The Origin of Economic Failures and Depressions
by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy
Forbidden
Planet is a class Sci-Fi tour de force staring Leslie Nielson, Walter
Pidgeon and Anne Francis. Released in 1956, it holds up surprisingly
well against Star Wars, the Star Trek series and even the most recent
digital entries into the genre.
The
story of Dr. Morbius, re-discovering the technological marvels of a
lost race of Krell on the distant distant planet Altair, is
updated Shakespeare: The Tempest! Forbidden Planet excels in special
effects, but it's enduring fascinations is to be found in its story
–a parable of technology vs its inventor
The
story of Dr. Morbius, re-discovering the technological marvels of a
lost race of Krell on the distant planet Altair, is updated
Shakespeare: The Tempest.
Forbidden Planet excels in special
effects, but it's enduring fascination is to be found in its story, a
parable of technology vs its inventor, the monster vs Dr.
Frankenstein, the enemy of our own making.
Forbidden
Planet shows us the dark side of human kind, a forbidding
gestalt of uncontrollable urges that lies within all of us. It is, indeed, a
monster from the ID!
Even intelligence —seemingly papered over the
more powerful id —cannot negate our darkest, deepest reservoirs.
Just as Lord of the Rings depicts the absolute corruption
of absolute power, Forbidden Planet confronts us with a question
we would rather not answer: what are we to do with the physical
manifestations of our inmost monsters? Far
fetched? Consider this: what are nuclear weapons if not the "physical
manifestations" of our darkest, unconscious impulses?
Is
"Terrorism" a Monster From the ID?
Forbidden
Planet shows us the dark side of human kind, a forbidding gestalt of
uncontrollable urges that lies within all of us –a monster from the
ID! Even intelligence –seemingly papered over the more more
powerful ID –cannot negate our darkest, deepest reservoirs. Just as
the Lord of the Rings depicts the absolute power, Forbidden Planet
confronts us with a question we would rather not answer: what are we
to do with the physical manifestations of our most inmost monsters?
Far
fetched? Consider this: what are nuclear weapons if not the "physical
manifestations" of our darkest, unconscious impulses?
Not
so long ago, it was said by many writers that the U.S. Was hated by
100% of terrorists. Aside from being an amusing tautology, it misses
the point. FBI statistics, for example, published by the Brookings
Institution, utterly repudiate the political exploitation of terror.
The FBI'S's own number are conclusive: while Ronald Reagan waged his
famous “War on Terrorism”, terrorist attacks against the United
States actually increased. Terrorist attacks were much greater under
R. Reagan than under Clinton. Yet Clinton was criticized for not
having waged such a war, if war it was! It raises the questions: is
it preferable to wage a war and fail than to not wage a war and
succeed?
Shakespeare's
“The Tempest” deals with the same question: what does it mean to
be human? The traditions of the enlightenment and more recently of
existentialism come down heavily on the side of the fully realized
individual –free to be human in the context of a free
society. How oddly quaint and surrealistically naive that seems after
a few years of debacle and the unleashed madness of the monster of
the Id!.
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The
story of Dr. Morbius, re-discovering the technological marvels of a
lost race of Krell on the distant planet Altair, is updated
Shakespeare: The Tempest. Forbidden Planet excels in special effects, but it's enduring fascination is to be found in its story, a parable of technology vs its inventor, the monster vs Dr. Frankenstein, the enemy of our own making.
Forbidden Planet shows us the dark side of human kind, a forbidding gestalt of uncontrollable urges that lies within all of us. It is, indeed, a monster from the ID!
Forbidden Planet shows us the dark side of human kind, a forbidding gestalt of uncontrollable urges that lies within all of us –a monster from the ID! Even intelligence –seemingly papered over the more more powerful ID –cannot negate our darkest, deepest reservoirs. Just as the Lord of the Rings depicts the absolute power, Forbidden Planet confronts us with a question we would rather not answer: what are we to do with the physical manifestations of our most inmost monsters?
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