...The Longer Lasting World Brave New World and 1984 are two novels that both take place in a totalitarian world; however the two worlds are very different. Huxley explains a world where the only things that are forbidden is having babies, being unhappy/questioning the state, and refusing to do the jobs and duties assigned to them. Contrastingly, 1984 is much more restrictive in the fact that they have complete control over the people, not allowing them to find love, not giving them privacy, nor allowing them to think badly about the government. Furthermore, in 1984 the government puts effort in inducing fear in the citizens by saying that they are in war, and they also use threats of torture if someone steps out of line, even in the slightest. Although both regimes control their citizens through the destruction of social relations, technology and controlling their sense of freedom, Huxley’s world state will clearly outlive Orwell’s party because Brave New World supports the development of a blissfully ignorant society, thus preventing rebellion, whereas 1984’s use of fear will inevitably destroy the stability of the nation. In addition to their methods, the destruction of social relations is something that appears in both texts. In Brave New World, sex is encouraged because it keeps people happy, though love is not. The state does not encourage the people to fall in love with someone because love leads to the want to start a family and have kids. Although both societies do...
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...dominant theme.” To what extent do ‘1984’ and ‘Brave New World’ depict a dehumanised society? Both Orwell’s ‘1984’ and Huxley’s ‘Brave New World’ certainly deny humanness to the characters in their novels. Kelman defines humanness as having two key attributes, identity and community. Dehumanisation occurs when these are removed from society. It is true that individuality is denied to citizens and although the community remains, it is subverted in order to fit the government ideal. It can therefore be said that dehumanisation occurs as people are denied and identity and the true meaning of community which is the perception that a person is part of an interconnected community of individuals. Dystopian literature serves to critique the current social and political conditions by looking at potential conditions. Both novels were written when the fear of growing totalitarian governments was present. The novels are a prediction of what may happen to society if this power grows worldwide. In 1946, Orwell wrote "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it." Around the time Huxley wrote ‘Brave New World’ there had been huge discoveries made in science and technology, Huxley took these and created a dystopia that uses technology to trick citizens into loving their slavery. The governments in both ‘1984’ and ‘Brave New World’ dehumanise people in order to maintain their...
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...Brave New World Brave New World is a form of utopian literature. It’s an imaginary society organized to create ideal conditions for human beings, eliminating hatred, pain, neglect, and all of the other evils of the world. The novel takes place in 632 A.F. (After Ford, the god of the New World). It takes place in a time where man is desperate for beliefs (and structures also a relief from pain.). All civilization has been destroyed by a great war. Then there is another war, the Nine Years War, which begins the era of Ford, ensuring stability through dictatorship. The society in Brave new world is based on a strict caste system. The highest of the five castes enjoy easier and better tasks, while the lower ones perform unskilled and all the dirty jobs. Ten Controllers hold all the power in this new world and peace is maintained by training infant minds and by dulling down adults with the tranquilizer, “soma.” The population is further controlled through scientific methods; marriage is forbidden, and children are not born but produced in an embryo factory THEME: Science and its influences on humanity is the major theme of Brave New World. The novel depicts a new society where human beings have been stripped of individual freedom, programmed to certain types of behavior, and conditioned to respond in scientific ways to specific stimulants. All traces of the old order have been eliminated. No longer are human emotions or relationships important. Infants are created in...
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...Scientism and Technocracy in Brave New World Introduction Brave New World is well recognized as a dystopian novel, in which Aldous Huxley satirically criticized scientism and technocracy. In this new world, science and technology was paramount. It dominated all aspects of human life. Humans were mass produced in laboratory and factories; human moral value were moulded by sleeping teaching; human emotions were controlled by soma. The overuse of science and technology reduced humans to one-dimensional man without individuality and the ability of critical thinking. Human beings were used as tools for political and economic purposes. The thesis is to study scientism and technocracy, the "improper application of science to human life", from two aspects: the interference with human physical life and the elimination of human spiritual life. Scientism and Technocracy Scientism, according to Zhu Wang, is "an excessive belief in the power of scientific knowledge and technology to solve all human problems including spiritual crisis" (194). It is "the authority of natural sciences, dominating all aspects of human life and rejecting religion, philosophy, art, and literature" (194). In Brave New World, Huxley depicted a dystopian society to condemn the excessive use of science and technology which eliminated human individuality and civilization. He pointed out in his Complete Essays Vol.6 that science was "the reduction of multiplicity to unity….the theoretical reduction...
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...Brave New World and The Time Machine Critically explore the extent to which the personal themes in Well’s THE TIME MACHINE (1895) and Huxley’s BRAVE NEW WORLD (1932) responded to the prevailing ideologies of social class that were present in England at their time of writing Keep in mind Wells wrote/rewrote The Time Machine, on and off, for around 12 years before it saw publication. Brave New World was apparently written in 1931 (and so the sharp change in ideas caused by the Great Depression could have shaped the novel.) Society is defined as “the aggregate of people living together in an ordered community” (http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/society). Every nation on this planet is comprised of many societies which all differ in their own ways. As time passes, society itself changes. The morals or beliefs that a society once stood by overtime, radically change to form a newer, revolutionized set of ideas. Fields like science and technology reach their most advanced states. Members of a society can also change. In most cases, members develop according to the new rules or ideals that are of the norm. Some changes are for the betterment of society while others prove to have more negative impacts. These are all changes one can expect when time travelling. Although, one cannot prepare themselves for the societies I have recently seen. Throughout my time travelling I have never come across two societies so strange. Both societies were of terrifying living conditions. One can...
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...Brave New World by Aldous Huxley Brave New world is a dystopian novel written in England in 1931 and published in 1932 during the Modernism literary period. The setting of the novel is in London and New Mexico ruled under an imagined future one-world government called the World State. The World State of Brave New World is a totalitarian dystopia that uses technology to, deceive its citizens into loving their slavery. Dystopia is a society, in this case the World State, that is an imaginary society organized to create ideal conditions for human beings, eliminating hatred, pain, neglect, and all of the other evils of the world. Huxley wrote Brave New World as a dystopian novel due to the rise of technology and science in the 1930s, focusing on the totalitarianism evils (meaning centralized or dictatorial). Huxley imagined a future of a totalitarian state where there is no such thing as freedom of anything and happiness was forced through manipulation, called conditioning in the novel. When Huxley wrote Brave New World, it was just a little over a decade since World War I. During this time, totalitarian states were popping up in the Soviet Union and Fascist parties were gaining power in Europe. Also, there were advancements in science, technology, and the relationship between the two as the world became more industrialized. Aldous Huxley was born in Surrey, England, on July 26, 1894, to a well-known family of scientists, writers, and teachers deeply rooted in England’s literary...
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...A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley is a dystopian novel of the early 1930s, gives a new definition to a functioning society. Throughout this novel, characters are not allowed to have an individual thought process, as they thought it could be dangerous to society. As you read, Bernard is the only character born in the "New World" that does not fit within societal norms, no matter what he tries to do. In the book, you can see that Bernard is not the only socially outcast person, as John the Savage, Linda's son, is too. Literary perspectives such as social class, gender, and feminist that are main supplements to this story. This dystopian society is separate from the outside lands or known as "savage lands." The "new world" is based on conditioning...
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...advances in technology, science, and social organization can produce an improvement in the human condition. That is, people can become happier in terms of quality of life (social progress) through economic development (modernization) and the application of science and technology (scientific progress). Progress implies change and evolution and throughout history most advances have been positive. However the rythm of progress seems to have accelerated over the last few decades and the technological breakthrough and scientific developments are causing some people to question this progress. Should we fear progress ? To answer this question I will present three documents. The first document I have choosen is an excerpt from “O brave new world” by Aldous Huxley. O brave new world is a dystopian novel which anticipates developments in reproductive technology, sleeplearning, psychological manipulation and classical conditioning that combine profoundly to change society. The extract is about reproductive technology. The D.H.C (Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning) is talking about the Bokanovsky’s Progress to a group of students. Humans grow in incubators. Before this progress, they only grew one by one in incubator but with a bokanovskyfied egg it’s possible to make 96 humans grow. Later in the excerpt he explains that these 96 persons will be twins and will work on identical machines. There will be millions of identicals twins. In this world the principle of mass production...
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...fascinating aspects of Brave New World for me is that it epitomises the pursuit of physical perfection and treatment of the notion of female beauty. In my opinion, Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World conditions people into the ‘perfect human’ leading then to the ‘ideal society’ that Brave New World is about. This is a precise reflection of today’s society and our so called ‘obsession for physical perfection’. You see, in Brave New world, humans never have to think of dieting, plastic surgery,...
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...Our Future with Science and Technology In Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, Huxley describes a chilling vision of a totalitarian society ruled by both manipulation and conditioning of its' citizens. It ways eighty one years ago that Huxley made this fictional world into a piece of literature that still resonates with his readers today. Social engineering and technology of modern society were either at its' infancy or not even created yet when Huxley wrote his book. The maturity of these ideologies and technologies that makes Brave New World touch close to home. Is it possible to bring a world of chaos to order or is it just a proclivity of the human condition? In Utopia by Sir Thomas More, the city Amaurot is the city of Hythloday's research of Utopian society. His mention of the lack of privacy among its' citizens can be very relevant to today. While we can still lock our doors and windows, close our curtains and blinds, the amount of privacy one has has been increasingly diminishing. With the advent of federal approbation of various ways of the government to invade on a person's right to privacy is a slow progression to the possibility of losing our privacy completely. Others argue that discretion of these actions should not be a worry of the common citizen. They argue that if you have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide. It is a way of justification of a deplorable act on our everyday privacy. And the debate will only continue to escalate as the rapid evolution...
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...Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World” in the Contemporary Context As the dominant intelligent being on earth, the human society has evolved to increasingly sophisticated yet convenience-oriented faction of the earth’s population. The various challenges that faced ancient man have been decimated significantly by the modern progresses. These developments are somewhere along the estimations of Huxley in his book “Brave New World” despite its futuristic setting, 600 years from now. The similarity of his fictional society to the current world is worryingly accurate, let alone the concerns that he claims to plague the society at the time. Furthermore, the increasingly liberal nature of the modern society is akin to that of the future described by Huxley,...
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...empty entertainment to keep a community thriving, Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World depicts a distorted society by over exaggerating the use of new technological advances and unemotional lifestyle. Throughout the novel, a futuristic, highly advanced world is illustrated based on the activities the people of the new world society partake in and the creation and decanting of the humans. This brave new world created is an exaggerated form of life today by emphasizing high technology and erotic and i satisfying entertainment distort life and create a false sense of a pure, perfect society. Continually, the use of technology plays a large part in the society because the use of technology...
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...Shakespeare’s plays, especially King Lear, in Brave New World .Often times both authors use Aristotelian conventions like reversal or recognition or they use motifs like those about clothes and God. They use these concepts to inform their respective audiences of the irony in the words “civilization” and “nobility”. They relay to the audience that nobility and baseness are not determined by birth, but rather by action. The writers juxtapose opposing concepts like savagery and civilization or nobility and baseness to allow the audience to understand that these terms are ironic. Similarly, they use techniques like reversal and recognition with motifs like those concerning clothes to express the same message. Initially Huxley uses the motif of nobility to show that his views on nobility are similar to those of Shakespeare, as he believes nobility should be based on ones actions. In King Lear Shakespeare repeatedly refers to Burgundy as “noble Burgundy” (1.1.223). He does this in order to show the irony in calling him noble as Burgundy is noble by birth, but not by action. This is obvious when Burgundy dismisses the idea of marrying Cordelia, once Lear removes her dowry, which in his eyes makes her worthless while in the eyes of France her worth does not change. Huxley uses the same motif to emphasize that there is a lack of nobility in the World State. In Kazi 2 Brave New World John Savage is one of the only people in the World State who has a proper understanding of what...
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...In the world of Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, everyone is happy, society is stable and peaceful, and the world seems like a utopia. Every person enjoys life and faces no problems or deals with hardships. In reality, the civilization is stable, but only because everyone chooses not to deal with their problems and escapes multiple displeasures through different means. Happiness is prioritized over everything else and everyone chooses to remain happy instead of facing truth or other conflicts. The civilization in Brave New World thus, is more dystopian than utopian. The major detrimental effects of this society are its use of escapism as an everyday application, and how that it deteriorates the psychology of each person. The detrimental effects of this society apply to the real world....
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...Dystopia: The World Today Introduction Written in 1931 and published a year after, The Brave New World (1932) contradicts the idea of Utopia (perfect world); a type of novel that queries the values of 1931 London using satire to dramatically represent a futuristic world in which occurring fads in British and America have been taken to extremity. People from The World State are living peacefully, free from any kind of war, abhorrence, impecuniousness, illness and physical sufferings. The novel depicts a potentially perfect world, not to mention people can enjoy wealth in terms of material possessions and all form of pleasures. Using high technology, human beings no longer have to conceive. They are created in factories wherein they are being prepared for future lives. The children are raised altogether and minds are controlled through sleep-teaching to further enhance their condition. As they turn to be adults, people are already destined to certain classes. And if one was unfortunately destined to be of the lower class, he would be raised to generally like the kind of life designated to him and be trained not to like nor appreciate - basically to the extent of being manipulated - other roles but theirs. They are subjected to engage or yield themselves in totally harmless entertainment and physical activities as form of leisure. There are several anticipations which were depicted by Huxley in The Brave New World. Although some of them may not be totally proven by this time,...
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