Session 11
In this session, we will consider two excellent portrayals— by modern movie makers and a 19th century writer—of how novel aspects of science might affect society. The movie is based on recent developments in genetics; the short novel, a bit over 200 years old, is based on efforts to understand the relationship between the living and the dead. Both are classics. I believe you will enjoy both of them. But please find time for at least one.
Assignment #1: Watch the film called GATTACA (1997).
The movie portrays a future, one perhaps not far away, in which genetic information obtained at birth governs lives and dictates what people might be allowed to do.
We will talk about the following questions:
–How close is the premise to current scientific reality? Closer than it was twenty four years ago when the film was made?
–How likely is it that genetic information can ever be as predictive as the film implies?
–What are the political benefits of making a film of this sort?
–What do you expect the film to achieve as entertainment, instruction, or a call to action?
Here is the link to the movie:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2xkDGAZil76b09aaURPSzQyQzA/view?usp=drivesdk
Assignment #2: Read the original short novel Frankenstein written by Mary Shelley in 1818, when she was younger than most of you. The book can be acquired inexpensively for a Kindle reader or in libraries and used book stores. But I am also attaching a highly readable PDF,here is a link to a less attractive version easy to access on line:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/84/84-h/84-h.htm
There are also movie versions—the most famous was made in 1931—and several derivatives (such as The Bride of Frankenstein, etc) but none of the cinematic versions adhere closely to the original text. Look at them only if you have special interests.
Last year, the Morgan Library staged a wonderful exhibit to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Frankenstein (https://www.themorgan.org/exhibitions/frankenstein); you might enjoy the information, photos, and short video on the website above.
Consider these questions as you read:
–What inspired the writing of this strange novel?
–Why do you think it has had such a powerful and sustained hold on the public’s imagination and on the public’s conception of science?
–The novel deals with the origin of life and has relationships to other writings about the creation of human beings, the distinctions between animate and inanimate objects, and the notion of forces that drive life. What does that mean about the relationship of science and religion? Or science and society?
Because of the novel’s bicentennial in 2018, special attention was given to Frankenstein that year, including new editions of the text, critical appraisals, and the special exhibition at the Morgan Library in New York (noted above). One especially brilliant essay about the writing of the book appeared in The New Yorker (and can be heard on a podcast):
Life and Letters: It’s Still Alive, by Jill Lepore. Two hundred years of “Frankenstein.” http://nyer.cm/1bH4KoU
Covid-19, pandemics, and the arts.
It goes almost without saying that the current pandemic will stimulate artistic efforts to portray the experience of living through it and its effects (real and projected) on various aspects of life. Few of these have appeared yet. But the history of writing about pandemics, real or imagined or both, is a rich one—easily accessed by an internet search. Among the most well-known examples are:
The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio (1353)
The Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe (1722)
The Last Man by Mary Shelley (1826)
The Plague by Albert Camus (1947)
The Great Influenza by John Barry (2004)
…and many others.
Additional, optional material:
There are many other interesting examples of ways in which science and scientists are depicted in the arts. I have listed some of these below; none is required for class but you might look at them in the future and I am likely to refer to them during our session.
Fiction:
CP Snow, The Search (1934) An early novel by the physicist turned novelist and politician, CP Snow, about the trials of starting out in competitive academic science in England.
Allegra Goodman, Intuition (2006) A deft novel about young scientists working in a biomedical research laboratory in a place modeled on the Whitehead Institute at MIT.
Andrea Barrett, The Voyage of the Narwhal (1998) A prize-winning novel about the rigors of geographical discovery in the late 19th century by a writer who teaches the literature of science at Williams College.
Carl Djerrasi, Cantor’s Dilemma (1989) An insightful novel by a famous chemist about how doubt pervades the relationship between a cancer researcher and his trainees when important but uncertain results are obtained.
Theatre:
QED A portrayal of the famously irreverent Nobel Prize-winning, CalTech physicist, Richard Feynmann.
Wit A moving account of a scholar of John Donne’s poetry dying of ovarian cancer.
Photograph 51 A dramatization of Rosalind Franklin’s relationship with Watson, Crick, Wilkins, and others during the discovery of DNA structure.
Copenhagen The German physicist Werner Heisenberg goes to visit his mentor, Niels Bohr in you-know-where.
Proof A young women reveals her mathematical skills.
The Half Life of Marie Curie
Film:
The Man Who Knew Infinity A recent well-reviewed biopic about the Indian math genius, Ramanujan, and his mentor at Cambridge University.
Arrowsmith You have seen already for Session #2.
Dr. Ehrlich’s Magic Bullet An oldie about discovering a treatment for syphilis.
Contagion A realistic account of the birth of an epidemic.
Paintings:
by William Blake, Gerrit Dou, Rembrandt van Rijn, Hans Holbein, and many others
(you can find most of these on line)
