After reading the novel “Frankenstein”, by Mary Shelley, and the chapter on Schwarzschild of “When we cease to understand the world”, by Benjamín Labatut, the first year IB Diploma students enjoyed an interdisciplinary lecture anchored around two questions: Are monsters invented or created? What are the connections between monstrosity in the cosmos and monstrosity in human imagination? The lecturers were Rafael López, the Language A: Language and Literature HL teacher and Head of Department, and Daniel Fernández, the Mathematics: Analysis and Approaches HL teacher.
Throughout the talk, Rafael López discussed the idea of how both Shelley’s and Labatut’s literary masterpieces represent the transgression of certain boundaries imposed upon the human being. In Frankenstein, the doctor defies prohibition (which leads him to the fundamental error of facing the forbidden and reserved for the gods). On the other hand, in Benjamin Labatut’s book, the consequences of unveiling the monster and making it visible to human eyes are shown as something that defies the very understanding of existence and challenges all paradigms.
In addition, Rafa connected these ideas to other literary works, like Ovid’s Metamorphoses, which the 1st year Diploma students have read. Mount Olympus and Hades were used as examples on how in ancient Greece, human knowledge was determined by prohibition and invisibility.
Daniel Fernández spoke afterward about Einstein’s general theory of relativity. He moved then onto Karl Schwarzschild, who found one of the many solutions to Einstein´s equations while fighting in World War I. That solution opened the door to the existence of black holes, and Schwarzschild got obsessed by the monster he had discovered. To finish his lecture, Daniel brought up some of the paradoxes that arise around black holes, like the black hole information paradox and the grandparents’ paradox.
Many questions arose during and after the lecture. Do monsters also have positive qualities (like the eagerness to learn, in the case of Frankenstein)? Is it possible to travel in space and time? Do wormholes exist? Is there a blackhole around us? It was an entertaining and instructive lecture not only for the IBDP students but also for their teachers!
