The Machine Stops

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“The Machine Stops” by E.M. Forster draws comparisons between the machine and the collapse of modernism because it shows the adverse effects on human progression as a result of the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment. The character Kuno, realizes that flaws exist within the Machine they live and wants to escape from it’s rigidity. Whereas, his mother, Vashti, worships the Machine and all it has done for her, as has allowed her to live a comfortable life with all that she feels is needed. Connections can be made between modernism and the machine as both aim for progression of human beings and has made religion seem obsolete. This allows for science and reason replace religion as a means of worship for those who follow with blind faith. Vashti believes she “worships nothing” and that “all the fear and superstition that existed once has been destroyed by the …show more content…

Similarly, the validity religion once had was lost as people more readily desired knowledge of facts. Furthermore, the story can be compared with Adam and Eve, where they ate from the tree of knowledge, became aware of their nakedness, and were ashamed. Kuno eats from the tree of knowledge for the first time when he feels that “humanity existed, and that it was without clothes… Humanity seemed naked and all [the] tubes and buttons and machineries neither came into the world with [them] nor will they follow [them] out, nor do they matter supremely while [they] are there” (12). Kuno undergoes a Genesis of his own with the realization that the Machine is mistaken for intellectual progression. He recognizes that it is doing the opposite, and limiting intellect by making knowledge useless; humans have stagnated while the Machine has advanced. Likewise, there was a paradigm shift that ended the age of modernism and brought forth a new way of thinking, just as Kuno

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