Prompts and Outline for Monday's Piece

Here is the outline I distributed in class, in case you decide to change your topic.

Here are the prompts that you could use for Monday.  Keep in mind that you can take any quote from the class packet or the "Worrier Warrior" article and build an argument off of that.

• According to Jean Paul Sartre, “Man is nothing else than his plan…he is therefore nothing else than the ensemble of his acts.”  What is your take on this quote?
• Are we the sum of what we have chosen to do in life, or is there something else going on?
• According to Jean Paul Sartre, “The full responsibility of [man’s] existence rest[s] on him.”  What is your take on this quote?
• Does this seem right or do you want to attribute responsibility for how you have turned out to other people, circumstances, experiences etc.?
• Sartre appears to believe that we always have a choice to accept or reject the influence of something on us.  What is your take on this concept?  Do we have a choice as to how we react to the people and things in our lives that could influence us?
• How have your choices created the person you are today?
• In your own experience, how much influence do parents have on their kids?
• Do your parents work with your “innate tendencies”?
• Do you and your parents agree on what high school you should go to?  Why or why not?
• Do you and your parents agree on your ideas for what career you’d like to pursue?  Why or why not?
• How “like” your parents are you?  Are you more like one parent than another?  Are you a combination?  Why is this significant?
• Do your parents treat you and your siblings differently?  Why?  Do you think this can be explained by genetic factors (or “inherent” personality)?
• Do you have any personality traits that you think were reinforced, changed, or subdued by your parents, friends, experiences etc.?  What does this prove?

Write a response to the "Worrier vs. Warrior" article

• Are you a worrier or a warrior? Somewhere in between?
• Write an essay in which you refute the worrier/warrior concept altogether.
• Write about members of your family as worriers or warriors: where you do think you get your traits from?
• Write about the effect of testing or grades on you:  think of SPECIFIC anecdotes/stories that show the reader how you felt, rather than just telling us about it.

Write a response to the ideas we've discussed this week (Rousseau, Hobbes, SPE, Milgram, etc.)

• How do you think you would you have acted had you been a participant in the Milgram or SP experiments? 
• How would you explain the results of the SP and Milgram experiments?  Why did people do what they did?
• How does civilization affect humanity?  Are we better off with it?  Worse off?  Both?  Neither?
• Why do “good” people do “bad” things?
• Write a response to Nietzsche's concept of the "Will to Power":
• What do people most want in the world?  Is there one essential thing that we all want?
• What do teenagers most want?  Adults?  Kids?  Is there a difference?  
• What do girls most want in life? Boys?  Is there a difference?
• Analyze how, if at all, money and power are related.