6/6 AP English Language Argument Essay Example #1

The Prompt

The Essay

Often, people find themselves frustrated after making a mistake, wondering if making it makes them inferior to others. The truth is, though, that mistakes are a necessary part of being human because it is through mistakes that we learn and adapt to new environments, and it is not the mistakes that matter but the way that people persevere through them and adapt. Mistakes are not simply failures; they are part of the process through which people understand what works, what does not, and how they should change their actions. Mistakes carry a necessary importance even very early in a person’s life because they help them develop skills that they would need to survive in the world. The first mistakes that all people make are falling. As no one is born with the innate ability to walk or stand, it takes trial and error, and many mistakes are made to figure out how to do something that most adults don't even think about; but the only way that we learn to walk is by trying over and over and by persevering through the mistakes. But walking isn't the only thing that took mistakes to learn; anything, from speaking to running to writing, took trial and error. There is a stigma that mistakes are bad, but in reality, they are one of the best things that can happen to everybody because they are what helps us learn. When a child falls while learning to walk, the fall itself does not teach the child how to walk; instead, the child must recognize what caused the fall and change their actions when they try again. This process teaches the child more than simply the physical act of walking because it develops the ability to respond to failure with adaptation. That ability becomes important throughout life, because people constantly encounter situations where their first attempt does not work. Learning how to walk shows that through mistakes, something as grand as being able to take first steps can be achieved. Therefore, even one of the most basic abilities people develop depends on the willingness to make mistakes, learn from them, and try again. Mistakes, though, are not just something that is tied to being young; mistakes are made throughout the life of a person, and it is how people learn to persevere through them and are able to avoid the mistake in their future. In the film Midway, the story describes the events of World War II from the attack on Pearl Harbor to the eventual victory of the United States in the Battle of Midway. The story is told from a narrator’s perspective, allowing the viewers to see the actions of all the parts of the army. In the beginning of the movie, the person entrusted with gathering intel receives information about the possible attack on Pearl Harbor, but he doesn't bring it up because it isn't backed up with enough evidence, causing the United States to be ill-prepared for when the actual attack happened. His hesitation demonstrates how fear of being wrong can influence a person's decisions. Instead of acting on information that might have been useful, he allowed his uncertainty to prevent him from taking action, and the consequences of that decision were severe. But he learned from the mistake that he made, and when he got intel about the attack on the island of Midway, he urged the people in command to send their ships there in order to prevent another tragedy from happening. As a result, he was able to relay the information in time, earning the United States a victory in the end. The difference between his actions at Pearl Harbor and Midway demonstrates the importance of learning from mistakes. His first failure did not permanently define his ability to make decisions; instead, it changed how he responded to uncertainty. By becoming more willing to act on imperfect information, he was able to make a better decision when another crisis arose. This reflects a larger part of human experience: people cannot always know whether their choices will be correct, but previous mistakes can give them the knowledge and confidence to make better choices in the future. This movie showed that mistakes, while devastating at times, can be used as a lesson to prevent an event even more devastating from happening. The mistake itself could not be undone, but the knowledge gained from it could influence future actions. This shows why mistakes are necessary: they allow people to turn past failures into experience that can guide future decisions. Lastly, not all mistakes turn out bad, as some of them can have lasting and good impacts on humanity. A prime example of this kind of mistake would be the research done by Japanese scientists, where they tried to create an AI that could use pattern recognition to be able to distinguish croissants from elephant tusks, but while it wasn't able to complete the task at hand, it was able to successfully recognize human cells that were about to turn cancerous, allowing for early treatment. So, while making a mistake, it was able to largely benefit the medical world, demonstrating that a mistake can be beneficial. What makes this example especially significant is that the researchers could not have planned for the discovery they made. Their unsuccessful attempt produced information that led to a completely different and potentially more valuable application. This demonstrates that progress does not always happen in a straight line toward a planned goal; sometimes, unexpected results reveal possibilities that people were not originally looking for. In this way, mistakes can expand human knowledge because they encourage people to examine unexpected results rather than simply dismissing them as failures. The accidental discovery therefore shows that being wrong can sometimes lead humanity somewhere it never intended to go, creating opportunities that would not have existed otherwise. Ultimately, mistakes are necessary not only because they teach people how to avoid repeating failures, but because they make new understanding possible. A child learns to walk by responding to each fall, people learn from past failures to make better decisions, and researchers can discover unexpected possibilities when an experiment does not go as planned. These examples reveal that human progress is rarely a perfect process of getting everything right the first time. Instead, progress often comes from noticing what went wrong, questioning why it happened, and using that knowledge to try something new. Thomas’s claim is therefore significant because without the ability to be wrong, people would lose one of the most important ways they learn, adapt, and create something they could not have anticipated.

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