Comments on my essay?

michaelzhu93
Fri, 30 Sep 2011 12:27:56 +0000

Hey guys, what score out of 6 would you give the following essay?

Prompt: Is it important to question the ideas and decisions of peopl ein positions of authority?

Essay:

As children, we were constantly surrounded by the mantra “Nobody is perfect.” Sometimes, that “nobody” inclludes authority. Would human civilization ever progress if we always blinding follow authority? Expamples from history, literature, and science all demonstrate that sometimes we can only make progress through challenging authority.
The story of Mohandas Gandhi epitomizes the potential benefits of thinking for ourselves. In the face of Britain’s global dominance, Gandhi questioned India’s British dependence. Using strategy civil disobedience called satyagahra, he inspired hundreds of millions of Indians to fight for independence. He even led a 250 mile Dandi Salt March in protest of unfair taxation. Gandhi’s protestations against British authority ultimately led to the liberation of an entire people.

The importance of questioning authority is also prevalent in literature. In “1984”, Geoge Orwell depicts the consequences of dogmatic belief in authority. Winston Smith lives in Oceania, a post-modern dystopia dominated by governmental control. Everybody around WInston fails to think for themselves, blindly devoting themselves to the Party and Big Brother, and in doing so they lose their individuality. “1984” demonstrates the importance of questioning authority by demonstrating what would happen if we don’t.

Finally, science is driven by skepticism. In science, you can’t prove anything is wrong; you can only disprove theories and propose new hypotheses. For example, Galileo and Copernicus revolutionized science by suggesting a heliocentric solar system, not geocentric as proposed by the Church. In doing so, they revolutionized science, opening the way for others like Kepler to expand our knowledge of the world around us.
Close inspection of history, literature, and science demonstrate that we should eschew dogmatic belief in authority.


(Length: fills 2 pages completely.) Any comments are appreciated! I already see a lot of ways to improve this thing.

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