science in j&h Flashcards
science vs religion thesis
In his novella stevenson looks to alight fin de siecle anxieities of extreme metaphysical advancements becoming too intense and defying the godly roots of a christian soceity, through the fractured friendship of lanyon and jekyll hes able to acentuate the split in opinions between a new scientific era and the concrete binary christians
science vs religion paragraph
-In the industrialist era of society there was a huge technoligical growth thatalighted fears of the unknown and drove rifts between those ambitious and driven by advancements and those minority now of church goers who felt new theories were decontructing the basis of their beliefs- this conflict is summarised in the broken friendship between lanyon and jekyll
- Lanyon, a man who balances his physical sceince with his relationship with god, believes that his soured relations with jekyll are because jekyll ‘become too fanciful for me’- the temporal delexis in became implies the rift between the two was a long coming thing and exentuates the length of which conflicting opinions can destory any bond, whilst the frickative alliteration in ‘fanciful for’ implies both a sense of falsity and highlights the disgust lanyon holds for his once friend. Here he also depicts his interest in physcoligcal sceince as a ‘cerberal disease’ this imagery implies a distain for new sceintificn findings as if it is polluted and mnetally warped. As well as this he seems to pass it off as ‘unscientific balderdash’- these are rude and damming words tha clearly portray a lack of respect
- the twos relations, and hence the rift between science and religion, couldve ‘estranged damon and pythias’- this is mythical allusions to two greek characters like them in a bachelor socety whom were inseperable, its clear its viewed that ideological differences such as those between them are unmendable
- upon discovering the truth behind the metaphysical sceintific developements as stevenson feared were occuring in the real world- lanyon is ‘shaken to his roots’ meaning the very basis of his beleifs that held up his world had been destroyed, his horror leaves him on his death bed a metaphor for the distruction of the church but he claims he shull ‘die incredulous’ christian men do not want to recognise the advancements and also fear it is stepped beyond gods willing amount, indeed jekyll is a promethian character who shull be punished
- when he discovers the trth of jekyll he dropps to his knees almost in confession and cries out to god in disbelief
- jekyll cries out to god and drops as in a confession
devolution and sceince thesis
Throughout his novella stevenson uses jekylls extreme scientific advancements as a warning to his promethium like nature and sparks fear into a fin de siecle audience who would worry for the disruption of metaphysical science and the changing world
devolution and sceicne thesis
- jekyll, like many metaphysical scientists, was seen to ahve been disrupting the godly order of things- indeed the very law of life- promethesus tested and outsmarted the gods and so was faced with eternal suffering and that was a popular fear in the victorian community
- in 1871 darwin published the theory of evolution which directly juxtaposed the ideas of god creating adam and eve in genesis 2 so there was a wave of fear that gods name was being discarded. There was also heavy fears from these people that we would devolve into monkeys and subsequent fears from lambrosco that those geneticlaly evil had been stunted and had more ape like facial features
- ‘snarled aloud into a savage laugh’ savage could play into racist imperialist fears of the ‘other’, minorities and non brittishness.it also along with snarled dehumnaises hyde- he is degenerate and is acting outisde of societal morals darwinism, devolution and avatism
‘something troglodytic’ term used to refer to the appearance of a cave dwelller, his behaviour and character even upon first meeting erases the years of human advancements espececially in an era of industrial and worldwide revolution. he is so isolated from the rest of sciety that he has not progressed, links into the theory of avatism. The anaphoric repetition of something shows ow unknwon and new this kind of primative evil it was, blaming the new advancements in the era
‘ape like fury’ ‘jumped like a monkey’ plays into lombroscos theory of avatism and regression as he is frequently likened to not just any animal but specifically primates, darwinism was a key threat at the time and stevenson highlights the conflict between conformist religion and the belief in evolutionism
SIMIAN IMAGERY
Cautionary tale
- cautions the corruption of metaphysical scientists in an industrially shifting era towards corruption
- Jekyll is a promethain like character who stevenson worried has pushed the boundaries of exploration to a point of disaster- causing fatalities throughout the novella
- ‘is gone to bed Jekyll and awaken Edward hyde’ emphasise the shocking and underestimated work of his experiments and his lack of control over it, creates fear as he cannot tame his own workings
- ‘I felt smaller slighter younger’ ‘happier’ ‘sweeter’ the allure of his societally immoral experiments is heavy and threatening. Only Jesus should have the power to transform shape
- confession like stance after murder of carrew, death of lanyon he says he is shaken to his roots and cries out to hod
- stevenson warns experiments like this are inately immoral
