pennywise256 Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 Ok, I'm taking philosophy HL and now it's time to do a philosphical analysis of a non philosophical material (i.e. a real life content). I have decided to pick a scene from a movie (I think it's Mark twain's or so, I don't really know it. Anyways, I post the link here. I found it scary, but philosophical, I mean it's not scary for being gory or something like that, it really makes sense. I need to write a 5 pages essay abut it and provide philosophical background. I have read little on the specific topic, the closest to it could be Sartre or other kinds of existencialism. But it's not so specific. Do you know which book I could read so I can ground it better ? thanks. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sandwich Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 Which book to read to better understand existentialism or what?I actually find the Wikipedia page on Sartre very good for giving you a quick flick through his main ideas. The Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (online) is also alright but very meandering on the topic of existentialism, or so I thought. Really this part of the assessment is more about being able to dissect non-strictly Philosophical things using thoughts and arguments based from your current knowledge than about proving you've read the Age of Reason or whatever.That video is so messed up o.O What aspects of existentialism were you thinking of relating to it? I can think of several directions you could take with the amount of stuff in that clip. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pennywise256 Posted October 3, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 Which book to read to better understand existentialism or what?I actually find the Wikipedia page on Sartre very good for giving you a quick flick through his main ideas. The Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (online) is also alright but very meandering on the topic of existentialism, or so I thought. Really this part of the assessment is more about being able to dissect non-strictly Philosophical things using thoughts and arguments based from your current knowledge than about proving you've read the Age of Reason or whatever.That video is so messed up o.O What aspects of existentialism were you thinking of relating to it? I can think of several directions you could take with the amount of stuff in that clip.I see, so tell me one of those directions I could take it through. Thanks for all. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sandwich Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 I see, so tell me one of those directions I could take it through. Thanks for all. Well I'm not here to do people's work for them -- I asked what aspects of existentialism you had thought of looking at. For instance why did you think that you could relate the clip to existentialism in the first place? This site is for people to say what they think about your ideas etc. and give you feedback to help you, but not to have the initial ideas. If you decided to bring existentialism in you must already have some ideas yourself -- unless you picked it out of a hat! So say what they are Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pennywise256 Posted October 4, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2011 I see, so tell me one of those directions I could take it through. Thanks for all. Well I'm not here to do people's work for them -- I asked what aspects of existentialism you had thought of looking at. For instance why did you think that you could relate the clip to existentialism in the first place? This site is for people to say what they think about your ideas etc. and give you feedback to help you, but not to have the initial ideas. If you decided to bring existentialism in you must already have some ideas yourself -- unless you picked it out of a hat! So say what they are Ohhh, sorry if I sounded lazy. It's just I thought it was quite obvious. The whole representation of clay-made people, and their behaviour; Based on that, I could raise an ontological question related to existence purpose, as in Sartre's work. Then the part in which Satan says " I find you humans quite interesting, even though you are a worthless greedy lot" That strongly suggest a deep critic on human most fundamental traits, and how they are shown in many different ways throughout history. And finally when the boy complaints Satan for having murdered them, which he answers saying "Never mind Ben, people are no value, we can make more at some time ... if we need them ... Life itself is only a vision... a dream ... nothing exists ... (and I don't get the last part)". I believe there was a philosopher who stated almost exactly the same things. That life is a dream, an illusion. I don't remember who it was, but I think it was one of the German post-modern philosophy methodologists (Husserl, Jaspers, Heidegger) Could you confirm that? If so, I would already have a very nice argument to write my essay. Thanks. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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