What Did You Eat For Dinner Last Night?

One of the themes of the novel ‘Animal Farm’ is that people’s ignorance can contribute to their political and social oppression. How does the animal’s behaviour in this novel support this theme?

In “Living Like Weasels,” author Annie Dillard’s idea is that humans can benefit from living wild as a weasel. I strongly agree because to live wild like a weasel is to live mindless, free and focused. With these living abilities we as humans will be able get closer to our aspirations in life and do whatever means necessary to get there.

The tone in the excerpt of “Live Like Weasels” by Annie Dillard is one that is reflective and optimistic. In this, she tells us what she’s learned from her experience of the an encounter with the a weasel. This is proven in the first paragraph of the excerpt, “I can learn from a wild animal...something of mindlessness, something from the purity of living in the physical sense and the dignity of living without bias or motive.” It Dillard shows us complete her reflection on what we, as people, can gain from learning about the habits of animals, and that she’s clearly thought about it. This is even more so further evident in paragraph two when she questions reasons with herself, “Could two live under the wild rose...as received and unchallenged

In the article, a girl with autism faces it with animals. In this article Temple says “Ever since she got autism, it made school and social life harder, but it made animals easy (Grandin and Johnson, pg 159, pp 2).” The article is saying that autism made it harder to live, but talking to animals made it seem easier. She says, “Animals kept me going (Grandin and Johnson, pg 159, pp 3),” it made her life easier because her animals was there to be with her and keep her company. This animal has impacted her life because at her new school she was able to communicate with others and become successful while having Autism. Every person who owns an animal has a friendship between the animal and their

When You look at an animal, you can sometimes see a person in them. It’s like when a dog starts to look like his owner, or when an animal represents a symbol, like with the Bald Eagle and Freedom. Well in Gary D. Schmidt’s book, Okay for Now, he uses animals, like birds, in John Audubon's book to represent different characters in the book like Doug, his mom, and his dad.

Though man and beast are born into the same state of nature, they differentiate because man is able to act on free will while beasts choose or reject by instinct. For example, Rousseau states, "that no animal naturally makes war on man except in a case of self-defense or from extreme hunger" (83). Therefore, man can decide to avoid or accept an encounter even if it’s not for means of self-preservation while animals do not create conflict other than for self-preservation. Further Rousseau conveys that, "beasts cannot deviate from the laws which are prescribed to it, even when it might be advantageous for it" (87). Man tends to stray from the 'laws' that nature assigned him because of his ability to consummate decisions independently from those 'laws' designated by nature. The principles of behavior and instincts given by nature commands all animals and man, but by animals lacking freewill they have no other choice but to obey those commands. Furthermore, due to the fact that animals are restrained by the laws of nature, "a pigeon would die of hunger beside a dish filled with choice meats and a cat beside a pile of fruit or grains" (87). Though the food given to both pigeon and cat, if consumed would meet their nutritional needs, nature does not instinctively program them to do

Incontrovertibly, one of the first things one may notice upon reading the work, is the use of highly explicit imagery connecting her thoughts and ideologies. With these techniques, her whole impression of the essay establishes an adversary relationship between the natural world and the human world. In summary, the author imposes that with weasels, much more freedom is granted through instinctual living, rather than as humans, who live with choices. Through her vivid and truly descriptive imagery, one may see emphasize and glorification to the way of life these little creatures live. Dillard writes “I think I retrieved my brain from the weasel’s brain,” from this hyperbole, she greatly induces her extreme and genuine fascination with these weasels. This device ultimately emphasizes the central idea that we as humans would be better off living and thinking like weasels. When exploring future into the work, one may continue seeing this technique into play as Dillard states, “The man could in no way pry the tiny weasels off, and he had to walk half a mile to water, the weasels dangling from his palm, and soak hi,

You open the fridge, the spotlight shines on all of the food, and suddenly you are stuck with the decision of what to eat. Everyone has been in a situation where they didn’t know which food to choose, to help us understand our options better, Michael Pollan created the book, Omnivore's Dilemma. In this book, there is a certain chapter that stands out the most: Chapter 8. Chapter 8 states all the facts about what the “omnivore's dilemma” is. By looking closer into this chapter, the reader goes back to the very question that pioneered this whole idea. The idea that in the modern world, with such a surplus of choices, how do we decide what we should, and what we should not eat? To give us a better idea of how we got here, let's start by finding out how we got to this point in the first place.

After reading Jeremy Rifkin’s article, “A Change of Heart about Animals”, I discovered more about animals than I had ever known before. As a former pet owner I know how much owners care for their pets and consider them to be a part of the family, almost like a child to them, so they are treated with kindness and are loved to the fullest. What I did not know was how intelligent animals actually are. Rifkin does a great job at expressing this by demonstrating to the audience facts that they had possibly not known or heard of before. For example, he describes how crows can make tools out of a wire, gorillas can learn sign language and have an average score on an Intelligence Quotient (IQ) test, and how pigs can often feel lonely and go into depression.

According to Pollan, the Omnivore's Dilemma is that we don’t know what to eat because we are humans. Making it hard because we need to eat a large variety of foods in order to stay healthy. We can eat anything from almost anywhere on the globe, all year round. The things that may keep us going, aren't always the best for our health and happiness. Therefore making it hard for us to chose what to eat.

However, their ultimate goals differ greatly from one another, in the way that Singer’s proposition would only add to the overpopulation problem that Hardin wants to avoid. If we were to take consideration of the vast animal population this new approach would only further deplete the commons Hardin wants to so desperately conserve. Hardin explains that, “A finite world can support only a finite population; therefore, population growth must eventually equal zero” (30). In Singer’s world, this finite population just grew exponentially. Given that animals tend to breed much quicker than humans, how could we ever keep up with their ever-growing demand? Furthermore, Hardin and Singer deviate from one another in their approach of trying to persuade the views of their readers. Singer explains in great detail the mistreatment of animals in farms and testing laboratories, this approach clearly uses imagery as a way to appeal to his readers through ethos. Hardin does not worry about appealing to the feelings of his reader, nor does he care whether his audience is insulted by his blunt and extreme views about society. While Singer is well-known for deliberately provoking his audience, it is very evident in his writing that he cares deeply for the lives of animals. He reasons that the mere fact that animals can feel pain is reason alone to consider them part of our society, this shows a deep emotional bond to

The article “A Change of Heart About Animals” written by Jeremy Rifkin informs readers that animals feel emotions very much similar to humans and should be given more rights. I agree with Rifkin’s statement, but to a certain extent.

Dogs, lizards, fish, cats, frogs, etc.; have no free will and therefore it appears arbitrary to impute it to human beings. Why should we do things that the rest of nature lacks? It would be an impossible aberration. The answer here, is that there is enough variety in nature—some things swim, some fly, some just lie there, some breathe, some grow, while others do not; so there is plenty of evidence of plurality of types and kinds of things in nature. Discovering that something has free will could be yet another addition to all the varieties of nature.

“The difference between the brain of the human and the higher animal obviously lies in the degree, not the difference on the essence” (Charles Darwin). The purpose of the quote is to express the feeling that the animal and human is similar, they have the human-like qualities. In Life of Pi written by Yann Martel, Pi uses animal imagery to show that animals that can be mad, suffer, and sad which are all human qualities.

I do believe that humans have free will to make their decisions. However, those decisions may be based on their personal environment, circumstances, unbringing and maybe even education. Each individual is responsible for