English 101:MT9 — Mason Topics Link to Biology 103:MT9
Essay 2 — Comparison/Analogy
Many of the essays in Lives of a Cell use comparison and contrast to make their points. Thomas compares cities and ant colonies to multi-cellular organisms, for example, pointing out both similarities and differences. Often his essays take the form of extended analogies in which the similarities are stronger than the differences: an ant colony is like a single organism is which each ant is a cell.
For this essay, you will need to observe some group behavior and compare this group the the functioning of a single organism. The group can be human or animal; for example, you could visit the Johnson Center and observe the activity on the ground floor (the fourth floor makes a good observation post), you could observe traffic around campus, or you could observe a flock of birds or an anthill.
The essay should 3-5 pages, with plenty of descriptive examples. But description is not the point of this essay. You need to use the descriptions to support your thesis: that this group behaves like a single organism.
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