Perssuaisive Essay (Recovered)-1ixpwkl
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Everything in blue will be a modification or a change
Born good, made evil
William Golding has wrongfully transformed global views about the morality of humans and the virtue within one’s mind and heart. His philosophical ideals around the fact that all humans are born evil, founded mostly by his savage and sheer evil experiences during World War 2, could be looked like the foundation for knowing the inner working of humans. His literature, more specifically the world-renowned novel Lord of the flies, written in 1954, sadly shapes the minds of students and adults in classrooms all around. His book portrays the lives of boys deserted on an uncivilized, southern Pacific island, of which they are responsible for few things: their safety, a newly made society and the fear of a ‘beast’. Contrary to its popular, underlining theme that humans are born evil, there are major aspects of the story that drives it further, thanks to good-hearted characters unaffected by society’s evils. Golding’s counterpart, Jean Jack Rousseau, is the preferable and undoubtedly the only answer to one’s prerequisites before entering the womb. His ideology, backed by current day studies performed by the famous Brain Games television show, demonstrates that humans are in fact born kind and good. The study involved babies that were placed in a situation where one hand puppet was shown acting kind and the other acting mean. In nearly every case the babies of only 8 to 12 months old almost always took the nice puppet when given the option to take one home. It is only in future years that subjects start to display evilness. Would you want your kids to be pronounced evil? Most wouldn’t. Although some may believe humans are born evil, they are in fact deemed to be born good-hearted without any ties to a sinful cause. It is only when society displays it evils upon kind people that humans become close-minded criminals.
Based solely on the theoretical statement posed by Golding, that humans are deemed evil upon birth and will forever be evil, though we are only held back by societies laws and its force against us, Lord of the Flies follows said path in every aspect of the book. The young boys, ranging from children to early teenagers, are forcefully given the responsibility, or rather an option, to pursue a law-based island in which everyone can live in concord until rescue comes. In the early stages, when reign is little, and power isn’t wielded, the island is calm and harmonized to some extent. No savagery displayed yet only possibilities of such; though it would only be sparked by the evil’s accumulation in power. “The three boys rushed forward, and Jack drew his knife again with a flourish. He raised his arm in the air. There came a pause, a hiatus, the pig continued to scream and the creepers to jerk, and the blade continued to flash at the end of a bony arm. The pause was only long enough for them to understand what an enormity the downward stroke would be. Then the piglet tore loose from the creepers and scurried into the undergrowth. They were left looking at each other and the place of terror. Jack’s face was white under the freckles.”. Jack was held back by the kindness of his heart, unable to kill a pig while in the hunt for meat. The boys had not been exposed to society’s greedy evils, though it was only until the taste of power and domination surfaced that mostly Jack had an urge for. Accounted as a leader his whole life, Jack had never the need to fear others or competition; his choir and friends always had his back regardless of their likings for him or his savage ways. Quoted in chapter 1 on page 19, it says, “With dreary obedience, the choir raised their hands.”. This states that the choir knew that Jack can handle power the best, though it is stated that he is best suited for a leader. It is shown that throughout the book Jack cannot handle such power. Deeper into the bloody story, after many deaths, whilst Jack had full power to feed his savagery, his peers, or rather soon to be successors, weren’t on board with his madness and his hunger for death; deeming they too were good-hearted, though they could not escape Jacks reign. This, in fact, contradicts Golding’s beliefs that society’s laws and power hold us back, but Jack seems to use it for evil. Biased as the book is, Lord of the flies did incorporate few mentions of the greater good in humans. The goodness on the island was oppressed by Golding’s theory but still sustained to induce a force upon the plot. Though lead by Ralph, Simon was truly the purest being on the island, as he was the overwatch to everything that occurred. He was viewed as a saint or godly figure; reduced from his heightened ability to reason and his superiority to find the best solution in the worst situations. “Here (in the jungle) the littleuns who had run after Simon caught up with him. They talked, cried out unintelligibly, lugged him toward the trees. Then, amid the roar of bees in the afternoon sunlight, Simon found for them the fruit they could not reach, pulled off the choicest from the foliage, passed them back down to the endless, outstretched hands.”. It is reviewed that Jack is the only being responsible for the wrongdoings on the island, only using his choirs and those scared as his workers. Jack also cannot withstand the position that he obtains, becoming savage with the power and strays further from godliness in response to society’s evil that assimilates throughout power.
Tested on the minds of those the least affected by toxic thoughts and actions, the babies in Brain Games have the purest and closest answers we have to the never-ending global question: Are humans born good or evil? “They are young enough that they do not speak language, but they are old enough that they can express their own preferences when given a choice of different objects.” states Karen Wynn, head of the infant cognition center at Yale University and the scientist behind the experiment. As previously mentioned, the babies are virtually unbranded by society as of yet and have not been affected by any means, only thinking and doing as what they were naturally born with months ago. The babies are given a presentation where a cat puppet is in need of help, in which two solutions are given. One dog puppet is mean and in fact, makes it harder for the cat; the other dog puppet kindly helps the cat. The two dog puppets are differenced via colored shirts so that the babies wouldn’t get mixed up with which was which. After a suitable presentation for the subjects, the babies were given the option to take one home, not by telling them but rather putting both in front of them and letting their pure and good hearts take one as they pleased. Unironically, there was only a small percentage of babies that had chosen the mean dog over the nice one, proving that most to all babies are born good. It is also to mention that the study isn’t based solely on what the eye sees. When a brain detects kindness, the brain releases a chemical called oxytocin, which makes the person feel compassion and empathy. It is also to be noticed that nothing will give a direct and true answer, meaning that the numbers for the good dog puppet could be higher, or possibly lower. “We used to think that compassion and sensitivity to the feeling of others were a thing that young children had to learn but now studies are suggesting that these tendencies may be part of our inborn human nature.”. Though we are scientifically born good, society lays its impeding and sinful evils on humans, resulting in the change from being good-hearted to cold-blooded. Previously stated, some civilization’s most powerful positions can lead to the corruption of one’s purity and kindness. As a result, such situations have formed mater evils such as Hilter, Stalin, Putin and more.
To restate, although some may believe humans are born evil, they are in fact deemed to be born good-hearted without any ties to a sinful cause. It is only when society displays it evils upon kind people that humans become close-minded criminals. Jack was proven to be lost in his reign of being a tormented dictator with all his power, leading him to an inescapable mindset of savagery that had not been there before he settled on the island. Biased as the story was, it most cases, where Golding hints his popular theme, it mostly contradicts itself, showing that everyone had a good side to them. Furthermore, in recognition of science, babies factually possess kind souls, choosing good over evil in almost every case, showing that beings right out of the womb are born good, essentially finalizing the debate on whether humans are inherently good or evil. The closest to unaffected minds humans have are babies, and they were proven to be kind. Humans are born good, only society’s evils make humans return to primitive ways. The voice of the young will give the old answers.
Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. Salem Press, a Division of EBSCO Information Services, Inc., 2017.
“Brain Games – Are Humans Born Good?” Brain GAMES.