| The arts and the sciences have coexisted for centuries, yet there have been few instances in modern academic history in which scientists and literary scholars worked together side by side, influencing each others research and benefitting from their varying approaches and ideas. This work examines the beneficial effects that may result from a discourse between those two cultures in order to help promote a better understanding of the importance of interdisciplinarity. I chose quantum theory as a representative of the sciences and Lacans psychoanalysis as a representative of the arts to demonstrate that a shared metalinguistic coding system can provide the basis for successful communication. Therefore, the first part of this thesis explains the two theories without using jargon or mathematical formulae to make them more accessible to a broader audience. In the next part, I analyze two Shakespearean plays, A Midsummer Nights Dream and Hamlet, through the scope of these theories, utilizing both their similarities and their differences. Working from the perspective of a literary scholar, my final claim is that literature can be used as an analogy to better understand both quantum theory and psychoanalysis, while at the same time, these two theories can help us understand and discover new meaning in literary works. This demonstrates that no discipline is superior to the other, and that bridging the communicational gap between them in order to combine multiple approaches and their different viewpoints will have beneficial results for both cultures, opening up an entire new spectrum of ideas and theories. |
