Technology In Brave New World

“All of our technological progress, civilization for that matter, is comparable to an axe in the hand of a pathological criminal” (Albert Einstein). This quote provides the definition that technology in the world is as important as a weapon for a criminal. One simply cannot live without each other. This connects to Brave New World by Aldous Huxley because in this utopia creating new technology is very essential making the world an easier place to live in. Therefore, the theme of Brave New World is that science will eliminate human suffering.

Technology has made numerous positive contributions to society in a very short period of time. Although, it also has a way to be intrusive and frightening. Three in class stories that display the fictional victimization of lower status people through technology are: “Repent, Harlequin!” said the Ticktockman by Harlan Ellison, Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, and Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. A Netflix series and British television program called Black Mirror by Charlie Brooker also expresses many of the same recurring themes of technological based exploitation in Episode 2 ‘Fifteen Million Merits’. There are multiple overlapping themes between these four pieces of work and today’s society.

This explosion of technology has opened many doors to the way we think and process information. Instead of the mundane linear cognitive thought processes involved in reading a book, the Net offers instant access to social media, games, shopping, and many other exciting and stimulating programs. This not only changes the entire spectrum of knowledge, but it also changes the way we look at the world. That is something the book has done, but not to this extreme.

Nicholas Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid” questions the motif of technology and if it is making us smarter or if it has made us so dependent on technology and its facility to do things that we are losing our own ability. Carr asserts “my mind expects to take in information the way the net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles… The more they use the web, the more they have to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing,” to emphasize the detriments technology has created and its constant environment of perpetual interference. Though because of technology, and the internet, people have become more efficient and are able to attain information faster. Carr concludes that some people tend to forget is that information is not knowledge, that knowledge is the transfer for short memory to long term memory, and the problem is that people tend to take in too much too fast, and overload the short term memory with constant new information and push out other short term memory to make room. But

There is no denying the incredible library of knowledge the internet has made readily available for all to use. Having such a resource is transforming modern society in many ways, as it brings insight and news across the world at a moment’s notice, all the while enhancing educational and technological advancements. However, according to Sven Birkets, an American essayist and literacy critic, in his essay, “The Owl Has Flown”, it is not without fault as observations are to be made on how this new resource has transformed people’s intelligence and wisdom. The author theorizes that the large, almost unlimited, library that is now being offered by services such as the internet, reshapes the public’s knowledge. Knowledge is transformed to be horizontal or insubstantial compared to the much deeper lateral understanding pertaining to older generations because of the amount of time they spent dwelling on a much smaller set of resources. This observation made by Birkets in the late 90’s is expanded upon, and modernized by Nicholas Carr, an American writer and author, in a more inflicting and self-reflecting article for The Atlantic magazine entitled “Is Google Making Us Stupid? What the Internet is doing to our brains”. Carr does not just blame the Google search engine in this claim, but the internet as a whole on how it impacts concentration and our ability to contemplate. These cognitive impacts are observed and explained in more scientific terms by Eric Jaffe, a regular Observer

In this article, Nicholas Carr attempts to explain how the way information is presented on the Internet has changed our way of thinking. He uses many different methods to do this, playing on the audience’s emotions as he uses anecdotes, research, and his own observations to try and convince the audience that the Internet has been detrimental to our thinking and learning processes. For the most part I believe his argument is ineffective because of his organization, his choice of sources, and his tone.

The internet sparked a new age of technology that may change the way our brains work. In the essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Nicholas Carr discusses his concern about the internet’s effects on our intelligence. He was once an avid reader, much like many of his colleagues, yet many of them can no longer dive into a thick novel. The power of Google has prevailed in terms of efficiently gaining information, so they all became fonder of scanning than in-depth reading. Carr even provides experimental evidence that people who are browsing the web tend to only stay on the same page for a short amount of time and rarely go back to it. This is unlike the way he used to spend weeks deciphering long texts. He acknowledges that this new type of reading is a larger part of our lives than any other form of communication that came before the internet, and that our brains will reprogram in order to take on these new qualities. He also notices that the systematic efficiency we created through industrialization is prominent in the Google search engine, and fears this could one day be implemented into our thought process, ending the ambiguity that results from our curiosities. The internet, and the massive amounts of readily available information that comes with it, can actually transform the way we think and perceive information, but it should be something we embrace, because we can utilize it to enhance society.

In Brave New World they highly depend on technology, that’s similar to our world because we highly depended on technology. For example in the brave new world the government is runned off of technology, they program the way people are born to how they think and act. In our world, we our similar because the media, money sources and the government controls everything that we see which bases out how we act. Despite its differences we are all monitored and controlled in several ways. The new state is a controlled society that reflects our society in a few similar ways. Their government controls and watches them and trains them to act a specific way. In our world The media, capitalist and government moniter things to try and calm

Brave New World, a novel written by Aldous Huxley in the early 1930’s, paints a picture of society willingly controlled by technology and the state; the science-fiction/dystopian setting paired with the ideological convictions of major characters within the novel presents Huxley’s ironic, yet thought provoking take on the direction of society. The novel, in essence, asks two questions. At what point do the benefits of technology subtract from the way one perceives others and oneself as individuals? And if a government possesses and abuses that power, at what point does one become a byproduct of government technology rather than an individual? Often compared to George Orwell’s 1984, Brave New World provides a very different interpretation of

In Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, the quality of World State is stuck in the 1920’s where technological innovations restrict the creation of the utopian society is impossible. This is proven through the looks of what makes a utopian society, how manipulation is used throughout the novel and placing both a technological and scientific view on how World State runs the society. Brave New World is known most for the fact that it is trying to mimic a utopian society through the way it conditions the people in World State. People sometimes associate the word “utopia” with Adam and Eve, a place of sanctuary and a place where everyone is happy and at peace.

Technology, despite its glorious front, has great faults such as distorting personal connections, distracting people from reality, and creating a despotic government.

When it comes to human life, controversy appears in almost every aspect. From artificial insemination to abortion, euthanasia to experimentation on human subjects, and organ donation to cloning, a plethora of arguments can be found either righteously rebuking or defiantly defending the matters at hand. These issues seem more prevalent as technological advances are made. The questions on these advances often regard how they can be used to best help society without violating people’s basic human rights or morals. Many authors have written books warning society of the dangers of taking advantage of technological and political power. Mary Shelley, Ray Bradbury, Michael Crichton, and Kazuo Ishiguro, to name a few, have all written books displaying these dangers. While reading these books, the dangerous, immoral actions and abuse of power seem evident, yet locating them in society is not quite as simplistic. The authors attempt to grant their audience a better way of finding these warning signs, while also providing an entertaining story. In his novel Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro utilizes first-person narration, symbolism, and allegory to show his audience the impact of interfering with the creation and purpose of human life.

There are many themes in brave new world one of them being Government control through technology.

What effect does modern digital technology have on individuals who rely on it heavily in their everyday lives? Innovations such as video games, internet search engines, and online databases receive great praise as well as great criticism depending on who answers this question. Nicholas Carr and Steven Johnson have both written pieces stating their opinions on technology’s effect on the human brain. Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” explains how accessing information quickly and easily through search engines like Google negatively alters the way people seek and read information and think. Johnson’s book “Everything Bad is Good for You: How Today’s Popular Culture is Actually Making Us Smarter” covers the positive attributes of digital technology, video games in particular. He explains how video games are intellectually stimulating and help develop complex skills. Digital technology has interesting effects on the different processes of our mind.

“Societies have always been shaped by media for communication, it is impossible to understand social and cultural change without knowledge of the workings of media even the alphabet is a technology that is absorbed by young children to learn to speak through communication. The digital age is changing the way we use our brains. Rather than store important facts, today we are more likely to store information about how to find those facts where a particular file is located on the computer, how to find an important webpage again.