10/31 citizenship reading

In terms of whether or not our government should help us out with our financial problems I have conflicting opinions. I agree that they should help us out if we get into trouble since we do help fund them through our taxes so it's only fair that they recipricate the favor. On the other hand, if it is a problem that was easily avoidable than they should have the right to say up yours your on your own. An example of an easily avoidable situation is all the people who go around and buy a crap-ton of stuff that they don't need and can't afford, like having 2 houses, 5 cars and only name brand clothes. If people are going to be that stupid they should have to deal with the consequesces themselves. It's not the governments problem that those people can't manage their money.

10/29 genetic engineering

I do not think that we should bring back the dinosaurs. Just because we can doesn't mean that we should. The movie jurassic park speaks for itself when you think about all the things that could go wrong. The dinosaurs died out for a reason, if they hadn't died out then humans wouldn't have come up. On that note, if we were to bring the dinosaurs back it would just be a struggle between two super-powers, them and us. And I get the feeling from the fact that they were bigger, stronger, and had better physical weapons that that would be a struggle that we would not win.

Mon. 20 - Social Change Wheel Activity

Today we did the social change wheel and i kind-of thought it was pretty dumb. I didn't really understand what was suppose to be accomplished by the activity. There were a lot of people yelling and i don't even know just because they wern't properly prepared. Better yet they said that on the one side of the card we're suppose to write how Wartburg can help us with the leadership skills shown at each station so that they can give it to the leadership comittee so that they can evaluate it. I don't think that would be advisable because i'll bet that most if not all of the studens just wrote down a lot of b.s. just so that they could have something down. That seems to me to be the worst way to gather information for any reason. Over all i would have to say that the entire activity was a complete waste of time and money for the college and ourselves.

Fri. 17 - Science in Jurassic Park

There is a lot of science in the movie Jurassic Park. One of the main scientific things was the genetic engineering that they had to do to make the dinosaurs in the first place. Hard as it was to believe in this instance with all the throwing in of random parts to make them. Then they had to be profficient at zoology, botony, palientology in order to be able to take care of the dinosaurs once they made them. Getting down to the smaller stuff they had to have, guns, electric fences, electric locks, electricity and motorized vehicles in order to maintain the environment where they kept the dinosaurs. From the big things to the small things science and technology played an important role in the movie.

Wed. 15 - Article in library

The article about the scientific flaws was very informative and interesting. As cool as it was though it wasn't really necessary. I mean we all probably know that the movie isn't really possible...it's a movie, it's just suppose to be an interesting piece of fiction. Even though it is fiction it can be accurate and most people preffer it to be, but we all know that movies can't be accurate or else a lot of the best movies made over the years never would have gotten off the ground. Even though it wasn't believable i think we all could enjoy the movie purely for its entertaining aspect.

Mon. 13-Jurasic Park

There are many pro's and con's regarded to the movie Jurasic Park. The pro's would be that if we really were that far ahead in the science field then we could also be a lot closer to curing aids and other genetic diseases. Another good thing about it would be that we would be able to study dinosaurs in their natural habitat, and im sure that would be benificial somehow. The con's to this movie would be if , like in the movie, the dinosaurs got out everyone would die, and thats probably not very good. Also you have to keep the butterfly effect in perspective. I mean the dinosaurs did die out for a reason, and so it's probably best to just leave them that way.

Mother Theresa as a roommate

I don't think i would like to have someone like Mother Theresa for a roommate, because you would always be stuck being known as 'the bad one'. This is because you know that they arn't going to be doing anything against the rules. Even if you did something that wasnt' that bad it would seem horrible compared to anything that they might do. On the other hand it might be kinda nice since you wouldn't have to worry about them doing anything to really piss you off.....

Matt Townsley

I would have to agree with Townsley fully with his article. I also think that Wartburg should follow it's faith without appology. In my opinion people in this country do way too much apologizing for living in a country where there is "freedom of speech." Having tolerancy towards other's opinions and completely giving in to them just so that you don't offend them are two very different things. I think people should follow their hearts and if others have a problem with that then tuff shit.

Chapter 18

Chapter 18 in the book the spirit catches you and you fall down is about how doctors in our country should be trying harder to mix medicines. For example when handling the hmong they should use their traditional shamen along with western medicine styles. There are actually specific cases where hmong who first consulted one of their traditional healers they were either cured just from that or else after seeing that it was not a spiritual problem were more willing to go along with physical treatments. But along those lines i also don't think we should get to the point to where we are favoring patients but we should be more understanding of their situation.

Paulo Freire

I would have to agree with Freire that teachers today are judged based on how much information their students can spit back at them, not neccissarily what they know. The fact that teachers do this can be very frustrating to the student when the teacher is explaining something and when you don't understand what they are saying they get angry at you for not just "getting it." This would then lead to the conclusion that Freire is right when he says that misbehaving students arn't "bad" students, just students that arn't willing to be drug along by their noses until they vagly understand what is going on.

I would also have to agree with Freire when he says that people are just empty voids where people in authourity tell them what to think. Now i don't completely agree with him but i think he has the right idea going on. Most people are greatly affected by what they hear and see on T.V. or the radio, and like it or not most of the stories are edited or censored to say, not what's actually the truth, but what the people giving you the information want you to hear.

Barry Schwartz

I would have to agree with Schwartz in the fact that teaching kids to learn for prizes is not a good thing. It is true that when all kids first go to school they are excited to be all grown up like their big brothers and sisters. Children might be able to keep up tht level of excitement for a year or two but eventially some teacher will yell at them and tell them that they need to grow up and stop messing around. It is at that pivitol poin where that child will stop seeing the fun in learning. If, as a society, we could stop that lecture from happening and therefore increase the number of mastery learners school preformance would go up. The fact that that talk does happen causes teachers to find alternative ways of getting kids to focus and participate in class. I think Schwartz puts it best when he says that kids "go from seeking knowledge to seeking approval."

Mike Rose

The building im afraid of is the Philosophy classroom. This is because this is the hardest class that i am taking this year, and the teacher is the meanest. It also doesn't help that everything we learn about is way over my head so i don't understand a thing about whats going on.

Rose entered the conversation by reading a variety of text to expand his knowledge. His getting into the conversation helped him a lot to get his scholarship to UCLA, he wouldn't have gotten there by staying where he was. I Can also enter the conversation in the same way, by challenging myself and not being afraid to ask for help.

A liberal education helped Rose to see past what he had. When he was just living in the trailer he thought that was pretty good because it was a step up from what he had had. When he went to college though, he began to see that there was more out there for him to persue if he wished.

Rose says that the best form of liberal education is when teachers or profesors will help you if you need it but they still encourage you to go out and do it on your own and actually learn something.

Plato and Kurt Vonnegut

In Platos' Allegory of the Cave he talks about how Socrates reffers to people in a cave living in the dark. He says that since they know nothing else they will only believe what they se, but if they are shown the truth about things they won't believe him because it's unfamiliar. He also says that people shouldn't judge others for not knowing as much as them, because they might have come from a different place where things were handled differently. Socrates suggested that people spend some time in someone else's shoes os to gain knolwledge. I think that that's really good advise because how can you judge people or possibly hope to help them if you have no idea how they think or where they home from.

Kurt Vonnegut Jr's story Harrison Bergeron takes place in the year 2081 when the government has decread that people be handicapped so that no one is better than anyone else. In my opinion it would be very dumb to handicapp everyone so that they were all the same because nothing would get done. If some people wern't smarter than other people then we would never have any improvements or advancements in our society. If everyone was the same the world would be a very boring place. Diversity in people and society is what gives the world it's color.

wed. questions

Giamatti explains a liberal education as a type of learning where you arn't forced to believe any one specific religious belief. He also said it is not an education where a person is taught to be put into their area of proffession right away. He says that a liberal education should be persued by people who genuinly want to learn, not by people who are seeking a means to an end. Giamatti ways that learning is not something that should just be persued in school but a lifelong persuit. He said that it is the differences in our minds and ideas that should spark ourselves and others into learning.
Yes, wartburg's mission fits into Giamati's idea of liberal education. This is because at Wartburg you are encouraged to think critically about everything even very sensitive subjects. Also, when signing up for classes your advisor will encourage you to take classes that your are interested in, even if that class has nothing to do with what you are actually here to study.