Huxley and Utilitarianism

"Consider the matter dispassionately, Mr. Foster, and you will see that no offense is so heinous as unorthodoxy of behavior. Murder kills only the individual - and, after all, what is an individual?" With a sweeping gesture he indicated the rows of microscopes, the test-tubes, the incubators. "We can make a new one with the greatest ease - as many as we like. Unorthodoxy threatens more than the life of a mere individual; it strikes at Society itself..."

-Brave New World pp150

It appears that Brave New World is a diatribe against Utilitarianism - and a rather effective one, at that. This Utilitarian paradise - a place where the lower classes are created as genetic and mental inferiors, conditioned to love their menial labor, while the upper classes are forced into prioritizing society above all else - hence the taboo long-term relationship; we wouldn't want someone to prioritize their partner over any one else - everybody belongs to everyone else.

Justice Vs. Power - Chomsky Vs. Foucault, Part 1

Well worth the watch; you can get to part 2 from Youtube.

David Hume!

Human Nature II

I have yet to be convinced either way, about the existence of a specific human nature.

The best evidence for the existence of human nature is the consistency among differing human societies for some specific morality... in no society has there been the acceptance of murder, for example. If one can distill what that morality is... you'll get a very narrow definition of morality.

I believe that every individual has a specific nature... my evidence for this is the existence of such a thing as happiness. If an individual is happy, he or she is operating in accordance to his or her nature. I also believe that a society has a nature... there is some way to maximize the total happiness of individuals in a group.

The leap from these to a nature for all of humanity is the one which I have trouble with. C.S. Lewis makes this leap, I think Ayn Rand does to. We live in a society that is different from any other existing society; technology makes the rules different than they have ever been before. For example: I believe, that in previous societies, patriarchy could be somehow justified. If a group needs a consistent hunter, than it will not look to the woman to find its catch, because a woman will bear children. In contemporary society, however; this is not the case, a woman can give birth to a child an be back on the job within a couple weeks. If my wife had a child, I would request the same time off. If this is the general case, then there should be no differentiation between women and men in the workplace - the nature of women and the nature of men is pretty much the same in contemporary society.

Human Nature

The big question I have been grappling with over the past while is: Is there such a thing as an inherent Human Nature? This seems to be one of the most important questions in philosophy, and one of the most fundamental ones; someone's philosophy hinges on this. Philosophers with extremely varied beliefs all believe in such thing as Human Nature: C.S. Lewis, G.K. Chesterton and other followers of Thomas Aquinas, but also people like Ayn Rand and Noam Chomsky.

On the other hand, you have those who believe that humans have no nature. Either they are completely dependent on society, or they have no real purpose. Nietzsche, Derrida, Foucault, and of course David Hume are in this camp.

I've yet to be convinced either way. I'll talk about this more later.