its been a really long time =O!

So its been a while so I decided I would catch up on the blog :) And I decided I would answer this question because it brings up a lot of discussion.

What ideas about humans, society, life, or science have you formulated as a result of reading this novel?
To be conpletely honest, when I opened this book, I hated it and I kind of closed my mind to it. But then I kept reading the book because I had to answer the study guide and we kept discussing it in class. Once all the scientific mumbo-jumbo was explained in class, the book was much easier to understand. Plus, there was more of a storyline once you reached chapters 4 and 5.
I learned a lot from this book. It taught me that humans can strive and strive to be perfect, but its just never going to happen. Bernard turned out to be a total mistake, and he is different from the other Alphas. Linda got pregnant because her reproductive organs were never removed as an embryo. Many mistake popped up in the book, but the people of the new world still continue to think that their life is perfect. They are pompous and very hot-headed, but that is all they know how to be. I learned that there is no use in trying to be a perfectionist, because eventually you will slip-up and make a mistake; it happens to the best of us. Its part of being a human.
I learned that science is starting to become scary. We are now doing things that were thought never possible. Parents will soon be able to pick the sex of their baby, and I totally disagree with that. Let nature take its course and just experience the miracle of having a baby without science becoming involved. I think a lot of science that interferes with human life is wrong. For example, machines that prolong the life of someone. I think that when the doctors decide that the human body can no longer function, that is the truth. What right does science have to interfere with any part of nature? Honestly, what is the difference between prolonging life and postponing death? But thats just one of the many things that science can now do. Science can now keep people's hearts beatings when they should have died in the first place, science can now allow parents to choose if they want a boy or girl, and science can now even have a pregnant man. What if this continues? Can future generations end up like Huxley's visions of the future? In my opinion, it is a good possibility. Its not guaranteed, but its a good possibility.
I learned that the people in our society are growing up too fast. Things that once been known as a privledge of being an adult, are now given to teeangers. Privledges given to teenagers are given to children, and so on. Its scary to think that sixty years ago, a teenager's biggest worry was if her family was going to have dinner that night because of the Great Depression. Today, a teenager's biggest worry is if they have a date Friday night.
The Great Depression led to the findings of new scientific studies. If we have another depression, will this Brave New World be the result? Like the Eleven Years War, will we have a choice to keep fighting or to have everything?
I learned that humans are supposed to have emotions. I can never imagine a life of always being happy. People can claim to be happy 100% of the time but that just can't be. The thing is though, our emotions make us a stronger person. We can deal with the things that life throws at us without popping a soma tablet into our mouth. And sometimes, its okay for the strongest people to break down and cry. It just makes us come out stronger in the end.
Personally, I would never want to live in the new world. Its so scary to think of having no originality and having sex with a new person every week. I think it is immoral, and that the people in this book have absolutely no morrals.

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Saturday night, Maria and I were bored so we decided to go see Madagascar 2. It's almost like Huxley has a sixth sense or something because the leader of the whole reserve of animals was ironically named Mustapha. And the most powerful group of penguins were called the Alphas. That's so weird. The book is relating to stuff that we're learning in American Cultures too, about communism and Karl Marx. I think Huxley's Brave New World is sooner than we can imagine.

I was wondering why it's called Brave New World. I understand the New World part because its obviously an entirely different and newly originated world from before, but what's so brave about it??