The Ironic Second Semester

I have only a few weeks of school left.  You'd think that I would be home free by now, having virtually no homework.  That's what I thought at the beginning of the year; but it's just the opposite.  I have so much going on at the moment that this post will only be a paragraph long as opposed to two!  To start off, I have a "Marketplace of Ideas" project that I chose to do on global warming, which shouldn't be too stressful but I'm making it overwhelming for myself.  Then, next week, I have the dreaded AP Calculus exam, and the week after, the AP Biology exam, so I need to review for that.  And for Music Theory, I have to write my final composition for May 14.  Then of course, the motherload: the senior project.  In a previous post, I summarized it, and now I'm finally writing it.  It's due a week from today.  Who would've thought that I'd have so much going on in the last couple weeks of my senior year?

Senior Ditch Day

Today is Monday, the first school day after our high school prom.  Apparently, it's tradition that seniors pull a Ferris Bueller on everyone and 'ditch' school on this day.  So you may ask, what are the possible reasons for doing this?  For some people, it's to catch up on sleep; they take Monday off to plop themselves down on their beds for several hours.  For others, it's to simply follow the tradition and keep it alive.  For most people, the idea of having an extra day off from school is very enticing.  And then of course, there are some prom groups who are out at their lake houses recovering from their hangovers for the day.  But what really bothers me the most about senior ditch day is that some students have their parents call them out.  I'm serious.  Their parents let them ditch, and then call them out.

Any senior that ditches for senior ditch day without their parents calling them out of class is penalized with a 3% grade deduction from every class.  Thus, seniors that choose to ditch are fully aware of the consequences of an unauthorized absence.  But when parents call the attendance office saying that their child won't be in school for the day, they authorize the student's absence and prevent the 3% reduction.  To me, that's just silly and unfair.  First off, why would a parent be willing to call their children out of class?  Wouldn't they want their child to be a diligent student and be in class?  Second, these students who are called out have no consequence to skipping Monday class as opposed to the students who actually ditch and receive a 3% reduction in every class.  It's just dishonorable to me that the students who are called out would say that they're ditching when they're really not because their absence is authorized.  If you're going to ditch, DITCH and face the consequences!  I chose not to ditch because I think the detriments outweigh the benefits!

Extraterrestrial Life

If you think about life, it is really phenominal.  How is a cell the smallest form of "life?"  What makes something "alive?"  How did life first come about from a bunch of molecules, a so-called "primordial soup?"  Where did molecules come from?  Matter cannot be created nor destroyed, so where did matter initially come from?  It's amazing how our planet is just the right distance away from the sun, just happens to have the right molecules necessary for life.  Heck, look how far life has gotten on this planet.  Life now can reside in trillion-celled vehicles that can function for years and years on end.  Genes, or replicators, continue to be passed on from generation to generation in different methods.  The possibility of life on a planet is rather slim if you really think about it.  Yet, in a constantly expanding universe, how can life not be possible?

There are more stars in the universe than there are grains of sand on Earth.  Think about the size of the sun.  The sun is larger than the volume of 100 earths.  The quadrillions of millions of grains of sand on Earth is a lesser number than the number of stars in the universe.  Thus, there are probably trillions of sun-like stars in the universe, and where there's sun-like stars (or any stars in general), there are bound to be planets revolving around them.  There is no doubt in my mind that there is some planet out there among the millions of galaxies and millions of millions of stars that houses life like Earth.  The probability is very likely.  How can you not believe that there is some extraterrestrial life out there?

America Alone - 5

In the final part of America Alone, Mark Steyn talks about the premise of the book title, that in the end, America will be one of the last ones standing in the so-called "long war" of Islamification, and the only country with the potential to win it.  "Because, if America can't, nobody else in the developed world can," Steyn states, "and they'd be well advised to begin reaching their accommodations with the new realities, an Islamic Europe and a nuclear Iran being merely the warm-up acts" (153).  Steyn's belief is that most of Europe is hollow, and the United States is becoming more hollow to appease Europe.  He says, "...the United States has become a slave to its habitual if largely misplaced fondness for Europe, while Europe has become a slave to its habitual if entirely irrational hatred for America" (160).  Well said.  Europe hates us for our apparent greed and selfishness, but to me, those are only benign factors of America's success; we are the most prosperous nation known to man because of our revolutionary political and economic systems.  Yet there are so many people out there that hate America, and it clearly will not help us in the long run.  Steyn also begins to talk about our Judicial systems and its flaws (example: trials for horrible people taking forever), our diplomatic position at the moment (example: African and Arab League members of the UN voted against the USA position more than 80 percent of the time, and EU members voted against the USA position 54.5 percent of the time in the General Assembly of 2003), our economic position at the moment (example: "Americans are paying for the rope that will hang them" (165) by paying for Saudi oil), and our media and its flaws.  There is so much crap directed towards America that it has become stereotypical, but we don't deserve this, Steyn believes.  "Most Americans are familiar with their stereotype abroad: the ugly American, loud, brash, ignorant, arrogant.  It is, in most respects, the inversion of reality: America may be the most modest and retiring hegemon in history," Steyn says (174). Mark Steyn is a native Canadian, by the way.  So how can we ease the tensions?

Steyn talks about his solution in the final chapter: be proud of your nation.  Yes, it sounds cliché, but most people kind of take the pride for granted and let Europeans and Islam stomp all over them.  "This book isn't an argument for more war, more bombing, or more killing," Steyn says, "but for more will." (193).  Like Europe, we have become somewhat hollow in the sense that our outer layer is our massive military and firepower, but behind it is a lack of will and pride for our own kind.  Instead, as Steyn says (which I agree with), we hide behind the whole 'multiculturalism' facade: "Multiculturalism was conceived by the Western elites not to celebrate all cultures but to deny their own: it is, thus, the real suicide bomb" (194).  I don't think that having multiple other cultures in a society is a bad thing until it begins to dominate, hide, and scorn the native culture, and that's what appears to be happening today in America.  Yes, as I said before I even believe that having diversity in a society can be a good thing, immersing other people into different cultures.  But submitting to these other cultures and having a system of political correctness that advocates this submission is taking will and pride away from Americans.  There are blacks and whites and yellows and reds but we are "The greatest nation on God's green Earth," undivided.  We cannot forget that.  To stop Islamification, Steyn gives three possible resolutions: submit to Islam, destroy Islam, or reform Islam.  Obviously the first two are farfetched, and reforming Islam "...is not ours to do.  Ultimately, only Muslims can reform Islam.  All the free world can do is create conditions that increase the likelihood of Muslim reform, or at any rate do not actively impede it" (205).  Steyn then talks about ten things we can do to induce Islam reform, including supporting women's rights, supporting economic and political liberty in the Muslim world, transforming the energy industry to decrease dependence on Saudi oil, and ending the Iranian regime.  His general hopes for America though are low: "We have been shirking too long, and that's unworthy of a great civilization.  To see off the new Dark Ages will be tough and demanding.  The alternative will be worse" (214).

America Alone is a bit of a roller coaster to read.  The topics Steyn talks about are often scattered and unorganized.  His contentions and ideas are perfectly valid, but in my opinion, a little intense.  Islamification is probable, but not as probable as he thinks it may be.  The Muslim extremists as I see them have very little infrastructure, just a bunch of firepower and the will and hatred for America.  I feel that once we stop funding the regime by cutting how much oil we buy from them, they will die out.  Who knows though, maybe his predictions will end up being correct.  So, I would probably not recommend this book to anyone; it's a big spiderweb of ideas and it's difficult to pull ideas out of it.  Don't get me wrong, I agree with plenty of things that Steyn says in this book, but I just found it difficult to read.

America Alone - 4

At the end of the second part in Steyn's book, he lays out to the reader "The Four Horsemen of the Eupocalypse;" in other words, what are the four main factors that will cause the European Union to crash and burn within the next couple decades (as Steyn cynically predicts).  According to the biblical story, the four horsemen are Death, Famine, War, and Conquest.  Death is fairly self-explanatory.  As aforementioned in previous posts, Steyn believes that not enough Europeans are procreating to replace those who have died.  "One would assume a demographic disaster is the sort of thing that sneaks up on you because you're having a grand old time: you stayed in university till you were thirty-eight, you took early retirement at forty-five, you had two months a year on the Côte d'Azur, you drank wine, you ate foie gras and truffles, you marched in the street for a twenty-eight-hour work week...It was all such great fun there was no time to have children.  You thought the couple in the next street would, or the next town, or in all those bucolic villages you pass through on the way to your weekend home" (109).  The demographic problem is not well-known in general, so I would agree that it has snuck up on Europeans, and even on us to an extent.  In the United States, the number of children per parent is 2.11, and it's most likely in decline.  Our so-called strength in numbers is becoming slowly but surely weaker.  In terms of famine, Steyn mentions the overall deterioration of European economy and society.  "Think of the European Union as that flat in Marseilles, and the Eutopian political consensus as the stiff, and lavish government largesse as that French guy's dead mom's benefits [from welfare],"  Steyn says.  "Take the one-time economic powerhouse of the Continent - Germany - and pick any of the usual indicators of a healthy advanced industrial democracy: Unemployment?  The highest since the 1930s.  House prices?  Down.  New car registration?  Nearly 15 percent lower in 2005 than in 1999.  General nuttiness?  A third of Germans under thirty think the United States government was responsible for the terrorist attacks of September 11" (113).  People see Europe as a success story today, but peel back the shiny peel and you've got a rotting continent.

In terms of war, Steyn believes that the "Islamification" of Europe is happening quickly and causing tensions.  He claims that Europe is not multicultural but rather bicultural: "You have hitherto homogeneous Scandinavian societies whose cities have become 40 percent Muslim in the space of a generation.  Imagine colonial New England when it was still the Mayflower crowd and one day they woke up and noticed that all the Aldens and Standishes, Cookes and Winslows were in their fifties and sixties and all the young guys were called Ahmed and Mohammed" (118).  Personally, I don't quite believe that all European nations are bicultural, and definitely not America.  I'm not sure how it is in Europe, but there is still plenty of tensions and racism between whites and blacks in America; it's not just Muslim-Americans versus Americans.  Steyn is definitely not one of those advocates for diversity.  He thinks that multiculturalism "...gives us the worst of all worlds: the worst attributes of Muslim culture - the subjugation of women - combined with the worst attributes of Western culture - license and self-gratification" (120).  His viewpoint here is incredibly cynical, and I'm not quite sure if I agree with him here or not.  There are downfalls to diversity, but there are also plenty of benefits, such as people being immersed into different backgrounds of the world.  I'm a bit like Steyn though in the sense that I don't really advocate for "diversity" or "coexistence."  Finally, in terms of conquest, Steyn is generally referring to the conquest of Islam over Europe and the conquest of Europeans over themselves.  Steyn is foreseeing a new Dark Ages.  He asserts that Europe is imploding itself: "The trouble with the social-democratic state is that, when government does too much, nobody else does much of anything" (126).  I could not agree more on that one.  When government gets more into people's personal lives almost like they're our parents, they're acquiring more political power.  As proven time and time again, political power is addictive, and eventually, the government (or specific individuals in the government) will want more and more.

American Alone - 3

Before you read any further, I want to make a disclaimer that this might offend some people.  In my previous post on this book, I asked if a shrinking American-European population and growing Islamic population was a bad thing, but never elaborated.  So why is it a bad thing?  Mark Steyn elaborates in detail on this issue.  He says, "That's the lesson of September 11: the dragons are no longer on the edge of the map.  When you look at it that way, the biggest globalization success story of recent years is not McDonald's or Microsoft but Islamism: the Saudis took what was not so long ago a severe but peripheral strain of Islam practiced by Bedouins in the middle of a desert miles from anywhere and successfully exported it to Jakarta and Singapore and Alma-Ata and Grozny and Sarajevo and Lyons and Bergen and Manchester and Ottawa and Dearborn and Fall Church...And now, instead of the quaintly parochial terrorist movements of yore, we have the first globalized insurgency" (61).  What was once a small strain of Islam extremism has become prevalent and spread like wildfire within the past decade.  Everyone knows about the so-called "muslim extremists," but in an American society where if you say 'black,' it's racist, we completely keep them on the down low.  In fact, we seem to appease them with our "Coexist" and "Celebrate diversity" bumper stickers.  Heck, President Obama did it when he recently had a meeting in the White House with the Egypt Muslim Brotherhood.  Muslim extremists have a strong will and a strong hate for America, while most of us Americans are sheeple, accepting it and going with the flow.  To Mark Steyn and to me as well, this poses a problem for the future of America.

Thus, to Steyn, "...it's not merely that there's a global jihad lurking within this religion, but that the religion itself is a political project - and, in fact, an imperial project - in a way that modern Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism are not.  Furthermore, this particular religion is historically a somewhat bloodthirsty faith in which whatever's your bag violence-wise can almost certainly be justified.  And, yes, Christianity has had its blood-drenched moments, but the Spanish Inquisition, which remains a byword for theocratic violence, killed fewer people in a century and a half than the jihad does in a typical year" (62).  In other words, he believes that Islam is a political project masquerading as a religion, and it advocates totalitarian-esque policies.  Like I said before, this may offend some people, but so be it.  To be honest, I can't help but agree with Steyn on this statement.  There's only one inconsistency in what he says: compared to the Spanish Inquisition, the jihad is a modern entity in a modern population, one much larger than the population back then; thus, more people are likely to be killed by jihad because of the larger population.  That's it though; what Steyn says here is very compelling.  There's constantly something in the news about some American guy that converted into an extremist and blew himself up on some subway.  More and more people are converting to muslim extremism, and more and more are born into it; it's a fast growing population.  Then, normal muslims will complain that this branch of Islam is so small that it couldn't possibly take over, and that it isn't a representation of their religion as a whole.  Well, unfortunately, it is.  "A while back I took my little girl to a science exhibition in Vermont," Steyn says, "and we spent a fun half-hour flipping balls into one of those big mechanical contraptions full of levels and runways and elevators.  But no matter which corner of the table you tossed the ball in, eventually it dropped into a little bucket and was deposited in the hole in the center.  That's the way it is with the ideology du jour: you come at it from the Richard Reid or the John Walker Lindh or the Taliban end, but you all drop down the same big hole in the center" (68).  Take a look at some of what is said in the Koran and see for yourself.

Lotteries

Yesterday was my 18th birthday, a huge milestone in my life.  I can vote, buy cigarettes and other....things, and buy lottery tickets.  It's interesting because most people that asked how my birthday was also instantly asked me, "Did you buy a lottery ticket?"  To which I reply "No."  Then the other side of my conscience goes, "Hey wait, why not buy one?  I mean, a couple weeks ago the Illinois jackpot was at $640 million...imagine all of the possibilities with that amount of money..." He tempts me, but I manage to resist.  Never will I ever buy a lottery ticket.  Here's why.

There is a higher chance that you will get struck by lightning on your way to buying the lottery ticket than winning the lottery itself.  There is a twenty-times higher chance that you will get into a car accident on your way to buying the lottery ticket(s) than winning the lottery itself.  As tempting as it may seem, IT IS A WASTE OF MONEY.  It is also kind of demoralizing to the American way.  The lottery encourages you to gamble, to hope to win something for nothing.  The American way is to work and thus be rewarded; the lottery expresses the contrary, receive a bunch of money for doing no work whatsoever.  I don't want to support an organization that contradicts and challenges American principles.  There are some people who claim that there is a strategy to winning the lottery.  Here's their strategy: buy as many lottery tickets as possible.  Doi.  Besides wasting your money on more lottery tickets, there is no strategy to winning the lottery.  The lottery is an un-American game of chance, slim chances at that.  So why not spend your well-earned money on other things that stimulate the economy?

"America Alone" - 2

When Steyn starts to talk about his hypothesis of "Islamification" of the West, extreme muslim population growth and western population decline, it makes you wonder about the issue of population growth in general.  Though yes, western populations seem to be in decline, the general world population has been growing throughout the years at an apparently exponential rate.  Take a look at graphs of human population and you can see for yourself.  Does this pose a problem for Americans?  For the environment? For the entirety of the world?  Steyn believes that it is not a major problem, and rather, the major problem is that the West is not creating enough babies.  He writes, "The 'experts' of the Western world are slower to turn around than an ocean liner, and in Europe they were still yakking about the 'population explosion' even as their 1970s schoolhouses, built in anticipation of traditional Catholic birth rates, were emptying through the nineties and oughts" (13).  He then cites a "blithely snobbish account...in Dehli" in Paul Ehrlich's The Population Bomb (1968), a book about the exponential growth of the world population: "People eating, people washing, people sleeping.  People visiting, people arguing and screaming.  People thrust their hands through the taxi window, begging.  People defecating and urinating.  People clinging to buses.  People herding animals.  People, people, people, people" (Ehrlich).  In response to this passage, Steyn retorts, "But in the twenty-first century, even Dehli's running out of people.  Even Paul Ehrlich's hellhole of a choice doesn't have a high enough birth rate to maintain its population in the long term.  Yet the complaceniks cling to the long-held Euro-Canadian policy of using the Third World as a farm team and denuding the developing societies of their best and brightest" (13).  Steyn denies the existence of a "population bomb."  "There is no 'population bomb,' Steyn says.  "There never was.  Even in 1968 Paul Ehrlich and his ilk should have understood that their so-called "population explosion" was really a massive population adjustment.  The world's people are a lot more Islamic than they were back then and a lot less 'Western'" (15).

This statement is a strong one, and for the most part, I agree with what Steyn says here.  I think the reason that western countries' populations are in decline is because of people like Paul Ehrlich that publish scary books about population growth.   Most western countries are developed enough to know that the world population is rapidly growing.  World population growth is a fact.  Heck, China has a one-child policy to prevent overpopulation.  Thus, perhaps these more developed countries are dissuaded from having too many children, when they should be having as many as possible right now.  On the other hand, people in third world countries have vastly different cultures, are not as educated and may not understand population dynamics, so they may be naturally inclined to have lots of children.  Western population decline and Islamic population growth is a problem, but I will go more in depth about Islam in a future post.  However, does the importance of Western population growth supersede the importance of controlling the world population?  I say yes.  At this rate, the world population is uncontrollable, so there's really no purpose in trying to not have children.  Besides, we will eventually run out of space, which probably will naturally control the population.  So why not encourage population growth? Western population is declining, but the population of Muslim extremists is growing by the day.  There's power in numbers.  It doesn't look good to me.

Theories on the Origins of Humans

Almost every senior in my school is required to do a senior project at the end of the school year in which they research a topic that they're interested in.  I decided to research theories on the origins of humans, because it's something that's been on my mind for several years.  It's also a topic that is still hotly debated by scientists, religious advocates, spirituals, and others.  How did humans come to being?  Why are we so much more intelligent than all other organisms on Earth?  There are countless theories, some more valid than others.  The three theories I plan to focus on are the creationist theory, the Darwinist evolutionary theory, and the Ancient Astronaut Theory.

The creationist theory is my tentative classification of a collection of religions, primarily Christianity, Islam, and Judaism.  I'm not sure whether or not I'm going to focus on one of the three; I'll decide in time.  The creationist theory is the general notion that God created man in His own form some 4000 years ago (and holistically, God created the universe).  This theory is present in ancient texts such as the Bible and Koran, and is advocated in religious buildings today.  Creationism was a commonly accepted theory until around the mid-nineteenth century when people like Darwin began to question it. 

Darwin postulated that every organism on Earth evolved from a common ancestor, and the reason that certain organisms exist and most are extinct is due to reproductive success.  This is the evolutionary theory of natural selection, also sometimes called differential reproduction or "survival of the fittest."  Organisms that are the most successful in their niche will have more time to pass their selfish genes down to their progeny via sexual/asexual reproduction.  Thus, the most efficient (though nowhere near perfect) organisms are the ones that last.  Humans, then, evolved from primates for specific reasons, as indicated by current fossil records.  There's a lot more to it; I'm just summarizing.  A great book that goes into detail about this evolutionary theory is The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins.

The final theory, the Ancient Astronaut Theory, is the one that is commonly thought to be the most farfetched theory of human origins.  Yet for some reason, I seem to believe in it, though that might change after I finish this project.  The Ancient Astronaut theory postulates that extraterrestrials came to Earth a very long time ago and as an experiment, mixed their DNA with primates to produce intelligent humans.  The evidence that suggests this lies in the ruins of ancient civilizations.  Incredible structures such as the Great Pyramid and Stonehenge are examples; some people believe that there was no way that humans could single-handedly build these structures.  If you read up on the architecture of these structures, it makes sense why people would think this. 

So which theory is right?  Who knows.

"America Alone" - 1

America Alone is a novel published in 2006 and written by Mark Steyn that asserts "The End of the World As We Know It."  Yeah, there are the 2012 Mayan prophecies and other seemingly supernatural stuff, but Steyn actually gives  political, socioeconomic, and demographic reasons to why he thinks that the United States will collapse in the next few decades.  In part I of the novel, Steyn begins with the main essence of his argument: demography will screw over the Europeans, eventually Americans, and muslims will take over.  When I say demography, I mean population growth/decay.  You would think that I am talking about population growth with Europeans and Americans, but I'm actually talking about population decay.  Believe it or not, almost all native European country birth rates are below 2, which means that every two parents is producing less than two children, resulting in population decay.  "Scroll way down to the bottom of the Hot One Hundred top breeders and you'll eventually find the United States, hovering just at replacement rate with 2.11 births per woman," Steyn says.  "New Zealand's just below; Ireland's at 1.9; Australia, 1.7.  But Canada's fertility rate is down to 1.5, well below replacement rate; Germany and Austria are at 1.3, the brink of the death spiral; Russia and Italy are at 1.2; Spain, 1.1- about half replacement rate" (10).  This is pretty surprising, but what's even more intriguing is the former paragraph, where Steyn states, "Some countries are well above that: the global fertility leader, Niger, is 7.46; Mali, 7.42; Somalia, 6.76; Afghanistan, 6.69; Yemen, 6.58.  Notice what those nations have in common?  Starts with an I, ends with a slam.  As in: slam dunk" (10).  These fertility rates of predominantly Muslim countries are tremendously higher than those of Europeans and Americans.  It makes you wonder: does this really pose a problem for us in the future?

Steyn says it will cause a huge problem in the future.  He claims, "By 2050, Muslim fertility rates will be in decline, as they already are in some of the more developed Islamic countries.  But they'll be beginning their decline much later than Europe's, or Canada's, or Vermont's, and so they will have a huge demographic advantage.  And given that that's the sole advantage they'll have - the Middle East's only other resource, oil, will be a fast-evaporating pool by mid-century - this is Islam's demographic moment and they have to make the most of it" (19).  In other words, these Muslim countries will have a huge population advantage, and by sheer number will be able to overpower us; there's power in numbers.  Steyn makes a valid argument here and I agree with most of it.  However, I don't think things will get as bad as he says they will.  Like he said, these countries are funded by oil; once oil runs out or we find an alternative energy source, we will no longer fund them and their booming population.  The extremists' regime would grow in size in accordance to the growing population.  But with no money, these countries' already dwindling economies will collapse and what then?  The extremists may have the numbers and the will, but they don't have the firepower and the technology.  I may be totally wrong here though; I mean, underfunded terrorists still continue to blow themselves up successfully and take others with them.  It does seem to be the opposite for America: we have the firepower and technology, but we don't have the will.  It is an issue worth pondering about; I still am, as you could probably tell.

Why My Blog is Boring

Most people who somehow end up on this blog will probably think, "Well this is boring," and then just X out of it.  The truth is, it is a fairly boring and monotonous blog, not necessarily in content but in appearance.  The background is uniform, the fonts are ordinary, and there are no pictures besides the one of Atlas holding the desperate world on his frail shoulders.  I do this intentionally, yet I don't know why.  Perhaps it is a statement of my own monotony.  I am an incredibly schedule-oriented guy, and I'm convinced I have OCD.  Anything asymmetrical bothers me.  As aforementioned, any pitch that is flat or sharp also bothers me (but I've become more used to it with time).  So maybe I have no pictures, around two paragraphs per post, and a normal font to maintain some uniformity, which is comfort in my language.

Perhaps I made my blog boring because my sub-conscious means for it to represent something.  The title of this blog is "The Search for John Galt," and this search takes place among a sea of clueless, ignorant Americans.  I and many others call these people "sheeple" or "bell curves."  They go through life assuming that their government will keep taking care of them.  They have very little responsibility for themselves, and they often don't make their own choices.  Thus, they are like sheep, going about aimlessly with the farmer, the government, controlling and herding them.  The farmer has most of the (political) power, and it's addicting.  So, while America is searching for John Galt (which they have been for a long, long time), we have sheeple, robots, bell curves that are there for the ride.  It is a long stretch, yes, but perhaps my subconsciousness made the blog boring to represent these sheeple.  They just fill up space and maintain symmetry.

Sexual Harassment and Date Rape

In class, our main topic of discussion is the issue of sexual harassment, particularly of females.  Over the past few decades, this issue has become more and more prevalent with the raised awareness of women's rights.  There are more questionable accounts of date rape in the news, and more questionable accounts of rape in general.  In the article "At colleges plagued with date rape, why 'no' still means 'yes'," a statistic states that up to thirty percent of college women have been victims of date rape.  So why is there so much date rape or rape in general and why has it been on the rise?  I don't think there's really a direct answer to that question.  Perhaps it is that males feel dominance and power when they rape.  Perhaps males feel more pleasure when they rape.  Perhaps males these days can get away with it more easily.  Perhaps it is different for all rapists.  But I think a prominent and interesting reason why date rape and such is on the rise is because of the evolution of our language.

I'm a teen, so I've obviously been exposed to the informal language of our time.  It's strange how informal english has changed over the years.  In my area, everything is a hyperbole.  It's a pet peeve of mine, and I try to avoid this way of speaking as much as possible.  If someone likes a movie, it's not a "good" movie, but rather "OMG!  THE BEST MOVIE EVER!"  If someone has a friend, it is not their "friend," but rather their "Biffel, best friendz for life!"  If someone receives a B on a test, they say "I totally failed that test."  Also, fececiousness is commonly incorporated in our sentences.  My fellow students like to kid a lot, and sometimes it can be quite confusing.  Sometimes, I hear of two people dating but they're really not and they're just saying they are.  So, I can understand why some guys would think that when girls say "no," they think they mean "yes."  By the way, I am in no way vouching for rapists.  It's just that over the years, words that were originally very powerful have lost that power due to their use.  An example is hate.  Hate is an incredibly strong word, but so many people use it willy nilly: "I hate this class," "I hate that kid," etc.  Perhaps the simple word "no" has lost its power as well, and when someone looks another in the eye and firmly says "no," they think it's just a joke.  It's a seemingly outlandish hypothesis, but think about it.  Maybe I'm crazy.  Maybe it's only in my area.  But maybe other people can sympathize.

Telekinesis

Telekinesis is the ability to physically move an object without actually touching it.  It is quite the phenomenon.  But how is it even possible?  Every time I think about it, it doesn't click in my head.  Work is the product of force and distance; the object moves, but what provides the force?  Mind power, apparently.  I've been looking around the Internet lately at sites on telekinesis, and each one suggests that the power from the mind can provide enough force to move an object on the physical plane.  It requires a lot of focus, though.  Most sites recommend meditation before performing any type of telekinesis to clear to the mind so you can provide a full focus on the object you're trying to move. 

Videos on the Internet of people performing telekinesis are...iffy.  Some of them look fake.  Some people even think that telekinesis does not exist, that all of the videos and claims of telekinetic powers are fraudulent.  Personally, I believe in it.  The sites I've visited say that with enough practice, anyone can acquire telekinesis.  I've tried several times before to move light or weightless objects such as a sheet of paper or a flame, with no luck.  I'm not going to give up, though.  One day, I am determined to acquire the skill and prove of its existence.

Telekinesis is a weird topic, and most people reading this probably think I'm a weirdo by now.  Heck, what is even the point of telekinesis?  To me, it's a skill unlike any other.  I find it to be so absurdly cool.  In some ways, it could even be useful.  How many times have you dropped a pencil on the ground and have to bend down to pick it up again?  With telekinesis, you can just send it back up to your hand.  Or how about when you're in bed, the lights are on, and you want to turn them off but the switch is out of your reach?  Just use telekinesis to turn off the switch.  The convenience and mysticism of telekinesis are enticing to me.

Xocai, the Healthy Chocolate

That's what I thought the first time I heard that phrase: What?  Healthy chocolate?  How is that possible?  In fact, raw cocoa beans can be considered a superfood, full of nutrients and antioxidants.  However, the typical chocolate maker cooks these cocoa beans, burning off most of the nutrients, and adds lots and lots of sugar.  If you've ever tasted raw cocoa beans, you would understand why sugar is a necessity.  So most chocolate is considered candy because it is composed of cooked cocoa beans, lots of sugar, and sometimes milk.  Personally, I have no problem with chocolate candy.  It's delicious, and I eat it pretty much every day.  How awesome would it be though if you can enjoy that taste of chocolate, but it is good for you too? 

MXI Corp, makers of Xocai chocolate, has a specific manufacturing process that differs from all other chocolate companies.  Instead of cooking the cocoa beans, they leave them raw, and instead of adding just plain sugar, they sweeten the chocolate with acai berries and other superfruits.  Believe it or not, the chocolate tastes like any other dark chocolate, except it's also filled with antioxidants.  MXI corp also sells other products that contain this chocolate (or the nutrients/flavonoids from it) such as a grape energy drink, which I drink a can of every day.  It's great stuff.  It seems too good to be true, but after consuming these products for more than a year now, I notice a difference in my overall energy level.  If you have your doubts, check out their website http://www.thehealthychocolate.com/ and see for yourself.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Last Friday, I came home from school, plopped down my backpack and ran up the stairs into my room.  Why, you ask?  To read.  Yes.  I came home on a Friday to read.  The book I was reading is called The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky.  I finished it that night.  It's basically the opposite of Atlas Shrugged in length and craft, but it is a spectacular book, well worth the read.  It's about a boy's progression through life in high school.  Though high schoolers would relate the most with this book, any reader can take something from it.  I feel like I have a personal connection with Charlie, the protagonist.  There is so much I have in common with the sensitive dude.  It also seems like he has the answer to my social questions.  I'm really grateful that the book was suggested to me.

The next day, I felt like driving wherever the road took me.  Something about this book has inspired me.  I have been pondering a lot lately about it.  The Perks of Being a Wallflower has made me consider whether or not I'm a wallflower like Charlie, whether I'm a bystander or a doer.  I'm not sure why I said these things, so I'm going to end it here with a recommendation: read this book.  It is well worth your time.

My Top 5 Favorite Ice Creams/Custard

Like virtually every American omnivore, I am a huge fan of ice cream.  There is something about its creamy consistency, variety and versatility that makes it one of the best treats of all time.  I have tried several different ice creams/custards out there and have managed to come up with a list of my top five favorites.  Note that I haven't tried every ice cream in the world, so don't give me beef for leaving out an important one.

5. Homer's Ice Cream - Homer's Ice Cream, originating from Homer's hotdog stand in Chicago, has one of the most wonderful consistencies I have ever tasted in any ice cream.  It has a certain elasticity to it that gives the ice cream a delicious chewiness.  I personally love this kind of consistency for ice cream. 
4. UW-Madison's Daily Scoop - UW Madison students in the agricultural science building have their own cows to gather milk from.  They send this milk to the Student Unions, where it is crafted into delectable ice cream.  The consistency is like Homer's ice cream, but the flavor is even better because the milk is local and very natural.
3. Cathy's Ice Cream (Kemps Ice Cream) - Cathy's Ice Cream and Candy Shoppe in St. Germain, Wisconsin serves Kemps ice cream, which not only provides a variety of flavors to choose from but also great taste.  The Cookies n' Cream flavor is to die for.  It tastes so sweetly fresh.
2. Scooter's Custard - Ahh, yes.  Scooter's Custard in Chicago is the epitome of deliciousness.  Not only is the consistency wonderful, but the added richness from the eggs gives the custard a kick.  It's like heaven in your mouth: so rich, so sweet, so tasty.
1. Dairy Queen - Last but not least is Dairy Queen, quite literally the queen of all ice creams.  Yes, it's an ubiquitous ice cream, but in my opinion, it's the best one out there.  Ever since I was a toddler I have loved that non-creamy consistency and the fact that the ice cream is more like ice milk.  It may not be everyone's favorite, but it's definitely mine; I have an emotional connection to this ice cream.

Race in America

To me, the problems of race in America—heck, the world—will never go away despite our best efforts to eliminate them.  It's a depressing opinion, but true to the human condition.  Today, there are still articles being published regarding race, proving that the problem persists.  In "Noose Sparks More Protests at UC San Diego," the title explains the premise of what happened: some ignorant student hung a noose on a bookcase in the library, causing people to storm into the office of the UC San Diego Chancellor in protest.    In "Why many Americans prefer their Sundays segregated," the writer explains that despite efforts to integrate, churches nonetheless are mostly segregated.  Blacks that attend church said, "I need a place of refuge [...] I need to come to a place on Sunday morning where I don't experience racism."  Heck, there are even some convoluted white men that believe blacks were better off during slavery (article: "Blacks better off during Slavery?").  It is no surprise that racism still exists today.  My opinions and thoughts on racism haven't changed in the past few weeks.

One article that intrigued me was "Whites in U.S. Edge Toward Minority Status."  It is estimated that within forty years or so, the number of minorities will outnumber the number of whites in America (funny, because the article still addresses them as minorities when hypothetically in this case, they're majorities).  That prediction does not surprise me.  It already seems like Spanish is America's main language as opposed to English.  And at the rate that minorities are flowing into this country, it would only make sense to predict that.  But who knows?  Maybe America won't be around in forty years to see if that prediction comes true...

17 Years of Untruth

In 1995, a man named Tirell Swift was convicted for a rape and murder that he never committed.  After repeatedly trying and failing to convince the authorities of his innocence, he lied by saying that he did commit the crime.  Swift was sentenced to fifteen years in prison.  Fifteen years later, DNA evidence finally proved that he was not responsible for the crime, and just a month or so ago, he was fully exonerated.  Back in 1995, Tirell Swift was 17 years old.  Today, he is 34 years old.  So far, he spent half his life behind bars.

It's quite shocking to listen to a story like Tirell's.  Here's a man, totally innocent, that is convicted for something he never did, and somehow, the Illinois legal system does not see this.  For seventeen years!  As a most extreme hypothesis, perhaps the court did know of his innocence, but they kept him in prison just to avoid more work on the case.  If that were true, that's pathetic.  And even if it's not, it's still pathetic that a completely innocent man was blamed for something he never did, and as a consequence, wastes half of his life rotting in a cell.  Tirell's story shows that states' legal systems in America are not perfect with their convictions; in fact, they are far from perfect.  I'm not really sure what could be done to fix this problem though besides allotting more time for the analysis of court cases and having more people involved with the analysis.  Of course, to do that would take lots and lots of time and money.  Yet no matter how much this problem is seemingly fixed, I don't think courts will ever make consecutive flawless convictions; nobody's perfect.  It's a shame that there are so many wrongful convictions out there, so many years of untruth.

Affirmative Inaction

As Proposition 209, which prevents racial, ethnic, or gender preference in education, employment and contracting, is now being challenged in court (click here for the full story: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2012/02/13/state/n010134S40.DTL), it would make sense for me to speak out my opinion about affirmative action.  In short, I blatantly disagree with the idea of affirmative action.  In long, here's why.

Let us first take a look at the concept of affirmative action.  Affirmative action is the notion of taking race, gender, sexual orientation and ethnicity into account when it comes to things like college admissions, job opportunities, and contracting.  Those in support of affirmative action would say that it benefits "underrepresented" minorities when they would otherwise be at a disadvantage.  They would also claim that affirmative action creates a broader sense of diversity in the American environment.  Now, let's create a scenario here: you are a successful white male high school student applying to a prestigious school.  You exceed the minimal requirements of getting into that school, and you are almost certain of being admitted.  A couple months after applying, you receive the letter.  You open it excitedly, only to discover that you have been rejected.  Somehow, sometime later, you learn that in your place, a male was admitted that did not even meet the minimum standards of the college, and the main reason he was admitted is because he is black and thus "underrepresented."  How would you feel about that?  Do you believe it is fair that someone who did not work as hard as you did was admitted over you because of the color of his skin?

It is far from fair, just as Jim Crow laws and segregation were far from fair before 1964.  What affirmative action is, is discrimination.  It is a failed attempt to "integrate" different cultures.  It is against the American principle of individualism, the idea that with hard work, you will be rewarded.  In the scenario, you worked your butt off, and in your place is a man who did not work as hard but was admitted because of the skin color he was born with.  A college is an institution of learning, a place allowing for the free expression of ideas and expansion of the mind for those with the aptitude of doing so.  Trivial things like race and ethnicity have absolutely NOTHING to do with learning.  And then of course, people reading this will probably get angry that I don't say that diversity has something to do with learning.  To me, diversity comes naturally, just as most political and economic systems work when the government doesn't manipulate them.  Diversity is just a plus; it enriches learning.  However, when institutions such as college boards make such a big deal out of diversity and purposely try to manipulate the system to force it, it causes problems, simply put.  The proof that diversity can be achieved by leaving it alone is in the article "'Race-Neutral' University Admissions in Spotlight UC, Florida..." by Mitchell Landsberg, Peter Y. Hong and Rebecca Trounson.  By eliminating affirmative action policies, The University of California "[...] has increased the percentage of admitted African American, Latino, and Native American students from 18.8% in 1997 - the last year of race-based policy - to 19% in 2002." Also, "Since scrapping its affirmative action program in 1996, the University of Texas system has seen a 15% increase in the number of black students and a 10% increase in Latinos."  So by getting rid of affirmative action, by admitting students that are academically qualified to be admitted into these colleges, by having diversity not be a top priority, they actually gained diversity.  It just goes to show that when you don't have authorities fiddling with the system and gaining political power, society works better.

People such as Time Wise typically refer to history instead of the present day when it comes to racial issues like affirmative action.  Wise is predominantly known as an antiracist, but to me, he's racist against whites.  He asserts in his article, "Whites Swim in Racial Preference," "Yet few whites have ever thought of our position as resulting from racial preferences.  Indeed, we pride ourselves on our hard work and ambition as if somehow we invented the concepts.  As if we have worked harder than the folks who were forced to pick cotton and build levies for free; harder than the Latino immigrants who spend 10 hours a day in fields picking strawberries or tomatoes; harder than the (mostly) women of color who clean hotel rooms or change bedpans in hospitals, or the (mostly) men of color who collect our garbage."  First of all, most of these examples are a part of the American past; nobody is forced to pick cotton anymore.  It's like saying that a lowlife black man in the city is a hard worker because his ancestors were once slaves.  Everyone knows that America is the land of the free, and with the right attitude and ambition that man could work his way up, just as Oprah did.  But you can't say that this lowlife black man knows what hard work is, and the same goes for the white man living in his mother's basement!  There are people out there, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and/or national origin, that truly understand what hard work is, just as there are some that don't.  To me, by addressing and grouping people in "underprivileged" and "privileged" sections, Wise is really creating more stereotypical divisions.  His argument is also based off of revenge, an irrational notion: we did it to them, so we should let them do it to us.  America has developed so that virtually every individual has an equal opportunity to succeed, and it should stay that way: no handicaps for the so-called "underrepresented." It is ignorant people like Wise that imply what is said in Orwell's Animal Farm: "All men are created equal, but some are more equal than others."

"White Like Me - Privilege"

In his book "White Like Me" published in 2007, Tim Wise discloses the apparent privileges of being white and the disadvantages of being any other color in America.  In the chapter titled Privilege, Wise claims that our efforts of multiculturalism shown by the media is really a "cover-up" of the still existing racial problems.  He also uses personal experience to prove his point.  "For me, white privilege was critical to my actually making it through school at all," Wise says.  "[...]I relied on my whiteness to mark me as a capable person with lots of potential, even when I wasn't demonstrating much of it" (Wise 22).  By having this "white privilege," Wise was able to skip class and break the rules without supposedly getting into too much trouble.  "[...] there's something about being white in this country," Wise asserts, "that allows one, even encourages one, to take a lot of stupid risks, knowing that nine times out of ten everything will work out; you won't get busted and you won't go to jail, neither of which black or brown folks can take for granted in the least" (40). 

Wise's assertions are perfectly valid and believable.  I like how he writes in a narrative fashion to make it more connectable to the reader.  His stories are engaging and thought-provoking.  However, the catch is that almost all of these stories take place more than twenty years ago, and a lot has changed since then.  For one, to me it seems silly that Wise believes that racist teachers nonetheless exist.  He says, "While there are many dedicated and antiracist white educators out there, in my experience the vast majority of them, though dedicated, have no earthly idea what it means to be antiracist" (20).  How does anyone not have an idea of what racism means?  Teachers, being competent adults, are not stupid; they are educated individuals, hence the name of their job.  Being the politically (in)correct society that we are today and the fact that virtually every teacher is a die-hard liberal, they are bound to feel pity for the minorities.  That pity is expressed as an idea of how to be nonracist.  I simply cannot believe that fully racist teachers still exist today.  Something that actually angered me was when Wise talks about seeing Schoolhouse Rock Live performed by fifth through eighth graders, and how it's "borderline racist".  He writes, "Among the lines in the song [Elbow Room] is one that intones, 'There were plenty of fights/To win land rights /But the West was meant to be /It was our manifest destiny!'  Let it suffice to say that happily belting out a tune in which one merrily praises genocide is always easier for those whose ancestors weren't on the receiving end of the deal" (30).  Give me a break!  First off, these lyrics are based on historical fact, something you really shouldn't be offended by.  And besides, is genocide the first thing you think of when you think "manifest destiny?"  I think not.  It's like having a choir sing a black spiritual (which our choir is actually doing) and an audience member being offended because it reminds him or her of the time of slavery.  Come on!  Man up!  It seems like anything you say these days can be offensive.  I can't even dress up as Pocahantas at my school because it depicts an Indian stereotype and may be offensive.  Everybody in America is being divided into these groups: African-American, Chinese-American, European-American, Polish-American, which is supposed to unite us, but I believe it's doing the opposite.  I believe it's dividing us; there are black-skinned Americans, there are white-skinned Americans, but we are all Americans.  Anyways...

Something else that is outdated is when Wise asserts, "Had these house parties been in black neighborhoods they would never have been allowed to go on at all, as large as they were, even without a single illegal substance on the premises, and without a single weapon in sight.  But for whites, in white neighborhoods, everything was different.  Our illegality was looked at with a wink and a nod" (37).  This claim seems like another reality to me.  Maybe he was on Mars, but in my time and place, regardless of the skin color of the culprits, cops bust house parties pretty much every weekend.  Heck, one time, I was at a clean cast party and a cop came because of a noise complaint.  Contrary to Wise's beliefs, cops don't just excuse white people of crimes they commit.  It may appear that cops bust blacks more than whites, but so?  You can't just instantly assume that because more blacks are being punished than whites, it is racism.  There just happens to be more black criminals at one time than whites, or vice versa.  To add on to his claim, Wise says, "[...] there's something about being white in this country that allows one, even encourages one, to take a lot of stupid risks, knowing that nine times out of ten everything will work out; you won't get busted and you won't go to jail, neither of which black or brown folks can take for granted in the least" (40).  I find this assertion to be plainly ridiculous.  Do you think nine times out of ten I won't get busted for murdering a man?  Do you think I am somehow encouraged to do something like that....because I'm white!?  In my opinion, Wise is completely overanalyzing this whole "white privilege" thing.  I believe that even since this book was published, improvements have been made.  I think it's common knowledge for most people in America that no man is "more equal" than another.  I don't deny the fact that racial problems still exist; I simply think that Tim Wise is exaggerating the whole thing.

"If I Were a Poor Black Kid"

In Forbes, Gene Marks recently wrote an article titled "If I Were a Poor Black Kid".  Marks asserts that "...the biggest [racial] challenge we face isn’t inequality.   It’s ignorance.  So many kids from West Philadelphia don’t even know these opportunities exist for them."  It is an optimistic viewpoint that any impoverished black kid in a city is capable of succeeding, that  opportunities are still available despite their lack of wealth and the color of their skin.  Marks goes further to give examples of the opportunities and thus embellishes his argument.  Though I myself am a typical wealthy north shore white male, I absolutely agree with Marks' assertions.  I have faith in the American dream, and I believe anybody can achieve it with the right mindset and work ethic.  It's the beauty of our individualistic country; work hard, and you will be rewarded, regardless of your background or what you look like.  I mean, Oprah Winfrey was born into poverty and with hard work, look where she ended up.  We have a black president.  There are countless examples of apparently oppressed blacks that rise to success.  It's never easy for these people, don't get me wrong; if you start out in poverty, it's much more difficult to prosper.  But it is possible; the opportunity exists whether you're black, white, asian, indian, et cetera.


There are a lot of people out there that would say Marks is clueless because he isn't a poor black kid but rather a middle class white man, which is a totally valid claim.  I think that Marks may be exaggerating some of his many listed opportunities.  However, that does not mean that all of these opportunities are nonexistent.  There is simply no way.  And surely Marks must have done some field work or research before writing this article.  On the Time website, Touré blasted Marks' article and one of his arguments is, "If I were a middle class man writing about a poor black kid I would assume that anyone who knows the world in the way that I do would make the decisions that I would make so I need only share with them the knowledge that I have. I wouldn’t think about how their environment might impact their ability or willingness to use that information. I mean, everyone has access to the Internet, right?"  Actually, yes.  It's called the public library.  There are computers in virtually every library available for use, AND they have Internet.  Yeah, I will never know what it's like to live in the shoes of a poor black kid, but the opportunity for success is there.

My Natural Bias

In fact, every human has a natural bias, but some can control it better than others.  Every human is hardwired with the instinct of prejudging, because back in uncivilized days, it assisted with survival.  With the ability to prejudge, humans could identify threats more easily, enabling them to live longer lives.  While we have become a civilized society and survival comes easy in America, humans nonetheless have this natural instinct to prejudge or "discriminate."  This instinct is strong in me.  Whenever I meet someone for the first time, I critically judge and place him or her into a stereotype.  Of course, if I were to speak out my biased thoughts, I would be in trouble, so over time I have managed to acquire a filter.  My first look at anyone, though, causes a bunch of prejudging thoughts to fill my head.  Anyone reading this now probably thinks of me as a bad person, but I can't help it!  I accept it, and I try to control it as much as possible.

A test that verified my prejudice was Project Implicit's Race IAT.  The test pairs blacks with "good" words and whites with "bad" words, and then the pairs switch.  It sends out a flurry of words and faces, and you have to choose which pair it belongs with.  The results are calculated from any errors you make during matching.  My results indicated that I have a strong preference for whites over blacks.  The test did verify my strong natural bias, but I believe it is far from perfect.  In my opinion, it's a pointless test.  Everyone should know that all humans have a natural bias.  And why test for something stupid like that anyway?  Okay, I have a strong natural bias; now what?  Should I waste my time and try to get rid of this instinct that's impossible to eradicate?  Thus, we should all stop freaking out about being prejudice because it's a human instinct; it's okay to be as long as you don't openly express it towards others.  Just keep the "don't judge a book by it's cover" moral in mind when you meet somebody, and you might be pleasantly surprised.

The Origins of My Blog Title

The Search for John Galt... so who is John Galt?


It's a great question that can only be answered by reading the novel Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, the most important book I've ever read.  Ayn Rand is not alive today, but her philosophy can be applied to every aspect of politics in present time; it's fascinating how she was able to do this.  Atlas Shrugged was actually written in the fifties and takes place during that time.  It's about two independent companies, Taggart Transcontinental and Rearden Steel, that are manipulated by the government, known as the Unification Board, in a recession, and as a result, the recession worsens.  One of the driving forces of the Unification Board is James Taggart, brother of the CEO of Taggart Transcontinental.  Taggart is a looter: a man who produces no thoughts of his own, feels to decide what is the best solution to a problem, and takes money and ideas from the men that use their minds to innovate and prosper.  He is also a phony, pretending to be capable even though he truly is not.  He feels pity for the struggling companies in the recession, and he hates the "dog-eat-dog" competition that Taggart Transcontinental and Rearden Steel are facilitating, so he tries in every way possible to hamper it.  As a result, the CEOs of these companies, who are actually the chief stimulators of the economy, pick up and leave, leaving America to fend for themselves amid chaos.  That is Atlas's shrug.  As for John Galt, I will keep it a mystery unless you read the novel and find out for yourselves, and you'll see why my blog title includes "The Search for".


I believe that the novel is not just focused on economic conservative values, but it is also focused on how to think.  The novel concentrates primarily on the importance of the mind. According to Rand, the mind is the most valuable tool for the individual, and the mind (reason) should be used rather than the heart (emotion) when reacting to outside forces.  Instead of feeling to solve problems, the most successful people use their minds and logic to think to solve problems.  The novel drove home this idea so effectively that I now follow and apply this philosophy to my life.  Atlas Shrugged has forever changed my life for the better, and I believe it changes anybody that reads it.

The Omnivore's Dilemma - 5

In the final part of his book, Pollan takes a major right turn in his subject matter: he makes "The Perfect Meal," a completely natural meal made from foods that he himself gathered.  The first part of his book is industrial, focusing on the corn industry, the second part is pastoral, focusing on local farms and organic food industries, and this final part is a way to tie things together, a focus on personal eating.  To make this meal, Pollan decides that he needs to gather at least one type of food from every edible animal kingdom, plants, animals, and fungi.  Because of his inexperience with gathering, he is helped by several people.  For plants, he grows his own vegetables, which was probably his easiest feat.  For fungi, Pollan chooses the other side of the omnivore's dilemma and goes mushrooming with the intent to actually eat them this time.  For him, the mushroom gathering is slightly harder than the vegetable growing, because he has to walk through muddy areas early in the morning, and the mushrooms are well-camoflauged.  However, the most difficult part of the gathering for him is the meat.  With a couple other experienced hunters, Pollan goes on two pig-hunting expeditions.  The first time, he fails to shoot one, and the second time, he finally succeeds. Strangely enough, Pollan says, "The one emotion I expected to feel but did not, inexplicably, was remorse, or even ambivalence.  All that would come later, but now, I'm slightly embarrassed to admit, I felt absolutely terrific—unambiguously happy" (353).  It is rather interesting to hear that hunting, killing animals, can bring happiness to people.  Before talking about his hunt, though, Pollan goes in depth about the ethics of eating animals and his vegetarianism.

Pollan delves deep into both sides of the argument.  For the vegetarian argument, he refers to Peter Singer's book, titled Animal Liberation.  Pollan writes, "'Equality is a moral idea,' Singer points out, 'not an assertion of fact.'  The moral idea is that everyone's interests ought to receive equal consideration, regardless of 'what they are like or what abilities they have.'  Fair enough; many philosophers have gone this far.  But few have then taken the next logical step.  'If possessing a higher degree of intelligence does not entitle one human to use another for his or her own ends, how can it entitle humans to exploit non-humans for the same purpose?' (307).  Essentially, this assertion says that equality does not exist in reality, and if humans can't dominate one another with their intelligence, then humans can't dominate animals with their intelligence.  Pollan also counters the "animals kill other animals too" argument by saying, "Do you really want to base your moral code on the natural order?  Murder and rape are natural, too.  Besides, we can choose: Humans don't need to kill other creatures in order to survive; carnivorous animals do" (310).  On the other side of the argument, he admits, "Meat eating helped make us what we are in a physical as well as a social sense.  Under the pressure of the hunt, anthropologists tell us, the human brain grew in size and complexity, and around the hearth where the spoils of the hunt were cooked and then apportioned, human culture first flourished.  This isn't to say we can't or shouldn't transcend our inheritance, only that it is or inheritance; whatever else may be gained by giving up meat, this much at least is lost" (314).  If we were to abandon meat-eating, the cultural, social, and physical benefits would be lost as well.  So, to eat meat or not to eat meat?

There is so much more that goes into animal-eating philosophy, but personally, I can't see myself living a life without meat, not just because I need the extra calories (because I'm skinny).  I was raised a meat eater, so whenever I see a simmering filet mignon, my mouth begins to water; I can't help it.  At one point, I stopped eating red meat for two weeks to see if I could really do it, and I failed miserably.  Even though the number of vegetarians in the world are rising today, I think that all humans will never evolve to live lives without meat.  I understand the vegetarian argument and I believe it's valid, though I could never be one.  However, what I don't understand are the people that are vegetarians because they don't want to support CAFOs.  If you don't want to support the industrial food industry, you can still eat meat! Just buy meat locally, where the animals are grass-fed and probably "happier."  Actually, that's what I do; my family owns a butchered half-cow.  Not only is it cheaper per pound than grocery store meat, but it is grass fed too.  Anyways...While people are beginning to understand vegetarians, I feel like the struggle between omnivores and vegetarians will never be resolved.

Overall, this book was an eye-opener.  It is incredibly educational and worth the read.  If you happen to be questioning the vegetarian argument, read this book!

The Omnivore's Dilemma - 4

Michael Pollan begins the third part of his novel by finally talking about the title of his book, the omnivore's dilemma, and the ethics of eating animals.  So, what is the omnivore's dilemma anyways?  Pollan explains this concept by telling a story about finding what looked like chanterelles (mushrooms) on a hike in Berkeley Hills.  He brings them home with him, thinking that he would eventually boil them up and eat them, but he is hesitant.  He refers to his field guide to verify that they are actually chanterelles and not poisonous.  The field guide mentions that there are mushrooms that look like chanterelles but can actually kill you, suitably named "false chanterelles."  These false chanterelles, it is written, have slightly thinner gills under the cap.  Pollan responds, "These were relative terms; how could I tell if the gills I was looking at were thin or thick ones?  Compared to what?  My mother's mycophobic warnings rang in my ears" (286).  Pollan's doubt about eating this mushroom is essentially the omnivore's dilemma.  In the next chapter, he says, "The blessing of the omnivore is that he can eat a great many different things in nature.  The curse of the omnivore is that when it comes to figuring out which of those things are safe to eat, he's pretty much on his own" (287).  The question is: to eat, or not to eat?  Humans have a wide variety of foods that we can choose to eat.  Through historical trial and error (error being the death of humans), we humans have been able to differentiate what is okay to ingest and what is not.  However, like Pollan's mushroom experience, not everyone can differentiate foods from poisons in the wilderness.

So, how does the omnivore's dilemma relate to today's food industry?  Most people do not obtain their food from the wilderness, and all of the food we buy in the grocery store is clearly not poison, so it's not like we're in a life or death situation like the omivore's dilemma.  Pollan modernizes the omnivore's dilemma by stating, "The omnivore's dilemma is replayed every time we decide whether or not to ingest a wild mushroom, but it also figures in our less primordial encounters with the putatively edible: when we're deliberating the nutritional claims on the boxes in the cereal aisle; when we're settling on a weight-loss regimen (low fat or low carb?); or deciding whether to sample McDonald's' newly reformulated chicken nugget; or weighing the costs and benefits of buying the organic strawberries over the conventional ones; or choosing to observe (or flout) kosher or halal rules; or determining whether or not it is ethically defensible to eat meat..." (289).  Because modern Americans do not need to worry about poison in their food, they worry about the kind of nutrients that are in their foods instead.  Should I have the double quarter pounder with cheese at McDonald's, or should I have a salad at Whole Foods?  The nutrients that are within the double quarter pounder deem the food not as healthy as the salad, and anybody stuck in the dilemma would choose the salad.  But anyone else that enjoys the taste of the burger more would choose it, regardless of its unhealthiness.  Should the government be able to protect Americans from the unhealthiness by choosing the salad for them?  In my opinion, no.  Individuals, omnivores, in the land of freedom called America should be able to choose a side of the dilemma and face the consequences.

The Videogames of Today

Technology seems to be improving exponentially.  Two decades ago, cell phones did not even exist.  Now, Apple has developed a cell phone that takes pictures, goes on the internet, utilizes skype (facetime), and has a robot that can respond to any voiced questions.  It's absurd thinking about it.  I believe this exponential growth in technological advances can be seen prominently in videogames.  I remember ten years ago, the Nintendo 64 was the modern console.  The games were in cartridges, and if they didn't work the first time, I would blow into them to eliminate any stray dust particles.  If the console were hit during gameplay, the game would freeze.  Back then, videogame graphics consisted of polygon figures and non-HD details.  Today, graphics are scarily life-like.  If the console is hit, the game won't freeze.  Some consoles even have motion controls, which back then would be considered incredibly futuristic.  For example, every movement you make with the Wii mote in The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is what Link mimics with the sword in his hand.  Like I said, it's absurd.  However, there's one game in particular that I want to talk about that has blown my mind, and that game is called Skyrim.

Skyrim is a northern province of Tamriel, which is a parallel world to Earth.  In-game, the province is around two MILES long.  The game takes place in a somewhat medieval era of swords and bows, but added onto this is magic, goblins, trolls, orcs, human lizards, et cetera.  This world is HUGE and seemingly endless.  You can see every blade of grass on the ground, every shadow corresponding to the time of day, even dirt on a man's face.  Speaking of which, there are hundreds and hundreds of people to talk to in the game, and more than half of them ask you to do something for them.  You may walk up to this random man and he'll ask you to retrieve his stolen ring deep in a forbidden cave.  There is lots of fighting (which is always entertaining) and an endless amount of fighting styles.  You can choose to run into enemy territory swords a-blazing, or you can camp on top of a hill and snipe out the enemies with arrows to the head.  Or, you can launch fireballs from your hand at enemies from a distance.  The possibilities in this game are endless, and it's actually quite scary.  At this rate of technological advancement, we're not far from virtual reality video games.  Is this kind of technology headed in the wrong direction?  Are video games becoming too real?  We'll find out eventually.

Personal Gardens

After I graduate from high school, my family will move up to their property in Northern Wisconsin while I go off to college (hopefully UW Madison).  While they're there, my mom plans to start up a backyard garden, a true, hardcore, versatile garden.  In my old home, my mom had a garden in the front yard, but it was a beginner's; she only grew simple stuff like lettuce, tomatoes, basil, and onions.  Being an excellent cook already, having home-grown vegetables and spices made her meals that much better.  You would never expect home-grown crops to taste any different from store-bought ones, but they really do.  Comparing store-bought tomatoes to our home-grown ones, I noticed that our tomato had a fuller red color; not only that, there was more flavor in our tomato.  So, why is there a difference?  Well, store-bought vegetables, if not organic, are grown with pesticides, and all vegetables are shipped halfway across the country to grocery stores, deeming them not as fresh as backyard vegetables.  Backyard vegetables are also treated with personal care rather than with machines.

I highly suggest starting up your own backyard vegetable garden; it is definitely worth the time, money, and effort.  When you eat your own vegetables, you know exactly where they come from.  It is a great feeling, not just because you know what you're eating, but also because you know that they are your vegetables and they are the product of your effort.  Vegetable gardens are also a way to have less dependence on grocery stores.  No more eating fruits and vegetables that you don't know the origins of, no more unknown pesticides, no more doubt.  And, if disaster ever strikes, vegetable gardens allow for self-sufficient living.  The benefits of gardens highly outweigh the detriments, so why not pick up that trowel and plant?