Book Review: One-Dimensional Man

To understand the impact of AI, we must retvrn to traditional Marxism

This is an entry for the AstralCodexTen book review contest.

One-Dimensional Man is a landmark book written by Herbert Marcuse in 1964. He was a famous mid-20th century philosopher of the Frankfurt school, which integrated continental philosophy, sociology, Freudo-Marxism, and postmodern humanities to create what we now call critical theory.

I will be honest: I am not a fan of any of those things. In fact, I’m strongly opposed to all of them! You might consider this a hostile book review. Nonetheless, I consider it important to understand my ideological opponents, so I did my best to read this book with an open mind and give it a fair treatment. Call it an “adversarial collaboration,” as much as I can collaborate with a man who’s been dead for almost fifty years. In doing so, I did find that it had some interesting insights, and I can see why these ideas continue to echo through academia today.

What is this book? It’s hard to define. It’s not, sadly, a sequel to Flatland like the title would imply. It’s written in that odd style of continental philosophy- it doesn’t really make any rigorous proofs, or any references to scientific studies, or any rigorous technical framework, but it still demands to be taken seriously. It’s Marxist, but it doesn’t really make an argument for Marxism- it assumes you’re already in agreement with that. It’s not fiction, but it sometimes writes in the same style as a literary fiction novel where it lays down huge assertions about history, the economy, and human nature with no attempt to prove them. It does have citations, but they’re mostly of other Marxist writers doing the same thing, and often in French or German to make it even more confusing. And of course, it’s all written in a hyperdense, labyrinthine style full of jargon. Let’s start with a taste, just to let you all know what you’re getting in for:

A comfortable, smooth, reasonable, democratic unfreedom prevails in advanced industrial civilization, a token of technical progress. Indeed, what could be more rational than the suppression of individuality in the mechanization of socially necessary but painful performances; the concentration of individual enterprises in more effective, more productive corporations; the regulation of free competition among unequally equipped economic subjects; the curtailment of prerogatives and national sovereignties which impede the international organization of resources. That this technological order also involves a political and intellectual coordination may be a regrettable and yet promising development.

My first instinct was to read it like Richard Feynman reading sociology papers- go through line by line, word by word, and translate it into regular English until the meaning becomes clear. And to be sure, there is some flim-flammery here, where the abstruse language tricks you into thinking that this must be something super profound, while hiding the actual meaning. I could “translate” the above quote into something like: “Our society sometimes restricts individual’s freedom. This is necessary and rational in order to have a functional society, especially with advanced technology.”

But reading it like that is a mistake. This style of writing isn’t like a math proof or a computer program, where every line is the next step in a rigorous logical sequence. If anything, the entire book is an argument against that sort of mechanical precision, to show how it alienates people’s human nature. It’s more like a biological system, or a big business, or, well… human society. It muddles through. In that spirit, I invite you to read the book, and to some extent this review, less rigorously. Don’t worry so much if any particular part strikes you as wrong or complete nonsense. Just keep going, and if you get lost, look for the next part that you might agree with or that gives you inspiration.

All is connected, especially old memes

This is a book of… well, everything. All of human history, the economy, capitalism, society, sexuality, everything. It is one giant whole of irreducible complexity, which must be grappled with all at once. Like trying to predict the weather or a human’s free will, this subject is too complex to allow great precision, and also demands massive intellectual effort if we are to make any progress at all.

But not impossible! Reading this book, I was struck by how many of his observations and predictions continue to ring true today. For example, he frequently refers to “advanced industrial society” or “advanced capitalism”- I think the kids these days call that “late stage capitalism.” He also frequently refers to a Marxian ideal where technological progress would create automated factories that free us from the drudgery of labor or any fear of poverty- aka “fully automated luxury gay space communism.”

Even in the 1960s, those were not new ideas. To some extent this book is a defense of Marxism, against the charges of “why does capitalism always produce better living standards” and “why hasn’t there been a glorious communist revolution around the world yet?” Indeed, he seems to have a grudging respect for capitalism, and spent much of his professional life criticizing the USSR. Example:

Mechanization is increasingly reducing the quantity and intensity of physical energy expended in labor. This evolution is of great bearing on the Marxian concept of the worker (proletarian). To Marx, the proletarian is primarily the manual laborer who expends and exhausts his physical energy in the work process, even if he works with machines. The purchase and use of this physical energy, under subhuman conditions, for the private appropriation of surplus-value entailed the revolting inhuman aspects of exploitation; the Marxian notion denounces the physical pain and misery of labor. This is the material, tangible element in wage slavery and alienation-the physiological and biological dimension of classical capitalism.

That sort of sounds like he’s admitting that the conditions of regular workers under capitalism have gotten better over time! Or another example:

The proletarian of the previous stages of capitalism was indeed the beast of burden, by the labor of his body procuring the necessities and luxuries of life while living in filth and poverty. Thus he was the living denial of his society. 7 In contrast, the organized worker in the advanced areas of the technological society lives this denial less conspicuously and, like the other human objects of the social division of labor, he is being incorporated into the technological community of the administered population. Moreover, in the most successful areas of automation, some sort of technological community seems to integrate the human atoms at work.

Ok, so what’s so bad about this? Work sucks, but it’s getting better all the time thanks to technological capitalism.

His answer is the name of this book. He… never quite gives us a simple clear definition of what a “one-dimensional man” is supposed to be, but instead lectures us on the psychological horrors of a “one-dimensional society:”

No wonder then that, in the most advanced areas of this one-dimentional society civilization, the social controls have been introjected to the point where even individual protest is affected at its roots. The intellectual and emotional refusal "to go along" appears neurotic and impotent. This is the socio-psychological aspect of the political event that marks the contemporary period: the passing of the historical forces which, at the preceding stage of industrial society, seemed to represent the possibility of new forms of existence.

But the term "introjection" perhaps no longer describes the way in which the individual by himself reproduces and perpetuates the external controls exercised by his society. Introjection suggests a variety of relatively spontaneous processes by which a Self (Ego) transposes the "outer" into the "inner." Thus introjection implies the existence of an inner dimension distinguished from and even antagonistic to the external exigencies-an individual consciousness and an individual unconscious apart from public opinion and behavior.3 The idea of "inner freedom" here has its reality: it designates the private space in which man may become and remain "himself."

Today this private space has been invaded and whittled down by technological reality. Mass production and mass distribution claim the entire individual, and industrial psychology has long since ceased to be confined to the factory. The manifold processes of introjection seem to be ossified in almost mechanical reactions. The result is, not adjustment but mimesis: an immediate identification of the individual with his society and, through it, with the society as a whole.

The way that I would “translate” this is to the meme of the NPC, sheep, or p-zombie: someone who is in some ways intelligent, but appears to have no free will of their own. Instead they mindlessly follow the trends imposed upon them by others. Don't ask questions, just consume product and then get excited for next product.

The classic XKCD comic makes a satire of that kind of thinking- essentially saying that it’s common for us to look down on others as less “free-thinking” than ourselves, when in reality we’re not any better than them. But Marcuse takes the idea very seriously. He goes so far as to argue that something like this is necessary for capitalism to continue to exist despite technological progress. If humans could “wake up,” Matrix-style, they could see that they were being exploited and demand a communist revolution. But instead they keep working, chasing an endless cycle of consumer spending that keeps them tied to their jobs.

Aesthetics, fiction, and sex vs the rational society

The book gets more interesting as it gets away from standard Marxism and into weird artistic stuff. That said, it also becomes even more difficult to understand. Take this choice quote about the magical power of art and fiction:

The tension between the actual and the possible is transfigured into an insoluble conflict, in which reconciliation is by grace of the oeuvre as form: beauty as the "promesse de bonheur." In the form of the oeuvre, the actual circumstances are placed in another dimension where the given reality shows itself as that which it is. Thus it tells the truth about itself; its language ceases to be that of deception, ignorance, and submission. Fiction calls the facts by their name and their reign collapses; fiction subverts everyday experience and shows it to be mutilated and false. But art has this magic power only as the power of negation. It can speak its own language only as long as the images are alive which refuse and refute the established order.

What on Earth is this supposed to mean? He just drops that and moves on, as if we’re all supposed to nod and agree with him.

His argument, essentially, is that literature is really great. It delivers deep, fundamental truths about society and nature that mere essays can’t deliver. Perhaps that’s why this book is written in the way it is- he doesn’t think that a rational argument can get at the real truth? In fact, he believes that that literature (and art) are so powerful that they have the potential to end capitalism:

The truth of literature and art has always been granted (if it was granted at all) as one of a "higher" order, which should not and indeed did not disturb the order of business.

So, art and literature are so powerful because of how true they are to human nature. But that sort of thing is dangerous to a capitalist society built on exploiting its workers, so we segregate the fine arts off into their own special category that has nothing to do with real life. Marcuse seems to believe that we would be better off integrating the ineffable artistic spirit with rational logic in all parts of life, which I guess is part of why this book is written in such a grandiose, perplexing way.

The book gets more spicy when he starts talking about sex. Marcuse puts the “Freud” into Freudo-Marxism. For example:

This socialization is not contradictory but complementary to the de-erotization of the environment. Sex is integrated into work and public relations and is thus made more susceptible to (controlled) satisfaction. Technical progress and more comfortable living permit the systematic inclusion of libidinal components into the realm of commodity production and exchange. But no matter how controlled the mobilization of instinctual energy may be (it sometimes amounts to a scientific management of libido), no matter how much it may serve as a prop for the status quo – it is also gratifying to the managed individuals, just as racing the outboard motor, pushing the power lawn mower, and speeding the automobile are fun.

Or…

In contrast to the pleasures of adjusted desublimation, sublimation preserves the consciousness of the renunciations which the repressive society inflicts upon the individual, and thereby preserves the need for liberation. To be sure, all sublimation is enforced by the power of society, but the unhappy consciousness of this power already breaks through alienation. To be sure, all sublimation accepts the social barrier to instinctual gratification, but it also transgresses this barrier.

His main idea here is a duality of Freudian “sublimation” with what he calls the “desublimation” of sexual emotions. As animals, humans have natural sexual impulses which don’t fit in to modern society. Those impulses can be repressed, but they don’t go away. So they are “sublimated” into other activities like work, sports, artistic creation etc. If you ever find yourself wondering “why is there *so much* time and money being devoted to some pointless activity,” there’s a good chance that it’s because that “pointless” activity is an outlet for our libido.

But desublimation, as described in this book, goes one step farther. It “unhides” the sexual impulses, in a way that it can still be consistent with a modern consumerist society. So now, through commercialized sexuality in media, fashion, pornography, etc, our repressed libidos are channeled right back into overt sexuality. You might think that this would be liberating. But no- Marcuse argues that this is just another rung on the capitalist ratchet of repression and alienation:

1. It is created and controlled by capitalism for its own interests of generating more consumption.

2. It replaces more radical and transgressive forms of sexuality/pleasure with commodified, conformist versions.

3. It makes people more docile and content to remain part of the oppressive capitalist system.

So desublimation gives the illusion of freedom from repression, when in reality it is just another form of social control. True liberation, for Marcuse, requires breaking free of this "repressive desublimation." Or as he puts it:

Freed from the sublimated form which was the very token of its irreconcilable dreams – a form which is the style, the language in which the story is told – sexuality turns into a vehicle for the bestsellers of oppression. It could not be said of any of the sexy women in contemporary literature what Balzac says of the whore Esther: that hers was the tenderness which blossoms only in infinity. This society turns everything it touches into a potential source of progress and of exploitation, of drudgery and satisfaction, of freedom and of oppression. Sexuality is no exception.

I find myself conflicted about this. It’s easy to criticize how many problems there are in modern society relating to sexuality, and it’s undeniable that it’s a bit crass how sexuality is exploited for things like advertisements or to get people addicted on shitty mobile games. But I also found myself asking, “so what’s the solution?” If we can’t just be wild animals, and we can’t repress our sexuality like the Victorians, and we can’t express it through convenient consumer packages, how the hell *can* we express it?

It goes back to that Marxist utopianism- a sort of sci-fi fantasy that in the future, everything will be so much better that all these problems will disappear. So first, all the factories get automated and become so productive that there is material for all, and no one is forced to work anymore— “from each according to his need.” Then, we give people an "aesthetic dimension" where art, creativity, and sensuality could become the "forms of a universe of human relationships no longer mediated by things" and “liberate Eros.” It’s all very vague, but it sounds nice.

To make money we have to mold ourselves into being a good worker, which means not only having the right work skills, but also changing your personality to fit the organization. You should present the image of a man who has no wild emotions or independent desires, only the urge to show up on time, work at maximum speed, and wear a cheery professional smile the entire time. Sexuality, of course, is out of the question, and all other necessary biological functions should be reserved for specific break times and hidden out of sight.

I do sympathize with how awful that can be. I’ve worked in crappy, repressive jobs before and it’s miserable. Still, to some degree, it just seems… necessary? If you want to get any work done you have to repress your base instincts sometimes, that’s just part of being human. Every child learns that as they grow up.

Reasoning against Reason

Marcuse does not have a very good opinion about rationality. If he was alive today, I’m pretty sure he would hate the entire rationalist movement. At first I thought he was simply pointing out the limits of human reasoning and the impossibility of reaching absolute truth, in the same vein as Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. He goes through various versions of this argument, from the classical (how does one generalize from specific observations to the universal? How can we be sure about the validity of our senses?) to the more modern (Karl Popper’s argument that a scientific theory can never be proven correct, and the inherent uncertainty in quantum physics).

But he goes on from there to a stranger, more political argument, where rationality leads to exploitation and human suffering:

To be sure, the “objective order of things” is itself the result of domination, but it is nevertheless true that domination now generates a higher rationality – that of a society which sustains its hierarchic structure while exploiting ever more efficiently the natural and mental resources, and distributing the benefits of this exploitation on an ever-larger scale. The limits of this rationality, and its sinister force, appear in the progressive enslavement of man by a productive apparatus which perpetuates the struggle for existence and extends it to a total international struggle which ruins the lives of those who build and use this apparatus.

The style of the book makes it difficult to follow his actual argument here. I keep waiting for him to give me some specific examples, or break it down into simpler terms, or at least repeat himself in different words. But he just refuses to do that, and instead continues moving on to the next topic of bold claims in dense philosophical language.

I suppose that’s the point. How can you make a rational argument against rationality? It has to come from somewhere else, which for him is that “higher order” of art.

I think his real objection isn’t some deep philosophical argument that pure reason is impossible, but that it is simply impractical in our world. For one thing, only the idle rich have enough time, energy, and education to appreciate philosophy, while the working poor are too busy striving for survival to think about such matters. EG, the only reason that I was able to read this crazy book is because I am temporarily unemployed and have time on my hands, as well as some college coursework in philosophy. A normal person would not be able to read this book. And since we have only limited amounts of brain power, it leads to a sort of flawed, short-term rationality with disastrous long-term results:

Once again: the insanity of the whole absolves the particular insanities and turns the crimes against humanity into a rational enterprise. When the people, aptly stimulated by the public and private authorities, prepare for lives of total mobilization, they are sensible not only because of the present Enemy, but also because of the investment and employment possibilities in industry and entertainment. Even the most insane calculations are rational: the annihilation of five million people is preferable to that of ten million, twenty million, and so on. It is hopeless to argue that a civilization which justifies its defense by such a calculus proclaims its own end.

Which… yes? I would have said that it’s obviously rational to kill fewer people to save the larger number. But Marcuse seems to think we need to rise above such petty bean-counting if we want to prevent war, and likewise that we need to rise above what seems to be the airtight logic of industrial capitalism if we want to end exploitation and live proper human lives.

He does give one example of this petty, machine-like capitalist reasoning that he’s against: the study of labor relations in the Hawthorne Works of the Western Electric Company. The workers there, in the mid 1920s, were on strike for a variety of reasons. The management wanted the strike to end, so they asked for some specific changes they could make to reach an agreement. The workers were vague, grumbling about low wages, dangerous jobs, and a terrible work environment. The management pushed back, saying this was still too vague, you have to give us something specific.

They talked more, and one of the things that came up was that the restrooms were “unsanitary.” It doesn’t go into details, but I would imagine that a blue collar worker in the 1920s would have pretty low standards for a restroom. I can only imagine that it must have been nightmarish for the workers to actually list that as one of their main complaints in the strike. Except that it wasn’t really their main complaint, it was just one of many, but it was something specific that the management could act on. So they put up signs in the bathroom with new rules, and also added a full time restroom attendant to make sure the rules were followed.

Problem solved, right? Now the bathrooms were clean. Except that the only reason they’re now clean is that another poor worker has to sit and guard them all day. It did nothing to solve the larger, tougher problems about why the workers were messing up the bathrooms in the first place- were they so short on time they had no time to clean? Was this some sort of protest against the company? Was the company hiring idiots and sociopaths who deliberately messed up the bathroom to make life miserable for everyone else? There’s no reason why a bathroom should be in such a terrible state- you can go in any normal person’s bathroom and it’s fine, because humans have a natural desire for cleanliness. Something deeper was happening here to make the workers miserable, and the company had absolutely no desire to fix it besides doing the bare minimum to get them back to work. The management was willing to negotiate on specific things like a pay raise or new rules for bathroom breaks, but they couldn’t negotiate on “we’re all so miserable that some people have taken to wrecking the bathroom to have some sort of petty revenge against the company.”

Conclusions

I have no conclusions.

I don’t think that’s a cop-out. This book just resists any simple summary. If I reduce it to simple bullet points, I’m falling into the same trap of limited-rationality “one-dimensional thinking” that the book is criticizing! Instead I should… what? Listen to a glorious opera, gaze upon an artistic masterpiece, and then go off to defy the norms of society with a wild bacchanalian orgy?

That’s really my main criticism of the book- I don’t know what he wants us to do about any of this stuff. I know what Marx advocated- I don’t agree but at least I understand it. But for Marcuse, I have no idea. He’s intensely political, but doesn’t seem to offer any political solutions. I came away with the feeling that I had read something brilliant and profound, but utterly unable to do anything with it.

And that’s where I do feel a bit angry. Like the Feynman anecdote from the start, or more recently the Sokal affair where a physicist published an article called “"Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity" as a hoax, I do come away feeling that a lot of this is just unnecessarily complex. Marcuse, like many critical theory writers, was deliberately writing in a way to make himself sound smart while obscuring the actual meaning. No one could argue against him because they couldn’t figure out what he was talking about, and no one wants to be the one to admit ignorance.

And that’s a shame, because there really are many interesting ideas in this book. As I read it, I kept having the oddest whiplash, where sometimes he would say something I agreed with, followed by something that I disagreed with strongly, and then something so vague it could mean almost anything, but then follow it all up with a brilliant piece of insight. I was glad that I could read it now, with the help of wikipedia and AI to decipher its meanings, rather than trying to struggle through it alone like a 1970s grad student would have done.

It’s impressive that this book was written in the 1960s, based on ideas from even earlier, and yet I find its ideas still resonate today. The inflation-adjusted gdp per capita in the US back then was about $30,000. Now it’s more than twice that high, and rising ever higher each year thanks to amazing new technology. And yet we don’t find ourselves in any way liberated from material concerns, at least not for the average worker- we are very much still worried about unemployment, healthcare, housing, education, etc. There are concerns that soon AI will make workers obsolete and usher in a massive wave of unemployment, but they had those same concerns about “automated factories” in the past, both in the 1960s and certainly in the 1930s when Marxism surged in popularity.

I’ve done my best, with this review, to select some of the more interesting ideas and critique them. Perhaps that’s ultimately the real goal of this book- not to make a definitive argument on anything, but to stimulate ideas from others across a wide range of topics. And in that, if nothing else, it succeeds brilliantly. I can see why this and other critical theory works led to so much excitement in the academic humanities.

But I still wish that they would slow down and say what they mean and let us refute them with clear logic.