The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster
Pg. 19
And in time” — his voice rose — “there will come a generation that had got beyond facts, beyond impressions, a generation absolutely colourless, a generation ‘seraphically free From taint of personality,’ which will see the French Revolution not as it happened, nor as they would like it to have happened, but as it would have happened, had it taken place in the days of the Machine.”
Within this passage from the Machine Stops, an advanced thinker gives a lecture on the dangers of first-hand ideas. Instead, he believes, every idea, opinion, fact, etc should be as far removed from the original source. History should be counted as less than history and more a “gossip vine” where information doesn’t come from a direct source. Overall this will lead to a more “accurate” assessment of history because it won’t be biased or opinionated.
I really like this sentence because I think it perfectly summarizes this apocalyptic society's belief on knowledge and learning. It also demonstrates the reason why this society is crumbling; there is no growth of knowledge. Instead, history and knowledge is being incorrectly condensed. The Machine has created a society of extreme comfort (to the point where muscles are so completely atrophied that citizens aren’t even able to pick up a book). This comfort has lead to laziness in all areas of life, including learning and history. No one )“needs” (or believes that they need to learn anything, so they don’t
While I like this sentence it does fit awkwardly within the structure of the story. This whole passage is more of an explanation of the world and comes in between two sequences of time. It’s in-between the comfy life with the machine working and the breakdown of the machine. This sentence serves mostly as exposition between two different story-based sections. It also works to explain a time jump. I would have appreciated this sentence more at the beginning of the story as a way of explaining the world more.
I think this sentence also demonstrates that even within The Machine society there are still radicals and extreme thinkers. The advanced thinker (that’s described in the passage) is on one in the spectrum. His whole life is based on laziness and worshiping The Machine. Then there is Kuno, who although he was raised with The Machine, wants to experience nature. In the middle, between their beliefs is Vashti. She loves The Machine but not to the extreme of the advanced thinker. Overall I think this sentence is a good description of a key belief system within the short story.
I wonder how the lazy and simpleminded lifestyle of the people in "The Machine Stops" is related to the taboo behind direct information and experience. Since it is indirectly stated that humans have been dependent on the Machine for the past several thousand years, maybe this fear of direct experience is just an accumulation of dysgenics as a result of living in isolation from the environment and from each other. When I read this quote, I also thought about how it related to the dynamics of power in the society of the Machine. The "advanced thinker" states that there will someday be a generation that will not see the French Revolution as it happened, but rather how it would have happened had it taken place during the days of the Machine. Since the Machine basically satisfies everyone's needs, people have no dissatisfaction with their very lazy and mundane lives, and a revolution would never take place. The thinker could be saying that it would never happen because dissidence and free thinking in favor of democracy is a thing of the past, but there is no real way to interpret this as the society of the Machine may have forgotten the real story of the French Revolution entirely as a result of thousands of years of distortion through what is basically an inter-generational "telephone game".
ReplyDeleteI really have no idea if this is accurate or not, but that passage kind of felt like a criticism of academia. I've seen academic articles that are criticisms of other criticisms of other criticisms, and I feel like that's something the author would disprove of. Also, I guess academia isn't really as genuine a profession as like, woodworking or something where you make practical things with your hands, and people in academics try to be as objective and emotionally detached as possible, which the author doesn't like. Furthermore, the author generally just really hates the idea of "telephoning", like having to go through other people or learning information from others instead of the source. There's that part where the machine says something like "if you have a complaint, you have to go through this one department which will relate your complaint to another department"(idk), which ig is a criticism of bureaucratic chains you have to go through.
ReplyDeleteThis is also one of the passages that stood out to me while reading "The Machine Stops." I found it noteworthy how they paint a future that is predominantly ruled by technology to be bland and essentially stagnant. In a usual debate regarding the future of our society and how technology fits into that, Forster's argument about technology resulting in a life that lacks human growth and learning is a relatively fairly common argument. The opposite, and relatively prevalent argument, is that the increase of technology is gonna stimulate society and bring upon more creativity and knowledge. It seems, though, that most pieces of writing I've read so far seem to argue the first point, that it will stop human progression.
ReplyDeleteI like how you bring up the different levels of people indoctrinated by the machine. You would think that Kuno would be the least radical since he has only every known the machine yet he is the most rebellious and curious about what life outside the machine holds. Vashti is interesting because we see her internal conflict between wanting to be with her son but also obeying the machine. I think this shows that even if our lives are completely reliant on technology we will always crave actual human interaction. I think showing us the different levels of people and how they feel about the machine makes the story more realistic which I think is good.
ReplyDeleteI really like your interpretation of how their attempt to learn about all of the ancient societies led to the downfall of civilization. I also liked how you described their knowledge as "gossip chains" because it really is like a giant game of telephone. Considering how normal social gossip is defined by the fact that as it spreads it becomes less accurate and more biased depending on who it is spread by, it is really bizarre that the society in The Machine Stops thinks that the opposite would happen. I think its another example of the hubris of the humans as their downfall, in their thinking they were so much better and more advanced than their ancestors, they atrophied their minds as well as their bodies.
ReplyDeleteI found it interesting how I automatically viewed the "advanced" thinkers in the society of the Machine as actually less advanced. They are content with society's amount of knowledge, which is exactly the opposite of what an "advanced" thinker should think. Kuno's intelligence is viewed as hindered, but he is one of the few that would eventually save civilization.
ReplyDeleteI agree that this sentence does a very good job of demonstrating just how different this world is from what we are used to. I think in addition to showing the general opinion about new ideas in this world, this sentence describes these people's views on individuality. When Forester writes that they want a society, "seraphically free from taint of personality" in this sentence, it goes to show how different their idea of originality is from ours, both in terms of ideas and people. In our world we are all told to "be yourself" and not do things simply because other people are doing them, but in this story people are told to do the exact opposite and conform to their society and the people in it.
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ReplyDeleteI agree with your interpretation of the line Anna. I really liked how it went beyond even just rewriting history to be more tolerable, into rewriting history with the machine in it lmao. I can't really denounce what they do though because I also have a crippling dependence on technology and cannot imagine myself in the past or in general without my phone. Glass houses and all that.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with your analysis of the sentence in that it shows how humans have become lazy and complacent - so much so that instead of bothering to think about history themselves, they have taken to parroting the words and ideas of others. I think this idea fits the overall extremist themes of the story. While it is definitely necessary to consider other second hand analyses when thinking about history, taking it to the extreme and completely ignoring first hand sources is not the way to go.
ReplyDeleteI think you did a very good job in show casing how meaningful this sentence is in relation to the rest of the story. With the way that emphasized how life is significantly different in the world of this story. The way people have changed by not allowing change in there life, not wanting to know what it is to experience, because that be something new to them. When in life today were always looking the next new thing to come our way and always wanting it constantly, but somewhere along the way the feeling started to fade for people until that got a point were they believed they reached a perfect life when in reality its a dreadful one.
ReplyDeleteI think this sentence helps us understand where Vashti is coming from. She's grown up with this idea that originality isn't a safe thing and it's much better to stay and follow what the people before her have in place. It's interesting because she has so much faith in the Machine, and all the other information that is provided her, that she isn't even compelled to think to explore for herself. It's such a different world than the world we live in now, where we're constantly building and learning new things everyday.
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