As well as reading The Giver, I am also reading The Deep, by Peter Benchley and I am further into it. As I read on more issues came up and more ideas cam into my mind. The Deep follows vacationing couple David Sanders and Gail Berke who recover a number of artifacts, including an ampule of amber-colored liquid and a medallion. Sanders and Berke seek the advice of lighthouse-keeper Romer Treece on the origin of the medallion, who identifies the item as Spanish and takes an interest in the young couple. The ampule is noticed by the man who had rented diving equipment to Sanders and Berke, which in turn attracts the attention of Henri Cloche, a local drug kingpin for whom the shop owner works, who wants to buy the ampule with no luck and then begins to terrorize the couple with Haitian black magic. Treece concludes that a recent storm has exposed her cargo of morphine and unearthed a much older wreck containing Spanish treasure. Treece makes a deal with Cloche, so they can dive in peace making him believe he will get the ampules for a million dollars, while his real plan is to have the chance to find the treasure. Cloche gives him 3 days to recover them. Sanders, Berke, and Treece make several dives to the wrecks, recovering thousands of morphine ampules from Goliath and several additional artifacts from the Spanish wreck. From all of this from the text, philosophy questions about trust come into my mind. Some of them are, when can you trust a person? Also, why do people place trust in others?
The first question I asked myself was why do people trust others? Many people place trust in other to get things. According to the dictionary, the definition of trust is "firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something." Treece made a deal with Cloche, so they can dive in peace making him believe he will get the ampules for a million dollars, while his real plan is to have the chance to find the treasure. Cloche placed trust in Treece, but Treece took advantage of Cloche's kindness and he tried to make money. Chloche placed firm belief in the ability and strength of Treece to get the ampules from Goliath. To answer the question, "when can you trust someone?", I believe that Cloche trusted Treece because if Treece found the ampules, Cloche could make a large profit from the ampules, because they are very valuable. People trust others when they get a benefit themselves. The benefit could be some money, or power. This kind of relates to my blog post last week about people being greedy.
The other question that I asked myself was; when can you trust a person? When you need something, you may have to place trust in someone else. You need people so that they can help you get what you want. I personally believe that you can trust someone when you have known them for a while, and when you know that they are not greedy and won't take advantage of you. People become not trustworthy when they are greedy. So, what is greed? According to the dictionary, it is "intense and selfish desire for something, especially wealth, power, or food." People would take advantage of you when they want wealth, power, food, and other things. I personally believe that you shouldn't trust everyone, and that if you need something, it is better to just wait for someone who you trust to come and help you get what you want. Trust should be a precious thing that should not be given to anyone. Trust should also be something special between two people, and being trusted should be a greater compliment than being loved, because only very few people could be trusted. It was a big mistake that Cloche trusted Treece.
In conclusion, many ideas about trust came into my mind when I was reading The Deep. Some of the questions that came into my mind were, when can you trust a person? Also, why do people place trust in others? While I was thinking about this book, I made a huge realization that being trusted is a greater compliment than being loved. You can love many people, but you only trust very few people. That is an important realization that I will live the rest of my life with.
Great blog post! "The Deep" looks like a really interesting book. I like how you discussed the theme of trust. I never thought about how trust and love relate to each other. I agree that they are two separate things, but I also think that for a person to love someone, they also have to kind of trust them, in some ways. You really got me thinking!
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