felt as if we were facing the same problem as the Luddites 300 years ago — only with fewer people, and this is a global problem”. So much for — excerpts from — the report from Leeds from the Earth First! gathering, where the film was also shown and discussed.

It is rather a shame that our exchange of letters recently has been compelled by external influences to leave matters of content, and that we have only been concerned with technical questions in connection with an interview, or the difficulties over post.

One aspect that repeatedly arises in the discussions after the film screenings is the question of using violence and your definition of “revolution”, which I quote at the end of the film.

The controversy centres around your position of the right to “self-empowerment”.

On that subject, one woman who had seen the film recently sent me the following question: “There is no right outside the state and no state outside of right, and right and state are Godgiven. Hegel was the first to subsume society and the state, and history and world consciousness, thus reconciling both categories. What does Ted Kaczynski think of this statement?”

Would you care to answer that?

The film continues to tour; in November in Germany, England, France, Switzerland, Hong Kong and Austria. It is often accompanied by discussions after the screening, whereby the problems addressed frequently move away from the computer to the current questions of bio- and genetic technology; a new attempt to solve “the problem of good and evil using technical apparatus”.

Yesterday was the 200^th birtday of one of the most important German writers, Adalbert Stifter. Do you know them? I think you would like his thinking and writings about nature, writings like this about an little see in the mountains...der wie ein schwarzes Auge ist, überragt von der Stirne und Braue der Felsen, gesäumt von der Wimper dunkler Tannen, drin das Wasser regungslos, wie eine versteinerte Träne.” (from: BUNTE STEINE, 1853)

And have you also heard that two men with the same name as you, the Kaczynski brothers, have been experiencing a remarkable political career in Poland recently? One of them (Lech) is even a presidential candidate, and yesterday he was really the winner and is the new president in Poland. Are the two related to you in any way?

I hope that you will soon have an opportunity to read the film text, and also trust that you will soon be able to let me know that you have received the book.

I will look forward to hearing from you, and hope that both you and your partner are well

Best regards
Yours
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg, October 24^th 05

32) TED KACZYNSKI to LUTZ DAMMBECK

November 6, 2005

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

The mail situation has changed, and if we wrote to one another in German the letters would probably be delayed less than two weeks for translation. Nevertheless, haste is necessary, so I will write you in English in order to avoid any delay for translation, and also because I write German slowly.

Thank you for to getting me the date on which the publisher sent me a copy of your book for the second time. The book has not been legitimately rejected by the prison authorities; if it had been, then I would have rejected a “rejection notice” explaining the reasons for the rejection.

There is every reason to believe that the problems with the mail have been due to illegitimate actions by certain members of the prison staff. However, the mail problems may now have been solved in part. Can you have your publisher send me a copy of your book by registered mail? If so, the book should reach me.

Very bad things have been happening here.

On Oct. 27, the prison authorities confiscated most of my books and personal papers. Most of my time and energy have been absorbed in efforts to save some of this material, so in this letter I can cover only the most essential points.

First, there is a man named Dr.David Skrbina who is teaching a course in the Philosophy of Technology at the University of Michigan-Dearborn.

It is a new course, and Dr.Skrbina says he has been having good success in making his students aware of the danger of technology. He is hoping to publish a book about my ideas that would include a selection of my writings, but he thinks that publication in the United States might entail certain legal difficulties that would deter publishers.

It has occurred to me, that publication in Germany, in German translation, might involve no such difficulties. Since I think you will be interested in Dr. Skrbina’s project, perhaps you would be willing to help him find a translator and a German publisher, assuming that he wants that, which for the moment remains an open question. (I am only just now calling his attention to this idea.) Dr.Skrbina probably would be willing to send you copies of some essays of mine that you have not seen. His adress is:

DR.DAVID SKRBINA
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN-DEARBON
COLLEGE OF ARTS, SCIENCES, AND LETTERS
HUMANITIES DEPARTMENT
4901 EVERGREEN ROAD
DEARBORN MI 48128 — 1491
U S A

If you would like to write him he will no doubt be able to answer your questions.

I have no time.

Second, the government attorney in my return-of-property case has said that everything I have written since my conviction should be sold to pay restitution to my alleged victims, and it is possible that the government may actually try to seize papers of mine that are already in the University of Michigan Library.

However, until the government actually levies upon the papers, I can legally dispose of the papers that I still own in any way that I like. I think that if the papers were in Germany, they would be legally beyond the reach of the United States Government.

Do you think there is a library in Germany that would like to have some of my papers? Because I am extremely pressed for time, I can’t write any more at the moment.

Sincerely yours,
Ted Kaczynski

36) November 28, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I received your letter dated November 6, 2005.

Unfortunately I’m pressed for time at the moment too and can’t answer you in a longer letter.

So I will send you only these short informations:

— the publisher will send you the book again by “registered mail”

— I contacted Mr. Skrbina. I found out very quickly his e-mail adress for faster corresponding and he was answering me promptly. We are in contact.

To find a good German-translater is no problem. The German version of the “corrected” version of the Manifesto which we produced is surely the German version which is possible.

— Yesterday I was talking & negotiating with one of the most important and famous archives & libraries in german-speaking countries about giving them some materials (papers, fotographs, several documents like film scripts, graphics and other documents) of my art- and filmwork, which they are interested to get.

The name of the archive is “Academy of Art and Science Berlin-Brandenburg”.

Here is the place where the estates of Bertold Brecht, Walter Benjamin, Heinrich Mann, Georg Grosz or John Heartfield are collected.

I ask them also for eventualy archivising some of your papers.

Yes, maybe it’s possible.

But for further discuss it would be helpful to give me some more informations:

How much material is it? Which kind of material is it (handwritten text/manuscripts/ photographs/books/essays/copies)? How many pages?

Which procedure would be necessary? Under whoch conditions could such transfer work?

“Das Netz” continues to run very successfully, in my next letter I will tell you more.

I hope you are well. With best wishes and greetings — also from my wife and Sabine Schenk

— to you and to your partner, I remain

Yours
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg Nov 26^th 2005

37) December 23, 2005

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg
THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
P.O. Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
U S A

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you from Hamburg.

Did you get my last letter dated Nov 28^th (with my questions regarding archivising some of your material/papers)?

The publisher was sending you by registered mail the book again and I hope that you ‘ve got it already.

I’m actuelly intensivly in contact with Mr.Skrbina and potentially we can do something together next year.

So I hope you are well. With best wishes and greetings to you and to your partner, I remain

Your s

Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg Dec 23^rd 2005

33) TED KACZYNSKI to LUTZ DAMMBECK

January 22, 2006

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

Thanks for your letters of November 28, 2005 and December 23, 2005.

I’m sorry I’ve taken so long to answer, but I’m even more pressed for time than previously. With regard to the possible donation of some of my papers to a German archive, you ask in your letter of November 28: “Which procedure would be necessary? Under what conditions could such a transfer work?”

But these are the questions to which I need the answers. I hope that the archive can answer them. If the archive can’t answer these questions, then I certainly can’t answer them either.

The United States Government claims to have a lien on all of my property, including my papers. This, if true, means that if I gave my papers to an American archive, the Government could take the papers away from the archive and sell them to pay restitution to my alleged victims.

I think that maybe the lien could not be enforced in Europe, and this would be my only reason for giving my papers to a European archive rather to an American one.

So the most important question is this: Could the United States Government’s lien be enforced against my papers if they were in a European archive? Perhaps the archive you mentioned can find the answer to this question. If not, then I don’t know how to answer the question either.

Can you give me the adress of the archive so that I can communicate with it directly?

Best regards
Ted Kaczynski

38) 10. Februar 2006

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
P.O. Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500
U S A

Dear Ted Kaczynski,

Thanks for your letter of January 22, 2006.

In that letter, you passed back to me some of the questions that I had asked you — after my conversation with the person responsible for the archive — about an archive in Germany possibly undertaking to keep your papers.

What I would like to establish, basically, is that I think it is important that your “papers” don’t end up in any old archive, but in a significant archive, where the material can be made available to serious, important international academics and researchers — at a time and to an extent that you can determine yourself.

I suggested a suitable archive, and I have had some early conversations of a very general nature there to inform people about you and the possible nature of the material — and to “advertise” it.

I met with some interest in this matter, because the fact that this archive is interested in a large part of my own archive material — including all the material connected with the film “The Net” — means I have a personal contact there.

This situation might lead eventually to an opportunity to place your material in the archive (under this mentioned “roof”) + under your own heading “Ted Kaczynski Papers” (or whatever you suggest).

That would be one solution — meeting the formal requirements — because in principle the archive of the Academy of the Arts in Berlin only stores the estates of Academy members or winners of prizes for art and science endowed by the Academy.

In order to clarify your questions in the letter dated January 22 — whether it is possible for a German archive/or more exactly the archive of the Academy of the Arts Berlin/ to take on your papers and whether your papers would be secure there — I must again ask you to answer some questions that I already posed in my letter of November 28.

Those were the questions that arose during my preliminary talks at the Academy of the Arts. In very concrete terms, and this is essential for us to know: what do you mean by “my papers?” More precisely: How much material is it? What kind of material is it (handwritten text/ manuscripts/ photographs/ books/essays /copies)? How many pages?

As far as the questions are concerned that you touched upon — and that you seem a little uncertain about: “Which procedure would be necessary?”, I will try and express myself more clearly this time:

What this means is — what ideas do you have about the rights that the archive would then have to work with your papers? Would the papers just be stored there, or could the archive assess them and make a catalogue of them, or would it be able to make them available to others for research purposes? Would it be possible for the academics of the archive or third parties to publish the papers, or parts of the papers?

I am sure you have very concrete ideas about the conditions under which you are prepared to pass on your papers. And of course the archive would like to know these details before any concrete discussions or any decisions can be made about them there. It is not a private archive, but one of the best-regarded, important archives in Germany or even in Europe, and there is a committee of academics, artists and archivists there who decide what material is taken on.

So what rights would the archive receive, and what rights do you not wish to hand over, but retain for yourself? And — without a more concrete list from you of what the material in question consists of, it will be difficult for me to trigger a more lasting, definitive interest in it at the archive.

That is the precondition, if we are to get matters moving. For that reason, I am asking for your understanding and your continued trust that I will continue to hold these conversations and preliminary negotiations in your interests and to your benefit. I can only do that because I am better informed about the relevant persons and conditions, I have personal contacts at the archive, and these people trust me. I would like to go on using the credit that I enjoy there for your benefit and your cause.

But to do that, I urgently need the information I have mentioned.

You also asked me: “Under what conditions could such a transfer work?”

What I meant by this question was whether you wanted to employ a lawyer to draft out a contract between you and the archive after all the details concerning the nature and extent of the material have been sorted out;

Do you want a contract at all, or simply an agreement? When there is agreement on the details it could be drafted either in Berlin and then sent to you, or you could send a draft by post and I would be happy to pass it on. And that question also means — what ideas do you have about how your papers could be transferred from Florence to Berlin? By post, by Fedex? It remains to be seen whether there will be problems with that in practice. No one can be expected to know that before the archive in Berlin is in a position to apply to the warden or to the relevant authorities. I am aware that the question of your papers has been a matter of concern for you for some time, and that it troubles you. I understand that very well, which is why I don’t like to press you at the moment with questions about the interview (where we had already made considerable progress — has Dr.Skrbina written to you about it?) or for your opinion on the film text or the book. But of course I am curious to hear your comments on both. But first of all, I would like to help you to clarify the questions in connection with your papers to your satisfaction.

As far as the “Net” is concerned, let me just say: a DVD edition will shortly be appearing in the USA, and in the autumn it will be going on a short tour — with additional material — through various university cities, where there will be discussions and talks on the film. Dr.David Skrbina has also been approached in that context, and we will soon be sorting out the details. I hope that you and your partner are well, and remain Yours
Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg Feb10th 2006

34) TED KACZYNSKI to LUTZ DAMMBECK

March 8, 2006

Dear Mr. Dammbeck,

On March 2, 2006, I received your letter dated February 10, 2006.

In that letter you indicate that you plan to show your film, Das Netz, in the United States in the near future.

I have read the English-language and German-language transcripts of “Das Netz” that you sent me earlier. Your film is defamatory. Therefore, if Das Netz in its present form, is shown in the United States, I will have to coinsider taking appropriate legal ection, for defamation, against everyone involved in showing or distributing Das Netz in the United States.

The defamatory portions of Das Netz include, but are not limited to, the following:

(1) Page 27 of your English-language transcript, page 27 of your German-language transcript. You say that I participated in “secret drug experiments” (“geheime Drogenexperimente”) at Harvard. This is false. I have never participated in, or been a subject of, drug experiments of any kind.

(2) Pages 30–31 of your English-language transcript, pages 31–32 of your German- language transcript. You quote passages from a letter that I sent you as an April-fool joke, without informing the viewers of your film that the passages were written in jest. Thus you lead your viewers to believe that I wrote crazy-sounding things. There is no passible excuse for this.

After you made the mistake of taking my letter seriously, I told you explicitly that it was an April-fool joke. and in your reply you made clear that you did then understand that it was an April-fool joke.

In citing the pages of your English-language transcript, I have used the numbers that appear at the top of the pages. However, the pages are incorrectly numbered: There is no page 26 and there are two pages 28. The pages of your German-language transcript were not numbered; I have numbered them consecutively in the oder in which the pages were when I received them.

In regard to the quality of your film as a whole, I will only quote the words of a French physician, author of several books, who is the only person I know (other than yourself) who has seen Das Netz. After viewing your film he wrote to me: “the spirit of your manifesto has been betrayed.”

There would be no point in my answering your questions about archives, because I have already decided that my papers will be deposited inb certain archives in the United States.

Ted Kaczynski

39) April 2, 2006

Lutz Dammbeck Lornsenplatz 11 D-22767 Hamburg THEODORE JOHN KACZYNSKI
Reg.N. 04475–046
US. PENITENTIARY — MAX
PO Box 8500
Florence, CO 81226–8500 USA

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

I have received your letter dated 8^th March 2006.

To be honest: I was rather shocked by the letter, and it annoyed me, too.

Of course I was happy to send you both the film-text and the book, but at the same time, I did also express my concern that you might not be able to get an impression of the impact and effect of the film on the basis of the text alone, when the images and the sound are missing.

I am still of the opinion that both the text, and in particular the film, make my attitude quite clear; that I don’t maintain that you took part in drug experiments. Far more, in the text, but also in the film — which of course conveys a different impression — it is clearly indicated that I am only making a reference to claims that are being spread via the Internet. At the same time, I did not simply take over those claims about supposed drug experiments, but portrayed them in question form. At no point in my film do I maintain that there is any proof of your supposed participation in drug experiments.

I would like to try and make that clearer to you:

Let’s take page 27 of the text, which you cite yourself. In the image, the scene begins in the following way: The viewer sees a screen, and my hands that are clicking on something on the Internet; he sees various websites, e.g. that of “Spirit of Freedom” with an interview with you under the heading “Prisoner Profiles” and your photo, and then (in the image) there follows — per mouse-click — a move to other websites.

It is only then that the commentary begins, off-screen, and in the German text this is “Im Internet finde ich Hinweise auf geheime Drogenexperimente der CIA Anfang der 60er Jahre an der Harvard Universität..... “, in the English translation (as a subtitle): “On the Internet I find references to secret drug experiments carried out by the CIA at Harvard University during the early 60s.”

This is accompanied in turn by various websites, including “Ted K., the CIA & LSD” (results among others if you are searching for “Ted Kaczynski + Harvard” on the Internet). While the commentary text continues, these sites are clicked on and opened, and they include one page, which makes the suggestion that you object to. In the picture the film shows following single words of the text as a close-up shot like “mind control experiments” and others, the commentary at this moment “Eine der Testpersonen ist der Mathematikstudent Ted Kaczynski “, in the English translation “One of the test participants is the mathematics student Ted Kaczynski.” What is wrong with that? Weren’t you a participant in Prof. Murray’s experiments?

However, the combination of image and commentary makes clear to the viewer that this is a claim made by that authors, and that I am only quoting them. In the next scenes of the film, my research takes me to Harvard, where I then make some enquiries of my own — but without adopting as mine the claim made of others earlier; on the contrary, in my images and the film action I show that there is no evidence to support it: by showing and saying in the film that no documents and evidence exist at Harvard that you were part of those (drug) experiments.

This is the end of this chapter of the film. You couldn’t read this (in the film-script), because it can only be seen — and understand (in the film).

For me it was important to show this all because it gives the viewers impressions of the situation, the athmosphere and the media-echo on the Internet about your case.

That is only one example of the understanding difficulties that I had already surmised might occur. I also attempted to explain my artistic method to you from the very beginning.

This is not a matter of journalism, but an artificial film essay, an piece of arthouse-film, which is suited to the subject and does it justice. And I had sent the text of the film to you more than six months ago without you having made any comment; that was another reason why I felt I could, and had to assume that you had no objections.

You also quote a French professor who believes that, “the film betrays the spirit of the Manifesto”. That is incorrect, and up until now only an untypical individual opinion. I could send you more than a hundred press opinions and excerpts from many, many letters and emails from normal viewers that prove the opposite. I have entirely positive reactions from people associated with Earth First or European political initiatives and environmental organisations such as Attac, for example.

I already sent you two press clippings that would have told you the same.

You wrote to me: “In regard to the quality of your film as a whole, I will only quote the words of a French physician, author of several books, who is the only person I know (other than yourself) who has seen Das Netz...”.

And I must contradict you there as well, I am afraid.

You know at least one other person who has seen the film, and that is John Zerzan.

He thinks that the film is very good and that is why last year he was more than willing to participate as a guest in several events in Germany connected with the film’s launch — for example in Berlin at a international film festival critical of globalisation, entitled “globale 05”; it was opened with a screening of “Das Netz”.

Afterwards, he participated in a discussion entitled “PROGRAMMIERTE DEMOKRATIE — DIE GLOBALISIERTE KONTROLLGESELLSCHAFT UND FORMEN DES WIDERSTANDS” (Programmed democracy — the globalised, controlling society and forms of resistance).

So you can see in which spectrum the film meets with interest, sympathy and distribution.

I have also heard that John made a positive reference to the film in “Green Anarchy”.

In 2004, the film won the “European Media Award”. Allow me to quote from the arguments of the international jury: “EMAF (European Media Art Festival): Award for pioneering work in Media Art was awarded to Lutz Dammbeck for his film “Das Netz” (The Net). Excerpt from the jury’s findings: “We unanimously chose “Das Netz”: an intellectual roller coaster ride through art, technology, philosophy, politics, psychology and sociology that strongly impresses us but simultaneously makes us uncertain.

The ride is resistant to a one-dimensional version because, although set in the linear medium of film, it triggers non-linear reception. The film is an enormous catalyst for interdisciplinary associations for a network in the mind, the perception of which suddenly surprises us. Still in a daze, we present the 2004 EMAF Award to “Das Netz” by Lutz Dammbeck.”

Jury members for the EMAF Award: — Prof. Michael Bielicky, Academy of Fine Arts, Prague — Alice Koegel, curator for Film & Video at the Ludwig Museum, Cologne — Maria Pallier, editor of Metropolis of TVE (Spain), free-lance curator

One pleasing effect of the film screenings and of the book has been more demand for the Manifesto; more people are reading it. I know of special seminars at various universities such as Vienna, Zurich, Hamburg or Berlin, where lecturers and students are concerning themselves with the Manifesto and your philosophy and ideas. There is evidence that this has been inspired by my film and it is certainly supported by the — as yet best — German translation of the Manifesto that we have made.

In this letter form, and with the additional risk of translation, it is perhaps difficult for me to get the fact across to you that the film in its present form is neither “defamatory”, nor does it “betray the spirit of the Manifesto.”

The film leads nobody “to believe that you wrote crazy-sounding things”. Quite the opposite.

Your quotations in the film appears very clear, logic oriented, “at the point” (as me one viewer wrote), but also wise, poetic & ironic grounded — especially in the second sequence/quotation you mentioned.

This is labeled clear as “April 1” in the commentary and with subtitels — in the film. But seems unfortunately not included in your script. In no way the film is disrespectful to you or your words.

To conclude, I would like to quote to you from a letter I received from a scientist in Vienna, who wrote to me: “...one thing that becomes very clear in your film: Gelernter and others are supposedly working on utpias of the technological society, but if you look at them and listen to what they are saying, it is quite tangible: they don’t even believe in these visions for the future themselves, for them they are entertaining speculation, but with no obligations attached, one they see no reason to fear.

And that is precisely where their strength lies — they rely on their inexhaustible, stifling pragmatism. The decisive question, surely, is what exists to counter this intellectual attitude and its repressive force? And you answer that question in your marvellous film by pointing to the Manifesto and ideas of Ted Kaczynski and presenting many viewers with some stimulating material that will also make them stop and think.”

I ‘ve got a lot of other wounderful letters, e-mails, critics and response.

This is why I am not only surprised by your letter and your accusations, but also very disappointed, for I regard them as entirely unjustified.

I invested a lot of time, energy and personal money into the film, and have been prepared to face some sometimes harsh attacks and reproaches, accusing me of having given too much space and publicity to your ideas and criticism of the technological society and progress.

I regret very much that you appear to have lost faith in me and my work.

I can see no objective and legal reason for any alteration of the film in its present form. If certain publications on the Internet or in printed publications bother you or if they are wrong, I recommend that you take legal action against the authors. Then, if there is a new version of my film, I am happy to consider these corrections respectively the wording that you mentioned in order to prevent any possible misunderstandings in the future. I will do this because I am still very much interested to be in touch with you and I still hope that the filming of you will take place as discussed for quite a while.

I am glad to hear that you have now found suitable archives in the USA for your papers.

It means that I can now abandon the efforts that I had begun — on your request — to find an archive for them in Germany.

I hope you are well,

Yours sincerely

Lutz Dammbeck
Hamburg April 2^nd 2006

This is where the correspondence ended.

I was disappointed. Also a bit offended. Hadn’t I put in a lot of effort and even contributed to TJK’s estate?

Sure, it was me who sought the contact. On one of the research trips, Karin had driven to the ADX Florence in a rental car, looked at the prison from the outside and tried to understand the situation in which my correspondent was. While the correspondence was going on, I had visited the place where his cabin had stood in Lincoln, Montana, and spoken to his former neighbors and the librarian at the local library.

Of course I wanted to work with him for my film first, which I did, and then do an individual interview and build a professional relationship. This attempt failed in 2006.

I had made an effort not only to use Ted as a training ground for developing my thoughts in the film, but also to accept many of his narcissistic rebukes, which seemed to me to be due to the conditions under which he wrote me the letters.

I didn’t ask many questions or asked them too cautiously, such as whether he was even the author of the Manifesto, which often played a role in our correspondence. Then, if he had admitted this, he would then ask whether these four books had played a role as inspiration and sources: The Ancient Engineers by L. Sprague DeCamp; Chinese Political Thought in the Twentieth Century by Chester D. Tan; The True Believer by Eric Hoffer and Violence in America: Historical and Comparative Perspectives by Roger Lane.

I didn’t ask him directly whether he was the so-called “Unabomber” or whether there were helpers who supported him. There were still many unanswered questions about Ted Kaczynski’s stay in Lincoln, his excursions during this time to other places in the area (Helena) and the assassination attempts, which seemed difficult to achieve without supporters. These were questions that I wanted to save for an individual interview, which unfortunately would no longer take place.

Had he been useful to me for my film and my art? Yes. Had I been useful to him by playing a role in his thought system? Yes.

My impression was that the former mathematician had lived all his life in a world made of numbers and at the same time declared this world to be his enemy, which he fought against.

This seemed counterphobic, similar to a mountain climber who is afraid of heights.

The forest and nature were also not places where he found peace. In winter, day-trippers raced across the road in the forest on motor skis a few meters from his cabin, or flew in helicopters to his most distant and lonely “sacred places”. And in the year of his arrest, the Little Library of Lincoln was connected to the nationwide digital network of libraries funded by the Melinda and Bill Gates Foundation.

The web of numbers he had laid over his hiking trails, nature observations, and bomb experiments did not provide the order that calmed his inner and outer chaos.

He only found peace in ADX Florence, ironically through the mediation of the state. The state served both as a projection figure and as a punishing comforter and redeemer at the same time. And Ted Kaczynski got the peace and quiet he had longed for all his life.

Investments:

— Report Dr. Sally Johnson on TJK

— Mathematical work by TJK

{1} Is this sequence of words correct? Or should I have written: “I’m overly busy with this...”?

{2} (The starting point is the story/fama/history of the so-called “white elephant”, which Emperor Charlemagne received as a gift from the caliph in Baghdad and which was transported across the Alps and on a raft on the Rhine to Aachen).

{3} I don’t know how to say that in German.

{4} Because I don’t understand how to express this thought well in German, I repeat this sentence in English so that there is no misunderstanding: If one wants to arouse serious and intelligent opposition to the technological juggernaut, one must avoid any tendency to focus too much attention on any one personality.

{5} Fascism scale