An essay on chaos that sets out to be original has a difficult job. So much has been said and written about the subject over the past hundred years, and particularly in the twenty years since the popularization of "Chaos Theory", that it is hard to talk at length without resorting to the clichés and banalities buzzily generated by popular culture. That this is so should come as no surprise. Chaos, after all, is all around us. In the uncertainty of the stock market, the vagaries of friendship, the breakage of lamps and the breakup of marriages, and the soft decay of snowflakes on window panes, in all the little incidents and ephemera of our lives, the universe reveals itself to be a fundamentally chaotic place. So the commonplaces here are cosmic. But this is not so much an essay on chaos as it is an essay on language. The corpus of the word, the measured of volume of sound that contains its multitudes of meaning, is what really interests me. And chaos, for all its symbolic heft, is only a small word: four letters, two syllables; hardly an imposing presence on the printed page. It is a small word, but a talismanic one. A Google search for chaos yields over 70 million results, touching on everything from postmodern literature to topological manifolds, from the politics of laissez faire to the finer points of interior decor, and beyond. Browsing through these diverse offerings, tracing the evolution of the word from commonality to cultural icon, it seems more and more that the poets and the pundits are right - we really are living in an Age of Chaos. But what is it about "chaos" that compels us? Where do those two syllables derive their tremendous, multivalent power? How does the word's long history, its deep religious...
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... tumors, and misplaced commas, and the knowledge that everything tends to disorder, that the stars will burn out and life on our planet is merely an energy debt taken out against the entropic forces of the universe, the recognition that that there are no answers for the problems of poverty, crime, war, and disease and that the choice between the ravages of revolution and the quiet desperation of the status quo has no resolution, and will never have a resolution, and the stubbed toes, and missed trains, and the faulty wiring, and the faulty genes; in short, the sound and the fury, the whole irreclaimable mess of existence - that all of this can be captured in a cast of sound, contained in a single word and set against the imperturbable cosmos of our own being and will, solitary and solipsized, as smooth and resonant as the voice of a Greek tragic chorus, chaos.
I think the main idea the narrators is trying to emphasize is the theme of opposition between the chaotic world and the human need for community with a series of opposing images, especially darkness and light. The narrator repeatedly associates light with the desire to clear or give form to the needs and passions, which arise out of inner darkness. He also opposes light as an idea of order to darkness in the world, the chaos that adults endure, but of which they normally cannot speak to children.
Indirectly through out his novel, Camus compares people who rely too much on their logic and rationality, versus those who accept that our world is confusing and unpredictable. Similar to his thinking, in “Crickets, Bats, Cats and Chaos” Lewis Thomas suggests that chaos stimulates the brain and actually suggests that even crickets or cats have thoughts during chaotic or unpredictable situations. Even though I have always seen chaos as a total lack of order, a desperate situation in which an individual loses control, Thomas gave me a new concept for chaos. He says that it emerges when a system is altered by a small change or small uncertainty in its interior; chaos is then the
... in order to affect the world. Chaos becomes, by the end of the novel, nearly
...otter, disturbing high pitched sounf of the oystercatcher, the cormorant, and the heron all connote the idea of an overwhelming chaotic nature of the world. The first two lines of the second stanza justify this view because we find that the speaker has gone through a personal experience of facing death. However, in the majority of the second stanza, the speaker finds a more peaceful underlying order in the next few images he sees. The butterfly, a couple quietly speaking, and the soothing warmth of nature all appeal to an underlying order, filled with peacefulness and serenity. From the different perspectives of a single experience of the speaker, the author is able to create a world where although chaos can be present through personal experience, the underlying order is still intact, as long as one is able to look at it from a more calm and peaceful vantage point.
...in fact, seem insanely chaotic. Our mindless support of self-centred political systems, of abuse of fellow human beings of different nationalities - it may well have appeared quite insane to him. The poem, therefore, delivers a strong message of warning: we must develop a stronger awareness, a care of what is happening, lest we, the collective we - humanity, the 'Idiot', are left in the ruins of our effort, alone, forever.
Hayles, N. Katherine. Chaos Bound: Orderly Disorder in Contemporary Literature and Science. Ithica: Cornell UP, 1990.
One of the most destructive and arrogant persons in history was Adolf Hitler. The destruction that he and his regime brought on humanity has seldom seen its equal. In reality the Holocaust was a terrible horror, but in Hitler’s mind it was merely a brushstroke in the masterpiece that he believed he was creating. Hitler believed that the Aryan race was superior to all others and that it was only natural, and not cruel, that the higher would show no humanity toward the lower (296). This prejudiced belief predominated Hitler’s thinking. In his essay, On Nation and Race, his assumption that Aryans are superior to all others creates a type of logical fallacy called “Begging the Question” (Rottenberg 291).
The epic poem, Beowulf, a work of fiction, offers more insight into Ancient Anglo-Saxon English culture than the work of Bede, who wrote, A History of the English Church and People. The epic poem Beowulf gives an enhanced illustration and clearer understanding of the culture of the Ancient Anglo-Saxon’s. The epic poem gives the audience a picture of what the Ancient Anglo-Saxon English valued; seafaring, warriors, heroes, and paganism.
Everyone has experienced some type of stress in their life. Whether it has been from work, school, or troubles at home, stress is stress. If anyone had played sports in high school, you know the challenge of balancing school and sports. Imagine that stress, then multiply it exponentially. Everyone knows that college is a much more rigorous version of high school. The only reason some athletes made it to college is due to scholarships for their performance on the field. If they don’t perform well on the field, that scholarship might get cut. This makes practicing the athletes main priority. However, college athletes have to concentrate on their grades so they don’t drop out of college. These athletes know they may not make it to the pro’s, so they know they have to have a back up plan. This back up plan is called a college degree. So college athletes have to concentrate both on sports and classes. Sounds kind of challenging. This is why I believe student athletes should be allowed to miss classes occasionally due to their sport. Athletes are under much more stress, are required to attend practices and classes, and complete their homework. This is simply impossible to do, at least for a human. I believe that this is an important topic because it affects all college athletes.
Mark Sisson argues that the use of banned substances isn’t a problem because these substances keep the athletes healthy and at the top of their game. This is a topic that is popular in today’s world of competition and professional sports. The claim to allow performance enhancing drugs is difficult to make people agree with you because the media always displays them as bad and they never say the positive benefits of these drugs. Since it is difficult to get people to believe and agree with your claim by pitching a well-constructed argument. Sisson presents a good argument by using strategies of persuasion such as ethos, pathos, and logos developed by Aristotle.
Have you ever felt stuck? Wherever you are, it’s the absolute last place you want to be. In the book Into the Wild, Chris McCandless feels stuck just like the average everyday person may feel. Chris finds his escape plan to the situation and feels he will free himself by going off to the wild. I agree with the author that Chris McCandless wasn’t a crazy person, a sociopath, or an outcast because he got along with many people very well, but he did seem somewhat incompetent, even though he survived for quite some time.
Attorney client privilege preserves the confidentiality of communication between the lawyer and client. If a person is convicted and hires an attorney to defend themselves on trial, they are given the advantage of attorney client privilege to keep any information that the client releases to the attorney to be kept between only themselves. Think of how attorney client privilege affects how much harder it is to find truth in the criminal justice system. Although attorney client privilege gives people the right to their confidentiality, is this more important than uncovering the truth and finding justice? In the United States criminal justice system, truth seeking ought to take precedence over attorney client privilege because a guilty person could be released and time for the client, attorney, and court would be wasted. In more basic terms, an attorney’s right to disclose vital information to the court should be prioritized before attorney client privilege.
What makes a good person good? According to WikiHow, "We should learn to define our own morals ourselves. One of the simplest ways to do so is to love others, and treat them as you would like to be treated. Try to think of others before yourself. Even doing small things daily will greatly enrich and improve your life, and the lives of others around you." This quote shows us what we need to do in order to be what society thinks as, “good". In order to be a good person, you have to do good and moral things in your society consistently. However people might think that by doing one good thing once in a while will automatically make you a “good person”, but in reality it doesn’t.
There is absurdity in the conflict between the man who wants to find reason and unity in the universe versus the universe that provides him with nothing but mute and meaningless phenomena. The feeling of absurdity exiles us from the home-like comforts of a meaningful existence, but hoping to find some meaning in life puts off facing the consequences of the absurd, the meaninglessness of life. The Chaplain asks, “Have you no hope at all? And do you...
...sus the elements, the physical world of the universe. The storm is infinitely strong compared to man, and is of the moment only. It is pitiless, but innocent. It has no malice; it doesn't want to be anything else but a storm. The poor, bare, forked animal, man, on the other hand, has an infinite wish to be infinitely great, to become what he is not." (Auden, p.224).