Technology In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

“Do we evade the full consequences of our advances: denying the ugly while claiming the beautiful...ignoring the impoverishment while squandering the wealth”(Vargish)? Mary Shelley's, Frankenstein projects an underlying message that the rapid advancements of knowledge and science are truly monstrous. This tale illustrates a man’s dangerous, unbridled thirst for advancing science and researching a new field yet to be discovered; and questions advancements in technology, science, and the nature of humanity. Mary Shelley’s argument is more relevant today than it was during the gothic era. Our culture’s evident addiction to electronics and personal devices is taking away all forms of intuition and initiative. Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein during

Although Shelley did not live to experience the wild inventions that have drastically evolved our world today, she did understand that the power of technology will go as far as we allow it to. This is demonstrated in the novel by scientist Victor Frankenstein whose sole focus goes into the extreme desire he feels to create life. He reads philosophers ideas and decides that “natural philosophy is the genius that has regulated my fate; I desire, therefore, in this narration, to state those facts which led to my predilection for that science” (Shelley 26). The philosophers of this time merely discussed the possibility of man creating life that Victor was determined to make a reality. He is the prime example of the hard working people that have innovative ideas today; but they can also learn a lesson from him. Shelley used Victor to show how ideas can advance how society thinks and goes about everyday life, but people must recognize the consequences of these

People today are so concerned with how they can better their life by speeding up the natural process of things. Victor also wishes to see modifications in lifestyle, by creating life himself. He becomes obsessed with the idea of being a human creator of life that it leads to corruption. One of shelley’s arguments goes along with how modifying the natural process of some things can lead to monstrous actions. The life that Victor created was not able to fit into society correctly, but was also too powerful to be destroyed. The creation was so powerful in fact that Victor, its own creator, was even horrified by it. One of the questions Victor asks himself is “Had I right, for my own benefit, to inflict this curse upon everlasting generations” (Shelley 220)? This is a good foreshadowing of what was to come of technology in the future. It sets the idea that technology has a long term effect on the world, and those who created it are the ones who must integrated it wisely into society. Victor reflects on the hvac the creation has caused in his life and feels guilty that “future ages might curse me as their pest, whose selfishness had not hesitated to buy its own peace at the price, perhaps, of the existence of the whole human race” (Shelley 220). He can only imagine the further damage that the monster can do to the world, and while he wanted to