So, yesterday we watched another TED talk, this one entitled "Are We In Control of Our Own Decisions?". This one was really interesting, but also very existential. In this TED talk, Dan Arieler, explained how a variety of things influence our decisions and why these things mean that we are not as in control of our choices as we think we are. When faced with tough decisions, we will often just go with the default option so we don't need to choose. Also, the variety of choices affect what looks better to us and, therefore, our choice. So this TED talk did not mention tragedy once, but it was still related to the topic. One important facet of tragedy is that the characters are often not in charge of their fates. Tragic heroes will try to control their lives and avoid tragedy, but, clearly, this does not work out for them. For example, Oedipus' whole goal in life is to not murder his father and marry his mother like the prophecy said he would. To do this, he leaves the people who he thinks are his family far behind and starts over in a new place-- that just happened to be where his real parents are from. All of his decisions end up being wrong no matter how hard he tries. This is, apparently, a common theme throughout many tragedies, which makes a lot of sense. It is frightening to think that we may not be in charge of our lives or even our choices; this lack of control also offers an explanation for the sudden changes of luck and fate are possible.
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