Plato has many thoughts on justice spread throughout his book The Republic. The first time he discusses justice is in Book I page 13. This is when Socrates is talking to Cephalus about justice. Cephalus' thinks that justice is paying your debts to whoever your debtors are and always telling the truth. Soon after, Cephalus leaves to tend to the sacrifices at the temple leaving Polemarchus to give his ideas on justice to Socrates. I think that Polemarchus explains justice better to Socrates than Cephalus. Polemarchus tries to explain that justice is giving to each man what is rightfully his. Therefore, if you have an enemy you shouldn't treat them with kindness but instead you should treat him how he treats you. Basically, justice in Polemarchus' eyes is that if someone wrongs you then you shouldn't repay your debt to them. And if someone is your friend then you should pay them back your debt. Socrates disagrees with this because sometimes we don't have the most virtuous friends. Also, our enemies aren't always the evilest of people even though we may think they are.
Around page 19 of book 1 we are introduced to a new character in the book named Thrasymachus he is a type of person known back then and today as Sophists. Sophists are people who believe that justice is worthless and should be done away with entirely. He had been trying to get in on the argument the entire time Socrates and Polemarchus were talking but was always ignored or told to be quiet. He was also very perturbed by all the flaws in Socrates' argument about justice. One thing that Thrasymachus said on page 24 of book 1 really interested me he said “...justice is the interest of the stronger.”. This meaning that whatever is right is decided by who ever has more power, money, etcetera. But Socrates uses the captain of a ship of sailors (and many others) as a way to show that even though justice is in the interest of the stronger the stronger usually has the interests of the weaker in mind when making decisions. To these examples Thrasymachus says that the only reason the stronger helps the weaker is to get a head in life. This is when Thrasymachus' true colors start to show and we as readers are introduced to the idea of living unjust as the right way to live. The way that Thrasymachus supports this is him saying that only the more intelligent and strong of this world are the only ones able to be unjust because they are smart enough to think for themselves. He also is saying that the more unjust you are the more things you get using a tyrant as an example
In the end of book I Thrasymachus leaves due to the fact that he thinks that Socrates is trying to do him personal harm by making him look bad in front of his friends. Glaucon (another person of the group) was dissatisfied when Thrasymachus left because he was hoping to give Socrates a better chance at explaining why justice is better than injustice. He is introduced in page forty-one of book II. Since he wanted closure on this subject he started to question Socrates himself. The way he does this is by trying to continue Thrasymachus' argument. Another person that was in the group but really hasn't talked much until now is a man called Adeimantus. His main purpose is to question the virtue of justice as just or something entirely different. Socrates talks for a while about the old days where justice was non existent and law wasn't even thought of. It was basically every tribe for itself but this posed problems because no one was able to rise to power since there was no law and no way of keeping people under control. This time was not a happy one since a lot of people were in need of some form of help because they weren't strong enough or smart enough to get things on their own. So a crude form of law was established.
So what I learned about justice from The Republic is that without it we are indeed a very weak people contrary to Thrasymachus' thinking. If we do not have law and order everything we try to do will fail since everything in God's world has order and balance and justice.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Unshackled
This installment of unshackled really inspired me. It is all about a man a named Clinton Goodwin. HE was born in Roswell with 9 brothers and sisters. They then moved to Arizona where most of his brothers and sisters were all born. Clinton's Mom had always read the bible but he never saw his dad reading the Bible. He was saved at a very early age when he went to some Sunday school. He was a very devoted Christian when he was in his teen years. Next, he moved back to his home state where he kept up his bible lessons for a while. But, after he started hanging out with non-Christians he worked with and grew apart from Christianity and Jesus. He then went to work at a restaurant and he met someone who was a robber and they soon became robbers. They kept doing more and more dangerous robberies and soon tried something to dangerous and got caught by the police. He had to go to San Quinton jail to do hard labor. While in there someone had killed himself. He then rededicated himself to Jesus and he was born again. After that, he went on to be a missionary to people who are in jail.
The end of the eighteenth century was an era wrought with revolution . However, this time the revolution did include violence, coups, or weapons. Instead, it was actually quite the opposite. The industrial revolution was a time where great strides were made in the fields of technology, agriculture, and industry.
Even though this revolution was a great gateway for modern technology and new inventions it wasn't the first of its kind. The industrial revolution was only the second largest revolution in terms of the events that were happening. This revolution was named the neolithic revolution and it took place around 10,000 B.C.3 Some of the major differences from before and after the Neolithic Revolution and after it was the change from the majority of society being rooted in gathering and hunting to one being based around agriculture.
Many centuries later (the eighteenth century to be precise) we find another similar revolution is happening. It was a time when common land was the norm. Common land is the system of agriculture that lets anyone farm anywhere. This meaning that people could start to farm whatever piece of land they could find that was open. The was possible due to the fact that you did not have to pay rent to stay on this common land nor did you have to pay rent to farm the common land either.1 Common land may sound like a pretty sweet deal but in all actuality most people in this time were very poor and underpriviledged. This is all the effect of people not being able to farm their land properly and be able to make their crops actually grow. Another disadvantadge of common land was that since people did not know how to farm properly a lot of good land was used up by people who had avsolutley no clue what they were doing. This ,of course, was done away with once the industrial revolution took place.
Another thing that was done away with during the Industrial Revolution was the way products were made by manufactured. One product that was manufactured gratly was wool and woolen products. Wool was Britain's main export before the revolution. However, their skill at how these products were made was very much unrefined and sloppy. A cause of this was people manufacturing everything by hand. Another cause of the poor workmanship was the fact that mostly everything was made at home by the family of the manufacturer. This poor workmanship drove families into wanting outside assistance
The outside assistance they were looking for took the form of two groups of people. One of the new groups of people that were hired in order to help with production of new goods was the hand workers that did the tasks that were originally he responsibility of the manufactures family another thing that was produced in great quantities other than wool before the industrial revolution was iron. Iron was only one of the many things that hand workers produced. The second group of people that helped the manufactures were the middlemen that went to market and sold the goods that the manufactured created. This cut down on the manufactures sales but also made it a lot easier for the manufacturer to make more more products which in the end makes the manufacturer more money. Another reason for middlemen for this period of time was the terrible condition of the roads. Many times when manufactures would try to go into to town to sell something their cart would lose a wheel or break a wheel which in the end would drive up their expenses even more. This was an even better reason for manufactures to hire middlemen since they didn't have to worry about the price of their carts they made even MORE money which made hiring middle men the obvious choice.
Before the industrial revolution took place competition in the field of business was alm,ost non-exsistent. This due to the fact that no one had really conceptuallized the idea before the eighteenth century. Also, everything in business was done in a very methodical way. There was no outside dealings in business which made the realization of competitive business even more difficult. The reason no one did trade out of town trading was due to the fact that no one liked it the viewed it more as a hassle more than anything else. They also viewed it as a challenge to their way of live. The reason no one attempted to do out of trading other than the un-political correctness of it all was because out of town traders were taxed ridiculously which in the end caused them to have less profit. Therefore every village would just mind it's own business with out any business related contact of any kind. This is kind of related to the lack of personal liberties in the time before the industrial revolution religious freedoms were greatly suppressed by the British Monarchy.
The main change of the industrial revolution was the replacement of human labor by machines. This resulted in a change from a largely agriculturally based society to a even larger economic one. Also, manufacturing goods from you home was no longer feasable so lots of people were forced to leave their homes in the country to go to the city in order to provide for their families. Not only was there a change in economy there was also a large change where everyone was located. Because of the new decision for everyone to move into cities the oppression of personal liberties came to a halt when the monarchy of the House of Stuart came to power. However, after the revolution the House of Hanover was instated and they had their mind set on war. Because a lot of people were leaving the country side and moving to the city. The prices of crops went through the roofs. With the new changes in prices common land was completely replaced and larger farms started taking over smaller ones. With the more money the farmers made the more methods of farming they could expirement with. This made owning land a very prestigious thing. Which in turn made farming nearly impossible for the poor. So the poor people had two options. They could either stay where they've been living and be treated unfairly on the farms or move into the cities and be treated unfairly at the factories. So, as you can imagine, this wasn't a very nice way to live. And for poor people starting your own farms was just completely out of the question.
The people that really had the largest impact on the revolution was Great Britain. They came up with the majority of new methods of doing work in more efficient ways. They also created the new inventions which made doing the work a heck of a lot easier. Mainly they improved upon the boat and how it ran. During the industrial revolution production of goods increased gratly. Not only did goods increase but so did the amount of services available to the public. In rhis time the upper and middle class thrived more than they normally would. And the lower class was even more poor and more downtrodden.
In 1769 cotton manufacturing began to become more popular than woolen products. This was mainly due to the invention of the Spinning Jenny. This machine made it easier to aquire yarn which drove the price of clothes way down.
The two leaders in the revolution were James Watt and Adams Smith. Adams smith wrote a book that greatly influenced the rest of the world's view on economics. Even though this may sound like a small accomplishment compared to the other stuff that was going on during this time period it was still a huge advancement in economics. The second man, James Watt, was the inventor of the steam engine. However, the process of Watt's idea coming to life wasn't easy and he faced a lot of challenges on the road to greatness. First, he was banned from the guild that he had been doing his studies at. He was forced to work just off the university grounds that the guild he was a part of was based off of. But that didn't stop him from becoming the great man of history that he is today. I could keep going on and on about the other accomplishments that Adam Smith had achieved but that would take quite a while.
Not all of the revolution was positive though. This was a time where Darwinism had got its start in the modern world. This made modern “scholars” to start questioning the Bible and the sad thing about us humans is that if we someone who seems smarter than us we will listen to whatever they say without questioning whether or not what their saying is fact or not. Another negative impact that the industrial revolution had was the beginning of pollution being pumped into the air by factories yet another thing that was wrong with the industrial revolution was the land being used up and demolished for the sake of factories. This is terrible because it drove a huge amount of animals from their homes or it just killed them all together.
Despite some of the negative effects that the industrial revolution had on the environment it was still a great time of advancement for the human race and technologically wise. If this revolution hadn't taken place the world we would live in would be nothing like the world we live in now.
Even though this revolution was a great gateway for modern technology and new inventions it wasn't the first of its kind. The industrial revolution was only the second largest revolution in terms of the events that were happening. This revolution was named the neolithic revolution and it took place around 10,000 B.C.3 Some of the major differences from before and after the Neolithic Revolution and after it was the change from the majority of society being rooted in gathering and hunting to one being based around agriculture.
Many centuries later (the eighteenth century to be precise) we find another similar revolution is happening. It was a time when common land was the norm. Common land is the system of agriculture that lets anyone farm anywhere. This meaning that people could start to farm whatever piece of land they could find that was open. The was possible due to the fact that you did not have to pay rent to stay on this common land nor did you have to pay rent to farm the common land either.1 Common land may sound like a pretty sweet deal but in all actuality most people in this time were very poor and underpriviledged. This is all the effect of people not being able to farm their land properly and be able to make their crops actually grow. Another disadvantadge of common land was that since people did not know how to farm properly a lot of good land was used up by people who had avsolutley no clue what they were doing. This ,of course, was done away with once the industrial revolution took place.
Another thing that was done away with during the Industrial Revolution was the way products were made by manufactured. One product that was manufactured gratly was wool and woolen products. Wool was Britain's main export before the revolution. However, their skill at how these products were made was very much unrefined and sloppy. A cause of this was people manufacturing everything by hand. Another cause of the poor workmanship was the fact that mostly everything was made at home by the family of the manufacturer. This poor workmanship drove families into wanting outside assistance
The outside assistance they were looking for took the form of two groups of people. One of the new groups of people that were hired in order to help with production of new goods was the hand workers that did the tasks that were originally he responsibility of the manufactures family another thing that was produced in great quantities other than wool before the industrial revolution was iron. Iron was only one of the many things that hand workers produced. The second group of people that helped the manufactures were the middlemen that went to market and sold the goods that the manufactured created. This cut down on the manufactures sales but also made it a lot easier for the manufacturer to make more more products which in the end makes the manufacturer more money. Another reason for middlemen for this period of time was the terrible condition of the roads. Many times when manufactures would try to go into to town to sell something their cart would lose a wheel or break a wheel which in the end would drive up their expenses even more. This was an even better reason for manufactures to hire middlemen since they didn't have to worry about the price of their carts they made even MORE money which made hiring middle men the obvious choice.
Before the industrial revolution took place competition in the field of business was alm,ost non-exsistent. This due to the fact that no one had really conceptuallized the idea before the eighteenth century. Also, everything in business was done in a very methodical way. There was no outside dealings in business which made the realization of competitive business even more difficult. The reason no one did trade out of town trading was due to the fact that no one liked it the viewed it more as a hassle more than anything else. They also viewed it as a challenge to their way of live. The reason no one attempted to do out of trading other than the un-political correctness of it all was because out of town traders were taxed ridiculously which in the end caused them to have less profit. Therefore every village would just mind it's own business with out any business related contact of any kind. This is kind of related to the lack of personal liberties in the time before the industrial revolution religious freedoms were greatly suppressed by the British Monarchy.
The main change of the industrial revolution was the replacement of human labor by machines. This resulted in a change from a largely agriculturally based society to a even larger economic one. Also, manufacturing goods from you home was no longer feasable so lots of people were forced to leave their homes in the country to go to the city in order to provide for their families. Not only was there a change in economy there was also a large change where everyone was located. Because of the new decision for everyone to move into cities the oppression of personal liberties came to a halt when the monarchy of the House of Stuart came to power. However, after the revolution the House of Hanover was instated and they had their mind set on war. Because a lot of people were leaving the country side and moving to the city. The prices of crops went through the roofs. With the new changes in prices common land was completely replaced and larger farms started taking over smaller ones. With the more money the farmers made the more methods of farming they could expirement with. This made owning land a very prestigious thing. Which in turn made farming nearly impossible for the poor. So the poor people had two options. They could either stay where they've been living and be treated unfairly on the farms or move into the cities and be treated unfairly at the factories. So, as you can imagine, this wasn't a very nice way to live. And for poor people starting your own farms was just completely out of the question.
The people that really had the largest impact on the revolution was Great Britain. They came up with the majority of new methods of doing work in more efficient ways. They also created the new inventions which made doing the work a heck of a lot easier. Mainly they improved upon the boat and how it ran. During the industrial revolution production of goods increased gratly. Not only did goods increase but so did the amount of services available to the public. In rhis time the upper and middle class thrived more than they normally would. And the lower class was even more poor and more downtrodden.
In 1769 cotton manufacturing began to become more popular than woolen products. This was mainly due to the invention of the Spinning Jenny. This machine made it easier to aquire yarn which drove the price of clothes way down.
The two leaders in the revolution were James Watt and Adams Smith. Adams smith wrote a book that greatly influenced the rest of the world's view on economics. Even though this may sound like a small accomplishment compared to the other stuff that was going on during this time period it was still a huge advancement in economics. The second man, James Watt, was the inventor of the steam engine. However, the process of Watt's idea coming to life wasn't easy and he faced a lot of challenges on the road to greatness. First, he was banned from the guild that he had been doing his studies at. He was forced to work just off the university grounds that the guild he was a part of was based off of. But that didn't stop him from becoming the great man of history that he is today. I could keep going on and on about the other accomplishments that Adam Smith had achieved but that would take quite a while.
Not all of the revolution was positive though. This was a time where Darwinism had got its start in the modern world. This made modern “scholars” to start questioning the Bible and the sad thing about us humans is that if we someone who seems smarter than us we will listen to whatever they say without questioning whether or not what their saying is fact or not. Another negative impact that the industrial revolution had was the beginning of pollution being pumped into the air by factories yet another thing that was wrong with the industrial revolution was the land being used up and demolished for the sake of factories. This is terrible because it drove a huge amount of animals from their homes or it just killed them all together.
Despite some of the negative effects that the industrial revolution had on the environment it was still a great time of advancement for the human race and technologically wise. If this revolution hadn't taken place the world we would live in would be nothing like the world we live in now.
Joseph
Joseph was always his father's (Israel) favorite son Genesis 37:3-4: 3 Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because he had been born to him in his old age; and he made a richly ornamented robe for him. 4 When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him. Joseph was greatly affected by God even from the early age of seventeen when God affected him by coming to him in a dream Genesis 37:5-7: 5Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more. 6 He said to them, "Listen to this dream I had: 7 We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it." Obviously they were not very happy about this dream since he was basically telling them that he was going to be their king. This coupled with the robes Israel gave Joseph made the brothers furious so they decided to throw Joseph of his robes and throw him into a pit Genesis 37:23-24: 23 So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe—the richly ornamented robe he was wearing- 24 and they took him and threw him into the cistern. Now the cistern was empty; there was no water in it. When his brothers were eating their lunch they saw a caravan of slave traders and decided to sell Joseph to said slave traders but little did they know that they just set in the motion the chain of events that would lead to Josephs dreams coming true. Genesis 37:26-28 : 26 Judah said to his brothers, "What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? 27 Come, let's sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood." His brothers agreed.
28 So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt.
The next way God affected Josephs life is by letting the slave traders sell Joseph to one of Pharaohs captain of the guard whose name was Potiphar Genesis 39:1 1 Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. Potiphar, an Egyptian who was one of Pharaoh's officials, the captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him there. This would be very important because Joseph would start to grow on Potiphar who would very soon appoint Joseph as the attendant of his house and everything Potiphar owned which would get him even closer to becoming king as his dream from God had said. And since Joseph was in the house of Potiphar his house was blessed and so was his fields. The next thing God did to affect Josephs life is he threw Joesph in prison by making Potiphars wife want to sleep with Joseph so that when Joseph refused she would tell him that Joe was trying to sleep with her so he would throw Joe in jail. But even in jail Joseph was still successful because God provided for him.
The next thing God did for Joseph was that he made two servants to the king ask Joseph about some dreams they had about their positions as baker and a cup bearer for the king in which Joe interpreted as one of the guards was going to be replaced as Pharaohs cup bearer while the baker was going to be hung by the king in three days. Because Joe interpreted these dreams he was appointed as Pharaohs dream interpreter to Pharaoh because he was having bad dreams. So then Joe was appointed as king of Egypt and that is how God affected Josephs life.
28 So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt.
The next way God affected Josephs life is by letting the slave traders sell Joseph to one of Pharaohs captain of the guard whose name was Potiphar Genesis 39:1 1 Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. Potiphar, an Egyptian who was one of Pharaoh's officials, the captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him there. This would be very important because Joseph would start to grow on Potiphar who would very soon appoint Joseph as the attendant of his house and everything Potiphar owned which would get him even closer to becoming king as his dream from God had said. And since Joseph was in the house of Potiphar his house was blessed and so was his fields. The next thing God did to affect Josephs life is he threw Joesph in prison by making Potiphars wife want to sleep with Joseph so that when Joseph refused she would tell him that Joe was trying to sleep with her so he would throw Joe in jail. But even in jail Joseph was still successful because God provided for him.
The next thing God did for Joseph was that he made two servants to the king ask Joseph about some dreams they had about their positions as baker and a cup bearer for the king in which Joe interpreted as one of the guards was going to be replaced as Pharaohs cup bearer while the baker was going to be hung by the king in three days. Because Joe interpreted these dreams he was appointed as Pharaohs dream interpreter to Pharaoh because he was having bad dreams. So then Joe was appointed as king of Egypt and that is how God affected Josephs life.
Immigration
Immigration has always been a part of the American way of life. Even from the very beginning of this great nation people from many different nations have come to seek the American Dream. But this American Dream is being challenged by the abuse of Americas lenient regulations on Immigration. Now, don't get me wrong I think immigration legally and for the right reasons is fantastic and very helpful if used in the right way. However, abusing the system is something the American government simply cannot stand for. Up to 22 billion dollars being spent on WELFARE for illegal immigrants to have a home here is simply unaccecptable. We should be spending the same amount of money tracking them down and deporting them back to where they came from. I do not try to sound so blunt and uncaring about such matters but it is just something I feel very strongly about and it's something I believe everyone should feel strongly about. However, legal immigration is a wonderful thing. In fact, it is all what America stands for. We are, at our core, a nation of immigrants even the most Americanized meals such as hotdogs and hamburgers came from German immigrants. Also, everyday new, legal immigrants come into America looking to better themselves and the lives for their families. And what happens when they get here is we get some of the most hardworking people you can find. This is because they know what its like on the other side and they want their families to not have to endure that any longer. This may scare some people because they want their jobs to stay secure. But, if these people really cared that much they would take on a competitive attitude and tried to beat the immigrants out for the job. However, the sad fact is that we Americans are to lazy to do anything for ourselves and we'd rather just have someone else do it for us.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)