SAT作文素材我们在前面已经提到过很多了，比如有政治方面的，有发明创造、生物医学，还有名人生平，这些SAT作文素材对于我们的SAT写作有很大的帮助，使我们的文章形象生动，有例证做依托，而不光是空洞的理论，只有理论的文章是没有任何说服力的，今天我们再来看一类SAT写作素材——哲学与思想。

　　1088:The first university

　　The first university with the authority to grant degrees arose in Bologna, Italy from student guilds and societies of scholars seeking protection from an intolerant church and government. Universities in Paris and Oxford were formed shortly thereafter, creating largely secular and democratic centers of learning that began to challenge the beliefs of the church and state, and nurture the development of human thought.

　　1897:The birth of psychoanalysis

　　German psychologist Sigmund Freud revolutionized the process of psychoanalysis for the treatment of mental illness. He popularized the concepts of anxiety and repression and introduced the idea of early childhood development of sexual feeling. Although his ideas are highly controversial and impossible to prove, terms such as "Oedipus complex" captured the collective imagination and equipped psychoanalysts with a new school of thought.

　　ImmaturityThe immaturity of young children may deter them from making moral discrimination about harmful actions committed against or others. Many scientific research prove that young children do not take into account the intentions of a person committing accidental or deliberate harm and that it is difficult for young children to differentiate between unforeseeable and foreseeable, and thus preventable harm.

　　爱因斯坦与波尔关于相对论的争论

　　One need look no further than the famous Einstein-Bohr Debate on determinacy - indeterminacy of quantum theories. On one hand, Einstein believed that quantum physics would eventually be replaced by a more determinate theory. Bohr, on the other hand, accepted the finality of the probability-based quantum theory. Their debate brought about chaos theory, which finally solved the debate by proposing wave-particle duality. When viewed from this perspective, the Einstein-Bohr debate evaporates. Depending on which part of the spiral we look, Bohr or Einstein will appear correct.

　　批评的作用(理证)

　　Receiving criticism can be a direct path to making yourself look good. Everyone is subject to it, from the person in the mailroom to the CEO of the organization. No one likes it, but everyone would be wise to hear it with an open mind. You can learn more about how to improve in your work and life through criticism than through many other channels.

　　Most criticism is intended to help you do your job, even live your life, better. It is meant to be useful and constructive. Some criticism is unfair, unjust and unkind. It is not meant to help you improve in any way; it is intended to hurt you, make you angry and wreck your day. Don't let it. The smart person treats all criticism in the same objective way, learning from it what he or she can and discarding the rest. The foolish person allows himself or herself to be manipulated into being angry or responding defensively, thereby losing whatever benefit he might have gained, and looking unprofessional and undignified in the process.

　　个人主义

　　Individualism holds that every person is an end in himself and that no person should be sacrificed for the sake of another. Collectivism holds that the needs and goals of the individual are subordinate to those of the larger group and should be sacrificed when the collective good so requires.

　　Individualism holds that the individual is the unit of achievement. While not denying that one person can build on the achievements of others, individualism points out that achievement goes beyond what has already been done; it is something new that is created by the individual.

　　Collectivism, on the other hand, holds that achievement is a product of society. In this view, an individual is a temporary spokesman for the underlying, collective process of progress.

　　In fact, the concept of individualism does not make sense in the absence of other human beings. Individualism and collectivism are contrasting views of the relationship between the individual and the group. Individualism is called ``individualism'' not because it exhorts the individual to seek a life apart from others, but because it asserts that the individual, and not the group, is the primary constituent of society.

　　Egoism vs. altruism

　　A true individualist wants the best for himself, so he seeks out the best, no mater who is the source. To the individualist, the truth is more important than any authority, including himself.

　　The first confusion is to confound altruism with kindness, generosity, and helping other people. Altruism demands more than kindness: it demands sacrifice. The billionaire who contributes $50,000 to a scholarship fund is not acting altruistically; altruism goes beyond simple charity. Altruism is the grocery bagger who contributes $50,000 to the fund, foregoing his own college education so that others may go. Parents who spend a fortune to save their dying child are helping another person, but true altruism would demand that the parents spend their money to save ten other children, sacrificing their own child so that others may live.

　　We are taught that ``selfishness'' consists of dishonesty, theft, even bloodshed, usually for the sake of the whim of the moment.

　　Reason is individualistic. No person can think for another; thought is an attribute of the individual. One can start with the ideas of another, but each new discovery, each creative step beyond the already known, is a product of the individual. And when an individual does build on the work and ideas of others, he is building on the work of other individuals, not on the ideas of ``society.''

　　成功和失败Winners & Losers

　　The word “winner” and “loser” have many meanings. When we refer to a person as a winner, we do not mean one who makes someone else lose. To us, a winner is one who responds authentically by being credible, trustworthy, responsive, and genuine, both as an individual and as a member of a society.

　　Winners do not dedicate their lives to a concept of what they imagine they should be; rather, they are themselves and as such do not use their energy putting on a performance, maintaining pretence and manipulating others. They are aware that there is a difference between being loving and acting loving, between being stupid and acting stupid, between being knowledgeable and acting knowledgeable. Winners do not need to hide behind a mask.

　　Winners are not afraid to do their own thinking and to use their own knowledge. They can separate facts from opinions and don’t pretend to have all the answers. They listen to others; evaluate what they say, but come to their own conclusions. Although winners can admire and respect other people, they are not totally defined, demolished, bound or awed by them.

　　Winners do not play “helpless”, nor do they play the blaming game. Instead, they assume responsibility for their own lives.

　　If you want to learn the secrets of success, it seems perfectly reasonable to study successful people and organizations, but studying successes without also looking at failures tends to create a misleading — if not entirely wrong — picture of what it takes to succeed. But the performance of any given firm is influenced by many random events beyond the control of managers.

　　乌托邦

　　Sir Thomas More wrote Utopia in 1516. The work was written in Latin and it was published in Louvain (present-day Belgium). Utopia is a work of satire, indirectly criticizing Europe's political corruption and religious hypocrisy.

　　Aristotle's ideas of aesthetics, justice and harmony are present in the Utopian's philosophy. In the 1800s, the rise of urban industrialization triggered the proliferation of Utopian projects (agricultural communes), all of which failed.

　　Utopia became the project of creating an ideal society apart from the demoralizing city. These Utopian projects were especially popular in Britain, France, and New England. The Utopian celebration of common property and dependence upon extensive state planning are the groundwork for communism and socialism as presented in Marx and Engels' written works.

　　如果说SAT作文的论点是一篇文章的骨架，那么这些SAT作文素材就是这篇文章的血和肉，要想使我们的文章具有很强的说服力，举例子就是最好的方法。所以说在平时SAT写作的练习中一定要积累更多的例证，希望以上SAT写作素材供大家参考学习。