The Cold Equations Essays

In the not so short story “the cold equations” the author presents a hard decision to kill one or many the killing of one to save many is decided. Tom godwin wrote a story about an EDS pilot who find a stowaway-- an 18 year old girl named Marilyn. Marilyn snuck on the little ship halling fever medicine for 6 men that were sent to the planet Woden. The pilot gets to know Marilyn who snuck on the ship to go see her brother who was on the other side of Woden. The rule was any sort of stowaway was to

The Cold Equations is a short story written by Tom Godwin in August 1954. Within the short story, Godwin is capable of presenting a story that represents a theme of “cold equations”. It puzzles the plot of two characters placed on the space frontier where one has to demise their lives in order to save the other willingly or both die due to the spaceship only acquiring a specific amount of fuel to carry one individual only. The storyline begins as the pilot of the space ship discovers a stowaway.

incidents, there are few things more hazardous than braving the infamous “Final Frontier.” Because of the danger posed by space exploration, there must exist a code to follow to ensure a desired balance between safety and progress. Tom Godwin’s Cold Equations has been described as “the best SF short story ever written, it is a virtuoso performance, a story set in a future so distant and different that we can only glimpse it in mysterious reflections and intriguing images” (qtd. Benford 217). First

`The story, “The Cold Equation” by Tom Godwin demonstrates the theme, with every action, there is a consequence with an outcome of good or bad. It's not any ordinary day for the six men stationed at Woden, on the Stardust, a spaceship-- a huge problem that is struck throughout the story is, you must kill whoever steps foot into a secret room located in the Stardust. Marilyn, an 18-year-old innocent girl who wanted to see her brother that she missed, was soon discovered in this secret room, therefor

The story Cold Equations by Tom Godwin, and the poem Traveling Through the Dark by William Stafford, both use two components of moral reasoning; moral judgment, and moral motivation. Cold Equations takes place in outer space where a slight increase in mass not included in the original calculations could get someone killed. Traveling Through the Dark takes place in 1962 on a road probably countryside. An example of moral reasoning is moral judgement, or the ability to correctly reason in regards of

In the short story “The Cold Equations” by Tom Godwin, he portrays a theme that when life goes against what seems to be imminent death, death will come through and persevere. In the beginning of the story an EDS pilot takes off to send a flu serum to a group of people on the planet called Woden, with just enough fuel to get there by himself. But as he is making his way there he finds out there is a girl that has hidden on his ship, named Marilyn, to get to her brother that is on Woden, but he can’t

In the story “Cold Equations” by Tom Godwin the author justifies the readers of the thematic tension compassion versus reality ultimately favoring reality based on the decisions made throughout the story. In the short story Marilyn, a young-teen girl, boards a spaceship so she can find her long lost brother, Gerry-- little does she know the law states any stowaway found in an EDS is to be jettisoned immediately after being found! The Commander very knows of the complications for Pilot Barton, having

Beautiful young girls need protection, beautiful young girls need rescue, beautiful young girls aren't killed... These biases are shared throughout western culture and confronted in Tom Godwin’s short story, “The Cold Equations.” This tale takes place in space, nature’s most unforgiving environment, where every mistake has grave consequences. Barton, an EDS pilot, finds a stowaway while he's on his way to deliver medical supplies to a group of fever-stricken men on the planet Woden. However, when

Reflection of: “Mark Twain and His Times” The article “Mark Twain and His Times,” by Stephen Railton tells of a time when Mark Twain was the American idol. During the period between 1865 through 1910, Railton declares was “Twain’s time” (Railton, 2010). During this time Mark Twain was in the midst of his lecture tours and live performances, his newspaper articles were being read by people all around the globe, and his fiction books became instant pieces of American literature. His storytelling

as life or death, but as small as what to eat for supper. They are just a part of everyday life. Everybody has to make choices, even characters in stories have to make choices, like Marilyn from Cold Equations, Jean from The Nothing, and Miss Geiss from This Year’s Class Picture. In the story Cold Equations by Tom Godwin, Marilyn has to choose between killing herself and saving seven other people or not killing herself and killing seven other people. Marilyn didn’t know that the capacity weight of

The short story “The Cold Equations” by Tom Godwin demonstrates how one should be careful where they sneak into because it can end in terrible consequences that can’t be changed . In the beginning, the main character Barton is introduced as an EDS pilot who is flying to his destination alone when he suddenly discovers there is someone stowing away in the supplies closet. Regulation clearly states that if a stowaway is found they must be shot out into space, so Barton knew what he had to do. He walked

In the short story “The Cold Equations” the author “Tom Godwin” expresses the theme of life and death. In the short story there was a girl named “Marilyn” who snuck into EDS pilots ship, the girl was young in her late teens she only did it because she hadn’t seen her brother in Ten years and didn’t want it wait any longer to see him. When Marilyn suck onto the EDS pilot's ship she expected a punishment but didn’t realize the extent of the punishment, she expected to have to pay her way through

In the short story “ The Cold Equations” by Tom Godwin the author creates the thematic opposition of doing what’s morally right versus what’s expected or guidelines that must be followed. In the end following the guidelines prevails even though it causes some pain but saves other people from having a similar fate as that of the girls. In the story there’s a man that is flying on an EDS short for Emergency Dispatch Ship and this man is flying to help group one on the planet of Woden. And in doing

The Cold Equations In this thrill seeking short story “The Cold Equations” by Tom Godwin. It starts out with a warmhearted 18 year old girl, Marilyn who shows up on an EDS ship getting pulled into a life or death situation in just a couple of paragraph into the book. She thought the easiest way to see her brother in Mimir is to be a stowaway, even when she was warned not to enter the ship she ignores the warning and becomes a stowaway anyway because she hadn't seen her brother in ten years. When

In The Cold Equations by Tom Godwin and Homestead in Idaho by Clinton F. Larson, Marilyn Lee Cross and Geneva have similar moral dilemmas in the way they react. In The Cold Equations, Marilyn is a stowaway on an Emergency Deployment Ship, or EDS, the contains fever serum. The ships have minimal fuel, so Marilyn’s added mass is fatal to not only herself but the pilot and the six sick workers who requested the serum. Geneva, from Homestead in Idaho, is bit by a rattlesnake. Geneva decides to bleed

A Stowaway in the Space Tom Godwin’s The Cold Equations clearly shows how much technology can affect people’s lives, and it can even let them live outside of the planet but it also limits the range of freedom. In this short story The Cold Equations, Godwin uses Barton and Marilyn’s changing characters and the setting of the story to convey several different themes. First of all, Godwin focuses on Barton’s changing character to show the theme regarding the laws of nature. For example, the narrator

people around them. For example, in Tom Godwin’s “The Cold Equations” and Laurie Colwin’s “Mr. Parker”, society places pressure on their respective protagonists. They face a struggle of how to deal with this pressure and whether to conform. In both “The Cold Equations” and “Mr. Parker”, the characters are faced with decisions that deal with the problem of how society’s influence plays a part in their decision making. In “The Cold Equations”, Tom Godwin explores the morality

In the story, “The Cold Equations”, Tom Godwin depicts the thematic tension as to never go against the path that you’re traveling on, because you could take a wrong turn and end up on a path towards unexpected consequences. In the year 2178, there are cruisers to carry people to the colonies on the far reaches of the galaxy. On the cruiser Stardust, a girl named Marilyn slipped onto an “EDS” or emergency dispatch ship. The EDS’s are only given enough fuel to arrive at their destination and return

Computers are used to functions that would take humans a long time to work out. They make work easier to accomplish. It can be used to show how much gas is used in a vehicle with different amounts of speed and weight. In the story Cold Equations written by Tom Godwin, a girl is a stowaway on a EDS. There wouldn't be enough gas to get to the destination with her added weight. A computer is used to figure out how long she could stay aboard with the gas that there was left. The pilot added

Tom Godwin’s short story “The Cold Equations” illustrates how one should think of and become accepting of their consequences whether it's deserved or not. The story is about an Emergency Dispatch Ship, also known as an EDS, with the pilot on a mission to give a group of six men who have a fatal fever. The pilot, Barton, during his mission finds a stowaway named Marilyn found in a small closet on the ship. Marilyn was a young girl trying to go to Mimir, for she had a destination waiting and hoped