Could a Frankenstein monster be created?

The idea of Frankenstein or ‘The Modern Prometheus’ comes from a novel by Mary Shelly in 1818. It’s hard to imagine that a woman of that period wrote this gothic horror story, but she was attempting to illustrate the futility of scientists trying to become like God. The reason she had so much time to write this novel is because 1818 was a year without a summer, which resulted because of a volcanic eruption that blocked sunlight. She had to spend a lot of time indoors because it was too cold outside.

Victor Frankenstein was the scientist, not the monster. Essentially, the story is that he had this insane idea about trying to resurrect a dead body using electricity, a force that was new to that period of time. In those days, people were fascinated by the reality of life and what it meant. Shelly spent some time trying to delineate the effects of being resurrected. The monster had no name or identity. He was, in essence, a creation. Was he a person? That’s a good question. She also relied on the myth of Prometheus, a man created from clay and water, and she used ideas from John Milton’s epic poem of the rise of Lucifer called ‘Paradise Lost’.

We’ve all seen versions of this Frankenstein story, including several movies that show all sorts of ideas connected with the concept of creating life from death. But, is this idea possible?

The main problem with resurrecting a dead person is reviving the brain. Brain tissue starts dying within minutes of not receiving oxygenated blood, and the brain is pretty much toast after an hour or so unless it’s kept cold. There have been several accounts of mostly children drowning and under water for long periods and being resuscitated, mostly because their body was cooled enough to prevent tissue damage, especially in the brain. I might add here that a body cannot simply be frozen and then be revived. Freezing caused water to expand and cause damage by rupturing cells.

The main reason that I bring this subject up is because of the science fiction idea of stasis. One of the proposed methods of sending people out to other star systems is to put them in stasis or hibernation. The reason for this is simple. While in stasis, they don’t need food and water, they don’t age, and they don’t get on each other’s nerves, which could result in fights and even killings. The idea of stasis is that the people get revived after a long journey and do their thing without having to endure long periods of boredom.

But, would this idea work? The answer is maybe. We know that some animals hibernate during the winter months and come out without harm, so it’s possible that humans could be rigged to do this. However, there are lots of problems connected to hibernation, and most of it has to do with the fact that our brains are more complicated than animals that hibernate. No one is sure what would happen to a person kept in a hibernating state for a long period of time. Would their bran atrophy during this period of inactivity? The human brain requires lots of energy to stay healthy. It consumes more resources than the rest of the body and it must continue to stay active in order to survive. This wouldn’t be practical on a long journey in stasis. Science must find a way to literally kill a person and then resurrect them at a later date.  What would happen to his or her soul? This is almost the same question brought up in the post about a Star Trek transporter.

By the way, Victor Frankenstein’s creation was not a dumb brute like the monsters depicted in movies. He became articulate and intelligent, but people feared him and he was driven to hiding. He also wanted a female companion, but the problem was this: if a mate was provided for this creature, then they would constitute a new species and a possible threat to mankind. Eventually, Victor pursues the monster to kill him, but he never does. In essence, Victor was driven mad by his attempt to play God and it leads to his death, which his creature laments and vows to kill himself so that no one will know that he existed.

Great story, but nothing like the movies and TV series that I’ve seen. I particularly like Mel Brook’s version ‘Young Frankenstein’ a comedy with Gene Wilder playing Victor. He and Igor steal a corpse of a recently executed criminal and Igor is sent to obtain a brain, but he selects a brain labeled ‘abnormal’ and thinks it’s the name (Abe Normal) of the person. It’s this brain that gets installed into the corpse with amusing consequences.

Thanks for reading.