What’s even wrong with the brave new world?

[Anonymous No.18082674]

Why should I even give a shit if it’s like immoral or degrading or whatever if I wouldn’t even know any better? Like if I could just take drugs all day that never wore off that could make me eternally happy, you would just be jerking yourself off if you would want to return to this dogshit life. Like, why the fuck would I just want to sit here masturbating all day if I could binge on benzos and have a bunch of sex at state orgies? And like id still get into heaven because I wouldn’t know any better if my actions and mentality were conditioned, so I got those bases covered but it’d be better because I wouldn’t have to suffer and just sit here jerking myself off

[Anonymous No.18082686]

>>18082674
Homie. Please find a hobby, or god, or other people, please. This is not a healthy attitude.

[Anonymous No.18082697]

The pleasure i felt from quitting heroin surpassed the pleasure I felt from ever taking heroin.

[Anonymous No.18082706]

>>18082697
See, you are just jerking yourself off right now. This isn’t your fucking blog man. Do you think I give a shit?

[Anonymous No.18082707]

>>18082706
Do you want lesser pleasure or greater pleasure that you have to earn?

[Anonymous No.18082718]

>>18082697
My father didn't raise no quitter.

[Anonymous No.18082728]

>>18082707
It’s all chemicals in your brain man. If this were the brave new world and I could just take drugs that gives me the same feeling, I literally wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. So I’ll take the one I don’t have to work for so I’m not just jerking myself off like you

[Anonymous No.18082742]

>>18082728
Well then you have your answer anon

[Blarty Hongo !H0lVGXJNm6 No.18082750]

>>18082728
Why don't you go get lobotomized? You'd probably be happier, if that's all that matters to you.

[Anonymous No.18082762]

>>18082674
Benzos and orgies would get boring after a while. What then? Back to step 1.
As far as I think, the problem is that you wouldn't have the opportunity to be human, i.e. to fail, to grow, to be your own rather than a blank slate experiencing homogenous pleasure that you don't have any complex relation to (which would, again, I believe, turn out insufficient for most human minds, which will seek problems around and within them even when there "shouldn't" be any problems anymore).

[Anonymous No.18082771]

>>18082762
>Benzos and orgies would get boring after a while. What then? Back to step 1.
>As far as I think, the problem is that you wouldn't have the opportunity to be human, i.e. to fail, to grow, to be your own rather than a blank slate experiencing homogenous pleasure that you don't have any complex relation to (which would, again, I believe, turn out insufficient for most human minds, which will seek problems around and within them even when there "shouldn't" be any problems anymore).
Not an issue because in this hypothetical world they have the technology to alter brain chemicals to make the fun never end

[Anonymous No.18082779]

Because the problem of death always exists.
Even if you could somehow be kept alive until the sun burned out, you still must face death someday when that happens.
How can you enjoy anything with the prospect of morality hanging over you?

[Anonymous No.18082794]

>>18082779
Because your brain chemistry would be altered. They would carefully control all external stimuli and condition you from birth and give you drugs and put stuff in the baby factory you were made in to make it so you were happy

[Anonymous No.18082802]

The thing with soma is that it's a literal miracle drug, it has no side effects(except for death when taking very high dosages) and it isn't addictive, and it seems to work just fine on both people who never used it and people who've been using for a long time.

Soma is unlike any drug we have in our world, people who compare it to to real drugs are making incorrect comparisons since nothing in our world offers anything similar to soma.

[Anonymous No.18082810]

>>18082779
So are you saying people can never be happy so long as death exists?

[Anonymous No.18082811]

>>18082794
How does that solve the problem of morality?
You could take away all knowledge of the existence of death, but how long can that last?
That's literally the story of the buddha.

[Anonymous No.18082816]

>>18082810
They can never sacrifice themselves to pleasure with no reservations so long as death exists.

[Anonymous No.18082818]

>>18082779
>>18082811
I'm getting confused, are you talking about morality or mortality?

[Anonymous No.18082822]

>>18082816
I do not understand, why not?

I'm not OP by the way?

[Anonymous No.18082823]

>>18082818
Mortality whoops.

[Anonymous No.18082824]

>>18082811
Who cares? I’m not gonna worry about it if it isn’t bothering me. I’m just gonna live the happiest life I ever could because that’s what I’m conditioned to in the bnw

[Anonymous No.18082826]

>>18082822
Because they will always search for answers to the reasons behind the need for mortality.
An unknowing will always haunt every action one undertakes and as that time towards the end of the sun/universe approaches it will only increase.

[Anonymous No.18082835]

>>18082826
And as we have seen time and time again man will gladly sacrifice all pleasure, even to the point of willing creating pain to rectify that unknowing of mortality.

[Anonymous No.18082843]

>>18082826
>Because they will always search for answers to the reasons behind the need for mortality.
Who says they will? I really do not understand this logic.
>An unknowing will always haunt every action one undertakes and as that time towards the end of the sun/universe approaches it will only increase.
How can you affirm that? We're not talking about regular humans here, we're talking about genetically and chemically modified humans such as the ones you see in BNW, frankly calling them "humans" might not even be correct at this point.

[Anonymous No.18082869]

>>18082843
As the time towards their end approaches, and if the knowledge of mortality is know then the same questions that people have pondered for all of human history will reappear.
Perhaps the pleasure will be so great and addictive they will have no choice but to remain in the pleasure, but these same thoughts will assure this same fear and panic intrudes into their lives as well.
I suppose you could control all thought process so these ideas could never enter your consciousness, so maybe at that point you could be right. I don't really know how to answer that point to be honest.

[Anonymous No.18082875]

>>18082674
A high level of dopamin/serotonin in blood=/=happiness. If you search for happiness at the intersection of pleasure and comfort, you will trick yourself into believe you have found the route to happiness and will thus content yourself with smiling at shadows whilst expecting them to smile back: they never will and niether will you

[Anonymous No.18082888]

>>18082728

>It’s all chemicals in your brain man.

Sadness and misery is just chemicals in your brain too so it doesn't matter homie :^ )

[Anonymous No.18082925]

I wish people posted more genuine refutations of this image rather than ignoring the point of the thought experiment and saying “they wouldn’t really be happy”

[Anonymous No.18083060]

>>18082925
Happiness is a spook, it is nothing—meaningless. Pleasure is a distraction, obfuscatory. Any automatic responses elicited by sense perception are simply inconsequential. That the acquisition of truth does not necessarily elicit pleasure or happiness should tell you everything about the nature and sequence/chronology of happiness in relation to other states

[Anonymous No.18083109]

>>18082888
I agree it’s all meaningless. But I’d rather be having meaningless sex then jerking myself off meaninglessly

[Anonymous No.18083139]

>>18082925
It's cause they can't. The image literally shows a utopia.

[Anonymous No.18083142]

>>18083109
You should be insulted by the power you give your body, you give what amounts to a chemical concoction that conditions you in the same manner I may condition a puppy.

[Anonymous No.18083157]

>>18082925
What refutation would you consider "genuine?" Is living in a happy illusion the same as the real thing?

[Anonymous No.18083180]

>>18082697
this, and the same is true for many other vices and pleasures of the flesh. people go on about "muh chemicals" but i have experienced essentially all that these shallow pleasures have ever had to offer and to tell you the truth? they don't even feel that good. i don't mean like they're fundamental unsatisfying or whatever, i mean the actual feeling of experiencing them, when you are actually conscious of it at the time of feeling it, it's not that great. it's easy to trick yourself into thinking that it is, but when you really, really look hard at it, you can see through it even as you experience it. it's nothing compared to even the smallest of deeper and less transparently "chemical" pleasures, of satisfaction, or understanding, or even just having a good time with your friends
>t. former coomer and heroin user

[Anonymous No.18083193]

>>18082674
Tell me: is pleasure the ultimate good?

[Anonymous No.18083206]

>>18083157
For all practical purposes, yes. What is “real” is just reality in its process of self making. If you perceive and believe it to be real, it is real in your subjective experience

[Anonymous No.18083218]

>>18082697
>>18083180
Good job anons

[Anonymous No.18083223]

>>18083206
So if you had a moment of clarity right now, and came out of a drug stupor in a little box somewhere, you wouldn't feel the least bit panicked about that?

[Anonymous No.18083231]

>>18083223
Maybe, but who cares? I’d just get high again and forget about it? And in the brave new world there are safeguards to make sure that moment of clarity wouldn’t come

[Anonymous No.18083236]

>>18083193
Since everything you experience can be reduced to chemicals in your brain, yes

[Anonymous No.18083251]

>>18083231
>Maybe, but who cares?
You would absolutely care, I can tell you've never been deep into getting high with an attitude like that

[Anonymous No.18083271]

>>18082674
>what's even wrong with the brave new world?
Literally this exact sentiment. It creates a hive of "I mean I guess it's really not that bad" when you're handing over your humanity.
It's not that bad, but you are if you're ok with it
>"Let none admire That riches grow in hell; that soil may best Deserve the precious bane."

[Anonymous No.18083289]

>>18083251
I’ve never gotten high in my life. And I’m gonna jerk myself off here because you invoked personal experience. I’ve done SSRIs for ocd and it helped me a lot get over it. I used to hate it when people touched me. Like I would have to take a 2 hour shower and do all this weird shit when someone touched me because I hate how it felt and I fucking hated them for touching me. But I took SSRIs and I just stopped caring. Like I didn’t give a shit about it anymore. And I didn’t even take that much, it really opened my eyes about the book. And soma in BNW isn’t like any drugs today. I’m not making a comparison to dopers. It’s supposed to be a technology far off in the future when they make babies in factories. The whole thing is really meant to be a hypothetical question: in a distant future when we have the technology to do things like eternal pleasure with no physical (or chemical) consequences, why should we stick to the old ways of experience? It seems to me infinitely better

[Anonymous No.18083345]

>>18083231
>safeguards to make sure that moment of clarity wouldn’t come
All safeguards fail sooner or later, as it's all based on best estimates of what will keep people safe from realization. You can't stop everything from happening

[Anonymous No.18083390]

>>18083345
>All safeguards fail sooner or later
This seems like massive cope. First of all you can’t prove this, second of all I don’t give a shit if two people out of a billion have a moment of clarity before they get high again and forget about it. Like who fucking cares. You are making a desperate argument. Go jerk off to aquinas or something

[Anonymous No.18083427]

>ctrl + f "chem"
>11 results
Do people imagine the brain as some sort of boiling cauldron with green happy chemical goo and blue sad chemical goo mixing and splashing around? Add more happy goo to neutralise the sad goo?

[Anonymous No.18083441]

>>18083427
Yes, it’s literally like the movie inside out

[Anonymous No.18083572]

>>18083236
So pleasure, then, should be pursued by any and all means?

[Anonymous No.18083578]

>>18082674
I'm not 100% happy. If I were to become 100% happy I would become so unlike myself as to be effectively destroyed.

The point of the brain is to come up with solutions to problems, just like bones are supposed to support your weight and muscles are supposed to move you around. If you don't use this stuff, it atrophizes. Brain atrophy is the death of personhood.

[Anonymous No.18083692]

>>18082674
https://hotelconcierge.tumblr.com/post/162571849189/the-tower

I'm not sure this will convince you, but it's one of the best counterarguments I've read. It actually inspired me in some ways.

[Anonymous No.18083774]

>>18082925
The problem is that then there would be no real adventure. Only safe imitations of it.

[Anonymous No.18083941]

>>18083774
>muh love, meaning and adventure
Only a small percentage of people actually experience these things in a fulfilling capacity. Most unthinking normalfags are better off in the BNW and since they outnumber you pretentious literary types, it's better for humanity as a whole.

[Anonymous No.18083983]

>>18083578
The point of BNW isn't to throw someone from contemporary times to live there damnit. The people there are conditioned since birth to adapt to their environments.

[Anonymous No.18084027]

>>18082750
This.

[Anonymous No.18084084]

>>18082762
Damn, thanks for the insight Anon. Not sarcasm.

[Anonymous No.18084171]

>>18082750
I don't know if a real lobotomy would make you happy. Personally, I would probably kill myself in the near future. I am just projecting but I do think most people life are miserable and they're better off dead. A lot of people get angry at this and claim that they like their life though, so I see BNW as a solution to eliminate suffering without eliminating life.

[Anonymous No.18084872]

>>18083983
But I don't sympathize with those people anymore than I do with ants. They are too unlike me. I like animals better than I like the people of BNW because the animals seem more relatable.

[Anonymous No.18084924]

>>18084171
A lot of people live miserable lives but they keep living because the natural survival instinct is really hard to override, it's just how humans are built.

This isn't a counter-argument, just something I wanted to say.

[Anonymous No.18085800]

>>18082925
Lack of freedom.
Freedom is what gives us meaning.

[Anonymous No.18085814]

>>18082697
What pleasure?

[Anonymous No.18085839]

>>18082686
fpbp. op wants to be a dog so long as he has an owner that spoils him

[Anonymous No.18085890]

>>18083774
Yeah but you wouldn't know that. To you it would seem like a real adventure

[Anonymous No.18085901]

>>18083941
Go ahead then, become the cattle like the "unthinking normalfag" you are.

[Anonymous No.18086389]

You error resides in assuming that emotions are just chemicals in the brain

[Anonymous No.18086450]

>>18082875
under ratedpost

[Anonymous No.18086547]

>>18083692
>Hotel concierge is still dead
>sam[]zdat is still dead
>TLP has been dead for years
Unrelated to the thread, but are there similar blogs to these that are still alive?

[Anonymous No.18086842]

>>18086547
I haven't found any, sadly.
But people found TLP's book

[Anonymous No.18086869]

>>18085814
i guess he means that afterglow feeling you get after when you're done being sick from the flu, except with heroin withdrawal

[Anonymous No.18086919]

>>18082674
because it reduces all existence to surrogate activity

[Anonymous No.18086982]

Why is it that /lit/, sometimes called the smartest board on 4channel, can’t answer OP’s question despite all these attempts trying? Is morality really just a spook?

[Anonymous No.18087132]

Because it's a pathetic existence to give up your potential, consign yourself to slavery, and live for base sensory pleasure. It's only a utopia for Nietzche's last man /bugmen.

[Anonymous No.18087162]

>>18087132
>Nietzche's last man /bugmen
What makes you say that?

[Anonymous No.18087228]

>>18087162
Because the last man cares only about comfort and security, they have no ambition, no individuality, no desire to strive for anything higher than keeping warm and safe. Which is what the Brave New World society offers.

[Anonymous No.18087252]

>>18087132
you will never be an african warlord

[Anonymous No.18087267]

>>18087228
>Because the last man cares only about comfort and security, they have no ambition, no individuality, no desire to strive for anything higher than keeping warm and safe
Then I must have misunderstood what he meant by the "last man".

[Anonymous No.18087686]

>>18082925
All refutations of that image require apriori statements (just how the image itself uses an axiom that pleasure is good)
For example, saying that desire is suffering (Buddhism - Nirvana - Trying to find a way out) can refute the image by saying it's just gonna make it impossible for the people living in that simulation to ever achieve the point that all beings strive for.
Then you can have a statement like "Believe in Jesus Christ and you'll join him in heaven" which can refute the image by saying that they're not really gonna give a shit about him since life is not suffering (which is one of the core statements in Christianity - Bear your cross as Jesus did and you will join him in Heaven) and will, therefore, not have any need for religion. Dooming their souls in the process.

This image is irrefutable if you believe happiness (being the main point of life) is achievable in this material existence.

[Anonymous No.18087785]

>>18082674
Look up the term qualia. You might *feel* something approximating joy through drugs, but no drug - however advanced - is ever going to be able to mimic the unique, subjective conscious experience you have of, let's say, seeing your first born son's face for the first time. That instance of an experience is yours and yours alone.

[Anonymous No.18087821]

>>18087785
In other words, drugs can provide only a general joy; specificity of individual joys can only be got at through actually experiencing the event for yourself. A drug might mimic the effect of seeing this thing termed "first born" for the first time - but it would be constrained by generality. That would not be *your* experience, but, rather, an artificial experience crafted in an attempt to satisfy humans in general. Only *you* can induce *your* experience of that by actually going through it. There are simply too many variables to account for, some of which do not occur until the action in itself is underway, in order for you to be able to replicate it with a drug.

[Anonymous No.18087905]

>>18083941
>implying i don't want to accelerate/collapse the system to bring about worldwide chaos and suffering without escape
In a society that has abolished all adventure, the only adventure left is to destroy that society.
Dystopia is the true Utopia. Everyone will have their adventure in WW3.