For the political science major reading this: on occasion you have probably engaged in a dialogue, debate, or all out argument concerning two sweet words- purism and pragmatism. For many of us, it seems natural for our beliefs or outlooks to fall somewhere on the spectrum between those two, and I think few of us would claim the title of purely pragmatist or purely purist—or purely anything for that matter. In reading Book I of Utopia, I sensed that More was contemplating these models in terms of both governance and faith. The interplay of purism and pragmatism comes to the surface in More and Hythloday’s back and forth about the fruitfulness or futility of providing wisdom and advice to rulers. To Hythloday’s point, rulers will often not heed the counsel given to them, or if they do, it is often a diluted or even “corrupted” version. In this way, Hythloday views the great endeavor of providing counsel as mostly fruitless; it is essentially hopeless. While More recognizes that the ideals he or Hythloday might lay before a king may never be reached, small changes or gains may be accomplished. In a sense, More suggests that it is better to do the little good one is able than nothing at all. In class today, the words realism and idealism were written on the board. Some would argue that More is pursuing realism, while Hythloday is holding fast to idealism—though perhaps not in practice, in belief. These piggyback off of the conversation of purism and pragmatism. For More and Hythloday, is realism a form pragmatism? Is not compromising one’s idealism a form of purism for Hythloday? I think More is wrestling with this himself. And, because his faith is so closely intertwined with his politics, he may be seeking to identify which settles his conscience: purism or pragmatism. Is pragmatism the compromising or abandonment of his beliefs? I believe More’s discussion with the fictitious Hythloday is his exploration of these questions. I think he long struggled with these questions, as many of us do today. More played the role of the pragmatist in Book I and, I believe, much of his early life. Yet, one could argue that in martyrdom he made final allegiance to purism. More’s exploration is one still prominent today. “Purists” will hold fast to the idea that an uncompromising and complete change is the only change worth pursuing. This often comes with a price: seeing no change at all. Political parties across time have warred internally, divided, or even fallen apart debating the question of purism over pragmatism. Is compromise a worse evil than futility? Some might ask the Republican Party that same question. In recent years we have seen an ineffective Congress, a highly polarized country, and even government shutdown as a result of the answer to that question being a hard yes. Republicans have gone to war within their own party debating that very question. Some Republicans would say that compromise is both un-Republican and unacceptable, bashing those who would pursue pragmatic approaches to change. Some Republicans would argue that compromise is a necessary tool in governance. And thus the debate over purism/pragmatism ensues. In this post, I am not proposing that one is better than the other. I am also not seeking to demonize the Republican Party. After all, do they not have the justification to pursue purism if their constituents would have them pursue it? In Challengers to Duopoly—a book about third parties in the American two party system—the author highlights another example of this debate within political parties and its implications. The Liberty Party and the Free Soil Party were both pre-civil war abolitionist parties. Both were fairly short lived. At the time, slavery was a very hot and controversial topic. While both parties sought an end to slavery, the two saw its abolition coming about differently. The Liberty Party pursued a more purist approach, holding fast to a call for total abolition with no concessions. The party had very little success and quickly met its end. From its remains came the Free Soil Party. This party approached abolition far more pragmatically, working with other parties and forming political coalitions. Gillespie writes that “many Free Soilers answered [to purists] that to be right and fail is no victory for what is right” (Gillespie 77). The Free Soil Party eventually declined, much like the Liberty Party. But, as Gillespie writes, this may have been caused by its return to purism over the years, which left is less appealing to a large voting base. Luckily, the leftovers of the FSP were absorbed by the rising Republican Party. Purism and pragmatism both in More’s Utopia and in modern times bring up heated debate across politics and, for that matter, religion. Many try to answer “Which is better?” Others will insist that the question should really be “Which is more effective?” The issue, I think, in answering either of those questions is that they fail to recognize that purists and pragmatists have different top goals. Purists seek above all to hold fast to their untainted beliefs, while pragmatists seek to make things happen. While each may hold both goals, it is the ranking of these goals that distinguishes them. For each, what is “better” or “more effective” is that which helps them to achieve that primary goal. Because these primaries are different for purists and pragmatists, I don’t know that there can ever be a decisive answer to these questions.

Challengers to Duopoly by J. David Gillespie

Book V of Plato’s Republic sets out a vision of family that is designed to optimize the cohesion of communal life within a city. Sex is permitted just once a year, pairings are determined by lot, and children are taken from their mothers and raised by the city. Plato identifies three classes which must exist, and who are made up by people who embody one of three personality types. The virtuous, courageous, and appetitive types, Plato argues, are all relatively equally prevalent among men and women, and so the distribution of work within the city should also be equally distributed between individuals.

These conclusions come about in-part as a result of Plato’s problematization of disunity, and minimization of the forces that create divisions. Plato identifies the nuclear family as a key source of disunity, and one that invokes problematic themes of possession as well, since parents can act as though they have a special right to ‘ownership’ over their family. Amid this discussion, Plato identifies men and women as being fundamentally similar, and decides that they should be treated the same. Of all the views he advances, this is likely the most agreeable to the modern liberal reader.

John Hittinger, in Plato and Aristotle on the Family and the Polis identifies three points of contention between Plato’s rules for life in a just city, and the edicts of Christianity as he, the author, understands them. I will focus on his first point, concerning the equality of men and women. Hittinger states that Plato, “… Makes some interesting arguments so as to nullify the differences between men and women as if they were no more than the length of one’s hair.” In making that claim, Hittinger highlights hair length because it is a performative indicator of gender, and not a physical sex-linked characteristic. The author’s refutation of the claims to gender equality implies that males and females are irreconcilably different creatures with complementary features. This view of fundamental gender difference, Hittinger advances, can be found in the bible. This analysis contrasts contemporary conservative Christianity with ancient Greek philosophy. On this point, Plato appears more in line with a modern liberal take on gender than Hittinger. Do you see this divide in how gender equality is treated as a trend, generally, in the dialogue between Christian thought and secular philosophy?

Works Cited:

Hittinger, J. (2013). Plato and Aristotle on the Family and the Polis. Saint Anselm Journal, 8(2), 1-22.

Plato. Republic. Trans. C. J. Emlyn-Jones. Ed. William Preddy. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.

Michael Brown

Plato’s Republic is a collection of books that focus on how justice.  He defines what justice is and how justice forms a state and how it affects man. For my blog I am going to focus on this discussion of Justice in Book II.

Glaucon and Adeimantus, companions of Socrates, are both arguing that injustice with always be superior to justice.  They want Socrates to show them that justice is of the highest desirability; meaning that people desire justice for its consequences.  Socrates seeks out to fulfill what Glaucon and Adeimantus want by examining justice in the individual and in the state. But for Socrates to show justice in the State he must create a viable state and with that brings the definition of the Republic. The republic is a place that has a sufficient amount of food, clothing and shelter for each individual, a division of labor and a system of trading.  For Socrates, he wants people to look for a just city rather than a just individual because a city is bigger than a person. The idea of a city came from people not being self-sufficient and having to work together. In Plato’s ideal state there are 3 classes: Guardian Class, Warrior Class and then everyone else. He then explains different kinds of state and describes a fevered state, which is luxurious. This is a type of state where excess and greed rule and that same excess and greed consequently leads to war. The Book ends with a discussion of what education should be taught to the guardians in the early years of their life.  Socrates, Glaucon and Adeimantus come to the conclusion that the old stories of the Gods should be changed and make the Gods look just.

Christopher Wright, an editor of the magazine Philosophy Now, wrote a column on Plato’s Republic and how it portrays a utopia. He stated:

“Plato’s conception of justice is informed by his conviction that everything in nature is part of a hierarchy, and that nature is ideally a vast harmony, a cosmic symphony, every species and every individual serving a purpose. In this vision, anarchy is the supreme vice, the most unnatural and unjust state of affairs. The just state, then, like nature, is hierarchical: individuals are ranked according to their aptitudes, and definitively placed in the social hierarchy.”

I think that this quote and the explanation of justice show that the just state, in Plato’s opinion, is a utopia. Plato stated in his explanation of the fevered state that excess and greed will cause war.  Everyone has a different view of what a utopia is sometimes they involve excess and greed.  That excess and greed can cause people to do bad things in order to fulfill their desires. But I am starting to agree with Plato’s form of Utopia. No matter where you are in society you are going to get the things you need and you will be protected.  The only way this “just state” works is if people don’t seek excess and greed then there will be no conflict.  We all may be able to agree that peace is a major component of utopias and Plato’s “just state” does have peace. I don’t see a problem with the hierarchy in the “just state” because everyone is helping each other and protecting each other.  For example the farmers grow the food for the Guardian Class while the Guardian Class protects the farmers from enemies. There is, theoretically, no greed or excess.  Everyone has a sufficient amount of the necessities to live thus there is peace and stability. But I am curious if the rest of the class agrees with me in that the hierarchical “just state” is a type of utopia?

Works Cited:

Wright, Chris. “Plato’s Just State.” Plato’s Just State. Philosophy Now, n.d. Web. 27 Sept. 2015. <https://philosophynow.org/issues/90/Platos_Just_State>.

The final chapters of Atwood’s Oryx and Crake leave the reader with conflicting feelings of optimism and despair – much like the opening chapters of the novel.

In “Time To Go”: The Post-Apocalyptic and the Post-Traumatic in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake, Katherine Snyder draws emphasis on the fact that both the first and last chapters have a “verbatim repetition” of Snowman waking up to the sound of the tide, wishing he was still asleep so as to escape the desperate reality of his life (Snyder 485). One could argue that this exact repetition is demonstrative of the lack of change (and lack of hope) in Snowman’s life since our first introduction to his character. Throughout this novel, the perspective of the reader changes because we learn of formerly ambiguous, apocalyptic events, and how Snowman came to be Snowman. In Snowman’s life however, nothing has significantly changed – with the exception of the discovery of other survivors.

Some may say this revelation is the most pivotal moment of the book; the existence of other human survivors alludes to the idea that Snowman will find camaraderie amongst his own kind and his life will improve. We arrive at the small sliver of hope that conditions are salvageable and, because Snowman is not the only one left, the world may not be as doomed as we previously thought. But is that really a fair assumption to make? Realistically, whether or not it is Snowman on his own, or with three others, they are all living in pure survival mode: devoid of resources and ultimately lacking the capacity to improve their conditions. Of Snowman’s last remarks, “Zero hour…Time to go”, Snyder reflects on the true connotations of his thoughts (Atwood 374). “Should ‘time to go’ be taken as a grim acknowledgement of the imminent extinction of both the individual and the species, or does it signify a positive engagement with futurity, whether that future may be human, post-human, or both? Does ‘zero hour’, a phrase that also appears on the novel’s first page, mark the end of time or its new beginning” (Snyder 485-486). In other words, can we allow ourselves to see this ending as hopeful, or is it nothing more than a prolongation of the inevitable?

With regards to Oryx and Crake, there is no way to know for certain the fate of Snowman and this post-apocalyptic world unless we read the rest of Atwood’s series. However, our thoughts on this conclusion could provide further insight into how we view the idea of an apocalypse – either as “a catastrophic end of the world…[or] the millennial revelation of a new age” (Snyder 486).

Works Cited

Snyder, Katherine V. “”Time to Go”: The Post-apocalyptic and The Post-traumatic in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake.” Studies in the Novel 43.4 (2011): 470-89. Web.

Chapter Twelve includes some of the most sinister and significant moments of Margaret Atwood’s novel, Oryx and Crake. In the beginning of the chapter, Snowman is on his way back to Paradice but decides to take a break and climb a tree because of the gash in his foot. Once the Chapter switches over to Jimmy’s perspective, we witness some of the most pivotal and defining moments of the entire novel. A lot happens with Jimmy in this chapter, as he is reunited with Crake and visits the Pleeblands for the first time. Additionally, he accepts a job working with/for Crake at the Rejoov compund. Once he has made the transition to the new compound, we get our first look at the Crakers and Oryx from Jimmy’s perspective, not Snowman’s.This part of the book is so interesting, because not only do we witness the dawn of the Crakers, but also get a glimpse of the love triangle between Oryx, Crake, and Jimmy. However, it is obvious that Atwood is not setting any of the characters up for a happily ever after.In her article, “A Tale Meant to Inform, Not to Amuse,” Susan Squier describes Crake’s real reason for bringing Oryx to the compound, as “Crake uses Oryx to put in motion a chain of events that leads to a compromise even more profound that Oryx’s” (p. 1154). Through the development of the Crakers, we can understand Crake’s ultimate goal. More than anything, Crake wanted to purge humanity of our undesirable traits. Atwood describes the intent of the splicing perfectly as she writes “What had been altered was nothing less than the ancient primate brain. Gone were its destructive features, the features responsible for the world’s current illnesses” (p.305) Through stage two of his plan, Crake has tried to remove the blemish of mankind from the world. Susan Squier offers an interesting outlook on the reasoning or logic behind Crake’s actions. She believes that education, and the way that Jimmy’s world views education could provide a plausible explanation. In this compound society, technology and science trump all other fields, which is exemplified by the state of the Martha Graham Academy in comparison with the Watson Crick Institute. As Squier sums it up perfectly, the images created by these two institutions “challenges our fascination with what science can do at the expense of what art can say” ( p.1155). Although Crake would disagree, Squier believes this separation of science and aesthetics is ultimately to blame for the state of the world. By disregarding aesthetics and their importance to society, this world has developed a “deep and devastating ignorance of themselves and the natural world around them” (p. 1155).  In conclusion, Squier brings up a valid point on the importance of art and aesthetics; however, this is just one of the many problems of the world within Oryx and Crake.

Secondary Source:

Squier, S. M. (2003). A Tale Meant to Inform, Not to Amuse. Science, 302(5648), 1154-1155.

Oryx and Crake Blog Post                                                   Derek Berry

In chapters ten and eleven of Oryx and Crake, Margaret Atwood evokes themes of renewal and transformation. While in the former chapter, Jimmy grapples with changes within his personal life as he enters the workforce, the latter chapter reflects these changes within the context of the broader society and species. Here arrives a critical turning point in the book, when life for both Jimmy and for the world are inexorably altered. Jimmy’s life crumbles, the hierarchy between man and beast is upended, and the civilization of Crakers begins to evolve.

After Jimmy graduates from university and leaves Crake behind, his life begins to change. He dates a woman named Amanda, with whom he is summarily unhappy, and he begins work at a corporation called Anooyoo. Notice that, said aloud, the name sounds like A-New-You, which is the thematic center of chapters 10 and 11. Things have become grim for Jimmy. Without Crake’s guidance and friendship, he flails through each endeavor whether it be professional or sexual. After his break with Amanda, he begins to sleep with several lovers, whom view him as a momentary play toy, a blip on the radar. His experience with casual sex is very negative, which may explain why he feels so uncomfortable later with the impersonal sex practices of the Crakers. Jimmy’s hair is also falling out. Overall, Jimmy’s life as gone sour, and yet he continues to work at Anooyoo, a corporation that comprises of a “collection of cesspool denizens who existed for no other reason than to prey on the phobias and void the bank accounts of the anxious and gullible” (247). They do so through selling products for the betterment of the individual: “cosmetic creams, workout equipment… Pills to make you fatter, thinner, hairier, balder, whiter, browner, blacker, yellower, sexier, and happier” (248). There exists in Jimmy’s world a system of shame exploitation, the ability to profit from others’ desires to self-transform. And yet Atwood counters this desire with several instances of negative change.

In chapter eleven, as Jimmy explores the abandoned compound, he is chased by a savage herd of pigoons, who he expects may seek to kill and eat him. These genetically-modified pigs are the result of scientific progress, and yet this transformation of the species does not bode well for humanity. In fact, the pigoons represent an inversion of the natural order—man over nature—as these aspects of nature gain the ability to hunt and kill man. Despite being originally conceived as a helpful innovation, pigoons have become an abomination. Not only have the status of the pigoons changed but also that of humans. In the context of an artificial world—one in which animals are genetically-modified and the environment falsified—what is the new status quo for human beings? How must humans now navigate this world that they themselves have altered?

There is, perhaps, an optimism too in this theme of transformation. Although one’s personal life or society or even ecosystem might alter drastically and cause mass death, there could emerge from the crucible of change something better. The reader observes this at the end of chapter eleven, when the Crakers build a signal fire for Snowman; the smoke from the fire rises, intended to guide him home. This new ritual, this reliance upon Snowman and their ability to adapt is highly interesting. Despite existing as more perfect and streamlined versions of human beings, they might be slowly adopted human traits (such as their mythologies surrounding both Crake and Snowman). What is Atwood attempting to say about the nature of change and progress? On one hand, she asks, what good is transformation if you constantly change for the worse? But she also offers a glimmer of hope, a sense that humanity in and of itself is not corrupt, is not, as Amanda’s roommates claim, “some sort of monster” (241). Rather, the human race has something decent to offer. Even through the murky haze of violence and greed and inefficient living, there might still be something superior about humans, something that the Crakers desperately need and so far lack. Maybe being human is the ability to change, not only our environments but our practices and ourselves.

Perhaps this human essentialism stems from the flinch one enacts when seeing one’s mother executed. Perhaps humanity is when one feels shallow and hollow when engaging in meaningless sex. Perhaps humanity is the pursuit of love, even through the flimsy medium of art. One must grapple with the threat of artificiality, the notion that one may not be truly living but rather merely surviving as Snowman does. One might merely be a brain in a jar in a scientist’s laboratory reacting to chemicals pumped into their brain; one might merely be a brain in a human-shaped jar waddling upon the Earth. And yet we still name ourselves human, still cling to this notion that we are not well-trained parrots squawking back empty words. Maybe what makes us human is not our ability to love but rather our ability to delude ourselves into thinking that love is more than mere chemicals flooding our brains, that life is more than a series of biologically-programmed survival mechanisms, and that there exists meaning, or rather that meaning may be created, beyond bare survival.

To hope, that is to be human.

Chapter’s 10 and 11 from Atwood’s Oryx and Crake provide pivotal moments for both Jimmy and Snowman, while also raising theoretical arguments about genetic modification. Chapter 10 offers a glimpse of Jimmy that is contrary to the character Atwood has thus established. Jimmy’s complacency and seemingly contentment with his life is presented through his relations with slews of married women, his desensitization (and even increased liking) to Chickie-Nobs and his disinterest in the tragic and hopeless state of his world. But his mindset is shaken by the reemergence of Oryx and his mother in this chapter. On a psychological level, I think Jimmy feels conflicted; he doesn’t know how to handle seeing Oryx again and he even questions if the film of his mother’s execution was real. To me this chapter shows a side of Jimmy we haven’t seen before- he’s much more reflective and emotional, departing from the passive character he has been till this point.

In chapter 11, Snowman is locked in a gatehouse by pigoons, who he quickly realizes have become much more predatory and intelligent. Within the watchtower he discovers a radio, which he hears a Russian voice through. This moment is instrumental because Snowman realizes that he is not alone.

To me, these chapters presented both Jimmy and Snowman as characters who had will and agency. Jimmy’s questioning of the information he receives and his frustration with his own life suggests his satisfaction is upset. For Snowman, his will to survive is shown through his creativity and purpose-driven mission to get to the Paradice Dome. He suddenly wants to take control of his condition.

One interesting concept presented in chapter 11 is the long-term effects of genetically modified organisms. I found the pigoons particularly fascinating. Snowman discovers that over the course of time, the pigoon has become more human and less pig; they even manage to outsmart Snowman. The genetic modification that took place in Jimmy’s world was supposed to improve human lives, but in Snowman’s world the backlash of placing human’s over nature is evident. This proposes the question of what we “can do” versus what we “should do”. Just because we have the technological ability to do something, does that mean we can discredit the moral implications of that action? I decided to research how far off we really are from altering the course of nature, as the corporations had done with pigoons. In the article “Is the world ready for GM animals?” the release of genetically modified mosquitos in the Caribbean and South America is discussed. Although these insects are designed to combat the mosquito population that causes dengue fever, the ethical question of what it means to bend the course of nature to suit human needs is brought up. With little research into how these mosquitoes will affect the present ecosystem and with almost no government regulation into the spread of these insects, some organizations are speaking out against the continuation of the project. Eliminating dengue fever, which effects upwards of 100 million people each year, sounds enticing, but genetically altering nature to cater to humans could be trap. Mosquitoes seem harmless enough but the increased use of this technology poses a vast array of ethical, although still theoretical, questions.

Rincon, Paul. “Is the World Ready for GM Animals? – BBC News.” BBC News. 25 Feb. 2015. Web. 5 Sept. 2015.

In chapters seven through nine of Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake, the narrator reveals the Crakers’ history. We find out that Crake literally created these people, selecting traits from among the animal kingdom and implanting them in the Crakers in order to perfect humans. Crake’s goal was to do away with human flaws, and this endeavor is quintessentially utopian.

For example, Crake had chemicals, “programmed into the men’s urine” as a protection against wolvogs and rakunks (Atwood 154). Crake also programmed purring into the Crakers. After discovering that “the cat family purred at the same frequency as the ultrasound used on bone fractures and skin lesions,” he installed that feature into the Crakers, endowing them with their own self-healing function (Atwood 156).

Then, the narrator shares that the Crakers grow up extraordinarily fast: “The yearling looks like a five-year-old. By the age of four he’ll be an adolescent” (Atwood 158). Crake believed that too much time was wasted on childrearing and being a child so he sped up the whole process.

All of these modifications of the human body reflect utopianism in Crake’s attempts to perfect humanity, and in the end, Crake invents a non-human being or humanoid, the implications of which Marcy Galbreath discusses in her work Genomic Bodies: Un-Natural Selection, Extinction, and the Posthuman in Atwood’s Oryx and Crake. Galbreath proposes that, “through Oryx and Crake’s un-natural selection, [Atwood] opens a conversation on human responsibility and non-human sentience” (Galbreath 2).

If human beings create sentience in other living beings, how do we treat those beings? How do we even decide what constitutes sentience? Do we consider them equals, or inferiors? Or might they be considered our superior as they’re engineered to be better versions of ourselves. Surely in the context of the novel, the Crakers enjoy a better standard of living as they’re better equipped to live in their surroundings while snowman struggles so survive.

Jordan Wills

Margaret Atwood is playing with my head, and I love it. Ever since the first chapter I turn every page looking for an explanation to why Snowman is in this situation and what potentially happened to the rest of the world. Atwood knows what I am searching for so she places blurbs of information that lead my mind down an array of paths. In chapter 8, Jimmy mentions that Harvard “drowned” which would imply sea level rise due to climate change. Sever storms and increased solar radiation which Snowman battles everyday supports the theory of climate change but would not wipe out the human race. The massive building destruction Snowman describes in chapter 9 reminds me of fictional stories of nuclear war but Atwood is smart enough to know that modern nations fighting with nuclear bombs isn’t feasible. The human population could have collapsed due to a genetically modified virus made by HelthWyzer, which may have worked too well. This is confirmed by Snowman when searching an abandoned home within the complex. The final and most curious clue Atwood notes is in chapter 8 when Crake shows Jimmy the secret Extintathon portal which describes anarchists biological creations that are used to “shut down the system.” In actuality I may never know why humanity has nearly been wiped out and the world is a barren wasteland but that does not mean I am ending my search for the cause.

Susan M. Squier’s article “A Tale Meant to Inform, Not to Amuse” eased my mind and changed my train of thought when reflecting on the novel. She shows how the varying education systems of Martha Graham and Watson-Crick universities can cause deep-rooted issues for society. Squier argues, “education that separates scientific and aesthetic ways of knowing produces ignorance and a wounded world.” She poses a well-rounded argument that really holds ground and made me look at Oryx and Crake differently. Does it really matter what happened to wipe out humanity? No. What really matters is what was society like before the event. We can analyze Jimmy’s world to see what happens when science reaches a point where it runs out of natural issues to solve. The only issue is once they solved all the natural problems that face society, they created new ones to keep the ball rolling and the paychecks flowing. This is the part we can learn from. Squier solution to this is to have everyone receive an education that includes all the academic subjects instead of becoming too involved in one highly focused subject. Sometimes extreme focus can help you achieve your goals but failing to realize what is happening around you can be a fatal mistake.

Works Cited

Squier, S. M. “BIOTECHNOLOGY: A Tale Meant to Inform, Not to Amuse.” Science 302.5648 (2003): 1154-155. Jstor. Web. 10 Sept. 2015.

Throughout chapters 4-6 in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake the reader is able to take a deeper look into the past life of protagonist, Snowman. In previous chapters Atwood gives vague, and spotty descriptions of not only present time where Snowman lives or the past where Jimmy (Snowman during adolescence) lives.

However in these chapters we get a better look into Jimmy’s life with more of a timeline, from adolescence to what seems to be his young adulthood. Something drastic in between Jimmy and Snowman has occurred, yet the we do not know what that is yet. However, there is an obvious disconnect between Jimmy’s world and Snowman’s. So which world is the dystopia?Is it Jimmy’s “near future,” imagined by Atwood, that both gives an approximation of the present and also projects forward, given society’s present situation. This projection is based on the present’s political, technological, economical, and social situation of today. This world that Jimmy lives in is sectioned off by classes where the elites live in private compounds owned by the biotechnology corporations, and the lower socio-economic classes live in the “dangerous,” (as told by the elites) pleeblands. In this world the idea of genetic engineering is common, giant corporations are in control, children are sold as sex slaves, and where there are hints of an oncoming natural catastrophe, perhaps due to global warming.

On the other hand there is Snowman’s post-apocalyptic-seeming world, where as of now he lives as an outsider among these “Crakers,” struggling to survive, or at least a strong enough will to do so. All the while he is covered in bug bites, hiding from the deathly sunset, wolvogs, and barely surviving on one fish per day.  Snowman passes his time by creating his daily schedule, while on the interim  recounting the days of Jimmy, and talking to the voices is his head. His current existence as Snowman is as an outsider to the genetically modified “Crakers.”

According to “Studies in the Novel” a journal article public by The John Hopkins University Press states that is is quite obvious why “readers of Oryx and Crake are not alone in their temporally uncertain, or doubled, relation to the novel’s dystopian mise-es-scéne.” (471). This is not only due to the dystopia and/or real world that Jimmy is born into, but also because Snowman is introduced in also a (maybe) dystopian world. This journal article suggests that in the beginning of Oryx and Crake there is a confusion of which world, or both, is the dystopia. Perhaps the confusion is due to the current real life similarities between Jimmy’s world and the readers. Since there are so many comparisons between Jimmy’s world and the world today, can it really be described as dystopian? It is hard to imagine a person’s own world being classified as dystopian. However, that could be the exact point Atwood is making in these beginning chapters. If this is the case then Atwood could be saying the inevitable outcome is Snowman’s world. On the other hand Snowman’s world can be the dystopia of the two, where living as a outsider, in a seemingly post-apocalytic world, on the brink of insanity is everyday life. The idea that either one, or both, could be the dystopia may also depend on the reader and his/her personal opinion on what their dystopia would entail. Either way the reader is being taught a lesson about the current, political, socio-economic, climatological situation. However, does this lesson change with the realization of which world is the dystopia?