(Download) "Portrayal of Physicists in Fictional Works (Essay)" by CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ~ eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Portrayal of Physicists in Fictional Works (Essay)
- Author : CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
- Release Date : January 01, 2009
- Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines,Books,Professional & Technical,Education,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 187 KB
Description
What image comes to mind when thinking of a physicist? A mad scientist bent on global domination? An absent-minded professor? Eighty fictional physicists are examined in the article at hand, including researchers, professors, astrophysicists, space scientists, and geophysicists in twenty-eight novels, twenty-one films, and a television series. Characters' actions and stated facts about them determined if they possessed one or more personality traits: obsessive, having major mental problems, withdrawn, brave, timid, socially inept, too career-focused, out of touch, arrogant, and stubborn. Gender differences were also explored. The texts' subjects were not necessarily on science. Aliens, time travel, golf balls, exploring space, parallel worlds, and disasters are example topics. A character had to have enough of a presence in order to gather information on their personality. A brief appearance does not give a good sense of personality. Seven characters are portrayals of people who actually existed: Marie Curie, Pierre Curie, Albert Einstein, Lieserl Einstein, J. Robert Oppenheimer, and Erwin Schrodinger (two portrayals). Lieserl Einstein, a pre-marriage child to Einstein and his first wife, may not have survived childhood. Her being a scientist is itself purely fictional. One character is an alien trying to pass himself off as a human physicist. His actions as both a physicist and a human may give insight into the view of how physicists act. Eighty characters were examined to see which, if any, of a selection of personality traits they possessed. The personality traits are subjectively assigned to the characters based upon their actions and statements about and by them. The personality traits are not meant to be an official psychological assessment and are based solely upon their fitting into the concept of that trait. 23 out of 80, or 28.8%, of the characters were obsessive. Some obsessive behavior revolves around characters' work. Marie and Pierre Curie become obsessed with their work, despite signs of illness. Gloria Lamerino is hired as a police consultant on murder cases and gets too involved. Some characters are obsessed with people. Dick Solomon is romantically obsessed with anthropology professor Mary Albright and is jealously obsessed with fellow physics professor Vincent Strudwick, who wrote a popular physics book. Revenge is another obsession. Lieserl Einstein is bitterly obsessed with vengeance on the father who abandoned her by outdoing him in physics. Her obsession results in losing her husband and son in the Holocaust due to her refusal to flee.