Tolkien once praised the phrase "cellar door" as one of the most beautiful sounds in the English language. While reviewing vocabulary for the GRE, I came across a few words that struck me as particularly beautiful:
Craven
Gossamer
Jabber
Nefarious
Some words, however, are just awful:
Pulchritude: (n) physical beauty.
I'm sure I'd be slapped if I ever tell a girl I find her pulchritudinous.
Friday, June 6, 2008
Monday, June 2, 2008
"Nightfall" and the allegory of the cave
You can read the short story "Nightfall" by Asimov here. Spoilers in the post below. Maybe Asimov had Plato's allegory of the cave in mind when he penned this story; he drops many references to the allegory. Both deal with the subject of revelation. It is an ironic transposition that the "Cave of Darkness", explicitly mentioned in "Nightfall", serves to reveal the truth rather than conceal it.
In the story of the cave, prisoners can only see shadows on the cave wall, cast by torchlight. They believe the shadows to be reality, until they can turn around and see the actual figures casting the shadows. But those figures aren't real either; they are puppets and marionettes. Only when the prisoners are freed, when they can go outside the cave, will they see the true reality revealed. The sun illuminates all and symbolizes the source of truth. If the prisoners were forced to go back to the cave, they would be considered insane by the cave-dwellers.
The themes of light and darkness, both natural and artificial, runs throughout "Nightfall". But here, the roles of light and darkness are inverted. Light from the suns obscures the reality from people on the planet Lagash. Because there is no night on Lagash, the people have never seen the stars. They can not see the other planets in that system. Instead of a source of truth and revelation, the sun acts as a veil, a cave, keeping the nature of the universe hidden in the light. The scientists attempt to simulate the truth by building a planetarium, creating artificial darkness and artificial stars. They also build a vault, lit by torches, as a way to preserve their ignorance and their sanity. The artificial light simulates the situation of Lagash.
When a rare alignment casts the whole planet in darkness, the stars can finally reveal themselves. Witnessing the revelation, the people of Lagash collectively descend into madness. This part of the story seems a bit of a stretch. Would people really go insane from the darkness? From seeing the stars? Have they not all been in the dark just by closing their eyes? It makes more sense when taken in the context of Plato's allegory. It is not the darkness that causes insanity, but the stars. The revelation of this natural truth completely changes the mindset of people on Lagash and causes insanity, just as it does in Plato's story.
In the story of the cave, prisoners can only see shadows on the cave wall, cast by torchlight. They believe the shadows to be reality, until they can turn around and see the actual figures casting the shadows. But those figures aren't real either; they are puppets and marionettes. Only when the prisoners are freed, when they can go outside the cave, will they see the true reality revealed. The sun illuminates all and symbolizes the source of truth. If the prisoners were forced to go back to the cave, they would be considered insane by the cave-dwellers.
The themes of light and darkness, both natural and artificial, runs throughout "Nightfall". But here, the roles of light and darkness are inverted. Light from the suns obscures the reality from people on the planet Lagash. Because there is no night on Lagash, the people have never seen the stars. They can not see the other planets in that system. Instead of a source of truth and revelation, the sun acts as a veil, a cave, keeping the nature of the universe hidden in the light. The scientists attempt to simulate the truth by building a planetarium, creating artificial darkness and artificial stars. They also build a vault, lit by torches, as a way to preserve their ignorance and their sanity. The artificial light simulates the situation of Lagash.
When a rare alignment casts the whole planet in darkness, the stars can finally reveal themselves. Witnessing the revelation, the people of Lagash collectively descend into madness. This part of the story seems a bit of a stretch. Would people really go insane from the darkness? From seeing the stars? Have they not all been in the dark just by closing their eyes? It makes more sense when taken in the context of Plato's allegory. It is not the darkness that causes insanity, but the stars. The revelation of this natural truth completely changes the mindset of people on Lagash and causes insanity, just as it does in Plato's story.
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