My response to "No Exit"

"No Exit" really made me think about the concept of hell and heaven after death. The idea of forever and ever and ever is tough to grasp. We all know life ends because death comes. But once you’re dead, there is nothing else. It’s death and possibly heaven or hell. And that’s why I’m starting to see why people liked the idea of reincarnation; you supposedly get to live again. And in life, you have the whole world. You have billions of people, billions of places to go. You could even go to the moon if you really tried. But if you die and you go to hell, that’s it. It’s you in a room forever, with nothing to look forward to. You can’t tell yourself you’ll move to another city or country or switch jobs or go on a great vacation. It’s just you and the room forever and ever. And maybe some people to torture you.

After finishing "No Exit," I was reminded of a scene from this movie, "Setup." A group of friends tries to steal a diamond, but there’s betrayal and revenge and so on. Anyways, in the movie someone is wondering about why there is good and evil in the world. They come to the conclusion that God created good and evil so that humans can choose between the 2 extremes because they have free will. If all was perfect, then we’d already be in heaven. Both “No Exit” and this scene make it seem as if heaven really is perfect. And then that made me think about whether you’re guaranteed that heaven is better. What if all your favorite people in the world go to hell and you somehow manage to go to heaven? I know I would not be able to fully enjoy what heaven has to offer if I knew I wasn't ever going to see my favorite people ever again. 

In “No Exit,” they always refer to Earth as “down there,” which goes against the usual idea that hell is “down there” and heaven is “up there,” so I thought that was an interesting concept.

“No Exit” also makes it seem as though Sartre believed hell is mostly psychological torture not physical torture. It goes against the usual idea that hell is a place that’s always hot and everyone is thirsty. Maybe that wasn’t hell for Garcin, Inez, and Estelle, which is why their hell is them being stuck in a room with each other. Which makes me wonder whether my hell would be psychological or physical torture. Hopefully I won’t have to find out. 

A Direction the Class Needs

I like the way our class is going. This is one of my classes that is actually affecting me. It's not something stupid like calculus, because honestly I am never ever going to major in math or become a mathematician or architect or engineer or some other job that requires math like calculus. I'm still not sure as to why I took that class. Anyways, in this class I've honestly learned so many philosophical ideas and I've begun to question so many things. I can see myself applying this class to real life. And not even applying it, but just completely affecting my outlook on life. I'm realizing more of who I am and what I think of life. I like when we have our big class debates because even if we don't say anything, we're still getting something out of it. I like that on days when I'm just plain tired, I can sit there and listen and I'll still learn something or change my opinion about something or even just completely reconsider something. And of course, we can always throw in our own opinions and ideas whenever we want to. I like that groupwork usually starts off a class discussion and it's not something random just to waste time; it actually helps us understand our readings and see if we're getting all the hidden meanings. I like the way this class is going. All I'd say is continue, please.

Who would Camus and Voltaire vote for?

                If Camus is slightly similar to Meursault, I think he would vote Libertarian. He thinks everything is meaningless. He doesn’t seem to care much about what each person thinks, but yet lets them think what they want and act according to that. He wouldn’t care enough to follow politics, so he’d choose Libertarians, who are the ones most likely to not interfere in his life and leave him alone to do as he pleases, because libertarians want maximum freedom, minimum government.

                Voltaire would vote Libertarian as well. The moral of Candide is that everyone should cultivate their own garden, which says that everyone shouldn’t worry about other things and working will keep them from doing bad things or being bored. Because Voltaire is basically saying that everyone should keep to their own business, Libertarians are the most similar. Libertarians want total social freedom and minimum government interference.