Is Ignorance Bliss?
There is 14.3 million mentally retarded people in the United States. So who is going to stand up for them? Charlie Gordon, a 37-year-old man, was mentally retarded but was then given a chance to change the world of science. He was offered to have a surgery to increase his intelligence and he took it. He now had a chance to make amazing discoveries. The surgery was worth the experience because it opened doors for Charlie. The surgery was worth the experience because it helped him contribute to the world of science. He contributed by desperately wanting to be in the experiment and wanting to make discoveries, “I hope they use me. Miss Kinnian says maybe they can make me smart. I want to be smart.” (Keyes190). He was the first human to really want to contribute to this experiment. Just by getting the surgery he helped science. Without Charlie they couldn’t have gotten the results and shown
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Now I know what it means “to pull a Charlie Gordon.’’ I’m ashamed.” (Keyes201). He always saw everyone as being his friend and everyone seeing him as an equal. At this moment he saw how people really saw him. For the first time in his life he saw his “friends” for what they really are. Even when Charlie became smart he started to be like everyone else, “I felt sick inside as I looked at his dull, vacuous smile, the wide, bright eyes of a child, uncertain but eager to please. They were laughing at him because he was mentally retarded, and I had been laughing at him too.” (Keyes207). He had been just like that boy once, and now he’s just like everyone who was laughing at him. He realized that he was becoming like the people who once laughed at him. This opened his eyes to how the world will treat people. It was worth the surgery because he got to experience the other side of
Nick Gordon is fighting against the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Bobbi Kristina’s administrator, Bedelia C. Hargrove. Radar Online, September 8, 2015, reported that Nick’s lawyers, W. Bryant Green III and Jonathan M. Broderick, are filing a motion for the case to be dismissed. Nick’s criminal lawyer Jose Baez called Bedelia’s lawsuit, "slanderous and meritless." According to a source, they have pointed out eight reasons where the lawsuit is wrong. They said that Nick is not a Georgia resident because he is living in Florida. He doesn’t own any property and he never married Bobbi Kristina. They claim that he didn’t do any of the crimes stated in the lawsuit. He didn’t give Bobbi Kristina a “toxic cocktail” and then fill a bathtub with cold
For being such intelligent doctors they should have known better than to put him through the surgery knowing all the risks. Charlie should not have gone through the experiment even though it was a major brake through for science. The doctors who performed the surgery were being very selfish when they decided to use Charlie for the experiment. Because of this experiment Charlie has lost all of his friends and his job and his feeling for miss.kinnian have grown rapidly just to get shot down.
The life of Hersh Gordon is pretty simple. Hersh was born on July 5, 1925, in Kovon the capital of independent Lithuania. Hersh’s father worked as a mechanic in a textile factory, his mother worked as a hat designer until he was born. Hersh and his Mother Would go to visit his aunt and uncle during the summers in a small town not so far away. They operated a small restaurant and motel from May to September, his mother would help out with the cooking. Hersh’s father would come on the weekends. Hersh talked his uncle into getting a ping-pong table so he could play the tourists to make some money. Through 1940-1944 Hersh was almost 16 when the Germans occupied Kovno and forced all jews to go into a fenced off ghetto. One day the door of their
Have you ever thought about having an IQ 3x normal that usual.Charlie an 37 year old that is slower than a averge person. Therefore he would be the perfcet contender for that surgery.
Before and after the A.I. surgery Before the A.I. surgery Charlie had a mental disorder were he couldn’t learn, read, or write. Charlie had a job at Donnegans factory. Everyone at the factory bullied him. “It’s a funny thing. I never knew that joe and frank and the others liked to have me around all the time to make fun of me. Now i know what it means when they say.” “You pulled a Charlie Gordon.” “I’m ashamed” (keyes,231.) After the A.I. surgery charlie didn’t get bullied at donnegans factory when he got his job back. Charlie was always getting bullied when he was younger and before the A.I. surgery.
Have you ever wanted to be something else? Be something you dream of? In the story, Charlie Gordon , a mentally challenged man, is faced with this question in his mind and fulfills his dreams of becoming smart, so he could be accepted, to have friends, and feel normal. Charlie taught us to never make fun of someone because they have something wrong. In this science fiction story, ¨Flowers For Algernon¨ by Daniel Keyes, Charlie, a 37 year old man had the IQ of just 68, but Charlie had potential and dreams of being smart. With A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) surgery, the doctors, and Miss Kinnian, his dreams were possible. Charlie Gordonś life was better after the surgery because he had the chance to feel smart and experience the real world
The more obvious ways he had changed was his intelligence, and the memories that slowly came flooding back to him after the surgery. He had went from an IQ of 70, to an IQ of 185 and counting. It had a tremendous impact on Charlie, for he was like a sponge, absorbing as much knowledge as possible, refusing to stop. He had exceeded the expectations, surpassing the IQ of the doctors that worked at Beekman University, and even the ones that constructed the experiment that changed Charlie’s life. He had managed to learn French, German, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Russian, Portuguese, Chinese, Hindi, and Japanese in an extremely short period of time. Before the surgery, Charlie wanted to partake in conversations with the college students about politics,
In my opinion I believe the operation has helped improve Charlie’s whole life perspective because, after the operation he was smarter, he could do things normal people could do, has a bigger imagination, and has feelings for other people. This has impacted Charlie by the flashbacks of his childhood that he couldn't remember before, He was determined to learn, Before he couldn't think/see things (example: the ink blots on the test.), has a bigger imagination, and can cut bad people out of his life instead of his “friends” making fun of him.
First of all, why Charlie shouldn’t have gotten the surgery is because he started understanding everyone and how they felt. This stressed him out a lot. He felt like he didn't belong with others. “Now I know what it means when they say “to pull a Charlie Gordon.” I'm ashamed.” (209). In this sentence, Charlie recognizes why his friends liked having him around so much. It was so that they could make fun of him and play tricks on him for their own fun. Also Charlie had felt bad about a kid at a restaurant. “I jumped up and shouted, “Shut up! Leave him alone! It's not his fault he can't understand! He can't help what he is! But for
In the modern world, patients expect their doctors to aid them and to support them. In the short story, “Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes, Dr. Strauss and Dr. Nemur conducted an intelligence enhancement experiment on a man named, Charlie Gordon and changed his life. With an IQ of sixty-eight, the scientists altered him and tripled his IQ. However, this operation has not been ethical because the procedure was abstruse to Charlie, the doctors were rushing, and Dr. Nemur and Dr. Strauss were acting selfishly.
One of the reasons Charlie is better off after the experiment is because he becomes more self-aware. One part of the story that shows this is when Charlie goes to a party with his friends Joe and Frank, and everyone laughs at Charlie trying to dance. Charlie is now smart enough from the experiment to realize Joe and Frank just keeps him around for some entertainment, and not as real friends, so now he knows “what it means when they say ‘to pull a Charlie Gordon’” (7). Here, Charlie is benefiting from the surgery because he is now intelligent enough to be able to tell whether he has real friends or not. He realizes that they are just making fun of him, because he knows he used to be very unintelligent, which is why they say he can pull a Charlie Gordon. Now, Charlie can be more aware of who he chooses to be with, and know whether or not they are actually caring of him. He has become more self-aware in his choice of friends, and by doing so, improve his emotional situation. Another
After the operation, in only a couple of months, Charlie starts showing signs of new intelligence. His grammar, improved, and he is able to reflect on what his does in the past something he wasn’t able to do before. He had finally gotten something use had always desired. Then, everything and everyone turned on him. In “PROGRESS REPORT 12” April 30th (pg. 60) Charlie writes: “now, they hate me for my knowledge and understanding. What in the name of god do they want of me? They’ve driven me out of the factory. Now I more alone than ever before…” Charlie got what he always wanted, and now he lost everything he had. It was a sacrifice it sounded like he didn’t want to make. I can tell just be the tone of his writing. This shows that we should embrace everything that we have. Charlie didn’t embrace everything, although he appreciated most of the thing he never became happy not being able to just enjoy life as it is.
One of the reasons Charlie was better off after the surgery is because he helped the world. One way he did this is because he found out the Algernon-Gordon effect. He stated this when he said “The unforeseen development, which I have taken the liberty of calling it the Algernon-Gordon Effect…”(132).The Algernon-Gordon Effect is when you slowly drop your IQ, which happened to Charlie and Algernon. With Charlie’s intelleince he he recorded actully what happened.
2.2% of americans have an I.Q. lower than 70. 37 year old Charlie Gordon is part of that 2.2%. Due to a newly discovered operation he has the chance to triple that score. In the beginning, he was moving slowly on his road to intelligence, but then he started moving very quickly. He was helping the factory he worked for make new advancements, and able to understand normal human emotions better. Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever, and his intelligence was quickly decreasing. Charlie was not intelligent long enough to experience real intelligence, or make new friends same that possess the same intellect. For that I believe he was better off after the procedure.
One reason why I think the surgery was a bad idea was because, no one was expecting him as a friend. When Charlie got his surgery, some people at his work were realizing that Charlie had changed, and was starting to have feelings. “Look at him. His face is red.He's blushing. Charlie is blushing.Hey, Ellen, what'd you do to Charlie? I never saw him act like that before”. In this sentence Charlie's workmates realized that Charlie's operation was actually working, and that Charlie was