Micaela Fosdick

Dr. Auge
HON ENG 225
7 April 2014
Aldous Huxleys Brave New World: A Discussion of Todays and Tomorrows Eugenics
Aldous Huxleys Brave New World explores a future dystopian society where there is no
huner, no war, no disease, and no choice. Everyone is happy because everyone has been
genetically engineered and conditioned to be so. Within the novel, human beings are literally
engineered, both genetically and through conditioning, to be whatever society needs them to be.
If, or rather when, the technology is available to the parents of our world that enable them to
choose characteristics of their child down to eye color and intelligence, what will be the
consequence? If manipulation of genetic material is no longer the stuff of science fiction, how
then do we address these issues morally? To answer these questions, we will look into the
consequences to our society and the effect on the dignity of the human person if this takes place.
In his story, Brave New World, Huxley created a society where all conditioning aims at
that: making people like their inescapable social destiny (16). Everyone has been genetically
engineered from fertilization and is pre-destined for a specific social caste based on heredity.
The pre-determined social caste also governs what the embryo is exposed to during development.
Pre-natal development no longer occurs within a mothers womb but literally in a test tube, and
babies are not born, rather they are decanted from their test tubes. During development, each
batch is exposed to varying factors depending on what their future holds. Those who will hold
positions that require high level of thinking (referred to as Alphas) will have healthy blood
surrogate where as those who are destined for the lower castes will be exposed to varying levels

of alcohol, oxygen restrictions and various others forms of conditions that result in disruption in
development varying degrees of the intelligence in individuals. Furthermore, because humans
are now grown in labs, they need only a limited number of true females for ovary donors while
others will be sterilized and become freemartins.
Before we address the issues from a moral ground, it is important to have the correct
background knowledge. Some may believe this discussion is not needed because even if
technology is making advancements that represent the dystopian of Brave New World, that world
could never happen here, the state could never garner that much power in the United States.
While this may help us sleep at night, the truth of the matter is, not too long ago, a form of statecontrolled eugenics was passed into legislation. What does the term eugenics imply here?
According to Sir Francis Galton, the one who first coined the word in 1883, the term refers to
the study of the agencies under social control that may improve or impair the racial qualities of
future generations, either physically or mentally (Allen 225). Galton, applying statistics to
heredity, believed it possible to improve humanity by judicious marriages (Sandel 63). In
other words, let the gifted and wealthy only marry other gifted and wealthy people and speed up
natural selection. Of course, another approach is to prevent the less gifted from reproducing.
The United States chose the latter.
In 1907, Indiana became the first state to adopt a law providing for the forced
sterilization of mental patients, prisoners, and paupers; in total, twenty-nine states put into
legislation forced sterilization laws, resulting in 60,000 people sterilized (Sandel 65, 66). An
article published in 1933 by J.H. Landman, Ph.D. entitled The Human Sterilization Movement
states Our country has been the pioneer in this movement and is today the foremost champion
and advocate of the cause in the world (403). Sandel describes Fitter Families contests at

state fairs sponsored by The American Eugenics Society (65). This is one example of how people
took such pride in their heredity; so much that, they were willing to be judged, like cattle or
sheep, based upon it. Not only did they take pride in their own heredity, but also in the possible
perfect race being created right here in the United States. Following these examples of how
The American Eugenics Society furthered its cause through such education, Sandel states that in
1935, the Los Angeles Times wrote an article comparing Nazi eugenics to the laws passed in the
U.S: Why Hitler says: Sterilize the Unfit!. Here, perhaps, is an aspect of the new Germany
that America, with the rest of the world, can little afford to criticize (67). And this is our wakeup call.
Never say that something cant happen here. Despite our need to believe otherwise,
there is no magic force field that protects the United States from dangerous ideology. Secondly,
it is important to note what began as a way to bring about a better, more highly functioning
society ended in Nazi Germany with mass genocide. Is this oversimplifying? Perhaps, but it
would be just as ignorant to claim that there is no connection between the two. Regardless of
whether or not the legislation of sterilization was right or wrong, it is difficult to argue against
that it is serves as a perfect example of a slippery slope. Everyone is well versed in the sins of
Nazi GermanyIt is important to keep this history in mind while discussing the present and
future in dealings with enhancing humanity.
When Brave New World was first published, it was not as readily accepted as valued
writing as it is currently; there were few positive reviews, suggesting perhaps it was a bit ahead
of its time. Now, however, the world portrayed in the writing does not seem so distant. The
science fiction of it is no longer considered fiction but is an expected goal that progress in
science will eventually meet. While most would agree that this type of technology being

controlled by the state would be wrong, determining who should have access to it and what
exactly it should be used for appears to be somewhat of a grey area on moral ground.
Furthermore, choosing those who would determine this poses another problem. Michael Sandel
describes the dilemma between morality and the progression of science in his book The Case
Against Perfection as stemming from the concept that science moves faster than moral
understanding (9). Some in favor of utilizing these advancements for designing ideal people
(parents deciding preferred height, eye color, IQ, etc.) would argue that taking advantage of this
technology is no different from the billion dollar industry that is currently exploiting that parents
want the best for their kids. It is no secret what lengths some parents go to in order to insure that
their child is accepted into the right daycare, putting them on the right track to get into an Ivy
League University. One should not overlook the overactive sports parents that involve their child
in a sport at a young age and instill ambition and love for that sport. Sandel uses the examples
such as Earl Woods getting his son, Tiger, involved with golf at a young age and Richard
Williams planning his daughters, Venus and Serena Williams, tennis careers: Lets face it, no
kid put themselves into a sport this wayThe parents do it, Im guilty there. If you dont plant it,
believe me, its not going to happen (Sandel 52). It seems more and more, in order for their
children to achieve greatness, parents are pushing their children, molding them into what they
believe to be champions. The problem with this is that as more kids are pushed to be better, that
standard of better gets pushed higher and higher, resetting the bar to impossible levels. Parents
may believe they are helping, however in reality this hyper-parenting, especially in regards to
focusing on a specific sport, is in actuality harming in more ways than one.
Sandel discusses instances such as sixteen-year-old pitchers undergoing elbow
reconstruction surgery, which is a procedure once performed only on major league pitchers

seeking to prolong their careers (53). Furthermore, he mentions that Dr. Lule Micheildirector
of sports medicine at Boston Childrens Hospitalreports number of patients treated as result of
an over-use injury as increased from 10 to 70 percent in the past twenty-five years (Sandel 53).
Push to perfection is not helping anyone, if anything it could be damaging chances of success
because the possibility of burn out. Of course, this hyper-parenting is seen not only in sports, but
in intelligence as discussed above when parents stress about getting their kids into the right
daycare in order to set the right tone so as to get into the right college. Granted, parents should
take the time to find the best care, however the best care should not be established by percentage
of children from the daycare that have gone on to Ivy League schools.
These examples only scratch the surface of how hyper-parents can be very controlling.
However, lets fast forward to a time when this controlling extends to the characteristics that
were once thought to be left to chance. If parents who are currently willing to give up everything
to insure their child gets into an Ivy League school, or a contract to play professional sports,
were given the opportunity to give their child the raw materialssuch as intelligence, height,
speedneeded to succeed, would they do it, or rather should they?
Brave New World raises this question: would society be better off if we were able to
genetically engineer everything about a person? Giving everyone intelligence, looks, ridding all
diseaseis this so bad? What is wrong with wanting to give a person all the raw materials
needed to succeed in life? One might argue that the brave new world is what is wrong. This
could potentially be called a slippery slope that ends with an engineered society, with only the
select few needed to lead being given enough leeway to have individual thought. However, one
could say we have already started down this slope with not only parental control, but also taking
advantage of steroids and hormones to enhance athletic ability. In fact, one could say that if

this type of enhancement is already accepted by society, than perhaps there really isnt an issue
with simply designing a child free from flaws. There are those who argue this would be unfair,
because not everyone would have access to this genetic engineering, but say the procedure was
subsidized in order to create an improved nation. Would this make hand-picking traits and
discarding others to make the ideal child okay? The simple answer: no. I cannot speak for
everyone, but the idea of deciding what a child should and should not be is unsettling.
The explanation for this unsettled feeling is put best by Sandel: The problem with
eugenics and genetic engineering is that they represent the one-sided triumph of willfulness over
giftedness, of dominion over reverence, of molding over beholding (85). Sandel goes on to
explain that the manipulation involved with eugenics asserts a Mastery that results in a
transformation of three key features of our moral landscapehumility, responsibility, and
solidarity (86).
The first of the transformations, and most elaborate, is humility. In todays world, control
is not something that is taken lightly. We like to exert our control; it is a symbol of our
independence and our dominance of other people and nature. However, as a parent, as much as
you want to be, you are not always in control because the child is also a human being who is
learning that being in control is much more favorable than being controlled. In addition, it is
nearly impossible for parents to be everywhere their child is, and they are not able to control
everything even their younger children come into contact with. In this way, parenting is an
experience in humility. Sandel makes the connection that in losing the loss of control in this
area, it is impossible for us to be open, and is essentially locking the gate on a gated community
(86). An important experience at that, humility allows us to be open to turns in our path that we
would otherwise be blind to. As we mature, we are told it is important for us to get outside of

our comfort zone. That comfort zone is comfortable because it is controlled. We can only leave
those zones if we are humble, and open to the unknown around us. The premise of eugenics is
that everything is capable of being controlled, but a world that is controlled is essentially a giant
comfort zone, one that unexpected and new experiences will never enter. Furthermore, these
talents we now call giftsmusic, sports, intelligencewould no longer be attributed to
something outside of ourselves. In this way, it loses its value as a gift, and instead of being
humbled by an achievement made possible by a gift, something outside of our control, we would
take total responsibility for any achievement and feel indebted to no one and owe no one
anything.
In regards to responsibility, Sandel points out that it is not the erosion of responsibility
(due to lack of need to work towards accomplishments) but rather the explosion of
responsibility (86). The ability to choose what another individual will become is not a privilege
but a very serious responsibility. Even choosing not to select characteristics could have
repercussions because now, if the child is born with any illness, the parents could literally be held
accountable because they had the chance to prevent that from happening. Furthermore, imagine
the repercussions if you make the wrong choice. The point is once the technology is there, a
choice will have to be made, and those choicesthousands of individual choiceswill
determine each generations fate.
While every parent wants what is best for their child, Mastery is not the way to
accomplish this goal. This is not to criticize parents that take an interest in their childrens lives.
It is about finding a balance; a balance of accepting love, and transforming love (Sandel 49). In
other words, it is the parents responsibility to provide for, love, and encourage their children to
strive to do their best; ambition is not necessarily a bad thing. This is the transforming love.

However, a parent must also have a love of acceptance. The thing about being a parent in
todays world, is that intelligence, athletic ability, or so called flaws are, to some extent, out of
the control of the parent. Yet, all of these qualities are a part of a gift, a gift of life that parents
accept wholly and completely. That is the role of a parent (I know because I had great ones).
This in and of itself is the problem with the society presented in Brave New World.
People are reduced to nothing but consumers, and in order to achieve the perfect race,
something is lost. The family unit is nonexistent, and while everyone belongs to everyone
else, no one really has to accept anything because everyone is engineered and conditioned to
fit in. While everyone one is obsessed with being happy, humanity has lost its purpose. In fact
the world controller, Mustapha Mond, outright says the purpose of life (in this society) is the
maintenance of well-being (Huxley 177). People are not to think for themselves, they are
simply to work, consume, and be happy. The people are completely under the Mastery of the
system (it has been going on too long to be a specific person). The question: is this form of
Mastery really that far from the Mastery put into action when deciding how intelligent a child is
going to be? In both cases the message of life is the same: life can be built, and a life is only of
value if it is built correctly.
The problem with this is that in reducing life to something that can be built, it loses
something. Humanity has an innate dignity; that life is precious is something that all people, for
the most part, can agree. Robert Spaemann in his book Essays in Anthropology discusses his
views of dignity, and how he believes that modern civilization poses a threat to human dignity
unlike any that has ever existed (68). He goes on to explain that the cause of this is the
reduction of life to bits and parts. In reality life is so much more than something that can be
pieced together in a laboratory. Spaemann actually goes as far to say that even planning to have

a child is exerting mastery over a life and thereby attempting to strip away its dignity (67).
While I would not go that far, I would agree with his general principle. To be human, to be alive,
is to have dignity, and everyone, every life, has to be wholly accepted as they are. In trying to
design a child, you are stripping life down to nothing but chemicals. The human body, when
reduced to the most basic molecular level, elemental atoms, it is estimated to be worth $160
(Data Genetics). Therefore, in essence, when we begin to build life, picking and choosing what
is deemed fit to live, we are putting a value of $160 on that a life and in doing so, we are
devaluing it. Furthermore, we are making a statement that it is these specific traits (whichever
traits parents deem worthy) that give a life value, not the life itself that has value.
This is not to say that this technology may not prove to be useful in other ways. There
have been great advancements made in the field of gene therapy as treatment for several genetic
diseases. A similar model is being used to alter the DNA of cancer cells. These are techniques
that would be beneficial to society. Unfortunately we live in a world where we cannot leave well
enough alone, and people will find a way to exploit even technology produced for the most basic
of goods. Because the truth of the matter is this: technology, when introduced, will eventually be
made available to not only those who truly need it, but those who are normal and wish only to
get ahead in the world. This is where the society of Brave New World fell apart, technology that
could have stopped at curing diseases morphed into technology used to create life and eventually
create a culture based on nothing but satisfaction.
In the end the dilemma we face is this, how can we use technology to bring good to
society without it ultimately leading to our down fall? It has already been established that by
designing human life, we are stripping that life of its true meaning and dignity by attempting to
assert our own Mastery over it. Robert Spaemann summarized the Brave New World, and

possibly our future, in one sentence: In a world where the sole purpose is the scientific
organization of the subjective satisfaction of as many people as possible, any notion that ties
science to its object of manipulation is extremely unhelpful (69).
.

Works Cited
Allen, Garland E. "The Eugenics Record Office at Cold Spring Harbor, 1910-1940: An Essay in
Institutional History." Osiris 2.No. (1986): 225-64. JSTOR. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.
<http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/301835?ref=searchgateway:07b97516be8a941632f491b00809e115>.
Date Genetics. "What Is Your Body Worth?" Data Genetics. TEDx, Apr. 2011. Web. 01 May
2014. <http://datagenetics.com/blog/april12011/index.html>.
Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. New York: Harper & Bros., 1946. Print.
Landman, J. H. "The Human Sterilization Movement." Journal of Criminal Law and
Criminology (1931-1951) 24.2 (1933): 400-08. JSTOR. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.
<http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/1135513?ref=searchgateway:3439387099f4707f01053575f66d3d6a>.
Sandel, Michael J. The Case against Perfection: Ethics in the Age of Genetic Engineering.
Cambridge, MA: Belknap of Harvard UP, 2007. Print.
Spaemann, Robert. Essays in Anthropology: Variations on a Theme. Eugene, Or.: Cascade, 2010.
Print.