Weight

We all bear a burden. A weight upon our backs, and while some carry a heavier load than others, all individuals can relate to the crushing burden of Atlas. In Jeanette Winterson's Weight, she questions the traditional viewpoint of Atlas, a solitary figure forced to carry out his punishment for eternity. In his final abandonment of his punishment, she poses the critical question of whether the struggle humans undergo is truly necessary, even to go as far to suggest that individuals just walk away from pointless troubles. As a Senior approaching graduation, I fear this message hit too close to home. As many of my "burdens" seem more and more pointless, I am often tempted to simply just set it down. However, unlike in Atlas' story, my Kosmos has the chance of collapsing if I do.

We Are All Our Father's Sons

In The War That Killed Achilles, Caroline Alexander explains the greek heroic belief that a younger generation could never surpass the greatness of the one previous, creating ancient heroes that were to be looked upon as insurmountable in their glory and prestige. However, Thetis, Achilles' immortal mother, was fated to birth a son who was greater than his father, upsetting the mythological norm of the time. Thus no God was willing to father this son, fearing the same fate of Zeus's father, and he was born to a mortal -- destined to die as all mortals do. Imagine if the Gods in the myths held the ideas of the American dream today, to live a better life than our fathers, to move forward in each generation, held true? Would this have changed the greatest mortal fighter's fate into that of a God? In the modern age, when one's family background is almost purposefully overlooked in the name of equality, it's hard to relate to the powerful influence of paternity in past generations. The question of whether this freedom from our father's is a curse or a blessing is subjective... one I look forward to investigating in "Clash Of The Titans", an upcoming film about the son of Zeus taking arms against his father. He chooses to fight for the people his was raised with instead of his own blood, touching on the existential subject of existence versus essence. Nevertheless he will have to come to term with his own bloodline, as we are all our father's sons, no matter how much we wish we weren't.

Utilitarianism: Useful and Dangerous

Although useful, I feel Ulitarianism is a dangerous philosophy to follow blindly. It does serve its purpose to allow individuals or governments to make decisions to give the greatest benefit to the most about of people, however as Colin Griffin stated on the Ning, it "falls apart when it is assessed in the context of death and one's own existence." If one could sacrifice a random stranger to save two others, is it right to do so? If you were forced to make that decision, and you chose the single individual, you are essentially killing another person. If one takes no stance, and the two die, you are simply letting fate run its course. Would you be able to sleep at night, knowing someone died because of your decision? Or would the comfort that two lives were saved let you rest assured you had made the moral decision. Personally, this is why I don't want to go into a field where these decisions are in my hands, i fear the ethical considerations would paralyze me from decisive action.

When one begins to look at a human as anything other than what they are, a human life, they lose sight what makes humanity so sacred. To say there is a value greater than one life is purely subjective, as value is an idea conceived by humanity, that didn't exist before it was thought up. Can we make decisions based off of something that could differ to vastly from person to person, individual to individual? I think instead we must take each decision carefully and not create numerical values, but use reason and logic to see what is right.

Somewhere to Turn

"Do you understand, sir, do you understand what it means when you have absolutely nowhere to turn?... For every man must have somewhere to turn."-Crime and Punishment

When men are backed into walls, into corners, into small closets that become their home they shed their layers of humanity and civilization and fall to their animalistic tendencies... to overlook what they know is right, to kill, to drink, to steal. Can we blame these individuals for pushing back against a society that constantly leaves them no other option but to retaliate? Although these people endanger our society, can we really condemn their actions, believe that we are above them? In their struggles they made a choice... can those who live in apathy look down upon them? Instead of labeling these individuals as criminals, dangerous beings unfit to live amongst others, I think it is necessary to observe their situation, feel the pressure of a wall against your back and the weight of society and poverty against your chest before we set them on a scale against ourselves.

The Dangers of Science

As a future science major, I must admit I love technology and humanities ability to consistently better itself outside the realm of selective reproduction. However, in the path we are headed, I see technology not being our savior, but being our demise. I don't believe it will one day turn on us like in the terminator, but we will still lose a part of ourselves to it, the essential core aspects of humanity that makes life so precious and treasured. For example, in Never Let Me Go, humans live off of the organs of donors, essentially making them close to immortality. Once humanity loses fear of an impending death, the dynamics of human life, thought, and society will change dramatically. As we also lose touch with the world around us, instead pulled into a virtual world composed of zeros and ones, not carbon and nitrogen, we come to the event horizon of our future. Do we keep taking steps forward, getting pulled into a path of technologically dominated lifestyles, or realize the dire nature of our situation and save ourselves while there is still time? The objective viewpoint of science is necessary towards research and development of new technology, however once we apply that lens to other aspects of our life, we lose what seperates us from lines of code.

Curse of Knowledge

“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.” - Thoreau

When the act of knowing our fate cannot affect it in any way, is it better to be blissful in ignorance? In Never Let Me Go, Ruth lives a life of believing instead of knowing, hoping instead of searching for truth. It is easy to codemn her actions as ignorant and unrealistic, however she lived a life full of hope and optimism, something many other carers were incapable of. Why look down on an individual for being happy? Some, such as Thoreau, would speculate that Kathy and Tommy's knowledge, fallout, and heartbreak make them better than Ruth's daydreams, however I do not think the answer is that clear. I think without the spark of dreamers and the optimists, the darkness of reality would be crushing. However, time often requires that we lose our innocence, no matter how much we wish to never let it go.

Foundations of Reality

For those who have yet to see Shutter Island, I would hate to ruin the experience for you, but essentially the viewer learns to question what appears to be real. Our experience of reality is simply the firing of neural pathways. Like all circuitry, it is prone to break... so how can we trust our senses, our perception of the world and what is real? Leonardo DiCaprio's character has a difficult time adjusting, constantly battling his own psyche. I saw many existentialist themes throughout Shutter Island and thought it fitting that it came out during our Existentialist unit. However, I do hope Never Let Me Go doesn't have as big of a surprise ending... I can't handle the foundations of reality breaking under my feet another time.