Nan Thinks Therefore She Is

"There is no limit to the power of the thought current you can attract to you nor limit to the things that can be done through the individual by it. In the future some people will draw so much of the higher quality of thought to them, that by it they will accomplish what some would call miracles. In this capacity... lies the secret of what has been called 'magic."

~ Prentice Mulford (1834-1891)

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By George, I think I’ve got it! Err…maybe. I think.

In Chapter 33 of “The Education of Henry Adams,” I begin to comprehend the conclusion of Adams’ “education.” Much like the film “The Secret” and top-selling book “The Attractor Factor,” it appears that Adams stumbled across the “meaning of all existence” during his life’s education. A couple of doctrines similarly parallel Adam’s theory: “I think, therefore I am” and “mind over matter,” meaning essentially “he [man] is the sum of the forces that attract him” (Adams 358).

Man serves as the attracting force of nature, drawing every nuance of life to him like a magnet. We are each comprised of a series of compounding moments involving people, places, things, thoughts – each having an integral role in shaping the very core of who we are right down to the tiniest of particles, dictating the very life we live, shaping our next step, forming our next thought. According to Adams, “…all these forces formed his thought, induced his action, and even shaped his figure” (358).

Thus solves the mystery of Adams’ dynamic theory. I hope.

The Meaning of Education

It took me awhile to figure out how to post, everything is in Spanish and my knowledge of Spanish verbs is extremely rusty.
Because I haven’t been in class for the discussions this book has been a little bit more difficult for me to grasp. One thing that I did notice was the importance of education in the book. Education appears to mean different things and doesn’t necessarily mean formalized education. It seems to mark chapters in Adams’ life. The first chapter in his life seemed to be marked by the times he spent with this grandfather and the education that he received from him. That chapter in his life ended when his grandfather died. The Free Soil Party was the next major Influence on Henry’s education and helped to prepare him later in life. One thing I found that was interesting was the overall tone of Chapter3; I found it interesting that Adam’s felt that he hadn’t really been educated. I felt his thoughts may have been due to the end result of the snowball fight and the deal that the members of the Free Soil Party made to support a pro-slavery candidate. When Henry finally receives formalized education he rejects it and finds it intolerable. His descriptions of Harvard were hard for me to believe because we hold Harvard to such high standards now. It also seems as though the narrators standards are extremely high stating that what they completed in four years he could have done in one month. After finishing this chapter and reading that Henry still claimed not to know anything I realized that education stood for something more and that it didn’t necessarily mean “education” in the traditional sense but instead referred to life lessons which is also seen in the later chapters. After coming to that realization the beginning chapters made more sense, now I believe that when he was talking about Harvard he meant that it wasn’t preparing him for the real world.

Henry Adams

The Law of Acceleration was a hard chapter for me to understand. I don't really understand the relevance of this section, maybe I missed it. Also, I noticed that he never seems to have a smooth transitions from one idea to the next. He starts out the chapter talks about images, then switches to motions, coal output and it goes on. I think this sort of speaks to the stream of conscience we talked about in class. Something that just caught my eye from this chapter was the first sentence. I hope we can try and talk through this. Adams writes, "Images are not arguments, rarely even lead to proof, but the mind craves them, and, of late more than ever, the keenest experimenters find twenty images better than one, especially if contradictory; since the human mind has already learned to deal in contradictions." I never thought of images as arguments, I wonder what makes him say this right off? Also, I think it is important to develop a sound definition of what images are. An image could be as simple a symbol for something just how someone views something. With that said, images can help enhance your argument. The mind craves images because it brings their thoughts into perspective. I wonder why Adams brings this up because I do not really understand what he means by the image needed is a new centre. Does this mean that he is now needs an image to prove his point contradicting his first statement?

Education of the future

Well, I want to start out by saying that I was somewhat disappointed by the ending. I was waiting for this big "ah hah" moment to occur with regards to Henry Adams' education, yet their wasn't one. Or maybe their was, I just missed it between the science and history lesson he provided within his last chapters. I think the "education" that he speaks of throughout this book is not what I perceived in the beginning. It's not the education that he learned as a boy or at Harvard, but the education he is discussing means a lot more. One thing I understood is that this education is a constant thing. It is lifes lessons as well as the history that we, and those that have lived before us have been through. His ending was quite blurry to me and he made a bunch of references to various individuals and time periods- yet I didn't fully understand the relevenace of his ramblings. I thought it was interesting how a lot of the predictions he made, looking back from our generation, proved to be true. In order to understand the force, and dynamic he speaks of, we need to take our minds outside of our current time period and understand the period he was living in. I do believe that man and nature work together and have for centuries, something that he touches upon. Without this force, where would we be today? We would not have progressed what so ever, and he incorporated those examples of Rome as well as the other time periods as an example (also- mentions scientific advancement as another example). He was living during an era that was flourishing with a bunch of technological advancements as well as scientific. Furthermore, he touches upon the future. I found this somewhat of a surprise because in the beginning of the book, he is so drawn by the 18th century and he thinks of himself as a boy from that time period; evrything that appealed to him was from that era. However, in the end he is more focused on the future. He doesn't seem to be stuck in that old century anymore- I could be wrong though because we did not read other parts. However, this future that he speaks of - he speaks of it in a historical context. He wishes he could live one day in the future with some of his fellow friends that have passed, possibly to see the advancements that that generation would have produced. In sum, I think he was presenting a message that each generation advances, and he speculates what will happen in the future, and if those in the future will be able to keep up on the same level. Meanwhile, will the future generation make the same mistakes? History does have a way of repeating itself, and can we truly go forward without looking back? (After trying to re-read these final chapters, I am still completely and utterly baffled).

Religion vs Science?

To be honest, I was reading on autopilot for most of the chapters and sadly didn't look into as many of his points as I should have. I happened to finish our reading yesterday so I wouldn't have to read anything tonight. Yet, from our class discussion and fear of failing another reading quiz, I realized the value of looking deeper into this book and decided to reread the last two chapters. In the previous few chapters, Adams seems to be pinning the new world's point of view through science versus the old one, mostly seen as the Church. Yesterday, I first thought him to stating that to be religious was in a way to be ignorant. As if, there was no use for religion in this new century for it was outdated and one must look for new education in the world of science. Though, some may view religion as a way of ignorance that is not Adams' point.
On page 359 he writes "Man always made, and still makes, grotesque blunders in selecting and measuring forces, taken at random from the heap, but he never made a mistake in the value he set on the whole, which he symbolized as God". He reminds me of my mom who when she was in her early teens went to church because it was what you did if you lived in Hollywood, SC and came from the Green family. Yet when she began to question God and her parents, they had no idea how to answer. They just said Church was important because that's what they were told to do and she just had to do it. She soon rebelled and refused to go to church all together since they couldn't give her a legitimate reason to go, also because the church was basically the town's Moulin Rouge. Later, she discovered the Church again but because of how she felt it was important to her and for her own reasons not "just because".
I feel this is Adams' point. He is not bashing religion, the belief in science, or evolution but stating that the mistake is to hold those things high without knowing what is holding it up. No man or woman can make a mistake if he or she knows the value and the reason behind their support or belief in something. He, in a way, implies not all men will have the same education because all will have different life experiences as well as different values and reasons for the way they live their lives.

For me, the Education of Henry Adams has been quite the journey - the first reading assignment we had was painful (no offense), but as we have proceed further into the autobiography, it has become more clear that his intentions were to reveal the different stages and experiences of his life, and his "education" is way of saying "life events." He also used humor in the book that we can now appreciate more that wasn't too noticeable earlier on. The book is unlike anything I've ever read because of the perspective of his autobiography. As we discussed in class, he doesn't use the first person point of view, rather he uses third person to get his point across. This, we concluded, was to retract himself from the situations and this outlook makes his opinions seem not so bias. It also makes it seem more like a story than an autobiography - this also makes it seem like he's telling the story about different people. For example, he calls himself "Henry," "The boy," "the Student," etc, so it creates a different feeling, like a tale, rather than a timeline of events. This completely alters the perspective because it makes the reader not feel as if they are reading a boring summary of someone's life, rather there is a plot. Overall, I've gained more respect /enjoyed it more the further we get into it.

Adams reading assignments

Sorry again about class today. Here are the reading assignments for Adams:

Wednesday: Ch. 4; pg. 157-159 of Ch. 14; Ch. 25 (these were originally assigned for today); Ch. 29, Ch. 31

Thursday: Chs. 33-35

See you tomorrow!