Thomas Mann and Heinrich Mann, Dual Brothers and Complimentary Genius Embraced by Complex Reality

摘要

An attempt is made to analyse the work and personality of two towering literary giants of the twentieth century, namely the brothers Thomas and Heinrich Mann using some of the global concepts of nonlinear dynamics and complexity theory. Nonetheless, the essay is directed mainly towards the non-mathematical but scientifically inclined and philosophically interested layman. Two main points are addressed. First, the essential and definite need for a sharp distinction between the world of facts and knowledge which encompasses science and technology and the other world which was called the world of value and morals. The second world is intimately related to all forms of art, literature and philosophy which encompass religion. On the every day level of a society, this distinction is an indispensable fact in itself and this, despite our conjecture that it is conceivable for the two worlds to unify at a very deep and as yet unknown individualistic spiritual level. The second point is the dual, complimentary and complex relation between Heinrich Mann and Thomas Mann on the one hand and the political and social situation in the Western hemisphere at that time on the other hand. We conclude by pointing out the utter humanism of the Mann family and how they respond to occasionally unbearable "condition humain", to use a Sartarian term, with art and rationality as the only way for salvation in a fundamentally and irreducibly uncertain and probabilistic universe.