Q3 Blog 4 Construct an argument that challenges normative ideology

The Industrial revolution has led to a vast amount of effects that are felt today yet one that easily stands out is the meat consuming culture that has given way for new chemicals in the meat, new, mass methods of slaughter, and a highly inefficient system of transport for meat. While these methods may easily increase the amount of meat being produced they have many adverse effects that greatly outweigh the comforts of having meat as a luxury.
One of the main reasons that the consumption of meat should be abandoned is because in the transportation of meat has made it so that meat is now pumped full of sometimes toxic chemicals. One of these chemicals is the chemical nitrous oxide. The World Cancer Research Fund recently published a study that showed incredibly high rates of cancer in meat-eaters compared to people who did not eat meat. They concluded that “all people should immediately stop buying and eating processed meat products.” It is thus clear that for personal health concerns meat should no longer be consumed by any humans.
Because the meat packing industry is a corporation it is motivated not by the comfort of the cows and pigs that it uses to make our hamburgers and steaks but it is instead motivated by the desire for profit. This desire leads the meat-packing industry to often commit acts of torture so heinous that, if revealed to the public, would bring disgust to any reasonable person’s mind. To make milk, for example, cows are impregnated and whatever calves are born from these mothers are brutally murdered so that the mother may continue to produce milk as its maternal instincts are exploited for our comfort. The calves are fed a milk substitute that is deficient in calcium so that the calves become anemic and so that they can then sold as higher priced “veal.” If God indeed put these animals on the earth to feed humans a kind, loving God would surely not have wanted us to abuse them in such a way.
Scientific studies have shown that the production of meat releases many times more carbon dioxide and methane into the atmosphere than the production of vegetables and fruits. These chemicals further contribute to Global Warming and a system that slowly chips away at the things that support it cannot last very long. It is unreasonable to keep consuming meat for the health and moral problems associated with it. This is why we must immediately adopt a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle. This may be a large change from the steaks and hamburgers that society has accustomed us to, but it necessary for this to happen if we wish for our prosperous society to continue.

Q3 Blog 3

“True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country,” once said Kurt Vonnegut and I know exactly what he means. I wake up and see how little people actually enjoy thinking. I would be horrified if the people I loathe so much were to someday be running the country. And unfortunately, many of these people will have positions of power within the government and within society. Many will become racist television hosts while other will lead a plethora of people away from voting for the legalization of gay marriages. Of course I am not referring simply to my specific high school class but to my generation in general which has been dubbed as “generation slacker” for our seeming inability to have a high work ethic. Unfortunately, I must agree with this label because it pinpoints the major problem with the youth of much of the world. Laziness from thinking and from using our intellectual capacities I dare to say is potentially the biggest problem our society will face when the current youth is older. As a mostly rational member of society who strives to make the world a better place it pains me to see people say things like “I don’t like to think,” which I have heard from family members and peers on several occasions. Our society must stop placing such high value on things of such low intellectual caliber, such as the latest trends. We simply must stop focusing on “Silly Bands” or the latest Justin Bieber CD if we wish to advance as a society. However, if our society wishes to end up like the society in the movie “Idiocracy” then by all means go ahead society for you are surely on the right track! If you wish to have society get more and more idiotic continue wasting hours watching television instead of reading or wasting hours on facebook instead of bettering your physical condition through exercise! Keep texting in classes which aim to raise your knowledge and discipline your thinking! All of these things are distractions from the more important goal of the betterment of society that must be abandoned. Society has to start focusing on the bigger problems of nuclear tension between countries and global warming if it wishes to even continue existing. These problems which loom over us cannot be solved by idiots whose only wish is to go home and blindly watch whatever the latest sitcom is or intellectuals who would rather waste their gifts with frivolous affairs than to tackle these problems head on. Instead they are solved by the true visionaries of the time like Martin Luther King Jr. or Vladamir Lennin who lead revolutions in thought and action. It is solved by the progressive zeitgeist of the masses which is what decides the fate of millions in its influence over the human condition. Because of this individuals with the potential of King or Lennin must rise beyond the distractions of laziness and the masses must change the way they think about the world and its problems. I for one must continue to have at least a bit of hope in society if I wish to struggle to try fixing it.

Q3 Blog 2

The top 2% of people in the world own more than 50% of all wealth. The concentration of such a vast magnitude of wealth has its obvious repercussions. As the saying goes “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.” It is unacceptable for this broken system that resembles feudalism to continue any longer. It is unacceptable for over 50,000 people to die every day from the problem associated with poverty. It is unacceptable for the human race to suffer on such a large scale while a privileged few enjoy on such a large scale. It is even worse that the fortune of these privileged few has been built, to a large extent, on the metaphorical backs of the masses. In recent times a more subtle sort of economic exploitation of the masses can be seen rather than physically obvious exploitation. In other words, the slavery of chains has been replaced by the slavery of debt. As caring human beings we simply cannot let this broken system continue any longer. If we truly care about our fellow peoples’ lives then we must surely change this. The method that I propose is Communism. Now, before you turn away in disgust at the simple notion of this let me remind you that the countries that have claimed to be communist and the countries that continue to claim to be communist are not truly communist. China, for example is definitely not communist as it has several private corporations within its borders. The Soviet Union was to a great extent communist but the corruption within the communist government ultimately led to its demise as government officials and government workers would get bigger apartments. However, the Soviet Union did in fact show several communist ideals. The main ideal of equality, both economically and socially, was exemplified in the Soviet Union’s space program because the space program was very open to blacks joining. This was so because in the Soviet Union they were not designated as “blacks” they were designated as “comrades.” Communism in today’s society could be incredibly successful because of the incredibly advanced technology we hold. Crops could be genetically engineered to grow quicker because of government funding of the sciences which would in turn feed millions that are currently starving to death as you read this. Carbon Dioxide and methane emissions would be greatly reduced as factories turned to nuclear energy for power. To run the government well there would be a board similar in theory to the “Brain Trust” created by FDR this board would consists of 100 of the world’s most intelligent people to run the world. These people would be selected to lead the country as they exhibited qualities of leadership and logic early in childhood and would then be lead to an education focused on problem solving. In short this argument can be summed up in this way:
People value life.
Capitalism destroys life.
Therefore, people should abolish Capitalism.
Communism would bring a prosperous life to all.
People should lead a prosperous life.
Therefore, people should adopt a communist society.

Q3 Blog 1

In recent philosophical discussion the problems with both determinism and free will are apparent. To people who believe in free will the problem of determinism is that it does not explain consciousness and that it does not explain why we still make “choices” in everyday decisions. To people who believe in determinism the problem of free will is that seems to be a construct to help us cope with the reality of the universe and that free will does not make sense because the things which determine our thoughts (the interactions between neurons) are physical and thus follow physical rules. If I were to drop a pencil and it fell to the ground it would be because I dropped it, it would be because of the rules concerning gravity, it would be because the pencil had mass, it would be because there was nothing but air to obstruct its fall, and etc. It would be because of countless of past events that combined to make that situation occur. If all of these factors were in place there would be absolutely no possible way that the pencil could have done anything else than what it did. The problem with the theory of determinism is that when expanding this deductive example to humans the past factors which I mentioned become much more complex. The factors which shape a human being are trillions of things but all of these factors and the human beings ultimately live in the physical world and are therefore subject to physical laws. The thoughts that human beings have are the result of physical things. They are the result of the interaction between neurons and the passing of neurotransmitters through synapses. They are the result of new proteins being made to encode for memories or perhaps new dendrites growing from neurons to encode for memories. It has proven by the fMRI that our reasoning and emotions are found in the brain. We do not have a soul which is not subject to physical laws and therefore free from the grasp of determinism. We do not have free will because free will would violate the very definition of the physical laws. Of course the realization of this does come with a certain nostalgia of a time when I believed that I had a choice between white milk and chocolate milk but as a person devoted to the truth I must ignore my intuition and follow the logical conclusion which is determinism.

Blog #7: Compare and Contrast

My purpose would be to show how even though both are run by the same officials, the extreme differences in wealth show a hypocrisy of the church.
Sample thesis: Although both churches are run by the same officials, the extreme differences in wealth between the churches reveal a hypocritical juxtaposition between the church's claims of helping the poor and what kind of churches it builds for the poor.
Key points:1) Difference in wealth 2) Difference of location of churches
Organization: Subject by subject

Blog #6: Working Definitions

For this blog I shall define the word genius through definition by negation, definition by history, definition by example, and definition by compare and contrast.
To begin we can define the word genius through definition by history. Its original meaning was a guiding spirit. It could also be applied to a talent in a specific field. In modern times, the word means high intellectual ability and is currently undergoing a change back to its original meaning of talent in a specific field. For example, "He's a genius at remodeling!" To define by example I can use the most famous genius in modern times who is Albert Einstein. Albert Einstein was a genius in both definitions because he had a high intellect and he also led a revolution and positively influenced his field. For definition by negation we can use the average person in a society. The person that contributes nothing novel and only contributes his/her ability as work. Also to define the word genius we can define by history. Finally for definition by compare and contrast I can compare a genius to a savant. The difference is that while both the savant and the genius\ have a high capacity for memorization, the savant can merely repeat the information while the genius understands the information's significance and can make interesting and novel connections.

Rice post 4

Catcall means boo.
Downtrodden means oppressed.
Burly mean husky.
Redaction means editing.
Vaporous means ethereal.
I actually want to continue with that.