Talk of Free Will

I find very interesting the mentioning of free will in this chapter. When Billy begins to travel through time, jumping from one moment to another and asks why he is there, a voice tells him that he is there because time is fixed that way; the moment is fixed and cannot change. This comes to my attention because the sense of time travel has always seemed to me as a method of going back and fixing what we thought we did wrong or could have done better. I believe this connects to the notion of free will because it is that sense of freedom we human beings have that trigger all of these hopes for changing the way things are or the way we have made them. In reality, there are some things we can change, others we cannot. Time is one of those we do not have the power to change or control and this is what I believe the Tralfamadorians mean when they say that only on Earth is there talk of free will. Free will does in fact very little in the real world.

Prelude to Metafiction

There is first mention of Kilgore Trout in this chapter, when Billy meets Rosewater after the war and finds that life is meaningless. In his desperation, Billy is offered to read one of Trout’s witty but lousy science fiction novels. It has come to my attention that Kilgore Trout seems to have a lot in common with the author Kurt Vonnegut, given he is also mentioned in this chapter as one of the sick American soldiers. With this first curious appearance was that I began to see the strange relationship between Vonnegut and Trout. Given we determined earlier in class that this book was something close to science fiction, and that in the first chapter, the narrator describes his book as a failure, I figured this character is meant to represent the author himself. And when this occurs, when something is referred back to itself, it is known as a metafiction.

Telling the Difference

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom always to tell the difference.” I first noticed this quotation at the end of the book on page 209. I thought it was a beautiful phrase, and I thought about how it relates to the entire story. Billy cannot change the fact that he is unstuck in time, and its paradoxical how he is at the same time forced to live his life all over again, unable to change what wrong he has done, having to accept his mistakes. In this chapter it is said that the plaque that reads this helps Billy guide himself through times of indifference. I find that this relates to my life in the sense that it is when I begin to care less about my life and what is going on in it, that the wanting to change fades away. Ironically, it is at this moment that one must take this phrase into account.

Time Travel

This is the chapter where we are first introduced to Billy Pilgrim. Once I learned he has become “unstuck in time” and travels through time unexpectedly, I related it with a film I saw a while ago called The Butterfly Effect. This is a movie about a boy who can also travel through time, and throughout the entire film we are amazed by how one minute change can lead to a whole new parallel universe in which things would have resulted to be completely different. I find Billy to be similar to this boy, only he cannot control what moment in his life he will go to next, and cannot change anything he has done. I also thought about how much I would like to go back in time, and fix all that I have done wrong, mistakes I know I made and can make right with what I know now. I would die to know what would result of changing a decision I made in the past. In reality, there are infinite amount of parallel universes that could result from different decisions we might have taken at a given moment.

Death is not the worst thing

In this first chapter, the way Vonnegut speaks of death caught my attention. It is almost some kind of mockery. Death is the only thing we are certain of, the only thing we cannot prevent from happening. The use of the phrase “so it goes” is a way of preventing lamentation and mourning over a death. It inspires a kind of humor, it is almost a way of saying, “well, it was bound to happen anyway”. We usually make such a big deal out of death, that we forget that it is just a part of life, that in reality, death doesn’t really mean that much, and we and our lives don’t mean that much either. We are so self absorbed that we forget that our lives are merely insignificant specks in a world where there are countless numbers of other beings. I remember reading this once in a novel “those who think dying is the worst that can happen don’t know a thing about life” (Sue Monk Kidd). I find that this relates to Slaughter House Five because this is what I think Vonnegut is trying to say, that there really are worst things than death. That death is not the end.

A. What is the difference between a blog and a book?

the differeence between a blog and a book is that a book tends to tell you everything you need to know in order to understand what is going on, while a blog simply exposes randomly, assuming you know exactly what the writer is speaking of, without giving you any background information. A blog is also a virtual piece of writing, while a book is a published one. Blogs also seeme to be more improvised, usually those who write blogs use common expressions or slang words, they write things that don't necessarily make complete sense to the readers.



B. How have blogs changes recently?

Blogs have recently become a massive form of communication. People all over the world can both read and write blogs, the only thing they need is internet connection. Blogs have become popular throughout this past decade, for there are currently around 15 million active ones. Bloggers write about anything they can possibly think of, every novelty, every piece of gossip, news leads to a blog. They have become a part of our culture and way of life.



C. Why might you read a blog?

One might read a blog to know about the diverse points of view people have to offer. For a certain issue, someone may be tired of reading from the same journalist who shows the same bias on the same news paper or magazine. A blog offers us a way of getting to know other people without even having to meet them. We learn about what goes on in their life, their country; we learn abou their culture and their background throughout their writing.



D. Is there reason to doubt the objectivity of a blog? Why? Why not?

Blogs are not perhaps the most reliable pieces of writing, due to that they are highly opinionated and biased. Blogs tend to be completely the opposite of objective. They expose diverse points of view, hardly will they ever be fair or just to those they speak of. Blogs can be about nearly any topic, and nearly anyone can write one, therefore they ought to be subjective.