Quarter 2: Journal 2- Paranormal Activity 2

I saw this movie on Friday night, and it totally freaked me out. While I won't delve too deeply into the plot, I did want to discuss the prevalence of karma in this movie. I am a firm believer in karma, so I definitely liked it being in this movie. Firstly, the daughter of the couple that is being haunted discovers that if one makes a deal with a demon, they must sacrifice their first born son. Interstingly enough, their family line has been all girls up until the point of Hunter, her half-brother, being born. The rule is that the demon will give you something, like wealth, in exchange for that life, and if you do not pay up your child, you will be haunted until he is obtained. These reasons unbeknown to the parents cause the demon to start haunting their family. This is a prime example of karma. The husband, in order to protect his wife and son, uses a cross to transfer the demon from his wife to her sister, because it has to be transferred to a blood relative. The posessed sister then kills her husband, travles to her sister's house, and kills both of them. I believe that the demon kills the husband out of an act of karma, as well as the fact that it is sheer evil. I do believe that things that you do will either come back to help or haunt you, as seen in this movie. Haunt. Hah. Punny.

2nd Quarter: Journal 1- Contact

Let's actually do these right this quarter. So in my Theory of Knowledge class, we watched the movie Contact. This movie is about genius scientist Ellie Arroway, who makes contact with Aliens, hence the title. In this film, Arroway fights many injustices in her path to actually meet the aliens. Predominantly ones of love, greed, fear and religion. The conflict arises in that only one person can go on the spaceship that will go to the Alien star, Vega, and that is where these injustices arise. The people who are funding their mission want someone who best represents the United States. Ellie's love interest is another possible candidate for the mission, and not only does he want to go (greed), he also wants to protect her (love and fear.) In order to attain both of these, he brings up the point that she is not religious, and most of the United States is. This completely ruins any chance she has of going. To make matters worse, right before the spaceship is about to leave, a kamikazi takes place on the ship, shattering all of her hopes and dreams. Luckily for her, Japan was building the same exact thing, and they called her, as they saw her best fit to go on the mission. She then reconciles her problems with her love interest, and the movie has a happy ending. Yay. I did want to discuss the four conflicts that arise in the movie: love, greed, fear and religion. These things are constantly problematic factors in our society today. People constantly operate off of fear, and let it control them. People kill each other over religion; take a look at the middle east. Greed is what drives society. We are a capitalist nation, after all. Finally, struggles with different kind of love are constantly brought up in our society and in politics. Gays, for instance, are not allowed to marry in most states. The movie Contact combines four very prevalent issues in society today, and centers them about a battle between religion and technology.

Solution

So I really don't know what else to do for these journals, so I'm going to attach them in an email and emial them to you.. The first 9 are on here, and the second 9 are on the word document. I'm sorry for the incovenience. Jake

Maurice

Hi Mr. Wilcox. So I'm at Purdue and I'm having trouble copying and pasting the journals that I typed last night in the car, so I'm going to save them as images and post the rest here.

Sorry they're a little late!

that's not working either. I really didn't anticipate this, but they'll be up soon!

Competition

I thought that I'd preface this journal with some questions. What are the differences between a good loser and a bad loser? What defines a cutthroat competitior. Is competiton unhealthy? A good loser is someone who can accept their losses, congratulate those who beat them, analyze their mistakes, and learn how to improve for next time. A bad loser is someone who cannot realize the mistakes they win and blames others for their loss. I think that being a good loser is a quality everyone should strive to posess. A cutthroat competitor is one who is willing to sacrifice for their win. On the reality show, The Biggest Loser, for instance, a lot of the competitors are not willing to sacrifice their intergrity in order to cast votes for certain people; however, on Survivor, it seems as though people are willing to sacrifice a lot more. Of course, that could be because the point of The Biggest Loser is to lose weight, while Survivor is to win the game. I do think that competition is healthy, to an extent. If you are too competitive, a lot of people will not want to be around you, and you will lose friends. However, if you are not competitive at all, then I think there is a lot to be lost. Competition is what makes the world go round. Not everyone can win. In order to win, others do have to lose. While competitions can create food, they also show skills in certain areas. These are vital to know who is best fit to do what. Therefore, while dangerous, I believe that competiton is necessary.

Senior Skip Days

We all know they exist. And we all know that one is coming up. The monday after homecoming is a legendary senior skip day, and one which I will not participate in. I value winning fall student athlete rather than a day off, because I believe that will make senior year more memorable. I originally was going to skip, too. One thing I want to do with my senior year is have fun! I don't want to be constantly drowned by homework. That doesn't sound fun to me at all! My priorities of course, lie with my grades, and I have too many borderline classes to miss at the very end of the quarter. Maybe I'll be able to participate in the next one. I do think that participating is worth it. As long as you're not skipping like once a month, and you keep your grades up, I think it's an okay privilege to use sparingly. I also do think that the amount of work you have to make up is worth, as long as you actually have fun on that day. I wouldn't want to waste my day just sitting around. You should catch up on sleep, then party hard with friends! (without alcohol, of course). I feel that senior skip days are important, because they let seniors have some piece of mind amongst all of the craziness. Everyone could use a break now and then.

Leadership

What constitutes a good leader? Are there bad leadership styles? Do we need leaders? I think the best way to be a leader is to be the support system, or the glue if you will, of the team. By trying to keep everything together, A leader would garner respect from his crew, and be viewed as a strong leader because his crew likes him. Furthermore, more people would be willing to work if they think their contribution makes a difference. I think that this would only work for leading a small group of people. For leading a country, for instance, I would have no idea what to do. Though I suppose if anyone truly knew that, the country wouldn't have as many problems as it does. Of course there are bad leadership styles. Leaders like Lenin and Stalin may have been effective, but they were by no means good people. But it could also be debated that since they got so many things accomplished, were they bad leaders? I would venture to say that they were, since the people they led probably did not like them. And I also think that civilization would not exist without leaders. People need to be told what to do, or else they will act out in chaos. I think that people are too greedy not to have rules.

College Choice

This is another one of life's major decisions. Where are you going to college? As of right now, I do not know. I do know, however, where I am applying. I have already sent everything into University of Cincinnati and The Ohio State University. I have most of my Purdue University application filled out. I still need to apply to Pennsylvania State Uniervsity, Brown University, University of Michigan and New York University. I will probably go and major in civil engineering, and minor in math. After college, then, I can either go on to be an engineer or be a law school. I'm not sure what I'm going to do yet. Another large factor in making the college choice is the amount of money that it costs. For instance, a place like UC would be WAY more cost effective than NYU. But at the same time, scholarships are available, and it's all very hard to decide what would be the best option. One of the best ways to see where you belong is by going on college visits. So far I have visited, out of those schools, OSU. I am visiting Kelley Riedy at Purdue next weekend! I am also going to visit Margo at UC soon, too. I don't think I could see myself at OSU, but hopefully I'll be able to see myslef at some of these other schools. There's just too much up in the air right now.

Career Choice

One of the hardest things to decide at any age, especially at age 18, is what you want to do in your life. When you take something like the IB Program, it really opens the doors to a lot of opportunities. This is a curse and a blessing. I think I want to go into engineering, but I'm just not sure. It's so hard to decide. I mean, how do they expect you to know at 18?! My uncle is 24 and he doesn't even know. There are so many factors, too! Happiness, money, location... Blargh. It's stupid to say that the amount of money you make doesn't matter. If that were true, a lot of people would not work. The pay is a large factor of what job I would work. It may be shallow, but I guess it's part of the game of life, though. I do hope that I make the right decision. Should I not, I could end up spending an extra year or two at college, which is not cost effective. At all. I guess I'll never know what the right decision is until I try.

GPA & Stuff

Let's define students by a single number. 3.987. Is that the epitome of my highschool endeavors? I guess so. That's what I'm told at least. Hey, at least it's good enough for top 10%, which is what colleges want to see. Great, another number. 23/249. I guess I'm just one for cutting it close. Really close to a 4.0, really close to the top 10% line. Furthermore, I got a 32 on my ACT. I'll explain why this is cutting it close now... I want to go to UC for engineering. I want to go there for free, too. In order to be invited to compete (yes!) for the Cincinnatus scholarship (one which lets you get a full ride) you must be in the top 10 percent of your class, and get a 32 or higher on your ACT. But I could really use a full ride... really, really badly. One of my biggest goals short term goals with GPA right now is to win the Fall Student Athlete. I think that I have a really good shot, but it'll be close between Ben Davis and myself. Hopefully we'll tie, and both get it. Gotta represent for the CC boys. Of course, I won't get that without an A in TOK, so I need to keep writing these journals. GOGOGO!

Cross Country is over!

Wow! I cannot believe I did it! 5 whole years of cross country, I feel really accomplished. I ran some great times this year, and stuck through every season. It was a really good feeling to step across that finish line and realize that although it's been fun, I'm glad it's over too. Finishing this season really made me realize how dedicated I am to running, and totally inspired me to train for that marathon Pav is setting me up for! Ever since freshman year, I had been running in the low 22:00s for my time. It was really hard to see 0 improvement, at least up until this year! My first race of this season was a 21:37, and my last a 21:40. It finally felt like everything had all come together and paid off. The team dynamics are... interesting. There're basically two groups of girls. The girls that do the work, and are good, and the girls that are pretty good, but if they did the work they'd be better than the first group. As for the guys, there are the varsity guys, the JV/Open guys, then Noah, Ian and me. Noah, Ian and I like the varsity guys. They're really nice, and cool. The JV guys are (mostly) snobs. Gah All in all, Cross Country has taught me two things. 1) Don't give up. 2) Mental and physical stamina. I truly believe that these two things have shaped me as a person.

Beauty

I was inspired by Ashleigh's blogs to write my own little blurb on what beauty is to me. I'm having a rough time not writing in question form right now. Beauty is defined, by dictionary.com, as: the quality in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind, whether arising from sensory manifestations, a meaningful design or pattern, or something else. I quite enjoyed that last part. While it's incredibly vague there, it does leave it up for one's own interpretation. In my humble opinion, that's what beauty is. It is one's own interpretation. Each and every person is beautiful in their own way. Some people have beautiful bodies; Some people have beautiful minds; Some people have beautiful lifestyles; Some people have beautiful innocence; Some people have beautiful confidence; Some people have beautiful modesty. These are very few, basic examples of beauty. Many people embody many of these qualities, whether or not they choose to believe it. The cliched quote from Margaret Hungerford, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," could not be more true. So my advice to everyone is to stay beautiful. If you believe it, other people will start to, too.

A question is the answer.

What does the title of this blog mean? Does it imply that for every answer that is given, multiple questions arise? Or can an answer ever be found, due to the realisation of more questions? What is 2+2? Couldn't the answer be 22, as well as 4? What 2 things are being added together? Are they real, or are they just numbers? Are numbers the only way to rationalize existence? Is our existence based off of thought? Is it not our thoughts that allow us to progress as a society? Does our society prohibit its progress based on its thouhts? Can the preceding statements be simultaneously true? Is it possible for opposites to co-exist? Can co-existence happen harmoniously? Is harmony perception of auditory aesthetics, or is it based on the rhythm? Is rhythm natural, or contrived for its benefits? Can things that are artifical ever benefit anyone? Is it possible for something benefit someone and harm no one; hence, is there an action that can go without a consequence? How does one differentiate a consequence and a benefit? If it is from their point of view, then is that to say that the benefit is for them? If so, does that make all benefits selfish? If all benefits are selfish, do they benefit anyone at all? How does anyone thrive, if their benefits are rooted in self-centeredness? Are self-centered people bad at life, or good at playing the game? To what extent is life a game? To what extent is life lived in the present? The future? The past? Does time itself, of the relativity of time measure these states of time? How is time measured? 2+2? Did you see this bein a cyclical blog? Do you now understand what the title of this blog means?