<p>First of all, we really should have an "Official Score My Essay Thread" or something of that nature.</p>
<p>I figured that I should practice my essay writing, as the SAT is in a week. Wrote this in just under 24 minutes. Blue book prompt #3.</p>
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<p>From the dawn of humanity, humans have strove ((...striven? I don’t even know what that verb is supposed to be)) to gain in knowledge. Knowledge has represented power, but it has further represented control as well. In civilizations, power has been parallel to control; knowledge is always useful to those who possess it.
Frederick Douglass is a prime example of the usefulness of knowledge. As a slave, he was never able to control his own destiny. Lucretia, one of his masters, taught him to read. This, he explained, was his greatest blessing. From then on, he read all that he could, gaining insight, gaining knowledge, gaining power. Then the day came, and at the peak of his discontent, he ran away. He was able to do this using his working knowledge of the world, gained from socializing, from observing, and primely, from reading. Ameliorating his position was not half as much a challenge with his profound gift - that of knowledge. As much as Frederick Douglass embodies knowledge as a benefit, his story is one of limited knowledge. Henry Thoreau, on the other hand, was one of the most effusive ((oops, wrong word)) knowledge-bearers of his time. He, like Douglass, upset social institutions with knowledge. Understanding that the Mexican war was to the detriment of all those involved, he refused to pay a poll tax ((was supposed to add: funding the war)). He was put into prison for a day, until his friends, Emerson included, paid it for him, without his knowledge ((haha didn’t mean to say knowledge again)). Emerson later explained to him that resistance was probably futile. Yet Thoreau and everyone reading his works came out on top for his action that day. He wrote his “Civil Disobedience” two years later, professing that it should be ((regarded as...)) an exemplary action to disobey a government that is incorrect in its actions. So, although Thoreau was jailed for his use of knowledge, it was not to his detriment, and was a great benefit for generations to come.
Technology has been regarded as knowledge-gone-wrong. People often look to the “good old days” when they did not have television, internet, or even phones. Technology, they say, is ruining posterity. And perhaps it is. Pollution of the earth, destruction of nature; things that Thoreau disliked, for all his emphasis on knowledge. ((fragment...uhh...)) Yet those come both from knowledge and a lack thereof. The earth is destroyed because we know how to destroy it, yet do not know to not destroy it. We do not have the knowledge to facilitation the success of the earth and its people. An imbalance of knowledge, perhaps, causes power to exist without control.</p>
<h2> Knowledge is never a burden; humans should never stop learning. It is necessary, however, to control knowledge, control the use of power. In this, we use knowledge wisely. We unboundedly benefit. As the maxim goes - “with great power comes great responsibility.”</h2>
<p>Definitely some syntax errors, but I'm not sure what this would get. Criticism is good.
By the way, I read it again, a lot of it is BS. I also probably wouldn't write ameliorating if it was an actual essay (I just had to include it because I remember someone posting "using the word ameliorate is an automatic 12"...haha)</p>