Coming out to tomorrow.

Coming out to tomorrow. Paul Kingsnorth’s new book Against the Machine is not about AI. It’s about us.

Kingsnorth doesn’t rant about robots taking jobs or killer drones patrolling the skies. He writes about something harder to face: how we’ve slowly built a Machine — industrial capitalism, digital infrastructure, global supply chains, and now AI — that has been unmaking us for centuries.
• The Machine tells us “progress” is inevitable.
• It replaces ritual with productivity, community with metrics, land with screens.
• It doesn’t just change how we work. It changes how we are.

This isn’t a tech book. It’s a spiritual manual for dissidents. Kingsnorth argues that the real battle is not about keeping up with AI — it’s about keeping hold of our souls while the sacred order that guided the West for 1,500 years crumbles into a pursuit of efficiency and profit.

Why does this matter in 2025?
Because while we argue about cyber regulations, AI ethics frameworks, or the next flashy SOC tool, we’re often ignoring the deeper shift: human beings becoming inputs in the Machine they built.

I don’t agree with everything Kingsnorth says — but his warning is clear: if we don’t actively resist, we won’t just lose jobs or privacy. We’ll lose our capacity for wonder, meaning, and even freedom.

Some books you read.
I expect this one will stare back at you.

Scott Gardner