https://io9.gizmodo.com/revisiting-mass-effect-after-i-came-out-a-trip-in-and-1846849513
https://twitter.com/Salon/status/1392691897353842699?s=19
https://www.seattletimes.com/life/food-drink/thanks-for-the-memories-bamboo-garden-a-cultural-exploration-of-kosher-food-in-seattle/
In the novel Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut, Jonah, a free-lance writer, is planning on writing a book about the first atomic bomb. He sets out to find information about the atomic bomb's creator by finding his children. His journey leads him to San Lorenzo, a tiny island in the Caribbean with its own religion called Bokononism. There he meets Dr. Hoenikker's three children Frank, Newt, and Angela. Jonah survives the end of the world and finally meets Bokonon, the creator of Bokononism. Kurt Vonnegut expresses many ideas and themes in Cat's Cradle.
One of the main themes in the book is that of human nature and the meaninglessness of life. Humans search for a meaning in life through religion in order to busy themselves. In one scene, Newt shows Julian Castle his painting of a cat's cradle. Julian says, "It's black. What is it—hell?" (pg. 168) Newt knows that it is a cat's cradle, but Julian does not. Julian saw the cat's cradle for what it really was…nothing. In another scene Newt explains how kids look at the cat's cradle, trying to figure out why it is named a cat's cradle. Newt says, "No damn cat, and no damn cradle." (pg. 166) The cat's cradle represents the views and opinions we all hold that do not exist because nothing matters. The cat's cradle represents religion as well because everyone has a different view on what it really is, but nobody knows why and they cannot make sense of it.
The meaninglessness of organized religion also goes in hand with the last theme. Julian Castle said, "Man is vile, and man makes nothing worth making, knows nothing worth knowing." (pg. 169) This quote can apply to religion, because man made religion and man knows religion, which according to Julian is not worth making or knowing. In the Book of Bokonon, there is a story about the creation of man. Man asks God what the purpose of everything is and then God asks if everything must have a purpose. The man says that it must, and then God replies, "Then I leave it to you to think of one for all this." (pg. 265) Man's explanation for everything is a lie, thus, religion is a meaningless lie because it is an explanation for what man cannot explain.
Another theme that is shown in the novel is a human's place in the universe. When Jonah is talking to Dr. Breed, Dr. Breed tells him about how ice-nine was invented because the army wanted to get rid of mud. When asked what the general had in mind by Jonah, Dr. Breed says, "The absence of mud. No more mud." (pg. 43) In another scene, Dr. von Koenigswald was giving the Bokononist last rites to "Papa" Monzano. During the last rites, they both sang a song, telling a story about how "God made mud" and how "God got lonesome" "So God said to some of the mud, 'Sit up!'" (pg. 220) God made man out of mud. The ice-nine led to the end of the world and mankind because it destroyed all the mud from which man came from. Thus, man's place in the universe was non-existent.
In retrospect, life is meaningless, organized religion has no answers for the meaning of life, and humans are insignificant in the universe. When humans die out, it will not be important because there is no meaning to their existence. Humans get closer to their demise by trying to find out the meaning for their being.
Vonnegut, Kurt. Cat's Cradle. New York: Dell Publishing. 1963.