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Emotion And Reason In Arcadia

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Arcadia does not clearly present a difference between scientific and humanistic truth, instead it shows the conflicting ideas of emotion and reason. Throughout the play, emotion and reason are portrayed through the similarities of the present day characters and the nineteenth century characters. Each character has their own way of understanding the progress of scientific and humanistic values with reason and intellect. Hannah evokes the idea of reason, specifically when she refuses to accept the idea of knowledge and love. Likewise, Thomasina portrays a strong, confident character, while also revealing the theories and ideas related to science. Arcadia, at no singular point, reveals what is the truth; rather it expresses a certain theme of …show more content…

Stoppard often refers to Chaos theory. Through out the play, the reader sees how even though time goes on, the events that happen in the future cannot be changed, but can be predicted. Similar to Chaos theory, general events that happen in the future could be expected. During scene 1 Thomasina says to Septimus, “If you could stop every atom in its position and direction, and if your mind could comprehend all the actions thus suspended, then if you were really, really good at algebra you could write the formula for all the future; and although nobody can be so clever to do it, the formula must exist just as if one could” (2884). Thomasina shows how math and science can join together to become a whole. Stoppard is trying to show how eventually time will intermix, and even though two different time periods are put together into one play, it doesn’t contradict the most important fact that all beliefs could possibly become one. Thomasina ties her knowledge of math and science into a theory that the modern day characters will eventually examine. Later on in the play, Valentine explains the meaning of Thomasina’s theory to Hannah; “The details change, you can’t keep tabs on everything, it’s not nature in a box. But it isn’t necessary to know the details. When they are all put together, it turns out the population is obeying a mathematical rule” (2912). Valentine refers to algorithms and Chaos theory, a common metaphor through out the play, that ultimately shows how to contrasting ideas can come together and play out like an algorithm by becoming one. The common use of Chaos theory throughout the play is somewhat ironic. Chaos theory says that no matter how complex something may be there is an underlying order that can cause very simple or very complex behaviors and events. This basically means that

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