GUAM: Student Socratic Conversations: Individual and Society

The Search for Gold / The Search for Understanding: 
      We are controlled by society in many ways.  Our image is what controls us.  We're perpetually worrying about what others think of us.  Media and propaganda cause us to be this way, and in today's day and age our society is completely influenced by media.  Human beings are mere instruments whereas society is the music itself.  Humans and instruments will always die and be reborn, but music will always live on as well as God and society.

The Search for Authenticity:
      I always thought that we, as humans, controlled society, but according to this article we are controlled by society.

The Search for Meaning:
       Is an individual just a mere instrument to society?
       Are humans actually controlled by society?

a.) How has your family, friends, and community affected my religious beliefs?

              I am a young man who believes in God, however I am not extremely religious.  I never attend church.  I don't read the bible.  I do believe in him though.  I believe in after life, and I truly think that our souls will live on forever.  These particular religious beliefs of mine have been influenced by my family, my friends, and my community.

             My father gave up his faith at the tender age of thirteen.  He completely stopped attending mass and church for several reasons, the main being that he was always threatened by nuns and priests that he was going to Hell for committing all these silly sins.  The sins that he committed weren't evil at all; it's just that my dad grew up in a time period where Catholicism was quite brutal and strict.  My mom didn't grow up in an extremely religious household, but she was still raised to believe in God.  Both of my parents's upbringings have caused me to be a believer in God but not in a religious way.

              My friends are always stating, to myself and all other peers, their religious beliefs.  A lot of my friends don't believe in any sort of God.  In fact, a good amount of my friends are complete atheists.  I even have Jewish friends who label themselves as "Atheist Jews".  Inherently, my friends's negative attitude toward religion has given me even more reason not to attend church on sundays.

              My community is not very religious either.  I live in the Bay Area.  In Berkeley, we champion the "freaks".  I'm not insinuating that these freaks are bad people, but I'm merely suggesting that the majority of my community's citizens are not religious but rather scientists and innovators.  I do, however, attend a catholic high school, though, so St. Mary's has influenced some of my faith in God.

           Needless to say, my family and friends and community have influenced my religious beliefs.  Thanks for tuning in to the J Rik on the Mic blog.

GUAM: The Quest for God: The Problem of Evil and Free Will

The Search for Gold / The Search for Understanding:


           God does exist.  Some people beg to differ because there is evil and corruption in the world.  A common rebuttal to the existence of God may be "if God's real than why do human beings commit crimes, harm others, and even murder one another?"  The main idea is that God can't cause the world to be perfect.  He can't prevent evil from happening because evil is not thing but a wrong choice made by an individual, and God can't make our choices.  If he made our choices we wouldn't even be human beings; we'd merely be robots.

The Search for Authenticity:  


             This topic challenges me greatly.  Never before did I think about this notion of evil and corruption.  I never really thought that God is a bad person for not preventing evil from happening.  I have just sort of thought that there's no such thing as perfection, but now when I look at both arguments in this topic the more I realize how both make all kinds of sense.


The Search for Meaning:


Does God exist?
Does God have the ability to stop all evil?
Does God want our world to be imperfect?
Can God inspire evil doers to eternally become good, or is it all up to the person to change his bad ways?

Visual Representations for Arguments

Argument from Religious Experience:
In this illustration a man is praying to God.  As we can see he is quite religious.  He truly believes he is having a divine connection.  He believes he is speaking with God himself.  Many spiritual people like this man have 'religious experiences' like this on a day to day basis.  Whether or not people actually speak with God, or Buddha, or who ever, nobody knows the truth except for that particular individual, and the god whom he or she is praying and conversing to.

Pascal's Wager:
Does God Exist? Does he not exist? Does he help us get through struggles? Does he have nothing to do with us getting past hardships?  No one has any definite answer to any of these questions which is what Pascal's Wager is all about.  Isn't the green question mark just beautiful for this topic?

The Argument from 'Degrees of Perfection':
Everything is labeled on a scale from lame to perfect.  That sounds a bit harsh, but it's entirely true.  Than, there are things that can't be ladled.  God, according to his followers, can not be labeled.  He is perfect.  He can not be more perfect.  Just like these block shapes.  They can not fit any more perfectly into their selected little holes.  

The Argument From Aesthetic Experience:
1.) Look at this kid.  He's a talented young violinist.
2.) Is his talent God given? Or did his talent just happen?
3.) Is this boy lucky, or was he given a great work ethic and desire to improve his violin skills?
According the Aesthetic Experience this young boy has all these attributes, and they were handed to him by God.

The Argument From Miracles:
This is in interesting photograph.  It may seem dark, but it really isn't.  Let's say this man's name is Steve.  Maybe Steve is a fluke of a person.  Maybe he's a drug addict.  Well, according to most people, flukes like Steve are going to need miracles in order to escape their miserable lives.  Maybe a miracle as ridiculous as a dolphin flying in the sky.  Who knows? The point is that miracles seem impossible, but they are actually plausible - not likely to happen, but that's all up to God - thus the power of miracles is right in God's hands.  Hopefully, people like Steve will find their flying dolphin, so they can get on the right path and live their life as good as can be.

The 'Design' Argument:
Our universe was designed by an intellectual.  This is a picture that illustrates God's mind.  As we can see a lot is going on in that brain.  This brain can hold infinite memories, facts, and everything else possible and imaginable.  God knows all, he has to know all, and that is how he was able to create the Earth's existence.

The Argument From Time and Contingency:
There is only one being.  Nothing else has to be, and furthermore in accordance to this article nothing is in being.  No one except for God, and this is a picture of God.  Needless to say, there has to be one who is existing otherwise there would literally be nothing.

The Argument From Change:
This is a photograph of people walking in a city, and as we can see they are in a hurry.  It's a visual representation of people having desires to change - change their current positions to go elsewhere which is why they are walking so quickly.  According to The Argument From Change nothing changes.  Desires may come along, like people wanting to move from one place to the other, but nothing actually changes itself. 

Guam sheet for proof of "The Argument from Degrees of Perfection"

      The goal of this activity was to gain a more definite understanding of God and religion as a whole. My group studied the "Arguments of Degrees of Perfection".


       From this article we learned that everything in this world is labeled on some scale - from rotten to perfect.  Whether it's a pet or a person or even a painting, every little thing and every single person is judged.  Everyone except for God.  God is the only being who is perfect.  God can not be any better than he already is.  Nobody else has that power because everyone, other than God, is labeled on different degrees of perfection.  Then, there's God, and he is perfection.

The Quest for God Blog Question #1

Where do I ‘see’ or ‘experience’ God?:


          I have experienced a connection with God in several ways especially since the passing of my best friend, Tyler.  I asked God of one thing -- to make sure Tyler is no longer angry, to give Tyler eternal happiness in his afterlife.  The entire week after his death the sky was blue, the weather was amazingly warm, and the birds were chirping with joy.  I don't know if I'm crazy or if this was a sign, but somewhere in my heart I truly believe that God granted my request, and now my best friend is watching over me as my guardian angel, and he has come to his eternal happiness.  Rest In Peace Tyler Joseph De Martini.

Unit 1: Moral Vision: Reflective Essay: Prompt 1 "Hustling"

          Although I call myself a good sport I often hustle people.  I'm always competing with my friends and family.  My personal hustle manifesto consists of several things:

            I frequently hustle my dad because he is one of my role models.  I like to compare myself to him because I want to be just as good a man as him but even better.  It may sound selfish that I want to be better than my father, but really it is a compliment to him.  Whenever my dad makes fun of me for saying something stupid I say in a joking way, "at least my high school grade point average is higher than yours was."  Obviously grades have nothing to do with intelligence, but the fact that I even bother to compete with my dad in the first place proves that I think very highly of him.

          I also hustle my friends on a day to day basis.  My best friend and I are always competing when it comes to grades, working out, playing video games, and pretty much everything else imaginable.  We don't hustle each other in a negative way; it is completely positive and healthy.  By hustling him I am motivated to perform better in school, become stronger and more intelligent, and just overall improve my skills in all categories.

          Needless to say, the art of hustling is quite significant in my life.  Some say it's not good to compete with others, but I completely disagree.  Without competition I would not be motivated to perform tasks to the best of my ability, and furthermore life would be boring.