Tag Archives: Philosophy

Transcendentalism in Wall-e

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Wall-e, the famous pixar robot, exhibited many traits of transcendentalism during his journey to bring life back to earth.  Wall-e was designed to be a waste-collecting robot.  However, because of a short circuit, he has the ability to think freely.  Free thought is an important trait of transcendentalism.  With this ability, Wall-e is able to fix his own broken parts and stay functionable as all the other wall-e robots broke down.  While collecting and compressing trash, Wall-e also collects interesting human artifacts.  One day, as he was searching around, Wall-e found a plant.   It was the first one he had ever seen.  Here is a video of when Wall-e collects items he finds interesting and discovers the plant.

He became fascinated with the plant and took great care of it.  Soon, another robot named Eve comes down to earth to see if she could find any form of life.  As soon as she saw Wall-e’s plant, she stored inside herself and went into standby mode.  When humans came back to take away Eve and do tests on her, Wall-e follow Eve onto the spaceship.  On the ship, the ship’s autopilot robot , Auto, tries to destroy the plant so humans could not return to Earth.  Wall-e and Eve work together to protect the plant.  The importance of the plant displays a huge theme of transcendentalism: the importance of nature.  Without nature, man cannot survive.  The plant was what brought humans back to recolonize their destroyed home in the movie.  This movie shows the transcendentalist view of the relationship between nature and man: nature is just as important as man, and man needs nature.  For a more complete synopsis and more information about the movie, go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall-e.  The movie credits end with an adorable scene of Wall-e and Eve holding hands under the tree they protected together

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Everybody is Special!

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The idea that each individual is special and original is deeply instituted into American culture and philosophy.  From a very young age, each kid is taught to be himself.  Kids are taught in school, at home, and even on television shows like Barney that everyone is different and special in his own way.  This is a link to the Barney song on this topic, in case you’re interested (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G17eL8z9Mo4).  Individuality is extremely emphasized even as a graduating high school student interviews for college.  Now-a-days, every college is trying to look for things that make a possible student stand out among the crowds.  If you have a special talent or are extremely passionate about a particular subject, chances are, you will be more likely accepted to top colleges.  Colleges are all about looking to improve their student communities.  They send scouts to look for potential students for their sports teams, and scholarships are given to individuals that have specific traits that colleges look for.  College applicants now must worry about extracurricular activities, sports, and volunteer activities in addition to doing well in school.  Individualism actually originated from transcendentalism.  Ralph Waldo Emerson, a leading figure in the transcendentalism movement, once said, “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.”  From this quote, you can tell that Emerson emphasized being different from others and being unaffected by worldly influences.  Transcendentalists believed that individualism was a key component in spiritual freedom, and that idea has been preserved through history: it is a huge part of American culture today.