Essays / Is the history understanding relevant in our daily life? [5]

the topic : The study of history has value only to the extent that it is relevant to our daily lives

estimating the value of history

there are two ways to interpret the topic:

- The study of history has value. The value only has impact on our daily lives.
- The study of history has value only when the history, which is be studied, is relevant to our daily lives.

Which of the two is the right interpretation of the topic? Or you have a better idea?
Please give some advice.

Writing Feedback / GRE AW ISSUE hunger, unemployment vs art [2]

topic "As long as people in a society are hungry or out of work or lack the basic skills needed to survive, the use of public resources to support the arts is inappropriate-and, perhaps, even cruel-when one considers all the potential uses of such money."

The speaker asserts that using public resource to support the arts is unjustifiable when there is starvation and unemployment in this society. He or she may base the assertion upon the fact that food, clothing and basic skills are the fundamental needs of human beings to survive. The statement is undeniable; in all, a starving man would not have the mood to appreciate a painting in any universe. However, the speaker overlooked some points about this assertion, such as the possibility to eliminate the hungriness and unemployment totally, the impact of art on economy and job market and people's spiritual needs.

To begin with, except being in a utopian society, the hungriness and unemployment can not be eliminated totally. It is common sense, that in a society, there is always someone who cannot get a job. Sometimes this is because of the poor economy, sometimes simply because one does not even want to work; so is the hungriness or the lack of the basic skills needed to survive. I concede that the government must set a lower priority to support the art than to meet the basic needs of people. However, to postpone supporting arts until unemployment and hunger are completely eliminated would definitely be postponed forever. Any informed person would share the opinion that a society is without any unemployment or hunger amounts to a fantasy.

Moreover, some specific kinds of arts can function as some industry to provide job opportunity. If the art subsidy goes into a painting gallery, only a few painters will get the jobs. However, if the money is spent on other arts, such movies or television programs, the job opportunities will be much more. According to a report conducted by a film industry association， it takes two thousand people six months to produce a movie on average, after they investigate three thousand movie from the 1950s and now. If other respects of the film industry chain are taken into consideration, such as the movie theaters and video stores, the number will be tremendous. So, supporting arts which could create jobs is somehow like shooting two birds with one stone when the government wants to meet the basic needs and to fund the arts at same time.

Finally, the speakers advocating that the art should always give way to food, clothing and job skills maybe ignore the fact that not only body and mind but also spirit consists of a human being. The human body and mind is powerful and sometimes the spirit is more powerful. Whenever there is economical crisis in a society, some kinds of art will boom. The golden age of American movie industry is the time when the Great Recession happened. Someone may argue when people having trouble in feeding their families, finding jobs, they will be reluctant to spend money on entertainment but food and clothing. However, he or she may forget people can get courage and hope for life in a movie after a bad day. A factory bring one thousand job to the society pales in importance compared to a movie bring a wind of optimism to a society, especially the economy is bad. The government has every reason to support the art which could give people courage and hope because foods keep us alive but spirits keep us unbeaten.

In all, when facing a dilemma of basic needs and arts, a government should never overlook the importance of arts in economical and spiritual field of a society.

looking for your advice.

Writing Feedback / History leads us to the bright destination in the ocean of social development and revolution [6]

TOPIC: ISSUE103 - "The study of history has value only to the extent that it is relevant to our daily lives."

here is my issue, please give me some advices, thx a lot

history

By using the word "only" the author's statement may be absolute to some extent since the study of history could be approached in many ways and be valued in many respects, which make the history studying has various values beyond our daily life.

To begin with, in this complicated world, there are many kinds of history and many ways to learn history. In scientific field, the history is the laboratory record, which scientists carefully analyse, when they design their further experiment. In business world, the history is the previous sales report, which the manages read, when they decide how to market new products. In hospital, the history is patients' medical journal, to which the doctors refer, when they diagnose their patients. These kinds of history study maybe not relevant to our daily live, yet, they still have great values beyond our daily life.

Move over, the history study could be valued in many respect which makes it valuable for many situations even though it is not relevant to our daily lives. The materials of history, written or unwritten, actually are carriers of our ancestor's wisdom and philosophy, and if we look behind the faces of these materials, we are able to find some of this wisdom and philosophy are permanently and universal. With modern technology, such as radios, the Internet, computers, etc. the leaders of military and business still read the ancient Chinese book "The Art of War" by Sun Tzu, who lived in his time when people battled with swords and spears. What make the book so popular is not the way in it about how to use cold weapons but the wisdom and philosophy of how to win a war. As a student majoring marketing, one of my curriculums are about the " The Art of War" in business world. The dean of my college told us " when you study the history with a more open mind, and find the true meaning of this book, you will find valuable guide lines for our study and work." As discussed above, the study of history show its various value in many respects even some of the materials are not relevant to our daily lives.

In sum, studying history is like looking back the road map which lead we human beings where we are and what we are today, more importantly, the ultimately goal of looking this map is to find a compass which could lead us to the bright destination in the ocean of social development and revolution. The study of history has every reasons to be valued highly whether it is relevant to daily life or not.

Actually, I an not sure about the meaning of "daily life" so I don't know how to present my idea probably.
If I illustrate that ecologist study the history of climate to know how to protect the environment in the future, I would state that this kind of history study may not be relevant to our life, but still has great value.

However, a voice in my mind told me, the environment is surely relevant to our daily life, because we all live one the Earth, so as the economy...

Would some one enlighten me, and give me a accurate definition of daily life?

Writing Feedback / GRE: "All nations should help support the development of a global university" [2]

here is my issue, plz give some advices, thx a loooooooot...

TOPIC: ISSUE11 - "All nations should help support the development of a global university designed to engage students in the process of solving the world's most persistent social problems."

In ancient Babylon, when people still spoke a single language, the Tower of Babel was not built because god confused people's language. In today, a global university seems to be another Tower of Babel because now human are not only with different language but also with different cultures, values, races and religions.

Such a global university will surely contribute to tackling some global social problems which requiring co-operations between nations. In this university, students from different countries with different cultures can exchange their opinion about world's social problem. By doing this, students broaden their views and are able to compromise when co-operating with other countries' students. These are all beneficial for solving world's persistent social problems.

However, there is always big gap between ideal and reality. Governments should not support it because it is impractical.

In the first place, coming with lots of potential disputes and anticipated difficulties, building such a university is a world's problem itself. Like other world's social problems, this plan also evolves different cultures, values and interests between nations. When things become complicated in that way, it is nearly impossible for global co-operations. To prove this, we only have to look back the countless conferences about the Tyoto Protocol. Still, emission level increased sharply during last decade. So, this plan is just another global problem, hard for politician to have a agreement on and solve.

In the second place, though every nation agrees to build this university, there are lots of potential hard problems to come over. For example, building and running such a university costs a lot of money and some developing countries maybe can not afford their shares of this bill. If rich countries pay more, the university may come out at the cost of losing its independence and autonomy. Secondly, the location of this university is also another anticipated issue. Naturally, most nations will want this university to build in their country so that they can somehow influence the students with their culture and value. In all, there are too many questions about the university to make the plan impractical to carry out.

Rather than build such a university, we have other practical alternatives to solve the global social problems. One of them is to send exchange students between countries. By doing this, the next generations of the earth may have a better understanding with each other. If American students spend some time in South Africa to see the poverty of this country and how people are seared in the horrible fire of AIDS there, they will understand why South Africa counterfeited the expensive AIDS drugs invented by American pharmaceutical factory without paying expensive licensing fee. .

To sum up, a global university is like the Tower of Babel for human to realize. Human with different value and competing interests always find hard for them to work together for one goal. However, the nations still have to tackle the world's most persistent social problems, not in a global university but in more practical and efficient ways.