issue208【challenge yourself小组】第三次作业 by zhangrongxinxln

zhangrongxinxlnUID: 2368076

208"The way people look, dress, and act reveals their attitudes and interests. You can tell much about a society's ideas and values by observing the appearance and behavior of its people."
1．不太支持作者的观点。了解一个人的态度和兴趣单单靠外在的look，服装和行为恐怕不够。同样一个社会的观点和价值也无法靠观察这些得到。
2．一个人的穿着等只能表现这个人的审美观，长相很多时候是没有办法给的，（如梵高，长得homely，很不讲究，行为也很古怪，这个靠这个没有办法知道他是genius in painting）。
3．People的look等还有可能受流行的影响。
一个社会的value就更不能仅仅靠服装和行为吧~~，肯能只是一时流行，全球化—流行没有国界。Distinct ideas 和value 得不到
4．要了解还需要什么

  Can we tell much from what people look like, the dressing they put on, or the way they behavior? Or can we understand a society's ideas and values just by observing the appearance and behavior of its populace? Is the measure of observing credible and neutral enough to judge some serious and server problems? I think the speaker's assertion is unfairly to some extent.
  There are some compelling arguments against the speaker's assertion, I think the most important one is that the looks and dresses are just external factors of a person's attitude and interest but not the necessary ones. For example, each one in the U.S, or even the world know that President Lincoln was homely in appearance, President Teddy Roosevelt always wore in tennis costume, and Vangho acted odd in behavior. Can we draw our conclusion that we know their attitudes and interests from their external appearances. In fact, what a people looks like is just something they cannot alter, and the dresses they wear may be just because of the aesthetic vision and the behavior we behave may just the way some want to express himself. Obviously, we cannot tell the attitudes and interests just from people's external appearances.
  The second compelling argument is that appearance may just represent a prevalence at some certain era. The earth is becoming more and more closely and we can know the fashion information by means of mass media, such as TVs, magazines, and internet. We more and more likely to dress in the same way as the fashion indicates. The prevalence in dresses cannot make people distinct from one another. For example, people from all over the world not only in U.s but many other countries like to wear T-shirts and jeans just for comfort or just follow the fashion. Therefore, we cannot know much about the ideas and values of a society.
  Admittedly, we can know something about people's ideas by observation of what they look like and what they behave. For example, we can know some about some African tribe ideas and values by observing their costumes, ceremonies and rituals and so on. However, the speaker is presumptuous in asserting the function of the observation. Only under some special circumstances we can get information of a society's ideas and values.
  In sum, the speaker's assertion is somewhat unevenhanded. To know more about a people's attitude and interest we need not only the extrinsic appearance but also some other things such as the environment he lives, the education he receives and so on
. Also to tell much about a society, we need to know the culture traditions such as the folk art, crafts, traditional songs and ceremonies which can help us to know better about the society.