Prompt 5

Sam Bacurin

AP English

8/13/12

The Philosophical Project

          There are many, many recorded accounts of philosophers and their teachings. Not everyone and everything could be touched upon in Sophie's World, but the collection was diverse enough to give people a good crash course in philosophy and its history.

          Early philosophers' questions were very broad; not much was known about the world at the time. People still believed the Earth to be flat. Questions like "who are we", "where did we come" were prominent. The early philosophers I most agreed with were the ones who tried to make sense of the natural world around them. Empedocles categorized things into four groups or elements, this attempt at basic categorization led to other philosophers and scientists making important discoveries. Democritus developed the atom theory, a theory that, while being quite a bit more complex, was correct in the most fundamental way. Aristotle contributed to science and philosophy by categorizing things as mineral, vegetable, or meat. Broad categories they may be, the effort towards furthering the understanding of the natural world. As well as his scientific ventures, I agree with his philosophical ventures as well. Aristotle stated that we get the ideas from the natural world and not the other way around like Plato said. The philosopher's I most agreed with were the ones who made an attempt at furthering knowledge by observing and recording rather than questioning. While questioning is a great way to find information, to exclusively use that as a means of learning is ridiculous to me.

          A lot of the philosophers were bound by the summit of the knowledge of their time period so their theories didn't always abide by current scientific standards. I understand this so there are not many philosophers I flat out disagree with. Plato is an exception. He theorized that nothing can become substance until we imagine it. It's almost laughable, this means that in order for a cat to exist, Plato must have had to think of it first and give it all its attributes. Kant is another exception. While his rose tinted glasses experiment was good, his assumption that everyone is born with innate morals does not sit right with me. Morals come from personal experiences and knowledge. Animals aren't born with morals, so there is no reason why humans should have innate morals. 

          I like to think of myself as on the fringes of the rabbits fur, but that is expecting too much. Maybe once I get some more life experiences under my belt and some higher education I can stare into the Magician's eyes. I want to know our purpose here, if there is one. If there isn't a purpose for us, we simply exist; I want to know even more.

Prompt 3

Sam Bacurin

AP English

8/12/13

The Middle Ages

          Most of the time the Middle Ages are thought of as a dark time for science and reason, with the Church bearing down on people who taught things that weren't canon. Some brave thinkers still managed to get their opinions and teachings out despite the oppression. Air conditioning was invented during the middle ages so not all creativity was stifled. St. Augustine brought out his creativity and the creativity of others during the middle ages as well as by likening ancient philosophers Socrates and Plato to Jesus.

          This was a bold move by Augustine. Some officials in the church would see Socrates and Plato as heretics to Church teachings. Augustine wanted to get people thinking critically in a time when it wasn’t just frowned upon, it was almost illegal. Most everyone at the time knew that Jesus died for their sins, some of the peasants may not have fully understood what that meant, but they got the gist of it, that Jesus selflessly sacrificed himself for them. Earlier in the book Socrates’s martyrdom was pointed out. Socrates could have escaped imprisonment, but chose to stay to make his point that he was a philosopher and didn’t fear death. Even though his only crime was questioning those who prosecuted him, he drank hemlock and died to make his point. Socrates’ death shares many similarities with Jesus’ death. Being a miracle worker, Jesus could have escaped as well, but refused. Both of them became martyrs for their own cause and to the general masses who may not of saw death as anything more than terrifying, the sacrifice was made even more significant.

          Now that St. Augustine had successfully gotten the attention of the masses by making Socrates into a Christ-like figure it opened the door to Socrates as well as Plato’s teachings being widely accepted. Augustine made a smart decision; the Church wouldn't call someone’s teachings a heretic if at the same time they were being likened to Christ. St. Augustine’s motives were to get people thinking with reason and the teachings of Jesus. He believed that there was a place for both because it didn't have to be one or the other. Augustine’s efforts led into the Renaissance when education started to become more common place so people could appreciate both men’s teachings.

Prompt 4

Sam Bacurin

AP English

8/12/13

A Skewed Perspective

           A minuscule portion of light is visible to human eyes. Humans have three pigment receptors. In comparison, butterflies have six pigment receptors and the mantis shrimp has 16 pigment receptors. A difference measured in orders of magnitude, still is only a small portion of light. The red tinted glasses experiment is pointing out that we only see what our mind lets us see, the tinted glass is showing what it would be like if our mind always saw everything in a red hue. 

          Of course it doesn't really matter what color the tinted glass is, it’s a metaphor for how just because we perceive something a certain way doesn't mean it really is. Two people living on opposite sides of the world would have very different tinted glasses, so to speak. All the philosophers present in Sophie's World are European; just from that small region look how many different viewpoints are present. The way people see things is dictated by where and how they are raised, not by a view point that everyone supposedly inherently possess. Kant describes a set of morals that all people share. To me this is a ridiculous assumption; morals are a completely subjective set of values that people form based on life experiences. I don't have a predetermined set of morals. I use the morals I have assigned to myself. 

In 7th grade I went on a field trip to Indianapolis with my fellow Catholic school students. Most if not all of my peers I had deemed decent people at some point or another. Driving through the city we stopped at a stop sign and there was a homeless man sitting on the street corner. Almost everyone on that bus pointed at him and laughed. I looked around at these people; people I respected and thought were good people with good morals. It was apparent that I was wrong. These people had tinted glasses that painted the world in a color that made it look as if they were better than other people because of trivial things like wealth and status. 

                 
               

                     

Prompt 1

Sam Bacurin

AP English

8/7/13

My Observations, on everything

            I like to think of myself as a very scientifically minded person. Therefore I have a very literal perception of things. Things like how the universe was created. Around 13 billion years ago the universe expanded from a single infinitely small and infinitely dense ball of energy. It expanded to a very large size in a matter of milliseconds. It expanded outward in every direction from there on. Several hundred thousand years passed by before anything interesting happened. All the mass in the universe was collecting at this time, gathered up by gravity. At time when a sufficient amount of gases and elemental particles became dense enough they came together to form the earliest star. This happened all over the rapidly growing universe until there were many stars, all of them fusing hydrogen together for fuel. There, in the core of the stars, were the basic building blocks of the universe forming. Heavier and heavier elements formed. Other celestial bodies were born amongst the residual space matter. Millions of years passed. The earliest stars grew old; some of them neared the end of their lifespans. Many died, often in violent explosions called supernovas which fused heavier elements together like gold and lead and spread out into the cosmos. Similar events continued  for many billions of years until Sol, or the sun was formed. In the beginning of the solar system there were many planets, many more than the 8 that exist today. None of them, not even the one that would be earth, harbored suitable conditions for life to exist. Early Earth was a violent volcanic wasteland, where only the heartiest forms of life could thrive. Eons passed by and primordial Earth began to cool. Water collected in Earth’s basins and the most basic forms of life sprang up. Microscopic singled celled forms of life that evolved into larger and more complex versions of life. More millions of years passed and creatures that somewhat resembled modern humans were hunting packs of animals, following them wherever they went. This pursuit of food leads to the early humans spreading about the world. Only a hundred thousand years later modern humans thrive. A blink of an eye in the universe timeline and the human species has come so far.

            The whole universe came about in a tiny amount of time but it took 13 billion years to get to where it is now. A lot of this information is canon to the scientific community, only the outliers of it debate this. The large amounts of speculation and questioning come from the question, “what came before it?”. There are endless answers to this question, but no one really knows. Many people believe a deity created it all. Some say it was a single one that did it, in fact many do believe it was one that did it, a God or gods perhaps. I personally don’t believe that anything created the universe. If I believed that a higher power created the universe, then that begs the question, who or what created the higher power. That logic would keep going on into infinity asking, if a higher power created the higher power, then who created that higher power. Because of that, I keep things simple by eliminating the higher power.

            Who am I then? I am a knife maker and a cyclist. I boast about my endeavors in these large areas of my life to compensate for my feelings of inadequacy elsewhere. I have a compulsive need to agree with people I want to please, I would never want to disagree with them because that might cause a conflict. Other than those odd personality defects that manifested from the initial shyness I developed early on, I think I am a decent person. I like to help people by using my collection of facts I acquired from reading obscure articles or from watching endless episodes of Modern Marvels and How It's Made. I love to make things and tear things apart. I strive to achieve things that will allow me to fulfill my dream of becoming an engineer.

             Ironically, what become a large portion of this essay is not something I use to identify myself with. In fact, most people who read this will be surprised to learn that I am an atheist. My hobbies are what I use to identify myself with. I am not a great person who can be harsh due to my pandering nature. At the same time I can be helpful since I read a lot and work hard so I can impress people and try to become an engineer.