If Stars Didn’t Twinkle

“Hydrogen –> Helium = Hope. Except, not really.

More specifically, Hydrogen –> Helium = the heat that gives stars its light. Without Helium, though, said stars would never shine bright.

So, what’s so bad about stars if they don’t twinkle?

Firstly, we would no longer have the stars to navigate the seas. What good is humanity if it were stuck in its own continent, unable to brave the unknown? This problem is deeper than just geographical exploration, though. It’s spiritual. We would no longer have any guidance in the night.

Those stars we so take for granted pierce the darkness in perfect light. They illuminate the Earth with what little light they reflect, such that we may have a hope of survival when the sun sets. Without them, we would still cower in fear before predatory snakes and giant nocturnal cats. The dark would then be something to be feared, and not conquered.

Then, it gets worse.

The lack of helium in stars, thus the lack of light in them, would break our spiritual and religious presuppositions.

Our ancient ancestors relied on the stars to proejct their beliefs. It shaped their way of life, and their moral philosophy. The stars were their Gods; more than that, though, the stars served as an abstract higher being with which the ancient peoples could look up to. They were metaphors for the higher order. “Reach for the stars” and some variation of that saying is what kept us from stagnating across time.

Without it, we would have a Nietzschean death of God.

Anyone can do this. Anyone! Simply look up at the sky at night and stare at the stars. If there’s no light pollution, it’ll be impossible to see the millions of speckled lights scattered across the sky’s canvas without spiritual awe. That spiritual awe grips us and puts us in a trance. It makes us contemplate our existence, and more so, inspires us to strive for a higher purpose than hunting rabbits and hiding from big cats.

To look up at the sky in awe at the stars is to dream. That’s where all the great ideas that built civilization came from: 2:00 AM walks around the house when everyone’s asleep, thinking about that incredible idea you’ve come up with that would change the world.

Without the stars and their twinkle, without the bright light which guides us when times are darkest, without something beautiful to look up to in inspiration and spiritual awe, we would fail to strive for anything greater. We would, fail to become human.

As an aspiring philosophy major, I would like to attend the University of Chicago to preserve exactly that: the stars we so take for granted. Ever since the Nietzschean death of God that crippled the collective unconscious, I’ve been fascinated by the societal efforts to preserve it. I’ve seen my own community lose the helium to their stars. Their stars no longer twinkle, and they thus become consumed by disorder and hopelessness.

Should I attend the University of Chicago, I would like to restore that Helium. I will use what I learn in Philosophy to bring back the light my community lost.”

University of Chicago Essay Prompt 2 Example Essay, Celestial Object

Tricky Math

“There’s something scary about Math.

Not the “I don’t like when they add numbers and letters together in Algebra” sort of way, but its connection with Psychology in particualr. Specifically, I’m talking about statistics. Even more specfically, pies.

These are no ordinary pies, but pie charts. There’s nothing too hard about them. They inform us about percentages and distributions. The scary part is the soft insinuation behind all of them.

When I was in my Sophomore year of high school, my friends and I developed Study Strat –an online software product using Big 5 personality test results to develop a custom work and study schedule around a student’s Google Calendar events. High in trait Neuroticism? Here’s how to study and how often without getting mentally strained. Low in Conscientiousness? Here are daily exercises to help you cope with low motivation throughout busy work weeks.

When I let my students in my tutoring sessions take the program for free, I immediately saw they improved both their academic performance and stress levels. I was convinced that the results will just “speak for itself” and that every parent and teacher would be begging to purchase such a product. Marketing it, though, was dreadful.

“If you build a great product, the product will sell itself.”

That’s what we thought. That is, until we tried to sell the product. In the offchance we were lucky enough that people would even listen to our proposals, the conversations went something like this.

“So, what is it?”

“It’s a program that tests your Big 5 personality traits to create a custom-made…”

“Big 5? What’s that? You mean, like, the sports store?”

“No… it’s…”

Marketing was our worst nightmare. At the end of the year, only six people actually decided to purchase the product. Five of them were very satisfied and one person bought the product but never responded to us about what they thought about it. Eventually, we wanted to try marketing the product to a for-profit tutoring center. Miraculously, we had a date and time reserved to discuss the product with the manager further. During our planning phase prior to the meeting, my friends and I came together to discuss how to introduce the product in a manner that doesn’t look so new and untested. Afterall, we only had 6 customers.

Our lead software developer said, “I know. Here. It’s a pie chart.”

A small sliver of our customers felt neutral or had no comment about our product. The rest of the 5/6 were ecstatic!

We obviously couldn’t stick with that proposition –it was too immoral, and felt too close to a lie depsite how true it was.

That’s what makes pies so easy: they’re the best at manipulating people into thinking something is more serious than it actually is. That’s not all, though.

As an aspiring entrepenuer looking to get into the online SaaS marketing world, I was stunned and surprised with how many seemingly smart and impressive people there were. At some point in my journey, I began to notice just how easy it was for people to sneakily misrepresent their statistics. They’d say that 80% of their clients were satisfied with an absurdly arrogant pie chart boasting a large slice to represent the 80%, and the other 20 percent just slightly outside the pie. Then, through more digging, one would find that they only really truly had about 5 cleints, four of which were satisfied.

The other thing about pie charts is just how simplistic their design is. It’s just a circle with lines through them. Yet, they so easily manipulate a reader into following a certain belief. It’s easy to make the pie, easy to see the pie, and easy to fall for the pie.

Despite my entrepreneurial temperament, I’m in some ways still a Math person at heart. I love the real numbers: the ones that don’t lie, or paint an unreal picture. It’s motivated me to take a statistical approach to my business temperament, and not try to trick people the way statsitcs usually can. I like to think I’m taking a more ethical approach to my own marketing.

Nonethelss, despite pies being so easy for manipulation, despite my persistence not to use them in my own business, I know when the business opportunities arise that I will still jump at them to take a slice.“

University of Chicago Essay Prompt 2 Example Essay, Easy Pie

The Warrior Rep

“There’s something weird about the human body.

Well, okay. There’s a lot that’s weird. We sometimes get sleep paralysis demons visitng us too.

Though, there are more monsters in our bodies than just the made-up one that sits on the corners of our bed. There’s us. Or, more specifically, the one that lays dormant inside of us waiting to come out. This demon comes out through strenuous physical activity. That doesn’t mean put dumbells and protein shakes into a pentagram. Instead, the ritual goes like this: put pressure on your body until you feel like you physically are no longer capable. Then, something magical happens.

The reps no longer feel painful. It’s weird, but you get a sudden burst of energy as if you were posessed by a powerful monster of immense strength. It wakes up inside you, and suddenly the pain disappears –it is replaced with strength.

One, two, three… thirthy-nine, forty….

Suddenly, dumbbell curls after forty reps won’t hurt anymore. Your arms won’t feel in pain, but you’ll have a newfound strength to do more.

Dumbbell curl number Forty-one and forty-two, thus, become something special.

They’re called Warrior Reps, because you need to fight for them.

In short, the Warrior Rep is the length of workout you go past your preconceived limit. If you are doing squats at the gym, the squats you do past the limit you oringinially thought you had are the Warrior Reps. The number of steps you’ve taken on a climbing mill past the physical limit you tell yourself you’ll stop at is a Warrior Rep. You can tell when your workout has a warrior rep when your workout seemingly transcends the part of your brain that tells you, “Why bother with the pain? Why not just go home?” You’ve done a warrior rep when you push out one more repitition during your exercise when your limbs are burning and you can feel your teeth clench in defiance.

They don’t have to be limited to the gym too. After all, not everyone can afford a gym. Warrior reps are also performed by those you see in the park running track. There’s always that one person. They’re the center of attention. The couple flirting under a tree, the aunties doing Tai Chi with the music blaring, the high school students training for Cross Country, they all know who is doing Warrior Reps.

It’s the person gasping for dear life whilst running laps.

He’s too tired to care abour proper running form. The back of his shirt is a puddle. There’s a fire burning in his heart that’s hotter than the fire in his lungs.

There’s only one thing a Warrior Rep can be used, though. It is used as a sobering reminder.

The Warrior Rep is used to remind ourselves of the frailty of the mind. It helps us remember the rationalizations we often make to get away with avoiding the painful responsibilities we know we must endure. To count your Warrior Reps is to remember just how powerful and capable the human body is. If the human body is capable of making at least one Warrior Rep, we have no excuses to succumb to our laziness and instant gratification.

Throughout my academic and personal career, I’ve counted my Warrior Reps. I’ve measured exactly how many times I can go further than my presupposed limits, and seen just how far they truly can go. Not only have I lifted heavier objects more often and swam more laps, but I also spent more hours studying than I thought I could tolerate. I listened for more minutes during conversations before interrupting a conversation. I did 2 acts of kindness a day instead of one.

If I had to invent a unit of measurement, every burning muscle fiber of my being would scream that the Warrior Rep is the one to invent. To conquer that which is seemingly inconquerable –it’s the most valuable thing to measure!”

University of Chicago Essay Prompt 2 Example Essay, Unit of Measurement

The Rarest Pepe

“In the depths of the “dark web” lurk strange alt-right forums, illegal activity, and, in some strange manner, humour that seems to transcend basic understanding.

Specifically, there is a running joke in alt-right forums known as Rare Pepes. These are online photos of a frog that are considered unique in design and artistic creation. Some, depending on how unique in character the drawing is, are considered more “rare” than others. In other words, they work like card games.

I was reading up on strange alt-right humor and soon found myself in a rabbit hole of the Rare Pepe trend. It led me to more of the history such as where the frog came from and why it was associated with alt-right fanbases. Then, I found something interesting.

Someone in a forum posted a method of creating what they called the “Rarest Pepe”

This would, theoretically, be a drawing of the frog that is truly original in that no one could have possibly created it. That is, it can exist without having been created by another person. Here is how to make it.

1. step one: become intoxicated. Drink however much alcohol it takes to be inebriated without passing out.

2. step two: pull out a sheet of paper and pen.

3. step three: draw Pepe the Frog in your inebriated state.

4. step four: fold the paper into a small square.

5. step five: dig a hole and bury the drawing in it.

The result is a piece of artwork that is completely original. No one had willed it into existence, as the artist was inebriated upon creating it. No one can discover it either since it is buried –unless it were randomly dug up.

Okay, so this doesn’t actually work. The piece of art would not be able to be original because it still was influenced by Pepe the Frog, the comic character made by Matt Furie. Any piece of art created, whether through sobriety or inebriation, would technically be traced back to some older idea. This path of creating the “Rarest Pepe” had me thinking, though: is it possible to truly create a peice of art that is completely original?

And, after long nights of thinking about the Pepe problem, I belive I’ve figured out a solution. This is how one could make a compeltely original piece of art, untainted by the combination of old ideas.

1. step one: have billions of canvases and buckets of paint prepared.

2. step two: make one stroke on each painting.

3. step three: statistically, at some point, Quantum Tunneling should allow the holes between atoms to pass through the holes between the atoms of the canvas. This allows your brush to pass right through.

4. step four: you may have intended to create a painting consisting of one brush stroke, but you’ve made a blank white canvas with a splatter of paint all over from the ensuing paintbrush dropping through the canvas. Thus, the new painting is something not related to your vision since you didn’t intend to create it. Also, it is something no one has ever done before.

Horray! A completely new and unique work of art that no one had ever created, untouched by the previous influences of others, is made! Except, it hasn’t been done yet. I also have my doubts that I can ask any university if they would have the funds to create billions of canvases and buckets of paint.

However, the only reason I fell down the rabbit hole of Rare Pepes and their strange culture was becasue I always had an interest in paradoxes and Mathematical phenomenon to begin with. If we had an absurd amount of monkeys randomly bashing on a keyboard, would one at some point write the entirety of Shakespeare’s works? It’s quite interesting an idea to humour, but I don’t think I would be investing in monkeys any time soon.

Instead, I would like to dedicate my time at the University of Chicago finding a solution to the originality problem. I’ve experimented for the past two years with machine learning and artificial intellgience to create paintings that are truly unique in design.

In short, I do believe there exists a piece of art that is completely unique and untouched by previous ideas. However, it just doesn’t quite exist yet. I would certainly like to contribute to that future creation. For the pluripotentiality of unique creations, I may not be too interested in creating the “rarest” hate symbol. However, I would still like to pursue machine learning as a means of revolutionizing originality in art.”

University of Chicago Essay Prompt 2 Example Essay, New and Original Idea

Tiger Parent

“There existed a time when, if someone were “possessed by demons” you would “cure” them by burning them at a stake.

In the modern day, we like to keep the flammables away –and for good reason. In modern day California, where I live, more fires are likely not welcome. However, my hometown in California, Arcadia, is a hotspot for a different kind of possession. It’s a kind of posession that involves less exorcisms and ghosts, but still involves being controlled. This posession makes people controlled by an ideolgoy.

The posession I’m talking about is traditional tiger parenting.

These practices stemmed from many different cultures. Chinese Confucianism, Catholicism, and Christianity were all major tenets that contributed to this way of parenting.

Tiger parenting differs in every household, but the most common involve extreme and unrealistic expectations of children and borderline physical and verbal abuse aimed at them. The posession part of tiger parenting is terrifying to say the least. In broad brush strokes, it works something like this.

“There isn’t a thing you can say that will convince me to change the way I parent my children. It doesn’t matter what research and authority you throw at me. I’m not going to budge.”

Where I’m from, this mindset is most prominent in immigrant families with first-generation children. The children more often than not live under the thumb of their parents and their tiger parenting practices. This physical and verbal abuse is so commonly widespread in the community that the children often grow up without autonomy. It’s not just my community in Arcadia that is posessed by delusional ideas of tiger parenting. It’s around the globe.

This worldwide posession of tiger parenting seems unmoving. No amount of science or theory can sway the opinions of tiger parents.

Thus, we reach a repetitive state. The world of child development and education is consistently repetitive. No matter the statistics debunking the efficacy of tiger parenting, no matter the facts, no matter the logic, there does not seem to be any way science can sway modern parents away from their ideological behaviors. I’ve worked with a parenting training program hosted in my local lobrary as an intern. The program was educational; it aimed to teach parents the right way of teaching children. This involved not spanking children, using words of encouragement, and avoiding abusive language.

I’ve seen how these seminars and workshops were carelessly denigrated. There was every excuse under the Sun thrown at the lecturers about why people should still be allowed to spank their children or speak to them however they please. Personal freedom, parenting “style”, cultural differences, and many more were all thrown about.

Child development psychology, no matter its sophistication, will not change the tiger parenting mind. All it takes is one word. “No.”

Thus, the field will consistenly repeat itself. It will come up with new ways of teaching and raising kids, but little will change. A basic rule of thumb in therapy is quite similar: people will not change unless they want to.

At the University of Chicago, I would like to end the cycle of repetitive child development research falling on deaf ears. There is great importance in research and uncovering the truth, but equally as important is the belief and utility of said truth. By taking a sociological stance that cross-disciplines child psychology, I hope to bring an end to the destructive and repetitive nature of the field. Through attending the University of Chicago, I may have hope of helping the research child developement psychologists worked so hard for, at last, become accepted. I would not only help the field, but the future generation of immigrant children so often affected by tiger parenting.”

University of Chicago Essay Propmt 2 Essay Example; Tiger Parent

Demeter’s Osteoporosis

What is the most life-changing revelation you’ve ever encountered and how did it shape the person you are today?

What I want to share is something quite personal. I do not think of myself as a “profound dreamer”. I’ve often only had dreams of being in dirty bathrooms, having my teeth fall out, or falling from the sky: very common dreams.

In fact, I don’t believe I ever liked interpreting dreams to begin with. I do not know the reason, but it may be because I found dream descriptions too convenient or vague; it was like reading something enlightening yet completely useless at the same time.

That all changed, though, when I had my frist genuinely profound dream 6 months ago.

I was driving down a freeway that never seemed to end. The road had become mostly a desert, and what little infastrcutre was left was mostly devoured by sand.

In the distance was a turn. There were a phalanx of Roman centurian screaming for help. I was, strangely enough, a spectator of myself in this dream. I watched myself drive past them, completely ignoring their calls. Then, the road became even more wild and uncivilized. Cracks and potholes formed all about, and the desert around me merged with the pavement. I stopped my car at what appeared to be one last exit. This exit was covered in wire fence and green fabrics, blocking off the path.

I watched myself park in front of the fence, scale up the fence, and swing over it. I was effectively in the other side. There, I saw three strange things in front of me: the remnants of Hong Kong in the distance, foliage and greenery slowly approaching from all sides, and a fog.

In the left side of me was a particularly stark patch of green. There was an abandoned mansion with a rusted gate featuring Egyptian heiroglyphics. Through the gate, a lively river was flowing downsteam. I followed the river downstream, where the trees grew thicker and Hong Kong could just be seen from afar. The fog started to thin out, and the setting resembled more of a forest with very step downstream. However, the strength and volume of water in the river decreased over time. Every elevation we I went down, the water started to become more green and thin.

Eventually, after an eternity of walking, the stream halted into a trickle. What used to be clear and rapid white water stalled into a small venomous green fluid. It seemed to cut through the vines and trees, and run only on the rocks. The rocks all led the eye, and what was left of the poisonous creek at that, to a small metal plaque with a golden frame carved on a large stone. On it, the fossil of a large prehistoric bird lay flat with its wings spread. The creek’s poisonous content had dripped onto the plaque, making the small-print description illegible. However, the title was clear.

Demeter’s Osteoporosis.

What I felt upon reading those words could only be described as an earth-shattering awareness of my own existence. At the time, I did not even remember which Greek God Demeter was. I didn’t even know what the word Osteoporosis meant. All I felt was a sudden self-awareness of my own being, how profound it was that I was alive.

When I woke up from the dream, I knew it wasn’t like any other experience I’ve ever had. I researched what the words meant, learning that Demeter was the Goddess of agriculture and harvest; she also punished the mortal world with winter upon discovering her daughter’s kidnapping by Hades. Osteporosis on the other hand meant the deterioration of the bones.

It’s one of the few dreams I’ve actually taken the time to psychoanalyze and truly deconstruct. It was such a profound yet indescribable feeling, but I believe I’ve found the meaning behind my dream and what my unconscious mind was trying to tell me. Throughout the early years of my academic career, I never truly had people who I could consider positive male role models. Many of the men in my life, whether it was my tyrannical father, my spoilt brothers, or men with the audacity to catcall me in the street, left a bad impression on my mind of men as a whole. I developed a negative relationship with men, and could hardly introduce any positive masculine energy in my life. During my family’s divorce, I felt detached from my mother and father. Strangely enough, I entered a “phase” trying to search for an identity through uncovering my cultural roots. Despite not feeling like I had any reason to, I felt that my identity after that had been fragmented and scattered. In some ways, I wasn’t “whole.”

This is what I believe my dream tried to tell me.

I believe my dream was trying to tell me that I was unconsicously in search of “wholeness.” The most masculine people I could imagine are Roman centurians, and I may have associated them and my ignoring them with my complete apostatization of any positive masculine energy in my life. Since my family used to live in Hong Kong, I believe my dreaming about entering the blocked off exit to reach it was my unconscious mind’s way of telling me that I was looking at my culture for wholeness. I was searching the Asian culture that I so readily abdicated when I was young. Without masculine energy in my life, and without any faith in its return, I was searching for a spiritual wholeness to replace it. When following the stream and seeing the healthy water turn to a trickling poison that destroyed the plaque of Demeter, It may have been a representation of the inevitable doom that would await me: if I continued to search into my soul until I reached the bottom, all I would find is the death of the poviding and caring part of my motherly side.

In short, what awaits me at the end of my resentful rage against all of masculinity is inevitably the death of the kind and caring motherly side that provides and brings harvest.

This analysis seemed barely accurate, yet very much so at the same time. Firstly, I’m not even a mother and I don’t control harvesting productivity with magic. Though, from a psychoanalytical perspective, I’ve very much seen my lack of faith in men as a whole begin to chip away at the “kind and loving” side of myself. I began to notice just how much my resentment and anger for men made me cynical; it didn’t allow for any more space to be a forgiving person.

The death of the masculine should not be the death of Demeter. Or, at least, I must not allow it to be that way. I must preserve the positive femininity in my life without letting the death of positive masculinity sow chaos into my life. Thus, I’ve decided to put on a more hopeful approach to my modern fight against patriarchal oppression. The postive masculine that should empower us is dead, and the modern patriarchy has taken its place.

I, however, am learning to fight against it with careful consideration for the positive feminine aspect. I cannot lose the mercy and willingness to provide, that aspect that keeps us close to Demeter.

University of Chicago Essay Propmt 2 Essay Example; Demeter’s Osteoporosis