Jessica Chang Chih-Yun
Sang Rhee Kim
Advanced Research Seminar Section J
Descriptive Analysis Paper
February 3, 2017
The object I have chosen is a stuffed teddy bear that I’ve had for a few years. This bear is very
soft and furry. The only hard parts of the bear are its nose and eyes. The bear is about 17 inches
in height and 8 inches at the widest part which is the head, similar to the size of a one-year-old
toddler, it has a pair of rounded ears, with a pair of legs and arms. The arms are teardrop shaped,
somewhat flattened. The legs are cylindrical and slightly bent at the knees, with a set of large feet
with a 4-inch diameter.
Its fur coat is a caramel color, which has two different lengths, one longer straight type, and a
short curly type, these two types of fur are dispersed evenly throughout the teddy bear. There is
also and a light nude color of fur around the eyes, nose, and mouth, which forms the shape of a
Mickey Mouse head shape when looking at it head on, face to face; this color of fur is all the
same type, short and straight. It has rounded dark brown eyes with large rounds black pupils. It
has a protruding muzzle 3 inch long, and a black triangular nose with a 1-inch width. The mouth
is closed and slightly curved, forming a smile, it is connected to the nose in the shapes of an
upside-down T, made with thick black thread. The light nude color is also found on its palm and
bottom of its feet. It’s paw pads consists of four dark brown circles in a row on top of another
dark brown Mickey Mouse shaped embroidery, this Mickey Mouse shaped embroidery also
appears on the left side of its lower back, next to its ball shaped tail.
The teddy bear has two fabric tags, one indicating that it is made of polyester fiber and
polyurethane foam. It also indicates that it is Disney copyrighted, with addresses of two Disney
stores, one in the US and one in the UK. The other tag is made with the letters in blue, which
writes: Duffy The Disney Bear and made in Vietnam. The teddy bear is in a pretty good
condition, it looks clean with no stains, tears or bald spots. Its fur also has a little glisten in it
when shining some light. When smelling the bear, it has a slight synthetic plastic smell, similar
to the smell of muslin fabric.
Teddy bears and stuffed animals, in general, are often referred to as comfort object, one would
most likely receive one at an early age, given to children as a friend, when they seek comfort,
calm them down. Teddy bears are also given on special occasions such as valentine’s day, or
mother’s day to show affection and care to someone else. Teddy bears are also an object that has
the potential to hold deeps sentimental value, people are often very attached to one stuffed
animal, and often when the bear is worn out, we seek ways to fix them rather than getting a new
one. So what is it about a teddy bear that makes us want to keep it?
The reason why we keep teddy bears forever is that it holds sentimental value, a vessel for
remembrance, or a trigger for safety and calmness. All in all, the teddy bear is a physical proof of
some untangle thing that we hold great sentimental importance to. Unwilling to let go or forget
that, perhaps we are aware of our forgetful nature, we fill this inanimate object with our own
meanings and therefore it became more than something we can throw away nonchalantly.
Trying to illustrate the intangible human behavior that I am trying to explore, I stumbled upon
stories of other people that reveals this humanness. Rick Rawlins has a box of memories, the
most interesting object in there is this small, yellow, sugared egg. A sugar egg is exactly what it
sounds like; it is an egg, made of sugar. It is hollow inside to be filled with other types of
candies, usually made during holidays and special occasions, often decorated with drawings on
the surface much like an easter egg; however, Rick only has half of it. The catch is, this sugared
egg, he has kept for 40 years, since 1970. And he kept it till now is because it carries with it a
significant memory. As a child, Rick moved around a lot because his father worked for the
government. Therefore he was never able to make any friends in time then he would have to
move again, what makes matters worse is that Rick is very shy as a kid. However this one time,
he finally got to make one friend, named David. And David even invited him to his birthday,
sadly this birthday is on the exact day that he and his family has to move again, and his parents
decided he wouldn’t be able to make it to the party. On the day of the eventful emotional
dilemma for an eight-year-old, he was sitting outside as his family is packing and getting ready
to leave. Young Rick just decided to leave and ran up the street to David’s house, and paused at
the doorsteps of his door. As young as he was at the time, Rick knew the level of friendship
between him and David probably wasn’t close enough for a goodbye. However, he rang the
doorbell anyway. When David’s mother opened the door, Rick could hear the sound for party
behind her, laughter, footsteps, children talking. Moments later David also came to the door,
peering behind his mother. Rick just stood there; he said he felt embarrassed and didn’t know
what to say, regretting that he had decided to do this, so he just froze. After a few seconds,
David’s mother whispered something to David, and he ran to the back to get something, what he
brought back is the same sugar egg that Rick has kept till now.
He walked back to his parent’s house, and they drove from Washington to Idaho, and
throughout that whole trip he held that sugar egg in his hand and kept it until this day. What an
amazingly innocent and beautiful story, however, it begs the question, why? Rick said the
importance to keep that sugar egg is immediate and hasn’t changed over the years, it is proof,
physical proof, that he had been invited to a birthday party and the hopes of making friendship
for the first time.
There is a follow-up to Rick’s story, recently 3D printing has been very popular, and 3D
printing companies started to provides a service where they will 3D print for you anything of
importance. So The producer of the interview that recorded Rick’s story asked him is he would
3D print his sugar egg so they can make an exhibit of all the stories they’ve ever interviewed,
and he agreed. However, the egg broke in the process of being scanned. The irony of it is that
they do have the scan of the sugar egg, and if Rick wanted to, he could have a replica of it in no
time at all. But is it the same? Since the sugar egg is a vessel of memory itself, can this replica be
another vessel of even more memory such as the story of the original sugar egg, and what
happened to it?
And this question has been asked by philosophers before in theory called the swamp man
created by Donald Davidson, which goes as follows: “Suppose Davidson goes hiking in the
swamp and is struck and killed by a lightning bolt. At the same time, nearby in the swamp
another lightning bolt spontaneously rearranges a bunch of molecules such that, entirely by
coincidence, they take on exactly the same form that Davidson’s body had at the moment of his
untimely death.
This being, whom Davidson terms “Swampman,” has, of course, a brain which is structurally
identical to that which Davidson had, and will thus, presumably, behave exactly as Davidson
would have. He will walk out of the swamp, return to Davidson’s office at Berkeley, and write
the same essays he would have written; he will interact like an amicable person with all of
Davidson’s friends and family, and so forth.”
So in this age of replicas, are the swamp man the same person as Davidson? will the 3D
printed object be the same as the sugar egg? Donald Davidson, and also I believe, No. It is not
the same because the 3D printed thing was not there when the event of importance happened.
There is an element of history and human touch that the replica will never have. Human touch in
the same way that an email will never be the same as a hand-written letter. That even the shards
and pieces of his broken sugar egg, are held to a higher sentimental value than a 3D replica.
The reason why we tend to store random things of meaningfulness perhaps came from an
evolutionary standpoint. Much like squirrels we are a species that hunts and gather and kept track
of what we have, as well as ration what we have, this meticulousness aided us in our survival.
This simple survival instinct made us see objects with something more, and with the growth of
our emotional intelligence, and memory capability, the meaning that we attach to these objects
grew as well.
Davidson, Donald (2001 (1987)). “Knowing One’s Own Mind” Reprinted in Subjective,
Intersubjective, Objective (pp. 15–38). New York and Clarendon: Oxford University Press.
Originally published in Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association,
60 (1987), 441-58.
“The Explorer’s Club & The Sugar Egg.” Interview. RADIOLAB (audio blog), May 30,
2014. Accessed February 6, 2017. http://www.radiolab.org/story/explorers-club-sugar-egg/.
