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Julie Nguyen
Phil 8
Tuesday 3:30-6:40
Code # 11632

1. Drawing from the Star Trek metaphor, and using your own life as a template, describe three or more incidents from your life where you reacted as “Spock,” “Kirk,” and “Scotty.” Feel free to tell it in story form.
One incident in my life where I reacted as “Scotty” was the time I defended a friend. It was a small get together amongst three friends to catch up on what has happened in our lives. As we all arrived at the restaurant to have a nice dinner, one of my friends started making negative comments about my other friend’s weight. She continued the nasty commentary about her weight. My inner “Scotty” came out when I defended my distraught friend. I could not withstand the bullying so I reacted; screaming at her to stop talking negatively about her own friend.
Another incident in my life where I relate to “Spock” was when I decided to stay home to study for finals instead of going out. In the spring semester of this year, I had five finals I needed to study for. There was a music event I wanted to attend but the event was the weekend before finals. I contemplated on whether I should take the risk of losing two days of studying to attend this festival or stay home and study all weekend. I decided to stay home and use the weekend to study for the final since that was a more logically thing to do.
An example of a "Kirk" moment for me was when I came home from school and I was excited to see my dog. As I looked for my dog inside my house I noticed he wasn't there so I asked my parents if they had seen (cookie) my dog, they said he was in the back yard Using the bathroom. I went out back to go see him but noticed he wasn't there and that the side gate had been up. I was really scared and had the worst possibilities running through my mind. I immediately go out looking for him and couldn't find him till after 30 minutes. I see a white dog laying in the street and realized it was my dog, he had been hit by a car. At this moment I had a Kirk moment, I was in tears because my dog/ best friend was gone.

2. Drawing from the film, Surfing Matrix, and using our own life as a template, describe two or more incidents from your own life where you experienced an unusual coincidence. How would Bertrand Russell or a skeptic explain it rationally?
A usual coincidence that I experienced about 4 years ago was when I met my current boyfriend, I had found out that we both had the same dog breed which is a male Lhaso Apso and they both had the same birth month and only were a few days apart from each other.
Another coincidence I had about 2 years ago was when I had a dream that I got into a bad car accident. A few days after I had this dream; I went to Orange County with my grandmother to go shopping. When we were at the store, I noticed there were multiple advertisements of car insurances. These car insurance ads had images of cars that had gotten into an accident. I thought to myself, “what if that happened to me? That would suck!” I got onto the freeway and I was at a dead stop because there was a lot of traffic. A few moments later, I was rear ended by a van that was traveling at 55mph. My car was totaled but luckily I came out of the accident with minor injuries.

I have come to terms that I am one that chooses to act with emotion (Kirk) when decisions are being made or being carried out. I recently brought myself a laptop. Mind you, this laptop was out of my price range and not what I wanted to spend. It was not until I started playing with it and admiring its features is when I fell in love and need it, well wanted it. Now, I sit writing my examination pondering whether or not to take it back and downgrade into something more conservative. As I'm looking at my laptop, I look around and visually my whole rooms tells stories of were my emotions took over on the decisions I made. The watches on my desk which tell of the night I went on a watch spree and started purchasing several watches in a matter of minutes.


First, I am a quality inspector. So, my job consist of me verify that the product that my company produces leaves our facility in the best quality possible for our consumer. Our assembly techs build systems on tables. Mind you, these tables have wheels and the systems are not bolted down. So, one Saturday a system fell off a table after it was fully inspected by me and another individual. The system was deemed unusable until an investigation occurs to determine the severity of the fall. These systems use fiberglass Cylinders to contain natural gas. Several days went by and dismantle of the system occurred where techs discovered that several bolts were missing from the system. If that system never fell, it would have been shipped to our customer with missing bolts which would have been severely bad. I had a conversation with a fellow inspector and i told him that "God" was looking out for me that day, but Bertrand Russell would explain it as systems have been going out missing things all the time; it was just the intersection of two unfortunate events occurring at the same time, probability. When I was a little younger, I went to a party at a friends houses. As you know, parties at that age are extremely testosterone filled. that being said, a fight occurred where an individual got escorted out while making a scene brought the attention of a neighbor who thought something bad was about to happen. This neighbor called the cops, they came with swat team and had everyone sitting on the curb for couple hours. I left 10 minutes before they came. All the times I get caught by cops this was the first time I was not there.

CODE#11632

Jamie Han

Professor Lane

PHIL 8

6 September 2015



EXAM1



Question 1 – Brain Metaphor



There was a time when I quit my job because of all the personal issues going on at home. This situation applies to the brain metaphor, also Spock from Star Trek, which is being the heartless, or the intellectual part of the brain. After having deal with not only my own depression but my brother’s depression, it was better for me to quit because not only was it affecting me at work but the others around me, such as my coworkers and the innocent customers who simply just want their coffee. I was messing up at work like being late to work and later told my manager that I needed a break. I was going to get fired because I got written up for being late. He knew about my situation and offered me a choice of leaving on my own so he wouldn’t have to fire me. I thought everything though and came up to a conclusion that it was better for me to leave and take a break.



The midbrain, also known as the heartstrings, refers to Captain Kirk from Star Trek, which is the emotional part of the human being. This goes back to about half a year ago when my ex and I broke up around the time I was going through an intense depression. Threatening him that I would commit suicide if he didn’t get back with me, I cut myself and sent him pictures of my scars. Being it the most emotional breakup I have ever went through, I was blinded by love, as we can call it, and acted irrationally.



Scotty resembles the reptilian brain and acts quick and instinctual on certain situations. This is also known as the heartbeats. Back when I had a dog, I lost her from my grip and instinctually ran after it to get her back. Although she was on a leash and had a nametag, it is tragic to have to go through the scare and the worrisome phase until you find the lost dog. To avoid the heartbreaking deed of posting the lost dog papers onto every doors and windows, my instincts burst in to not lose her from my sight. Thankfully I caught the leash on time when she paused to see if I was following her.























Question 2 – Surfing Matrix



An unusual coincidence is when a guy falls in love with me and thinks that I’m the girl that he had been looking for the whole time. Love, the way I see it, is generally a coincidental thing but not all relationships start out as an original mistake. I act a certain way to attract the people that I like. All the guys I have ever dated always thought that I was the girl. I tend to pick out guys who are emotionally vulnerable and easy to manipulate. Then, I realized that this is all a matter of the possibility and the outcomes. Some guys would not budge even when I signaled them and it did not matter if they were vulnerable or not; they were simply just not interested in me.



As Professor Lane had mentioned in class, the things we call miracles are actually not miracles but only possibilities and chances. It is interesting to find out that when people pray, they might get the things that they wish for but, again, those are only just possibilities.



I began to start smoking about a couple months ago and smoking alone, believe it or not, is incredibly lonely. So then, I prayed for a friend to smoke with in my neighborhood so I wouldn’t have to smoke alone at night. Like a miracle, I saw a guy smoking around my house! But was it really a miracle? Has a spiritual, extraordinary being really sent me a friend from the Heaven to smoke with me so I won’t be lonely when I smoke? No. Ever since I felt the loneliness of smoking alone, I was always searching and hunting for someone to talk to when smoking by myself. Just like Bertrand Russell would say that ‘none of the events in Christianity seem to be logically valid,’ it was all a possibility that came through of a guy on a business trip from Taiwan renting the house right next to mine right in Diamond Bar, California. On events like this, Russell would possibly say that these miracle-like events are only chances that happen. However, the feeling of wishing for someone to smoke with and finally attaining it was incredibly amazing and so amazing that I almost started to believe that I was a little closer to God.

Spock

I recently had a son, a lot of the decisions I wanted to make on his behalf were stripped from me in manners of spite. I couldn't name him, didn't attend his birth and couldn't even drive him home. But I was able to think rationally about everything. I knew before hand how things would not play out in my favor so I did other things that I knew would make me feel like a father. We agreed on a name we both thought was cool. I bought his first car seat which was the most important part of getting him home. I also face-timed him the moment he came! To some this may not be a big deal but with proper thinking I maneuvered around the pot wholes and disappointment due to spite from his mom and found other means that would make me feel like I had a say in the matter!



Kirk (Emotional)

Once again I will pull from the experiences of my first born. The pregnancy was nothing less than a roller-coaster ride from hell! I experiences so many different mood swings and would act out of emotions rather than logic. Name calling and silly arguments arose and the time period was more so emotional than enjoyable. I missed the entire beauty of the pregnancy from acting out of emotions. Huge lesson learned. Now I spend much more time analyzing the situation and my reactions so that I will never experience such problems.



Scottie (Driven)

I feel as though I operate more so from this aspect of the brain than any other. I am a very driven person so to pin point a specific occurrence is a bit hard to do but one moment has stuck out to me more than any other. When I made up in my mind to relocate to California to pursue my dreams of singing. I drove three days in a Uhaul with my 1988 Cutlass on the back. Doesn't sound really "driven" however fighting your sleep driving for three days and facing very challenging and CHANGING weather is not the easiest "road trip" to pursue.

"Coincidence"
I went to visit a psychic on my birthday last year and found her reading highly questionable. Why? Well I have over 20 tattoos and they are all of things that hold great importance to me. Things such as sports, music, religion and different wordings or poems. Well she began to tell me that my name would be world wide as far as fame. I would be a man whose name would hold numerous amount of weight. Well I began to ask why. She stated that she could see me playing sports! I was immediately confused. I played three sports in high school and went to college for football but I decided to hang my cleats up and not play due to a new love in music. (I sing) Well as I looked down in despair I noticed one thing. I have a huge football and basketball tattooed of on my shoulder. And to make things a bit more "coincidental" I had on a tank-top shirt displaying these tats. I found her level of expertise to be amusing and "coincidental."...HAPPY BIRTHDAY.!

1. Drawing from the Star Trek metaphor, and using your own life as a template, describe three or more incidents from your life where you reacted as "Spock", "Kirk", and "Scotty." Feel free to tell it in story form.
I live my life thinking that I do things like “Spock.” Think things out rationally and do them based off of the conclusions I came to. A couple of years ago, my friends had a spontaneous idea, which was to go camping. I knew how my friends are; they don’t really know how to plan ahead much. In this instance they came up with the idea in the span of a couple of days, so I knew that there probably much preparation going into it. I kindly declined their invite, and I dodged a bullet. They had the good stuff to have fun like pot an booze, but they forgot the essentials like plates, cups, forks, enough water, etc. They ended up having to drink water out of an empty vodka bottle, and eating beans and sausages out of the cans. At least passerbys thought they were hardcore as they chugged water out of the vodka bottle.

A moment when I acted on emotion was when one of my buddies from college smoked pot with me for the first time. We had to work an event at Qualcomm stadium later in the day and we were going to go together. He became really paranoid and didn’t want me driving in my condition. Even though I was an experienced driver, I didn’t want to agitate him, so we called our buddies and told them we weren’t going to be able to make it because Jacob really thought we would put ourselves in danger.

A moment where I acted on instinct was the first (and so far last) time I got into a fist fight. Some friends and I were horsing around like kids do when it got a little out of hand. We were playing a game of dodge ball and I had got my friend out. The ball bounced back to me and I hit him again. He didn’t like that and he started punching me. I rushed him, wrestled him to the ground and started pummeling him. He started crying and I immediately felt remorse right after. This was a case where emotions were running high, logic went out the window, and the Scotty in me took over.

2. Drawing from the film, Surfing Matrix, and using our own life as a template, describe two or more incidents from your own life where you experienced an unusual coincidence. How would Bertrand Russell or a skeptic explain it rationally?

Back in middle school I had a crush on a girl named Lisset who I use to talk to in marching band. We went to different high schools and lost contact shortly after that. I attended UCSD in 2010, and was living on campus. The school has this weird system where the school is split into six colleges and I was part of the newest colleges to get added to the school, Sixth College. As I was walking to class one day, I had my headphones on and I feel someone tap my shoulder. I turn around and then realize that it’s my middle school crush Lisset, and began talking after that. Not only did we attend the same university, but we also ended up in the same college within the school.
A rational thinking person would say that it was a mere coincidence. I am a skeptic (most of the time) and also think this as well. I didn’t see it as “destiny” bringing us together or anything. It’s a good school not too far from home, and not too close either. It turns out we chose UCSD because it had what we wanted in a university.
Many years ago, I found an old VHS tape which had footage of a birthday party back at a house we use to live in. It was a big birthday party when I was just a kid with lots of people. For a brief moment one of our neighbors pops in really quick to say hi to everyone. I notice that there is a family waiting by the gate for her and recognize that it is a younger version of family friends that we are now very close with. At that point I knew we hadn’t met them because their mom took care of my cousins years later when we began going to school. Our neighbor used to do home massages and they she was doing work on my friend’s father who does physical labor for work.
This one is a lot easier to dissect, because we lived in the same area, and we just didn’t know the other family even existed until we got to know them. We ran into them in this instance, and it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to say that there is a possibility that we would meet them again. That we hit it off and became friends is something that no one can really predict.