If the State did the parenting:

      Even if the state wants to be more involved in parenting, it would be very hard for them to control what is taught in the home. Besides, if the state were able to control what children are taught in the home, where does this stop? If they control what children are taught in the home, then most likely they would have to put cameras into people’s homes, which would in no way be providing the American people with the privacy given to them in the Constitution. Also, shouldn’t it be up to the parents, to a certain point, what their children are taught in their own home? It is one thing for the State to want to protect children from extreme harm if the parents are hurting their children, but if a parent wants to teach their children about something like their religious beliefs, I think they should have the right to do so. After all, what if a family is Catholic or Jewish (or any other religion for that matter)?  The state is not suppose to claim any religious standings, so if they said any one was better than the other, then there would be major problems with a lot of people. It should be up to the parents to raise their children in their own home. If the state had total control over what is taught in the home, then the state could force parents not to teach their children about their religious beliefs, and the state would tell all the children what to believe. For the most part, the state could be brainwashing the children. The State might have some good intentions when they say they want to be more involved in what children are taught in the home; but even if they tried to do this, there would be a lot of people who would be in extreme objection right away.

Photo Journal Walk

Today my family decided to go to Fort Casey, which we like to go to often. While the rest of the family was exploring the fort, I decided to go for a walk on the beach. However, my Mom would not let me go alone, so I had to take my dog with me. But that's okay, I know he will never judge me. So on my walk I thought about all that has happened this year. So much has happened and so much more is to come. I'm really excited to be graduating high school and move on to a different part in my life, but at the same time I am also nervous and unsure about what is to come. The beach is a place where I have grown up, I live very close to a park and I spend a fare amount of my free time there, especially when I just need to think. Whether it's sitting on the beach watching the sun set, going for a hike in the woods, or paddling around a lake in my kayak, I love the outdoors and it is something that brings great comfort to me. I just love being able to get away from the world and to just sit and think about my life and all the I have gone through and to even think about what my future may hold. This walk was a good break, seeing as how my Christmas break was not really a break. I enjoyed getting to take some time to just really relax and think about my life. This walk was just the break I needed.

Three Problems with Naturalism

          One problem with a naturalistic explanation for life is how they explain the origins of matter/living organisms. Naturalists say that the first living matter was made out of non-living matter. How could that even be possible? You cannot take a pen and turn it into a living thing. How then could non-living matter create living matter?

          Another problem is evolution. According to evolution, living organisms are slowly, over billions of years, developing by means of mutations and natural selection. However, if living organisms are slowly developing, then how did the cell ever come into being? Cells are the basic unit of life and make up living organisms. Even though the cell is extremely small, is it also very complex. The best way to think of a cell is to think of it as a machine. It needs to have all the parts in order to function. If any of the parts are missing, the cell cannot function and will die. That is why evolution cannot work. If all living matter develops over time, then the cell could not have been made. Besides, if the cell cannot function without all its working parts, then it would have been killed off by natural selection (survival of the fittest), something naturalists also believe in. If the cell was killed off, then there could be no living matter.

          A third problem is how naturalists explain the idea of some kind of designer that made all life. They say it all began by random chance and that to get to the stage of life we have today was also random chance. Naturalists also say that there is no proof of a designer that created life. But yet we have things like DNA, which are so complex and very precise. Besides, it is easier to believe that there is a designer who created the first living organism, than to believe life came into existence by some complete random chance.

          Those are just some of the problems with naturalism. Naturalists do not have any real proof to support their claims on things like the origin of life, evolution, or even that there is no intelligent designer. Hopefully naturalisms unconvincing answers within the scientific realm will cause others to question their theories as well.

Proposal

             For my "positivity project" I plan on writing notes of encouragement to the people in my neighborhood. I know how much words of encouragement help me when I am feeling sad and I hope to do the same for my neighbors. In order to do this I will need some markers, maybe some glitter, and either pieces of paper or note cards. After writing these notes I plan on putting them on the doors of the houses. I do not really ever get a chance to talk to any of my neighbors and hopefully this will open up an opportunity to speak to one of them. Hopefully by doing this I can bring something nice into their day. A plan on doing this either Sunday afternoon or Monday.

Sarah, Entry # 9:

            I do not think that the dreams people had really affected them. One reason is that we never see the dreams that people have. When people slept it was only so that the play could continue. If people had not randomly fallen asleep then the juice would not have been put into their eyes. Even when characters thought they had had a dream they did not change anything about themselves at all.

            As for which character I thought I was most like; I do not really see any similarities between any of them and myself. I admire Hermia the most out of all the characters. She does not give up until the can be with the one she loves. Also, she does not let her father or Demetrius get in her way. She fights for what she believes is right and does not let others influence her decisions. For example, when she tells her father in the first act of the play that she will not marry Demetrius, she states: “I do entreat your grace to pardon me./I know not by what power I am made bold,/Nor how it may concern my modesty/In such a presence here to plead my thoughts”(Scene 1, Lines 58-61). She knows that she is not being very respectful to her father by doing this but she feels that it is the right thing to do and that he is being unfair. That is why I like her best, and why I want to have some of her characteristics.

            Hermia’s standard of purity is however not very surprising for this period of time. Back then people had higher standards when it came to purity unlike today. There are a fare amount of people with high purity standards in this day and age, but there are also many people who simply do not really care. As for Lysander’s apologizing, I think that he probably realized what he said had upset Hermia so in order that she not get angry at him he just said that he did not mean it that way. As for relationships as a whole in that day and time; they were probably a lot less casual then by today’s standards. Back then marriages were arranged; as indicated in the first act of the play when Hermia’s father wanted her to marry Demetrius. It was probably not very common for two people to just fall in love and get married. That is why it is such a big deal when Hermia and Lysander run away together when Hermia’s father will not let her marry Lysander.  What would you say is the most important theme of A Midsummer Night’s Dream? Does this theme apply to modern times in any way? Which scene was your favorites of the play and why?

Sarah, Entry #7:

                        I think Shakespeare set the most magical scenes in the forest for a reason. In many different stories and plays the forest is often seen as the place where magical things happen. They can be seen as something harmless like fairies or other mystical creatures or dark things like witches or the devil. Obviously Shakespeare was not trying to go for the dark magic affect. That is why I think he set the play in the forest instead of a castle or a mountain peak. To me, when I think of castles I imagine a royal battle and not fairies or other magic creatures. As for a mountain peak, I think that this also does not really tend to display as magical of an affect as the forest.

                        I also think that Helena and Demetrius are in some ways similar characters. They both are rejected by the people they love and in the end they both end up falling in love (with one another). It also makes sense that Bottom and the fairies are opposites. He is rather bossy and they are for the most part servants.

                        As for when Snout thought the lion would scare the women; this was probably because back then women where seen as weak. During this time in history women tended to be seen as rather defenseless people. That is most likely why he said this. I do not think that the costumes would have been very scary. After all, this is a play and costumes in plays do not tend to be overly scary. It just seems that they did not want to scare the women because they thought of them as being rather frail. For example, in Act 3, Scene 1, Bottom says: “Masters, you ought to consider with yourself, to bring in (God/ shield us!) a lion among ladies is a most dreadful thing; for there/is not a more fearful wildfowl than your lion living” (Lines 23-25). What do you think? Could he have said this for another reason? Something else that I was wondering about was that after Bottom woke up from his dream, he had just thought of everything as having been just a dream. Do you think that the reason this experience did not really change Bottom for the better is because he thought it was all just a dream and that he had nothing to worry about? I also wanted to know which character was your favorite in A Midsummer Night’s Dream?

Sarah, Entry # 5:

            When they wake up after Puck put the juice into their eyes Demetrius proclaims that now he loves Helena. I think that this may have just been one of those things that Shakespeare put in the play as a way to resolve the play. It may not have been the most logical idea for him to just randomly fall in love with her but it helped to end the play. As Demetrius says “my love to Hermia, /Melted as the snow/… And all the faith, the virtue of my heart, /The object and the pleasure of mind eye, / Is only Helena” (Act 4, Scene 1, Lines 162-163 and 166-167). It looks like Demetrius just randomly changed his mind to love Helena instead of Hermia. This may have something to do with the reoccurring magic throughout the play. After all, somehow he just feels in love with her as if by magic. As for his attitude in the play in the beginning he really does seem to love Hermia. He chases after her when he finds out she ran away with Lysander. Then later the juice causes him to fall in love with Helena. One character which is not really in the play that much is Theseus. Why do you think that Shakespeare did this?

            As for the fairies in the play; I think that they were not super important characters in the play. They never had their own act and whenever they are in the play they are always doing something for someone else. For example, they followed Titania around and the only reason that they were there was to help her and Bottom. I think that they were there to add yet another element of magic to the play. The fairies are magical creatures which the audience would have found very entertaining. Other than that, I think that Shakespeare did not really have any specific reasons for including the fairies in the play. Do you have a different idea about the fairies? Also, are there any characters in the play that you think are either extremely like one another or that are complete opposites?