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Ishmael Study Questions Essay

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Chapter 1 1. How are people like severed fingers from a hand?
People are like severed fingers from a hand because they cannot function alone. They need their main component (the palm) to work correctly.

2. How are people not like severed fingers from a hand?
People are not like severed fingers from a hand because they are individuals with their own ideas and personalities; they need a ruler, but they don’t necessarily have to be controlled.

3. What does it mean for a teacher to fail?
If the student fails, the teacher fails. If the teacher cannot compel the student to do something, to use his own mind to solve a problem, then he has failed because the student was not successful.

4. How is being a captive similar to …show more content…

2. In what ways do people act like enemies of the world? In what ways do people NOT act as enemies of the world?
People act like enemies of the world because they only allow for themselves. In other words, they kill other animals if they pose a threat to their growth, like the land is ours and ours alone – not to be shared. On the other hand, people have recently begun to think more about the destruction we are causing on the planet and initiating a change within their communities. In this way, they are working with the world, rather than against it.
Chapter 5 1. What do you think makes people mess up the planet on which they live? Is this a fundamental human flaw? If so, what is it?
People mess up the planet on which they live because they make the mistake of thinking that we dominate the world. That we are the end of creation; that evolution ended with us, God’s greatest work. This is a human flaw. There are no other animals that try to control the whole world and make it their own. Humans are the only ones.

2. What does Ishmael mean on page 91, when he says, “the world of thought is coterminous with your culture”?
He means that our thoughts reflect in our culture. We create what we think and what we think is that we are the better species. Not just better. We are, in fact, the best. At least, that’s what we think.
Chapter 6 1. The student says nothing when Ishmael asserts that there is a

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