[ExI] 1984

Stefano Vaj stefano.vaj at gmail.com
Wed Jan 27 10:55:15 UTC 2010


2010/1/26 John Clark <jonkc at bellsouth.net>:
> Huxley pointed out a very real problem, there may be an alternative but
> Huxley didn't write about it because he didn't know what it was, and neither
> do I. The problem he described may just be as profound as profound can be.

The alternative is probably to part altogether with the idea of
"safety and happiness for the largest number" as exclusive societal
goals and takes one's risk with progress and change, isn't it?

> But in 1984 the "meaningful" thing you are doing, as party members freely
> admit, is causing more pain to exist in the world. No, I'd rather live in
> the Brave New World!

What is especially curious, and indeed quite sadistic, in the 1984
ideology is that in that context suffering is the only conceivable
parameter of the party's influence, since, as O'Brien says "if
something is pleasurable, one might be doing it simply out of its own
interest/will" (quoting by heart). In fact, *real* influence is rather
measured on one's ability to determine what one considers pleasurable
or at least desirable...

> There is meaning in Brave New World, the pursuit of happiness; but that's
> it, nothing else. And that's just not enough to build Jupiter Brains and
> engineer the universe, or even the galaxy.

On the contrary. Since any kind of change (let alone a posthuman one)
implies some degree of impredictability (of... "singularitanianism",
in the "etimological" sense of being beyond your the applicability of
your "equations"), a Brave New World require that change, conflicts,
progress, etc. be frozen and disposed of.

-- 
Stefano Vaj



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