For my post, I found an anime/manga series that reminded me of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. The series is titled, Monster, by Naoki Urasawa, and the story takes place in Germany during the 1980’s. The storyline revolves around this moment when Dr. Tenma had to choose to use his medical skills to save the life of the mayor or to save the life of a child. His superiors were pushing him towards saving the mayor for monetary reasons however, because of Dr. Tenma’s past, he chose to defy orders and try to save the child. The surgery on the child was successful but the mayor had passed. The mayor passing away resulted on Dr. Tenma’s superiors firing him. Upon hearing about his termination, Dr. Tenma was feeling angry and spiteful and vented to the child he thought to be unconscious. Dr. Tenma explained how his superiors were wrong and wished death upon them. The child hearing this felt the same way and felt gratitude towards Dr. Tenma for saving his life. So, the child decided to grant the doctor’s wish and murdered the men the doctor spoke of and the one who replaced his job. Dr. Tenma was re-hired because of those death however, the police believed him to be the killer. Throughout the series, the Dr. Tenma tries to find out exactly who or what exactly did he save.

Monster and Frankenstein are similar in the sense that the protagonist of each story spawn a so-called “monster” that murders the people around them. Both not knowing who or what they created and bringing back the dead to life. Another circumstance where the stories are alike isthe fact that both protagonist had a past where they failed to save a life that scarred them. That past led them to wanting to bring life to their creature. However, Monster differs from Frankenstein because the child in Monster had a past that turned him into a murderous creature and he has his own family. On the other hand, the creature from Frankenstein was lonely and had no past before being brought back to life.

“After so much time spent in painful labour, to arrive at once at the summit of my desires, was the most gratifying consummation of my toils. But this discovery was so great and overwhelming, that all the steps by which I had been progressively led to it were obliterated, and I behold only the result”(52). The passage I had chosen to analysis is one that puzzled me for I believed, out of all the situations in his life he perceived to be the cause of his now horrid life, that this event was the true cause of his misfortunes.

Within the passage I had stated, Frankenstein had discovered the answer to his longing need for animating a lifeless object. In this moment, the shock of discovery made him obsessed with the results. In turn, he became isolated for two years in his studies and nearly kills himself by not caring about his own well-being. Now, the question that arised was, “How could he forget about all the intensive studying and analyzing he did of the human body from life to death and death to life?” Forgetting the process of anything leads to misinterpreted results. Frankenstein could have missed something very important that could have prevented the making of a monster. If only he hadn’t have been so blinded by his discovery.

Frankenstein points out two moments in his life that he felt triggured his misfortune. 1) His father not telling him the worthlessness of reading the works of Cornelius Agrippa, Albertus, Magnus and Paracelus. 2) When he saw lightning strike a tree and a man who got excited by that, explained his theory of electricity and galvanism. These two events changed him from a youth interested in natural history to one that wanted to learn math and the natural science. It is true these moments were what made him so interested in what he was trying to accomplish however, as a scientist who forgets his stepping stones in the moment of discovery can create dillusions of actual discovery. In the same page of the passage, Frankenstein says he is not a mad man but really that is what he became at that very moment. At that moment he forgot about his past and all his understandings of life and death because some kind of light struck him tellig him that this is the answer to everything. Blindly choosing to accept his discovery was his downfall, not the ideas he was susceptible to as a child.

Hello everyone! My name is Cedrick and I am majoring in Corp. Communications. When I am asked if I am a New Yorker, I hesitate because I was raised in Long Island where we are not identified as one of the boroughs in New York. I used to get bashed on by my friends in Queens for not knowing the struggles of being a “real New Yorker” but since I’ve been commuting to Baruch I now know the struggles.

I believe Kant’s definition of Enlightenment is a state when a person has the ability to think for themselves. Now I know it may sound crazy. After all, do we not all think for ourselves? We make our own choices based on our own beliefs.. Or do we? Because we think that we follow our own set of rules and beliefs is why Kant thinks Enlightenment is difficult to achieve. He calls this state of false Enlightenment, “immaturity”. Immaturity is the state in which we are so comfortable with what we’re told to say and to do that we accept it. We dare not wander from what we already understand because that could be dangerous and as humans, we want to stay safe. I have encountered moments where I chose to stay with the norm because I was afraid of what others may think of me.

I think that we do not currently live in an Enlightened age because in our society we are obsessed with titles and what others think of us. We blindly follow the teachings of those around us who follow the same structure of our society. Today, the internet gives us the ability to learn things on our own and to say whatever we feel like however, it is only temporary whilst in front of a screen. The real emergence from immaturity is when one can do and say things on their own. There will always be situations where we will obey and hide our own thoughts because the mentality of our society is duty before reason.