Support the IEET

The IEET is a 501(c)3 non-profit, tax-exempt organization registered in the State of Connecticut in the United States. Please give as you are able, and help support our work for a brighter future.

Via PayPal

Technoprogressive? BioConservative? Huh?
Quick overview of biopolitical points of view

Ayesha Khanna interviewed by NY Times

David Brin’s EXISTENCE: Official Trailer

How to Talk to an Alien

Religion, Witch Hunts, Homophobia and Human Rights in Africa

At-Home HIV Test Raises Ethical Questions

‪Human Trafficking of Sex Workers‬

Sex Work – Demeaning Practice or Basic Human Right?

Yes, I Am a Believer

Bostrom & Cascio @ Astana Economic Forum

We Are Borg

Manna: Two Visions of Humanity’s Future
Author

by Marshall Brain

The Astrobiological Landscape: Philosophical Foundations of the Study of Cosmic Life
by Milan M. Ćirković

Smart Mice, Not-So-Smart People: An Interesting and Amusing Guide to Bioethics
by Arthur Caplan

From Transgender to Transhuman: A Manifesto On the Freedom Of Form
by Martine Rothblatt

Peter Wicks on 'Yes, I Am a Believer' (May 24, 2012)

Peter Wicks on 'Yes, I Am a Believer' (May 24, 2012)

AlonzoTG on 'Mind Uploading, Vitology, and Crystal Minds' (May 24, 2012)

Intomorrow on 'Yes, I Am a Believer' (May 24, 2012)

Intomorrow on 'Yes, I Am a Believer' (May 24, 2012)

Subscribe to IEET News Lists

Daily News Feed

Longevity Dividend List

Catastrophic Risks List

Biopolitics of Popular Culture List

Technoprogressive List

Trans-Spirit List

Also check out technoprogressive multimedia on Thoughtware.tv

IEET > Rights > Neuroethics > Vision > Bioculture > CyborgBuddha

Print • Email • permalink • (1) Comments • (1498) Hits •

subscribe •

•

•

•

•

Would soma, free love and the feelies be so bad?

Aldous Huxley

BBC: In Our Time

Posted: Apr 9, 2009

Brave New World is a lurid, satirical dystopia in which the hopes and fears of the 1930s are writ large and yet the book seems uncannily prescient about our own time. But why did Huxley feel the need to write it and is Brave New World really as dystopian as we are led to believe?

Discussants:
- David Bradshaw, Reader and Tutor in English Literature at Worcester College, University of Oxford
- Daniel Pick, Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London
- Michèle Barrett, Professor of Modern Literary and Cultural Theory at Queen Mary, University of London

(MP3)

Listen/View

Print • Email • permalink • (1) Comments • (1499) Hits •

subscribe •

•

COMMENTS

Mark Plus • Mayer, Arizona, USA, Earth • Apr 11, 2009

The discussion on the radio show indicates the Huxley intended BNW in part as a satire on some aspects of American life that he encountered and found unseemly. American conservatives tend to idealize life in the U.S. before the 1960's. But ironically foreign visitors like Huxley often noticed things in the early and mid 20th Century that conservatives tried to pin on later decadent trends. According to the Wikipedia article on BNW, in the early 1930's, after Huxley visited the U.S., he "[was] outraged by the culture of youth, commercial cheeriness, sexual promiscuity and the inward-looking nature of many Americans."

This invites comparison with Egyptian philosopher Sayyid Qutb's assessment of American life, derived from observations he made while studying at a college in Colorado in the late 1940's. Qutb seems to describe BNW's cult of the "pneumatic" female body when he writes, disapprovingly, that:

"the American girl is well acquainted with her body's seductive capacity. She knows it lies in the face, and in expressive eyes, and thirsty lips. She knows seductiveness lies in the round breasts, the full buttocks, and in the shapely thighs, sleek legs : and she shows all this and does not hide it." Because these aspects of American culture have only strengthened since the early 20th Century (just look at the "reality" shows about vacuous American teens, for example), BNW continues to work as literature that describes a world we continue to recognize as a caricature of our own.

YOUR COMMENT

Next entry: Red Sniper vs. The Dagger

Previous entry: What is Mindware?