We’ve recently been captivated in the UK by Sky Tv’s adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.
But what would a non-dystopian version of a brave new world look like?
The Drama was a lush, modernistic, sex-fest; well made, well produced and thought provoking, as was the original novel itself. In a twist more suited to George Orwell, the Internet had become self-cognisant and had taken over control of the population and the world.
In Huxley’s 1921 novel Crome Yellow, one of the characters sets up the future novel’s plot for us.
An “impersonal generation” of the future that will “take the place of Nature’s hideous system. In vast state incubators, rows upon rows of gravid bottles will supply the world with the population it requires. The family system will disappear; society, sapped at its very base, will have to find new foundations; and Eros, beautifully and irresponsibly free, will flit like a gay butterfly from flower to flower through a sunlit world.”
Brave New World
The version of a Brave New World we encounter thanks to Sky Tv is a world where people work a little, socialise a great deal, and go out for parties and sex marathons all night, every night. Everything is fuelled with “Soma” a drug that’s various varieties will insulate the user from EVER having to experience ANYTHING again! The players drift through this drug-fuelled sexy-fest without a care.
We find later that the computer model that’s running their lives was programmed by a group of “founders”, who are still plugged into the net, and are now living out their lives virtually. Their bodies remain in a state of stasis, not aging, whilst their minds sit on the beach drinking cocktails all day.
I found it curious that the makers had decided to make this group a mixture of men and women.
I have worked for many years around Programmers, almost all of them men.
It strikes me that this version of the Brave New World would have been exactly what a load of boys, given the opportunity, would create for themselves!
It puts the men in control, (no surprise there) it effectively makes the women their sex slaves in an ambient sort of way. Life is one long festival, with no hangover, no bills to pay and no consequences for their bad behaviour. I can’t see any woman, programmer or not, being subordinated in that way — for ever! That being said, its a tiny flaw, in an otherwise fun slice of viewing.
Matrix
It also echoes ideas from the Matrix, that the system will control everything for us, that Birth will be an un-necessary inconvenience, and that Death will become a civic duty. That perhaps the system will eventually begin to exploit us, to use us as it’s resource to discover further.
This then also echoes such thought experiments such as Plato’s cave. The suggestion that we are chained in a Cinema, unable to do anything except watch the screen.
We’ve all from time to time, lost ourselves so deeply in a film, that it almost becomes a shock when it ends and we find ourselves back in our mundane lives. In Plato’s model, we have no idea who the projectionist is, we have been watching so long, that we believe this to really be what reality is. Are we ever going to get out of that Cinema?
What happens if we do? That might be a much scarier thought in reality.
Reality?
This all seems very real doesn’t it? Covid, Lockdown, Global Warming.. it’s a very convincing and gripping simulation right now.
Perhaps you are being used by the system. Perhaps you are being used by the being we call God. (Let’s be fair, he knocks off a lot of us in pretty cruel ways!)
We look at Quantum Physics, and we start to see that at the tiniest levels the “sand” is shifting all the time. We really have built our castles on sand, not rock. Unfortunately, it turns out that at the quantum level rock is no more solid that a nice Strawberry Jelly anyway!
We turn our consciousness toward a “wave” at the quantum level, and it becomes a “particle.” We look away, and it turns back into its wave form.
The reason things feel solid is due to standing waves. You might surmise that millennia of conscious attention finally pins things into their form. It’s also the case that everything is subject to entropy, a gentle breaking down of everything in our Universe.
I suggest that the Universal “attention” span, might be taxed by holding everything in place, so our world “was created” and is slowly degrading.
You, as a little slice of the consciousness of the Universe pin together bits of the fabric round you as you experience them.
To my mind, it’s like my Garage. I bought or created those things in there. If I leave them unattended for a few years, they’ll get mouldy and break down. If I go in occasionally to check how everything is stored, this doesn’t happen.
Maybe that’s the model then, Consciousness has its hand stuffed up your backside, and plays you like a hand-puppet until it get’s bored, and chucks you into the garage, where you eventually rot!
Consciousness
The weird thing I’m trying to push here is that you are actually Consciousness itself anyway!
The model’s akin to one of Cloud-Computing (Oh dear, it real is going to take over our world!)
You are a computer, who can do its own processing, but occasionally you go back to the net to send or receive new information. The Cloud holds it all, you hold your own bit.
Do you remember the SETI programme, where your computer’s screen saver would connect to the web, when the computer wasn’t being used, and help join into a host that did complex calculations to find Alien civilisations, whilst you slept?
You are NEVER not connected to the “Cloud” of consciousness, but to make the game seem more real, you are fitted with a set of Left Brain circuitry that makes you think you are alone, that you are an island!
So here we are, lovely conscious beings, exploring all the In’s and Out’s of Consciousness, in a massive SETI style operation, and constantly sending new information back to the cloud of all things. It’s a wonderful programme of self-discovery for us on the Micro basis, and a wonderful journey of self-discovery for us, as consciousness, on the Macro basis.
God!?
Did Jeremy just claim that he’s GOD!?
Yes, I did, and so are you! (I realise that there may be a purge or fatwa on the way for me now, but as death is just a return to the source of all this wonder, then I don’t really mind!)
What happens if you actually manage to “peer through the veil” whilst still being a resident of this planet? Well, that’s what we call enlightenment. According to those who have gone there, it’s not quite that simple! I think you can pop in and out of it for a while, until you eventually manage to string all the “In’s” together and lose the “Out’s” completely. However, that being said, I’m told that even that might only be “Enlightenment Light” and that there many be many new levels to ascend to after that. The only problem being is that few people bother to write back, and as soon as they do, they get turned into God and Gurus.
Don’t stick yourself on a plinth, there’s only one way to fall.
So, let’s say I have found a way to spend lots of time in this quiet state, what’s life like for me?
I get to relax and play as I wish. I’m not really bothered about society and family. I put myself into the flow of the Universe, and if the big plan is that I survive and thrive, then resources will come my way.
“There’s only ONE sin in this world, and that’s not being in the true flow of your life…”
The Universe
The Universe is abundant and will provide, you just have to be aligned and open for it.
When you’ve played your part… recycling time! You get to try out Entropy for yourself!
I’ve written much in my previous articles about Dr Pang’s version of a Brave New World.
In short, people use Meditation and Qigong to cultivate their lives. They become “better” people, this spreads across the globe. We stop hurting each other or our home, and we settle into a co-operative and creative future, that allows us to explore the last hidden part of our Universe — i.e deep inside us!
Bhutan
What’s it like to live in Bhutan? Not having been there I don’t know. I have occasionally seen snippets of films. They always register exceptionally highly on the “happiest of countries” list.
The make happiness part of their financial policymaking.
They lead a predominantly Buddhist lifestyle, with all that comes with that. Don’t get me wrong, hideous things happen in Buddhist countries too, it’s just that they are exceptionally seldom occurrences.
Is life just sh*t-boring there? I was please to read about the Dalai Lama, that he’s very childlike, if you crack a joke, he’ll laugh uproariously, if you tell him of a tragedy, he’ll shed a tear. Neither event will leave a lasting indelible mark on his soul, as they so often do in our Western lives.
Imagine a conscious life, where you flow easily, not hitting the bumps in the road very often. Imagine days of beautiful happiness, simple easy and satisfying tasks, creative co-operation with your fellow beings.
“Be the change you want to see”
The days of wonder lie just ahead, but we must just elect to head in that direction. Qigong provides a framework, but there are many other ways. Let’s search for a path to conscious living together.
Let’s leave a legacy for the following generations that doesn’t look like “Brave New World!”