Blog #5

Maggie Vincent

Mrs. Wilhelmus

AP English Language

5 August 2013

A Philosophic Lesson

      Jostein Gaarder made my head spin with how many philosophers he fit into 500 pages. When I finished the book I had to just sit back and mull it over for a few minutes. I could not even think about trying to dissect it yet! Even if I did not agree with every philosopher, it was wonderful to get a good overview of him or her. Philosophy had always been something I wanted to learn about and I was very glad to get the opportunity to get a history of it.

      There were a lot of philosophers in Sophie's World that I liked and agreed with. I particularly liked Socrates. The fact that he admitted he did not know anything was very humble and wise. If one goes through life thinking they know everything, then he or she is bound to get a very rude awakening. Socrates prepared for everything in knowing that he knew nothing. I also liked the fact that he taught Plato, who then taught Aristotle. The fact that three great minds were all connected is fascinating. It is even better that they disagreed with each other! 

      The moment I read Karl Marx's name I started disagreeing with him. As someone that lives in a capitalist nation, everything he said went against what I thought. I immediately realized that I was not being very open-minded so I restarted the chapter about Marx. No matter how hard I tried to be open minded about his ideas, I just could not get past what I knew about communism. Communism looks great on paper. However, in practice, it has not worked out well for communist nations. I was very glad to get a better understanding of Marx's ideas but I simply do not agree with him.

      At the beginning of the book Sophie was poised to bury herself deep in the rabbit's fur. After she started learning about philosophy she realized this and started climbing to the top of the rabbit's fur. I was in the very same position as Sophie. I thought I had decided where I stood with my beliefs and that was that. Sophie's World taught me how to ask important questions and how to think about them. I got so many different philosophic views that I found that I had my own opinion as soon I started reading about each philosopher. It was not until the end that I realized I had started climbing back up the rabbit's fur. Hopefully I will continue this path and remain at the top.