I recently was pretty sick and was prescribed three different medications for my illness. Two were to help me get better; the other, hydroxyzine was designed to help me sleep. I soon experienced its magic. Upon taking the pill it was only a matter of minutes before I’d doze off into oblivion. My illness passed way before my little orange bottle emptied. Now with about twenty sleeping pills left, I have some major thoughts to sort out.

Part of me is thrilled that I have them. If I’m ever having trouble falling asleep the night before an exam, I can simply pop one and get the recommended night of rest. The other part of me however, is disappointed. There is something about the growing popularity of medications in people’s lives that I find disturbing.

I like to think of people as evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins describes them – genetic machines. We are essentially complex structures of chromosomes and neurological connections, and because of this mechanistic structure, there is almost infinite possibility in how we can alter ourselves emotionally, mentally and physically through drugs.

We are all familiar with the popular remedies. Ritalin improves concentration, steroids strengthen muscles, Cialis gives four hour erections and Mirapex helps ease Restless Leg Syndrome. These waves of medications represent just the beginning of man’s understanding of the human blueprint.

All it will take is one pill and the dominoes will begin to fall. Ask yourself, if a drug were to come out tomorrow that would greatly improve memory with no side effects, would you take it? Moreover, would you even have a choice? As society would rush to Walgreens you’d be left with either conformity or inferiority, and not many of us are strong enough to choose the latter.

That’s what scares me a little. The trend in society now is to fix disorders, which by all means is a noble goal. But the danger is that what is simply an aspect of someone’s personality today might well be a disorder tomorrow. In our parents’ generation, hyperactivity was a way of life; now it is ADHD and fully curable. In future generations, will insufficient memory retention or height inadequacy be disorders as well? (Just picture the television advertisements, “I was having trouble meeting women because I was only 5’6″, but that was before I started taking…”)

Though a more capable human race would certainly be more productive, is it really the purpose or place for man to speed up the evolutionary process? It sounds like a Hitler-esque, social Darwinist kind of goal, a goal that may just cost us individuality.

What our generation cannot forget as we gain better mastery for the “genetic machines” that we are is that our abilities, our mental capabilities, and even our disorders define who we are. As we slowly are able to smooth out the inadequacies of ourselves, we will all become more of the same person.

Though this all may be extrapolated dystopian thinking, at least for tonight, I will pass on my hydroxyzine pill and resort to counting sheep in my head.

Weinberg freshman Cody Kittle can be reached at ralphkittle2007@u.northwestern.edu