Problem
Analysis provided by sociologist Kai Erikson in his essay, "Of Accidental Judgments and Casual Slaughters."
I. What is the "observation" about human decisions that Erikson presents on p. 128?
II. What is the passage from Shakespeare that President Truman's biographer Merle Miller found that the president had underlined?
III. Give one reason why Erikson thinks the phrase "decision to drop" should indeed appear in quotation marks.
IV. When Erikson writes, "I do want to ask, however, why that possibility was so easily dismissed," what possibility is he referring to?
V. What is Erikson's position on what he calls "the standard wisdom" that dropping the bombs prevented a high-casualty invasion of the Japanese mainland?