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Into the Void: Philosophical Fantasy and Fantastic Philosophy in the Works of Stanisław Lem and the Strugatskii Brothers

Grob, Thomas. (2011) Into the Void: Philosophical Fantasy and Fantastic Philosophy in the Works of Stanisław Lem and the Strugatskii Brothers. In: Soviet Space Culture. Cosmic Enthusiasm in Socialist Societies. New York, pp. 42-56.

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Abstract

Stanislaw Lem’s Cyberiad (Cyberiada) is a collection of philosophical ‘robot fables’ about the constructors Trurl and Klapaucius. One of these tales is called Jak ocalał świat, or How the world was saved. The ingenious Trurl builds a machine that is capable of producing all objects beginning with the letter ‘n’. His somewhat envious colleague Klapaucius wants to test it and instructs it to manufacture ‘science’ (nauka), upon which it brings forth a horde of bickering scientists. The instruction to create ‘nice’ — that is, negatives — has the machine producing antiprotons, antielectrons and antineutrons; asked to make ‘nothing’, it comes to a halt. Not even the demand for ‘Nothingness’ can faze it — it begins irrevocably removing things from the world. The constructors are aghast; the machine has to be stopped. However, the things it has eliminated are gone forever. The sky has particularly suffered — it is completely devoid of anything bar a few stars. The world, the machine sadly affirms, is simply full of black holes of Nothingness and, thus, the world has remained punctured with holes of Nothingness to this day.
Faculties and Departments:04 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > Departement Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaften > Fachbereich Slavistik > Slavische und allgemeine Philologie (Grob)
04 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > Departement Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaften > Profilbereich Osteuropa-Studien > Slavische und allgemeine Philologie (Grob)
UniBasel Contributors:Grob, Thomas
Item Type:Book Section
Book Section Subtype:Further Contribution in a Book
Publisher:Palgrave Macmillan
ISBN:978-1-349-32437-8
e-ISBN:978-0-230-30704-9
Note:Publication type according to Uni Basel Research Database: Book item
Language:English
Identification Number:
edoc DOI:
Last Modified:12 Mar 2019 08:39
Deposited On:28 Jul 2016 08:48

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