本論文主要探討在雷‧布萊利《華氏451度》裡大多數的公民如何藉由集體的努力而非政府的威權來達到虛擬烏托邦，並研究為何少數異議團體會認為此社會其實是無法擁有真正快樂的真實反烏托邦。透過不以要求智能為主的教育，多數公民傾向和學校來合作產出自主服從的學生。因此學生更有意願沉浸在娛樂媒體，反對從閱讀書籍而產生的智識上的反思。因為他們認為個人差異或知識取得會破壞齊頭式的平等，他們進而藉由書本內容及娛樂媒體的一致性來維持這難以穩定的舒適感。視聽媒體更提供偽親密、偽個人主義和負面區隔性來切斷人類可以從真實世界互動中取得的真親密、個人創造以及正面直接性。公民們發展出自我審查制度，認為所有的文學書籍破壞他們所擁有的享樂；因此他們要求火人來執行燒書的政府審查制度。這乏味的重覆於娛樂媒體更讓全部市民變成智識停滯的機器人，所以這種新時代的機械式被動消費是反對異議份子支持的過往手工式的主動生產。多數優勢團體因為本身高科技的優越感進而對虛擬烏托邦產生自我中心的幻想；他們甚至刻意忽略來自於鄰國所發動的核子戰爭。但是核災的發生徹底摧毀他們對於虛擬烏托邦，確切地顯露出真實反烏托邦的樣貌。雖然核子戰爭的災難為多數優勢團體造成了世界末日，但是也讓少數異議團體對於未來抱有重生般的樂觀態度。最後，少數團體透過不斷的自省揭示了虛擬烏托邦的完美只是完全的停滯。

This thesis explores the way the majority of citizens depend on their individual efforts rather than government authority to attain their virtual utopia, and the reasons the dissident group regards their utopia as a real dystopia which fails to ensure actual happiness in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. The majority of citizens coordinate with the school to produce conformists through intellectually undemanding schooling, so they willingly immerse in hedonistic entertainment against the intellectual struggles in book reading. They require the uniformity of book contents and entertainment media to maintain fragile comfort since they always regard individual differences or knowledge acquisition to disrupt their equality. The audiovisual media produce pseudo-intimacy, pseudo-individualism, and negative mediation to separate from actual intimacy, individual creations, and positive immediacy derived from humans’ interactions with the real world. The citizens develop self-censorship to regard all literature as hurtful to their happiness, so they request the firemen to execute government censorship to burn all the books. Their dull repetition in media entertainment even makes the citizens machine existences with intellectual stagnation; hence their mechanic mode of passive consumption in this new era stands against the dissidents’ handicraft model of active production in the past. The majority of people have their egocentric fantasy of their virtual utopia based on their technological superiority; they even keep deliberate obliviousness to the atomic war declared by the neighboring countries. However, the nuclear cataclysm actually reveals a real dystopia by destroying their narcissism toward the virtual utopia. The nuclear destruction brings about apocalypse for the dominant group but resurrection optimism for the minority group. Eventually, the continual reflections required by the minority group disclose such perfection as permanent stagnation.

Amis, Kingsley. New Maps of Hell: A Survey of Science Fiction. New York: Ballantine, 1960.
90-97. Print.
Bloom, Harold. Bloom’s Guides: Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. New York: Chelsea House, 2007. Print.
Bradbury, Ray. Fahrenheit 451. New York: Ballantine Books, 1953. Print.
---. “Interview with Ray Bradbury.” Gauntlet. Interview by Donn Albright. Colorado Springs: Gauntlet Press, 1991. 139-143. Print.
---. “Ray Bradbury: Fahrenheit 451 Misinterpreted.” Interviewed by Amy E. Boyle Johnston. LA Weekly News. La Weekly. May 30, 2007. Web. Mar.10, 2012. < http://www.laweekly.com/2007-05-31/news/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/ > .
---. “Recurring Symbol.” Fighting the Fires of Hate: American and Nazi Book Burning. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Web. Oct. 8, 2012. < http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/bookburning/symbol.php > .
Brown, Joseph F. “‘As the Constitution Says’: Distinguishing Documents in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451.” The Explicator 67:1 (2008): 55-58. Print.
Camara, M. “Contemporary Anglo-American Dystopian Fiction: Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451: Themes and Aesthetics.” Annales de l’Université Marien Ngouabi 8.1 (2007): 73-88. Print.
Christman, John. “Autonomy in Moral and Political Philosophy.” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Ed. Edward N. Zalta. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2011. Web. Oct. 15, 2012. < http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2011/entries/autonomy-moral/ > .
Connor, George E. “Spelunking with Ray Bradbury: The Allegory of the Cave in Fahrenheit 451.” Extrapolation 45.4 (2004): 408-418. Print.
Foucault, Michel. “Docile Bodies.” Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York: Vintage, 1995. 135-169. Print.
---. “The insane.” Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988. 65-84. Print.
Gelbrich, Judy. “Section II: History of Education─American Education: the Second Half of the 20th Century: Post-World War II and Beyond.” Module One: History and Philosophy of Education. Ed. LeoNora M. Cohen, and Judy Gelbrich. Columbus: School of Education of OSU, 1999. Web. Jan. 9, 2013. < http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/ed416/ae8.html > .
Gilbert, James B. “Popular Culture.” American Quarterly 35.1/2 (1983): 141-154. Print.
Hoskinson, Kevin. “Kevin Hoskinson on Fahrenheit 451 as a Cold War Novel.” Bloom’s Guides: Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 2007. 66-70. Print.
Kael, Pauline. “The Book’s Censorship Metaphor Does Not Work─But the Movie is Worse.”
Reading on Ray Bradbury. Ed. Katie de Koster. San Diego: Green haven, 2000. Print.
Kant, Immanuel. “An Answer to the Question: What Is Enlightenment?” Kant’s Political Writings. Edited with an Introduction and Notes by Hans Reiss. Trans. H. B. Nisbet. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1970. 54-60. Print.
LaBrie, Michael R. Now Was Then, Then Is Now: The Paradoxical World of Fahrenheit 451. Diss. Newport: Salve Regina University, 2010. Print.
Mogen, David. “David Mogen on Fahrenheit 451 as Social Criticism.” Bloom’s Guides: Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 2007. 62-66. Print.
Molly, Mark. “Fahrenheit 451 Author Ray Bradbury dies aged 91.” Metro News Jun. 6, 2012. Metro. Web. Nov. 12, 2012. < http://metro.co.uk/2012/06/06/fahrenheit-451-author-ray-bradbury-dies-aged-91-457114/ > .
Plato. “The Simile of the Cave.” Republic. Trans. Desmond Lee. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974. 240-48. Print.
Seed, David. “The Flight from the Good Life: Fahrenheit 451 in the Context of Postwar American Dystopias.” Journal of American Studies 28.2 (1994): 225-240. Print.
Sisario, Peter. “Peter Sisario on Literary and Biblical Allusions.” Bloom’s Guides: Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 2007. 47-52. Print.
Touponce, William F. “William F. Touponce on Reverie.” Bloom’s Guides: Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 2007. 56-61. Print.
“Theremin.” Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, 2011. Web. 8 May 2011.
< http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/theremin > .
Weller, Sam. The Bradbury Chronicles. New York: HarperCollins, 2005. Print.