An Object

Dostoyevsky had an interesting perspective in comparing mankind to a piano key. Unlike a piano key, he says that man is unpredictable. We do not want to be the same every time. I have to agree on this statement. In my opinion, we would like to have the whole keyboard opposed to the key. In certain situations we want to act one way and in different we act a different way. Humans sometimes put on masks and are fake in front of people to do what? make them like you. This is a increasingly occurring phenomenon that is kind of getting on my nerves.

Monday post

The ungrateful biped. It's an interesting choice of words to describe ourselves. But, in a way, Dostoyevsky is right on his pithy description of us humans. We, as a race, have been given almost everything possible to reign over the other species in our kingdom. Thumbs, an advanced brain, the fact that we stand, our reasoning, etc. all contribute to the idea that we are ungrateful. We are ungrateful in the sense that we do not use everything we have been given as a race and a species to advance to our full potential. Instead, we create things around us which are not in our best interests as a race. Instead, we think for ourselves, and do things like destroy the O-zone layer. We reign over the animal kingdom, yet we are destroying the world that we inhabit, therefore, we are ungrateful bipeds.

Monday Post

Live for the journey. That is what most of us humans do. We pursue the challenges of the journey toward success. All the difficulties we endure,  the obstacles we overcome and the effort we put into something in order to achieve success is what we desire. After we achieve success, is there anywhere to go? I can relate what Fyodor states in this section of the book with my swimming career. I practice everyday in order to achieve faster times. My journey, and what I look forward to, is the everyday challenges practice provides me with and the swim meets that test my the amount of effort I have put into the pool. It is ablaze itself amazing when I get a PR in one of my events,  and at that time I am half I put in all the time energy and passion into my sport, however, the next day I will be starting all over again, back in the pool for more practice. Therefore I can conclude that we live for the journey, we accomplish much more in the oath toward sucres, we learn much more in the path toward success and it is the experiences that we keep with us forever.

monday

Wendell Pfeffer

1/24/14

            I was not present during the discussion but I think I understand what was said in class after reading a few posts. It actually is quite frightening reaching a solid ending in your career. Those that work their whole lives to perform or become good at something soon will be incapable of doing so. For example, those that play soccer professionally or those that participate in the Olympics soon become to old or are replaced with other younger well suited athletes. You work your whole life for something but then what. Its sad I know but that’s reality.  This notion is worse then completing goal. Once you complete a goal you create another one. That Russian ice skater girl that was fifteen and won like 3 gold medals did complete one of her goals of achieving a gold medal, but there is still so many more goals for her to achieve. I believe we are constantly creating goals for ourselves. This enables us to keep a positive mental attitude.

Uncertainty

Even though we fear the unknown we still have a desire to encounter it. Dostoevsky makes a valid point when he states that if  the unknown was taken away and we already knew our destiny, man would be bored. We would not know what to do with ourselves after we accomplish a certain goal we have strived for so long to complete. Once an athlete finishes his or her goal of winning the competition, they do not know what to do besides train for another competition and strive to win because to them that is normal. In the same way it is like checking off an item from a bucket list. Once you finish the last task, there is nothing more to do. As Dostoevsky points out, without uncertainty there is no point in really living. What is the point of knowing what your life will be like when your are 50 at the age of 12? If you already know something is going to happen, you take away the idea of hope and fate. Without them, you go through your day already knowing what will happen and suspense is thrown out the window. 

NFTU Monday Post

Life is the longest and most fun adventure we will ever have. I am the type of person that wants to die happy and complacent with the life I lived. Today we talked about how we destroy the buildings we are making before they are done because we become afraid that the result will not be as amazing and thrilling as we imagines. This is another problem the conscious man has. We create unrealistic expectations for our situations and because of that fear, we never really get to accomplish anything. We prefer the journey to the destination because the destination is set, while the journey has twists and turns and the ups and downs which make it exciting for us. The goal can be the same for everyone, but what makes someone unique is the way they achieve that goal.

Monday Post

I was not in class today but by what i have read so far from other people's comments, i think that the discussion today revolved around how humans tend to fear as Sofia said, the unknown, and end. In my opinion, the travel is always better than the arrival, the chase is better than the destination. The end, no matter what is reflects all the work you have done to get to that point and makes it more valuable. For example, it feels better getting a good grade on a difficult test you studied for rather than an easy test you winged; beating the best soccer team in the world is much more enjoyable than beating the team in last place. However, we need this end because humans would feel lost if there was not a wall. It would feel as if everything we has no purpose if there is no end. Humans need to continually be working on something, toward a goal, no matter what it is because when that's taken away, what is the purpose of your life; one is always working towards something.