Techne in a Brave New World by Huxley, an essay about the ballance of technology and humanities - with referances to Brave New World and different articles

Essay by Anonymous UserHigh School, 12th gradeA-, August 1996

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Technology is defined as using the entire body of science, methods, and materials to achieve an end. Technology, or techne, is so preoccupied with weather it can, it never considers if it should. In 'Of Techne and Episteme,' a article on technology and humanities, the author Eddy warns us that a society without epistemological thinking would lead to a society of 'skilled barbarians.' This is the topic of the novel Brave New World in which Aldous Huxley portrays a future world where babies are manufactured on an assembly line and put into a social class while they are still embryos in a test tube. As children they are engineered to be content with their rank in this world where love, viviparous reproduction, and knowledge of anything beyond your job serves no purpose. A look at Brave New World supports Eddy's beliefs on the importance of humanities in society because of unethical genetic experimentation and the character's lack of individuality.

The society of Brave New World has gained the knowledge to produce babies much like their God, Henry Ford, produced the Model T. They have taken this technology and exploited it for their own benefit. They have created with their hands without using their head or heart. Scientists toy with the embryos, cutting off oxygen to those predestined to become lower caste members. Those chosen to work as rocket plane engineers were in constant rotation during the embryonic phase of their life. 'Doing repairs on the outside of a rocket in mid-air is a tickish job. We slacken off the circulation when they're right way up, so that they're half starved, and double the flow of surrogate when they're upside down. They learn to associate topsy-turvydom with being well-being.' These procedures would be considered morally incorrect today, however, in the...