Journal: 4-7

LAST JOURNAL ENTRY OF THE YEAR

     Last week I asked the question of whether there was any true scientific evidence of benefits coming from the use of alternative medical treatments. I did my research and found that there is scientific evidence that supports the use of some alternative medicine; especially those that are used as anti-oxidants. Some examples of alternative medicine that works includes how Glucosamine can be used to treat arthritis and how cumin is a nature anti-oxidant which helps to improve your over all health.

     The day has come. I am righting my final ethics blog entry of the year! This class has been awesome. We've talked about so many topics, I don't even know where to start. At the beginning of the year we studied fallacies and how others can be misleading. We smoothly transitioned into studying several documentaries, all of which were very entertaining to watch. For our midterm we broke off into groups and made our own documentaries about pretty much whatever we wanted to. My group obviously made the best documentary about Chickfila and KFC. Then we transitioned into the ethical portion of the class where we discussed if certain situations were ethical and what being ethical really meant anyways. Also, we kept up on the situation in the Middle East and watched other documentaries involving international relations. We finally closed the year with a discussion of the basic principles of magic. However, we must not forget that throughout this whole year we started working on Heroic Imagination Projects. It might not have been the most successful thing but it really was inspiring and gave us real insight into international charity work.

     In my opinion, I've seen a common theme that we've constantly been studying throughout the whole year. The same theme has popped up in every activity and unit we studied and I have really learned alot about it. This theme of study was deceptions. We saw how documentaries can deceive you, media can deceive you, advertisement, international issues and especially magic can deceive you. By studying deception I've really been able to notice people trying to deceive me constantly that I wouldn't have noticed before I had taken the class. It was really interesting to see how studying deception can be so usefull in everyday life and I really am thankful for learning about it in depth.

     From this class I have gained  wealth of knowledge. Knowledge that ranges from random tidbits of information to life long lessons that I'll be able to take with me my whole life. I'll be able to hold conversations in the future with alot of the information I've learned in this class. I'll be able to have a discussion about what's really ethical or not with someone else and use the information from this class to back me up. As far as I'm concerned, this class has made me so much more aware about the world around me and has made me understand the world a little bit better. It has also increased my curiosity on certain issues and has inspired me to question the world and society. One of the things I've learned from this class is that you need to constantly be asking questions to yourself, society and the rest of the world.

     Since this is the last journal for ethics class, there is no more question to ask and have answered by next week's journal! I just want to say Mr.Couillard that it's been great having you as my Ethics and Physics teacher this year. I can tell that you really do love what you do (even if you didn't start out as a real teacher anyways :p) and that you're passionate about teaching the subjects you teach. Keep being awesome and inspiring! Thank you.

http://www.culpwrit.com/2010/10/20/take-the-ethics-pledge/

http://lfort.wordpress.com/2010/09/16/critical-security-studies/

http://georgiatechdopp.wordpress.com/2010/01/20/the-importance-of-a-thank-you-note/

Journal: 4-6

Nutrition

     Last week I asked if there were any true benefits for kids who believed in Santa as opposed to those who didn't. Although I was unable to find any studies that were conducted about this question, I did find alot of debate on the internet between parents about the effects believing in Santa had for their kids. Most of the parents said that telling their children that Santa exists gives the children incentives to be well behaved and also increases their happiness especially around the holidays. Also, alot of parents said that allowing children to believe in Santa helps create wonder in their children and a good adept sense of imagination.

     This past week in ethics class we watched a documentary about the satus of nutrition in America. The documentary discussed how there is a trend in America for people to seek out alternative sources of medical treatment such as aroma therapy, mind and body health and multivitamins people can find at the grocery store. The documentary preseted both sides of the aruguement of whether the new trend in alternative treatment is beneficial to the public or harmful. It was really eye opening and posed many interesting questions which allowed me to think more in depth.

     In my opinion, alternative medical treatment is not necessarily a good idea. Why wouldn't someone want to follow the regular course of medical treatment which has been proven to work? Not to mention many of those multivitamins and pills which are sold as alternative treatment in most grocery stores are not aproved by the FDA and may be unknowingly harmful to you when mixed with other mdeicines you are taking or your current medical condition. All people should use drugs which have already been tested for effectiveness and ensured for safety, otherwise, they risk their own lives. Also, alternative therapy only inspires hope and most of the time does not actually work and may have a placebo affect on it's user.

     This is much like how certain people attribute longevity to rediculous things such as eating lots of butter or applying lots of lotion. This is simply a placebo affect which allows people to believe that there is a certain reason for their longevity when really they probably lived long because of good genes and good nutrition throughout their lives. Alternative treatments have provided a route for people to explore ways to find the "fountain of youth" which will allow them to stay young forever.

     I end today with a question, is there any true scientific benefit to alternative treatment?

http://www.fallacyfiles.org/adconseq.html

http://www.eworldpost.com/multivitamin-have-no-effect-on-colon-cancer-14960.html

http://www.crossfitenergy.com/diet-and-nutrition

Journal: 4-5

Believing in Magic

     Last week i asked if there were any health benefits to believing in magic or things that supposedly don't exist. Through my extensive research online I was unable to find any substantial facts or evidence for my question. However, I do have an opinion on the matter. I don't think it necessarily makes people feel better if they believe in magic but I do think it makes them happier and more carefree which is good compared to being critical and negative about such issues.

     Last week we watched a documentary about this magician who went around to people who claimed to have supernatural powers and challenged whether they really did or whether they were just faking it. He went about this by taking away the special tools of those magicians and seeing how they did. Also, he explained how all of the tricks he ssaw the supernaturalists could be done simply by using slight of hand.

     In my opinion, I don't think this man should be going around trying to prove that magic is not an actually real thing. I think its wrong for people to point out how a trick is done and they're taking away the magic and the feeling of happiness when they do so. I feel as though he is being unnessecarily critical and pessemistic. People should decide for themselves whether they think a certain magic trick is real or not. Just allowing yourself to believe in magic does no harm at all.

     To me this is alot like the issue of believing in Santa, the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy. For kids, believing in these figures is magical and exciting. However, when we grow older, we lose faith and the holidays have less significance and happiness for us that little kids have. So why would anyone want to discourage people from believing when it does no harm in doing so, but it might do harm to tell them that they don't exist at all.

     I end today with a question: Are kids who belive in Santa more well off than those that don't?

"Magic Architecture." Making Good Software. Web. 23 May 2011. <http://www.makinggoodsoftware.com/2009/10/15/magic-architecture/>.

"Magician Cartoons by T. McCracken." Cartoons by T- McCracken. Web. 23 May 2011. <http://www.mchumor.com/movie_magic_cartoons.html>.

"TLC Family "Christmas Games: Find Santa Claus"" TLC "Guides" Web. 23 May 2011. <http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/family/find-santa-claus.htm>.

Journal: 4-4

Magic

     Last week, I asked the question of what the response to the Osama Bin Laden assassination was from the Muslim community. I researched this topic and came across several news articles that dealt with the question I had asked. Although nothing has happened yet in response to the assassination, many people in these new articles believe something will happen as a response.

     However, the articles claim that Muslim are not likely to react negatively to the attack because most of them have beliefs that are the opposite of Bin Laden. Most Muslims don't believe in using violence to show Muslim superiroty and might be glad that the leader of Al-Qaeda is gone. These articles also claim that Al-Qaeda will most definitely respond with a terrorist attack or something negative to the Western World.

     Last class we talked about the principles of magic and how these principles can relate to every day life. We watched videos of Penn and Teller and analyzed how they used deception in order to make the viewers trully believe what they were seeing. They explanied exactly how they did each trick and how one little mess up could thorw the wholre trick off.

     In my opinion we all can learn from the principles of magic. If we can learn about the art of deception then maybe we won't be so easy to be able to be deceived by people in everyday life. People might never become victims of frauds or con artists ever again. I believe magic has alot of ideals that it can teach us in the areas of deception and also having an open mind. If one has a closed mind, one might never be able to experience true delights such as the art of magic.

     There are two kinds of people when it comes to magic. There are those who choose to see it as magic when it happens and don't question it because they would rather have it be that way. And there are those who don't believe in magic and try to scrutinize magic tricks in an effort to figure out exactly how the magicican performed the trick. Unfortunately, society has mostly turned into the second kind of person. But if more of scoiety was like the first kind of person, we might have a better society.

     I end today with the question: What are the benefits of believing that magic exists?

http://live.washingtonpost.com/osama-bin-laden-death-muslim-community-reaction.html

http://media.photobucket.com/image/wand/PhntmBlackIce/Wizard101%20Wiki/magic-wand.png?o=4

http://yellowmagpie.com/penn-and-teller-about/

   

Journal: 4-3

Discrimination

     Two weeks ago, I asked the question of where all the child stars are now in life since the movie Promises first aired. I was unable to find any material online but we watched a video in class about several of the child star's lives. The one boy, Faraj, moved out of the country and came to the United States and now works at Walmart in an effort to get money to pay for college. All of the other children that were interviewed are still in the midst of the conflict in the Middle East and claim that it's getting worse. Alot of them have given up on the dream of peace and some have even gone into the army defending their race.

      This past week we have been watching this tv show series called 30 days. We watched this particlar episode entitled "Muslim in America". It was about this strongly religious Christian man who goes to live the Muslim lifestyle in a Muslim family home for 30 days to see what it was like. At the beginning of the experiment he didn't understand Muslims and judged them just like everyone else. However, at the end of the experiment he had a much better understanding of the religion and culture and gained alot of respect for the Muslim people as a whole.

     In my opinion, this was a very good experiment to be done and showed to the public. It shows that you can't judge a book by it's cover and that although some of the practices of Muslims may seem foreign, they really aren't at all. Also this show really opened my eyes up to the fact that Muslims are upset that they are associated with terrorism and that they are so offended that they won't associate themselves at all with it and also will not apologize for the 9-11 attacks because they want to prove the point that them and their religious beliefs had nothing to do with the attacks on the United States.

     It seems that in today's society, Muslims are being discriminated against more than ever. Especially after all of the hype comming from Osama Bin Laden's death, there has been a new wave of hatred towards to Muslim people. This is very wrong. Muslims can't go to an airport without being checked 5 timesand they get dirty looks whent hey are out in public because they're different and they stand out. America has unfortunately deamonized the Muslim people.

     I end today with a question: What is the Muslim community's repsonse to the death of Bin Laden?

Halder, Daipayan. "Being a Muslim in Mumbai | TwoCircles.net." TwoCircles.net | Inform | Educate | Empower. Web. 09 May 2011. <http://twocircles.net/2008feb03/being_muslim_mumbai.html>.

"Islam-isation Is What Muslims Need! Islamic Articles." Quran Recitation: Holy Quran Learning and Online Quran Reading | Live Quran Tutor. Web. 09 May 2011. http://www.quranreading.com/blog/islam-and-muslims/islam-isation-is-what-muslims-need/.

Olson, Ole Ole. "Breaking: Osama Bin Laden Dead | NEWS JUNKIE POST." NEWS JUNKIE POST | News, Politics, And Opinion From Around The Globe. Web. 09 May 2011. <http://newsjunkiepost.com/2011/05/01/breaking-osama-bin-laden-dead/>.

Journal: 4-2

Conflict

     Two weeks ago I asked the question of what the current situation is like with the Israeli Palestinian conflict. Through my extensive research, I didn't find too many detailed reports but I notice that things aren't really changing over in the Middle East and if there is change then it's usually for the worse and not to better the society. It seems as though more people are attempting to leave the area all together and move to another place in order to avoid war and make their own choices in life instead of someone else making their decisions for them.

     This week we've only had one day of class so far and in that one day of class we talked about a variety of things. One of the first things we talked about was this screen saver that helps benefit many different charities if you download it onto your computer. How it works is that it uses your computer to run data for certain causes such as the American Cancer Society so that research can take even less time than ever before. After that discussion we finished the rest of the documentary "Promises". It was very interesting to see the perspective of the conflict from the vulnerable viewpoint of a child who has grown up with the fighting going on around them.

     In my opinion, the most powerful part of the movie was when the two Jewish twins crossed over the check points into Palestinian territory to play with Arab children who were also being followed in the documetary. Even though they couldn't communicate with eacother very well, they still acted like normal children around eachother and played soccer and did other activities. It was as if they weren't even surronded by the conflict at all. However, it was hard when all the children sat down to discuss how the experiment went. They like the experiment because they liked being friends with eachother but they were sad that the Jewish boys weren't allowed to stay because they weren't Arab and that they would probably not see eachother again.

     This reminded me alot of the movie "The Boy In The Striped Pajamas" where a regular German boy who lives near a concentration camp befriends a Jewish boy within the concentration camp. Every day they would talk even though they were seperated by an electric fence and the German boy expressed desires to join the Jewish boy. However, when he does, he ends up dying with his Jewish friend within the camp. The situation is very similar to that of a Jwish boy befriending a Arab child in the Middle East.

I end today with a question: Where are all the children now who were in the film "Promises"?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli%E2%80%93Palestinian_conflict

"Israel Makes Children Cry." Instablogs - Mobile. Web. 27 Apr. 2011. <http://marcovilla.instablogs.com/entry/israel-makes-children-cry/>.

http://www.411mania.com/movies/dvd_reviews/99379/The-Boy-In-The-Striped-Pajamas-DVD-Review.htm

Journal: 4-1

Why the Division?

     Last week I asked a question about what the statistics are for having blind people receiving surgery to heal their blindness. Unfortunately, I was unable to find any relevant statistics on the matter of whether the number of surgeries performed has increased or decreased. I was hoping that by knowing this, I could compare it to what the deaf community is going through right now and how the blind react differently than the deaf. However, all I found was that the number of surgerys in other countries was increasing because more doctors were being sent to other places in order to cure the blind.

     This past week, we did a variety of things in ethics class. At the beginning of the week we reveiwed the messages and issues that came up at the TEDX Teen confrence that happened this past weekend. After that we reviewed a couple of TED Talks that related to what we were talking about in class and we watched an interesting one about a French artist. At the very end of the week, we started to watch the documentary "Promises" which is about the Israeli Palestinian conflict and we worked on our heroic imagination project as well.

     In my opinion, I think the most meaningful thing we learned this past week was the story of the French street artist. I love what he is trying to do with his artiwork. He's trying to exagerate how people really are in an effort to create an understanding of ignorance. He also has helped the Israeli Palestinian conflict by posting pictures of isrealis and palestinians together and having people try to figure out to difference between the two pictures. It turns out that no one was actually able to figure out who was the Plaestinian and who was the Israeli.

     This conflict between the Palestinians and the Isralies reminds me alot of the civil war in the United State. Both groups were almost identical in religion and culture but for some reason hated eachother and started to aimlessly kill eachother just because that's how they knew how to settle things in the day. The same can be said about the Plaestinians and the Israelis who are almost identical but yet still they will both fight to the death against eachother to do what they proclaim is the right thing to do to protect their religion and territory that they have.


     I end today with a question: What is the current status on the war against Isreal and Palestine?

"A Man Walks past a Shack in Kibera on Which Photographs by French Photographe..." The Independent | News | UK and Worldwide News | Newspaper. Web. 11 Apr. 2011. <http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/living-large-the-biggest-artist-in-the-world-1657832.html?action=Gallery>.

"BBC - London - Entertainment - Tate Wraps Itself up in Street Art." BBC - Homepage. Web. 11 Apr. 2011. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/image_galleries/tate_street_art_gallery.shtml?9>.

"Thursday, October 21, 2010." Eclectix: Traditional, NewBrow, Pop Art. Web. 11 Apr. 2011. <http://eclectixart.blogspot.com/2010_10_21_archive.html>.