In this section of Quinn's "Ishmael," one of the main points that struck me was the idea of perspective, and the major effects this has on problems. Certain mindsets have caused problems, prevented solutions, and done much more. The other major issue with perspective is thinking that it cannot be changed.
During the discussion about the Cain and Abel section, Ishmael explains how the Takers believed they were right and so did the Leavers. By having the narrator attempt to persuade Ishmael in a roleplay, it became very obvious just how stiff our perspectives our. When humans believe we know the right answer, we insist that there can be no other correct way. I have heard many analogies on this way of thinking but my favorite involved some simple math. 4+2 equals six, but so does 3+3 and 5+1 and many other combinations. None are "wrong" ways to get to six, they're just different methods. And things like this occur many times in all subject areas. It does not make one any less good than the others. But for some reason, because each culture has found a method that "works," we feel that is should be the only method.
Ishmael continued on this idea of perspective when he mentioned that we feel that we cannot change, specifically when it comes to saving the world. We only understand our one lifestyle and truly cannot fathom altering it. We also believe that we cannot fix what we have done. But if only people could see and understand that this is not true, just quite difficult for us, but not impossible, then we could really begin changing for the better and making a positive impact.
As a person who was raised in a Christian setting but is now atheist, this chapter of "Ishmael" was very jarring for me in many ways. It also pointed out a factor and side of the book I had failed to pick up on before. Additionally, I had to do some research to really understand the context behind Quinn's probable intent. This factor was the religious references, both subtly and obviously made throughout the work.
Quinn, before completing his bachelor's degree, was studying to become a Trappist Monk, which is part of the Roman Catholic Church, but his spiritual director ended his studies. After that he began writing and publishing more, and stopped practicing Catholicism. He did, however, continue believing in a higher power, but just not in the same strict sense. Following my discovery of these facts, I felt my view on the chapter shifted entirely. I did, finally, relate to my fellow classmates in the sense that things were being "shoved down my throat." I would speculate that I finally understood this because it was the first time I disagreed with the author, or Ishmael's teaching. While his talk of the Bible is merely another one of his many analogies and visualizations, using a story that many people are at least vaguely familiar with, I went back through the text and found that there are so, so many times he speaks of higher powers and gods. Before, this did not affect me, as I never took it literally, but knowing that Quinn really felt this way had an impact on me.
While Quinn's religious beliefs do not truly impact his ideas, this newfound discomfort forced me to reevaluate my stance on the book. I am still in complete agreement with the ideas and the laws governing the natural world balance, but I simply believe it is just the way of science, rather than a higher power, that creates these laws and animal instincts to protect those laws. One such example was the food chain idea, and the system of not harming your competitors in order to have more food. In my freshman year of high school, we created fun food webs that illustrated a particular environment. If one species kills of it's competitor, the prey they once competed for, will, for a short time, flourish. This will then allow the killer species to grow larger, which will affect everything that eats it, allowing their populations to get larger. But at a point, when any one of these species inevitably hits 'too large,' the entire system will fail, all the way down to the bottom and all the way up to the top. This is because the food web really is like a spider web, in that it is delicate. You cannot harm just one small bit of it without also damaging the rest. It needs to be protected, which most animals naturally do so, as their instincts tell them to only kill what they need, or what their community members need. Humans, however, have destroyed many portions of the large, large web, which will eventually lead to its collapse.
Ishmael continues to lead the narrator on a journey of self and cultural discoveries in this next section of the book "Ishmael." While the gorilla may be perceived as all-knowing and therefore almost condescending in the manner that his ideas--and only his ideas--are the correct ones. However, because of his role as a teacher, rather than a preacher, I feel that he is simply explaining his point of view and it happens to be quite convincing to his student, our narrator. Because of this, us as readers are a bit more persuaded into also believing this viewpoint, as we are witnessing someone else do the same. As a reader, without any reason to believe the narrator is untrustworthy or unreliable, you tend to side with your protagonist. By implementing this technique, Quinn is, in my opinion, quite smart. Not only does he share his ideas, but he subconsciously convinces people to trust his words. An equally smart or opinionated reader may catch onto this while reading and feel a little forced into this means of thinking, but why would an author write something if he did not want others to love, live, or believe in it?
Personally, I have enjoyed this book so far. I especially connected with the passages about flight and the laws of flight. Through another one of Quinn's creative techniques of utilizing many metaphors to help readers visualize what he is saying and really feel it, I was able to truly connect. In that moment, this story was not about a teacher and his student, the narrator. Instead, I was the student and the narrator did not exist. I also really connected to this part thanks to a crazy little incident I had last summer. While doing some volunteer work, I was on a ladder that was about ten or twelve feet tall. I was near the top and just about to come down when the ladder tipped over and I fell off it. While that distance is not a super long fall, those moments before I hit the ground felt very long. And I did feel that flying sensation that Quinn described. I imagine our society kind of like me on my ladder. I felt great, was working just fine, until a few moments before it all happened that I realized everything was not fine but it was too late to stop it. Furthermore, after falling, I was told that I had been using the ladder improperly. A few days later when I had recovered, I began using it again, this time in a much more safe way, and I did not fall again! Our society believes it is totally fine continuing on the path it is taking, but soon it shall realize that everything is a disaster but it will be too late to fix it. We will then fall and fail, and after some time, probably try again. I don't know whether or not society can survive the fall, and if so, will it even learn from it's mistakes? I would not be shocked if we just tried to get right back up on our improperly placed ladder and do it all over again.
Through these four passages in the novel "Walden," Henry David Thoreau writes about a character, based off himself, that lives in a very secluded, minimalistic lifestyle. While Thoreau convincingly portrays and describes this life as though it were an accurate reflection of the time he spend on the lake, it in fact was quite exaggerated. I personally believe this speaks volumes. Thoreau preaches simplicity and isolation, when in fact he was not living that way. At first, like my classmates, I felt a small bit lied to. The character I had come to associate with the author himself, as he had intended, was much more of a normal human than he allowed us to read. But this fact demonstrates just how far we are from the ability to be alone and only connected to nature--how important human interaction is to our ideas and our society. And that even back then when this novel was written, a far more disconnected society than the one we live in now, it was nearly impossible to live the way Thoreau detailed. After coming to terms with this new fact, I realized that he was not in fact lying, but instead was idealizing. He was doing what many writers do and living out his own desires, which he could not attain in real life, on paper. And it was not simply the life he desired for himself, but the life he wrote to persuade everyone to live. Especially in today's failing global climate, it would be useful for many people to convert to this self-sustaining, natural lifestyle. But just as Thoreau himself could not live this way, it is just as challenging to reach now.
Of the four passages, the one that spoke to me most was "Sounds." Thoreau detailed the many things he heard, including both the industrial side and natural side of his life. While Thoreau mocked the townspeople with their obsession for gossip, I could not help but find parallels with their actions and his own. While they whispered to each other, Thoreau eavesdropped on nature, hearing the many different animals and the wind blowing and much more. I found this to be quite significant, in that this ideal isolated life that Thoreau glorified was still impossible. Even in the woods, he was connected, not to the other people but to his surrounding world. There is no living alone, as this Earth is one large system. There is no off the grid because everything is connected in some way or another. Even by fishing and farming at his little place on a lake, Thoreau was impacting his environment. While this impact can be defined as minimal, especially in today's standards, it still exists and there is no way to get rid of it.
The question arose of whether or not is was possible to live "off the grid." And especially whether or not it is a reality for many, many people to live this way, rather than just a few. I do not believe it is, but I do not think of this challenge to mean it is not worth attempting. Many people idealize this life, but Thoreau does a great job describing the many difficulties this lifestyle brings. It is no easy task, and requires a good amount of work, but it can happen. I wondered what this life looks like now, and I found this video:
Clearly it is no small feat, both in Thoreau's time and now, and it is not completely disconnected from society, but it is possible and definitely better for our planet.
Within these first four chapters, "Ishmael" has managed to captivate and confuse me, as well as excite me to read the rest of what this seemingly all-knowing gorilla has to say about the state of our world and how our collective human opinion has affected the way we view both the world and our place in it.
Since reading about Ishmael's reflection on our story of creation, and just how mythological it is, I have not stopped thinking about it. The idea that we build everything up to the single moment that humanity began is an astonishing thought, but astonishingly true. And this is reflected in much more than just the way we talk about how the world came to be. It happens in every conversation and news title that exists. Phrases like "Mother nature wreaks havoc" when describing a natural disaster show how we have twisted a natural event to seem like the one out of place, as if the winds of a tornado or waves of a tsunami are supposed to bend to our will or stop when they reach the buildings and roads we have created. We get annoyed by things like potholes, which are just the affects of temperature shifts on solid surfaces. In total, Ishmael was right in that we truly act and speak about the world as though nature exists to support civilization, rather than civilization existing thanks to nature. When I searched "Mother Nature" and clicked on the News section, the very first article I found was "'This is mother nature kind of kicking us': Water released over spillway at Calif. dam," exemplifying just how real and embedded in the culture Ishmael's ideas are.
The other idea I continue to think about is the way Ishmael named one, nonspecific group of people as Takers, and the others as Leavers. He defines them as civilized versus primitive, but I still feel these terms to be a bit vague. I feel the most important distinction between the two groups is that both groups believe in their way of life, but one group insists on pushing their ways onto the other. When Ishmael first introduced these terms, I did not understand that he was solely talking about humans, and rather thought he meant all animals. In this sense, humans are the Takers, while animals are the Leavers. Animals do not live their lives with the purpose of making a difference or being remembered, they simply desire to eat and procreate, and that is enough. The Takers, however, desire to push others to live the way they live, or at least bend to their commands. For instance, humans have pushed so much wildlife out of their homes, with the expectation that these animals will just relocate. The Takers also want to make an impact known by all. However, when I realized that Ishmael was solely talking about humans, my original thoughts were not entirely off. In a primitive lifestyle, the goals is simply survival, much like animals. While I am sure this topic will be further explored during the book, I would presume that Ishmael is going to mention how the world is filled with far too many Takers, and that we must learn to be sastisfied with a Leaver lifestyle, as it is sufficient and much healthier for our Earth. It will also show our submission to nature, as Leavers are at the discretion of nature, while Takers, as described earlier, for some reason talk as though they are above nature.
During the discussion about the Cain and Abel section, Ishmael explains how the Takers believed they were right and so did the Leavers. By having the narrator attempt to persuade Ishmael in a roleplay, it became very obvious just how stiff our perspectives our. When humans believe we know the right answer, we insist that there can be no other correct way. I have heard many analogies on this way of thinking but my favorite involved some simple math. 4+2 equals six, but so does 3+3 and 5+1 and many other combinations. None are "wrong" ways to get to six, they're just different methods. And things like this occur many times in all subject areas. It does not make one any less good than the others. But for some reason, because each culture has found a method that "works," we feel that is should be the only method.
