Even though this lecture seems to confuse me a lot, I am able to get the main point. In part three to me the main point is that happiness cannot be found in materials. But the BIG question here is how do we find happiness within ourselves? I also feel like the main concept is to live your life and die; but I disagree with this because life is not something we should live for just to die. It’s much more than that; you do not live your life as a neutral human being without any emotions or feelings at all. That would be when our life is “meaningless” and there is no point to live it and we should all die; as stated in the lecture. I think that there are many ways one can find true happiness; it all depends on what the person likes. For example one may become happy while they are eating because they enjoy consuming food, another may be happy when socializing with others. It all depends on the individual. This also connects to if we are able to find true happiness in ourselves or is it just the things we have surrounding us that make us happy? As stated in the lecture “…real value came from within and was greater than any value that could come from external things since it couldn’t be taken away.” I agree with this quote, but to me it seems like in the world we live in today, this does not seem to be true for all of us. Maybe for some of us but definitely not for all. These days we find pleasure within the products surrounding us, so we do not consider the fact that we are able to be happy by finding happiness within ourselves.
In part four of the lecture it seems to me that all of us are living under the same rule. We need to treat others the way we want to be treated. It also talks about freedom, and are we really free to do what we want to do? For example if we are free to do something bad, then won’t others start to follow what we do and start to do bad things as well? In the lecture it states that “To be free, then I must follow the golden rule and act only as I would have others act.” I agree with this quote because this is a rule I follow in my life as well. I guess not at all times, but come on we can make mistakes. I usually treat people the way I would want them to treat me in any situation. Also the example of being a slave is a good one for this lecture since it shows how we are all in the same level. It’s not like one individual is better than the other, no we are all living equally and everyone should treat each other equally as well. After reading this, a question kept coming up in my head…what’s your definition of freedom? I think this whole concept of freedom all depends on what you think freedom is. Depending on your thoughts, your definition may be different from others. “Our actions, though free, are constrained by our situation in a community.” I agree with this quote since it does depend on the situation which leads to your choice in what you should do. To be honest all this is really confusing to me, but it may become easy to understand…hopefully soon
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I also thought this was a very confusing part to his lecture. I agree that true happiness can not be find in materials but that also people have different perspective on what happiness is and many different levels of what it is. The fact that we humans think differently shows that happiness comes in different ways. Happiness is something that comes from the person and not just a something that makes you happy for a second but for a really long time. The golden rule, to my opinion, Is something that everyone follows even if we do not want to because that is how we humans follow our lives and try to see things.
ReplyDeleteI thought that your blog was very helpful to the understanding of what happen in the lecture. The examples were interesting and I agreed with most of your thoughts. Your perspective on some of the things I thought was interesting even thought I agree.
Dear Amber,
ReplyDeleteI really liked the honesty and approachability that you formed through your writing. There was a slight tone of questioning and confusion that added further approachability for the reader. You stated that happiness should be lived in the moment, not just looking ahead to death, as Banach proposes. You also go on to say that further on, Banach insinuates that we should treat one another as we would like to be treated and that you kind of disagree because everyone has different morals, so this idea cannot be applied to everyone. This theory that we cannot all have the same moral as one another is very reflective of individualized thinking, which I think is better than to be force-fed a certain ideology and to just be like everyone else. Just to fix up some grammar things, I think that you could try and cite Banach more in your entry so we, as readers, know whom you are referring to in the quotations. Continue questioning, bringing your authenticity in writing and most importantly sharing your point of view. Keep it up!
~Hayley