The movie Fargo, by Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, presents the story of a car salesperson and a habitual con who prefers other people do his work. Jerry hires incompetent thugs to kidnap his wife in part of a grand plan, which includes fraud, Conn game, and deception. Viewed on the lenses of stoicism and Epicureanism, jerry evinces more Epicureanism characteristic and fail to meet the threshold that Socrates gives for knowledge and wisdom.
The essence of Socratic wisdom is acknowledging that one does not know anything. In the movie, Jerry pretends to know everything and has all things figured out only to be outwitted and manipulated by the father-in-law, and after being failed by incompetent thugs hired to kidnap the wife. It is clear that Jerry is not wise and did not appreciate that he knows nothing when dealing with the father in law. In the movie, Jerry on several occasions failed to acknowledge that he had inferior knowledge compared to those he was dealing with. In a scene where he is on phone with Riley Diefenbach
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In the film, Jerry has no control of himself, his thoughts or anything going around in his life. He harbors negative thoughts. Moreover, when he goes to his friend at the garage who vouched for Grimsrud, he is unable to get access to the duo and thus totally lost control of the situation even though he had changed his mind. Epicureanism is also evident in the scene where Jerry shows frustration when removing ice from the vehicle. He was frustrated because he could not be like his father in law and upon realizing that he has been outwitted by the father in law decide to channel his frustrations on the windscreen. Jerry starts slow using his ice-scraper as he removes ice from the windscreen, however as he continues, madness erupts in him and be begin and he starts beating the windscreen in
In the movie, The Voices, we meet Jerry Hickfang. Jerry appears like your regular quirky, new guy on the job. He has an innocent, childlike demeanor and always has a smile on his face who seems genuinely pleased to be working in the packing and shipping department of Milton Fixture and Faucet which is a bathtub factory. He lives above an abandoned bowling alley in the small Midwest town of Milton with his two pets, a cat named Mr. Whiskers, and a dog named Bosco. No one at the company except for his boss is aware that he sees a government assigned psychotherapist, Dr. Warren. His other coworkers register him as awkwardly eccentric and upbeat. He has no human friends, the only friends he has are his pets, which incidentally speak to him, but
The sociological perspective examines the hidden reasons for one’s actions and identities that people have. It stressed how they are influenced by their society and most of all their social location. Social location predetermines all aspects of one’s life and there are rules that come with social location, and with rules come social control mechanisms and social stratification that keep people in line. With social location also come institutions that provide roles which form one’s identity. In the movie, “Good Will Hunting,” the main character Will Hunting is a young deviant what grows up in a rough neighbourhood and has the intellect of a genius. Role theory and other concepts from the sociological
In Apology, Socrates is confronted with questioning of why he thinks people slander him the way they do. To answer, Socrates brings up the term of “human wisdom.” This is a type of wisdom that is not godly, and Socrates expresses that he is not wise at all. Human wisdom composes the notion that having great wisdom is having the ability to not think he knows what he does not know. In order to support his claim, Socrates brings up the Oracle story. Here, Chaerephon asked the Oracle if anyone was wiser then Socrates and “Pythian replied that no one was wiser.” In Socrates understanding of how he was most wiser, he told a story about going to three different types of people: politicians, poets, and craftsmen. Out of these three, it was understood that the hierarchy is reversed and the craftsmen are truly wise in their craft but felt this made them speak in other fields, when if fact they knew nothing about. These cases bring up the human wisdom and why Socrates is exploited as very wise, because he does not try to think and speak on something he does not know. The oracle brings up the “form” of what human wisdom is and uses Socrates as an example. In the end, the person who is wisest knows that his wisdom is worthless.
In every case, people view a situation as either reckless, or noble. Into the Wild, written by Jon Krakauer, tells the story of a young man named Chris McCandles who leaves home to create a new identity for himself and go on an adventure to find freedom from society. Krakauer wrote about Chris’s nobility of following his beliefs of freedom, even if death was the only answer to his goal, in order to teach his readers to ignore the confinements and control of society and reach for your true desires in life. Some oppose Krakauer’s view though, and see Chris as reckless because he takes no precautions with his life, and throws his family and friends away in order to make his journey to Alaska, his freedom, easier. Through the mode of pathos and
Jerry, despite his relative decency, is victimized by the power structure of the school as well as his peers (Bagnall). “Choosing to disturb the universe means that Jerry himself is thrown into chaos” (Junko). His refusal to conform makes him the prime target of both the Vigils and the school officials, despite admiration from his peers. Cormier makes it clear that moral individuals can not survive unaided in a corrupt, oppressive system (Harris et al.). Jerry, while standing up for what he believes is right, is constantly torn down and abused by Archie’s goons. No one, not even his best friend Goober, came to his rescue to combat his oppressors. Arguably, “the reason Jerry was not saved was because he stood alone” (Harris et al.). Jerry stood alone in refusing to take the chocolates, his abuse by the Vigils, and his eventual physical and mental destruction by Janza. In fact, his destruction makes him into a martyr. His surrender in the end makes him an even more realistic hero and shows that it takes more people to fight powerful figures (Peck). Cormier challenges the perception of the modern “Superman” figure and replaces him with an “Average Joe”: a jack of all trades but master at none. Despite his defeat, Jerry’s legacy will live beyond him, whether publicly celebrated or privately discussed by Trinity students (Siegler). Jerry’s battle could have been won if his peers acted against the power structures as
Socrates, an Athenian philosopher who lived from 469 BC until his very unnecessary death in 399 BC, has had his wisdom called into question many times since he has been studied. But to know whether some is wise, we must first know what it means to be wise. According to Websters Dictionary, to be is wise is : (1) having or showing good judgment; (2) informed; (3) learned; (4) shrewd amd cunning. From this definition, it is clear to me that Socrates was wise in every aspect of the word. He shows this wisdom while
In 1949, Arthur Miller wrote a play called “The Death Of a Salesman”. This play is known for its compelling view on the mind of the middle class working man. The characters in “The Death of a Salesman” all have various dimensions of development throughout the story. These characters can all be seen as components one collective mind using Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory; the Oedipal, Id, Ego, and Superego. These characters all strive for success by way of the American Dream and all of it’s inconsistent factors and betrayal that personify it so well.
In the film “Eskimo Fight for Life” the Inuit winter camp has a defined social structure. From generation to generation the roles of men and women remain the same. The most important role for men is to hunt to feed the camp. They hunt seal which is a symbol within the camp because it conveys the meaning of survival. The women are responsible for supplying the camp with the necessary clothing such as fur coats and boots. The women also teach their daughters these skills so that they can make their own clothes and boots. The Inuit camp also has their own language which enables them to communicate with one another. With the use of language, the elders, especially the grandmothers, can tell the children stories. These stories are one way they pass
Socrates thinks that it requires wisdom to know the difference between the knowledge and an opinion. And what he means by that is knowledge is based on reasoned ideas beliefs, and can be proved and confirmed by rational arguments, where’s other opinion is not proved. For Socrates, the reason is the bigger way to show the truth. Socrates explained that role model is how to act well for example an equivalent way, knowledge is in an unqualified manner, according to Socrates statement beauty and wealth could benefit us sometimes if we used correctly, however, also harm to us if we did not use it the right way. This is means with knowledge we know how to act well. Socrates explained of wisdom and knowledge, as expressed by Plato in The Apology (StevenM. Cahn 29p-30), is sometimes interpreted as an example of a humility theory of wisdom Socrates and his friend Chaerephon visit the oracle at Delphi. As the story goes Chaerephon asks the oracle
The characterization of Jerry illustrates the stages of maturing and becoming independent. In the beginning of the story, Jerry is depicted as young and immature. The immaturity of Jerry is shown when he is trying to capture the older boys’ attention. In order to capture their attention, “he began splashing and kicking in the water like a foolish dog.” This action conveys that Jerry is still immature, and wants to join the older kids. After seeing the boys pass through the tunnel, Jerry also wants to pass through in order to be a part of their group. In order
For example one of the helpful way I would apply Socrates Epistemic Humility for whoever is bearing in mind applying to a job. People tend to work at places they are interested in and believe that they have what it take to work at that job. If people apply Socrates wisdom that the knowledge one knows is nothing then they would be open to obtain more knowledge from the job they are hired for. Knowledge can be obtained anywhere at any time and having the ability to tell yourself that you know nothing will give you the will to acquire more of what you believe you know but really do not know. So overall Socrates is right about wisdom because in today society human are arrogant and ignorant believing that they know everything because of their statues and things they have done to believe they are wise. But in reality that person really knows nothing but ongoing the process of achieving new
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very present one” –Albert Einstein. This quote by one of the most impactful men in the world emphasizes that although reality is not set in stone and changes constantly, it is an unavoidable part of life. This means that if someone refuses to accept their realities, it is due to issues within them that are unresolved. Holden, the protagonist in The Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger, has extreme difficulty with facing the world around him, thus resulting in the restriction of him growing and evolving as a character. This is due to multiple reasons which include the fact that he never experienced closure from his brother Allies’ death, he does not want to lose his childhood innocence, he feels as though he does not fit in with society and his damaging obsession with mortality.
In order to do this, he goes about Athens questioning those he believes to be wiser than him, including politicians, poets, and craftsmen. Upon this questioning, he discovers that even those perceived as the wisest actually know far less than one would expect. Even the craftsmen, who have much practical wisdom in their respective fields, see their success as merely a tribute to their vast knowledge of many subjects. This, Socrates claims, is not true wisdom. Human wisdom can be described as the acknowledgement and acceptance that one does not know everything, nor is one capable of knowing everything. This, however, does not mean that people should sit idly by, never pursuing wisdom, for it is still vital to the attainment of a good life, which should be the ultimate goal of mankind.
Socrates, always depicted as searching for the answer of the good, uses dialectic to probe for knowledge and virtue. Through the use of questioning, Socrates disturbs the citizens into thought and the pursuit of the good. Like a gadfly, although annoying,
The film Dallas Buyers Club is a biographical drama whose plot is based around the HIV/AIDS epidemic of the 1980s. Early in the history of the illness, cases of a rare lung infection were found in five previously healthy young men. In addition to that, the young men all suffered from various other infections which indicated that their immune systems were not functioning properly. The new illness was so aggressive that before a report by the CDC could be published, two of the five men had succumbed to the illness. Besides the similar rare cases of lung infection amongst the five, there was one other shared characteristic; they were all gay men. By years’ end, there were 270 reported cases in gay men with the same disease; of that 270 however, 121 of those individuals had passed (Timeline of HIV/AIDS,2011). It was now clear that there was a new threat to gay men besides social ostracizing; HIV/AIDS had made its presence known.