My Life Changed free essay sample

My life Changed My father is a lawyer, so he is always active. But everything changed two years ago. My mother noticed some bruises in my father, she told him to go to the doctor but he didnt want to go. After that he started to loose energy, he was always tired. My mom told him to go to the doctor again, this time he agreed. They went to the doctor, and when they arrived home their faces were pale and yellow. I asked my mom what the doctor said and she answered me, Your father is sick, very sick. His kidney is no longer working. I started crying, I felt bad, I didnt know what to do or what to say. One month later my father was bad, so the doctors decided to operate him. The doctor puts a line in his kidney to remove the bad stuff. We will write a custom essay sample on My Life Changed or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page We were sad as family, I was confused; I thought my dad was going to died. The doctor talked to us about a kidney transplant, my mom agrees and she signed up for the kidney. We waited for the kidney to arrive for six months, the longest six months in my whole life. After that period of time a doctor from Guadalajara calls us, he told us that the kidney of my father was ready, that we had four hours to arrive to the hospital in Guadalajara. We lived eight hours from Guadalajara, so my mom said that they were going in airplane. They arrived on time, but the doctor told them that the family of the person who was going to give him the kidney decided not to donate it. My mom was mad and I was too. But three hours later they called her again, this time was real. My mom and my dad waited the whole night in the hospital for the doctor to call them for the surgery. Finally the doctor called my dad. The surgery lasted five hours. My dad was transplanted, everything ended there. I was happy, finally my dad was fine. This changed my world, now Im totally different. Now I respect more my father and my mother. I try to do my best at school so my father can feel proud of me. I appreciate more life and love everything I do.

Cultural Relativism Is Truth Defined By Our Culture Or Our Culture By

Cultural Relativism: Is Truth Defined By Our Culture Or Our Culture By Truth? In his article Cultural relativism and cultural values, Melville Herkovits defines the principle of cultural relativism as judgements are based on experience, and experience is interpreted by each individual in terms of his own enculturation (26). This is the basic premise of cultural relativism, that beliefs, values, and morals are all based on ones culture. Therefore, since morality is based on society and different societies have different views of right and wrong, there can be no moral absolutes. Since there are no absolutes, under this view of cultural relativism all moral views determined by ones culture are deemed true whether they conflict or not. Upon first glance, relativism seems like a very appropriate concept of morality in the world. It is clear to see that there are differences of what is acceptable and unacceptable in different societies across the world. Growing up in Western culture I have grown a fondness for meat, especially steak. It is a momentous occasion when I can go out or fix a nice, juicy steak for a meal, the bigger the better. This is not a problem in my culture, save those few health conscience people who say I will die by heart disease, but I dont consider them part of my society anyway. However, if I were raised in an eastern, Hindu, culture these dietary practices would be considered wrong. My act of eating cow would be considered a moral atrocity. From examples like these and many others around the world we can see a good case for different cultures having different moral views, but is that really the case? I believe that at a surface level cultural relativism holds some merit, however if we look deeper into the issue we can find a flawed, and inaccurate theory for the way that the world should work. Some of the biggest arguments given in defense of cultural relativism are the many different practices of different cultures from around the world. Melville J. Herskovits gives examples of a West African culture of Dahomey, which practice polygamy. He also states different religious traditions of different cultures such as African societies that incorporate possession of an individual by a god to be the supreme religious experience. In an exert from his book Ethics: Discovering Right and Wrong, Louis P. Pojman describes an Eskimo culture that, allow their elderly to die by starvation, (33). These are all strong examples, but do they actually support the idea that these cultures have different moral values? In the examples given by Herskovits about religious traditions being different this is true, there are various religious practices in various cultures that have dissimilar habits. These however are religious practices and not moral concepts. One church chooses to worship their god using a full orchestra and robed choir, while another chooses to simply have a piano and a singer. Do these churches have different moral principles, or are they merely choosing different expressions of worship? With Pojmans example of the practice of a harsh euthanasia by the Eskimos, he goes further to explain that it is not the moral principle that causes the Eskimos to leave their elderly to starve, but the harsh environment. In the harsh environment of the arctic it is not considered a good action, but a necessary one in order for the survival of the whole tribe. Were the tribes to live in a tropical or temperate environment where food is not so scarce this brand of euthanasia would not be practiced. If we also look closer into the example given in the beginning of this paper we can see that the immorality of eating beef is not based on moral principles, but different beliefs. The example of a Hindu culture, (taken from a very intelligent professor of mine) being outraged at the Western practice of eating cow meat is based on the religious belief that dead relatives are reincarnated into animals such as cows. Now this is not a belief held by other Western religions, therefore the consumption of beef is freely practiced. However, what the two cultures do share is that it is immoral to eat relatives. As we