Is Roland Barthes on the writing “The Eiffel Tower and Other Mythologies” a mad man or a genius? Well there are many aspects of his argument that seems a bit obscure yet clear at the same time, well my own contradiction which  is what I viewed as part of his point, the paradox us humans deal with when it concerns to symbolism, object, dreams, and view in particular. The first part of his writing conveys to the reader how he and Maupassant view the Eiffel tower. He and his friend says the Eiffel Tower is literally nothing! It is just an object or a monument of nothing! So as I read the passage he brings up many different ways people think about the Eiffel tower. He even brings up a bunch of science and says we are empiricists. In addition, not only that we learn my experience and observation, but we also have a major goal in mind. To use learning structures to make sense of what we see when we look from the peak of the Eiffel Tower. He even states that there is a word for this kind of learning. That word is decipherment. We decipher or at least try to decipher every vegetable strata on the location we view things. Then he also claims that the monument is useless. What intrigues me about the writing is when he says that we create meaning to an object that’s purpose was just to satisfy Eiffel’s dream along with the artist’s petition. This dream which he speaks of is what there idea was to ascendant power at there time. Also a dream to be able to be as big as the tower itself. This shows that the tower was created with aspirations that it’s meaning would be to be capable of constructing a monument that embodies power. He then uses an example that is similar to the sun tower that another individual wanted to create. The problem was what it took to make the sun tower especially since it would involve masonry. That is a very tedious task which will require a lifetime of work to get accomplished. So this goes to show that dreams of power and ideology comes hand to hand when it comes to crafting these constructs of art. Another story which seems to bring about the essence of his point with with the tower of Babel. Babel is a tower that people wanted to create to reach heaven and communicate with god, but instead god deceived them to prevent them from creating the tower. To conclude my post Roland Barthes to me is a genius even if he says the Eiffel tower is a useless monument because he makes a point that we use our imagination to make meaning towards the tower.