<p>Please grade my SAT essay. How can I improve within the span of one night before the Saturday test? It is my last attempt ever, so I must make it count. please grade the essay and offer any feed back.</p>
<p>prompt:</p>
<p>Is the way something seems to be not always the same as it actually is? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.</p>
<p>
Casual observation often leads to assumptions that are based on nothing but empirical evidence. In order to fully understand something, one must peel away the layers of the onion to closely scrutinize the subject in question. Under the eyes of the average observer the way that something seems remains unquestioned; under the eyes of a keen observer the way something seems is openly questioned. Clearly, appearances are misleading. Examples from scientific studies combined with a historical anecdote indicate that what “seems” isn’t always what it is. </p>
<p>To understand how sometimes the way something seems isn’t always what it is, take the curious case of newly discovered cognizant intelligence in Mamillian species. Long thought to be the only organisms with the capacity for critical reasoning and language, humans now must share the ranks of superior intelligence with other animal species. A recent study documented in the June 2008 issue of the Gottenburg Institute of Animal Science’s bi-quarterly journal claims that “mammals such as chimpanzees… once thought to be creatures of instinct are challenging the previous held notion that they lack intelligence. After painstaking research we have concluded that they [chimpanzees] have an advanced capability to use tools and the rudimentary basis for a language to express emotions, thoughts, and ideas.” Only after years of intense scientific study did the Gottenburg Institute discover that other advanced animals are aware of themselves within the environment. Previously, actions committed by chimps were thought to be natural instincts. Now, it is common knowledge that chimpanzees have an intelligence roughly equivalent to an eight year old human child. If it was not for the curious scientists committed to zoology at the Gottenburng Institute, humans still would remain ignorant of the very creatures that we share the earth with. By dedicating time and resources to dissecting an issue that was once thought to be common knowledge, the definition of animal intelligence has forever been changed. </p>
<p>Furthermore, one of history’s greatest mysteries was recently solved by a team of archaeologists in Guangdong China. During 11th century Song China, under magistrate Shi-Long-Wang hundreds of peasants mysteriously disappeared. Over time legend and lore of yore has skewed history into a convuluted version of really happened in the province. The disappearance was once accredited to an outbreak of the Bubonic plague, however recent archeological evidence suggests that it was a deadly strain of the h-3 virus that infects only the rice plants in the Guangdong region of China. Celebrated archaeologist Billy Jarwell went on to say “without the tools of modern science, examining the dna of the dormant virus within the rice stalk wasn’t possible. What more will we find that we previously didn’t know”? By examining the calcified remains of a peasant, traces of the deadly strain of the h-3 virus were found in the stomach of a deceased peasant. Thus, after careful observation new facts arose from once accepted fact. What more will change as technology progresses?</p>
<p>Upon examining the evidence provided by case of the disappearing peasants and the Gottenburg’s research on animal intelligence, the definition of mundane things have changed. Without careful observation, we would be living in a world that accepted fallible evidence. Yet, appearances are misleading. The age old adage “Don’t judge a book by its cover” sums up the point that what seems might not actually be. Our definition of the past, present, and future will continue to be redefined.
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chkw94
December 4, 2010, 1:09am
2
<p>This is solid.