The Future of "Brave New World" is "The Time Machine"

Brave New World gives us a dramatic view of a future in which the technology made possible by science brings science to a halt. This future is consistent with the more remote future seen by the Time Traveler in Wells's Time Machine. After the disruptive influence of science has been permanently tamed by the triumph of bureaucracy and eugenics, it is easy to imagine human society remaining stuck in the rigidly conservative caste system of Brave New World for thousands of centuries, until the s...

 The A not B Task

Emilie sits on her father's lap and excitedly stares at the shiny brass bell that the research assistant across the table is holding. Making sure Emilie is watching, the assistant places the bell into one of two matching wells in the table and then quickly covers both wells with identical cloths. Emilie is eager to grab the bell, as any eight-month-old would, but her father gently holds back her arms while the researcher distracts her with a funny face. After five seconds, Dad is signaled to ...

 The Various Ways of Exterminating a Race

Now there are various ways of exterminating a race, and most of them are cruel. You may end it with fire and sword after the old Hebrew fashion; you may enslave it and work it to death, as the Spaniards did the Caribs; you may set it boundaries and then poison it slowly with deleterious commodities, as the Americans do with most of their Indians; you may incite it to wear clothing to which it is not accustomed and to live under new and strange conditions that will expose it to infectious dise...