Youth
Feb 26, 2012
Undergraduate / 'When people's heads collapse' - Statement of Purpose for UT [NEW]
Sorry I've procrastinated so I've missed my chance to have my english teacher help me. I'd appreciate any suggestions or corrections.
This is transfer essay A for UT right now. Their site says 1 paged single spaced is prefered but I'm slightly over that.
Thanks so much!
By the end of my senior year in high school, life had quietly finished preparing a way to show me the power of reflection. Socrates famously said, "The unexamined life is not worth living," and he continues to make more sense as I become more aware of how unaware I actually am. While reflecting, I am free to choose what values are worth holding on to and which are not. Before my senior year, I had only been reflective occasionally and shallowly. Once I began to value it though, a spring opened up for me. My goals began to change into things more meaningful and everything about me worth altering or bettering began to fall into my purview. It all began for me when I started to take walks after school. That's what got the ball rolling, and as long as it keeps rolling, then I will continue to get better at thinking about those matters that matter most.
Those walks eventually changed my whole view of many topics, especially that of knowledge. I would read but the messages often floated around my head, unconnected until after school. I would sometimes wonder, what role does intelligence really play in a person's capacity for happiness? I imagined two situations appearing to both a person and a bird, one entailing greater happiness than had ever been experienced and the other, greater misery than had ever been experienced. These situations seem to create a blurry image of happiness/misery limits. If we were to have a glimpse of both the birds' and the humans' situations, then we would see that they are different from each other in content but not value. If people were to evolve later on, then the new insights brought by our intellect would expand and change the situations at the peaks of happiness and the depths of misery. That wouldn't mean that the previous peaks weren't actually peaks, but that the peaks were evolving harmonious to our complexity and imagination. The moment we imagine more, we become more complicated and new happiness/misery limits are set, both more wondrous and horrendous than before.
This was a puzzle to me because then why would someone desire to be an intelligent and thoughtful person if the greatest experiences he could have at his current understanding are synonymous with the greatest experiences the thoughtful person could have? It's because we are connected to the world and the people on it. If I lived on my own world then it wouldn't matter what others were doing or thinking. I wouldn't even know what I am missing. This seems to be the reason as to why people aren't envious of the thought that somewhere in this universe some super intelligence is likely experiencing life to profoundness we can't even comprehend. Because we are all connected, those of us that possess the seeds of growh have a duty to spread them. Spreading seeds will help those that are painfully unaware, or even more tragically aware, that life has more to offer than what they have been given. The mass of people affected by neurodegenerative diseases are a group that could use some seeds about now.
At this day and age, it is fairly certain that everyone will develop Alzheimer's disease if they live long enough. Not only does this deny people the possibility of getting the most out of their lives, but because the people affected have had a taste of life with the full presence of their minds, Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative diseases prove to be a true torture. As Christopher Hitchens was speaking to an audience of children he said something I won't forget: "I want to live my life taking the risk all the time that I don't know anything like enough yet; that I haven't understood enough; that I can't know enough; that I'm always hungrily operating on the margins of a potentially great harvest of future knowledge and wisdom." Many people cannot and will not be able to operate on those margins because the brain is not understood enough. I want to join that effort to understand. When people's heads collapse and they are left asking where their minds have gone, I want to be there to help them find them.
It will not be easy though. Overall, life is a struggle, and the strength to pursue change wears thin sometimes. A few weeks ago, I went out to the woods for several days to take myself away from the world. Maybe then, I hoped, I would see how connected to the world I was. I got there and I couldn't meditate, and my head felt as clouded as the sky above me. Despite my many setbacks there is plenty of hope. Hope shows while I'm looking inwards and lately it shows itself in my night-time dreams. I have powerful impressions coming from dreams that deal with the desire for discovery. Having them lets me know that I'm not just saying these things anymore to try and convince myself. I've already done that.
Sorry I've procrastinated so I've missed my chance to have my english teacher help me. I'd appreciate any suggestions or corrections.
This is transfer essay A for UT right now. Their site says 1 paged single spaced is prefered but I'm slightly over that.
Thanks so much!
By the end of my senior year in high school, life had quietly finished preparing a way to show me the power of reflection. Socrates famously said, "The unexamined life is not worth living," and he continues to make more sense as I become more aware of how unaware I actually am. While reflecting, I am free to choose what values are worth holding on to and which are not. Before my senior year, I had only been reflective occasionally and shallowly. Once I began to value it though, a spring opened up for me. My goals began to change into things more meaningful and everything about me worth altering or bettering began to fall into my purview. It all began for me when I started to take walks after school. That's what got the ball rolling, and as long as it keeps rolling, then I will continue to get better at thinking about those matters that matter most.
Those walks eventually changed my whole view of many topics, especially that of knowledge. I would read but the messages often floated around my head, unconnected until after school. I would sometimes wonder, what role does intelligence really play in a person's capacity for happiness? I imagined two situations appearing to both a person and a bird, one entailing greater happiness than had ever been experienced and the other, greater misery than had ever been experienced. These situations seem to create a blurry image of happiness/misery limits. If we were to have a glimpse of both the birds' and the humans' situations, then we would see that they are different from each other in content but not value. If people were to evolve later on, then the new insights brought by our intellect would expand and change the situations at the peaks of happiness and the depths of misery. That wouldn't mean that the previous peaks weren't actually peaks, but that the peaks were evolving harmonious to our complexity and imagination. The moment we imagine more, we become more complicated and new happiness/misery limits are set, both more wondrous and horrendous than before.
This was a puzzle to me because then why would someone desire to be an intelligent and thoughtful person if the greatest experiences he could have at his current understanding are synonymous with the greatest experiences the thoughtful person could have? It's because we are connected to the world and the people on it. If I lived on my own world then it wouldn't matter what others were doing or thinking. I wouldn't even know what I am missing. This seems to be the reason as to why people aren't envious of the thought that somewhere in this universe some super intelligence is likely experiencing life to profoundness we can't even comprehend. Because we are all connected, those of us that possess the seeds of growh have a duty to spread them. Spreading seeds will help those that are painfully unaware, or even more tragically aware, that life has more to offer than what they have been given. The mass of people affected by neurodegenerative diseases are a group that could use some seeds about now.
At this day and age, it is fairly certain that everyone will develop Alzheimer's disease if they live long enough. Not only does this deny people the possibility of getting the most out of their lives, but because the people affected have had a taste of life with the full presence of their minds, Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative diseases prove to be a true torture. As Christopher Hitchens was speaking to an audience of children he said something I won't forget: "I want to live my life taking the risk all the time that I don't know anything like enough yet; that I haven't understood enough; that I can't know enough; that I'm always hungrily operating on the margins of a potentially great harvest of future knowledge and wisdom." Many people cannot and will not be able to operate on those margins because the brain is not understood enough. I want to join that effort to understand. When people's heads collapse and they are left asking where their minds have gone, I want to be there to help them find them.
It will not be easy though. Overall, life is a struggle, and the strength to pursue change wears thin sometimes. A few weeks ago, I went out to the woods for several days to take myself away from the world. Maybe then, I hoped, I would see how connected to the world I was. I got there and I couldn't meditate, and my head felt as clouded as the sky above me. Despite my many setbacks there is plenty of hope. Hope shows while I'm looking inwards and lately it shows itself in my night-time dreams. I have powerful impressions coming from dreams that deal with the desire for discovery. Having them lets me know that I'm not just saying these things anymore to try and convince myself. I've already done that.