The religion of the machine age

FIRST EDITION, published 1983 by Routledge & Kegan Paul. xviii, 267pp, bibliography, index. The author was the wife of Bertrand Russell. Publisher's statement: "Dora Russell's involvement in world affairs spans most of the twentieth century. Bron in 1894, she is now an inspiration for, and becoming a symbol of, movements for peace and freedom. The Religion of the Machine Age has taken 61 years to come to fruition and publication; the first chapter ('The Soul of Russia and the Body of America', which appears here as a preface) was written in 1922. The book as it has finally been written is more topical now than when it was first commissioned in 1923. Dora Russell has written a history of humankind's beliefs and ideas--a defence of right to survive in this 'machine' age of ours. She asks why, how and when humanity began to make machines at all. This leads her to survey the development of male consciousness over the centuries, ending in an almost religious worship of the machine, engendered by mathematics and science. Dora Russell's exploration encompasses history from the primitive to the present, from hunting and gathering societies to a society that has experienced the Falklands war and is now living through a new recession, in the shadow of annihilation. The book as a whole reflects the two aims which Dora Russell declares have determined her life: to liberate women and to try to end the Cold War."