(The Crucible) Reading Journal 4 - All of Act 4

Act four starts out in the jail. Tituba is talking about the land of the Devil, Barbados. She says it is a great land and the Devil is going to take her there soon. Sarah Good tells Tituba to get the Devil to take her to Barbados as well after hearing about how the Devil is kind to her there. Tituba also offers Marshall Herrick if he wishes to come with them and he claims its the proper morning to go to Hell. This sets the mood for the scene; it preludes all the havoc in Salem that day. Afterward Parris, Hale, Hawthorne, and Danforth discuss the hangings scheduled for that morning. Reverend Parris reveals that his niece, Abigail Williams, has ran off with his fortune, and Reverend Hale reveals his true feelings about the court's ruling. He shows that he believes the accusations wrong and that he is trying to tell people to lie about their witchcraft to keep their lives. He believes that their deaths is as if he murdered them because he signed off on multiple rulings. They specifically address John Proctor who refuses to talk to them. They decide that they should have his wife, Elizabeth, talk to him and attempt to convince him to live. After their conversation Proctor begins to confess his dealings with the Devil, but refuses to give his name and we are led to believe he hangs along with Rebecca Nurse. The entire situation defeats the purpose of religion and God. By confessing the people of Salem are allowed to see the light of God. However, most of these people did not actually do what they are confessing to and therefore are lying which is against the word of God. So, if the people of Salem truly believed in God then there would be no confessions. The people in the "light of God" were actually disobeying God while the people who "dealt with Satin" are the people with God. It is a huge confusion that ends up with many dead. The most odd thing of it all is that Danforth refused to withdraw charges after all evidence pointed towards their innocence. The accusers have left Salem which leads us to believe it was all a lie, while the people who are accused are best Christians of them all for not confessing. It makes you wonder if this really was a Puritanical society with its corruption. In the end Proctor talks about how God's vision of his confession is enough and they shouldn't have to nail his signature to a wall, and Danforth refuses to accept this. This is especially odd since Puritans believed that God should be the only one to judge which means by not accepting his confession to God is disobeying their beliefs. Everything in this situation completely disobeys both logic and religion. Throughout the book there is a continuous build up for a need for righteousness, but it never comes. The ending is unpredictable to the unlikely events that took place in Salem. These people were crazy and from the first page to the last word Miller does an excellent job displaying their insanity.

(The Crucible) Reading Journal 3 - All of Act 3

Act three starts out in court where Francis, Giles, and Proctor have unexpectedly shown up. They claim to have evidence. The court is not happy about their appearance and takes them aside to talk to them. Reverend Parris claims they are there to uphold the court while Reverend Hale wants to hear them out. The men have brought Mary Warren with them who claims that she never saw any spirits and that the other girls are lying about them as well. It is clear she does not want to tell them but Proctor is forcing her to because good people, such as his wife, are going to be hung. They bring Abigail to check Mary Warren’s statement and she claims it false. Mary Warren calls Abigail a liar and Proctor calls Abigail a “whore.” Abigail and the other girls start repeating everything Mary says, claiming that Mary is trying to possess them. Mary finally breaks and says Proctor made her sign with the devil. The act ends with Proctor being taken to jail. There is definitely prejudice in Miller’s writing. I strongly believe that Miller does not find these events that took place in Salem sane. Although no one will ever know one hundred percent whether the girls were lying or not, Miller tries to make them look like the bad guys. Proctor was an honest man in Miller’s eyes and the “spirits” never existed. Miller uncovers these strange events as fact. It fascinates the reader that any human would take part in these events and makes the reader continue and stay engaged. There also seem to be a lot of grammar mistakes in the dialogue that make the reader stay awake or else you will soon be confused why they are using were when referring to themselves. Miller wrote The Crucible for older audiences. Due to strange plot and sequence of events, it would be rare for younger audiences to completely understand the content. Also younger audiences would not understand the references to their Puritanical society due to the lack of knowledge about American life before the revolution.

(The Crucible) Reading Journal 2 - Act 1 Appearance of Reverend Hale to the End of Act 2

Reverend Hale finally arrives in Salem. Immediately the population has questions about witchcraft, from their wives reading strange books to their children dancing in the woods. In further investigation of the children, Hale questions Abigail Williams who releases the information that Tituba forced her to drink chicken’s blood. Tituba admits to having encountered the Devil, but says that she fought his control. After the incident where Abigail tells everyone that Tituba trifled with the Devil, the girls who were dancing in the forest begin to accuse many others. They claim to have seen the Devil and his helpers. If the accused do not admit to witchcraft they are hung. The townspeople are all buzzing about the events in the court. Marry Warren, a servant of the Proctor household, went against John Proctor’s permission. When she returns from court, she informs John and Elizabeth Proctor of the horrible news. Later they find out from her arrester that Elizabeth Proctor was also accused of witchcraft. The process they use to determine whether a person is hanged or not is illogical. If the person is innocent then they did not commit an act of witchcraft. However in order to keep one’s life that person must plead guilty to their acts of witchcraft. If the population of Salem was Puritans, which they were, then they believe that no one should lie however by setting someone free they are encouraging lying. The Constitution claims that someone is innocent until proven guilty however this is not the case in Salem. It seems that in Salem, the accused is already guilty and has to prove their innocence by saying that the Devil controlled them. Despite the craziness of the events that take place in this book, it is strangely appealing. The interest is in the confusion of Miller’s writing. He writes like this on purpose to help show how confusing the actual events are and why people would actually do these things.

(The Crucible) Reading Journal 1 - Act 1 to the Appearance of Reverend Hale

Aurthur Miller, The Crucible, Published 1952,1953,1954

Reverend Parris found a group of girls dancing around a fire with his servant, Tituba, uttering foreign words. Among these girls are his daughter Betty and his niece Abigail. Betty is in a state they believe to be caused by sickness. Parris is paranoid that his enemies will remove him from the ministry with this evidence of witchcraft. It is also mentioned that Abigail was removed from service of the Proctor family because she was having an affair with the man of the house, John Proctor. Reverend Parris has called on a witch expert, Reverend Hale, to examine the town for witchcraft. The town also has many on-going territory disputes that cause people to go to extremes. Citizens have even gone to the point of naming each other witches to own the disputed land. Miller approaches the story with an interesting standpoint. He attempts to enter the confusing fight between the two factions without bias, which is difficult and only furthers the confusion of the reader. It makes it difficult to tell who is doing what and when. This fits the story of the Salem Witch Trials because the entire event is confusing as to why humans would treat each other this way and their inability to follow the religion they pretend to follow. The real question is rather if this event encourages religion or denies it. The story can either be interpreted to encourage belief in religion or to discourage belief in religion. If you see these accusations by the town’s people as a correct interpretation of the word of God then God must exist because he protected the town from the devilish beings, while if you see these accusations as false then their belief in God caused many innocent people to die and therefore religion is responsible. This is what makes the book so interesting. When you read the book you further your belief in religion whether it is negative or a positive outlook on religion. Did Miller write The Crucible for this purpose?

Reading Journal 6 - Behavior

In this section of Six Easy Pieces, Feynman proves the uncertainty principle and the reason sub-atomic particles act as both waves and particles. Feynman first uses a theoretical experiment of bullets (particles) being shot randomly at a wall with two wholes in it. Behind the wall there is a detector that recognizes when bullets make it through. In the experiment there is a chance that the bullet will go through the top hole, P1, and a probability that the bullet will go through the bottom hole, P2. These two probabilities are graphed. Now when a bullet is allowed to go through either hole 1 or hole 2, there is a P12, which is graphed. It is determined that P12 = P1 + P2 due to interference both through probability and the graph. The experiment is then done exactly the same except for with waves. For waves P12 ≠ P1 + P2 because when waves interfere they cancel each other out. Now when this same apparatus is used with an electron gun, it is found that the electrons with the ability to move through both holes independently have an average probability that acts like the particle experiment, but the rate of electrons found is inconsistent. However, when an apparatus is designed that allows us to know which hole an electron goes through there is interference and P12 ≠ P1 + P2, like waves. There is no apparatus that allows us to know which hole and electron goes through without interference because of this electrons, a sub-atomic particle, are considered to act as both waves and particles. When the experiment is done with other sub-atomic particles, results are similar. Because electrons and all sub-atomic particles are unpredictable in both speed and location, we are always uncertain of where these sub-atomic particles will be.

Reading Journal 5 - The Theory of Gravitation

In this section of Six Easy Pieces, Feynman discusses the theory of gravitation. Despite gravities simplicity and the obvious presence of this seemingly strong force, it is a rather weak force when compared to nuclear forces (force binding the nucleus of atoms together), and electrical forces (positive and negative repulsion and attraction). By far the strongest of the three being nuclear forces and electrical forces are far still stronger than gravity. Gravity is only “inversely proportional to the mass of each and varies inversely as the square of the distance between them” (Feynman 89), (F=G(mm^1/r^2). In other words the bigger the two objects and the smaller the distance between them, the stronger the force will be. Feynman also discusses that the reason the Earth and other planets are circular is that gravity is pulling them as close together as they can be. The planets are not circles, however, they are ellipsis. They are ellipsis because the planet’s rotations causes a centrifugal effects which tend to oppose gravity around the equator spreading the middle of the planets farther out than the rest of it. Other than the brief background on gravitation and the explanation of the planets’ ellipsis shape, Feynman discusses the effects of gravity on moving objects. He states that because something is moving while be pulled it results in a curved motion. As if the object is strafing around the pull. This motion describes the revolutions of the planets around the sun, and the moons around the planets. Gravity most helps us predict the motion and position of stars. This is the reason gravity is used so often in astronomy. It is likely that the reason gravity was discovered so early was human natures fractionation with space and the stars. Without gravity we would know very little because without gravity we would not notice very much scientific.

Reading Journal 4 - Conservation of Energy

In this section of Six Easy Pieces, Feynman discusses the law of conservation of energy and its applications. The law of conservation of energy says that no matter is lost or gained by processes. Without the law of conservation of energy we wouldn’t know very much. If the law of conservation of energy didn’t exist then we could not know the energy of a photon, the specific heat of any element, the amount of energy required to do anything. This is because without knowing where all of this energy went, you cannot know what the energy was used on. So if we didn’t know the law of conservation of energy, then every energy value would consist of kinetic energy, potential energy, heat energy, and all the different kinds of energy, however, the law of conservation of energy allows us to know that if we add up all of these energies before and after a use of energy, we will find the same value for energy. This allows us to figure out each component of the total energy and specifically identify one of the values. The law of conservation of energy does not have to be applied on a small scale we can apply the law to the amount of energy in existence now and in the past. If all of our energy is in chemical bonds, nuclear energy between protons and electrons, and gravity, and all the sources of these are constant (gravity’s being mass) then the amount of energy that exists today must be the same as the amount of energy when whatever happened to create everything happened. Feynman also strays from the topic of conservation and more about energy and the amounts of energy we have access to today. Feynman claims that “(w)ith 150 gallons of running water a minute, you have enough fuel to supply all the energy which is used in the United States today!” (86). This just shows how much energy there is still left in the world. All we need to do is find a way to harness this energy and then this energy crisis that the world is in now will not exist.

Reading Journal 3 - The Relation of Physics to Other Sciences

This chapter of Six Easy Pieces shows how physics affects all the other sciences. Despite Feynman’s earlier tone towards chemistry and its inferiority to physics, he does realize the importance in all the other sciences. He discusses how each one gives knowledge of the world and furthers understanding of physics. For chemistry, he talks of how theoretical chemists are actually physicists and that the deepest levels of chemistry end up in quantum mechanics. For biology, he discusses how biologists helped discover conservation of energy. For astrology, he discusses how physics came to be from people noticing the simplicity of the movement of stars and planets. For meteorology, he gives a cynical view in which he says that the reason the measurements are for meteorology are possible is physics and how they have everything wrong. Water and air is unstable, making it impossible to know the condition of the air. For geology, his tone lightens as he discusses the unknowns of geology and how there is much more to be known. For psychology, he discusses two parts. One for psychoanalysis, which is not a science, and the other for the way our brains interpret sensation. He also explains how when we learn, cells have to change, therefore meaning atoms have to change, which brings us back to physics in the interest of the atom. Finally, the explanation of how physics relates to all the other sciences. In his explanation, Feynman analyzes that every other science wants to know what created what they study, and that each science is constantly changing. However, physicists do not interpret what physics is now as anything different of what it was at the beginning of time. Once and for all, he ends his conversation of other sciences to tell the importance of bringing it all together so they can truly understand the world.

Reading Journal 2 - Basic Physics

This chapter of Six Easy Pieces discusses basic or simple physics, generally through the eyes of the 1920’s. Not only does Feynman discuss breakthroughs in physics, he also discusses the effects of our understanding of the world these breakthroughs have. In the subject of physics, he talks about forces and their origins. These forces include the repulsion/attraction of protons and electrons. Apparently this force is what makes the electromagnetic field which at different frequencies gives us light, radio waves, etc... Later into the chapter, Feynman discusses quantum physics and how it shows that sub-atomic particles act as both waves and particles, making them particle-waves. Not only does quantum physics say that there are particle-waves, but it also states that you cannot tell the momentum and position of anything at the same time. Because of this, you can never fully know what the outcome of an experiment will be. For instance, if your experiment is to test if you can walk through walls, you cannot know that you are going to bump back from the wall until is has already happened because the positions of these particles is unknown making each experiment completely different. Because each experiment is different it is presumed that the outcome could also be different. Feynman also explains what his brilliant work in quantum electrodynamics has done for our understanding to the world. It is apparent that “out of quantum electrodynamics come all known electrical, mechanical, and chemical laws.” This makes the study of quantum physics important to the world because of the knowledge it can give us is all sciences. Although it is presumed that sub-atomic particles refer to only electrons, protons, neutrons, and photons, there are actually a lot more than just those four. Each particle has an anti-particle. For example, electron’s anti-particle is a positron. There are three classifications of these particles, baryons, mesons, and leptons. These categories fit similarly to the way a periodic table is organized. There are many similarities based on which column, row, and ground they are in (referring to Table 2-2 on page 41).

Reading Journal 1 - Atoms in Motion

This chapter of Six Easy Pieces discusses everything is made from atoms. It emphasizes this theories importance as well. What makes the atomic theory so important? Why would it be the “only one sentence passed on to the next generations of creature?” Why not start at more elementary particles like electrons, photons, protons, neutrons, etc…? Feynman talks about the structures that atoms form in solids and the errors in illustrating atoms. Illustrations of atoms fail to show how atoms never stop moving. Even at absolute zero, the atom still has to jiggle and vibrate. If moving uses energy, then wouldn’t the idea that all atoms are constantly moving mean that everything needs a constant supply of energy? If so, what is the source of energy? Would it be the repulsion and attraction of protons and electrons? Feynman does say that these illustrations are beneficial in their ability to show angles. Wouldn’t you be in able to see the 3rd dimension of angles; making the illustration a failure at demonstrating angles? He also discusses how water evaporates and the equilibrium that is established between the air and the liquid. If by blowing these air away alters the equilibrium to push more liquid into water vapor, couldn’t you cool mass amounts of liquid with a fan blowing the top of it? There is also a brief discussion on the task assigned to chemists in naming compounds. Feynman clearly believes that physics is the superior science, however I believe that chemistry is just a different, equal form of science. It does not require less brainpower to do chemistry; it is simply a different skill. If that is the case then what about the other forms of science (biology, engineering, astrology, psychology, etc…), are they also inferior to physics because they require different skills?