For the final blog, I'm asking you to compare and contrast something new and something old about the same topic: the concept of immortality.
The new one is a piece by Brian Merchant from Vice.com about cryonics which is the relatively recent technological ability to freeze ourselves after death in the hopes of being somehow brought back to life at some later point. Obviously, this technology is fraught with some serious questions about "playing God." Is it ethical? Who wouldn't be immortal if you had the means? On the other hand, who would? It's Calypso offering Odysseus the chance to be one of the gods.
The older one from 1837 is a famous American gothic short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne called "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment." You can read it here, or listen to it here.
When you are done reading, please write a 300 to 400-word response that distills your thoughts on immortality as presented in these two pieces with at least one reference to both works. Note that a reference does not have to be a direct quoted passage (but it could be).
The new one is a piece by Brian Merchant from Vice.com about cryonics which is the relatively recent technological ability to freeze ourselves after death in the hopes of being somehow brought back to life at some later point. Obviously, this technology is fraught with some serious questions about "playing God." Is it ethical? Who wouldn't be immortal if you had the means? On the other hand, who would? It's Calypso offering Odysseus the chance to be one of the gods.
The older one from 1837 is a famous American gothic short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne called "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment." You can read it here, or listen to it here.
When you are done reading, please write a 300 to 400-word response that distills your thoughts on immortality as presented in these two pieces with at least one reference to both works. Note that a reference does not have to be a direct quoted passage (but it could be).