By RM
Genetic engineering is one of the more obvious examples of the needs of the system of capital to dominate and arrange everything within its grasp to its benifit and to those who rule. Many who protest or take actions against genetic engeneering of other life-forms are correct in stating genetic engineering must stop, though I disagree with the reason why many of anti-genetic engineering activists etc. oppose it as such. Many whom oppose genetic engineering claim to be against it as such due to the fact genetic engineering of other life forms will produce results unknown. It is this fear of the unknown that I disagree with. To fear the unknown is to destroy the imagination, it is the ultimate attack on all possibilities in favor of the status quo. It is an act of subjection and therefore ensures the continuance of the present social order and as such, such a statement is of no use to those who want nothing less than the total destruction of the present system. I believe such actions must be viewed in terms of the exploiters and the exploited. I believe genetic engineering must stop due to the specialization and alienation such actions (and western science in genersl) create and maintain which is always to the benefit of the ruling classes. Like capitalist language, math, etc. science was created to enhance the system of capital therefore benefitinig those in power. In able to understand such an analysis it would be useful to understand th ehistory of western science.
Western science is based and born out of both capitalist time and mathematics. Time had been created by early priests and emperors as an organized institution to control the majority for creating surplus to the benefit of those in power. 1. Number had originated to allow the ruling classes to measure land and for tax purposes originating from private property 2.-therefore both time and mathematics originated for the needs of capital. Thus with such understanding, it is hardly supprising to discover that western scienceor capitalist sciencebased off such institutions of control who's only function is to enhance capital- also serves as capitals underling finding other ways to exploit what is not yet exploitable for the benefit of capital. Capitalism requires a repetitive lifeless objectified view of the world in order to function. It is therefore only fitting that such a view has brought about the notion of the earth and the entire universe as one giant lifeless clockwork machine; (One significant factor which helped shape the notion of the universe as a clockwork machine was the introduction of the mechanical public clocks in the 1300's which had originated from Christian monasteries) 3. Descartes' which clearly has influenced western mathematics and thus western science in his modern philosophy viewed the whole universe as one giant clockwork machine with all life in it were engines in motion or cogs that humans are the masters and possessors of which was interwoven with the dominant Christian religion of the time. 4. In other words his viewpoint rationalized the objectification of all life for the use and profit of the ruling classes. Desecartes' philosophy had attempted to ereadicate all chaotic elements of nature through orderly repetition of his views of a clockwork universe, therefore turning everything wild into a commodity to be explioted within his view of a universal mechanical system designed to rationalize and enhance capital. Issac Newton had forwarded such thinking creating equations to mathematically explain the attraction and repulsion of objects that is physics. He had forwarded the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century by developing a complete mathematical formulation of nature as a perfect machine or a perfect clock. 5. As mathematics and the newer scientific systems spread throughout particularly in the west, such views of the world came to influence and dominate other forms of human activity to a greater extent. In 1747 Le Mettrie produced L'Homme Machine in which 'man' came into view as completely mechanical as compared to the previous notions that 'man' had a soul so was not mechanical. 6. Thus even humans themselves became machines in which was easier more intigratable for the system of capital. In more modern times the view of the world has been reduced to bits of information through relativity and quantum physics as well as energy physics and other advanced physics.
In order to maintain such an imposed viewpoint so as to continue to benifit the system of capital, one is required to act only within the confines of the present western scientific model. One must act on "scientific facts" (presented to them by scientists before them only) therefore requiring the individual to act not by their own imaginations or creativity, but by a certain system of rules and labelsetc. others have created which they then must follow; therefore creating a hierarchial class structure of those who create the organized system of western science and those who must follow within such rules. As a result those who are required to follow such an ever-growing scientific system must suppress their feral wildness and uniqueness for the narrow confines of the scientific system as the "one and only" "correct" model. As such, since western science is not intended to provide playful interaction and reaction with the rest of nature but the domination of nature, hence genetic engineering; which is needed to serve the system of capital. All of which must be destroyed along with those in power if we are to be able to live our lives towards the creative unknown rather than through the authoriatarian acts of fearing what we cannot predict.
1. John Zerzan, Elements of Refusal, (sec. ed. 1999), pg. 19 and
George Sarton, A History of Science, (1954), pg. 11
2. John Zerzan, Elements of Refusal, (sec. ed. 1999), pg. 52
3. Lewis Mumford, Technics and Civilization, (1934), pg. 16
4. http:// www.utm.edu/research/iep/d/descarte.htm
5. http://mathstcd.ie/pub/HistMath/People/Newton/RougeBall/RB_Newton.html
6. http://www.cscs.umich.edu/~crshaliz/LaMettrie/Machine/