1984

1. war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength. the three slogans are antonyms to us.

2.Newspeak is the official language of Oceania. It's purpose was two things: one was to provide a medium of expression for the world-view and mental habits proper to the devotees of Ingsoc and two, make all other modes of thought impossible. A-everyday words B-political words (compound words) C-scientific and technical terms

3. They need to keep their vocabulary as little as possible, weeding out all of the antonyms and synonyms so they can't express themselves as much. The less they know is better. An example is from page 28: "The thing that now suddenly struck Winston was that his mother’s death, nearly thirty years ago, had been tragic and sorrowful in a way that was no longer possible. Tragedy, he perceived, belonged to the ancient time, to a time when there were still privacy, love, and friendship, and when the members of a family stood by one another without needing to know the reason. His mother’s memory tore at his heart because she had died loving him, when he was too young and selfish to lover her in return, and because somehow, he did not remember how, she had sacrificed herself to a conception of loyalty that was private and unalterable. Such things, he saw, could not happen today. Today there was fear, hatred, and pain, but no dignity of emotion, or deep or complex sorrows." This passage shows the comparison of what life used to be like to what it is now and how they used to be able to love and have friendships. Now family doesn't matter and people aren't there for eachother without reason or logic.

4. The Party is able to manipulate the past because they have control of the present. They do not let anyone keep records of their past such as documents or photos. This makes people believe whatever the Party wants them to believe because their memories become unreliable.

The Party not only controls the minds of people, but of every source of information there is.

5. Two minutes of hate.

cloning

After watching the cloning video, what is your view of cloning? Do you agree or disagree with cloning? Within your answer make sure you keep in mind questions like; should there be limits or restrictions to cloning? Are there benefits to cloning? What forms of cloning do you agree with (if any)? Therapeutic (organ), reproduction, food, and animal cloning?

I disagree with cloning. I don't believe there is any reason for cloning a person with the same features because really, what is the point?? I don't think cloning should be aloud, so I think it should be completely restricted. The benefits for cloning that I can think of is to have another one of the same person, but how could that be a benefit when we are all suppose to be 'unique.' Since I don't believe in any type of cloning--I look at food cloning and still ask the question WHY...?? So in all of the forms of cloning, there is absolutely no reason for it. It is also not morally right.

Ectasy and Soma

The movie dealing with ectasy had to do with people getting a feeling they wanted to get because it "felt good." The book BRAVE NEW WORLD had people injecting themselves with soma, so they could shut out the real world and feel happy. Both of these drugs are used for the same thing. They both give people a feeling that they "can't get" in the real world. The drugs are an escape from all bad things.

Position on Brave New Babies

I don't believe that babies should be created through embryotic devolopment unless someone is incapable of producing the eggs themselves. I really don't agree with choosing the sex of your baby. Dr. Mark Hughes tells us that he won't help his patients who ask for the option of choosing their babies sex. He tells him "We're not going to do that." He states that it discredits the value of an individual life, which is what I believe too. I think that if someone creates a life, it's suppose to be an amazing thing...so now why would someone want to choose what their baby is going to be; it's like saying that they wouldn't be happy with that baby. I think they should stop all of this research for higher technology in creating babies before they take it too far. It's unethical, and morally wrong.

Universal Health Care

http://www.miscelaneasdecuba.net/media/pdf/Article-Hirschfeld-Press.pdf

In this article, a woman goes to Cuba to research the universal health care system. While she was there, she found that many Cubans are not satisfied with their health care. They had made complains that their doctors were unhelpful, that the best hospitals and clinics only servered to political elites, and a lot of the medical supplies were stolen from the hospital and sold on the black market. They also criticized the way their data was unreliable and the atmosphere was horrid--because with certain diseases surrounding the premisis such as TB and HIV.
Cuba's Health Care system has a severe shortage of medicines, medical equipment and other supplies.