Community versus University (Frankenstein 1-6)

In the text, victor goes back and forth for some time about not wanting to leave home to go to school, and wishes he could stay home and learn like a close friend of his (Shelley 27). His first encounter with one of his professors at university of Ingolstadt involves Victor’s interest in natural philosophy is completely bogus and he needs to lean about the new sciences such as chemistry. As he begins to look closer towards chemistry Victor starts to loose focus on his family and friends back home which can be taken as foreshadowing of him losing himself. He admits to getting lost in the pursuit of discovery, and does not visit home or write home for two years (Shelly 31).

College is about becoming who you are, working on becoming an emerging adult and reaching toward independence. If Victor had stayed in Geneva do you think he would have had access to chemistry and experimenting like he did in Ingolstadt? Would staying home swayed him from creating his monster at all, or just delayed the inevitable?

Dial 3: The desire to dial

One of the most interesting sections in the first few chapters of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? begins on page one, where the reader is first introduced to a device known as the Penfield mood organ. The mood organ gives users the ability to preprogram their emotions. The main character, Rick, uses his mood organ to help him wake up content in the morning and perform in a professional manner at work. Rick’s wife, Iran, also has a mood organ but she uses her organ in a much different way. Iran sets her moods organ to allow her to feel despair. Iran believes that feeling hopeless, even if it’s only twice a month, is reasonable since she still witnesses the things that would have made her sad but the emotion is blocked by the mood organ (Dick 5). Rick on the other hand, disagrees and tells her to change her setting for the day.

Iran brings up a good question about the use of the Penfield mood organ. If we had the ability to control or change our moods with an external force, should we? How does the ability to use the mood organ relate to the use of antidepressants?