5 votes

How factories were made safe

3 comments

  1. [3]
    dredmorbius
    (edited )
    Link
    Roots of Progress explores a fascinating and critically vital question, but does so under ideological blinders and using manifestly obvious rhetorical techniques (strawman arguments,...

    Roots of Progress explores a fascinating and critically vital question, but does so under ideological blinders and using manifestly obvious rhetorical techniques (strawman arguments, blame-the-victim, historical revisionism) which hugely impair the entire project.
    Tremendous potential. Miserable accomplishment.

    It is an exceedingly slanted narrative omitting much and painting a pointedly inaccurate history.

    The author has grossly cherry-picked sources and issues. See by comparison:

    Some other interesting case histories would be Union Carbide's Bhopol disaster, the Johnstown flood, PEPCON, and many others.

    It's a target-rich environment.

    7 votes
    1. [2]
      Comment deleted by author
      Link Parent
      1. dredmorbius
        Link Parent
        Yep. I've been following Roots of Progress for a few years now. It's consistently strongly libertarian, techno-optimist, cornucopian effort. I'm not sure if that's by intent or out of ignorance...

        Yep.

        I've been following Roots of Progress for a few years now.

        It's consistently strongly libertarian, techno-optimist, cornucopian effort. I'm not sure if that's by intent or out of ignorance and lack of ability and insight, though the end results don't much matter.

        As I've said: the questions and topic it's addressing are vitally important. The capability and skil with which it's being executed are utterly unsuited to the challenge.

        5 votes
    2. skybrian
      Link Parent
      Though Wikipedia tries, there is no neutral point of view. I didn’t think the article was as bad as you say. History is vast and there is always more that could be said. What they did say seems...

      Though Wikipedia tries, there is no neutral point of view. I didn’t think the article was as bad as you say. History is vast and there is always more that could be said. What they did say seems interesting.