Aldous Huxley interviewed by Mike Wallace (1958) | Hacker News Reader

Aldous Huxley interviewed by Mike Wallace (1958)

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At this point we find ourselves confronted by a very disquieting question: Do we really wish to act upon our knowledge? Does a majority of the population think it worthwhile to take a good deal of trouble, in order to halt and, if possible, reverse the current drift toward totalitarian control of everything? If the United States of America is the prophetic image of the rest of the urban-industrial world as it will be a few years from now — recent public opinion polls have revealed that an actual majority of young people in their teens, the voters of tomorrow, have no faith in democratic institutions, see no objection to the censorship of unpopular ideas, do not believe that government of the people by the people is possible and would be perfectly content, if they can continue to live in the style to which the boom has accustomed them, to be ruled, from above, by an oligarchy of assorted experts. That so many of the well-fed young television-watchers in the world’s most powerful democracy should be so completely indifferent to the idea of self-government, so blankly uninterested in freedom of thought and the right to dissent, is distressing, but not too surprising. “Free as a bird,” we say, and envy the winged creatures for their power of unrestricted movement in all the three dimensions. But, alas, we forget the dodo. Any bird that has learned how to grub up a good living without being compelled to use its wings will soon renounce the privilege of flight and remain forever grounded. Something analogous is true of human beings. If the bread is supplied regularly and copiously three times a day, many of them will be perfectly content to live by bread alone — or at least by bread and circuses alone.

– Aldous Huxley, Brave New World Revisited, 1958

> – Aldous Huxley, Brave New World Revisited, 1958

I really love the way this man crafted his words in a series of evocative imagery that just jumps out at you as you read along. To date, I seriously cannot find a person with a better mastery of the English diction.

I've emulated a lot of his writing style in my own since I was 17 and the structure therein (syntactic format and punctuation) but I fail to come close to even 1/10 of his prose.

Some may call it a run-on sentence format, but all he is doing is elucidating a well thought out idea as best as possible in the written word.

On topic:

I've seen this interview countless times, and read his entire bibliography and most of his essays, there are still a few I still haven't gotten to. And his last point is actually very relevant as it was when it was written, perhaps more so now.

I recently watched a podcast between 2 comics, who argued if the rise of Q-anon and the actual mobilization of the disenfranchised rust belt male cohort was a result of the lack of sports on TV in the onset of COVID.The largest followers of these events and tailgate culture are these very same demographics. Thinking about it further it may also coincide that the lack of satisfaction in the presence, over saturation really, is what made them resort to alcoholism, opioid abuse and eventually overdose/suicide. Prior to this was the tea party movement, and that was quelled rather easily by contrast. There was often a snarky remark in so called Libertarian circles online in early Spring when most sports started in the US that went like: 'Well, the Revolution has been postponed for yet another year.'

It was enough to make you think and really made me think back to the Savage's inability to integrate in the Society in Brave New World where every need was supposedly satisfied. It may also explain why so many countries were so quick to re-introduce sports as soon as they could in direct disregard for the supposed severity of COVID: a necessary evil as it were. Football hooliganism around the World is a very effective strategy to create internal conflict and to distract those who would otherwise resort to violence against the State in most instances: often lower class, poor, working-class males.

The sport may differ but the comparison in tact is not without merit, and these things can be traced back to Rome (the US' only real analogue) with bread and circus being a commonly funded thing by the aristocracy to keep the plebs in line despite all the massive warfare, murder and corruption in just about every phase of the rise of the Roman Republic to the fall of the Roman Empire.

I asked if we were already in the early stages of Brave New World when an article about the sperm shortage was unable to meet the demand of single mothers wanting COVID babies?

It is with these things in mind that you begin to realize that the parallels are very stark if you care to analyze them.

can you link the podcast?

It was Whitney Cummings, and Andrew Schultz [0] who I recently found out has a podcast that often delves into hacking things like Netflix's algo that's put his special in the top 10 since its been out, or the social media loop cycle it has with the MSM that creates headlines and an odd form of enhanced self-promotion with things like SEO so he understands these Social engineering topics rather well and happens to make them funny. Sorry no time stamp, but it was a funny podcast so worth a watch.

0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwdkeIhKHNM

1984 is so often cited in reference to modern dystopian happenings but Brave New World got it right in so many more ways! The Audible version is great, I highly recommend everyone reading or listening to this sometime in 2021.

A book with a similar thesis, that may be of interest to you: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death

Oh yes! Read this one in college :)

Brave New World has a amazing ending that really pushed me on the fence whether the world of BNW is good or bad.

I had few discussions of it and I still to this day, can't decide. It is definitely must read book, and its a good read too. Not a borish slog that puts you to sleep.

See also Huxley's _Island_ for his attempt at a utopia.

(although strictly speaking, a Utilitarian would claim Brave New World is already a utopia, because the Savage was the only discontent.)

Why would I have to be a utilitarian to make that claim?

> because the Savage was the only discontent.

That's not accurate. Bernard was discontent as well. In fact a good chunk of the book is describing his discontent and inability to fit in, despite his status.

On top of that, he eventually goes to an island full of such discontent and intellectually curious spersons.

However, limited discontent does not equal dystopia, or a lack of utopia. People can be discontent in a utopia as long as it is stable (which it seems to be in BNW).

Because utilitarians believe that topia-ness is proportional to some measure of average (whether mean, median, or modal, BNW is a happy society) contentment. You can make that claim without being a utilitarian, but I don't think one can be a utilitarian without making that claim. (unless one gets into "no true utility" :-)

Bernard was discontent, but he was content when he could exploit the Savage, and he'll be very content on the island (and his discontentment was merely that, he was never suicidal). Mond would also rather be on an island (a place that sounds reminiscent of Dante's first circle) with all the cool people, if it weren't for his (programmed?) sense of duty. I don't get the sense that discontent too-individualistic people remain discontent once they are allowed to go to the islands.

(In Huxley's england, I believe people who either wished or were forced to avoid the bottles of their copy-book upbringing became "remittance men" and women, some of whom wound up on literal islands.)

The classic dystopias in literature described a supposedly future time, in order to criticize the present. The classics: Clockwork Orange; Farenheit 451; Brave New World; 1984.

Now there's a new trend in this genre, where a supposedly possible future time is described in order to glorify the present, and defend it against all possible change, good or bad, because "it could become worst". Handmaid's Tale is a good example. It makes catholic religion look so good it's sad. The total absence of criticism towards a religion tied with the institutional rape of thousands of children[0], and hatred of women, for instance, is absurd. And the fact is the raping is still going on as you read this. Of course this is only a single point of failure and absurdity amongst many others. Whilst Huxley, Orwell and others were driven by passion and rebellion against injustice and misery and desire to change life, low quality scripts like the one on this TV series are clearly motivated by making money while surfing/exploiting current social media cultural "trends". Disgusting.

0: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-44209971

Soma can be augmented, there is no need to use a pill. Just play a game, watch meaningless film or tv series, watch sports. Be part of a fandom or echo chamber. Actually virtual pills are more powerful and more easy to distribute:)

yep amazing that he didn't know what form they would take but he knew what the effects would be

Just your phone is enough.

As is this very website.

Any screen really.

This video is one of my favourites, I downloaded it many years ago because I knew one day it will disappear.

I do the same sometimes, and some have indeed disappeared. Does archive.org or somewhere else make periodic backups of YouTube videos? It feels like there must be someone doing this systematically somewhere...

I have a habit to download all forms of critical thinking. Just in case if someone in the near future will ask what is it?

My favourite quote (slightly paraphrased) from Brave New World:

"The aim of conditioning is to make the people develop a strong preference and thus strive to pursue exactly that which we have predetermined they should do and think."

Spot on.

Aldous Huxley is one of my favorite writers of all time.

Weird, mostly unknown fact: he died on the same day that JFK was assassinated (Nov 22nd, 1963).

Thanks for the link... but you just sent me down the rabbit hole of old Mike Wallace interviews!

Where can I buy an entire collection of these Mike Wallace Interviews?

He was probably referring to the Soviet Union - but his prediction about communist/totalitarian regimes being "heirs" (i.e effectively deal w/ over population) seems somewhat accurate at least.

Also - clearly Jordan Peterson got his fashion sense from Aldous here.

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