Earthwalk — Philip Slater

Philip Slater is the most astute analyst and critic of American society, bar none. He also wrote some other very cogent books, including "The Pursuit of Loneliness" and "Wealth Addiction," but this is his masterpiece. It is an utterly brilliant book, but one that will be rejected out of hand by those who still believe in the myth of progress. One short excerpt will give you the idea:

"The kind of growth Western culture has experienced over the past three hundred years would be considered a sign of gross malfunction in any other context. Healthy growth is paced differently - it does not absorb or destroy everything living around it. It is cancerous cells that grow and reproduce rapidly in total disregard of their connection with surrounding cells. From this viewpoint technology would have to be regarded as a cancer on human culture, Western culture as a cancer on the human species, and the human species as a cancer on terrestrial life - a cancer that may in the end be treated by radiation and radical surgery at the same time."