It’s the End of the Worldand I Feel Fine
It’s the End of the World…and I Feel Fine!
(The role of intellectuals in the creation and justification of nuclear weapons.)
In Fail Safe and Dr. Strangelove, Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, Sidney Lumet and Stanley Kubrick question the relationship between technology and humanity by emphasizing mankind’s tendency to create machines that cannot be adequately controlled. By blatantly revealing the absurdity of game theory (Mutual Assured Destruction as a reasonable deterrence for nuclear war), both directors call into question the dominant pro-Cold War American ideology. One of the most quintessential aspects of this ideology includes the drive for constant technological advance and strategic superiority. Without the brainpower of the scientists and intellectuals who dedicated their lives to the extension of technological power and the study of international conflict, the Arms Race would certainly not have been possible. These academics not only became the architects of atomic weapons but they were also faced with justifying the use of these nuclear bombs, and creating a theoretical framework within which nuclear warfare might be appropriately (and rationally) conducted.
Within this context, one noteworthy parallel between Fail Safe and Dr. Strangelove is the existence (in both films) of a single intellectual genius that actively perpetuates the “science” of nuclear advancement and strategy. Indeed, through the characterizations of Professor Groeteschele and Dr. Strangelove, both Lumet and Kubrick examine the prominent role of intellectuals (both scientists and theorists) in the creation and justification of nuclear warfare. Ultimately, both Lumet and Kubrick reveal the problems with relying solely on science and mathematics to resolve international conflict, thus suggesting that modern warfare requires a more humanistic, ethical definition of right and wrong. Both Fail Safe and Dr Strangelove serve as moralizing responses to the dominant American Cold War culture, rhetoric, and political policy. In his article titled “Dr. Strangelove (1964): Nightmare Comedy and the ideology of Liberal Consensus,” Charles Maland identifies the dominant American cultural paradigm (during the Cold War) as “the Ideology of the Liberal Consensus.” Maland maintains that the Ideology of the ...
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...ocosm of possible nuclear disasters, both directors choose to include a character that embodies the contemporary ‘nuclear intellectual.’ Indeed, scientists and theoreticians (like Groeteschele and Strangelove) played a prominent role in defining and perpetuating the new Cold War culture. These academics not only became the architects of nuclear bombs but they were also faced with creating a viable theoretical framework within which the use of these weapons would be both recommended and justified. However, both Kubrick and Lumet suggest that in order to apply their brilliance towards mass destruction and death, intellectuals must give up a portion of their humanity, becoming increasingly more like the devices they create and defend. The mutual catastrophes that occur in Fail Safe and Dr. Strangelove show the inevitability of human weakness and scientific fallibility. Through the development of Professor Groeteschele and Dr. Strangelove, both Lumet and Kubrick illustrate the catastrophic possibilities of relying solely on science and mathematics to resolve international conflicts. Ultimately, modern, high stake warfare requires a more humanistic, ethical code of right and wrong.
Most of us would like to think that history is based on civil negotiations between representatives from around the world. The fact is, war has always been a disease that spreads not only in the battle field, and infects all those who come in contact with it. In the case of nuclear weapons, the United States, like many countries, raced to produce some of the most deadly weapons. Kristen Iversen shares her experiences surrounding a nuclear production facility in Boulder Colorado called Rocky Flats. The events at Rocky Flats are fuelled by secrecy and widespread hazards, it is the integration of these concepts to various aspects of her life that are at the center of Full Body Burden.
In the third decade of the Cold War, less than two years after the United States population had been scared half-way to death by the Cuban Missile Crisis, Dr. Strangelove invaded the nation's movie theatres and showed the country the end of the world. Touted by critics then and now as the film of the decade, Dr. Strangelove savagely mocked the President, the entire military defense establishment, and the rhetoric of the Cold War. To a nation that was living through the stress of the nuclear arms race and had faced the real prospect of nuclear war, the satiric treatment of the nation's leaders was an orgasmic release from deep fears and tensions. Its detractors argued that the film was juvenile, offensive, and inaccurate. Viewed, however, in its context of the Cold War and nuclear proliferation, Dr....
Through his uses of descriptive language Hersey exposes to the reader the physical, emotional, Psychological and structural damage caused by a nuclear attack. He shows the reader how peoples are physically changed but also how emotional psychologically scared by this act of horror. Through Hersey’s graphic detail of the horror after the bomb and the effects years after he shock the reader while also give the message that we shouldn’t let this happen again. In the book Hiroshima the author John Hersey exposes that a nuclear attack is not simply a disaster that fades away when the rubble is removed and buildings are rebuilt but an act of horror that changes the course of people’s live.
When referring to the Cold War Novels of Bradbury (The Martian Chronicles and Fahrenheit 451) it is imperative to understand his mode of thinking during the time. Bradbury first captures the general sense of anxiety, as well as his own, felt in a new atomic age, in the fifth chapter of The Martian Chronicles, "The Taxpayer." This short chapter identifies fear of nuclear war as an impetus for leaving Earth...
William Blake was probably more concerned than any other major Romantic author with the process of publication and its implications for the interpretation of his artistic creations. He paid a price for this degree of control over the process of printing, however: Blake lived in poverty and artistic obscurity throughout his entire life. Later, when his poems began to be distributed among a wider audience, they were frequently shorn of their original contexts. For William Blake, there has been a trade-off between the size of the audience he has reached and the degree of control he exerted over the publication process.
In 1949, the U.S. was shocked when the U.S.S.R. was able to successfully reproduce a nuclear missile, when, the U.S. had been carefully guarding the plans for the missiles. The missiles continued to improve when, in January of 1950 a German theoretical physicist named Klaus...
William Blake was one of those 19th century figures who could have and should have been beatniks, along with Rimbaud, Verlaine, Manet, Cezanne and Whitman. He began his career as an engraver and artist, and was an apprentice to the highly original Romantic painter Henry Fuseli. In his own time he was valued as an artist, and created a set of watercolor illustrations for the Book of Job that were so wildly but subtly colored they would have looked perfectly at home in next month's issue of Wired.
Often times, the vast entirety of the world populous enjoy movies for their entertainment or insight value, as well as the variety of topics of which they offer. The Cold War, a popular theme among many films, perpetuated from 1945, following World War II, until 1991. As the historical tensions between the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Russia, USSR, the two nations came to stand off, only to be interceded by the all too unfortunate and plausible concept of Mutually Assured Destruction. The era raises the question and sense of awareness for each country of the other’s strength, striking fear into those who lived to see it unfold. The American society, in an effort to raise public awareness of the threat that lay at its door step, turns to the entertainment industry for assistance in their dilemma. Between 1982 and 1991, during the rise of the burgeoning motion picture industry and the apex of the Cold War, several motion pictures make their debut where they depict Soviet Russia and its destructive and innovative potential. These films based within the time period, such as The Hunt for Red October, Red Dawn and War Games, are noteworthy examples of American propaganda during the later period of the Cold War and its distortion of what threats lie at the relative east in an effort to raise concern over the intercontinental standoff.
The main argument made in this movie is that of the dangerous of the Cold War stand off we were apart of. At the time, around 1945, it was believed it would take as little as 10 large nuclear devices to destroy life on earth,1 a small fraction of the arsenal that the countries possessed. This was most clearly expressed in the fictional “Doomsday Device” metaphor. Another large piece of satire within the movie was the character background of Dr. Strangelove himself. At the time period the movie was set in it was widely believed that the US Government was using past Nazi Scientists to farther their own research in the Cold War Stand off. Dr. Strangelove can be seen as a based Nazi Scientist by his heavy German accent and also a “accidental” shout of “Hail Hitler”. Finally one of the most satired, but least obvious perhaps, was the hierarchy secret style of leadership with in the US military at the height of the Cold War, due to the renewal of The Red Scare2. The first example of this is that General Ripper was able to order a nuclear strike with no questions asked but also he is the only one who could recall the attack, a power that not even the president had. The second, less obvious, example of this is when the commander of the Army division arrested the Executive Officer he didn 't know why he needed to do so or anything about the impending nuclear strike. The movie hinted at the dangerous of this leadership style as it caused people to follow directions blindly, even when those directions were wrong. I don 't believe that this is the best film representation of the feeling of Americans during the critical time period in a historical context. Although it does show many hot topic issues that occurred during that time you may not pick up on them unless knowing before hand that it was a popular issue of the
“Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room!” Most famously quoted from the movie Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, this black and white satiric film produced and co-written by Stanley Kubrick in 1964, is a prime example of Kenneth Waltz’s Realist theories in regards to International theory.
William Blake was born in Soho, London in 1757 along with six other siblings. As a child Blake talks about having visions dealing with angels and God. He began as an engraver and was thought to stay an engraver for the rest of his life. During the 18th and 19th century engravers were known as one of the most skillful people rather than being known as artistic. Later on in his life he expressed himself through poetry. His poetry consisted of his views on social, political and religious injustices during his lifetime. Blake believed in the imagination, democracy, and in the individual, which reflects in the 18th and 19th century Romanticism movement. Although Blake was a religious man who practiced Christianity, he believed the Bible was a form of control, he was a nonconformist radical who criticized political issues by writing a couple of poems that provoke a sense of exposer to the issues during the time, and he also criticized social issues by disagreeing with the actions of the people and the government.
William Blake, was born in 1757 and died in 1827, created the poems “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” and Proverbs of Hell. Blake grew up in a poor environment. He studied to become an Engraver and a professional artist. His engraving took part in the Romanticism era. The Romanticism is a movement that developed during the 18th and early 19th century as a reaction against the Restoration and Enlightenment periods focuses on logic and reason. Blake’s poetry would focus on imagination. When Blake created his work, it gained very little attention. Blake’s artistic and poetic vision consists in his creations. Blake was against the Church of England because he thought the doctrines were being misused as a form of social control, it meant the people were taught to be passively obedient and accept oppression, poverty, and inequality. In Blake’s poems “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” and Proverbs of Hell, he shows that good requires evil in order to exist through imagery animals and man.
Maddox, Robert. “The Biggest Decision: Why We Had to Drop the Atomic Bomb.” Taking Sides: Clashing View in United States History. Ed. Larry Madaras & James SoRelle. 15th ed. New York, NY. 2012. 280-288.
Sir William Blake was known for his lucid writings and childlike imagination when it came down to his writings. Some will say that his writings were like day and night; for example, "The Lamb" and "The Tiger" or "The Little Boy Lost" and "The Little Boy Found." Born in the 18th century, Blake witnessed the cruel acts of the French and American Revolutions so his writings also, "revealed and exposed the harsh realities of life (Biography William Blake)". Although he never gained fame during his lifetime, Blake's work is thought of as to be genius and well respected today. "The lack of public recognition sent him into a severe depression which lasted from 1810-1817, and even his close friends thought him insane (William Blake,)". Blake once stated, "Always be ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid you (http://brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_blake.html )."
“As in many places in Africa, the growing cities of Nigeria at first are divided by ethnicity. Benin City for example, has a city government that operates under the national government, but also has sections of the city, each of which dominates a single group and led by chieftain of that group. As the cities develop, these societal isolations tend to disappear; now the cities are blending the old African societies and replacing them with national identities.” (Moss 383)