Evolution in other words

The city of Uruk is ruled by Gilglamesh, a powerful king that has it’s people suffering. Therefore, the villagers pray to the gods to help them, so they let go a wild beast named Enkidu to the forests around Uruk.
One day a trapper sees this terrible beast, and tells Gilglamesh. "Go, trapper, bring the harlot, Shamhat, with you. When the animals are drinking at the watering place have her take off her robe and expose her sex. When he sees her he will draw near to her, and his animals, who grew up in his wilderness, will be alien to him."
This means, that Shamhat has to sleep with Enkidu, in order for him to loose his powers, and so it’s done.
"You are beautiful," Enkidu, you are become like a god.
Why do you gallop around the wilderness with the wild beasts? Come, let me bring you into Uruk-Haven, to the Holy Temple, the residence of Anu and Ishtar, the place of Gilgamesh, who is wise to perfection, but who struts his power over the people like a wild bull." With this Enkidu is taken to Uruk, in order to meet the powerful Gilglamesh.
Meanwhile, Gilglamesh is having two dreams he can’t explain. The first, is that a meteorite fell from the sky, and he wasn’t able to move it, so the people of the city make a great feast around it. And the second dream, is just like the one before, just that the meteorite is replaced by axe.
Later, the king is making a new rule for his kingdom, and it consist that every bride will have to sleep with him, before going to bed with her new husband. There, Enkidu arrives and tries to beat up Gilglamesh, but he fails to do so. Nevertheless, they both become partners and grow up together.
One day, Gilglamesh decides that he will cut down all the trees from the forest, and that means he will have to beat up Humbaba, that is the guardian of the forest. Enkidu asked Gilglamesh to forget this dangerous journey, for he knew the power of Humbaba. Gilglamesh ignores his friend, and is ready to battle Humbaba.

From the Gilglamesh I can notice some historical facts to force me to say, that it is a myth to explain our existence. First of all, Ekindu, turns from being a wild animal to a civilized human just like us. Also, Gilglamesh had a sever desire to cut down trees, and during all of human history we have done the same.
I am very egger to keep on reading, and find out want will happen to Gilglamesh after his battle with Humbaba

Why does it take a Minute to say Hello and Forever to say Good-bye?

Ishmael and the pupil talked about laws that applied to everyone, like gravity or aerodynamics, but they forgot to include the law of death.
“It was a pneumonia that got him-your friend the ape.”
I stood there blinking at him, unable to fathom what he was getting at.
“Vet came Saturday night and shot him full of stuff, but it was too late. Passed off this morning around seven or eight, I guess.”
“Are you telling me that he’s...dead?”
“Dead is what he is, pardner.” (pg.260-263)
I’m not surprised that this law only showed up at the end of the book, because all of their lessons were about the study of life. Nevertheless, with this particular death, I didn’t look at it as I explained in “The looser in all of us”, but in a positive sense. With Ishmael dying, I see it as a green light to go ahead and use all the wisdom he instilled in us, and apply to my own life. Also, it means that I can’t depend in my teachers, but in what they taught me.

Michelle Obama's Speech

By The Associated Press – 1 day agoPrepared remarks of Michelle Obama, wife of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, for her address to the Democratic National Convention. On Monday night in Denver as released by the Obama campaign:OBAMA, As you might imagine, for Barack running for president is nothing compared to that first game of basketball with my brother Craig.I can't tell you how much it means to have Craig and my mom here tonight. Like Craig, I can feel my dad looking down on us, just as I've felt his presence in every grace-filled moment of my life.At six-foot-six, I've often felt like Craig was looking down on me too - literally. But the truth is, both when we were kids and today, he wasn't looking down on me — he was watching over me.And he's been there for me every step of the way since that clear February day 19 months ago, when — with little more than our faith in each other and a hunger for change — we joined my husband, Barack Obama, on the improbable journey that's brought us to this moment.But each of us also comes here tonight by way of our own improbable journey.I come here, tonight, as a sister blessed with a brother who is my mentor, my protector and my lifelong friend.I come here as a wife who loves my husband and believes he will be an extraordinary president.I come here as a Mom whose girls are the heart of my heart and the center of my world — they're the first thing I think about when I wake up in the morning, and the last thing I think about when I go to bed at night. Their future — and all our children's future — is my stake in this election.And I come here as a daughter — raised on the south side of Chicago by a father who was a blue collar city worker, and a mother who stayed at home with my brother and me. My mother's love has always been a sustaining force for our family, and one of my greatest joys is seeing her integrity, her compassion, and her intelligence reflected in my own daughters.My Dad was our rock. Although he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in his early thirties, he was our provider, our champion, our hero. As he got sicker, it got harder for him to walk, it took him longer to get dressed in the morning. But if he was in pain, he never let on. He never stopped smiling and laughing — even while struggling to button his shirt, even while using two canes to get himself across the room to give my mom a kiss. He just woke up a little earlier, and worked a little harder.He and my mom poured, everything they had into me and Craig. It was the greatest gift a child can receive: never doubting for a single minute that you're loved, and cherished and have a place in this world. And thanks to their faith and hard work we both were able to go on to college. So I know firsthand from their lives — and mine — that the American dream endures.And you know, what struck me when I first met Barack was that even though he had this funny name, even though he'd grown up all the way across the continent in Hawaii, his family was so much like mine. He was raised by grandparents who were working class folks just like my parents, and by a single mother who struggled to pay the bills just like we did. Like my family, they scrimped and saved so that he could have opportunities they never had themselves. And Barack and I were raised with so many of the same values: that you work hard for what you want in life; that your word is your bond and you do what you say you're going to do; that you treat people with dignity and respect, even if you don't know them and even if you don't agree with them.And Barack and I set out to build lives guided by these values, and pass them on to the next generation. Because we want our children — and all children in this nation — to know that the only limit to the height of your achievements is the reach of your dreams and your willingness to work for them.And as our friendship grew, and I learned more about Barack, he introduced me to the work he'd done when he first moved to Chicago after college. Instead of heading to wall street, Barack had gone to work in neighborhoods devastated when steel plants shut down, and jobs dried up. And he'd been invited back to speak to people from those neighborhoods about how to rebuild their community.The people gathered together that day were ordinary folks doing the best they could to build a good life. They were parents living paycheck to paycheck; grandparents trying to get by on a fixed income; men frustrated that they couldn't support their families after their jobs disappeared. Those folks weren't asking for a handout or a shortcut. They were ready to work — they wanted to contribute. They believed — like you and I believe — that America should be a place where you can make it if you try.Barack stood up that day, and spoke words that have stayed with me ever since. He talked about "The world as it is" and "The world as it should be." And he said that all too often, we accept the distance between the two, and settle for the world as it is — even when it doesn't reflect our values and aspirations. But he reminded us, that we know what our world should look like. We know what fairness and justice and opportunity look like. And he urged us to believe in ourselves — to find the strength within ourselves to strive for the world as it should be. And isn't that the great American story?It's the story of men and women gathered in churches and union halls in town squares and high school gyms — people who stood up and marched and risked everything they had — refusing to settle, determined to mold our future into the shape of our ideals.It is because of their will and determination that this week, we celebrate two anniversaries: the 88th anniversary of women winning the right to vote, and the 45th anniversary of that hot summer day when Dr. King lifted our sights and our hearts with his dream for our nation.

Stages in Metamorphosis

The main purpose of a teacher is to instill the student knowledge and insight, but most importantly is to pass on his wisdom to the student. Ishmael knew when it was time to let go of his pupil, because he felt he had already taught everything, it was time the pupil go on by himself, and he had reached the goal as a teacher. Consequently, Ishmael and the narrator enclosed the teachings by going over last minute questions, and the main conclusions they had drawn.
“Why did we evolve?” (pg.238)We evolved from Australopithecus to Homo sapiens sapiens, because we were still in the competition; we were part of the general community of life. I think we stopped evolving because we are slowly eliminating the other contestants. Nevertheless, by eliminating a specie is prejudicing our knowledge of the past, because every specie we kill had vital information about life before agriculture.
“It has this to do with anything: The world of the Takers is one vast prison, and except for a handful of Leavers scattered across the world, the entire human race is now inside that prison. During the last century every remaining Leaver people in North America was given a choice: to be exterminated or to accept imprisonment. Many chose imprisonment, but not many were actually capable of adjusting to prison life.” (pg.251).This quote demonstrates the power of Mother Culture, because it forces you to live by her rules and it is a life prison. She is able to control all of your thoughts, makes you think you’re a god, and eliminate other ways of living. Also, so you don’t find out you are in a prison, it tricks you, makes you busy consuming the world. “Well…it helps to keep the inmates busy, I suppose. Takes their minds off the boredom and futility of their lives.”
“Yes. Can you name yours?”
“Our prison industry? Not offhand. I suppose it’s obvious.”
“Quite obvious, I would say.”
I gave it some thought. “Consuming the world.”
Ishmael nodded. “Got it on the first try.” (pg. 251-252)
In this chapter I also found the answer to a question that had constantly bothered me: How can I use this knowledge and use it to change the world? What will I do when I arrive to page 263? Ishmael wrapped up his lesson by answering my question.
“What you do is to teach a hundred what I’ve taught you, and inspire each of them to teach a hundred. That’s how it’s always done.” (pg.248) I also noticed, that between lines that he was saying ‘Good bye. I’m finished with you.’

I Now Pronounce You Immature and Innocent

For this chapter to start, our narrator was forced to explain why he wanted to know about human life without agriculture. With this task completed, the life class began again.
After some reiteration, Ishmael and the narrator made a great exercise, which consisted of Ishmael being a Leaver and the narrator a Taker named Bwana. The Taker basically tried to persuade the Leaver, to change his hunting and gathering habit, to agriculture.
“And this is why we lead shameful lives, Bwana? This is why we should set aside a life we love and go to work in one of your factories? Because we eat rabbits when it happens that no deer is present itself to us?” (pg.224)
Ishmael made a splendid job convincing the narrator and the reader. He was so transparent and innocent, that we understand he’s point and why he wouldn’t change his hunting life. Nevertheless, it is very hard to accept this idea, because Mother Nature has done a good job washing our brains.
“That’s exactly the point. The gods plant only what you need. You will plant more than you need.” (pg. 227)
“All the same, Bwana, what are we to do with this food if we don’t need it?”
“You save it! You save it to thwart the gods when they decide it’s your turn to go hungry. You save it so that when they send a drought, you can say, “Not me, goddamn it! I’m going hungry, and there’s nothing you can do about it, because my life is in my own hands now!” (pg.227)
For a victim of Mother Culture such as the narrator and the reader, this makes perfect sense. You should be the owner of yourself, and you should control your own food. However, I was impressed of how much I related the narrator’s arguments, to a teenager’s argument. Both of the disputes are asking for more liberty, but they are not responsible and mature enough to handle them.
“So you think this is what’s at the root of your revolution. You wanted and still want to have your lives in your own hands.”
“Yes. Absolutely. To me, living any other way is almost inconceivable. I can only think that hunter-gatherers live in a state of utter and unending anxiety over what tomorrow’s going to bring.”
“Yet they don’t. Any anthropologist will tell you that. They are far less anxiety-ridden than you are. They have no jobs to lose. No one can say to them, ‘Show me your money or you don’t get fed, don’t get clothed, don’t get sheltered.’” (pg.229)
Overall, I stand firm with the Leavers, and I think Takers were immature while taking a decision. Also, the two characters made an update in their discussion, and changed the meaning of Leavers and Takers. Now Leavers are those who live in the hands of the gods, and Takers are those who know good and evil.

The looser in all of us

Ishmael and the narrator are the most important characters in the book “Ishmael” by Daniel Quinn. By the time I arrived to chapter 7, it seemed so awkward that the book talked so little about their personal lives. For Ishmael, I gained information by a glanced at his past, in the first chapters. Nevertheless, I just knew the narrator was in search of a solution to the human disaster.
Just by reading the first paragraph of chapter 10, my concern was no longer there. I learned that Ishmael, also had a week point, and wasn’t the hero I thought he was.
“I said, “Well, where shall we begin? Do you remember where we left of?”
“Shut up.”
“Shut up? But I thought we were going to go on just as before.”
With a grunt, he shuffled to the rear of the cage and gave us all a look at his back.” (pg. 196)
The “Shut up”, that Ishmael said to the narrator, took his
Superhero mask of. I saw that Ishmael was also ashamed of him, and was not longer laying in a bed of roses.
Even though I was able to release the looser from Mr. Perfectionist, I felt extremely bad. Once again, I said to myself: a hero failed. Martin Luther King was shot, as well as Mahatma Gandhi, or Abraham Lincoln and Bolívar died alone and deceived.
Isn’t this unfair? They all give us hope and make us believe in a better world, but for the price of our lives. In that case, we wouldn’t even be alive for the better world! How ironic is that? And after all, one of the main ingredients the prohibited fruit Adam ate was ego, and I think most of us prefer to live in a world of disaster than not live at all.
I think that is why Quinn left Ishmael’s life for the end; he wanted to give the reader the bad news in the end. I regret being curious in the first place, because unconsciously I knew I would just receive another failure.

We are not jellyfish

We are not jellyfish

1

There are Leavers and Takers. Our culture is categorized under Takers, and the rest are Leavers. Both Takers and Leavers have been asked to answer the same question: How things came to be this way?
Takers were very sure of their answer, and rapidly said, “The world was made for men.”
Meanwhile, Leavers thought about their answer for some time and finally made their mind.
“We were made to live in the world, but the world doesn’t depend on us.”

2

According to Ishmael, our way of thinking is a myth, and I agreed with him while reading the book. Nevertheless, while going over and over my thoughts again, Ishmael is absolutely wrong.
I don’t think the world was made for us, or that evolution suddenly stopped when we appeared in the world.
The world denied living with Takers, and yes, we are the world’s enemy. But humans, decided to play with their own rules, and made their own world based on technology, and other luxuries Mother Earth refused. Now, I think if we keep on going to at this pace, we will soon be totally independent from Earth, and we can be called Earth’s mistake.

3

I can really relate my theory with Adam and Eve. They both refused to play by the God’s rules in paradise. Therefore, they were expelled and had to live their own way, by dressing and other customs.

The QUESTinos

A. What is the difference between a blog and a book?
The difference between them, is that a blog is faster, opend to comments and discussion, and they are very efficient and economical. Meanwhile, books are heavy, slow, and only the author has a chance to illuminate us.
B. How have blogs changes recently?
Since blogs started they have became very popular. Now there are well known journals and companies with blogs, so everyone with acess to a computer can interact with them. Also, the language used in blogs is much more relaxed. People use OMG (Oh my god), smilies, and other common and casual language.
C. Why might you read a blog?
You might read a blog for several reasons. You might stop just for curiosity in a subject, or for a research in a specific topic. Usually other sources are not clear enough, don't have media, or repeat the same over and over again, while blogs are concise and easy to understand. Besides, with blogs you can write comments, relate them to your own life and discuss about the topic in the same place.
D. Is there reason to doubt the objectivity of a blog? Why? Why not?
Yes. I would always check on the given information, because there is a big probability that it is fake or a gossip. This happens because the authors have the right to write whatever they want, and there is nothing that verifies the written info before being posted.
E. If you kept your own blog, what would you title it?
I don't know. I think it depends a lot on what I am going to write about. For example, if it is a blog about animals I would name it "Wild girl".