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Frankenstein

SCIENCE: The Real, Freaky Experiments That Inspired “Frankenstein”

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Frankenstein experiments

On Jan. 17 1803, a young man named George Forster was hanged for murder at Newgate prison in London. After his execution, as often happened, his body was carried ceremoniously across the city to the Royal College of Surgeons, where it would be publicly dissected. What actually happened was rather more shocking than simple dissection though. Forster was going to be electrified. The experiments were to be carried out by the Italian natural philosopher Giovanni Aldini, the nephew of Luigi Galvani, who discovered “animal electricity” in 1780, and for whom the field of galvanism is named. With Forster on the … Read more

SCIENCE: Monsters in Real Life

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Frankenstein

People are fascinated by monstrous creatures, and popular culture and folklore are populated by bizarre beasts, from electrically reanimated corpses and giant, hairy humanoids to blood-guzzling vampires and amorous fish-men. Are any of these monsters even remotely possible in the real world? Not every monster is scientifically plausible, but many do have their foundations in the natural world’s real-life “monsters,” a group of experts reported here March 31 during the Future Con panel “Ack, Real Monsters.” They weighed in on what makes a monster and introduced the audience to some terrifying examples of animals that are just as strange and … Read more

We Already Have the Wheel. Frankenstein 1 – Strange Conception

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John Allenson

Frankenstein Part 1 – Strange Conception. We know the myth of how Mary Shelley came to write the novel Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus.  The myth is fairly factual but the underlying biases give a completely false understanding of who Mary Shelley was, why she wrote the first science fiction novel (at least in English), and what was happening in the novel. The basic myth is that a group of important men and a couple of young women were trapped in a castle in Geneva and bored out of their skulls.  The poets came up with a contest to tell … Read more