EPISODE DESCRIPTION: When Flowers for Algernon came out in 1959, It was science fiction. What if you could go in for surgery and come out with more intellectual potential? In this episode of Socratica Reads, Kimberly ponders how some of this concept has actually come to pass (informed by her stint in Joe Tsien's "smart mouse" lab). How has this book influenced our work at Socratica? The message of the book is clear, and sadly at odds with much of academia.
Get your copy of "Flowers for Algernon" here:"
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Transcript:
Welcome Everybody, to Socratica Reads. My name is Kimberly Hatch Harrison, and I’m the cofounder of Socratica. You know us from our educational videos about math, science, programming, and how to be a great student. Socratica Reads is a podcast about the books we’ve found influential. It really shouldn’t come as a surprise that people dedicated to making the education of the future were heavily influenced by science fiction - the literature of the future.
Today’s book is “Flowers For Algernon” by Daniel Keyes. Do you think of this book as science fiction? I read it when I was around 12, and it wasn’t in the sci-fi section of the library, but it certainly follows the typical sci-fi premise - imagine a world with a certain technological advance. How will people behave in this new slightly tweaked future? How will society respond?
In this world, as imagined in the late 1950s, there is cutting-edge brain research underway. You can go in for surgery, and come out with a higher IQ. You might think the Algernon from the title is the main character, but no - Algernon is a mouse - a test subject who has had this surgery, and become much smarter than your average rodent.
The funny thing is, when I read this book as a kid, it was still science fiction. But when I was in grad school at Princeton, I spent a little time doing research in Joe Tsien’s lab, where we made smart mice. We did this by overexpressing a certain gene active in the brain called NR2B. Mice with extra NR2B could learn how to solve a water maze faster, and they could remember better. Reality was catching up.
It is still science fiction to imagine this being used in people, and in Flowers for Algernon we have a cautionary tale. The main character is Charlie Gordon who has very limited abilities, and can only follow simple directions. Even Algernon can beat him at maze puzzles. Charlie goes to a night school for challenged students, and learns to read and write, but will never progress as much as he wants to. He is a man trapped in a body that doesn’t respond to his hard work. He longs to connect with other people, but of course, people are cruel, and they don’t think of him as a real person, and even the people Charlie thinks are his friends play cruel tricks on him.
Could this surgery deliver Charlie into a better life?
The researchers ask him to keep a journal, so we hear Charlie’s thoughts.
March 11th, the day after the operation. Charlie writes
If your smart you can have lots of frends to talk to and you never get lonley by yourself all the time.
I will say it’s hard going reading through Charlie’s journal entries. You ache for him, even as he rapidly improves. You see how he does suddenly understand how people saw him before - there’s a sort of Adam and Eve eating from the tree of knowledge moment, where he is ashamed.
Very, very briefly, he’s able to connect with his fellow human beings. But he rapidly passes them.
May 15 ...strange how when I’m in the college cafeteria and hear the students arguing about history or politics or religion it all seems so childish.
I find no pleasure in discussing ideas any more on such an elementary level. People resent being shown that they don’t approach the complexities of the problem - they don’t know what exists beyond the surface ripples.
This is the beginning of his downfall. Charlie becomes MEAN. He hurts everyone around him with his superiority and his attitude that his work means more than being a decent person and having meaningful relationships.
It’s interesting that Charlie can the truth of this when it comes to the scientists:
August 11 “You’ve become cynical,” said Nemur. “That’s all this opportunity has meant to you. Your genius has destroyed your faith in the world and in your fellow men.”
“That’s not completely true,” I said softly. “But I’ve learned that intelligence alone doesn’t mean a damned thing. Here in your university, intelligence, education, knowledge, have all become great idols. But I know now there’s one thing you’ve all overlooked: intelligence and education that hasn’t been tempered by human affection isn’t worth a damn.”
This is where the book really makes me sad. I’ve been around brilliant people all my life. And you might think that the smarter you are, the less foolish you would be. But some of the smartest people I knew - the people I went to college with, my professors - so many of them were really just idiots about basic human kindness and decency.
This reminds me of another quote, from a play about a simple man who understood simple truths - Harvey, written by Mary Chase. It was made into a movie starring James Stewart as Elwood, a man with an imaginary 6 foot, three and a half inch rabbit as a best friend. They want to lock Elwood up. But Elwood was such a GOOD person, why would you want to keep him out of society and leave nasty people out in the world, just because they were smart? “Years ago my mother used to say to me, she'd say, "In this world, Elwood, you must be" - she always called me Elwood - "In this world, Elwood, you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant." Well, for years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. You may quote me. ”
