Loss of Innocence
Click here to edit subtitle
Blog
Gain of Corruption (Blog Post #1-Special K)
|
|
Why do we do what we do when we don't understand something? We always strive for perfection and try to comprehend what we want to learn, but what do we do when we can't understand how something works?
We do the opposite.
Doing the opposite of something you are trying to learn opens your mind up to new possibilities never even touched upon before. When we use these tactics and strategies to solve problems, we are able to gain a fuller understaning of how things work. In Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, the main character, Victor Frankenstein, is obsessed by the concept of life and its depth. He works endlessly, fulfilling his creative thirst, and cracks the code to create what he later calls a monster. Although Victor cracks the code of life, he is left scarred and dead on the inside, causing the death of 2 people he knew. Victor is scared at his knowledge and understanding of life, but can not fathom the mere tip of death itself. The opposite can't be understood because he's scared by just the aspect of it. This loss of innocence on the pursuit for life changes Victor as a character by dispelling his sincere naivete towards the situation.
In calculus we have this concept of a derivative, the rate at which something changes at a cartain point. Many people are challenged by it because they don't focus on it's opposite, the integral, the same way. Understanding of the opposite side of a point allows for mastery of something one was once confused about. These ideas help us progress as a society and fill in any gaps along the path of our problems.
The monster in Frankenstein also transverses through a similar dilemma. He is called ugly by his creator, who flies away from his creation and leaves it abandoned. The monster has nothing to do but to try to opposite, from being rather calm and shy to becoming violent and analytical. This idea of engaging the opposite due to either a lack of understanding of something or to, on the flipside, master and learn a concept can be seen as debateable from 2 vastly different perspectives.
Now that we're understood this possible idea I have proposed, what's the opposite of this title?
Loss of Innocence.
- Special K
Categories: Wednesday
Post a Comment
Oops!
The words you entered did not match the given text. Please try again.
10 Comments
Negative Curve says...
I felt Special K had a really good connection with the anecdote about derivatives in calculus. However, i think Special K fails to see the fact that sometimes surroundings have a huge impact on people's perception of things.
I'm not too sure about that Negative Curve. I feel that Special K's main point is that to understand one thing, you must understand its opposite. In other words, to find the integral of a function, you must first understand what's derivative is.
Negative Curve says...
I felt Special K had a really good connection with the anecdote about derivatives in calculus. However, i think Special K fails to see the fact that sometimes surroundings have a huge impact on people's perception of things. For example, the teaching of Usha Bhatnagar sometimes forces us to reclaim sanity rather than focus on concepts of calculus.
Hi there Negative Curve, I totally agree that surrounding do have a huge impact on perception and would like to now acknowledge that as well. While perception is a very reasonable and based idea that does indeed effect the way ppl view things, I believe that the surroundings are at times a prime factor that lead us towards the search for our ideas and beliefs in the first place! Thanks for the input though!
However, isn't the gain of corruption conceptually the same thing as a loss of innocence, which would be more like comparing a derivative to a secant line rather than the comparison that you drew between derivatives and integrals. Would you care to clarify/expound?
TreeGee says...
I really enjoyed the way that you tied your whole blog back to the seemingly unrelated title at the beginning,
However, isn't the gain of corruption conceptually the same thing as a loss of innocence, which would be more like comparing a derivative to a secant line rather than the comparison that you drew between derivatives and integrals. Would you care to clarify/expound?
Great analysis and literary catch there TreeGee. You're the first to see that point there and I was waiting to see if anyone would catch this aspect of my poem. As we know i chose the word for word literary opposite of the title of the poem, which correlates to Loss = gain and innocence = corruption. As we see these individual pieces, much like the steps in solving for a secant line, there are individual and separate parts that collectively work together as a whole.
Now the catch here is that the opposite of loss of innocence is indeed the gain of corruption. Regardless of the individual literary changes, the underlying meaning remains the same, which reinforces the concept of gaining a more holistic view of understanding. There's more than what meets the eye, and this reflects on my narrative as well. As they are both different, yet the same, aren't victor and his creation the same in a way? They both are similar in the fact that they were influenced by their initial surroundings to pursue their own beliefs, like how victor went to learn when his family looked down upon it and how his creation left to pursue his own path when it was shunned by victor. Obviously this is a stretch, but that's the point of literary analysis in itself.
In fact, aren't derivatives and secant lines individually expressed in minute differences in their definitions and uses, while still finding essentially the same rate? Thanks for this great comment, and I hope people can see this and that we can continue to have meaningful discourse!
Megan Ho says...
I throughly enjoyed your blog post about this particular part of the book and it amazes me how you were able to not only analyze the meanings but also be able to keep that in mind and expand your knowledge into other subjects as well, the derivative was a good example and helped me fathom what was going on.
Thanks Ms. Ho!
kusha1123423 says...
Great analysis and literary catch there TreeGee. You're the first to see that point there and I was waiting to see if anyone would catch this aspect of my poem. As we know i chose the word for word literary opposite of the title of the poem, which correlates to Loss = gain and innocence = corruption. As we see these individual pieces, much like the steps in solving for a secant line, there are individual and separate parts that collectively work together as a whole.
Now the catch here is that the opposite of loss of innocence is indeed the gain of corruption. Regardless of the individual literary changes, the underlying meaning remains the same, which reinforces the concept of gaining a more holistic view of understanding. There's more than what meets the eye, and this reflects on my narrative as well. As they are both different, yet the same, aren't victor and his creation the same in a way? They both are similar in the fact that they were influenced by their initial surroundings to pursue their own beliefs, like how victor went to learn when his family looked down upon it and how his creation left to pursue his own path when it was shunned by victor. Obviously this is a stretch, but that's the point of literary analysis in itself.
In fact, aren't derivatives and secant lines individually expressed in minute differences in their definitions and uses, while still finding essentially the same rate? Thanks for this great comment, and I hope people can see this and that we can continue to have meaningful discourse!
Thanks for the clarification Special K, I really appreciate the response and I look forward to reading more of your insightful blogs. I love the way you tie in usha's concepts of calculus into your literary analysis; it's very engaging and elicits immediate interest.
Oops!
Oops, you forgot something.