This blog post examines how ‘Demian’ portrays good and evil not as fixed moralities but as tensions within the human psyche, and why that boundary inevitably fluctuates, through the work’s symbols and the characters’ development. ‘Demian’ was written in 1916 during World War I and published in 1919, immediately after the war ended. Hermann Hesse (1877–1962), already a renowned...
What truth does Les Misérables reveal about the 19th-century French Revolution?
This blog post examines how Les Misérables shows the 19th-century French Revolution was not merely a political event, but a history condensed with the lives, suffering, frustration, and hope of the people. Victor Hugo, Confronting the Revolution The film Les Misérables, which gained immense popularity in Korea several years ago, was a musical adaptation of the novel of the same name...
Is Inspector Javert a villain, or a victim trapped in a “wrong righteousness”?
This blog post examines Inspector Javert from Les Misérables not as a simple villain, but as a character ensnared by a “wrong righteousness.” It explores the tragic clash of law, justice, and conviction, tracing why his choices led to catastrophe. It shows how people, as individuals or as a community, forge the right path of history. Moreover, it starkly reminds us of the many harrowing...
How did Victor Hugo’s life shape his literary world?
This blog post examines how Victor Hugo’s life—transforming from a royalist poet to a republican writer—infused his literary world, including works like Les Misérables. Born in 1802 in Besançon, eastern France, he was the third son of Joseph Léopold Sigisbert Victor Hugo, a soldier under Napoleon. His father’s frequent postings abroad, including Spain and Italy, meant Victor...
Is science interconnected, or is it fragmented into independent pieces of knowledge?
This blog post explores whether scientific knowledge is closely interconnected by examining the process of solving the Poincaré Conjecture. In ‘The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,’ author Thomas Kuhn argued that scientific theories are not continuous, do not develop gradually, and their direction is not the pursuit of truth. This caused significant ripples among many scientists...
The Speed and Direction of Evolution: Why Did Dawkins and Gould Hold Different Perspectives?
This blog post compares the evolutionary approaches of Richard Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould, exploring why they held differing views on the speed and direction of evolution. This book creates a fictional debate using the opposing views of Richard Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould on Darwin’s theory of evolution. Richard Dawkins wields the powerful weapon of ‘The Selfish Gene’ to explain...
Selfish Genes and Evolution: Gradual or Stochastic Equilibrium?
In this blog post, we’ll look at Richard Dawkins’ theory of the selfish gene and discuss whether evolution is driven by gradual selection or has a stochastic equilibrium nature. In his perhaps most famous book, The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins argued that natural selection takes place in units called “selfish genes.” In his other book, The Blind Watchman, Dawkins states that...
What legacy did Josef Kajetan Tyl leave on Czech literature?
This blog post explores the literary legacy and significance of Josef Kajetan Tyl, a central figure in Czech Romantic literature. Romanticism In the 18th century, the major European nations were dominated by the Enlightenment, a movement that inherited the classicism established in France in the 17th century, while at the same time making reason the sole means of perception. Classicism was...
Book Review – Le Hasard et la Nécessité (Life, Its Ambiguous Definition)
In this blog post, I’ll be discussing Le Hasard et la Nécessité, a philosophical exploration of the boundaries between artifice, nature, and life. The book explains the life sciences, particularly molecular biology, from the perspective of natural philosophy. Chapter 1, “D’étranges objets,” is an introduction that uses logical thinking to explain the distinction between...
Why do we still believe in water animation?
In this blog post, the final chapter of Le Hasard et la Nécessité explores the human psychology of why we continue to believe in vitalism in an age of science. Le Hasard et la Nécessité Chapter 9: The Kingdom and the Maw of Darkness In the final chapter, titled “The Kingdom and the Fall of Darkness,” Jacques Monod emphasizes the need to accept our situation in the world, which has been...