Olivia Grounds

Mrs. Wilhelmus

AP English Language

13 August 2013

                                                                               Slightly Furry

There were many different philosophers that were talked about in Sophie’s World. Some of them I agreed with, while others were not exactly my cup of tea. Every philosopher has his or, in some of the rare documented cases, her own take on life. Darwin believed in survival of the fittest while Plato believed that everything was based off a perfect idea of that thing. In fact, everyone has their own idea on what makes up life. Because of this, not everyone believes exactly what another does. I agree with Locke's idea, but not the ideas that were presented in “Fate”.

Locke believed that our senses build upon each other. It has been said that a baby only feels six main emotions after they are born. These emotions are happiness, sadness, surprise, fear, anger, and disgust. Now, I am not sure if those are the only emotions that are the basic building blocks of feelings, but I do believe that when we are born, there is a certain set of feelings that are present. A baby will not know heartbreak until there is a reason to feel that way. Sadness and anger may make jealously, but if you throw in some surprise, that emotion might become heartbroken. This feeds into Locke’s theory that there are complex ideas that stem off of simple and basic ones. He believed that a person would have a simple thought before building those simple thoughts into a complex one. You have to know your numbers before you can do anything with them. This ties into another of Locke’s theories. He believed that there were two different perspectives on life. The first is that some things can be redone over and over again, while using the same guidelines, and getting the same results each time. An example is one plus two equals three. One plus two will always equal three because it is the way math works. The second perspective on life is the one that can not be reproduced by each person. This could be the way something smells to what is most enjoyable to listen to.

One idea that I least agree with is the one presented to us in “Fate”. I do not believe that fate is predetermined This is that I believe is true because no one truly knows what is going to happen to them a week from now, let alone what is going to happen in their whole life. Sure, there is a general idea of what is going to happen to them, say growing old, but no one knows what is going to happen for sure. I believe this includes what ever higher power is up there, too. If they knew what was going to happen, then why let people die because a person decides to rob a gas station? Why let someone continue on a path, knowing that there is something bad at the end waiting for them? If the higher power knows something bad is going to happen and does not stop it, what does that say about their morals? I would not want to follow a god, any god, that would not do the right thing.

Each philosopher has their own view on the way certain things work. No two people believe the exact same thing and think the same way. That being said, I feel as though my beliefs are more closely entwined with what Locke believes than with the philosophers in “Fate”. As to where I sit on the rabbits fur, I believe that I sit on a little of everywhere, because who knows where my thoughts on life are in the grand scheme of things. I believe that everything has to start somewhere, so why not use the basic building blocks of life? But to what those building blocks are, I have no clue.  

Olivia Grounds

Mrs. Wilhelmus

AP English Language

12 August 2013

                                                              A Vision Stained With Red

            When a person looks through rose tinted glasses, they only see the good things in life. In the Kant chapter in Sophie’s World, Alberto has Sophie put on glasses with red lenses. These two sayings are not the same thing. The idea is similar, yes, but they do not mean the same thing. Rose colored glasses is seeing the good in life, while red tinted lenses is literally seeing everything the same as before you put the glasses on, but in red. They are similar because they both change your perspective on things in life.

During my freshman year at North High School, a group of my friends and I were trying to explain to another friend that not everyone has to see colors the same way. What I might see as red, others might see as green or blue. We were taught to call the colors we see red or purple or blue, but that does not mean we all see “red” the same way. It is all relative to what we have been taught since a young age. This is sort of the same idea with Sophie and the glass. Sophie saw the shapes of the objects the same way, but they are all different shades of red.

This applies to everyone’s life. For my life, it is the way friends around my view politics, classes, future jobs, music, books, activities, and religion. I know that some of my friends are Republicans and they hate Obama Care, while others think it is a great thing to have. I know that my favorite class is Chemistry and I despise Physics while one friend loves Physics and hates Chemistry. Another major example is religion. I have a friend that is Christian all the way, but I am kind of floating through, not sure what I believe. I mean, I think that there is a divine power that started life and the universal, kind of like what Plato talked about, but how am I to know for sure. Where did this divine power come from?

I believe the way people see the world depends on who they are. No one views everything the exact same way others do. Does a serial killer believe everything that a pacifist does if the best thing to do in a certain situation is right? How about the other way around? I think that the way we see the world depends on who we are and the way we think.

Olivia Grounds

Mrs. Wilhelmus

AP English Language

11 August 2013

                                                            Faithfully Philosophical

            In a time, were Christianity and philosophy collided; there were two major philosophers that brought these two together. Their names were Aquinas and St. Augustine. They believed that Christianity and Philosophy could go hand and hand, not be a threat to one another. These two saw the likeness of the Christian religion and the philosophical ideas teachings that the two Greeks had. Aquinas and St. Augustine “Christianized” the philosophical teachings of Aristotle and Plato.

            St. Augustine was not always a Christian. He started off as a Manichaean, a religious sector that started in the Late Antiquity. He did not believe that everything had to be placed into the category of good or evil. So, when he came across Neoplatonism, he jumped aboard that ship pretty quickly. While he studied Neoplatoism, he found that Neoplatonist believed that there was a divine being. This helped sooth the problem of right and wrong. Later on, he found Christianity and he believed it was much like the teachings of Plato. He believed that Plato must known of Christianity because his teach was much like the ones in the Old Testament. He saw many similarities between the two, one being that both Plato and the Old Testament said that there was a god, and that that god must have had an the “idea” what the world could be. He saved Plato’s teachings this way, for the school that Plato built was taken down. Where students once learned philosophy in school, Christianity began to be taught and took its’ place. The combining of these ideas and filling in the gaps with his own conclusions made Plato’s teachings immortal.

            Aquinas, like St. Augustine, believed that there was an eternal power. He bridged the gap between Christian ways and Aristotle’s idea by knowing that faith and knowledge had to go together. He knew that there was not a way to disprove God, only one that would prove that there was a god. He preserved Aristotle’s much like St. Augustine preserved Plato’s, bringing the two together and showing the similar traits that both of them held.

Olivia Grounds 

Mrs. Wilhelmus

AP English Language

10 August 2013

                                    Aristotle’s Archaic Views and Philosophers’ Feelings

            I once read that, “Anonymous was a woman,” and throughout the course of history, I can see why that saying is extremely accurate. In Sophie’s World, we see views of women throughout the book from different philosophers, and a lot of them are very sexists. It was believed by nine out of ten philosophers that women were the property of men and that is certainly not true. Even Aristotle, one of the most brilliant thinkers in history, had skewed views when it came to woman.

            Aristotle viewed women as incomplete men. He thought that women were supposed to be submissive to men because the child that they had would only carry the male genes. It is too bad that he does not live in today’s society, he would know that a child splits their genes fifty/fifty. His mentor, Plato, had an entirely different view on women.

            Plato believed that women were given the same power of reasoning as men, so they should be able to govern. But, he believed that this was only possible if women were taught the same way men were and were not forced to be a stay at home mom that did nothing but serve her husband and take care of her kids. Plato was the first person to suggest nursery schools and education for all. Plato even gave a high priestess the job of communicating his philosophical findings to his mentor, Socrates.

            I believe that Aristotle’s views on woman were slightly understandable, given the time period he lived in. On one hand, he had a mentor who believed that women could be important to society. If he had taken time to think about Plato’s point of view on woman and agreed with them, he may have been my favorite Greek philosopher. He did not though, so that title goes to Plato. On the other hand, he did not have DNA to show that both men and woman contributed to the gene pool of a child. I believe that if he had that information during his lifetime, he would have come to a different conclusion when it came to women and their place in society.

            I believe that there should have been more women role models in Sophie’s World. Sophie and Hilde both lived with their mothers but neither really look up to them. Also, All the philosophers that we read about were men, most of them were bias against women. If women could have had a say in society all of those years ago, the whole world could be completely different. But, because of all the discrimination against woman, people of our time are still wondering who the first woman president is going to be.

Olivia Grounds

Mrs. Wilhelmus

AP English Language

9 August 2013

                                                Lifelong Questions
            For a long time, people have been asking the questions, “Who am I?” and “Where does the world come from?” These people include philosophers, teachers, teens who are questioning their life, and many more. For each person, the answers to those questions are different. These answers can depend on where you live, what your religion is, and what time in your life it is.
            Who am I? There are multiple answers to that question. In the literal sense, I am Olivia Grounds, a junior at North High School. I have blonde hair and blue-green eyes that are encased in glasses all the time. I live in McCutchanville with my mother, father, brother, and two dogs. In my free time, I read a plethora of books and watch a select few television shows, most of them are British shows because I believe that British actors are far superior to American actors when it comes to the portrayal of emotions. I volunteer at Oaklyn Library every summer because the library is one of my favorite places in the world. Another place that I love to be is sitting at a potter's wheel. I spent 3 weeks this summer at a pottery camp where all I did was make pottery. One thing that most people do not know about me is that I love horseback riding, even if it has been forever since I have last been on a horse. But, all of that does not really describe who I am on the inside.
               Let us try in the figurative sense. I am a caterpillar whose cocoon is slightly off center. I am a book whose ideas are not understood by everyone. I am a flower whose buds are just starting to bloom. I am a painter that can not transfer what is in my head on to a painting. I am a birthday present from a friend; you have to open me up to see what is inside. Again, this does not describe who I am adequately. So, who am I? I am who I am.
              Where does this world come from? There are many beliefs on where the world comes from. One belief is that God created the Earth in seven days. Also, in the Islamic religion, it is said the god Allah said “be” and the world began. I personally believe that there is a higher power that created the universe, but it is probably not God or Allah. I believe that there could have been a big bang that started the universe, but that had to come from somewhere. It could not just poof and suddenly there is a whole universe that came from nowhere. This is like the question, “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?”  You know that one had to come first, because a chicken does not fall out of the sky and then you have chickens. It has to come somewhere and I believe that it is the act of a higher power followed by evolution.