In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Shelley illustrates how the environment destroys the life of a scientist, Victor Frankenstein. Victor's generation of a creature from dead matter apparently casts him as an immoral man. However, it is often overlooked that Victor is simply the product of his environment. The social and scientific environment in which Victor immerses himself induces in him the desire to create the monster and forces him to continue its construction. The only environment that comforts Victor is that of nature and his family. By revealing the manipulative side of society, Shelley shows that even though the monster is Victor's creation, Victor is equally the creation of his own environment. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay In Victor's world, the value society places on science ultimately incites his obsessive behavior. Throughout his life, people condition Victor to leave behind his interest in old philosophies for the more important concepts of natural philosophy. This scientific society first comes to Victor through his father. Although Victor's father has no personal experience with science, he knows that the concepts are important to society. Victor explains that his "family was not scientific" (23), but his father still "expressed a desire for [Victor] to attend a course of lectures in natural philosophy" (25). Even his father is aware that the works of the philosophers that Victor reads first are obsolete. When Victor attempts to share his interest in Agrippa's philosophy, his father “looked casually at the title page of the book and said, 'Ah! Cornelius Agrippa! My dear Victor, don't waste time on this; it's sad rubbish'” (23). In this way, Victor's father discourages interest in philosophy to encourage interest in science, the subject that society deems most significant. After entering college, Victor's professors continue to condition him for the unnatural act he eventually commits. Professor M. Krempe belittles the works of ancient philosophers from the first time he meets Victor to abolish any interest Victor may still have in their works. After Victor confesses that he has read the ancient philosophy, Krempe responds: “'Every minute... every moment you wasted on those books is completely and utterly lost. You have burdened your memory with exploded systems and useless names'” (29). Subsequently, Professor M. Waldman leads Victor to believe that science is the most rewarding study by arguing that natural philosophers “required new and almost unlimited powers; [who] can command the thunders of the sky, imitate the earthquake and even taunt the invisible world with its own shadows” (31). With this statement, Waldman speaks of natural philosophers as if they were God and, therefore, instills a sense of awe in Victor. Victor expresses his new enthusiasm for science after his conversation with Waldman when he declares: "From today natural philosophy, and especially chemistry, in the broadest sense of the word, has become almost my only occupation" (32). Both Victor's father and his professors turn off his interest in early philosophers because society considers them rudimentary and claims that the ideas of natural philosophy are more consequential. Once Victor begins his studies, one can see how society's desires begin to take over his life. Victor's obsession with his research proves that the influence he receives from his father and professors works. He explains how tasks that had once been arbitrary and monotonous become engaging and, therefore, “the more [he]he fully entered science, the more [he] pursued it exclusively for its own sake” (32). As his research continues, science slowly begins to take over his life so much so that his search, "which had previously been a matter of duty and resolution, now became so ardent and longing, that the stars often disappeared." in the morning light while I was still busy in my laboratory” (32). In Victor's world, science is a self-perpetuating intoxicant. He states that “No one except those who have experienced them can conceive of the attractions of science. In other studies you get as far as others have gone before you, and there is nothing left to know; but in scientific research there is continuous food for discovery and wonder” (33). Therefore, once society sucks Victor into scientific research, it is almost impossible for him to get out. The influence of his father and his professors allows Victor to follow a science-obsessed society down a path of destruction. Victor himself claims that the power that a scientific society holds over man is responsible for many evils in the world, not just his creation. . He admits that his intoxication is unnatural: “If the study to which you apply yourself tends to weaken your affections and destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can mingle, then that study is certainly unlawful, that is to say, it does not suit the human mind” (38). Furthermore, he claims that this unnatural state of mind ruins men all over the world. According to Victor, “if no man would suffer any business to interfere with the tranquility of his domestic affections, Greece would not be enslaved; Caesar would have spared his country; America would be discovered more gradually; and the empires of Mexico and Peru had not been destroyed” (38). Victor is able to place the blame on society for his creation by shedding light on other evils in the world that arise from the same exhilaration Victor feels from the research. This society-induced obsession causes Victor to isolate himself from all other people: such isolation only makes Victor more troubled and sickly. Before the scientific environment completely pervades Victor, he thinks about returning home. Victor states that, "[He] thought of returning to [his] friends and [his] hometown, when an accident occurred which prolonged [his] stay" (33). This “accident” was Victor's newfound interest in the human body. Furthermore, before leaving for university, Victor promises his father that he will write to him often, but Victor ultimately becomes so involved in his research that he knowingly abandons his family. Victor states: “I therefore knew well what my father's feelings would be; but I could not turn my thoughts from my employment, in itself repugnant, but which had taken an irresistible hold on my imagination” (37). Ultimately, Victor's confinement worsens his troubled mind and worsens his health. After all the time Victor spends on the creature, "[his] cheek had grown pale from study, and [his] person had grown emaciated from confinement" (36). Since society tells Victor to put all his effort into building the creature, Victor must isolate himself from society and give himself the disease. In contrast to the fact that society's unnatural technology makes Victor sick, the natural environment soothes his troubled state. During his illness, he emphasizes his inability to relate to the things that once gave him pleasure: “Winter, spring, and summer passed during my labors; but I did not look at the flower or the spreading leaves – visions which before my work always gave me supreme pleasure, so deeply absorbed was I in my occupation” (38)..