"Seeing is of course very much a matter of verbalization. Unless I call my attention to what passes before my eyes, I simple won’t see it."
To do this well, be sure you include your perspective, what you understanding in her text. You also should consider the specifics, the images and examples that she uses. Examine a few of these images and examples and consider their location, structure, and meaning. Be sure you use quoted evidence from her text in this work.
Please read the responses your peers post and feel free to directly respond to their ideas as well (as long as you include their name). Your response should be a 2-3 paragraphs long.
The birds that the author mentioned when she went out to investigate the racket were somehow a great illustration of how people ignored small things in their daily lives. There are hundreds of birds on the Osage orange and the birds almost make up the Osages’ appearance. But people still miss the point of finding it out and if the author just looked at the tree in a long distance instead of coming up and took a clearer observation the amazing scene that hundreds of birds flew away from the tree in all directions would be hardly being seen.
ReplyDeleteAnd the people who were born to be sight-disabled are a good example of how differently they acted after regaining their sight when they underwent the surgery compared with those sight people. They had a hard but fabulous experience when they were adjusting to their whole new surroundings after being able to see. Their perspective of looking upon the world were so different and refreshing that it was like a blow to all those people who were so lucky to have their capability of seeing from their birth but do not use best of the ability. We are blessed with the ability to perceive the world in a more colorful way but gradually we start to lose the sensitiveness to be aware of everything around because we got so used to our vision sense that we always take it for granted. Those inability people taught us to be always appreciated, to be always sensitive and acute to our own lives.
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ReplyDeleteIn Dillard’s writing, she mainly talks about ways of seeing and not seeing. We see the world with the help of experience, with knowledge as well as with feelings, which constitute two ways of seeing – one is the naturally obvious and the other is the artificial one, just like the images of walking with a camera or not. However, at times, we cannot see. Since there exists darkness and sometimes, too much light just prevent us from seeing the world in a much clearer and a more concentrated way. While being blind is the other way of not seeing. Therefore, those newly sighted people see the world in a quite different from the past. And such image delivers message that meanings of the world change via different ways of seeing and those people remind us how beautiful the world is.
ReplyDeleteTo see the world is not only limited to seeing the world with feelings, the knowledge or experience, it’s a way to dig out the world with your own ideas and do not take everything for granted, so that you won’t dismiss or ignore a lot. The image of the secret depicted by Dillard is a high priced pearl, which may be found, but may not be sought, which means that once we see the world with heart and care about the details, then we’ll see something really matters.
CAN KNOWLEDGE HAVE A POSSITIVE EFFECT IN SEEING?
ReplyDeleteIn her "Seeing" text, Dillard mentions that when she is in flat countries, she stays in the sunset trying to see the green ray, which is a streak of light that rises from the sun and it only appears only for about two seconds. "In flat country I watch every sunset in hopes of seeing the green ray. The green ray is a seldom-seen streak of light that rises from the sun like a spurting fountain at the moment of sunset; it throbs into the sky for two seconds and disappears. " (Dillard, SEEING).
I think that knowledge is important to be able to see and can have a great impact in what we see and the way we see things. In this image or example is very clear. If Dillard wouldn’t know that the phenomenon of the green ray actually existed, then she would never have been able to see it, so the knowledge she had and the information she had about the green ray actually helped her to be able to know at what time and where should she be and look so that she could the green ray.
Here the knowledge gave her the opportunity to see but this seeing also gave her more knowledge and it a cycle because then she will have more information and be able to see more things and all over again.
Knowledge can have a positive effect in seeing and the way we see.
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ReplyDeleteFrom Dillard’s writing, she mentioned the ideas of darkness and brightness. For instance, “If we are blinded by darkness, we are also blinded by light.” In my opinion, the meaning of them which Dillard tried to bring out, is the necessity of striking a balance between brightness and darkness when doing something or making decisions.
ReplyDeleteWhen we are in the darkness, we lack light and visibility so we cannot see. In reality, darkness is something like when we are in a dilemma, we cannot find any help by others and we do not know what we are supposed to do next. As a result, the light may solve our problem. Vicki has brought out a good idea that lights imply voices from different groups of people. The people may give some possible solutions to the problem that we are encountering. According to Dillard, “for the newly sighted, vision is pure sensation unencumbered by meaning”. She used an example of a twenty-two-old girl to support the advantages of brightness.
Nevertheless, everything is a two-edged sword. As Vicki mentioned in class, the light can help us but it may be dangerous simultaneously. According to Dillard, “I asked the patient what he could see; he answered that he saw an extensive field of light, in which everything appeared dull, confused, and in motion. He could not distinguish objects.” Indeed, when people are bombarded with too many voices (lights) come, they may get lost. The light can be overwhelming, but too many lights may cause a trouble to us. Hence, it is vital to strike a balance between brightness and darkness.
In my view, world is a combination of both subjective and objective matters. What we see reflects what the world is like in our mind. Just as Dillard said, it is all a matter of keeping my eyes open, to see the naturally obvious and construct an artificial obvious. Hence, there isn’t just one way of seeing, let alone the definitely and eternally right one.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, what we know results in what we see. That means different people see things in different perspective. It isn’t limited to an unchangeable pattern. For example, the native told the herpetologist that there weren’t snakes in the ravine. However, it turned out that the herpetologist found three bags of snakes at last. Specialists can see things hidden beneath the surface just due to more experience and knowledge. Meanwhile, what we know may also prevent us from digging out deeper and seeing things more clearly. Just as Helena said, “we tend to take everything for granted and don’t rethink or rediscover.” That’s normal in life. People are accustomed to seeing things through others’ eyes without discovering and seeking for the real facts on their own. For instance, when the author picked out the frog, she saw that it wasn’t green at all, but the color of wet hickory bark. It’s different from what the campers has told her, who were misled by the general common sense.
Secondly, what we expect influences what we see. The newly-sighted people can see trifling things more vividly and clearly because they expect this chance to bring light to their world, with curiosity and excitement. In this way, they not only keep their eyes open but also keep their mind open. They are seeing, feeling and experiencing the color-patches. They are constructing an artificial obvious. In a word, the way of seeing is various. There is no right or wrong towards the way of seeing because every mind has its own vision.
As the article mainly discusses the secret of seeing, Dillard probed into the different ways of seeing. After discuss two different ways of seeing, the author concluded that seeing in the truly way which turn back to your senses may be a waste of time. While comparing world’s spiritual geniuses to a unclear river, the important things to do are not ways of damming it. Instead of controlling them, we should see something above the muddy river itself. The author ended with “launched into the deep, and you shall see”. It reminds me of discuss between objective and subjective.
ReplyDeleteI keep thinking whether this discussion is meaningful to the problem of seeing. There is no denying that it really matters to acknowledging the world. But when it comes to the secret of seeing, Dillard compared it to the pearl of great price. Just like priceless pearl, the secret of seeing arouse human-beings’ desire to seek it continuously while most actions are meaningless. Both pearl and “seeing” are hard to find effective ways which are suitable to most of the situations. Instead of summarizing the method of “seeing”, we can only try to hone our spirit and wait for the gift of seeing. Instead of relying on objective aspect or subjective part of our minds, what we should do is forgetting ourselves and going into the realm of real which is not made up of only subjective or objective.
Annie said that the artificial obvious is hard to see. The bullfrog’s example is to support the viewpoint of why it is hard to see. Sometimes what someone told us is not really true, we had better see the world by our own sight if possible.
ReplyDeleteNot everybody is right all the time and if we want to find the truth, we should have our own thoughts instead follow what others said. Just as Annie give the bullfrog’s example, most of frogs are green, but bullfrog is not green, it is the color of wet hickory bark.
I agree with Ning Jonathan that, we should opposite of our general ideas of expecting how something will look and act. It is really helpful for people when the want to achieve something.
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ReplyDeleteIn Dillard’s writing，she discussed a lot on the ideas of darkness and brightness.One of her views is that “If we are blinded by darkness,we are also blinded by light.”
ReplyDeleteIt is true that darkness makes us fear,let us wander.We can not see anything in the darkness.If you can’t see things by appearance，let alone the kernel spirit.But even in the brightness,you may also be confused because just as Jonathan said “Too much light may also terrify people just like the darkness does.
We always can not see things clearly when their all sides come to our eyes.The world is full of temptation,we should keep a pure mind and a cool head not only to see them,but also to feel the kernel spirit of them.Seeing by your heart is more important by your eyes.
In Dillard’s writing, she mentions that ‘If we are blinded by darkness, we are also blinded by light’. In my opinion, there are several ways to comprehend this sentence.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, suddenly getting exposed to strong light may shock us so that we can not see and feel consciously. The hunter’s story serves as a good example in Dillard’s essay. ‘The sun, low in the sky, sends a glare into his eyes. The reflex from the mirror-like water hypnotizes him, he seems to be unable to move. he is completely paralyzed, he just falls and falls.’ Sometimes, we are not ready to face with tremendous changes of our life. And since we have been stay in the dim environment for too long, we just can not get used to brilliant sunshine immediately.
Secondly, light blows away darkness for us so that we can get a bright vision of the world. However, the problem is that our eyes may be blocked and deceived, which will result in a misreading and distortion of the world. What is worse, we still firmly believe in the distorted world because we see it. Actually, the more clearly we see, the more impossible for us to realize our mistake. For instance, the author’s friends believe that the frogs in the bottom of the river are green. But when she picked a frog out of the river, she found it was not in green but the color of wet hickory bark actually. The campers believe the frogs are green because they have seen that from the bank. They were misled by light.
Thirdly, strong light catches our eyes all the time and it is easy for us to ignore details that are not so shiny. For example, the moon is visible only during the night. It can't be seen in the daytime because of strong sunlight, even if it is hanging in the sky at that moment.
Lastly, light offers us a huge quantity of information and choices, which may make us confused. Like Vickey said in the class, too much light from different directions is just like voices from different people around you. You hear all of them at the same time, but you can get none of them. A great amount of information rushes into your mind and puzzles you. You can not figure out what to believe and follow.
In paragraph three, there is an example, it said there were many many birds in a big tree out of his house, but he didn’t know them for a long time. Until one day, he walked up to a tree, a hundred birds flew away. He finally found the bird. How could so many birds hide in a tree without his seeing them? He couldn’t believe it, and when he wanted to search the birds again, they’ve already flew away.
ReplyDeleteNature can reveal something, it can also conceal something. There are so many things around us, some of them might have been an important role or have great impact on your life, but, because you cannot see it, you just missed it. When you finally notice it, it is just too late. Therefore, you should keep your eyes open, and always watch your life carefully. Author use this example to prove what he said before(For nature does reveal as well as conceal: now-you-don’t-see-it, now-you-do), and lead to the topic of “keep your eyes open.”