During the British socialist revival of the 1880s competing theories of evolution were central to disagreements about strategy for social change. In News from Nowhere (1891), William Morris had portrayed socialism as the result of Lamarckian processes, and imagined a non-Malthusian future. H.G. Wells, an enthusiastic admirer of Morris in the early days of the movement, became disillusioned as a result of the Malthusianism he learnt from Huxley and his subsequent rejection of Lamarckism in light of Weismann's experiments on mice. (...) This brought him into conflict with his fellow Fabian, George Bernard Shaw, who rejected neo-Darwinism in favour of a Lamarckian conception of change he called "creative evolution.". (shrink)

Describing someone as disabled means evaluating their relationship with their environment, body, and self. Such descriptions pivot on the person’s perceived limitations due to their atypical embodiment. However, impairments are not inherently pathological, nor are disabilities necessarily deviations from biological normality, a discrepancy often articulated in science fiction via the presentation of radically altered environments. In such settings, non-impaired individuals can be shown to be unsuited to the world they find themselves in. One prime example of this comes courtesy of (...) H. G. Wells’s “The Country of the Blind.” This paper demonstrates science fiction’s capacity to decouple disability’s normative quality from classical medical models stemming from the medical Enlightenment movement by challenging the idea of the biologically normal. It first provides a brief account of disability before exploring the concept of medical normality. It then problematizes the biologically consistent being, arguing that health is only understandable when environmentally situated. Next, the paper provides an overview of “The Country of the Blind” before analyzing how it challenges the idea of biological normality, framing it as a social product rather than a universal constant. Finally, the paper concludes that science fiction narratives effectively interrogate our world’s seemingly consistent trends by envisioning (un)desirable alternatives. (shrink)

The claim that an information revolution is underway is scrutinized in this paper. Particular attention is given to the notions that new information technology will radically increase human choice and rationality in decision-making. The literature on informatics and technology is selectively reviewed in order to determine whether the present use of technology seems to predict an increased choice and rationality in the future; earlier technologies have had this effect; and past social predictions of this type have proven generally correct. We (...) reach a mixed or negative conclusion in every case. Although the possibility of an information revolution cannot be dismissed, neither can it be readily accepted at this point unless we significantly diminish what is normally meant by a 'revolution'. (shrink)