<p>Have modern advancements truly improved the quality of people’s lives?</p>
<pre><code>On the eve of the American Revolution over two hundred and fifty years ago, the celebrated American writer Thomas Paine remarked that the current technological achievements of the time – the Industrial Revolution was just beginning – would soon mark a new and awesome chapter in human history, a time of great simplification and prosperity. Indeed, his words have sounded through the generations, and never before have they held any more truth; modern advancements have truly and greatly improved our quality of life. Martin Grosse and Ceraria pay testament to this universal truth.
Martin Grosse was the leader of the African nation of Ceraria for a great many years during the late twentieth century. A very antiquated man, he greatly opposed any change. He argued that modern advancements would ultimately destroy the world. The United Nations and most of the Western world tried to modernize the country, but Martin Grosse stubbornly opposed any such measures. However, suddenly and rapidly in 1997, a great epidemic ravaged the countryside. Thousands of farmers died to this deadly plague of the so-called Morocco Fever, carried by mosquitoes from the large swamps of the area. Finally, the nation was ripped apart and over half the people died, including Martin. It seemed to all outsiders that that country in Africa would surely be ghostly empty and totally devoid of people within a matter of months.
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<p>United Nations workers got to work immediately. They rolled internet cables through the nation and constructed large hospitals using heavy cranes and machinery. Scientists worked out a vaccine within a matter of months. Millions of people were quickly saved due to the advanced hospital equipment in this area. The country of Ceraria was eventually conquered by Sudanese rebels in 2001, but between 1997 and 2001 Ceraria was briefly one of the most technologically advanced and heavily invested areas in the world. Due to new technological innovations, the once ancient Ceraria, far behind its time, was saved from utter destruction. Modern advancements helped improve the quality of life in the country that had for so long stuck in the horrific quality of life of the middle ages. </p>
<p>Indeed, my father was one of the workers in Ceraria. He claimed that in Ceraria the workers had been treated as heroes. He had met one family in particular from the capital city of Mopolis – he had singlehandedly seen their progress from farmers using iron sickles and tools to farmers using tractors and machinery that had increased outputs at least 10 times. Modern advancements made life so much easier for everyone. Although it is true that family had to grapple with gasoline and other things he had never seen before, the family agreed that the iron age had long passed, and that the new age of prosperity was finally upon the entire country.</p>
<p>In conclusion, technological advancements have truly improved our quality of life. Ceraria and its citizens serve to exemplify this undeniable fact. In fact, in the broader world in the past 100 years, life spans have doubled, billions of people now have clean, running water without cholera or other maladies, and now millions of people can rest at night knowing that their diseases and afflictions will not kill them as the diseases had done only a few years before. Who knows what lies in the next 100 years?</p>
<p>Can people have too much enthusiasm?</p>
<pre><code>Over two hundred and fifty years ago, on the very eve of the American Revolution, the famous American writer Thomas Paine proclaimed in October 1775 that enthusiasm for the American Revolution must not be extreme, lest blind fanaticism occur. Indeed, while Thomas Paine was speaking in a time of great patriotism for a cause that he supported, his words still ring true today; it is possible to have too much enthusiasm, and too much enthusiasm may be detrimental to the very cause one has enthusiasm for. The 1989 Revolution of Ceraria exemplifies this universal truism.
The people of the African nation of Ceraria had been chronically suppressed by the dictatorial Communist regime in the country. In 1989, while the students in Beijing, China, were beginning to gather and while other Communist regimes were beginning to collapse elsewhere, the people of Ceraria finally began speaking out against Communism’s treachery. First, they did so peacefully, through protests and movements. Eventually, full-blown civil war occurred as a high general from the Communists defected and announced that he would lead the rebels. Most of the people in Ceraria were enthusiastic and backed the rebels. The Western world was also anxious for the downfall of Ceraria’s regime, so that one of the last Communist countries would fall and Democracy would be instituted. England, France, and the United States supplied the rebels with massive amounts of weapons and supplies. The rebels quickly gained ground on the capital. However, in a drastic twist of fate, fanaticism among the people and deep hatred for the Communists sharply escalated. Enthusiasm was so great that the rebels had sick and despicable practices – for example, they would even cook the brains of some Communist soldiers and eat them to show the rebels’ superiority, and some would pile coal on the prisoners and set the entire pile aflame to show their hatred for the Communists and their support for their own cause.
Reports of such atrocities reached the major Western countries. “London For Cannibalism,” read one newspaper headline. “What a dramatic irony that the center for civilization in all of the world would support brain-eaters,” reported a columnist. One by one, the Western countries demanded an end to these practices. Unfortunately, enthusiasm was so high, fanaticism and extremism so pervasive, that any cry for mercy for the Communists seemed heretic and like treason to the rebels. Eventually, all the countries stopped supporting the rebels. The rebels lost ground, and the last rebel surrendered in 1991 to the Communists.
In conclusion, extremely high amounts of enthusiasm backfired on the rebels in Ceraria. While anyone should approach a just cause with support, extremism must be avoided. For any cause to escalate into extremism may quickly backfire and ultimately cause the downfall of the cause. In fact, a study conducted by Harvard University recently announced that 78% of the bills in Congress approached with overwhelming and even fanatical support from the public failed to reach the President’s desk.
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<p>Are people more likely to be productive and successful when they ignore the opinions of others?</p>
<pre><code>“To look at what others have to say,” Gandhi once said, “is to be successful.” Indeed, his words still ring true even today; people are more successful and productive once they consider the opinions of others. To ignore the opinion of others, one invites frustration and disaster. The dilemma of famous mathematician Fromanski pays testament to this universal truism.
Fromanski was born in Poland in 1732 to wealthy and successful doctors. Fromanski admired and was intrigued by science and mathematics as a child; a precocious child, he had already moved to Oxford to study mathematics by age 16. He perfected the earlier mathematics of Newton in college and, by the time he was 30, had written numerous mathematics books. He was exalted by the King George III and was promoted to the Head of Mathematics at Oxford University. He was an extremely proud but reclusive man who held himself in high regard and worked for ten hours every day on mathematics, stopping only to eat and on Christmas. Eventually, at age 45 he found himself on the verge of a major scientific discovery – he had, after all, begun studying biology a few years ago at age 38 and had already made many minor discoveries. He had discovered that a certain kind of copepod, an extremely tiny predatory marine creature that feeds on plankton, would emit oxygen atoms when agitated in a certain way. This major discovery was to change all that was currently known about how those copepods worked, and it was to answer a number of questions on how fish in general in the ocean worked. Unfortunately, he was met with a puzzling error – his studies almost directly contradicted with the work of an earlier scientist, Abramovitch. Fromanksi locked himself in the room for days on end, refusing to speak with anyone, reviewing his calculations again and again, analyzing the copepod under his microscope again and again. He disregarded the opinions of anyone that dared question his process – he was, after all, Fromanski, perfector of the Fromanski Calculus. His problem seemed to be answerless. Everything that he had done and everything that Abramovitch had done seemed to be correct; Fromanski even raised the possibility that science was fundamentally flawed.
After almost a month of frustration, Fromanski’s aide Sally secretly gave his work to another scientist, Horovitch. Horovitch began speaking with many of the other scientists at Oxford. He walked around the university, speaking and digesting all the material and input he received from other scientists. Within a few days Horovitch solved the problem; the other scientists had hinted that perhaps there was no problem after all, and that turned out to be correct. Both Abramovitch and Fromanski’s conclusions had been correct. They did not, as Fromanski claimed, contradict each other.
Through considering the opinions of others, Horovitch solved a problem that had frustrated preeminent scientist Fromanski for weeks; in fact, Fromanski’s refusal to consider anyone else’s opinions to be correct invited failure and frustration for weeks. In conclusion, people are not more likely to be successful when they block out the opinion of others from their minds. In fact, doing so is detrimental to success and productivity. After all, a study conducted by Harvard University in 1990 revealed that less than 1% of current scientific theories resulted from the efforts of only 1 person. In fact, over 98% of accepted theories resulted from collaboration, the open sharing of ideas and opinions from a group of people.
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