Stoppard’s The Hard Problem

Abstract

The goal of the paper is to study contemporary British playwright Tom Stoppard’s one of the major plays The Hard Problem (2015). From literary, philosophical and psychological standpoints analyze the author’s relation to consciousness, altruism, and evolutionary biology. Stoppard’s The Hard Problem is a good example of intertextuality too. Creative mixture of scientific literature, technology, playwright’s other works and John Steinbeck’s fictional reality artistically expressed in the play. Examination of these things will enable us to talk about the author’s relation to the existence of God.

Considering this, I would like to discuss several issues:

1. Human Consciousness and artificial intelligence;
2. Altruism and evolution;
3. Existence and non-existence of God.

References

Lee, H. (2020). Tom Stoppard A Life by Hermione Lee, Faber & Faber, 2020.

Stoppard, T. (2015). The Hard Problem by Tom Stoppard, Grove Press New York 2015.