The seminar on Science and Literature: Stimulative or Antagonist — opens up a rich conceptual field that spans epistemology, aesthetics, ethics, pedagogy, and cultural politics. The phrasing itself invites debate rather than reconciliation, which can be intellectually productive.

The Interdisciplinary Seminar on Science & Literature seeks to explore the dynamic and evolving relationship between scientific thought and literary expression. Science and literature, often perceived as distinct modes of knowledge production, have long intersected in their shared efforts to understand, represent, and question the world. From literary engagements with scientific discovery to narrative, poetic, and speculative responses to technological change, literature has consistently acted as a space where scientific ideas are interpreted, contested, and humanized.

This seminar invites students, scholars, teachers and academic stakeholders to examine how scientific paradigms, methods, and metaphors inform literary texts, and how literature, in turn, shapes cultural perceptions of science. Particular attention may be given to interdisciplinary frameworks that bridge the humanities and sciences, including science fiction, medical humanities, environmental humanities, digital humanities, and posthumanist thought.

By fostering dialogue across disciplines, the seminar aims to encourage critical reflection on the ethical, philosophical, and cultural implications of scientific knowledge as mediated through literature, and to promote collaborative approaches to research and pedagogy in an increasingly interconnected intellectual landscape.

Below is a structured framework of Major Themes and Sub-Themes that may help in designing sessions, panels, or paper presentations.

I. Epistemology: Truth, Imagination, and Knowledge

Major Theme 1: Competing or Complementary Truths?

• Scientific truth vs. imaginative truth
  
  

• Empiricism vs. mimesis
  
  

• Objectivity vs. subjectivity
  
  

• Fact, fiction, and narrative authority
  
  

• The problem of “post-truth” culture
  
  

Sub-theme possibilities:

• From Plato’s suspicion of poetry to Aristotle’s defense of poetic universality
  
  

• The epistemic value of metaphor in scientific discourse
  
  

• Narrative as a mode of knowledge production
  
  

II. Historical Encounters Between Science and Literature

Major Theme 2: Conflict Narratives

• The Enlightenment and the rise of scientific rationality
  
  

• Industrial modernity and literary anxieties
  
  

• Darwinism and Victorian literature
  
  

Sub-themes:

• Charles Darwin and literary imagination
  
  

• The “Two Cultures” debate by C. P. Snow
  
  

• Romantic resistance to mechanistic worldviews
  
  

Major Theme 3: Productive Intersections

• Scientific metaphors in modernist literature
  
  

• Literature as anticipatory science (proto-science fiction)
  
  

• The rise of science fiction as a bridge genre
  
  

Sub-themes:

• Frankenstein as early science-literature negotiation
  
  

• H. G. Wells and speculative futures
  
  

• Ursula K. Le Guin and anthropological imagination
  
  

III. Ethics, Technology, and Responsibility

Major Theme 4: Literature as Ethical Critique of Science

• Bioethics and genetic engineering
  
  

• AI, robotics, and consciousness
  
  

• Surveillance capitalism
  
  

Sub-themes:

• Brave New World and technocratic control
  
  

• The Handmaid's Tale and reproductive science
  
  

• Never Let Me Go and cloning ethics
  
  

Major Theme 5: Can Science Learn Ethics from Literature?

• Narrative empathy and moral imagination
  
  

• Storytelling in medical humanities
  
  

• Case studies in narrative medicine
  
  

IV. Language, Representation, and Metaphor

Major Theme 6: Scientific Language vs. Literary Language

• Precision vs. polysemy
  
  

• Metaphor in quantum physics and cosmology
  
  

• The rhetoric of scientific writing
  
  

Sub-themes:

• The narrative structure of research papers
  
  

• Scientific models as imaginative constructs
  
  

• Popular science writing as literary art
  
  

V. Science, Literature, and the Posthuman Turn

Major Theme 7: Posthumanism and Digital Humanities

• Human vs. machine creativity
  
  

• AI-generated literature
  
  

• Data-driven humanities research
  
  

Sub-themes:

• Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and artificial consciousness
  
  

• Donna Haraway and cyborg theory
  
  

• Climate fiction and Anthropocene narratives
  
  

VI. Pedagogy and Interdisciplinarity

Major Theme 8: Bridging the Divide in Education

• STEAM vs. STEM
  
  

• Interdisciplinary curriculum design
  
  

• Teaching literature in science institutions and vice versa
  
  

Sub-themes:

• Creative writing in engineering colleges
  
  

• Scientific literacy through fiction
  
  

• Literature as a tool for critical scientific thinking
  
  

VII. Indian and Global Perspectives

Major Theme 9: Science and Literature in Indian Context

• Ancient Indian knowledge systems and aesthetics
  
  

• Myth, cosmology, and scientific imagination
  
  

• Modern Indian science fiction
  
  

Sub-themes:

• Rabindranath Tagore and science-humanism dialogue
  
  

• Jagadish Chandra Bose and literary sensibility
  
  

• Indigenous ecological knowledge vs. Western scientific frameworks
  
  

VIII. Contemporary Concerns: Post-Truth and Media

Major Theme 10: Imaginative Truth in the Age of Algorithms

• Misinformation and narrative manipulation
  
  

• Algorithmic storytelling
  
  

• The aesthetics of data visualization
  
  

Sub-themes:

• The role of literature in resisting fake narratives
  
  

• Science communication and public trust
  
  

• Digital culture and epistemic crisis
  
  

Structuring the Seminar

You may organize it in three clusters:

Cluster A: Conflict

• Science vs. Literature
  
  

• Objectivity vs. Imagination
  
  

• The “Two Cultures” problem
  
  

Cluster B: Confluence

• Ethics, narrative medicine
  
  

• Science fiction as mediation
  
  

• Metaphor and meaning
  
  

Cluster C: Future

• AI and authorship
  
  

• Posthumanism
  
  

• Climate crisis and planetary narratives
  
  

Possible Provocative Questions for Call for Papers

• Is literature merely illustrative of scientific ideas, or does it produce knowledge independently?
  
  

• Does scientific rationality diminish imaginative freedom?
  
  

• Can fiction foresee what science later materializes?
  
  

• In the age of AI, who owns imagination?
  
  

• Is post-truth a failure of science, literature, or both?

Explanation of the sub-title of the seminar

In the seminar title “Science and Literature: Stimulative or Antagonist”, the two terms are not merely descriptive; they frame a conceptual tension. Their meaning becomes clearer when read against debates such as The Two Cultures by C. P. Snow.

Let us unpack them contextually rather than lexically.

1. “Stimulative” — What Does It Imply Here?

In this title, stimulative does not simply mean “encouraging” or “inspiring.” It implies:

Intellectual Stimulation

• Science generating new metaphors for literature (evolution, entropy, relativity).
  
  

• Literature expanding the imaginative horizons of scientific thought.
  
  

Methodological Stimulation

• Narrative shaping scientific communication.
  
  

• Scientific models influencing literary form (fragmentation, non-linearity, uncertainty).
  
  

Ethical Stimulation

• Literature provoking moral reflection on scientific innovation.
  
  

• Science challenging literature to confront new ontological realities (AI, genetics, climate crisis).
  
  

In this sense, “stimulative” suggests mutual fertilization—a dialogic, productive relationship where each discipline expands the scope, language, and responsibility of the other.

It assumes:

• No hierarchy.
  
  

• No epistemic superiority.
  
  

• An interdisciplinary future.
  
  

2. “Antagonist” — What Does It Imply Here?

“Antagonist” is more philosophically charged than “opponent.” It suggests structural tension rather than simple disagreement.

Contextually, it may imply:

Epistemological Conflict

• Empirical verification vs. imaginative construction.
  
  

• Measurable truth vs. experiential truth.
  
  

• Quantification vs. interpretation.
  
  

This recalls classical suspicion beginning with Plato’s critique of poetry and extending through modern rationalist traditions.

Institutional Rivalry

• Funding priorities (STEM vs. Humanities).
  
  

• Educational hierarchies.
  
  

• Policy influence.
  
  

Cultural Antagonism

• Scientists viewing literature as vague or non-productive.
  
  

• Literary intellectuals critiquing science as reductive or mechanistic.
  
  

In this framing, “antagonist” means:

• Competing claims to authority.
  
  

• Rival definitions of truth.
  
  

• Conflicting visions of human progress.
  
  

It resonates strongly with Snow’s formulation of divided intellectual worlds.

3. The Productive Ambiguity of the Title

The power of your title lies in its refusal to decide in advance. The word “or” performs intellectual work.

It invites inquiry such as:

• Are stimulation and antagonism mutually exclusive?
  
  

• Can antagonism itself be stimulative?
  
  

• Does conflict produce creativity?
  
  

Historically, many major developments emerged from tension:

• Darwinian thought stimulating literary realism.
  
  

• Romantic poetry resisting mechanistic science.
  
  

• Science fiction imagining ethical futures before science actualized them.
  
  

Thus, the two terms may not be opposites but dialectical forces.

4. Possible Interpretive Frames

You may clarify the contextual meaning in your concept note using one of these frames:

Frame A: Binary Model

Science and literature compete for epistemic legitimacy.

Frame B: Dialogic Model

They challenge and refine each other through debate.

Frame C: Dialectical Model

Antagonism becomes the very condition for stimulation.

5. In the Contemporary Context

In the age of AI, climate crisis, and algorithmic governance:

• Literature critiques technological power.
  
  

• Science depends on narrative for public trust.
  
  

• Ethical imagination becomes central to innovation.
  
  

Here, “stimulative” might mean necessary collaboration.
“Antagonist” might mean necessary resistance.

6. A Concise Conceptual Definition for Your Seminar

Within this seminar, “stimulative” can be understood as:

The capacity of science and literature to mutually expand each other’s epistemic, ethical, and imaginative horizons.

And “antagonist” can be understood as:

The structural, epistemological, and institutional tensions that position science and literature as competing authorities over truth, value, and human progress.