The Future of Inhuman Nature

Brian Paschke

ENG CMP 0200- Dr. Johns

If we determine what is human by physical properties alone, we run into the danger of becoming obsessed with our property. If we believe that everything that humanity has accomplished in the past years is worth nothing, then we declare progress worthless. We must then accept a compromise position, where increased property is representative of an escape of humans from the physical realities of the world. The more property we have, the less we value it, and thus we can begin to enjoy the complexities of experience, and move on to a world where the physical is totally subordinate to the mental and the philosophical.

The esteemed historian Benedict Anderson has been influential in the study of Nationalism as a way to examine human communities. He defines the Nation as “an imagined political community”- Anderson, 5. This is because in a nation, all members are not able to have relationships with all other members, you will have countrymen with whom you feel a strong bond, and yet will never meet. It is imaginary, because unlike your family or your tribe, the feeling of nation only exists to contrast the feeling of ‘The Other’. One only sees their self as a member of their own nation to consciously conceive themselves as distinct from the members of opposing groups. The same idea can be applied to the definition of humanity- We are only human compared to that which is not human.

If we apply the scientific reductionist ideas to the human being, all parts are broken down into elements and further into protons, neutrons, and electrons. From a strict reductionist point of view, there is no way to differentiate between inanimate matter and the components of the human body. A man is a rock is a cat is a moon. I do not say this in an attempt to imply that there is nothing special about the human, but rather to imply that the basis of humanity does not rest in the physical.

Silver addresses the famous reductionist Renee Descartes in an argument against the mystical aspect of humanity. Humanity does not exist because we were placed here by some divine being. “Instead, Descartes argues, natural processes could be understood through the pure logic of mathematical representation and theoretical problem solving.”- Silver, 21 Processes can be understood, and so I do not accept a religious definition of humanity where I cannot question those in charge. No person has a lock on who is human and who is not, and no one can truly judge all of humanity.

Bill McKibben has a strongly materialistic view of the human experience. He is obsessed with the marathon race. He believes that without physical challenges, something essential to humanity is lost. “But as we move into this new world of genetic engineering, we won’t simply lose races, we’ll lose racing; we’ll lose the possibility of the test, the challenge, the celebration that athletics represents.”- McKibben, 6. I view McKibben as a yuppie. His challenge is one that is pampered- he never truly has to struggle for his life. His struggle is chosen, he makes the choice to run. The pleasure that he experiences is completely real, and I can attest myself to the joys of running, but I would not define my life by this challenge.

To look more closely at the meaning of humanity, we should look closely those who truly have nothing. “In poor west-African societies converted to Christianity, heaven can take on a faux-modern appearance with immortal souls cruising in Rolls-Royces down clean streets (unlike their own) past glass and steel skyscrapers fronted by decorative fountains.” – Silver, 38. The missionaries try to bring hope to people with their religion, but people want to be happy in the life that they are currently living. Can we accuse these people of missing the point and being overly materialistic when they have nothing? Perhaps these people simply see past the twisted logic of these missionaries in order to see the life that they would like to live.

Coming back to Descartes, “Through the process of pure reason- leading to what may be the most famous sentence and follow-up in philosophy- Descartes proved (to himself, at least) that the evidence for the existence of a separate and distinct human soul was even strong than the evidence for the existence of the human body.”- Silver, 38 “I think; therefore I am… I could pretend that I had no body and that there was no world or place that I was in, but I could not pretend that I did not exist.”- Descartes, 54. If the human consciousness existed in any other vessel, it would be just as human. A mannequin is not human, but an ensouled computer designed to improve itself is.

Thought is the essence of what is human. The self exists independently of the physical body, at a different level. Stephen Hawking would be unable to communicate without the aid of a computer to translate text into voice, but no one would consider him to be less human than others not so technologically enhanced. McKibben would no doubt take the position that Hawking has achieved the great things he has done because of the challenges he has overcome due to his disabilities, but I say Hawking represents the future. Hawking has been forced into a position that does not allow him to enjoy all the material realities normal to most humans, and has evolved to a state of being existing only in the theoretical.

The best athletes in our world do not perform because they are challenging themselves; they want to be the best. “In 1995, researchers asked two hundred Olympic hopefuls if they’d take a drug that would guarantee them a five-year winning streak and then kill them. Almost half said yes.”- McKibben, 4. These athletes want to be immortalized in human history; they wish to be remembered forever. I view this as using the physical body as a lunch pad into the realm of the theoretical. They do not care about death, they do not fear the end of their actual existence, because they know that they will continue to exist in the minds of other competitors, and they become more than just the flesh.

McKibben says that he believes pushing the limits of what humans can do, but I would say that rather than pushing the definition of humanity he is only encouraging living within the bounds of the known, and is proposing stagnation and repetition. McKibben is different from the athletes he refers to because he performs only for his own enjoyment, whereas the athletes want to become something more. McKibben already believes he is famous and successful, and so can espouse ideals that those who have to struggle to eat would find offensive.

McKibben is in a place that he is totally comfortable. He can supply his family with everything he needs, and I would say that he does not respect those people who do not have what he has. He says of genetic engineering “It will break us free from the bounds of our past and present and send us winging off into parts unknown. That’s precisely what appeals to some.”- McKibben 11. If you believe that the world is perfect as McKibben does, then this is ok. I believe our world has many problems, and this is exactly what needs to be done. Despite our supposedly liberal governmental system, there are still millions of people who do not have basic water sanitization, people who must fight with their neighbors in order to obtain the basic necessities to survive.

Arguing for the purity of the human to prevent improvements is comparable to those who believe that “organic” foods are somehow more pure, when in reality these practices represent an outdated method of production that is too inefficient to be allowed to continue if the world wants to meet the full nutritional needs of the entire population. People like McKibben spoke against the Green Revolution in the 1960’s, and from the perspective of rich white America, the Green Revolution was a nightmare. What about the other people in our world, people from places like India where a third of a billion people live in conditions we see as utter poverty?

Acccording to Silver, these people were not out to mutate our vegetables for profit, but to improve lives. It is not just additional food that is being produced, “When the costs of producing and consuming food are reduced, more money is available for people to spend elsewhere, allowing them to improve the quality of their lives.”- Silver, 267

The impact of genetic engineering on our plants is undeniable, and the human lives that have been saved as a result of reducing famine cannot be ignored. “The impact of introducing the high-yielding variety seeds was felt in the production of the major cereals. Between 1950-51 and 1969 total food grain production approximately doubled, from fifty million tons to a hundred million tons.”- Chakravarti, 320.

Deniers say that this is for the upper class, that this revolution is simply a way for big industry to gain ever more control over this world’s production. “The feat was accomplished in the face of a pessimistic attitude which declared uneducated farmers unable to adapt quickly to the new ways… Yields in Indian and Pakistan have shot up from 11 bushels per acre to an average of 50, with reports of yields up to 150 bushels in some areas.”- Peace and the Green revolution, 347

Is this an unnecessary increase in production? I compare this to enhancements in humanity, where we might say that no enhancement is needed until it is too late. Are we mutating these plants into devils, or are we saving lives? “The 1968-69 crop year on the Gangatic and Indus plains in India and West Pakistan ordinarily would have produced a famine… But there was no famine. Instead, the Pakistani wheat crop was about 14 percent higher than in the preceding year and the Indian crop eight percent. With or without drought and bad growing weather, wheat yields have been increasing.” – Peace and the Green Revolution, 347. This is a serious improvement, humans taking control back from the unnecessary chaos of the universe. The universe wants to descend further and further into chaos, and humanity wants to bring order and understanding.

I do not appreciate McKibben lowering the level of discourse as he does when quoting Silver, saying that genetic engineering is impossible without cloning, then subsequently speaking of the Raelian UFO cultists’ fraudulent research. A cult and a scientist are two different things, and Silver is no joke. I believe that my arguments result in an improvement of the human condition, and escape from misery. A denial of my argument is a position against progress. It is arrogant to say that we have reached the pinnacle of human existence, that nothing more can be improved.

While some people still deny the reality of our worlds, everyone who believes in reason, science, and truth have come to accept the fact that humans have evolved from apes, which evolved from smaller mammals, and so on in an unbroken chain leading down to forms of life undetectable to modern man. There are some things that humans are biologically designed to do- convert oxygen into carbon dioxide, breed, and die. There are two options available to us- change or stagnation.

We humans have turned earth into a different planet than it once was. Those who would say that the environment of the planet must be taken care of are correct, but it must not be taken to the point that the welfare of human beings is put after the welfare of animals.

Unfortunately for me, my whole argument falls apart when I am asked “So Brian, what are you doing tonight?” My response to this question will probably be some self-fulfilling activity- drowning myself in my own humanity. McKibbens arguments ring strong to me. I ran cross country, and still enjoy an exhausting run. To me, the most eloquent argument he makes is the simplest. “Sure, these questions are important, especially the last one. But they’re not all-important. The techno-utopians ignore all the equally urgent queries, such as “What shall we have for dinner?” and “How are your feeling?” and “Can I give you a hand with that?” and “Do you think you could ever love me, too?” “-McKibben, 226

I can only say that we will one day evolve beyond these questions, we will one day live in a different world. I can only pray that we do not eliminate all that is valuable and interesting in the process. I believe that the risk is worth it, in order to lessen the human suffering that covers the majority of our earth.

Works Cited

McKibben, Bill. Enough : Staying Human in an Engineered Age. New York: Owl Books, 2004.

Silver, Lee M. Challenging Nature : The Clash Between Biotechnology and Spirituality. New York: HarperPerennial, 2007.

Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Revised Edition ed. London and New York: Verso, 1991, pp. 5-7.

Rene Descartes, Discourse on Method and the Mediations (New York: Penguin, 1968), 54.

Peace and the green revolution.(1970). Science News, 98(18), 347-348. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3955518

Chakravarti, A. K. (1973). Green revolution in india. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 63(3), 319-330. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2561997

Kristine Latham
December 9, 2008
English Composition
Dr. Adam Johns
The Human Contradiction
The Human Contradiction is the condition that all humans are faced with that will eventually lead to their demise. The basic premise of the condition is that humans are hierarchical, meaning that they like to hold dominance over others. Alone, this is a flaw that can be overcome. However, humans are also extremely intelligent creatures that have the capabilities to develop vast technology. Among these technological inventions are weapons. Weapons are used to gain dominance, to maintain control, and to extend power. When you combine the hierarchical flaw with a huge capacity to create novel things you find yourself constantly at war among your species. Eventually, this technology will become too great and the desire for power too strong, and the species will go into a world war. Some might say that this has happened already and we, as a species have survived. However, due to the Flynn effect, intellect is increasing as time goes on. With each new generation there is a greater capacity to develop weapons and state dominance. With each new weapon that is created, there is a greater ability to kill. World War II was referred to as the war to end all wars. Octavia Butler believes that eventually, we will enter into a final World War; final because the chances of our planet or species surviving are only as great as the likely hood of aliens coming to rescue us. Humans are hierarchical and intelligent and will lead the species to extinction through war if technology and instinctual contradiction is not brought under control.
World Wars represent the greatest example of intelligence and hierarchical tendencies in history. So far there have been two. Both wars were based on a need to instate power over others. There was this driving desire to have some groups recognized as better than others. Whether this power is defined by religion or land, it always comes back down to dominance. Despite their common cause, both wars were vastly different. With each new day there are more and more catastrophic weapons. If there were to be a third World War, it would be the very last, for it would destroy our species and our planet.
The First World War began in 1914 and ended in 1918 after killing over 20 million people. The war began as a thirst for power. The Great Powers could not settle with the land that they had. The fought for more land, because land equals power. The French held resentment towards the Germans, after losing land to them years and years ago. The Germans wanted to have the same power as all of the other nations on the continent. They went up against the French striving to get this power. Soon other countries began to take sides until it was two huge forces against each other, all for a “place in the sun” for the Germans. The French gained the support of Russia, Japan, the United States, Italy and the United Kingdom. While the Germans gained the alliances of Austria-Hungary, the Netherlands, Spain, Bulgaria, Switzerland, Monaco and the Scandinavian’s. The war began shortly after the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. An entire world went to war all because of some countries need to dominate over other countries.
The Second World War began in 1937 and ended in 1941. World War II was ranked deadliest war in history after killing 70 million people; 50 million more lives were taken than in the First World War. This war once again was one side versus the other, in this case the Allies versus the Axis. It started when the Treaty of Versailles was made after the First World War stating that Germany must lose land and have limited armed forces. This made Germany crave power more than ever. Germany’s invasion of Poland had a domino effect on other countries that were not at peace with each other. Event after event caused more and more countries to enter the barbaric fight. The United States was last to enter the battle after their home territory was attacked at Pearl Harbor by the Japanese air force.
History has a tendency to repeat itself. Over and over in history we can look back and see the same mistakes being made. Humans are hierarchical and have the tendency to put other groups down in order to make their own group seem more important or superior. In 1848 women spoke out and fought for their rights as citizens for the first time. In 1920, America took the first step towards ending sexism. Today, woman still fight discrimination in the work force. It took people 72 years to decide that women should be treated as equals to men. Today, in school, children are taught the horrible history of sexism. Our society preaches the positive effects of the women’s rights movement, glorifying the women that stood up against society to say that they are equals and should be treated as such.
A similar historical timeline takes place during the civil rights movement. Another time glorified by the history taught in elementary schools. Every fifth grader in America can tell you about the hero Martin Luther King who stood up against discrimination and Rosa Parks who refused to succumb to the injustice of the law.
Today, homosexual and bisexual individuals do not have the same privileges as all Americans. They are discriminated against by our government, a system formerly designed as a democracy to represent the rights of the people. Yet, in 2008, members of our society cannot marry in most states and do not have equal tax breaks as heterosexual couples in the states that they can be wed. Furthermore, homosexuals do not have the right, as spouses would, to make life altering decisions for their loved one while in a hospital.
In Octavia Butler’s trilogy Lilith’s Brood, she envisions a third world war to be so terrible that the species and planet would have been destroyed completely if it weren’t for an alien species that saved them. There is almost nothing left by the time the Oankali get to the planet. They save the few humans that they can and take them to a ship in space where they will breed humans until they have restored Earth enough to send the humans back to live on. Even after the humans have seen what their hierarchy and intelligence does, they never stop to change their ways. The Oankali keep the people that they rescued in rooms of isolation. They were asleep suspended in a plant that provided their bodies with nutrients. They were not kept asleep or isolated as a punishment or an act of hate, merely because when put together there were too many instances where the humans tried to hurt if not kill each other. When the humans were finally given the option of freedom back on earth, they formed groups called the resisters that fought against other groups. The resisters were so set in their ways and so fearful that they ignored all signs of danger and recklessly continued to live in ways that they were familiar. The resisters spent most of their time trying to recreate the life they had before the war. They tried to go back to making technology and using weapons to kill, even though they all lived through the war. They knew that they were endangering themselves all over again. Yet they refused to give up their guns. Every time they made a gun, it got more powerful and more accurate.
The third world war the Octavia Butler imagined in Lilith’s Brood involved nuclear weaponry, which now is only part of the concern. Scholars like Bill Joy, Bill Mckibben and Lee Silver are in agreement on few things but they can all recognize the possibility for devastation that the technology we are creating may hold. Bill Joy controversially states that, “We have approached the first moment in the history of our planet when any species, by its own voluntary actions, has become a danger to itself - as well as to vast numbers of others” (Joy). Genetics, Nanotechnology and Robotics “release the power to build devices that are genetically distinct and selectively destructive” (Joy).
Bill Mckibben strongly believes that we should forget all technology. Completely turn around the future of the world and stop going down this technological path that will inevitably demolish the species. This would be extremely difficult though.
Silver argues that this is leaving too much up to chance. He believes that nature is random and cruel. Silver enforces the idea that we have no predestination determined by God. It was random that the human species came to be. It was random how the human species has died from natural destruction and disease. Silver presents that perhaps, it does not have to be random how humans become extinct. While technology is extremely dangerous and potentially devastating, we might as well try it because either we will die thanks to moody Mother Nature and an unreliable God or do to our own inadequacies. Technology can make our lives easier, longer and happier. It would be foolish to ignore these advantages simply out of fear of offsetting some sort of balance or plan. There is no plan, we are a genetic mutation. It was an accident that we came to dominate the world. So why should we hold back from experimenting with what else we could become.
Even the most respected and intelligent scholars of our country cannot agree on a final decision to save our lives. Everyone is too wrapped up in being correct and being the leader who helps everyone make what they believe to be the right decision. The idea of a collaborative effort is gone because of hierarchy. This instinctual need to dominate prevents any positive impact from being made.
Frighteningly, Octavia Butler is not that far off when she envisions a third world war. And it is true that it would take an alien rescue for us to survive. Just by looking at the growth of weaponry between the First World War and the second we can see that a third world war would be so devastating that the chances of survival would be slim to none.
Over the years weapons continuously are getting more powerful. This exponential increase in intelligence can be explained through the Flynn Effect which was first noted by J. R Flynn. Studies were done that supported that “average IQ scores have risen over the past 70 years” (Siegler). The basic idea of the effect comes down to humans are getting smarter. With each passing year there is a higher average IQ score. In 1942 the raw score for the 10th percentile on the IQ test was 18. In 1980, it had shot up to 38. The most prevalent demonstration of the improvement of weapons can be seen through the sequence through the World Wars.
In World War I the main weapons used included: “air forces, tanks, poison gas, and effective submarine warfare” (Wagner 328). This was the first time that the Government, Military, Scientists and Industrialists all collaborated in order to make the most deadly force possible.
In World War II we advanced to: amphibious aircraft, balloons, blimps, bombers, gilders, helicopters and autogyros, missiles, artillery, tanks and tank destroyers. The technology of World War II was unlike anything the world had ever seen before. The wealthiest countries were taking the war into the air. Just to give a glimpse into this complicated and in depth topic, amphibious aircraft is a technical term for flying boats and float planes. Not only were there planes that couldn’t sink and boats that could fly, but there were 70 versions of these amphibious aircraft inventions. World War II ending when atomic bombs were dropped for the first time.
The decision to drop atomic bombs is still a controversy today. The effects of dropping the atomic bombs are still realized today. This haphazard decision to drop, at the time, the deadliest weapons known to man resulted in devastation for innocent civilians for decades to come.
Humans are intelligent, hierarchical and doomed. The Human Contradiction is a real condition and has mapped out an inevitable death to the human species. Due to the condition all species on Earth and the planet itself are in danger. With each new war there are millions of more deaths. We clearly have not learned our lesson. Octavia Butler is very accurate when she imagines what a third world war would be like. The inability for scholars to agree is just one more factor that will lead to our demise. Humans cannot coincide peacefully. They must instate dominance and hold power over others. Since they are so intelligent they are more than equipped to do so. In the process of instating dominance we will lose all sight of things with real value and eventually there will be nothing.






Works Cited

Eisenberg, Nancy, Robert Siegler, and Judy Deloache. How Children Develop. New York: Worth, Incorporated, 2005.

Find related articlesEditDelete
Joy, BIll. "Why the Future Doesn't Need Us." Wired: 1-19.

Margaret, Wagner E. The Library of Congress World War II companion. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster, 2007. 328-409.

Andre's Final Project

Andre Cedeno
Dr. Adam Johns
Seminar in Composition
December 6, 2008

Communication & Detachment

In Chris Ware’s “Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth” the main character Jimmy Corrigan lives much of his life through the telephone. The consequence of his actions is that he becomes an isolated individual who has no friends and who only talks to his mother. An example of Jimmy being unsociable is where after having a phone conversation with his mother he calls Peggy, a woman he has a crush on, saying, “P-Peggy, it’s J-Jimmy… if you hurry and look outside right now there’s a rainbow to look at/ S-See it? You see it? Ha Ha boy, it sure would be fun to take a walk out right now and look at it don’t you think right now” (Ware 12). There would be no problem with this phone conversation until Jimmy’s face-to-face conversation with Peggy happens. While day dreaming about a life together with Peggy, Jimmy is stirred from his dream where Peggy tells him, “Jimmy!! Take your mail and get out of here! I’ve got work to do” (Ware 16). Jimmy relies on the telephone for his communication and gets the results expected of a poorer medium of communication than face-to-face communication. However, the telephone is still a richer form of communication to computer mediated communication, one of the biggest new forms of communication. The results expected from this medium are even lower than that of the telephone. By relying heavily on CMC people will end up with less intimate relationships than Jimmy Corrigan. With more reliance on this new medium of communication people have become more distant individuals, with fewer connections between them. Examples include people text and instant messaging others instead of talking to them. New communication technology is causing many in our society to become more detached from one and another compared to the results from face-to-face communication. This detachment is evident throughout today’s society and even in works of fiction by Chris Ware and Octavia Butler.
Computer-mediated communication has increased a great amount over a short period of time. Online tools such as blogging, chatting, e-mailing and networking sites have become more and more popular. Other similar technologies such as text messaging have also become extremely popular. These technologies have allowed for more convenient communication but have also caused communication to become more impersonal. This detachment involved in CMC has had many adverse affects on the relations of today. Joseph McGlynn conducted two studies involving CMC and relationships. The first study examined CMC’s impact on closeness, satisfaction and support while study two examined the reasons individuals chose to use CMC and the perceived effects of using this medium of communication. In study one it was found that as the quality and quantity of CMC increased so did the amount of relational closeness, satisfaction and social support. Study one also found a positive relationship between the amount and quality of face to face communication and all three of the variables. In study two it was found that:
Respondents suggested while CMC enables relational partners to maintain a greater number of relationships with reduced time and effort, the value of relationships may be declining. As a result of this paradox, partners face the challenge of balancing increased numbers of connections with decreased perceptions of connection. (McGlynn 46)
The results of these two studies show that while CMC has allowed people to maintain relationships they have had to sacrifice the merit of these relationships. One of the individuals involved in the experiment even said “Friendships today are different because although you can keep in touch easier, I feel that some closeness or intimacy may be lost through CMC.”(McGlynn 46) Conducting trivial relationships online does not compare to carrying out these same relationships face-to-face where closeness and intimacy are at a premium. The beneficial effects of CMC such as its convenience are cancelled out by the fact that it misses a major component of communication, intimacy.
I have seen this lack of intimacy firsthand. While using CMC I have continued insignificant relationships with people I rarely spoke to face-to-face. On an online networking site I had a conversation with one individual who I knew from school. I had only spoken to him briefly during our whole time together in school but, when I joined the online networking site many mere acquaintances were labeled as friends. While I was able to contact them much easier than I would have been able to before I realized that many people labeled as friends really were not friends. They were only people I knew, with whom I had little to discuss. Instead of talking to these people about trivial matters I could have been meeting other people face-to-face and establishing more tangible or intimate relationships.
Besides a lack of intimacy, other examples of the disadvantages of CMC in the real world are evident in Sonja Utz’s “Media Use in Long-Distance Friendships” and Robert J. Sidelinger’s “Couples Go Online: Relational Maintenance Behaviors and Relational Characteristics Use in Dating Relationships”. In Utz’s study she compared the use of e-mail and phone conversations in long-distance relationships. It was found that people preferred phone conversations over e-mail for intimate conversations while they used e-mail for less intimate communication. One reason that the phone was preferred over e-mail was “because of its higher media richness and social presence – fewer socio-emotional cues get lost.”(Utz 16) The phones closer relationship to face-to-face communication provides advantages over CMC with regards to socio-emotional cues. The less technologically advanced form of communication is the form used for the more intensive actions. Sidelinger’s study dealt with how CMC affected relational maintenance behaviors and relational characteristics. These characteristics include communication satisfaction, interaction involvement, commitment and relationship satisfaction. Sidelinger concluded that, “Even when people communicate simultaneously with each other by IM, they may not feel a strong presence of each other. Ultimately, CMC may not be employed effectively if individuals are not fully emerged in the communication process as they interact with one another online.”(Sidelinger 12) The amount of effort put into the communication correlates to the results of the communication. This shows that CMC is not as effective in relationships as richer mediums of communication such as the phone and face-to-face communication. The convenience of CMC also causes it to become more superficial.
The superficiality of this medium also leads to other problems. In Jamie Switzer’s “Creating Impression in CMC” she conducted a study where individuals who worked in the virtual world on a task were asked questions about their teammates. The results of the study showed that a third of the respondents did not even form impressions of their teammates. Other respondents used cues in the text to create their impressions. One respondent said, “I picture short sentences coming from short people,” (Switzer 19). The lack of several major cues causes more random impressions to become formed with CMC. In regards to CMC Switzer said, “the information and range of cues available is significantly narrowed…CMC places a greater emphasis on text-based verbal behaviors as well as on preconceived biases and personal schemas.”(Switzer 3) The reliance on biases to form impressions shows that CMC is not effective in forming relationships. Other research shows some of the effects of relationships developed online. “When Online Meets Offline: The Effect of Modality Switching on Relational Communication” by Artemio Ramirez Jr. and Shuangyue Zhang examines how switching mediums of communication effected relationships. Those who stayed online with their relationships had “greater intimacy and social attraction than the other conditions in which Ftf (face-to-face) contact occurred.”(Ramirez 1) Relationships were even harmed when they transferred from online communication to face-to-face communication (Ramirez 1). This may relate to Switzer’s findings about biases and schemas being used for impressions, since these usually turn out to be false the relationships formed only through CMC will not live up to the expectations when people meet in person. Any relationship that you have to use stereotypes to form is not a good relationship. Relationships should be based on what we know about other people not simple assumptions. If relationships cannot transition to face-to-face there is no point in having them, not many people are willing to interact with others solely online.
While there are many disadvantages to using CMC there are also a few advantages of this medium of communication such as the convenience it provides. In McGlynn’s study the main reason for the use of CMC was determined to be its convenience. This medium of communication does allow people to correspond more often and helps to deal with barriers such as time and distance. CMC can help people communicate in long-distance relationships and others who have conflicting schedules. However McGlynn also found that, “comparatively few participants denoted CMC as a superior means of communication,” (McGlynn 77). He even refers to Geert Hofstede’s ideas of individualism versus collectivism as a reason for the choice of personal convenience over better communication with others. In America there is an individualistic culture where things such as convenience for one are put over the relationship of two. People sacrifice relationships for their own convenience. People in America have sacrificed many things for convenience but, if a form of communication hinders relationships because of its expediency, is that really an advantage that we should make a sacrifice for? Others support CMC with the social information processing theory which suggests that these relationships involving CMC may take longer to develop but, in the end they are just as effective (Ramirez and Zhang 5). This theory goes against the ideology of the social presence theory and the cues-filtered-out theory. Both concepts suggest that nonverbal cues, which can be found in face-to-face communication, help to with relational processes (Ramirez and Zhang 5). Some of these factors that are lost in CMC include partner predictability, social information exchange, self-disclosure and attraction. Much of our communication relies on non-verbal communication and the cues involved within it. Without these cues it is much harder to understand one and other. How do you explain a shrug to someone on the computer? The answer is that you cannot. We lose these things with CMC, some of the more distinctive parts of our conversations which help to get our point across.
With the more personal parts of communication, such as cues, becoming lost with these new technological changes people should try to focus their attention on using technology to create more personal communication. Society should try to become closer with one and another instead of more distant. An example of something we should strive for is the communication found in Octavia Butler’s “Lilith’s Brood”. While the humans rely on the same face-to-face communication that has been used by them for thousands of years, the Oankali are able to use their sensory tentacles to send messages to each other. The sensory communication is even more personal then the face-to-face communication of humans. When discussing the level of communication between two Oankali construct sisters and Akin, another Oankali construct, Butler says, “He could talk to them, communicate with them nonvocally, but he could never have the special closeness with them that they had with each other.”(Butler 379) The direct forms of communication used between the Oankali create stronger relational bonds such as the one between the two construct sisters who relied on each other. If new communication technology allowed us to communicate on a deeper level like the Oankali it would strengthen interpersonal relationships. Since this is one of the goals of communication we should strive for technology that would put us on par with the Oankali. With new mediums of communication similar to the one described above humanity could finally creating a richer medium to express ourselves not something that is worse but, more convenient.
In today’s society people are relying more and more on CMC and similar technology. As a result those who rely heavily on CMC have made more superficial relationships. Many people are less willing to put the same amount of effort into relationships as they would without CMC. People want things in their life to be fast and easy but, some things simply should not be. As communication technology progresses further will mankind be willing to give up more of the intimacy involved in relationships for convenience and other things that make talking to each other easier or will we try to create more intimacy in our communication? Will we end up with relationships like those of the Oankali or Jimmy Corrigan?

In Class Critique

I critiqued Siatta Merchant's project. For her project I said that she should provide more real life examples to support her argument such as the ones she used regarding Che Guevara and Martin Luther King Jr. Overall I thought that her creative project was very good but just needed the incorporation of more examples.

Critique

I critiqued Andre's paper in class. I really liked his ideas on communication and his relation to Ware and Butler. I felt that Andre's paper had a lot of good facts and it was apparent that he had done his research. I suggested to Andre, as you did, that he make the paper a bit more personal and give his point of view. I also suggested, at specific points that Andre explore deeper the ideas of isolation, in relation to jimmy, and the part communication has played in his own life. The last thing that I suggested was a better transition to the paragraph that talked about Butler and Lilith. Overall, I thought Andres paper well written, well researched, and well thought out.

Paper Critique - Colin Conner

I cirtiqued Giovanni's paper. While reading the paper I saw that it was a little difficult to read because it kind of just jumped from paragraph to paragraph with out any transition. So I pointed out where a transition was needed. Then I saw that it was a little bit short for a short story, but that was expected with a draft, so I pointed out a few areas where he could have elaborated on the story in a way to lengthen the paper along with strengthening his argument. My only other comment was that his argument was good, but could be strengthen and I said he could do that just by elaborating on the details. It was well on its way to being a good short story.

Colin Conner's Final Project

Colin Conner
Dr. Adam Johns
Seminar in Composition
5 December 2008

You Can Have a World's Fair, but You Can't Have a Fair World

Human intelligence, combined with technology, when being applied to problems, has not always had a positive impact on the world. Octavia Butler tackles that theme with her first book of the Lilith's Brood trilogy, Dawn. In her version of Earth in the future, we have used our intelligence to continue to develop more deadly weapons and use them on one another to the point where mankind is nearly wiped out. Our salvation comes in the form of an alien race that offers to help us recover from extinction but with the price of crossbreeding with them. We have to give up being completely human to remain alive. This ultimate sacrifice is, according to the alien Oankali, necessary because of our contradictory nature. In an exchange between the characters Lilith and Jdayah, Jdayah defines the human contradiction of intelligence paired with a hierarchical nature He adds that the contradiction grew within humankind like a cancer. Lilith protests, arguing that human destructiveness cannot be attributed to our genetic structure:
“Yes,” he [Jdayah] said, “intelligence does enable you to deny facts you dislike. But your denial doesn’t matter. A cancer growing in someone’s body will go on growing in spite of denial. And a complex combination of genes that work together to make you intelligent as well as hierarchical will still handicap you whether you acknowledge it or not” (Butler 39).
As the Oankali see us, we are not able to control our hierarchical nature, which causes us to be in conflict with one another. When part of our society is held down because they are identified as different, there is bound to be pain, suffering and strife. In Dawn, even though our situation is hopeless without the Oankali, humans still choose to rebel and use weapons and murder to make their point. Whether it is ethnic group versus ethnic group, natives versus colonists, or rich versus poor, there is hardly ever a situation that is solved peacefully. Even when given a second chance with the enhanced genes of the Oankali, humans revert to their embedded "cancer." Man's use of technology will ultimately be his demise because of "the human contradiction" (intelligence combined with hierarchical behavior) identified by Butler.

Big improvements in technology have always been popular with anticipating audiences, but in many cases these technologies are not as beneficial to society as we think. This was first seen at the Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago. The peak of man's achievement also signaled the beginning of what we know as the modern world. Society would never be the same again because of the technological developments achieved for the World's Fair. However, rich and poor as well as ethnic groups were segregated because of the new age of technology, and the generation of materialism. With biotechnology, we see that a great amount of intelligence is required, but hierarchy plays a role in who is able to take advantage of the improvement that it provides. Only those with the funds to pay are able to have genetically engineered babies, and there will eventually be two separate species; "GenRich" and "GenPoor."

In the real world, here and now, our intelligence is leading us to another kind of possible confrontation and may be changing what it means to be human. With the advances in genetic engineering, we are coming close to a time where diseases and other birth defects might be eliminated before a child is born. It is not too much of a stretch of the imagination to see a time coming when we want the baby to also have musical or mathematical talent, and we can ask the genetic specialist to include that; for an additional fee, of course. With people spending this extra money Silver imagines, “GenRich parents put intense pressure on their children not to dilute their expensive genetic endowment in this way.” And indeed, eventually, they become ‘entirely separate species, with no ability to cross-breed, and with as much romantic interest in each other as a current human would have for a chimpanzee.’” (McKibben 39). Again, we see our hierarchical nature come out when these amazing genetic advances can be accomplished, but only those with the money to buy them will get them. McKibben raises this issue in Enough, where he quotes Lee M. Silver's book, Remaking Eden, which introduces the terms GenRich and GenPoor (38). It is not hard to imagine 10-15 years from now, when a couple with a lot of money could ask a genetic doctor to make sure their baby boy won't be bald like his father, and also to give him enough intelligence to get into Stanford since his Mom and Dad couldn't. Across town, another set of parents find out their child will be born with leukemia, but for a large sum of money, which they don't have, they could have it eliminated. McKibben notes,
“...A sixth of the American population lacks health insurance of any kind – they can’t afford to go to the doctor for a checkup. And much of the rest of the world is far worse off. If we can’t afford the fifty cents a person it would take to buy bed nets to protect most of Africa from malaria, it is unlikely we will extend to anyone but the top tax bracket these latest forms of genetic technology” (37).
Because the GenRich would be no more than 10% of the population, this would spell trouble for the world's unity. We would return to segregated schools and other buildings. People would be looked down upon for not being GenRich, and the GenPoor would hate the GenRich. We would take a step back as a society. This could lead to battles between the GenPoor and GenRich, a new kind of Civil War, fought out in the streets and in the government, where legislators call for a Genetic Bill of Rights.

I agree with McKibben that our intelligence will ultimately lead to a new hierarchy, and eventually a new species. Genetic engineering is too much for us to handle right now, we do not have correct limits set, and it also will not benefit everyone as it stands now. We need to know our limits and what is good for society, and what will lead to our doom. We have seen the kinds of weapons of mass destruction that we are able to create to strike fear into other countries. In 1893, the Krupp cannon (the equivalent of a weapon of mass destruction at the time) was introduced at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. This event showcased many of the great technological advances of the time people from all over the world. It also proved our love for power and our continued social hierarchy.

This World's Fair marked the beginning of the modern era, and there are some developments that point to a new height in our human intelligence: the huge wheel created by George W. Ferris to be more impressive than Eiffel's tower in Paris; the first long distance phone call; and illumination of the buildings and grounds using light bulbs and electricity. Sadly, this event also showed our hierarchical nature: the exclusion of blacks except as restroom attendants and the Africans on display as primitives; a separate building for women, with artwork by women and displays of women's activities (Muccigrosso 138, 143). Women played a secondary role in society and the right to vote was still many years away. Even though America was able to experience the “electric” intelligence of Edison and Tesla that ultimately lit the fair, only the rich homeowners would be able to benefit directly from this great technological leap at the end of the exposition. There were also more ominous products like the artillery cannon from Krupp. Twenty-five years later, weapons like the Krupp cannon and others would make World War I (A battle to be on top of the world's hierarchy) one of the most vicious of large wars. Our intelligence allowed us to create chemical weapons, aerial warfare with airplanes, and armored attacks with tanks, all able to cause massive damage.

During this course, I have had the opportunity to reflect on the viewpoints of McKibben and Butler. Although one author writes nonfiction and the other fiction, both agree that, given the proper tools, man cannot avoid destroying himself. McKibben looks at the dark side of genetic engineering and sees the ultimate outcome the same as Butler: that one day, humans will no longer be human. Humanity has shown that we are able, at times, to hold back our hierarchical nature, and use our intelligence for more positive results. Looking back at the World's Fair of 1893, we can see that electrical power is now a utility in every household of the rich and the poor. Telephones became a fixture, and now long distance is free. Women eventually got the right to vote, and a bi-racial man is now President of the United States. In Erik Larson’s text, The Devil in the White City he observes,
“The fair’s greatest impact lays in how it changed the way Americans perceived their cities and their architects. It primed the whole of America – not just a few rich architectural patrons – to think of cities in a way they never had before. Elihu Root said the fair led ‘our people out of the wilderness of the commonplace to the new ideas of architectural beauty and nobility.’…The fair taught men and women steeped only in the necessary to see that cities did not have to be dark, soiled, and unsafe bastions of the strictly pragmatic. They could also be beautiful” (373).
The Fair’s use of architecture as a way to house exhibits captured the height of creative expression. The buildings served as exhibits themselves, allowing the public to experience the structures as much as what was contained within them. Lots of other positive developments came from the fair, in the areas of art, and music. Many positive results have come from genetic engineering as well, including food crops that are resistant to disease and drought, and cures for some of the worst diseases, like cancer and Alzheimer's are currently being researched.

I have seen both cancer and memory loss affect my family. It is very a tough struggle dealing with the consequences of these diseases and the stress they place on a family. I wish there was a way to eradicate these diseases from the world so that no one has to suffer. This would be a great advancement that would benefit people all around the world, but I would like to see the cure not involve genetic engineering. Right now genetic engineering is too dangerous and could cause more harm by producing genetic mutations that are as bad as the diseases. We have not proven yet that we will be able to control genetic engineering, and until we can, we should not continue with researching that powerful technology.

The human contradiction of today’s world has its roots in the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 and continues with McKibben’s ideas. With the first large use of electricity taking place during the fair, that opened up a world of possibilities for new technologies. People were able to see the benefits of electricity in their everyday lives and how it could change the way we lived. This eventually led to new electronic appliances that were useful in our everyday lives such as the radio, television, and shortly afterwards, the computer. The computer allowed us to use our intelligence to build software and processors to solve problems. Once we made the computers more powerful and more reliable, our first uses were for warfare, looking for ways that one group of people could dominate or survive attacks from another group of people. McKibben shows us that genetic engineering is the here and now. It too is an application of our intelligence, combined with technology, to solve a problem. He knows that it could be our inevitable downfall when he says, “It’s not just the critics of germline engineering who see this slick slope looming; those who see it as inevitable also frankly admit that today cystic fibrosis, tomorrow IQ” (McKibben 126). This powerful technology could be used in our military to build the “perfect” soldier, with enhanced senses, strength and intelligence. We are not ready for this future, with our intelligence leading us to a continued struggle for the top position in the world hierarchy. There is just too much possibility for genetic engineering technology to fall into the wrong hands, although I cannot think of a situation where it would be proper for the United States to have access to these future warriors. As we have seen for the past 20-25 years, we have not been very good about overcoming the human contradiction either. We have been using our military power to wage a "war on terror" that asserts our hierarchy over people we view as terrorists. Just as McKibben said, a new type of human will be created. When that happens, will we be like the humans in Dawn, where the normal humans will rebel and attempt to remove the superior individuals? We will continue to use our intelligence, combine it with technology and attempt to solve problems. Our hierarchical nature will still exist, and may be enhanced by our genetic changes. Despite what we might consider progress, the "human contradiction" will remain intact, bringing about our own extinction.


Works Cited:
Butler, Octavia E. Lilith’s Brood. 2000. New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2007.

Larson, Erik. The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America. New York: Vintage Books, 2004.

McKibben, Bill. Enough: Staying Human in an Engineered Age. 2003. 2004 ed. New York: Owl Books, 2004.

Muccigrosso, Robert. Celebrating the New World: Chicago’s Columbian Exposition of 1893. The American Way Series. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, Inc., 1993.

paper critique-Nick Lubic

I took a look at Jim's paper, which was a short story on a soon to be college student. He did a good job of really describing how the main character was feeling and what was going through his head. His story was a little short so I suggested that he go into more of how his mother was feeling about him going away to college. His research was a little bit hard to find but once he explain what he was incorporating, it made more sense. Also, I couldn't really find a way that the story connected to the class. He , again, explained that it was related to McKibben so it made more sense. Overall, he did a good job.

Lauren Dodds Final Paper

Lauren Dodds
Dr. Adam Johns
Seminar in Composition
December 5, 2008

Opening up to Oankali Values

According to King Whitney Jr., “Change has a considerable psychological impact on the human mind. To the fearful it is threatening because it means that things may get worse. To the hopeful it is encouraging because things may get better. To the confident it is inspiring because the challenge exists to make things better.” In Octavia Butler’s science-fiction novel Lilith’s Brood, the Oankali are a life form that has survived millions of generations because of the unique ability to change. It’s not only that they do change, they must change. They have to mate with other species to become an entirely new species in order to maintain existence. Humans should be more like the Oankali when it comes to adaptability. We should be more accepting of change as the Oankali are and we should look to the Oankali for the necessary changes that could benefit society. The Oankali are not afraid of change but humans are set in their ways and unfortunately, it’s the humans’ values that need change the most. As they have adapted, the Oankali have developed a better set of values and our society should better exemplify these Oankali values.

The most notable change that accompanies the lifestyle of the Oankali is the change of sexual practices. Reproduction with the Oankali is very different from the sex that humans are accustomed to. The traditional sex between a man and a woman will no longer produce children and once the humans choose to stay with the Oankali, sex, along with other forms of touching, will no longer be pleasurable; it will be repelling. The Oankali way of mating requires five members: an ooloi, two males, and two females. It is no longer a union between one man and one woman. Sound familiar? That’s right! The great homosexual marriage debate! A construct child, made from an ooloi, two males and two females, can feel a piece of each parent in itself and it’s essential for each parent to be there for the child, (and the birthing mother) for the birth and for some time after. Without them present, the child is likely to become ooloi. The child needs to feel the presence of each parent and spend time with them to learn all that it can from each one. This non-traditional combination of parents is exactly what these construct children need to be brought safely into the world. Butler is making her point that non-traditional families that are increasing in numbers in the modern world are perfectly capable of raising a perfectly normal child. Homosexual organizations used to be fighting for social acceptance, now they fight for the right to marry and adopt. There are certain states that flat out ban gay adoptions, but in other states, adoption agencies have been more accepting depending on the religious affiliation of the agency and the type children they place. A study conducted by Rutgers University shows that though fundamentalist Christian agencies were unwilling to give homosexuals a child, Jewish-affiliated agencies as well as public and private non-affiliated agencies are much more accepting of homosexual applications (Adoption). Rutgers professor David Brodzinsky stresses that "with over a half-million children in foster care and more than 100,000 waiting to be placed for adoption, the need for more adoptive parents is evident. [. . .] There is growing recognition that homosexuals have the same capacities and can provide the same quality of care to children as heterosexuals, and the children do quite well. Homosexuals are a valuable parenting resource for raising children that need families" (Adoption). Some organizations are starting to be more open, much like some humans decided to live with the Oankali, but it would be beneficial to society if everyone could grasp these concepts. Everyone would agree that children need families that can provide love and support in a safe environment suitable for the child to grow and learn. Now people need to realize that there is no reason why same-sex parents cannot provide this environment. There is no evidence that homosexual parents cause any harm to their children more than any set of parents can do harm to their children. Why then is society so caught up with the sex of the parents? When an agency is questioning whether the couple is suitable to adopt, they should question, not their sexual orientation, but rather the key characteristic that would classify any couple, heterosexual or homosexual, as good parents. The Oankali are open to change and this is a particular area that modern society needs to learn to adapt to and come to accept. They need to learn to focus on the values rather than get caught up in the details. If a gay couple can provide suitable lifestyle for a child, then so be it. Who’s to say that a certain heterosexual household would be better off than one with parents of the same sex? Not all heterosexual parents are models of perfection anyway.

There are plenty of heterosexual households that should never have had kids. There are parents that fight constantly, that use drugs or illegal substances, act out towards each other in abusive manners, and use profane language and derogatory comments among many other actions not conducive to the upbringing of a child. “‘One out of every two marriages,’ claims Libby Bortz, a psychiatric social worker and community activist in Denver, ‘contains one episode—at least one episode—of physical violence,’ and ‘one of every three or four . . . female children under the age of eighteen experience sexual abuse’” (Bennett 78). The resisters may have paired up man with woman but their lifestyle is not perfect for the upbringing of a child. In fact it is rather hostile. The day Akin is brought to Phoenix a fight breaks out when Tino’s father showed up at the Rinaldi’s house with a gang of his friends to take revenge on the raiders. Shots were fired, furniture was smashed, dishes were broken, people cursed as by the end of it, two lay dead and two wounded. This is not the environment a child should be raised in and in the modern society violence is not limited to households.

Children in this day and age grow up in a cruel and unsympathetic world. Rape, burglaries, drug deals, shootings, stabbings and murders dominate the news, depressing anyone who watches. There are several active rival gangs that continue to attack and kill the members of the opposite gang in a constant cycle of revenge. It’s this kind of endless violence, thievery and recklessness that corrupts the innocence of our youth. These negative influences are absent from the Oankali villages because the Oankali also suffer the pain they inflict on others. As an infant, Akin “had learned [this] important lesson: He would share any pain he caused. Best, then, to be careful and not cause pain” (Butler 257). It’s a perfect reinforcement of the Golden Rule: “Do onto others as you would wish them do onto you." The Oankali can live in this way because they are avoiding their own personal pain but all people should live their lives according to this rule in order to make their world a better place. The Oankali take this aspect a step further. Not only do they avoid hurting others because they don’t want to feel the pain, they also simply hate to see others suffer. Even when hearing the man that murdered Tino scream out in pain, “Akin tried not to feel the anguish that came to him reflexively when he saw a Human suffering [and] one part of his mind screamed for an ooloi to save [the] irreplaceable Human” (Butler 357). Their species has the ability to heal themselves quickly and heal others as well. It upsets them to see a resistor that is hurting and it upsets them even more to see a resistor that is hurt but won’t let the Oankali help them. Humans don’t have the ability to lay their hands on their neighbor and watch them miraculously heal but they do have the ability to care. It’s as if people have become insensitive to the pains of their neighbors and insensitive to the downbeat news. Many people just don’t watch anymore claiming, “The news is just depressing; it just full of bad stuff.” Maybe things have gotten so bad because people just don’t care anymore. The Oankali do not have this option.

In Butler’s novel, humans had the option of joining the Oankali or becoming resistors and the division shows how people place value on different aspects of life. The resisters could not have children so they spent their days building and scavenging, trying to fill the void and find purpose in their lives. They told themselves they were getting ready for the day when they would have children as they continued to build up their town. They had “real houses” with glass windows and they had mills for power (Butler 279), but focusing on their material possessions could not make them happy, even though they felt that their hard work was necessary. Tino, in disgust of the primitive appearing lifestyle of Lo criticized, “You’ve got kids to plan for and provide for, and you’re going to let them slide back to being cavemen!” (Butler 280). He couldn’t imagine why the Oankali didn’t use the resources they had to make their living arrangements great—great according to their human definitions that is. Their values are clearly flawed when they discover the technology to develop guns and start using them against each other. The Oankali may not have houses but they live comfortably in a peaceful community with family and have everything they need. They don’t need big fancy houses, it’s the people in the house that matter and without all the distractions that the resisters work to develop, the people of Lo and villages like it are able to see what’s important more clearly. When I had the opportunity to visit Quacha Birra, Ethiopia, a small sub-Saharan African village, not even depicted on the maps, I noticed that the community was completely devoid of “stuff”. They didn’t have any of the gadgets we “can’t live without” and they didn’t seem to miss them. Value was not placed on material objects, but rather on their love of God and love for each other. They had an incredible sense of community and their kindheartedness radiated from their daily demeanor. We met a family living with HIV. The husband and wife, dirty and skinny, stood with their two poorly dressed little girls and welcomed us into their home. There was obviously no abundance of food or money and yet they passed around a basket with a mango for each of us: a gift for our generosity. This genuine act of kindness served as a perfect example of the hospitality we are all capable of. It struck me that they gave so much despite their poverty in comparison to our giving from our abundance. Without all the extra commodities the Africans I visited, much like those that coexist with the Oankali, have a much better grasp on what’s important and are living a lifestyle where they can experience what is meaningful. Sometimes real houses with glass for windows can just get in the way.

The thing about the Oankali is that they recognize that change is going to occur and they don’t try to prevent it from happening, as humans tend to do. Lilith is deeply disturbed by the new family structure Nikanj describes. It tells her that “Families will change, Lilith—are changing. A complex construct family will be a female, an ooloi, and children. Males will come and go as they wish and as they find welcome” (Butler 260). Lilith thinks it’s wrong for fathers to not want “the ability to be fathers to their kids” but Nikanj assured her that this was just part of the changes of the trade and the construct children would not find it as upsetting as she did if the father did not stick around. In the United States, men are not particularly monogamous anyway. Not only do women seek more commitment than men, they also “honor it more in practice” and in the case of cohabiting, “twice as many cohabiting men as women were unfaithful in a given year” (Bennett 78). Society is trying to fight the natural tendencies of men. But why fight it? America holds this image of the perfect family: a mother and father with 2.5 children, who sit down for breakfast and pass the orange juice around the table. But this is not an accurate picture of American life. “Over half the marriages in this country end in divorce, with infidelity blamed for 17 percent of more” and in 2005, the United States employed over 18,000 marriage and family therapists, compared to the 3,000 in 1970 (Libaire). The rate of affairs is not what’s important; it’s the attitude towards the affairs that matter. Americans have affairs at about the same rate as the French, but according to Pamela Druckerman, author of Lust in Transition, a book on infidelity, “adultery crises in America last longer, cost more, and seem to inflict more emotional torture than they do in [other countries]” (Libaire). Americans need to stop putting so much stress on the pursuit for perfectness and start excepting things for what they are. The Europeans have the right mindset; affairs aren’t that big of a deal. There’s no need to wrap so much emotion around it. The perfect nuclear family is rare and since this is not going to change, we should just change the mindset of society to account for this fact, much like the Oankali has done. In Lo, some men stayed with their families because they wanted to but men were not required to stay and those who left were not looked down upon. If it takes a village to raise a child then the fathers aren’t really all that necessary anyway.

Someone might argue that the Oankali are no role model for values. The very way that they destroy cultures and civilizations just to maintain their own existence should immediately take them off the pedestal. Little by little, they forced humans to give up their humanity and they took from them what was never theirs to take. They are bullies who take advantage of less developed life forms. But, in the Oankali’s defense, humans were never on the right path. Our values are all wrong and we are doomed to failure from the start because of the human contradiction: we are both intelligent and hierarchical. We are smart enough to develop weapons but the hierarchical aspect entails that we will use these weapons against each other, which will lead to our demise. In this case, the Oankali were only steering us in the right direction. They were saving us from our inevitable and eventual downfall after saving us from our first failure. They’re not bullies, they’re rescuers, and so their values should be an example for humans to strive for.

When the Oankali find a new trade partner they go about the exchange with an open mind. They realize that the change will be a complete metamorphosis. Not only will the species change physically, they will have a new way of life. Humans, as a species, are comfortable with the way things are. Any new development or way of thinking that could potentially pose some sort of threat to the way things are and have been for years is scary. So scary, in fact, that we must protest in front of churches, universities and whoever else we can point a finger at and broadcast our concerns on weekly news magazines like 20/20 and 60 minutes so that all can join in the fear. It’s true that the Oankali are different, but why does different have to be so frightening? The Oankali might always look alien to humans but their values shouldn’t. They exemplify openness to new ideas and put stress on that which should be important. Butler would agree that humans should be more like the Oankali.



Works Cited

"Adoption More Open for Gays and Lesbians". USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education). . FindArticles.com. 04 Dec. 2008. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1272/is_2695_131/ai_99849663

Bennett, William J. The Broken Hearth : Reversing the Moral Collapse of the American Family. New York: Doubleday, 2001

Libaire, Jardine. "Why French Men Don't Get Caught." 21 Feb. 2007. Best Life Magazine. 1 Dec. 2008 why_french_men_don_t_get_caught.shtml>.

Lauren Dodds on the peer evaluation

Dana evaluated my paper. She told me that the way I fixed my thesis worked and helped to make my argument consistent throughout the paper. She thought my third paragraph was addressing two different point and that it might work better to split the paragraph up, and so I split it up and expanded on both aspects. She thought that my last point, arguing that men aren't monogamous anyway, needed a lot of work. It was a difficult point to argue and I wasn't convincing her yet. She also gave me an idea for a counter argument and a rebuttal but I decided to go in a different direction with that.

Meaningless

Giovanni Serrapere
Dr. Adam Johns
Seminar in Composition
November 30, 2008
Meaningless

The weather was beautiful outside so Dean thought it would be a good day to work on his garden. For weeks he had been preparing his garden for summer, he had planted tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, zucchini, strawberries, and even watermelon. In his retirement Dean always found time to do some work around the house, even if there wasn’t a problem, he’d find one. He worked as a mechanic for over 40 years before retiring in time for social security. He took a shower and sat on the couch, he wore a new polo shirt and a pair of khakis. Dean’s son Brian was coming to pick him up. They were going out to his favorite steakhouse; he had already decided in his head what he was going to order. Dean looked at his watch impatiently, then like clockwork, the door opened and in came Brian. Dean got up as soon as he came in; Brian nodded his head upward and asked “You ready?” “Of course I am, I’ve been ready for 15 minutes.”
Brian had made reservations for 5:30, and therefore was in a hurry. He was late because he had been stuck in traffic on the commute back home. His Dad would usually yell at him for being late even though he was well in his thirties. Brian wanted to tactfully broach a subject but he wasn’t sure how. He asked his father if he knew what yesterday was, he shook his head no. “It was the 10th anniversary of Jimmy’s Passing.” Brian stated matter of factually. In fact, Dean did know what the day before had meant, but he tried not to think about it too much. “Huh, I totally forget about it.” “It’s crazy, 10 years already; it’s already been a decade.” Dean stayed silent and looked out the window of the car. Jimmy had died of a heroin overdose; he was only 22 years old when it happened. In some ways they both felt responsible, maybe they could have been more available to him, or they should have known he had a problem. They all had trouble when their mother died, but Jimmy took it the hardest. Maybe, he was more honest with his feelings, Dean and Brian just put on a better pretense. The rest of the car ride was imbued with an awkward silence. But it was okay, for Brian was used to these, Dean wasn’t the type of man to talk about his feelings.
At the restaurant, Brian told them we had reservations for 5:30, it was 5:40. They were asked to just a moment, there wasn’t a table ready yet. Dean saw the waitress come by, and asked her “Excuse me, what is taking so long? We made reservations, we shouldn’t have to wait.” The restaurant was busy with most of the tables full or ready to be cleaned, and the waiting area began to grow outside of the doors. Dean’s statement only added more stress to this woman’s workload. But out of experience she dealt with it tactfully, “Sir, I am so sorry about the wait, I will get you a table right away.” How many times had that woman had that woman been hassled by irate customers. She probably had been working there a long time. She would endure any kind of treatment to feed her kids. Waitressing was on the light side of what society can do to depredate you. Dean grinned, “You see boy, that’s how you get things done.” Their booth was near the back of the restaurant, there were moose heads on the wall near them. A young waitress about 20 years old came to their table. She had a flirtatious smile, and assuaged Brian and Dean by using words like “Honey”, and “Sugar”. Dean didn’t have to look at the menu when he was asked what he wanted to drink, it was like a prerecorded message played and said with great decisiveness, “A Peach Tea, and the Texas T-Bone, with a sweet potato on the side.” Brian however ordered his Coors, and needed until she came back with it to order the NY strip steak. Brian asked him about his recent endeavors, and Dean started telling him about his new garden and that Brian was wasting his yard by not planting one. Again Brian wanted to talk about Jimmy, but he knew he would be cut off by his father’s ramblings.
In Brian’s cubicle he sat at his computer and talked all day, most days dragged by, but they all seemed to melt into one long week at a time. He couldn’t even remember what he had done after work most days. His official title was customer service rep, but he might as well have been replaced by a machine. Everything he said was recorded, and he was only allowed to say certain things. But like everyone else he knew he had to pay the bills, and that was about all he could do. He had his mortgage to pay, and his new Mazda didn’t come cheap. Every year Brian looked forward to his 2 weeks off in the summertime. He would go camping up in the Sequoias for a couple of days, and then spend the rest of his time at home. At his desk he had a day calendar, a stress ball, and a copy of ESPN magazine. He thumbed through the pages while he talked with customers. Since he had a headset he thought maybe, he should start bringing in dumbbells to curl while working. Any distraction from the routine lobotomizing monotony of the day would suffice.
The morbid anniversary still haunted him, he wondered what he would be like if he were still alive today. What had Jimmy really missed out on though? He didn’t feel anymore accomplished than when Jimmy had been alive. His job was truly meaningless; he didn’t even get satisfaction from helping the angry or nervous customers. If there was a dream job he didn’t know what it was. When he was a child he wanted to be a doctor so he could make people feel better. As soon as he got to High School, this changed; he got average grades, and didn’t care much for school. Jimmy was even more forlorn than him, most of the time he didn’t even go to class. He thought his Dad was only made worse by Jimmy’s death; he was already a pitiful case before. Brian remembered the times when his Dad had kicked Jimmy out of the house first for quitting school, and then for quitting his job. Jimmy was never motivated; he never saw the reward in working all the time. He was like that even before he started to do heroin. Now Brian could see some reasoning in this sentiment. Jimmy had questioned why we should work, he argued that Mom had been a nurse, had worked hard just to end up dying of cancer. His father’s response was always to call him lazy, he would tell him to quit complaining, and to do what he had to do.
Dean was changing the air filter in the a/c system, when Brian appeared behind him. “You’re lucky I didn’t fall, you scared me half to death.” “I thought I’d surprise you.” Dean wasn’t used to Brian popping in on him; there contact was limited to the weekends mostly. Dean finished replacing the filter and came off the ladder. He made coffee for both of them, and they sat on the back porch. “How do you like my garden, it’s coming in pretty good.” “Nice, it will be good.” he said in a lackluster tone. Dean sensed something wrong but was afraid to ask what, he knew what the conversation would entail. He tried to change the subject and talked about his upcoming vacation. “So you looking forward to the Sequoias?” Brian sat silent for a moment and looked at him saying nothing. “Jesus Christ Dad, you are allowed to talk about it you know! Don’t tell me you haven’t been thinking about. You had a son he died; it’s nothing to be ashamed of.” Dean exploded letting out all his pent-up frustrations, “It is something to be ashamed of, he had a life and he threw it all away. He was weak, he was a drug addict. He was a selfish spoiled brat, who didn’t think about anybody but himself.” “No he wasn’t, we were selfish for wanting him to stay in his empty life! None of us had anything after Mom died, you especially, but you wouldn’t acknowledge that either. Maybe if you had been honest and talked about our problems it wouldn’t have happened.” Dean got up and breathed deeply holding his temper; he walked back in the house and left Brian there.
The next day Brian did something unusual, he decided to take his vacation 2 weeks early. Not only that but he planned to take a trip down to San Diego, maybe stay on Coronado, he hadn’t been there since his Mom was alive. This new venture was needed; a new outlook on things would do him good. The Pacific Coast Highway would be his trail; first he would travel west to Pismo Beach, then drive down to Santa Barbara and spend the night. The next day he would drive down to San Diego and try to find a hotel with vacancy, it would be difficult during summer. As he came near the 101 the air became cooler, and he held his hand out the window. Jimmy had always liked road trips, and maybe he was there with him in spirit. In Pismo, he stopped for gas, and went to a Mexican restaurant near the ocean front. He ordered a Shrimp burrito, which was one of his favorites and a large horchata. He took his meal and walked out onto the end of the pier with his food. The sun was setting on the horizon; the pacific seemed to go on forever. There were seagulls in the distance sailing in the wind, and a pod of dolphins swam in the corner. The ocean reminded him how insignificant he was, he was only one of the billions of people on this earth. He imagined all the people with all of their problems, in all of history. Who was he in the grand scheme of things? Was anybody important, the earth is billions of years old, and all of this was just on earth. What about the rest of the universe? What is he compared to that?
He wanted to get on the road before the sun completely disappeared so he left his spot on the pier. Along the Highway were signs for the various Spanish Missions. They still stood after nearly 300 years, a testament to the struggle to convert the new world. The padres had spent their lives devoted to this cause. Their faith was matched by few; to them it was their purpose. To many it gave meaning to have faith, but it was all an illusion of meaning. For others their faith was a tool to shackle their constituents. The seeds to revolution were squelched, the poor couldn’t be angry if it was all in God’s plan that they suffered. Blood was spilled in the name of Christianity, Native American babies were murdered, villages were massacred, and disease was spread, all for a lie. Their lives were to the conquistadors only a foundation to reach heaven, to achieve glory. After getting to Santa Barbara he decided to keep driving. He would rather spend money for a night in San Diego. At about 1:30 in the morning he got there, he was tired and he quickly found a place to stay that suited him. The alarm was set for 8:00 he would not waste time on this vacation.
There was this nice bakery 2 blocks from the beach; he ordered 2 croissants and a large coffee. He sat on the table outside, basking in the ocean breeze. After he was finished, he walked onto the beach, and walked along the shore. Brian decided to call his Dad, and tell him where he was, he had not told anyone where he was going. Brian hoped his Dad wasn’t angry at him anymore. Dean didn’t pick up the phone, confirming Brian’s fears. This wouldn’t stop him from enjoying himself. The Hotel Del Coronado was a landmark that Brian had always liked to visit, so he sat down at the beachside bar at the hotel. Just being on the beach was infinitely more pleasurable than a day at the office. The openness of the beach represented freedom, while his office life seemed to stifle his whole being. The Hotel was oven a hundred years old, it was just a building albeit stunning, but this artificial thing had more life than he had. It not only had a rich history, but it would last longer than he, just like it outlived its creators. They had spent a lot of time and effort building this, but if one would inquire as to who built it, only a small number of people would know. Architecture that magnificent and still their attempt at immortality failed. It would hurt to go back to the valley and he knew this. The ocean was calling him; he ran out to the sand, took off his shirt and jumped into the oncoming waves. The water was a bit chilly but he didn’t mind, it had been years since he had experienced the simple joy that is the beach. Even his Dad would have no qualms about expressing his love for the ocean. The water had a therapeutic effect on his demeanor, and he decided the best thing to do was to get his Dad to meet him down here. He could afford it, what good was saving up for retirement if he doesn’t enjoy himself. The phone was brought out again, again no answer, so he decided to leave a message.
For lunch, he treated himself to the local harvest of the sea; he ordered some calamari, and the restaurant’s specialty, fish tacos. Again he opted to sit outside, with a refreshing Corona in his hand, sandals, shorts, and a shirt with flounder on it, he looked like a native. If only Southern California wasn’t so damn expensive, money always seemed to be a problem for him. His whole life was centered on procuring it, but for once he finally got to enjoy the fruits of his labors. Dean still hadn’t called back, so he started to assess exactly what he said. Was it really that bad? Brian concluded that his father was just being his stubborn old self again; he would worry about it until tomorrow. One more day would suffice; it was also all he could afford. There was a jazz concert that night at Seaport Village, he decided to go. The music played like a perfect soundtrack for the setting, he listened pleased. The notes painted the night with bright colors, each sound made a different color. The next morning he got his stuff together and put it in his car, he even bought a sweatshirt that said “San Diego” on it for his Dad.
On the way back instead of taking the 101 he took the I5 straight into the gut of the valley. Down the mountainside after Pyramid Lake, he was now in the valley. He could always tell by the smell of the cows, which were not his favorite. This was just another sign of his rueful life, along with the smog of the valley visible from the mountain top. He stopped in Kettleman City, for an In and Out burger, he ordered a double cheeseburger with fries, and a strawberry shake. He sat on the outside under a plastic umbrella at the table; he ate his food and looked out at the desolate landscape. It looked like a desert, but the San Joaquin was somehow a fertile valley. The land had for generations sustained life; it supplied the nation with most of its food. The migrant workers helped to feed the country, their lives were spent toiling for others. Yet, all they had was just enough to feed their families, and they were looked at as subhuman. They would die in their 50’s, the chemicals from the pesticides, the sun, the dust, and backbreaking work would ravage their bodies. Their lives were essentially sacrificed to give their kids a chance; this was noble but also tragic. Yet Brian was worse off, because he had nobody’s life to enrich. He worked for himself, he worked to pay bills. As he got closer to home he realized how it felt to him, it was like a self inflicted jail sentence. Brian’s routine was his prison he was somehow trapped behind bars as a free man.
His Dad’s car was there when he got there; he decided to knock this time. Nobody came to the door, so the doorbell was rang. Still nobody came; Dean was probably out back in the garden. Brian walked in and called out, “Dad”, he looked in the living room, then out the back door, but no one was there. He walked into his Dad’s bedroom, and saw him laying face down on the bed. The upper part of his body was on the bed while his legs lay scrunched on the ground. He flipped his Dad’s body over, and listened for breathing. There was nothing, that was it, he was dead, and it was his fault. He called 911 and told them the situation; they would have to assess the cause of death. The police questioned him to make sure there was no foul play. It turned out that his Dad had a stroke, 2 days before.
Brian was devastated he sat on the couch in disbelief over what had happened. He was o young how could this happen to him. His retirement had just started; he hadn’t even begun to enjoy himself. All of his life he had worked only to have his wife and his son die before him. Brian didn’t exactly feel like he had been a plus in his father’s life. Brian knew it was his fault, if he hadn’t got in that argument his dad would still be alive. Dean would be buried at the local cemetery, right next to his wife and son. Maybe he was with them right now, probably not but it was a nice thought. Brian didn’t want to have a funeral service; they didn’t keep in touch with their family. He had only met them a couple of times when he was younger. Besides Dean probably wouldn’t want a big expensive fuss for him. For days he stayed in his house, but he didn’t mind, that’s what he normally did on vacation anyway. What was he going to do now? His father was all he had left, friends and girlfriends came and went he never had a close bond with any of them. Would he continue down this dead end path?
He watched as his father was put into the ground. The tombstone was simple and summed up his entire life in a couple of words. “Dean Stanley February 14 1942- June 25 2008 Father, Loving Husband, Hard Worker.” What else could Brian write about his father, his life were those things. All of that hard work and sacrifice pain and anguish just to end up in the same place that Jimmy and Mom were. The picture was sobering, 3 family members in a row, he did not look forward to this sad fate.