Reflection About Ishmael

Sabena Vilaysom

Professor Coe

Biol 1108

13 August 2015

Ishmael by Daniel Quinn was a good book, however I found it hard to get through because there is not a plot or storyline, there is just a bunch of teaching. It was basically like a long lecture. I had to re-read some parts to completely understand what was being said. However, after finally getting through this book, it turned out to be a real eye opener; it made me reflect on topics that I never thought about. At first, I did not like how Ishmael used a lot of questions to teach the narrator. I wanted him to just explain everything all at once. Later on in the book I realized that if he just explained everything at once and did not question the narrator, then the narrator would not have

learned anything. This method basically helped the narrator answer his own questions. Since Ishmael was not a human, he is giving us an outsider’s view of the world, and how flawed it is. This book was a great read and I found many topics discussed by Ishmael intriguing.
Ishmael discusses the creation of life theory.

The way the passage was in a story telling dialogue between the narrator and Ishmael really helped me get a better understanding of the point he was trying to get across. The creation of life theory is something we have all learned when we were little in science class. The same story is told over and over ending with the arrival of humans. Ishmael then tells his story which is the same way, however it ends with the arrival of jellyfish. A point that Ishmael’s story makes is that the time line for creation abruptly ends at human life; this shows that we believe that earth was created for our existence and nothing else is created after. We believe that we were born to conquer the world, and that this world only serves our needs. This is the basis of why our culture acts the way that they do. I never really thought about things that way. Everyone knows the same story and that it ends with the arrival of humans but we do not really think about it, we never questioned why creation ends with humans. We do not think about the meaning of things or question why things happen to be the way they are. What I loved about this book is that Ishmael questioned the narrator to think about why things are the way they are because we never really question it, we just go with what we are

told.
One topic spoken about was that we all contribute to the destruction of the earth because we do not follow any of the natural laws. We believe that these laws do not apply to us, so we simply do not apply them. In nature, animals are able to coexist with their natural predators, for example lions and gazelles are seen as “enemies” to us, but a lion kills only one, “not to satisfy its hatred of gazelles but to satisfy its hunger.” Lions do not kill multiple gazelles just because they are bored. Only one is needed to satisfy its hunger then they both can coexist. Ishmael states “diversity is what’s under attack here. Every day dozens of species disappear as a direct result of the ways the Takers compete against the law.” We break all three of the laws, which is why so many animals are endangered or extinct. One of the rules is that a species should not “exterminate their competitors.” A species can however defend ones self when threatened. We will kill other species for reasons other than being threatened. For example, big game hunting is actually considered to be a sport. We are killing animals just for our own enjoyment; just recently an American dentist killed Cecil the Lion, which started a big controversy. Poaching is also example of breaking this law, the West African black rhino is almost extinct due to our species being selfish and killing them for their horns. Many species of tiger are also endangered or extinct because we hunt them for their beautiful coats. I disagree that we are the only species that kill for reasons other than being threatened, I watched a dolphin documentary on National Geographic, and they too will kill for fun. They kill porpoise babies for reasons that are unexplainable. Another example is my aunt’s new puppy, she enjoys hunting down and killing rabbits and birds for enjoyment because she loves the chase. I’m sure there are plenty of animals that kill when they are not threatened, however, I think Quinn focuses on humans because other animals do not do it to the extent that we do. If we followed these rules then all species could coexist, I do not believe that our species will ever follow these rules. Even with poaching and big game hunting bans, some individuals still continue to do so. There are many people and organizations trying to help stop this problem, but there will always be those few individuals that defy against it. We are selfish and do not even think about the destruction we are doing when we are destroying forests to make room for ourselves and our food.
In high school history class I was taught that the agricultural revolution was a turning point in our history.

Life before the agricultural revolution was made out to be awful. It was a huge advancement that let us keep up with our population increase. What I did not think about is what agriculture is doing to other species. Agriculture is not our downfall; the extent to which man takes it is our downfall. It is stated that agriculture supports population growth, and that can damage diversity. The more our species expands, the more of a threat it poses to other species. Ishmael states that Takers and Leavers pass down different types of knowledge from generation to generation. Takers pass down knowledge of knowledge and how to grow crops where as the Leavers pass down ways to live a better life. In Takers culture we want to keep advancing so we discard old ideas and keep creating new ones to replace the old ones. In Leavers culture, each generation learns ways to live from the previous and so on. We are taught to believe that technology advancements are great successes and that before it life was not as great, when in fact they could be our downfall. I had a Pre-calculus teacher in high school that believes this as well, he believes technology is our greatest downfall and claims it is dumbing us down. He would always yell at our class and say that back in the day they did not have calculators and everyone was smarter back then because they all had to think for themselves.

We use calculators to do simple math problems that can be solved in our head. He got so frustrated over this that he actually quit teaching. Now that there is technology, no one is really thinking because a machine does it all for you so we are in fact dumbing down. Now that I think about it no one really thinks for himself or herself anymore or questions why things happen to be the way they are like people did back then. Nowadays if an individual is curious about a topic, instead of going to the library and reading about it we can just Google it. What I like so much about this book is the Ishmael really challenges the narrator to think on his own instead of just giving him all the answers to his questions.
One point that I was confused about was when Ishmael and the narrator were talking about evolution towards the end. Ishmael says that good things happen to species that live with in the hands of god, evolution. Through out the novel he has stated multiple times that Takers are living outside the hands of god, so would they not evolve because they chose not to live by the laws? Since leavers do live in the hands of god, would they be subjected to evolution? So centuries from now, Takers would evolve technologically, while the Leavers knowledge on ways to live evolve? I reread it multiple times and I am still a bit confused on that topic, its an interesting topic but hard for me to grasp. Another thing that I did not really understand was the Cain/Abel part; I’ve been Buddhist my whole life so I never really heard the story only bits and pieces.
Although this book was terribly long to get through, I thought this book was an excellent read and I would recommend it to others. At first when reading the book, I thought it was a bit strange that a telepathic gorilla was a teacher to the narrator. But after finishing, I understood that only an outsider, someone neutral and unbiased, could understand culture or civilization. I think that Ishmael understood more because he was an outsider and since we are not, we are almost blind to it since we were taught that this is the only way to live. One quote that really stood out to me was the prison metaphor. “The world of Takers is one vast prison, and except for a handful of Leavers scattered across the world, the entire human race is inside that prison” (Part 8 Ch 10). We are prisoned by this way of life, and this prison distracts us and does not allow us to see what is really happening. Our distraction happens to be consuming the world, and everyday we are "contribut[ing] daily to the destruction of the world" whether we realize it or not. This book opens your mind, and changes the way you think about civilization. It forces you to think deeper and points out things that we tend to overlook.