In Jean-Paul Sartre's Existentialism, he speaks of two different types of existence. These are "essence before existence" and "existence before essence." "Essence before existence" is when something is created because it already serves a purpose. For example, when Eli Whitney created the cotton gin, it already served a purpose therefore it was created. Sartre argues that humans, on the other hand, is an example of "existence before essence." He says that humans did not serve a purpose before they were created.  
In Steven Hawking's Is Everything Determined, Hawking questions whether or not everything is already pre-determined. After arguing both sides of pre-determination, whether or not it exists or not, Hawking decides that everything is already determined but he expands on how and why everything is pre-determined. He says that although everything is pre-determined, humans are not aware of that of which is already determined. Things can alter the already pre-determined such as free-will.

I agree with Stephen Hawking, partially because I grew up in a Christian private school my entire life. I believe that everything is already pre-determined, because there is a God, although the already pre-determined path can be altered due to the fact that God gave humans free-will. I do not agree with Sartre, because I believe that humans did a serve a purpose before creation, therefore they do not follow underneath the category of "existence before essence."

existentialism in our lives

In the two essays “Is Everything Determined?” and “Existentialism” the authors discuss about the debate of whether our lives a predetermined or if everything happens spur of the moment and nothing is to be expected. In Jean-Paul Sartre’s essay “Existentialism” she argues that existentialism exists and she states that “if existence really does precede essence, man is responsible for what he is.” She wants her readers to be aware of what existentialism exactly is, since it can be a confusing subject to many people who may have not ever heard of it before. She engages the reader into her argument by illustrating her points into something we can understand. In Stephen Hawking’s essay “Is Everything Determined?” he ponders the question about whether everything is meant to be or whether it isn’t. He opens up everyone’s eyes by stating “I now turn to the third problem, the questions of free will and responsibility for our actions. We feel subjectively that we have the ability to choose who we are and what we do.” He is questioning the idea that we are all free to do whatever we want in this world and choose to be whoever we want to be. This may be true in America, but it is not true in every country. So was it predetermined that America was going to be the advanced country with freedom today, when there are countries struggling such as Guatemala? The wrap up to Hawkins essay states that yes, existentialism exists, “but it might as well not be, because we can never know what is determined.” In my personal opinion, I am on board with Hawkins essay, the idea that yes some things are determined by God, but that we are also free beings who can change the plan with our own actions.

Are we responsible for our fate?

Jean Paul- Sartre introduces an approachable description of “Existentialism”. According to, Jean Paul- Sartre a major key idea to existentialism and human conditions is that ‘existence precedes essences”. The extract of something is the deliberate meaning. In “Existentialism” the idea that we “make” who and what we are is introduced. It’s important that we take the responsibility to be aware of who we are. Sartre over all point is “Existentialism is nothing else than an attempt to draw all the consequences of a coherent atheistic position. It isn’t trying to plunge man into despair at all.” In “Everything Determined” Stephen Hawking discusses the ties of fate and God’s work along with free will. Throughout the essay, he talks about free will and rather or not we should be punished for our actions.  Sartre says that we are responsible for our actions, while Hawking’s argues that God or science is the reason for our actions. I agree with both. However, I strongly agree with Sartre point more. God and fate may be responsible for some of our actions, but WE primarily choose which ones we use. We are given many options not just one, which leaves us the responsibility to choose the route we want to take. Every action we take a consequence follows. For example, a convicted murder serving a jail sentence is in jail because of the actions they chose to take. We live in a “free” world so everything is a choice. Earning a degree is an option. We often tend to forget that it’s an option because we are told it’s the “only” option. We all chose to attend college and we were responsible for our decisions. College isn’t for everyone therefore, others made the decision to do something else. My point is everyone is responsible for their actions. Other factors may determine where we may end up due to the choices WE make, but primarily we are responsible for ourselves and our actions.

      In “Existentialism” and "Is Everything Determined" they both seem to revolve around the idea  of how humanity lives its lives and how we can have a great deal of where fate takes us.  The essay Is everything Determined kind of goes into the question of whether human control their fate or is it created by God and the author, Stephen Hawking, references the play Julius Caesar. He also goes on to talk about how humanity's aggression might play a factor in how humanity's fate. At the end of the article he says everything is determined.  .  In Existentialism the author, Jean-Paul Sartre says that there is no determination what so ever because humanity is ruled by fate and circumstance. The authors are saying that we should live our lives the way that we feel they should be lived but we all have the right to a difference in our opinions. I agree more with the fact that everything is determined because I believe that God has a set plan for all of us and that He has a plan for each and every single one of us because we're created by Him. This explains why things happen the way we do because it's God's plan taking form and motion, as someone very wise once said "when things seem like they're falling apart they could really be falling into place", and although I do not know who came up with this quote I very much agree with it because I've experienced it firsthand many times throughout my life.

Bewilderment & Our Life - Caronina Reyes

From the very interesting readings, my definition of bewilderment would be, the way humans are unfazed, unmoved, baffled and unresponsive to a certain situation or a specific experience.

Certainty is based on how well we know and are confident about something. From the readings author Edward Abbey and Fanny Howe use certainty as simply a concept of life. Abbey uses it in his essay “The Serpents of Paradise” of how certain the many animals live. From how they look, lay down and even crawl. He is very specific with the snake, and even calls it a “snake story.” Even stooping down to its own level of life. In “Bewilderment”, Howe only uses the concept of her public or known life as the certainty in it. She explains that her public life is certain because it is basically what she wants to show the public and what she knows she is displaying to them. These authors ideas of certainty lead back to my opinion of it, how by being certain we know how well and how confident we are about something. This is necessary in our lives because it creates a mode of satisfaction for our brains and even our heart. I believe that having a concept of certainty in our life provides us with relief. We are able to be certain with our actions, our tests, our mind, our answers and our lives.
Bewilderment is necessary in our life because of the act of surprise. The true definition of bewilderment is that it is “a state of being confused and puzzled.” Bewilderment means not understanding, but it goes way beyond that, it implies a state of complete mystification. People experience bewilderment when they are utterly baffled by the situation at hand. This bafflement either includes complete shock, daze, no words, anger, or sadness. However bafflement can also include positive emotions such as, amazement or surprise. An example of negative bafflement is death of a loved one, an example of a positive bafflement is an engagement. Examples of bafflement in the essays are the fact that the narrator in “The Serpents of Paradise” lives in the desert, living day to day with surprises from the local animals, while in “Bewilderment”, the author simply wants bewilderment to not be a state of mind from which she wishes herself released. Rather, for it to be “an enchantment that follows a complete collapse of reference and reconcilability.” Howe simply wants for bewilderment to be her life, she doesn’t want life to be certain.  Howe’s essay doesn’t just acknowledge the confines of logic, but her essay explores the potential inbred layers of multiplicities, complications, and contradictions of our life.

Which of my senses is the most/least trustworthy

After reading How We Listen, and listening to Colors I feel like my least trustworthy sense would be ophthalmoception, which is sight. I believe this because when i see something my eyes can be interpreting this in a completely different aspect from someone else who is looking at the same object. Even if we discuss what we see, their view of this can still be completely different. We can be looking at the same object and only recognize the colors we are each able to see and our entire life we've only known the colors we have been able to see. Even if they're wrong in our eyes, we don't really know.  Someone else can possibly see much more or much less of that object depending on their color deception. Just the fact that some people are born without being able to see at all makes me wonder... However, I think my strongest sense, or most trustworthy, would be tactioception, which is touch. I think this because no matter if l am blind or not, we will all be able to feel exactly what a figure is like physically. Sometimes it might take longer to realize what a figure was like physically, if you were blind, but that just depends on the shape, texture and a few other things. Regardless of what the shape of this item is, I can still figure out if this object is smooth, rough, hot, cold, or even pleasant and painful. 

Most and Least Trustworthy

In the radio lab "Colors" and the short essay "How We Listen" by Aaron Copland I think the most trustworthy out of our five senses would be our sight and our least trustworthy would be our hearing. In reading "Colors" Copland talks about how when we listen to music there are three separate planes to which each person may or may not listen on. He lists these planes as the sensuous plane, the expressive plane, and the sheerly musical plane. He later goes on to talk about how when some people listen to music they aren't really listening because when they listen to the music their mind takes them to a place where it is easier to dream. Not many notice this because they think that by listening to the music they are able to be expressive which they aren't really doing because they aren't listening to the music. In truth are tuning out the music that is tuning out the world around them. We can listen to different and each of us get different feelings from the music. When I listened to Bach's  Well Tempered Clavichord  I could tell when the tune of the notes that were played each changed to a different feeling from sad to happy or from calm to erratic. When I asked my room mate to listen to the same piece I had listened to to her the music was just the same note the whole time she could not determine when the piece changed its tune. Our hearing is the least trustworthy of our senses because out of all the things we hear we don't all hear the same things as someone else. To someone else a song may give them a different feeling or represent something else that someone else would think was wrong. In the radio lab "Colors" they talked about colors with different people and how they each did different tests and how colors to them either had a lot or a little bit of colors. When they talked about the color they got from the sap of the tree and how when they added water to it the color would then be noticed. Behind the making of the sap though they found out that a bullet had been found in the sap that they had used. When they talked about how some women were known to be tetracolor that they may be able to see more colors than most people. When they were with the mother that was an interior designer and was able to see the little difference in the shades of cloth. She described the sky as blue but having hints of pink in it. Our sight is most trustworthy to me because we can see so many different shades of colors to some a rainbow may only have six colors but to other people it may consist of up to sixteen colors like the mantis shrimp can see. Our sight tells us when there is a change in something whether it be in weather or a change in color. So to recap our hearing is the least trustworthy because we don't always listen when we hear music or speak to  person. Our sight is the most trustworthy because even without being able to see all colors we still notice the different tints and shades in our lives.