Thursday, July 7, 2011

Brave New World: Allusion

"INFANT NURSERIES.  NEO-PAVLOVIAN CONDITIONING ROOMS, announced the notice board." pg. 19

At the beginning of chapter two, Huxley makes a reference to Pavlov.  Ivan Pavlov was a famous scientist who conditioned dogs to drool at the sound of a dinner bell.  In the same sense, humans are conditioned to passively serve the Ford community in Brave New World.  Each person is born into a caste with a respective job.  As humans grow up, they are conditioned to do their jobs and live by the rules of society.  For example, a group of Delta babies were conditioned to hate books and flowers.  The babies were taken into a room with books and flowers and when they got excited an alarm sounded, frightening them and then they were shocked to reinforce the lesson. Just as Pavlov conditioned the response of his dogs, humans were conditioned for certain things according to their castes.

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