The essence of “The Abolition of Man”
The core questions that are presented to readers in C.S Lewis’
“Abolition of man” tap into some very visceral fears that humanity has about
the future. Deep within the bulk of the essay is a question that people are
still asking today. Will we push the
advances of technology so far to the point that we become less of ourselves? The
caveat with this essay comes in the form of an anecdote about the author’s
friend and his thoughts on mankind’s relationship to nature. The words, “Man
has nature whacked”, came as a troubling observation to Lewis; a product of
man’s quest to peal of a sense of humanity. Lewis noted that the words of his
friend had a certain “tragic beauty”. The tragedy could come stem from his
friend, a dying man, expressed how he thinks nature and mankind are competing
for relevance, with mankind in the lead of the race. The philosophical problems
that his friend’s comment was inspired by led Lewis to ask himself the
following question in the essay; how is mankind developing increasing power
over nature? Shortly after the first of the big questions in text is
introduced, Lewis brings up planes, wireless devices, and contraceptives as examples
of man kinds prowess of the forces of nature. One interesting reflection that
Is made early in the text is the idea that if Lewis himself were to someone pay
someone to carry him, he too could be considered strong. Within that
hypothetical situation Lewis, having convinced and even manipulated someone
into carrying him, has established sense of power over the strong through his
class. Lewis convincing a strong man to carry him can relate metaphorically to
the relationships between buyers and sellers in the capitalistic systems that
we live in; a phenomenon that Lewis argued is a product of man’s escape from
humanity. Lewis believed that through phenomena like the buyer seller
relationship mankind is slowly creeping away from a deeper sense of humanity.
When it comes to contraceptives, Lewis expressed how it seemed paradoxically
problematic that people who already exist make large “devastating” decisions
for people to don’t exist yet. The real question to ask according to C.S Lewis
is whether or not life and death is our choice to make. Lewis also noted how contraceptives could
become a sort of selective breeding, one that would cut off impoverished
communities from the gene pool. In the case of contraceptives, certain groups
of people execute power over other groups of people with nature as the
instrument. Later, in the essay Lewis
mentions how eugenics and scientific education will become a power under which
generations in the future will become subject to. He goes further with this
theme to say that “Each new power won by man is a power over man as well”
(Lewis.2) which is to say that every advance in technology will be eventually
used to control or terrorize the masses. At one point in the essay, Lewis
explains that when mankind can control everything about itself human nature as
we know it will be as risk. Humanity will be something that we can modify and
control, which would easily open and fresh new can of ethical can of worms for
us to deal with. Lewis goes on to
explain that “The battle will indeed be won, but who, precisely, will have won
it?”(Lewis.3) as a way to say that the advances in technology and humanity
keeps on pushing isn’t necessarily beneficial to humanity itself. As a final note, one can find a fascinating
quote at the end of the essay when Lewis explains that ..”To see through all
things is the same as not to see”(Lewis.6) . The quote could be read as a way
of saying that once all the unexplained things in life become explained, the
meaning and value of life itself will dwindle into nothing.
1 comment:
I love that your precis begins with fears that technodevelopment will render us "less than ourselves" when these technodevelopments are always promising to make us more than ourselves: enhanced, augmented, abundant, invulnerable, superintelligent, transcendent.
I also like that you not only set up your argument (as does Lewis) by reading the anecdote about the dying man who thinks humanity is on the brink of conquering nature -- and, "hence," death -- but that you thematically return to it at the end when you evoke the dying man as casualty in the later quote: “The battle will indeed be won, but who, precisely, will have won it?” That is to say, what if the techno-transcendent being who escapes death can do so only by becoming differently dead?
For Lewis of course the so-called "power of technology over nature" is better understood as tools mediating relations of power between/over people. As you quote: “Each new power won by man is a power over man as well.” You go on to say this means which "every advance in technology will be eventually used to control or terrorize the masses." This is a real fear of Lewis' -- his discussion of planes quickly becomes a story of mass-bombing, his discussion of radio quickly becomes a story of mass-propaganda (needless to say, this is the immediate aftermath of WWII Britain) -- but I definitely think that while Lewis fears the worst he hopes for better deployments of technology, perhaps in the service not of conquest but of care. If you were to respond that Lewis may hope for better but that his argument provides little ground for that hope… well, I gotta agree with you on that one!
I truly appreciate the glimpse of strong reading you offer of "Lewis convincing a strong man to carry him can relate metaphorically to the relationships between buyers and sellers in the capitalistic systems that we live in," since this introduces some welcome class critique into the mix (I think you are being really generous in your reading of Lewis here, more generous than I am myself, but I do appreciate the move), especially given the rather reactionary and hyperbolic claims he makes about contraceptive healthcare (which you also make sure to highlight).
I found the writing and thinking here mostly clear, but I do think another edit might have caught that "quest to peal of" (quest to peel off?) and may have encouraged you to break the block of text here into maybe three more manageable paragraphs! Lots of good stuff here.
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