Rescuing Mark Watney - The Martian, Humanities 10
In our society today, the moral usually believes in “The needs of the many outweigh the need of one”. In some situations, there are dilemmas that we have to make sacrifices in order to solve the issue; our moral would tend choose the happiness of the many over the sacrifices of the few, thus, the least would be sacrificed for the happiness of the majority. However, in the book The Martian by Andy Weir, the idea is communicated in a different way. Instead of scarfing for the needs of the few, the many are making considerable sacrifices for the good of the few. If anything, the author intends to tell us that being altruistic and sacrificing our own happiness for the sake of helping others is …show more content…
Before the start of the rescue mission, each of the five crew members got in contact with their family members on Earth. Until this moment, we finally have a deeper understanding the lives of the five crew members, as well as their relatives and friends. “‘Hey, Melissa…,’ said Robert. ‘Am I getting through? Can you see me?’ … ‘Wow! Good find!’ ‘I know right!?’ (Weir, 245). As we started to have a closer approach to the lives of these five crew members, we came to the realization that they are not just crew mates of Mark Watney, but people with lives and families. Knowing that Mark is stranded, every crew member is altruistic enough to take life-threatening risks to save their precious friend. Such decision requires insane bravery; prolonging the time that they spend in space hugely boosts the chances of dying, and if the probe launch ends up in failure, everyone would die in the end. Yet, when one calls for help when he is in danger, everyone responds; it almost feels like that being altruistic is hard-wired into our
In our society today, the moral usually believes in “The needs of the many outweigh the need of one”. In some situations, there are dilemmas that we have to make sacrifices in order to solve the issue; our moral would tend choose the happiness of the many over the sacrifices of the few, thus, the least would be sacrificed for the happiness of the majority. However, in the book The Martian by Andy Weir, the idea is communicated in a different way. Instead of scarfing for the needs of the few, the many are making considerable sacrifices for the good of the few. If anything, the author intends to tell us that being altruistic and sacrificing our own happiness for the sake of helping others is …show more content…
Before the start of the rescue mission, each of the five crew members got in contact with their family members on Earth. Until this moment, we finally have a deeper understanding the lives of the five crew members, as well as their relatives and friends. “‘Hey, Melissa…,’ said Robert. ‘Am I getting through? Can you see me?’ … ‘Wow! Good find!’ ‘I know right!?’ (Weir, 245). As we started to have a closer approach to the lives of these five crew members, we came to the realization that they are not just crew mates of Mark Watney, but people with lives and families. Knowing that Mark is stranded, every crew member is altruistic enough to take life-threatening risks to save their precious friend. Such decision requires insane bravery; prolonging the time that they spend in space hugely boosts the chances of dying, and if the probe launch ends up in failure, everyone would die in the end. Yet, when one calls for help when he is in danger, everyone responds; it almost feels like that being altruistic is hard-wired into our