Thanksgiving Post

When people ask me how senior year is going my immediate response is always about teachers, work, and dance. And while those things are interesting, the truth is, I wouldn't be able to do any of it without my classmates, my friends. They help me so much, not just with grand gestures of companionship, but through all of the little, everyday things.

The first, most obvious, most persevering classmate that deserves my acknowledgment is Adina. Adina, you have been a better friend than I could ever hope for. For six years, you've showed me what it means to care about others. You've given me unending amounts of support, even when I seems like a lost cause. You don't judge me, at least not outwardly, but the few times that you did you were so convincing that I felt immediately motivated to change my actions. Most of my friends are friends of convenience, but not you. More often than not, our relationship has not been convenient. We've probably had a grand total of about 3 classes together, yet you always made time for me, and I will always make time for you. I am deeply thankful for everything that you are. You are more than a classmate, more than a friend.

Classmates are also important for creating uniting forces against unreasonable teachers. I will not name specific teachers, for that is disrespectful (not to mention its on the never deletable black hole we call the internet). But Izzy, you know who I'm talking about. And girl, you keep me sane. Without your voice of reason holding me down all year, I surely would have been driven crazy by now. I am so thankful to have you close by every day; you help me more than you know.

I am thankful for the classmates that tutor me. If you didn't know this, I am very bad at being wrong. When I don't understand something, I am hard pressed to admit it. But it does happen. And when it has, there have been a few select students who have been able help me understand things. They were able to accomplish either a) what the teacher has failed to communicate, or b) what my brain has failed to teach itself. I am so happy that these people exist because they show an obvious passion and creative way of thinking and communicating that inspire me as well as our other classmates.

Lone Travelers

It amuses me greatly that while this is the third class in which the teacher has shown Into the Wild, but I have yet to see the full movie. But that's ok, seeing a movie is somewhat less important to me than the things I was doing while not in class. :)

To me being alone when choosing what path to take in life is, if possibly nonessential, most definitely important. People have more influence over one another than they sometimes realize. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Yes. It surely is. But imitation is not self. A moment in which you discover that your actions mimic someone else's more than they do your own is the time when you must choose a new path. You must choose a path that is entirely you, and being alone is the best way to assure this.

I see the people that do travel alone as having a very pure form of confidence. I recently finished a book that was all about what confidence is and how it is displayed. Essentially I view being comfortable in your own skin, and being okay with being alone as the root of confidence. A journey into the wild-alone-is, among other things, a search for confidence. There are of course then the spiritually enlightening moments of knowledge that stem from this.

The thing is you don't have to actually be in the wilderness to be in the wild. What is wild is what is unfamiliar, untamed, uncontrolled. Simply by not letting others decide which path you take and not influencing what you do along this path is going into the wild. Traveling into the wild, the wild of a city, of a town, of a forest, or desert, is an opportunity to learn, and to gain confidence. Confidence to have peace of mind. To find om.

Still haven't Figured This Out Yet!

I still haven't figured this, or anything else out yet. And from here, it looks like there isn't much that any of us have figured out. Lets start at the beginning. Creation. Some people have figured out that there was a big bang, while others are still skeptical. But even those scientists don't know why life formed. What the hell is this vacuum that we exist in??? I haven't decided where I stand in the debate of some unseen force (a god?) giving things a higher purpose, or the existentialist view of uninhibited free will, that this here is all we get. There is no before, there is no after, there is no reason. What else haven't we figured out? We know that people have genes, and that our genetic codes have an influence on who we are, but we still don't know exactly how they do this. Are personality traits like confidence due 25% or 50% go genetic vs environmental factors? Nature vs nurture. Every single thing that we debate about! They show that we haven't figured out the universe. But, unlike the post prompt suggests, I disagree with the placement of a "yet" at the end of it. I don't believe that we ever will figure everything out. To figure everything out would be for our knowledge containing vessels to be full, and I do not believe that this is either desirable or possible. Not knowing things, not knowing if we have any purpose IS our purpose. Being able to search for some answers and have theories and debate our ideas is what gives us purpose. And so no, we weren't meant to be able to figure this out... ever.

How do I know what I know?

What I have to say in response to this question is just another form of the nature versus nurture debate. On one hand we have John Locke's idea of tabula rasa, where our mind is, at birth, a blank slate on which experience writes. To me this is a very logical idea. As someone who doesn't believe in a definitive god, it makes sense to think that we cannot inherently know anything. Instead, everything we know and think is a result of our life experiences. I can read and write because I went to school. Therefore I know things because I was taught them.

On the other hand is the very loud argument for innate knowledge. The best evidence that I can use to support this idea is IQ. Some people are naturally smarter than others. People with an ultra-high IQ seem to have a head start because they appear to inherently know more than the rest of us. But I've actually just started to see the flaw in this argument. What does IQ measure? Some studies day it measures our motivation to do well, but for the purposes of this argument I will use a different definition. I see intelligence tests as tests of pattern recognition and connection making. Those who are best at making connections score the highest. They are the most observant, the fastest thinkers, and the "smartest." So if people with high IQs are just more observant than the general population and can make more connections than us, they didn't start off already knowing more. They just had better tools to learn more.

By my own mis-shaped argument I would say that we know what we know by how fast and how well our brains can make connections between different pieces of knowledge, and that everything we know is learned.

The Garden State

The concept of the garden state appears to refer to the garden of eden, and to the quote from genesis stating that "the lord took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden, to dress it and to keep it." Dressing it and keeping it is what Candide is referring to when he says that "we must cultivate our garden" (p. 94), implying that at the end stage of the book, Candide and his companions have reached an Eden of sorts. If we are to go along with the myth that Eden is the closest thing to paradise, Candide has apparently found heaven on earth, also known as, the best of all possible worlds, proving that throughout the entire book, even having gone through many hardships, he never does shed Pangloss's philosophy.

I also think that it is important to note that even in their garden state, they are undeniably bored. According to the dervish on page 92, man is supposed to "Cultivate your land, drink, eat, sleep and [keep your mouth shut]." This does not give Candide the sense of higher purpose that he has been striving for, and the old woman even proclaims on page 91 that she thinks it might be better to "undergo all the miseries we have each of us suffered" than "simply to sit here and do nothing." These views are important to me because I believe they portray the way that society tends to view "happiness." We see being happy as something primitive and simple. Those who are happy are somehow inferior? Like the story we read at the start of the year about the Omelas, people need suffering in order to be interesting.

So if the garden state is paradise and the best of all possible worlds, and in the best of all possible worlds we are happy, and happiness is "basic," and being board does not translate to happiness, the best of all possible worlds and the garden state cannot exist.

On Judgement

What punishments are appropriate for which crimes? Is an eye for an eye the way to go? Really, what is punishment? Cause... and effect. While Pangloss's (Leibnitz's) philosophy was no doubt flawed, he did have one thing right; he knew that "there is no effect without cause." Punishment is supposedly just one of the effects that our actions have caused, the part that comes back to us. Some times, the effect is obvious. Throw a ball at a wall with the intent of damaging the wall, and it bounces back and hits you in the face, that bloody nose is your punishment. But in society, we have chosen to deem people worthy of determining other people's punishments. Since humans have to deliberate for so long to determine the appropriate effect for a man's crime, how can we be sure that their punishment is truly an effect of their actions? Sadly, I do not have an answer to this question. I do know, as did the old lady traveling with Candide and his beloved (I confess I just don't know how to spell her name), that everyone has experienced hardships, and that most of us believe ourselves to be undeserving of such cruel treatment. To the receiver of punishment, the penalties always seem outrageous. But to the disciplinarian, they deserve what they got and then some. So really, as people, we are all to subjective to judge the appropriateness of a given punishment from either end.

The Modern Gadfly

We all (all being everyone in this philosophy class) know (or should know by now) that Socrates is the most historically famous gadfly. He was an extremely critical man, and questioned any presumption that he encountered. His questionings and pestering, while bothersome, prompted his targets to engague in self-reflection. This method, in my opinion, taught people more things about life than any lecture ever did.

On this topic of teaching, I have been lucky to have had some teachers myself whose methods have closely resembled Socrates'.  Like this ancient philosopher, they accepted the fact that they were not all-knowing beings, and that they 1) had the ability to be wrong sometimes, and 2) could quite plausibly learn from their own students. While not necessarily teachers of traditional science, they were scientists in the manner that they did not accept social presumptions, but instead took it upon themselves to examine them and come to some sort of reliable conclusion based on many factors.

To take things a step further, they made me do these things too. A specific example of this examination took place in a math class. My teacher, Mr. X, would not let me use mathematical concepts and properties unless I had proven them first. Once I could present a proof of the theory, I could then use it to solve problems and prove other theories.

These select teachers challenged me. They bothered me. They made me reach conclusions on my own instead of just throwing information in my face. They prompted questioning and examination. They are the modern gadflies.

An Unexamined Life is not Worth Living?

     What is the purpose of life? This philosophical question has plagued man since as long as time. Originally, every living being has the same purpose, to reproduce. Our most fundamental need is to extend our species. But here in 2014, with the human population reaching capacity, procreation is not of supreme importance. This leaves us to speculate why we are here. For most people, those who are not struggling for survival, I question the meaning of the word living. We can go through life eating, breathing, and sleeping, but if we never push boundaries, are we living?
     My intuition is to say no, being alive is not living. By being alive, we have succeeded in fulfilling the bottom portion of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. As members of a first world society, we no longer need to focus on basic survival skills, so we are forced to search for more. The ultimate goal for everyone is happiness, which is really an abstract and profoundly unattainable idea. By striving towards the idea of creating happiness, we will live more worthwhile lives. These two ideas translate because our presumptions regarding the things that will make us happy are ever-changing. To decide which things in life we think will truly make us happy, and are therefore worth our time and effort, lots of self-examination is required. In this process of self examination we are forced to question our presumptions about happiness and about ourselves. By looking inward we will become more adaptable and thoughtful, turning us into better human beings.

Me

     I, Jacqueline Ariel Kromash, like to think of myself as a JAK of all trades. I like to believe that what makes me stand out is not a star performance as an athlete, musician, or student, but a unique combination of talents and interests that are all of importance.
     Thus far in my short life, society would like to categorize me as a student, a senior in high school to be specific. I attended Franklin Fine Arts Center for elementary school, and Whitney Young for middle and high school. In school, I have been trained that good grades will get me far in life, and so I try my hardest in every class to get the highest grade possible. And it's worked pretty well. Outside of school however, is where I form am able to make personal decisions and build my character.
     One of my most prominent passions is dance. I didn't start dancing until about 5th or 6th grade, but I had always been interested in performance arts and activities such as acting, ice skating, and gymnastics. My love of dance blossomed even further when I came to the academic center and now I am a member of Guys and Dolls, and I take classes at the Chicago Multicultural Dance Center 4 days a week. I want to continue my study of dance throughout college.
     My favorite school subject is math, at which I have always excelled. I am on the WY math team, and am considering the possibility of majoring in math.
     Reading is my most unorganized outside of school activity. I love to read for pleasure, but don't enjoy the sickening levels of questioning and analysis that comes with reading for school. I read fantasy, science fiction, and social evaluation books. Some of my favorites include the Harry Potter series, the book Half the Sky, and many of Malcolm Gladwell's books.
     I have attending JCC's camp Chi in Lake Delton, WI since 5th grade. It is a Jewish camp at which I have made some of my closest friends, some of whom are from all over the world. This past summer was my first summer as a counselor for camp.
    Horseback riding is a hobby of mine that I love, but has taken a back seat to dance and school. Growing up, I had a friend whose family owns a  horse farm in Crete, IL where I used to ride every weekend. Now I only go a few times per year, but still enjoy it immensely.
     Some interesting facts about me are that I can burp on command, and have a deep love for everything Beyonce. My favorite tv shows include Breaking Bad, Orange is the New Black, House, Bones, Numb3rs, Criminal Minds, How I Met Your Mother, and Big Bang Theory. I hope to go to medical school to become a surgeon after college.
     While brief, this description gives a pretty good overview of who I am and what I want to be.