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Tuesday, August 19, 2014
Freedom of thought
A while back I read a book series called Uglies. In this series nearly the entire planet had been destroyed leaving only a few large cities across the world. In these cities to keep the population under control at the age of 16 teenagers would undergo "The Operation". In this operation doctors reshaped a persons body and improved it, but also created lesions in a persons brain, which they did not know about. These lesions impeded creativity, violent behavior, apathy, dysphoria, and adrenaline release. This made people always happy, never questioning, very peaceful, and could not very well think for themselves. This particularly reminded me of the end of chapter two of Brave New World. The director spoke of how they manipulated the minds of the children with the repeating voice and how a child's suggestions are not their own but the suggestions from the State. This made really think because I cannot imagine not being able to really think for yourself. The thought of having not really having the ability to do so scares me. I can't begin to understand those who thought of this idea. I know that I would never want to live in a world like that, then again, if I did, I would never really know now would I?
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I too value my ability to think, and I also think it is a horrifying thought to lose it. Though, I do want to attempt to answer your question. The reason for a lot of the things people do is because it will somehow give them an advantage, praise them in some way, or make the situation the way they want it. Someone might take away your capability to think for a number of reasons because of this. For example, it may give them unfettered power over you or a group of people, or maybe they want to make everything the exact way they want it with people as moldable as play dough. People are willing to do extremely harsh things to give themselves power.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, I value having my own thoughts as much as the next person. It's strange wondering what was going through the mind of the person who thought of this idea. Although I hate the idea, it's actually not that bad. If you wanted to have a perfect society that would think exactly what you thought was right, this would make for a foolproof plan! If there was any way to have a perfect utopian society, this would definitely be at the top of my list. Like I said, I would hate not having the option to have my own thoughts, but if I wanted a perfect society, this is definitely a good plan.
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