Dalton Anderson
Mr. Neuburger
Eng. Comp 102-104
31 August 2011
Single Paragraph Essay
Perception of the World
The human mind may be one of the most complex biological machines in the world. Humans have the ability to manipulate or alter reality simply by changing one’s perception of their environment. A good example of a person perceiving his environment in a non-normal way would be in Lars Eighne’s essay “On Dumpster Diving.” Eighner regales us with tales from his own life. According to societal norms, we perceive happiness as: having sufficient monetary earnings, a healthy family, and a nice house to live in. Without these things, we cannot be happy. However, Eighner says in effect that he’s content, if not very happy, with his life. In the passage, “I am always very pleased when I can turn up exactly the thing I most wanted to find… scavenging more than most other pursuits tends to yield returns in some proportion to the effort and intelligence brought it to bear.” (264) Eighner tells us quite clearly that it makes him happy when he finds something of significant use that someone else thought to be garbage. The final sentence, “I am sorry for them.” (265) says a lot in that he sees us living a sad and miserable existence.
Eighner, Lars. “On Dumpster Diving.” Power of Language: Language of Power. New York:
Pearson Learning Solutions, 2009. 317-23. Print.
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