How the Rise of Geopolitics Invalidates Huxley's Fears of the Future

           Unlike fine wine, it seems, Aldous Huxley’s analysis does not improve with age. Or stay valid for that matter. His 1958 book Brave New World Revisited details how the very fantasies he described in Brave New World are materializing much faster than expected. The rise of totalitarian regimes around the world coupled with new advances in technology created an environment conducive to the tyrannical future Huxley outlined in his groundbreaking novel. While the world Huxley lived in was a very fair comparison to the future he predicted in Brave New World, the current international system does not permit the political hypotheses he puts forth in his book.

            In Brave New World Revisited, Huxley explains that one of the leading factors of the Brave New World complex is immense overpopulation. As it is, the birth rate is generally more difficult to control than the death rate, as birth control depends on the will of the people whereas death control depends on the will of the government. As our world population grows quicker than it dies out, we face incremental increases in population size. In underdeveloped countries, oversized populations place considerable strain on an already beleaguered pool of economic resources – land, labor, and capital. Thus, the government must intervene more in order to allocate these stretched out resources and provide for the welfare of their people. Huxley fears larger populations will create the need for larger governments to the extent that they become totalitarian.

            What does this mean for first world countries where economic resources are abundant? As Huxley posits, “If over-population should drive the underdeveloped countries into totalitarianism, and if these new dictatorships should ally themselves with Russia, then the military position of the United States would become less secure and the preparations for defense and retaliation would have to be intensified” (Huxley 11). Hostility and global aggression at this scale will force the US, along with the rest of the West, into totalitarianism. Perhaps staggering insight in the 1950s, this claim contains massive untruths in 2014. Of course, the blame lies not on Huxley for he could not have foreseen today’s international political landscape the way it is. But the greatest error in Brave New World Revisited is that it overestimates the scope of Russian aggression. With new industrial powers in play today and a plethora of new countries, Russian aggression would not be directed at the United States but at its closest neighbors – bordering countries.

            The dissolution of the Soviet Union occurred in the early 90s and Chinese industrialization took hold in the 70s. As autonomous states, China and former Soviet nations would be the primary obstacles to a Russian campaign of aggression. Although these countries were not barriers to Russian influence in Huxley’s time, political realities have shifted.  In fact, no other country better speaks to the current extent of Russian aggression than Ukraine, who is currently grappling for autonomy from Russia. So, long before the country could even attempt to elicit a response from the West, Russia would have to deal with its borders, allowing plenty of time for the USA and our European allies to build up defenses and resist the very wave of totalitarianism that Huxley cautions against.

            Once again, Huxley is certainly not at fault for the non-universality of his writing, for international politics is always fluctuating. While the Brave New World future itself seems more and more doubtful, the quality of the novel remains one of the best in its genre.

Works Cited

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World Revisited. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1958. Print. 

Style Challenge

            Weeping girls; scared women, blonde, brown-haired, and curled; shiny knights; wealthy men and proletariats; all from the palace, all from vending fruit, from sweeping the streets with the carelessness born of boredom, and rushed to the perimeter of the kingdom to relinquish their sadness, if they could. The weather was dreadful, the air suffocating, the humidity thick as if an ocean inhabited at the atmosphere. Perspiring, marching with haste, gossiping about the fate of a doomed neighbor, the villagers and the knights descended upon the great barrier that separates their great kingdom from the sprawling countryside, a region ripe with thieves, crazed wanderers, and despicable beasts. Oh how exciting was the scene, oh how depressing was the scene; the setting sun seemed full of hope, the setting sun seemed full of dread; the pathway to the lost friend was paved with happiness ever after, was paved with sadness ever after. Now, now, now was the time to act.

            In a frenzy of motion all the village men acquired their supplies and their composure (the ladies fetched pails of water and food for it was going to be a long day at the edge of town). The knights burst through the crowd with their ladders, and, riding their horses, they approached the immense brick wall that separated their humble kingdom from the chaotic wilderness that surrounded them. One by one, the knights lined up to the wall and linked their ladders together using the hardware supplied to them by the generous village men. Each man whispered words of encouragement and hope to the other; they were determined to rescue their poor, lost king from the top of the wall.

            King Hubert was a unique personality; frizzy, unkempt, black hair; eggshell white skin; bright blue eyes and dark pupils. What a man he was in his youth, always concerned for the welfare and happiness of subjects, always the best in the practice of diplomacy. But then his sons died in battle. Oh he could not bear their loss; the poor man went mad months after and periodically wound up in the strangest of places, like today, he sat mysteriously atop the outer brick wall of the kingdom.

            Frantically, the knights tried to scale the immense barrier that currently served throne to their deranged leader. Shouting words of hope, the knights exclaimed that they would be up soon, that he need not worry, and that he must absolutely not leap from the towering wall. But those words fell silent to the ears of the king who sat and stared at the horizon dreaming of his boys who lay asleep, cradled in the arms of angels. Ignoring the pleas and the cries of the knights and the village men and the village ladies, the king jumped from the wall and hurtled toward the ground below. Smashed and dull, his golden crown drifted in the pool of blood that formed at the feet of a most saddened, heavy-hearted people.

State-Sanctioned Science

           How reckless I used to be. I owe my life and status to the World State, yet my past behaviors defied the very foundation on which this great State was constructed. I thought I was intelligent, but really I was ignorant. I thought I was a scientist, but really I was a heretic. I’ve learned my lesson and I’m so very thankful I was given another chance. For the sake of our State and of humanity, I’m committed to upholding the very ideals I once neglected.

            I was in my prime, enjoying life’s greatest pleasures. Not yet 22, I obsessed over Electro-Magnetic Golf and had girls by the plenty - sometimes multiple girls a night, sometimes simultaneously. A pneumatics specialist by night, I was infinitely more surreptitious during the day. I was the Chief Biophysicist for the Centre of Hatcheries and Conditioning. My job was research-based. Officially, I was supposed to refine the Bovanovsky and Podsnap processes in order to surpass the embryo proliferation rates of our counterparts in Africa and Asia. But my office was laden with temptation. I dwelled in arm’s reach of the best technology, seemingly crafted by Ford himself. My workplace was my soma.

            In time, I became distracted from my job. I was constantly unfocused on the task at hand, electing to do my own research. Invigorated by the discoveries of Einstein and Tesla and Newton, I was most excited by the physical world and by the prospect of leaving my own mark on scientific history. As my focus increasingly eroded, I became invested in my own interests, ignoring the agenda of my employer, the State, and humanity. How reckless I used to be. But “Everyone belongs to everyone else” (Huxley 40). That famous bit of hypnopaedic wisdom gnawed at me, urging me to get back to work. I refused to listen and succumbed to my savage fantasies.

            Machines whirred, test tubes bubbled, and lights flashed. I was at home. My job was to find the best way to be productive. To squeeze the most human life from a single embryo. For a job that required the most productive outcome, I often observed, the process was highly inefficient. Alphas and Betas were manufactured solely to manufacture more Alphas and Betas. Human capital was always in high demand at the Hatchery. I wondered to myself: “Why not mechanize the Hatchery process? Why put people to work, when our machines could easily do the leg work?” After all, less time for work meant more time to indulge.

            Bit by bit, I materialized my dream. I was fueled by the desire for self-actualization. A bit of welding here, a bit of circuitry there. My pet project became my obsession. A metal arm slowly took shape. And then another arm, a pair of legs, a body, and finally a head. I kept thinking of that one verse from the Bible: “And I told them of the hand of my God that had been upon me for good, and also of the words that the king had spoken to me. And they said, “Let us rise up and build.” So they strengthened their hands for the good work” (Nehemiah 2:18). With my knowledge of the human body and my experience with mechanics, I created a robot. Proudly, I eyed my creation. Then the nagging feeling returned. “Everyone belongs to everyone else.”

            One day, I heard a knock on my office door. Frantically, I hid my robot under a blanket and I opened the door. The D.H.C. peered at me suspiciously. I quickly stood up straight and greeted him shyly.

“Hello,” the director gruffly responded.

“Would you like to come in?” I ventured. Without answering, the director stepped in drifted around my workplace.

“You’ve been awfully non-compliant lately,” he started. “We haven’t received a report from you in a month. Hatcheries in Africa and Asia continue to make advances in embryo-producing technologies, yet we remain idle. Your laziness and fruitlessness have begun to concern the administration, including myself.”

“I-I’m sorry. I’ll try to pick the pace,” I stammered. I prayed to Ford that he wouldn’t find the robot.

“Sure,” he grumbled. He stopped. Catching a glimmer of light from underneath the blanket, he walked toward my workbench. Suddenly, he yanked out the robot and started cackling madly.

“You fool. You thought you could trick the State,” then his tone took a dark turn, “but you have failed. Insolent child, you must know that your scientific foibles are prohibited in our society. You create for the State and for the State only. Not to satisfy some irrational dream you cherish. People must be put to work for without work there is no leisure. Happiness is dependent on work. You should be condemned for your sin. But your intellectual powers are immense, so I will offer you this: be exiled or accept training to become a World Controller.”

Any reasonable man would have accepted the latter option as I did. I quickly realized that my actions had unfettered the security of our great State. For in a State where stability and happiness reign supreme, the perception of science that dominated the era of Einstein and the other greats is only dangerous today.

Works Cited

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. New York: Harper & Bros., 1946. Print.

In the Spirit of Halloween

Out of darkness, came light. Out of irrationality, came rationality. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein charts the transition from Enlightenment ideals to the Romanticist school of thought. This harrowing tale recounts the experiences of Victor Frankenstein as he sets out to do what no other scientist has done before: create life. As piecemeal as Frankenstein’s monster, this tale stitches together varying perspectives to detail Victor’s journey of creating and confronting his demonic masterpiece. Grounded in the scientific method, Frankenstein’s approach to his work is certainly rational. However, his passionate urges and powerful obsessions ultimately reveal that his motives are highly romantic.

Frankenstein’s monster hesitates little to bite the hand that feeds him. His loneliness and hatred for his creator instigate him to murder Victor’s close friends and family. In a quest to avenge the deaths of his loved ones, Victor sets out to find the monster and kill him, laying the groundwork for his own certain doom. Some may speculate that Victor’s death is emblematic of the fall of reason in an emotionally charged world. However, it is not reason that guides Frankenstein to create the monster in the first place. Sure, his approach is logical and scientific, but his motive to create life aligns with the Romantic school of thought. That is, his desires are fed by passion rather than reason. So, Victor’s ultimate fall is not a “condemnation of Rationalism,” rather, it is simply a signal of the Romanticist strength. Shelley did not intend to demean Enlightenment ideals; instead, she wanted to delineate the comparative magnitude of passion. The monster, by extension, is born from emotion. It is no surprise then, that the monster himself sees the world through a Romantic lens. He simply wants to break free of the isolation that perpetuates his loneliness and his sadness.

Lastly, Frankenstein is novel not because the monster makes a nice Halloween prop. Victor Frankenstein, in his creation of the monster, is ultimately invested in the truth of life. This novel is timeless because we are an information-thirsty society. All of us are driven by the passion for knowledge. Social media and news represent the convergence of information, all that we seek in our modern era. The monster is Frankenstein’s vindication of his quest for knowledge in the natural sciences and in life. As humans, we think we are better off by knowing more. The true horror of Frankenstein, and the reason why it resonates loudly in modern culture, is because this novel perverts our mission to know by portraying the harms of seeking truth when unfounded by rationality.