War and Peace in the Global Village

By Marshall McLuhan War and Peace in The Global Village is a collage of images and text that sharply illustrates the effects of electronic media and new technology on man. Marshall McLuhan wrote this book thirty years ago as a sequel to The Medium is the Massage, and following its publication predicted that the forthcoming information age would be “a transitional era of profound pain and tragic identity quest.” McLuhan outlines how all social changes are caused by introduction of new technologies. He interprets these new technologies as extensions or “self-amputations of our own being,” because technologies extend bodily reach. Computers have become extensions of our central nervous system, and most tech-related innovations have a profound effect on our emotions and sensibilities. McLuhan’s ideas and observations seem disturbingly accurate and clearly applicable to the world in which we live. War and Peace in the Global Village at the current moment becomes a meditation on accelerating