Most self respecting Disinfonaughts will, at some point or other, have been condemned for the crime of being ‘weird’ or ‘abnormal’. These words play on an implicit root assumption that anything ‘unnatural’ is in some sense immoral or evil. Rest assured that those who try to attack you with such labels imprison only themselves. The truth, in a literal sense, is that there is nothing in this universe which is “unnatural”. Even metaphorically the word “unnatural” is almost irrelevant because our minds cannot glimpse that which it describes and can only hypothesise that it might exist.
The writer Philip Ball, in a piece on his website entitled “Unnatural: The Talk Based On The Book“,[1] says:
“[T]o call something unnatural is not an act of taxonomy but a moral judgement. The unnatural act is something we are supposed to condemn. [...] Our disapproval stems from the theological tradition of natural law [..which..] plays out in a rationalistic yet teleological universe in which everything has a part to play, and all things have a ‘natural end’ which, being ordained by God, is intrinsically good.”
Here he is speaking about moral judgements suggested by the word in relation to controversies in science surrounding genetic engineering or cloning.… Read the rest
