The Fear du Epogue
4 September 2006
The Editor, The New York Review of Books
To the Editor:
In your September 21 issue, Tony Judt appropriately quotes Leszek Kolakowski's observation that Marxism is "a modern variant of apocalyptic expectations which have been continuous in European history" ("Goodbye to All That?").
Later in the same issue you revisit the current concern over global warming ("'The Threat to the Planet': An Exchange"). Might today's widespread fear that humankind is doomed by capitalism and SUVs - unless we follow Al Gore's advice to "drastically change our civilization and our way of thinking" - be just the most recent manifestation of these apocalyptic expectations?
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
The Editor, The New York Review of Books
To the Editor:
In your September 21 issue, Tony Judt appropriately quotes Leszek Kolakowski's observation that Marxism is "a modern variant of apocalyptic expectations which have been continuous in European history" ("Goodbye to All That?").
Later in the same issue you revisit the current concern over global warming ("'The Threat to the Planet': An Exchange"). Might today's widespread fear that humankind is doomed by capitalism and SUVs - unless we follow Al Gore's advice to "drastically change our civilization and our way of thinking" - be just the most recent manifestation of these apocalyptic expectations?
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
Posted by Don Boudreaux on
Friday May 18, 2007 at 4:09pm