Anthology 2

I thought that the second part of the class anthology had a lot of similarities between the essays. It seemed as though some of the essays were either over the purpose and meaning of life or the topic of aesthetics. This is interesting because there were a few essays that reminded me of some of the topics that I have written about. For instance in my final paper I chose the topic of why we purchase curtain things. And in the anthology there were a few essays in there that were very similar to this. So I thought that it was interesting to see how these essays were set up and how they got there point across.
Stephanie Ogden said “Today, there are people who don’t fall into the trap of having to
buy the best products out there; but for the most part, the whole idea of “looking better” has
become everyone’s main concern, from the way he/she dresses, to the products and structures we
create”. This was kind of the same thesis that I use in my final paper. I think that people desire the best products or homes to feel if they do not have these then they will no longer be able to keep up with everyone else. Because humans are so competitive we are always striving to be the best and to do this we sometimes need the best gear to accomplish this. So by having the latest and greatest cloths, toys, cars, ect. We think that we will be the best and this is not always true.
She also said “For a lot of individuals, materialistic products have become the object of their affection. Pricey goods aren’t even necessarily better than cheaper ones, but more attractive. Picture yourself on a busy street corner of New York City; whether or not you’ve been there, you know that this
city is one of the most upgraded in the world. The lady standing in front of you has a Louis
Vuitton purse in one hand and an iPhone in the other, while wearing her Diane von Furstenberg
suit and Manolo Blahnik stilettos. You have just a regular purse and suit from JC Penney, a flip
phone, and loafers from Payless, but do these “best of the best” items make her better than you?
No, you are both equal.” I thought that this statement was very good in getting a mental image of what she was trying to say. And it was just about the same idea as I used in my final paper.
So for the most part I thought that all the essays in the second part of the anthology were close to the same ideas where as the first part didn’t quite seem as close. They helped me get a better grasp on the topic that I was going to talk about in the final essay.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keeping_up_with_the_Joneses

Anthology part 1

I thought that the first part of the anthology was very interesting because you could see how other people in the class write and how they came up with their topic for the papers. It was interesting that we all read the same essays and when we decided what topic to write about they were all different from each other but in some since they had a few of the same points. They essays also showed how the ideas of the topic were organized to get the main point of the paper across. There were a few essays had similar ideas but for the most part they all had different main focuses that were used to get the point of the essays across.
One of the essays that I thought had a good point was Cally’s Individuality essay. She said” humans are by definition competitive. Keeping up with the Joneses is the American dream.
We have dream jobs, dream houses, dream cars, and dream mates.” This is so true because we always want the latest and greatest technologies to make us seem like we are the most popular or to get another person’s attention. And as our society keeps advancing without end and we want the coolest things. An example of this was when Apple first came out with the iPod. I remember I purchased the first kind that Apple made. I thought it was the best kind of mp3 player ever with its one gigabyte of memory, I had it filled up in two seconds. At first I was the one who had the best music player and this made me feel like I was the coolest person on the planet. Then a week later they came out with another nano that could hold 4 gigabytes. And all of my friends went out and purchased one. So I then wanted it because it could hold more songs and my iPod was the older version so I no longer had the best mp3 player. Then Apple took off with the idea by making all kinds of styles and colors with different sizes of memory. So after awhile I purchased the latest and greatest 16 gigabyte iPod. Again I thought I had the best and I would never need to buy another one because it was the newest style. But a few weeks after I had my new iPod, Apple made a newer and cooler iPod with a touch screen. I was a little made because the iPod I got wasn’t ever close to being as fancy as the newer IPod. And the cycle will probably keep going. So this shows that we do want the newer technologies because our friends get the more technologically advanced things and this makes us jealous.
Anyways I thought that the essays were interesting because it gave me an idea if I have been writing the same style as everyone else or not. I think that it is interesting how we develop different ways of getting our topics and what style we use to get our point across.

The Inhanced and the Unenhanced

“The Enhanced and the Unenhanced” by Gregory Stock was one of the most interesting essay that we have read yet. It made me think about how advanced we are becoming. One hundred years ago we did not think that it would be possible to get on a phone that wasn’t connected to the wall with a cord and call anybody that we wanted or that we could just get on a computer and type a report or even get on the internet with it. And now days these things are done without even thinking about it. In this essay we are so advanced that people who want to have children have an option of genetically modifying them to how the parents want them to look or act. We can screen the embryos to see if they have any signs of diseases or if they will become a boy or girl. To be able to do this is just crazy to think.
In my opinion I don’t think that I would want to have my kids genetically modified. I think that the way children are raised is a way to make them act a curtain way when they are older through gaining experience in life. If we just modify them to be perfect then they wouldn’t need to learn through experience. I think that they way kids turn out is the way mother nature wanted them to be and if we decide to manipulate them then something might turn out wrong with them. If everybody decided to have their kids this way then it could take away the idea of being unique. Everyone would want their kids to be smart and healthy and if everyone was good at everything then they would all be the same with all the same talents.
If we had the technology to do this to our children some of the pluses that could come from it would be that we could screen out all of the possible sources of diseases. If we could see a possible source of a disease and fix it before the embryo started to grow. The only reason I would ever want my kids to be genetically modified would be because of this. It would make me not have to worry if my kids would be unhealthy. Another good thing that could come of this would be if a couple was unable to have kids because of health issues then they could get their child made in this lab or however they do it and the kid would be healthy.
In conclusion I liked this read but I don’t entirely agree with what Gregory Stock was saying will and should happen. I think that if we all were good at everything from the beginning then we wouldn’t have anything unique about ourselves. But I do see how modifying our children could be a good idea to make them healthy but other than that I wouldn’t want to mess the gift that god would be giving us.
http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/03/the-worlds-fi-1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregory_Stock

Dogs Snarling Together

The short essay “Dogs Snarling Together: How Politics Came to Rule the Global Apparel Trade” by Pietra Raivoli was a very long and boring essay. I thought the author used to many abbreviations of the different companies that are involved in making T-shirts. The only part of the essay that I could follow easily without losing my attention to it was the beginning were it talked about Auggie and his army that he had to keep the made in China shirts from getting out on the market in the United States.
In the essay where it described what Auggie does was kind of interesting. He basically runs around Washington persuading politicians to make laws that restrict some of the free trade from other countries. This seems kind of smart in a since that if he didn’t do this then by now the United States would probably wouldn’t have any textile mills left. This would take away several jobs in the United States which would hurt our economy even more that how it already is. In the essay, it mentioned Julia Hughes, who is a Washington representative for the United States Association of Importers of Textiles and Apparel. Her job consists of trying to get some of the laws that Auggie gets passed lifted. She thinks that the T-shirts that are coming from China are a good thing. As Pietra put it, “They follow each other around Washington constantly plugging holes where in the import dike and the other is trying to punch them out. Because they are in constant motion the trade laws are always changing making it harder for other countries to make profit in the U.S.
In conclusion it thinks that I agree with what Auggie is doing because he helps some textile workers keep their job. This is good for our economy because it helps the unemployment level and it gives several people jobs. And I think that if it is made in America it is instantly better that things that are made in China. When I think of “Made in China” I instantly think that the quality of the produce is as cheap as it can and probably wouldn’t last as long.

Robert Thurman "Wisdom"

The short essay “Wisdom” by Robert Thurman was about trying to find our own self. The way to do this was to try to get rid of our inner demon that is always telling us to do the things that we do. It is this thing that makes us act a curtain way to others and that will cause us to become afraid of things that are not clear to us. Once a person defeats this then they have found their true self. They then no longer are only concerned about problems in their own life but are more concerned with the problems and issues of everyone around them.
People often think that they know who they really are because they think curtain things, or are knowledgeable in a curtain issue. By being knowledgeable in a curtain issue, we think that we know all there is to know about something. This gives a sense of security because we will know what do and how to act when in a curtain position that we think we know everything about. But in reality we are actually wrong in thinking we know everything about a curtain something. This is the inner demon trying make you believe something that is not what your true self would believe. In order to find who you really are you need to admit that you are wrong. But this is hard to do for us because the demon doesn’t want you to become vulnerable to not knowing what to expect. “Knowing something is a way of controlling it, being able to put it in its proper place in relation to us so that we can use it effectively” (743). If we think we know something then we will feel a little control over ourselves and we will no longer feel afraid of it because we know what the thing is. Once we admit we are wrong then we feel like we are no longer in control and not being in control makes us become afraid. But if you are your true self then you are not afraid of these things but you are curious as to why you were afraid of it in the first place.
Once you have found yourself you will no longer be self centered and worried about the things in your life. Instead you will be a person who cares about others around you and you will try to help them find their way. “One of the most significant changes you will notice upon discovering you selflessness is that your sense of being separate from everyone else has now eroded. Your new awareness enables you to perceive others as equal to yourself, a part you, even. You can see yourself as they see you, and experience empathically how they perceive themselves as locked within themselves” (752).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism

The Myth of the Ant Queen

“The Myth of the Ant Queen” by Steven Johnson was an interesting essay on complex systems. It is so true how every part of a complex system has its own way of working and it doesn’t need any one or thing to tell it how to do its job. Such as the example of the ants all doing their little jobs that may seem worthless but without the ants doing these jobs the colony won’t survive. Because of a joined team effort they all get food. It is weird that the ants do these jobs without being told to do them and that everything all seems to have been organized by the governing ant such as the Queen, who made the plans for the jobs or that, controlled the colony. When really they are just doing these things by instinct of what their genetic genes tell them to do. I also thought it was interesting how the ants had a cemetery for their dead. It shows that they respect their dead just as humans do. It was crazy that they put the cemetery as far away from the colony as they could and also as far away from their trash pile. And they did this without seeing what they were doing or being told how to do it. They just did it naturally.

In the essay when he started to talk about the town of Manchester he was describing this city as a chaotic place with no rules or form of government. The city did not have people organizing how life should be or how to get things done. They just did what they thought was right and natural to do. It was growing so fast that they wouldn’t have been able to govern in if they wanted to. The town was composed of people just doing what they wanted when they wanted to. Yet in all its chaos it managed to be the city that defined the future of urban life. And it wasn’t really even a city until the great explosion took place.

Both of these examples showed that a complex system can function and survive just as good as a system with rulers and people being told what to do. The way that the two examples are kind of linked together is that they both just functioned by doing things naturally. They didn’t have anyone bossing them around and they didn’t have an organized way of getting things accomplished. They just did what they thought was right naturally.

The Library of Babel

In the short essay, “The Library of Babel”, was a comparison of a huge never ending library that had hexagonal floors with a stair case, and the humans trying to figure out how life and the universe works. In the library there were books that would only contain curtain letters that would be in a language that couldn’t be understood, or it would repeat a curtain set of letters over and over. There was a book in the library that would be written exactly the same as another but with only one microscopic difference. There were an infinite amount of books that were all written with the twenty five orthographic symbols. In this essay, man was the librarian of the library and was trying to decode the books. The information that was in the books was the key to how the universe works and how to live a successful life. There was one book that nobody could ever find that contained hints on how to decode the books and man was always looking for this book but could never find it. This is what I got from the essay which was kind of hard to understand.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Library_of_Babel