Hello all...
The following are the focus questions for "The Bet." You don't need to respond to these on the blog, just read them over for tomorrow!
1. Who won the bet? Why? (Did anyone really win the bet?)
2. Which do you think is worse- imprisonment or the death penalty? Why?
3. How do you interpret the letter at the end (written by the lawyer)?
4. The characters in "The Bet" are both considered dymanic characters. How are they dynamic characters? What do we learn about them? How do they change? How do we know?
Happy reading!
Answers:
ReplyDelete1. Technically, the prisoner won the bet since the prisoner had stayed in the lodge the alloted time and that was all he had to do, even though in the process, he died. The banker somewhat won due to the fact that the prisoner did not claim his money even though he renounced it.
2. The punishment, in my opinion, that is worst is the death penalty. The reason being is that you die instantly rather than living in prison. Even though prison is terrible, you still live.
3. How I interpret the letter was that his realization of what he thought was once Earth, after spending 15 years in prison and reading philosophical, idealistic and religious books, he sees in his eyes for what Earth really is. And after seeing his hold for Earth become meaningless, he sees that material possessions aren't as dominant in his life anymore. So, the prisoner feels no remorse after giving up the $2 million.
4. The characters in "The Bet" are considered dynamic characters since their personalities change throughout the story. We learn about them that they recieve a change in their train of thought that the prisoner at first wanted nothing more than the $2 million but throughout the story, his view changed from selfishness to a new-found love towards humanity. The banker's change of train of thought was that he wanted nothing more than to win the bet but now, he just wants his friend back. We know this due to the fact that in the beginning, they both just wanted to win the bet but now, we can see their wishes develop at the end of the story.
I feel as if the death penalty is easier and life imprisonment is more cruel. This is because with the death penalty you die fast.
ReplyDeleteWith life imprisonment you have a lot time to think about life and its true meaning, but in the end you still die. Dieing with wisdom is probably harder than dieing without it.
As for the bet, Heather and I talked about it at lunch and came to the conclusion that in order for a bet to be broken off, both people have to want it off. The lawyer broke it off by writing in the letter that he doesn't want the banker's 2 million dollars and to prove it he'd leave 5 hours early. The banker broke it off by accepting this and not telling anyone. Instead of showing people the letter and bragging about how he "won", he locked the letter up and didn't show anyone. Therefore, both agreed to break off the bet.
THERE WAS NO BET! =]
I think that Life Improsonment is a far worst punishment than the death penalty because
ReplyDelete1.) After being imprisoned for life, you get all crazy like the lawyer and eventually hate your life, and at that point living a life you hate is torture.
2.) The death penalty won't prolong the punishment: while life imprisonment makes you locked up in a cell for like 50 years, you only stay on death row for 1 year. You won't be living hell, becuase living a life that you hate isn't worth living.
The Argument: Everybody is wrong except for me and Sunny
The Lawyer lost the bet by explicitly stating "to deprive myself of the money I shall get out of here five hours early and break the contract of the bet" which means a breach of contract automically enstates that the Banker wins. Im not talking " ON the inside... he lost the bet"... the lawyer really did
WINNERS= ANI AND SUNNY
I think that the death penalty and life in prison are both really bad, however I think that the death penalty is bad because you just die and being alive is better than being dead even though, in the case of The Bet, you can go insane. Also, with life in prison there is always a possibility that you can be proven innocent. If you get the death penalty and then you're found innocent, its too late because you're already dead. However, I believe that life in prison is bad too because there is more suffering involved and. I think its really hard to pick which one is worse because both are really bad and you end up missing out on life. If I had to pick one I would just say neither because I wouldn't want my life to end like that.
ReplyDeleteAs for the bet, I think that the lawyer did renounce the money AND he left. He renounced it in the letter, he says he renounces it. Then he says that he will also be leaving 5 hours early. I think that this ends the bet. Also, it doesn't matter if he renounced it or not, I think that, in the end, the money didn't even matter anyway. Sure, the banker gets to keep it, but really what value does it have at that point? I mean he already read the letter and has to deal with the guilt for the rest of his life. I think no one won the bet because the lawyer went nuts and also grew to hate life and what it means and the banker has to deal with the guilt and what he learned from the letter for the rest of his life. The two million therefore is essentially not worth anything because it won't help the banker forget about his guilt. Money isn't going to solve the bankers problems, therefore, there shouldn't even be a question, the money means NOTHING.
HECK YEAHHH ANNIII!!!!!
ReplyDeletep.s i love this blog thing
p.s my answers ( the right ones) are coming soon!
1. THE BANKER WON THE BET THE BANKER WON THE BET THE BANKER WON THE BET. Look at it this way, the bet was if the lawyer could stay in "jail" for 15 years. he did not stay for 15 years, therefore the banker WINS and gets to keep the millions end of story.
ReplyDelete2. At first, i always used to say i would much rather be dead than be in jail for the rest of my life, but now i am starting to feel differently. i do believe jail for life is a better way to decide a persons punishments because it is a slow death and it teaches the person lessons and makes them suffer.
we dont have to answer 3 and 4 yet right?
ReplyDeleteso my final answer to number 2 is i would rather for me to die, but for someone else who deserves so suffer life in prison
I think life imprisonment is a worse punishment than the death penalty because as a prisoner you actually have to face the consequences. You have to live with absolutely nothing for SO long. As for death penalty, you are hardly getting a punishment. Obviously you don't get the oppurtunity of living but you don't face the suffering. Everything just goes away for the person.
ReplyDeleteAs for the discussion... Neither the banker nor the lawyer won the bet. In fact, I agree with Becca 100%, there was NO BET! There was no set winner of the bet because half of the bet was accomplished by the banker and half was accomplished by the lawyer. The actual bet was that the lawyer could stay in improisonment for 15 years, which he did. He won that part of the bet. On the other hand, the banker bet that he would keep his 2 million dollars which he did, but it is only because the lawyer told him to.
1. At first, I thought that nobody won the bet. But, after hearing Sunny and Ani's arguments, I now believe that the banker won the bet in some sense. This is because it is true that the bet was the the lawyer would have to stay in prison for 15 years in order to win the bet. The lawyer knew he was breaking the bet by leaving five hours early. Therefore, in technical terms, the banker did win the bet. But, both the banker and the lawyer benefited from the bet. This is because the lawyer learned what was important to him in life and after reading the lawyer's letter, the banker realized that money isn't everything.
ReplyDelete2. I think that imprisonment is far worse than the death penalty. This is because when you are imprisoned, you are deprived of all of your rights, connection to the outside world, and everything else. I would much rather be dead than live a horrible life suffering. Would you rather suffer or die? By dying, you are getting off easy because you don't have to live with what you did wrong. Look at what happened to the lawyer when he was imprisoned, he went crazy because he had no connection with the outside world, and nothing to do. He went insane and began to believe that life isn't worth living. This is why I would much rather be dead than imprisoned.
I think that the death penalty and improsinment are both cruel, unfair, and shouldn't be allowed. One of the guests at the dinner said, "both are equally immoral, for they both have the same object- to take away life. The state is not God. It has not the right to take away what it cannot restore when it wants to." I agree with this man 100%!!! However, if I really had to chose one of them, I would take the improsinment. Of course it is torture, but I love living and the thought of being sent to the death chamber kinda freaks me out.
ReplyDeleteFor the discussion, I agreed that neither man won but they also won at the same time. They lost because neither man won the 2 million dollars, but they also gained a lot of knowledge that I think will make them realize that materialistic objects and money is not the point of life. They should be happy and grateful for what they had, but it is just as good to be alive.
I think life in prison is much much better. I say this for 3 different reasons:
ReplyDelete1)Some crazy awesome thing could happen and you could end up getting out of jail.(One day your in and the next day your out)
2)You could witness to other inmates about your religion (mine's christianity). This is some thing you couldn't do if you were dead)
3)You can maybe give back to the community. You can show young people the consequences of making poor desicions, so then they won't be in the same place you're in. Giving back feels good it's yummy (in my tum tum).
i think that this blog is quite magnificent because everyone gets to express how they feel without having everyone around them "pressuring" them into what they say and how they feel.
ReplyDeleteP.S. no one won the bet, the bet was null and void when the lawyer renounced the money.
To answer number two, I definitely think that life imprisonment is MUCH worse than the death penalty for many reasons. First of all, the death penalty is an easy way out. It happens quick and then it is all over with, you don't have to suffer for your whole life. Even though you are not going to die right away in jail, it is basically like the end of your life. When you become a "criminal", if you do get out of your sentence early, your life becomes a bunch of restrictions. People begin to treat you differently and it is much harder to find a job. If you think about it, if you are ill and in the hospital and you either have the choice of living, but suffering, or dying and being put out of your misery, what would you choose?
ReplyDeleteAs for the bet, absolutely no one won the actual bet. Before the lawyer even left, he said that he was renouncing the money, thus ending the bet before he even left. Once the money is taken away, the bet is over, that's it.
In my oppinnion it was the banker who won the bet not the lawyer. I agree with Ani and Sunny on this fact because the bet was made already and its unfair to end the bet just because you had learned your lesson you can't go back on a bet cause a bet is a bet. For example you can't just flip a coin call heads they show you the coin then switch to tails.
ReplyDeleteImprisonment for life and death, niether is what you want but if I had to choose I would choose impisonment becuase like the lawyer you can gain higher knowledge and also amend for things you've done and not die quick and painless and act like you didn't do anything.
I think the worse punishment is imprisonment. When you are imprisoned you have very few if any freedoms. It would be hard to live a life that you have little control over and have to listen to whoever has imprisoned you. I think it would be better to get the death penalty because you wouldnt have to spend your life alone with no point of living.
ReplyDeleteAfter thinking about the bet i have to agree with Sunny and Ani that the banker won the bet. The bet simply stated that the lawyer had to stay locked away for 15 years and in return he would get the 2 million dollars. When the lawyer left his room before the end of the 15 years he lost the bet so the banker didnt have to pay him anything.
Well, like rebecca said, we had come to the conclusion that the bet had been called off. When you have a bet, to call it off both people have to agree. The agreement was made between the lawyer and the banker. When the banker was going in to kill the lawyer, he essentially was taking dramatic measures to make sure the bet became null, therefore calling off the bet. The lawyer had also nullified the bet via writing the letter and then deciding to leave 5 hours early. So... there was no bet in the end :D
ReplyDeleteI think that the worse punishment would be life imprisonment. It lets you think about things and life an such to the point where you come to the ultimate realization that life really isn't what its all cracked up to be. With life imprisonment the person with the sentence will have to life the rest of his/her life as a worthless life just occupying space until they die, which makes them be all alone and it is a long slow death, instead of quick death.
I believe that neither the banker nor the lawyer won the bet because the bet was CALLED OFF (suck it sunny).
ReplyDeleteOnce the lawyer declined the the 2 million dollars the bet was called off because it was no longer a bet. The bet was that he would pay the lawyer 2 million dollar if he stayed in jail for 15 years and neither of those things happened. He renounced the money AND THEN left before the 15 year mark, showing that the bet had ended and nobody won or lost the bet.
They both had an understanding that nobody would win the in the MOST LITERAL SENSE.
This discussion was really enjoyable because everyone has differing opinions and we all knew that neither was right nor wrong (although we all believe that the other is wrong). There were a lot of sides to the argument and that was fun to yell at eachother back and forth.
I would rather be in jail the rest of my life then suffer the death penalty because like the lawyer says at the beginning, it is better to live a prisoner than not live at all. Although the lawyer had unfortunate consequences to his prisonment I think that maybe it will help me understand my life whether it be postive or negative and I think that it would help me see what the rest of the world does not from the outside.
that was CARA MAZOR
ReplyDeleteOh, and Ani, although I agree that the letter itself was a breach of contract by the lawyer by renouncing the bet, I disagree that this means that the banker won. The banker went into the house/hut place with the intent to kill the lawyer. That in itself forcibly makes the bet off. Think about it, the banker going in to even just smother the lawyer, he is making the lawyer have human contact before the bet is done. For example, if we had a bet that...ummm... say I wouldn't eat a piece of chocolate cake for the next ten years. If you (I know, this is really weird, but it's the only thing coming to mind...) force-fed me a piece of chocolate cake, without leaving me a choice, like with a feeding tube from the hospital or something, would that mean I lost the bet? It wasn't MY doing to lose the bet, you would have forced me to lose. So with the act of just entering the house/hut the banker forcibly made the lawyer lose the bet, therefore the bet was then called off.
ReplyDeleteOn the death penalty vs. life imprisonment (I swear this will be my last comment...hehehe...) I just wanted to say that I would rather have the death penalty that way I could cherish the memories and my life how it is already, than to go through life in prison and have the realizations about life and realize how superficial and vain my life really is. I would rather die loving the people and things I have always loved than to hate all of life and not love anything by the time I die. (did that make sense?)
ReplyDelete1) I don't think anyone won the bet because the bet was called off when the lawyer renounced the money. If he had left before he wrote the letter than the banker would have won.
ReplyDelete2) I think it depends on the person. If they have a family I think it is better to be imprisoned because then you can still see them and stay connected. However, if the person is alone then I think the death penalty is better because it will kill the person faster instead of letting them suffer.
3) The letter kind of confused me. However, from what I understand, i think the letter is stating how the lawyer understands life a lot better than he did before. He renounced the money because he learns that in the end, everyone will die so it is pointless to be caught up in greed and wealth.
4) They are both dynamic characters because they start out trying to win the bet and all they can think about is wealth. Towards the end, the banker loses all of his money. In the end, the lawyer leaves because he realized life is to short to be greedy, and the banker cries because he realizes that the lawyer was right.
Yeah Heather, but being my argumentative self, I'm going to drag this on a little longer.
ReplyDeleteThis would have been different if he had killed the lawyer. BUt he didn't. So the discussion's over.
Ani...Sunny... and now, Sydney has joined the dark side of the blog. There was NO FREAKING BET! Pardon my language Mrs. Rosen. Both cancelled out on each other in the bet and also both of them won. The banker cancelled the bet by renouncing the $2 million and he also won by staying in the lodge for all 15 years. The banker cancelled by agreeing to the banker's renouncing and he also won by keeping his $2 million dollars.
ReplyDeleteOh, yeah! I can have facts, too!