Matthew Shi, PD 6, 10/11/2023

 Matthew Shi - Period 6 - 10/12/2023

Modern Mythology 2024

Literacy & Learning

    I think the usage of post structuralism is a great idea. The idea of questioning whether anything can be accepted as truth is an idea that I believe should be shared towards everyone. How do people truly know what can be perceived as real? I remember a couple years back that someone mentioned the idea that no one can really prove that they exist. What they see, what they feel, what they know, could all be a trick. All they know is they, as a consciousness, is currently existing. It flows into the idea of whether or not history really happened. People may claim that history did happen as evidently proved by the remains of our ancestors. But those people weren’t really there when it happened. So how do they know? All they truly know is that their consciousness existed in what they did but no one can prove their consciousness to others. For what all people know, maybe only ourselves is conscious and that nothing else is real. Nothing can be perceived as the truth in the world. Even this writing itself can’t be perceived as the truth. Writing is something created by our ideals. A mere story for their own purposes. Recently, our focus on Greek Mythology has gotten me to think whether or not it is truly real. 

For the longest time, I believed that some parts of mythology, including Greek Mythology, was real. Some myths have origins that are factual while others have completely fictional origins. While the ideas such as Medusa may seem completely absurd with the idea of turning people into stone, the Trojan War was based on historical fact which may have displayed events that actually happened in history. However, as time goes on, my head can’t wrap around the fact on how mythological history had occurred as commonly as it sounded with demigods such as Hercules and Perseus appearing so often with their heroic feats. Intervention from the gods had seemingly stopped at a point with no reason why. One theory suggests that the Greeks were disappointed in the gods due to the war occuring in their society, leading them to stop believing and worshiping the gods. I see this as one of the ideas of post structuralism as the Greeks may have begun to see that the gods may not even be real. The idea of disappointment in the gods and loss in worship begins to display their distrust in the authenticity of the gods. Nothing can be known for certain how anything in the world happened. If history itself can not be perceived as real, how would the Greeks be able to prove that the gods existed and had caused the events told in the myths?

I’ve been able to apply post structuralism to the world around me as it deepens my understanding of how people are perceiving the world around them. After I heard the idea of no one proving that they exist besides proving their consciousness itself existing, I thought it was an interesting philosophical perspective. To others, it may sound like a madman but when given thought about it, it’s a very realistic possibility. Learning that people, poststructuralists, are also thinking the same thoughts gave me the insight that there were people I could share these ideals with. People perceive the world in their own ways. They may perceive it in extremely simple ways. They may perceive it in a complex manner where they question everything. Some may be seen as naive. Others may be seen as philosophical. Regardless of their perception, as post structuralism itself states, nothing can be known for certain whether or not their perception is true or false. It indulges deeply on the human mind’s viewpoint and helps me understand that there are no wrong ways to see the world. If nothing is known for certain, there is no right or wrong. People have their own viewpoint and people have their own story. Whether it really happened, no one really knows. Whether we trust their authenticity is completely up to us. In the end, how they perceive the world is their view.