One question raised in the Monsters and Ourselves unit that I find particularly interesting is the question about whether all life has a purpose. I took this question to mean why do we live, and what is the reason, the purpose, of our living? I would answer this question as such: If we look at all life excluding human life, (animals and other living organisms, that sort of thing) I think most people could agree that the purpose of these lives is to survive for as long as possible and to create the following generation. Not exceptionally glorious, but logical. Personally, I believe that all life has this purpose. And I do mean all life- that means you too, humanity. However, I would be willing to bet that most people would not be rushing to agree with me, to agree that something so basic could be the purpose of every human life. I think the reason for this is that society has ingrained in us the idea that we all have our own individual purpose to fulfill, that humanity is much more special than your average life form, and that we all have a higher purpose- a more alluring purpose in life than to merely survive and reproduce. Personally, I think that this is just a story we tell ourselves so that we might feel better about facing the hardships in our lives, which is why I realize that the majority of people would be unwilling to admit that this is the sole purpose of their existence. I acknowledge this because even I sometimes want to be assured that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak, that there is more to life than living just for the sake of living. So to sum up, I believe that if we don’t acknowledge our most basic purpose, then we each individually decide our own purpose in life.
This question made me think of The Stranger, because I was fascinated by Meursault. He is the one character that did, in fact, live for the sake of living. He did not seem to aspire to anything greater or "better" than what he already had. He did not pretend to feel something that he did not actually feel, as we saw when his mother passed. He just felt what he felt and did what he felt like doing. He just lived.

From our Socratic Seminar questions- support or refute the following: "As the novel progresses, Edna becomes more and more selfish, immature, and irresponsible, and therefore less admirable and even less likeable." When I read this I completely disagreed. I found that I did like and even admire Edna in a way as The Awakening progressed. Maybe because I (for some reason- not everyone liked it!?) really like The Awakening, it is a bit difficult for me to see Edna in a negative light. I mean, I understand how someone could say that Edna is a bad person, or call her irresponsible, immature, and selfish- it is just not easy for me to agree with any of these things. But when I read that statement again, I began to see a bit of truth in it. One word caught my eye and sparked something in my mind- selfish. When I thought about it, I could definitely see Edna as being selfish. But I am still unwilling to say that Edna's selfishness is the same as selfishness the way it is usually percieved. Instead I started to see how Edna's selfishness is the same kind that is seen in Howard Roark in The Fountainhead- from our notes, "each man's primary moral obligation is to achieve his own welfare, well-being, or self-interest... He should be 'selfish' in the sense of being beneficiary of his own moral actions." That is the kind of selfishness I see in Edna. Although it is interseting- I am under the impression that most everyone in our class respected Howard Roark for refusing to let other people dominate his thinking and his life, and for not conforming to the standards of society, and yet, even though Edna does the exact same thing, most people seemed to have some serious issues with her for it. Most likely that reaction is due to the fact that in Edna's situation there were children involved. In our society, while it is an awful act for a man to leave his wife and their children, it is nigh unthinkable for a woman to do the same. Like we have discussed in class, people today are more prone to accept a mother leaving her children if, say, she had a drug or alcohol addiction and her leaving was best for them than they are to accept Edna's leaving. But I must say, personally I don't begrudge her for leaving her children behind. Despite what others have said, I just don't see any another way for Edna.

Despite finding the Cutural Relativism article rather frustrating to read, (if the theory is correct then we must accept that we cannot judge anything as being better than anything else and so what we think of as progress is in fact not progress at all but instead these changes we lable progress are a violation of society's rules and therefore immoral... so on and so forth) I found the "What Can Be Learned" section of the Cultural Relativism article interesting. "Cultural Relativism warns us about the danger of assuming that all our preferences are based on some absolute rational standard." I agree that they most certainly are not. Who decided that it is morally acceptable to consume certain animals while it is unacceptable to consume others? The fact is that there is no objective right or wrong. Our own ideas about what is acceptable and what is not are only perceptions based on the things we have learned from our own society.
I think that the most important lesson to be learned from the Cultural Relativism theory is the value of keeping an open mind. We are greatly influenced by the viewpoints of the people around us, and when we adopt these views as are own we often settle in our ways, refusing to even entertain the idea that we could be wrong. And whether we realize it or not, we often think anything different from what we know is wrong. I believe that the most valuable tool a person a person can have is an open mind. The sooner we accept that we do not know absolutely everything, the better.

Personally, I have a difficult time believing anything without some sort of proof, and so I have difficulty accepting any of the various ideas about soul mates as true. I think it's important to say that I am not denying the validity of these beliefs (for all I know we could only be half of a whole, destined to search for completeness). I'm just saying that I do not claim to know things which I have absolutely no evidence of other than my own faith. So I do see the different views of soul mates as fantasy.
I definitely do not believe that each soul has a perfect relationship waiting in the wings. I think anyone who has ever been in any kind of relationship knows that perfection does not exist. Every relationship takes at least some work because none of us are perfect. We are only human, as the saying goes. And I believe that because we are human we strive for closeness. I am more inclined to think that that is the reason why people search for someone to share their life with- because humans are social and need companionship.
Our culture is fond of the idea of soul mates. Many very popular books and movies today deal with the concept of two people "completing one another." Concerning Wuthering Heights, I hardly know what to make of those twisted relationships. But if I did believe in soul mates, I would say that Heathcliff and Catherine were meant for eachother.

In a statement from 1981, Martin Camargo asserts that Beowulf, an "exemplary pagan," falls as far short of the Christain ideal as Grendel falls short of Beowulf. I agree with this statement for several reasons. First, I do not think that Beowulf is in any way modest; he is in fact very proud. In the mead hall he boasts of his heroic deeds. Another reason I agree with this statement is that the afterlife is not seen as something better in Beowulf. Instead, the people of Beowulf are concerned with performing heroic deeds and making a name for themselves, because they believe that their name is what will live on after their death. In our society the majority of people believe that our souls live on after our death, but people still try to leave something of themselves behind, whether it is their name or some sort of contribution to benefit following generations of people.
In 1990 George Clark argues that the narration of the hero's three battles moves from optimistic certainty that the world order is knowable and benevolent to doubt, leaving fame as the only sure value. I also agree with this argument. In Beowulf's first battle against Grendel, the sides are obvious. Good versus evil. Beowulf the proud, accomplished hero versus Grendel the horrific man-eating monster. The outcome is good clearly triumphing over evil. Beowulf's second battle against Grendel's mother is not as certain as his first battle against Grendel. When Grendel's mother attacks she comes to the mead hall suddenly, unlike the description of Grendel going to the mead hall, which takes up almost twenty lines. And when Beowulf actually fights Grendel's mother it is more of a struggle; he is pinned down and almost stabbed before he becomes the victor. In this second battle, good and evil are not as clearly defined. Grendel's mother only attacks the hall to avenge her son's death. This is a reason I believe even Beowulf would accept, because the concept of 'an eye for an eye' is shown as a reasonable value earlier in Beowulf. Beowulf's final battle against the dragon is the most uncertain. From the beginning there is little hope of Beowulf succeeding, and good and evil are also not obvious in this battle. Both the dragon and Beowulf are motivated by their own sense of duty- Beowulf to protect his people and the dragon to guard his treasure. The battle is drawn-out and arduous, and both the dragon and Beowulf perish, Beowulf leaving his name to live on after him. In the end, as George Clark argues, the only sure value left is fame.

Looking through the Socratic Seminar questions forThe Fountainhead, I saw a question I don't think was discussed very much in class. The question asks what is revealed about the media in the novel. The first thing I think of when I think of the media in The Fountainhead is the Banner and it's owner, Gail Wynand. The purpose of the Banner is to give the people the stories and the news that they want to hear. An enormous number of copies of the Banner are sold daily, until Wynand begins trying to promote Howard Roark. Even though Wynand's paper was very popular before, sales of the Banner drop dramatically, and the public begins to think of Wynand and the Banner as a joke. Wynand began talking about the greatness of Howard Roark, which is not an opinion shared by most people in the novel. The public does not want to hear about Roark, and so they refuse to listen, they refuse to buy the Banner.
I think that telling people only what they want to hear is definitely an idea present in contemporary media. There is an insane amount of gossipy entertainment websites, television shows, and magazines today. It's impossible to flip through channels on tv, browse the web, or even just go through the check-out line at a grocery store without seeing or hearing about some sort of scandalous gossip. I am disgusted by the "latest, juciest gossip" reported on these tv shows and in these magazines- who hooked up with who, who shouldn't be wearing a bikini. But whether we want to aknowledge it or not, the goal of the media is to make money- which means making the audience happy, which means telling people what they want to hear. So, while I do think that what the media reports can be silly and shallow, I suppose the media industry is just another business, trying to make money. In my mind, the real people at fault here are the ones who actually care about which celebrity looks fat, and other similar, stupid stories.