Technology In Brave New World
I. Introduction
Brave New World, written by Aldous Huxley in 1931, shows a fictional dystopian society located in London that greatly relies on technology and rejects today’s values such as love, family and emotion in order to achieve maximum societal stability and gain a false sense of happiness. The novel grasps concepts of futurology, which bolster the idea of the book satirizing modern society and showing what it could become. In the not so distant future, the novel predicts that humans will innovate technology and enable it to control the genes of the community members and continue to mold them using repetitive hypnotic treatments and other mentally challenging processes. Manipulation of such reproductive and mind altering procedures …show more content…
People were stripped of the ability to be an individual, given drugs (soma) to feel happy and avoid the facing the realities of their current situations. The novel also praises the works of Henry Ford as they use his name in place of God’s and model the society after the assembly line and mass production. It continues to show how the community is influenced by machines and industry to create a sense of uniformity, conformity and efficiency. The author’s attitude about the importance of technology and science is that it can transform life completely and negatively affect society. People are taught to gratify their needs with the simple consumption of soma and to avoid personal connections. Wants such as sex, happiness and material goods are almost immediately attained so that negative feelings will not influence anybody to stray from their job or role to the system. In order for the society to function as a whole in this novel, every member is “programmed” to fit in, engage in sexually satisfying acts with others without establishing a personal relationship, and keep away from finding the truth about life as we know it. Although, the State seems to function well, it is still considered a dystopia due to it’s lack of truth, free will and ability for …show more content…
The Humans are categorized into such groups before they are “born” (live birth no longer exists and test tube babies are made instead). Alphas, the superior class, are enhanced with the best genes to make them taller, stronger, and smarter and so forth. The lower caste embryos are intentionally maimed and undergo cruel tests to alter their genes and let their physical form show inferiority. One process mentioned in the novel to disadvantage these low class humans was to “put alcohol into [their] blood-surrogate” (46). The alteration of genes shows great importance in the story. As an Alpha, Bernard Marx, is constantly troubled by his physical deficiency caused by alcohol accidentally mixed into his blood. Several other methods are used to differentiate the castes from each other. For example, to harm the brains of the Epsilons and other low status embryos, (they are made for factory/manual labor and are believed not to need intelligence for such a job) they are put under an oxygen shortage. Mr. Foster, an Alpha working in the Hatching Center, even exclaims “nothing like oxygen-shortage for keeping an embryo below par,” (14) proving that they use technology to put limitations on the different social classes. In a Brave New World, technology was manipulated to shape the community, their physical and mental features. By doing this, the gap between social classes becomes more
Brave New World, written by Aldous Huxley in 1931, shows a fictional dystopian society located in London that greatly relies on technology and rejects today’s values such as love, family and emotion in order to achieve maximum societal stability and gain a false sense of happiness. The novel grasps concepts of futurology, which bolster the idea of the book satirizing modern society and showing what it could become. In the not so distant future, the novel predicts that humans will innovate technology and enable it to control the genes of the community members and continue to mold them using repetitive hypnotic treatments and other mentally challenging processes. Manipulation of such reproductive and mind altering procedures …show more content…
People were stripped of the ability to be an individual, given drugs (soma) to feel happy and avoid the facing the realities of their current situations. The novel also praises the works of Henry Ford as they use his name in place of God’s and model the society after the assembly line and mass production. It continues to show how the community is influenced by machines and industry to create a sense of uniformity, conformity and efficiency. The author’s attitude about the importance of technology and science is that it can transform life completely and negatively affect society. People are taught to gratify their needs with the simple consumption of soma and to avoid personal connections. Wants such as sex, happiness and material goods are almost immediately attained so that negative feelings will not influence anybody to stray from their job or role to the system. In order for the society to function as a whole in this novel, every member is “programmed” to fit in, engage in sexually satisfying acts with others without establishing a personal relationship, and keep away from finding the truth about life as we know it. Although, the State seems to function well, it is still considered a dystopia due to it’s lack of truth, free will and ability for …show more content…
The Humans are categorized into such groups before they are “born” (live birth no longer exists and test tube babies are made instead). Alphas, the superior class, are enhanced with the best genes to make them taller, stronger, and smarter and so forth. The lower caste embryos are intentionally maimed and undergo cruel tests to alter their genes and let their physical form show inferiority. One process mentioned in the novel to disadvantage these low class humans was to “put alcohol into [their] blood-surrogate” (46). The alteration of genes shows great importance in the story. As an Alpha, Bernard Marx, is constantly troubled by his physical deficiency caused by alcohol accidentally mixed into his blood. Several other methods are used to differentiate the castes from each other. For example, to harm the brains of the Epsilons and other low status embryos, (they are made for factory/manual labor and are believed not to need intelligence for such a job) they are put under an oxygen shortage. Mr. Foster, an Alpha working in the Hatching Center, even exclaims “nothing like oxygen-shortage for keeping an embryo below par,” (14) proving that they use technology to put limitations on the different social classes. In a Brave New World, technology was manipulated to shape the community, their physical and mental features. By doing this, the gap between social classes becomes more