Nothing can bring one down to the ground as reading works written by (or talking to) psychologist and physician. Unlike discussion about mental state that for some seem near mystical, the above mentioned work with flesh and bone and know inner workings of the human machine to a tiniest detail.

If there is something more terrifying than above I haven't encountered it. If there is a truly evil byproduct of 20th century then it is improvement in knowing what makes people tick developed through psychology (on a side of good but also so easy to get corrupted .....) and mind-messing through propaganda and mass media (which again is applied psychology, one that turned to be the corrupted branch of that science). One can only look at period before WW2, rise of propaganda and all the modern doom-and-gloom, destruction everywhere mass media of modern days. What they left in their wake is nothing but mind violence and millions of lives destroyed, sometimes in more perverse ways than it is possible through physical means.

Author writes in a very understandable way. Same as we go through entire species physical evolution chain from inception to birth and adulthood, we go through same process mentally - basically going through entire evolution from our species' earliest mental steps 'til modern days (although sometimes I wonder if there is a difference here mind you). Author explains in very plain terms the way people think individually, how easy it is to control the individual (that easy it is really scary) and the effect mass has on the individual (very interesting point on how mass of people degenerates to the level of the weakest individual in the mass - this being the greatest danger when entire populations go crazy which is reason why mass is always used as control mechanism by powers to be against the individual).

At the time when these essays were written media was riding the hysteria of nuclear war. Author's comments on this seem very contemporary - media constantly bombarding people with catastrophe and doom to the point of numbness, point where people start regress due to constant live in fear and suicides start to pile up. Reminds you of certain recent crisis?

It is truly eye opening how easy it is to bring society down through constant fear. It takes just a little nudge to push human being into abyss and bring it to the level of automaton, zombie creature. This ease is precisely reason why these mind-messing activities should be treated as crime against humanity.

So... one thing I learned is that when "specialized" teams for crisis management start having more psychologists/social engineers than actual experts for the topic in question it is time to run for the hills. Nothing good can come out of it.

Very interesting book, highly recommended to everyone. ( )