Final Blog

How do humans interact with nature?  This has been, as I perceive, the main question the class has revolved around.  While our main presentation for the final revolved around the three texts we have read this semester (Ishmael, Into the Wild, and the works of Hemingway) and so many other questions, they all boiled down to this.  Each family, while all agreed nature is something valued and we humans should be in touch with, debated their own philosophies.  I believe, in my own opinion, that yes we should be in touch with nature more.  I remember when the lunar eclipse happened this April, it was late at night and my family asked me if I wanted to see it with them.  I told them no, because why would I need to see it in person if I could just see it on the computer?  I realized the next day what a ridiculous response that was.  I could've seen something so rare and beautiful in person but I chose not too because I was too tired and I could see it another time or on the screen. The text I chose to annotate was the wolf video called Feral which we viewed in class.  It's about a boy in nature, born and raised in the wild, who then had to become civilized but the attempt to assimilate him into their society was ultimately fruitless as he returned to his natural state.  This fit in wight he group project because it shows how humans interact with nature.  The boy is the outcast, the one who is in touch with nature, while everyone else, the students, teachers, and the man who tried to civilize him, are the "normal" ones, the people out of touch with nature and secluding themselves in their own artificial conclave.  Regarding the project, I made annotations about the video, an outside source (Grievous by Todd Davis), and Mary and I created the script and compiled all the answers to make a cohesive and coherent script since we weren't part of the contesting groups.  I think I would've changed some of the actions and wording of the script to make it sound more realistic, while some people made remarks about other teams and cheered for themselves, it lacked a certain element of humor or drama.  However, I did like that everyone made contributions and worked together; none of this would've been possible without everyone's help.  If I could do this project again, I would but as I've stated before I would add more human qualities to the show, such as humor, drama, romance, etc.  As well, I would've wanted it to go more in depth about the philosophies.  Most of the answers just scratched the surfaces of the inner meanings of the different texts we read in class.  I personally wish I had put more time into it but studying for the other exams got in the way of that so it wasn't as detailed as I would've hoped.

Triptych

November:

January

April

In this triptych, I wanted to examine human's relationships with nature over time.  Being a Minnesotan, weather is a huge part of our lives here when they tell us we have four seasons but really it's just two: winter and road construction.  Nevertheless, the snow is a big part of our lives.  As seen above, the first snowfall feels magical, almost as if it's that one person at a party who just livens everything up.  From my experience, I've always loved the first snowfall because it's a beautiful change of scenery as opposed the the brown, dead leaves littering the streets.  January comes and I often have mixed feelings about the weather.  On one hand I like the weather because it's beautiful and there's always a possibility of a snow day (or this year, a cold day).  But if there's no days off of school, then the driving is treacherous, crisscrossing in the street around potholes and bumpers on the roads.  As well, the cold is a bitter attribute.  But we deal with it because we're cold-blooded vikings of the north.  April comes and it feels like a drawn out experience.  Personally, I've always hated it when it snows in April because "April showers bring May flowers," but the flower won't come if they're frozen like last year.  These months aren't just literal either, they're figurative for stages of our life.  In "November", or when I was a young lad, I always loved that first snowfall, and the last.  I loved sledding down the giant hills and creating snowmen and having snowball fights with everyone at school.  Then"January", or adolescence, came along and I no longer had the same appetite for the snow.  I liked it then but not in the same way.  I always thought to myself I liked the snow but I didn't like the cold, so I stayed inside and played with my friends, away from nature.  Fast forward to "April", or young adult, and I loathe the snow much more so than I ever did.  I thought to myself that I can watch the snow on my computer away from the cold, detaching myself from nature.  As I've grown older, I've become more distant from nature, wanting this utopian nature (the sun and warmth that mimicked the indoor weather) that didn't come very often.

Ishmael and the Gods

Carpe diem.  Seize the day.  Many a person has used this quote in some way or another to justify actions, even popularizing the meaning to the slang term “YOLO: You Only Live Once.”  Even Montclair State University, a nationally ranked university in New Jersey, has adopted the quote for their motto.  Yet Carpe Diem has another meaning to.  Instead of seizing the day, man has seized the world.  What was once a world filled with nature and Leavers has been ravaged by Takers and their technology, artificial buildings and pollutions to taint the purity of the natural world.  Ishmael spoke of these Takers seizing the world one day at a time.  He speaks of the world before Takers, how the gods ruled the world with confusion of how to seize the day, seize the Leavers fates.  When the gods took action, many Leavers cursed the gods for their misfortune and when they took action, many Leavers cursed the gods for their misfortune.  But for the responsibility to not fall on their shoulders, they created something else, something else that would take responsibility, something else to seize the world.  This “something else” was man, and from the ribs of man, according to Ishmael, came woman, and from woman came child. 

Ishmael recounts the story of Adam and Eve in Genesis, how the gods told Adam that if he eats from the Tree of Knowledge, he will certainly die.  In genesis, the Garden of Eden is described to have two trees, the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge.  When Adam and Eve ate from the latter, God cursed them and banished the two to the outside world.  Yet with our newfound knowledge, Ishmael implicitly raises the question “Are we better off with eating the fruit?”  Throughout the book, Ishmael continuously argues that Takers are ruling the world and are destroying it at the same time.  We are just like the gods, who whenever made decisions Leavers would die off and curse the gods, only now they curse us Takers.  Time and time again, in Genesis, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Numbers, and Exodus, the Israelites are thrown into hardships such as being slaves in Egypt, wandering through the desert for forty years, and more.  Both Ishmael and religious texts prove time and time again us Takers would have been much better off without eating the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. 

(Fig.1, Thomas Cole's artistic impression of the Garden of Eden)

Yet only these religious texts, which events in these stories may not have even happened, and Ishmael tell us how we shouldn’t have eaten from the tree and how the Takers destroy the world, yet again over and over.  Yet these religious texts contradict themselves, not explicitly but implicitly.  King James’ version of Genesis states that God said after Adam and Eve ate the fruit, “Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil.”  If we have the knowledge of God, to separate good and evil, does that mean that good was evil beforehand?  Or does that mean Adam and Eve unknowingly evil actions?  According to Genesis, no, but it’s apparently a sin to know right from wrong, to know good from evil.  If us Takers are able to notice right from wrong, wouldn’t that make us more adaptable to learning good, because many evil people in the world don’t see themselves as evil but doing good for the world or for themselves?  Wouldn't we be able to not only to learn what is right and do more good but become more advanced?

Looking over history, us Takers have advanced economically, politically, socially, and technologically.  Nowadays, we can live comfortably with cold blizzards outside our homes, discuss human history and what we can learn from the past, and blog our assignments while letting the whole world see our insight.  We have not been victims of tragedy for all of history.  Yes, life may have been better in Eden for a long time, but we have created our own Eden; we have conquered and harnessed the world and the Leavers in it.  Jessica Lange, portraying Constance Langdon on American Horror Story: Murder House, states: 

“Ever since I was a little girl, I knew I was destined for great things. I was going to be somebody. Person of significance. Star of the silver screen, I once thought. But... my dreams became nightmares. Instead of laurels, funeral wreaths. Instead of glory, heh, bitter disappointment. Cruel afflictions. Now I understand. Tragedy was preparing me for something greater. Every loss that came before was a lesson. I was being prepared. Now I know for what. This child... a remarkable boy. Destined for greatness. In need of a remarkable mother. Someone forged in the fires of adversity, who can guide him. With--with firmness. With love.”   

(Fig. 2, Jessica Lange as Constance Langdon in American Horror Story: Murder House)

Lange shockingly parallels the hardships of us Takers in the beginning and our achievements in the end.  God has prepared us, tested us, to be where we are and where we go in the future.  Tragedy prepared us for the greater future.  Our ancestor’s hardships have shaped us to who we have become. 

  Ishmael, at the end, asks the narrator and the reader with him gone, “Will there be hope for man?”  He questions our ability to survive in a world we destroy.  Yes, science has proved global warming at alarming rate, fast extinction, deforestation, and more.  But to think that we’d be better off without us knowledge is downright ridiculous.  So many other events happened in history that destroyed the world: dinosaurs, meteors, ice age, and more.  The world always finds a way to grow back and take everything for itself again.  Seizing the day, the gods have seized the day before.  We are no better than the gods, yet we are no worse than them either.

Quoted Sources:

Ishmael by Daniel Quinn

King James' Version of Genesis

American Horror Story: Murder House

Photo Sources:

Constance Langdon: http://nativeaudiogrrrl.blogspot.com/2012/01/character-of-week-constance-langdon.html
Garden of Eden: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_of_Eden

Humanism: What defines us as Humans?

One of the most interesting conversations that we had in class was whether Koko, the gorilla who can use sign language to communicate, Genie, a child who cannot communicate fluently, or Robbie, a robot who is fluent in speaking languages such as English, is more human than the others.  Many would define human as Homo sapiens.  From a biological and physiological standpoint, anyone who is classified under the genus Homo sapiens is a human while anyone out of this category is not a human.  Therefore, Genie would be the most human because Koko and Robbie do not fall under this category.  However, looking at a philosophical standpoint, Genie may not be very human.  We went over in class about how human = biology + communication.  From this standpoint, none of them are human because Koko and Robbie aren't biologically Homo sapiens and Genie cannot communicate.  But the definition of Humans is skewed to official definitions and definitions that other people created for us to which we may not agree with.  From a biological standpoint, I would agree that Genie would be the most human.  There's something else though that makes us Human though, our way to rationalize and our ways to feel emotion and communicate.  We can do so much more than other animals such as fish, birds, and insects, not to mention most mammals.  Humans can love, hate, anger, think, and do so much more.  I believe that yes, biology is important to describing someone as human but things can be described as emotionally human.  Robbie, the robot, could emotionalize sadness, love, and heroism.  He could express so many emotions and still think rationally and communicate.  Koko could also do the same.  Koko could communicate through sign language, think, and is a carbon based life form, something that Robbie is not.  Although Koko does not fall under the genus Homo sapiens, it's widely recognized by many that we Homo sapiens evolved from apes which are related to gorillas.  Although none of them are really Human, I do believe that they are in a sense somewhat Human or not human with humanistic qualities.  Genie is a Human biologically but can't communicate, Koko isn't a Homo sapien but can communicate and is related genetically to Homo sapiens, and Robbie is not a carbon-based life form but can communicate and has many of the emotional aspects that we humans have.  Therefore, none of them are more human than the other but are all somewhat human.