An interesting article. But I find a couple of things about it odd. First, he says: > ... Amish practices are ultimately driven by religious belief: the techn

An interesting article. But I find a couple of things about it odd. First, he says: > ... Amish practices are ultimately driven by religious belief: the technological, environmental, social, and cultural consequences are secondary. They often don't have logical reasons for their policies. Of course, there is no rule that says religion cannot be logical. Regardless, he says a little later: > Behind all of these variations is the Amish motivation to strengthen their communities. And then he spends several paragraphs giving a logical, well reasoned account of how various technologies (cars, electricity) were rejected because of their impact on the community. Second, while carefully explaining one group, the old-order Amish, he very much mischaracterizes another: the Luddites. These were not people who simply rejected all new technology; they were protestors against the social changes produced by the industrial revolution. And their protests sometimes took the form of violent destruction of textile factories. It seems they didn't want to be mere cogs in some huge corporate machine, a sentiment I think most of us can empathize with (regardless of whether we approve of their methods).