Post # 3

Aldous Huxley was a credit to the intelligence of the human species. From birth he was groomed for intellectual superstardom by his academic upbringing; before school age he was learning from his father's botanical laboratory. Working at a technologically advanced chemical plant taught Huxley about the laws of nature and influenced his thoughts about purpose.

Brave New World portends a world in which humans are created (in a process not unsimilar to car production), stimulated by sex and drugs until declining capacity due to age, and killed. The book makes a bleak mockery out of concepts like "convenience" and "the blissful singularity." Huxley implies that humankind actually seeks the dystopian future he has portrayed, further implying that our sense of purpose is way out of whack to ever accept a life of insubstantial complacency.

This comic contrasts Huxley's dystopia with Orwell's.

The Doors of Perception showed how psychedelic drugs supercharged some of Huxley's spiritual insights (he had been philosophically and spiritually Hindu since 1939). He claimed that he felt the personal realization of the Hindu concept of satcitanada, which is a compound word combining existence, consciousness, and bliss. "Duration is replaced by a perpetual present." He talks about the debate of "the way of Martha v. the way of Mary," comparing active and contemplative life, and decides that contemplation should include action. Way trippy.



"Brave New World - Themes and Motifs." Sparknotes.com. 1 May. 2010. http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/bravenew/themes.html.


"entry for Brave New World." Wikipedia. 1 May. 2010. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World/.