Slow Poisoning of India Documentary (Blog Post 2)

Claim made by Filmmaker:  Pesticides should not be used by farmers.
Agree
My claim:  Pesticides are harmful to the environment and local inhabitants and therefore should not be used by farmers.

Body Paragraph 1: Harmful to the environment

• The pesticides are a poison that seeps into the soil and water supply and cause harm to the surrounding environment (info from the documentary)
• This disturbs all parts of nature in the surrounding area
•  Nature needs to be preserved if we wish to live healthy lives and the use of pesticides does not allow for that
• Insects develop immunity to the pesticides
• Once this occurs, the pesticide does not accomplish its goal and only damages the environment

Body Paragraph 2: Harmful to local inhabitants

• There are many victims from the use of pesticides
• Many children are born with deformities and illnesses because of the use of pesticides
• It is unhealthy to uses these pesticides and they should not be used

Slow Poisoning of India Documentary (Blog Post 1)

The documentary begins by explaining the way pesticides affect all of the food we eat without us noticing.  Then it starts to tell us the facts about why pesticides are so detrimental.  The narrator states that all pesticides are lethal poisons, and the use of these pesticides contaminates land, water, air, and food.  Next the documentary begins to explain the effects that pesticides like endosulfan have on local communities.  They show many cases of children who have deformities because of the use of the pesticides.  A doctor then gives insight into why the pesticides are so harmful to humans.  He states that the poison suppresses our immune systems and allow mutated cells to remain in the body causing cancer and many other serious illnesses.  The documentary then switches gears and begins to talk about how people are beginning to realize the consequences of these pesticides being used and what they are doing to help the situation.  Many of the farmers who used to use pesticides have reverted back to organic farming and are allowing nature to kill the pests instead of the pesticides.  They are also switching to biopesticides which are not harmful to the environment.  The farmers who did so are now profiting more than ever and the profit increases with every year because the soil is getting more and more healthy from the lack of pesticides.

The filmmaker uses many rhetorical strategies to try to sway the audience to agree with him/her that something must be done about the pesticide use in India.  A large portion of the film was a depiction of the way children have been affected by pesticide use.  This appeals to pathos to try to draw in the emotions of the audience.  It is very effective because many people have children and would not want anything like that happening to them.  Also, the filmmaker decided to incorporate many facts about pesticides and the use of them in the documentary.  This appeals to logos, which shows people the logical reasoning behind why pesticides are so detrimental.  The appeal to logos was effective because it was able to illustrate why the pesticides are so harmful.  Lastly, there was an appeal to ethos in the interviews with the doctors from India.  This was effective because it gave the documentary much credibility.

Violent Games are Emotionally Desensitizing AOW #27

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111012124019.htm

The article I read was about an experiment to see if violent video games made people want to be just as violent in real life. Their studies showed signs of the video games making the participants "emotionally desensitized". By this they mean that the participants who played the first-person shooter games did not respond as strongly with a fear element to the image shown to them because they were so used to seeing images just like it. The source of this article is sciencedaily.com. This site is a very popular website for up to date news for research that has been conducted. It establishes its credibility through referencing the University of Bonn's experiment and explaining it well. Outside of this piece, there are many arguments going on about how violent video games corrupt children and make them want to kill people. This is why this article was written. This piece wants to give the reader the true information about how these video games affect an individual. This article was written for all who relate in any way to the violent video games that this article is talking about.

The main rhetorical element in this piece was the use of logos. The majority of the paper was about the study that was conducted by the University of Bonn. Another element I saw was ethos. The author established his/her credibility through referencing and explaining the experiment. The pattern of development that this piece used mainly was exemplification. It worked well with what the article was trying to do. In the end, I believe that this article achieved its purpose because It gave the straight facts about the effect of violent video games on an individual.

Open Science Now! AOW #26

http://www.ted.com/talks/michael_nielsen_open_science_now.html

This video on ted.com is of Michael Nielsen trying to persuade people to join in the Open Science Project. This project is trying to make it so that the scientists who make discoveries do not hide them from the world until they can get credit for everything that they have researched, but post their findings on social networks made for scientific studies. He talks about a similar project called the Polymath Project, which was a blog in which mathematicians posted on in hopes to find a solution to a very complicated problem they faced. On the 37th day that this blog was online, the creator posted that they had found the solution and the polymath project had been a success. Michael Nielsen, the speaker, is a Fulbright grad physicist who has published several books pertaining to quantum physics and, more recently, the Open Science Project. The context of this speech is that many scientist are hiding their discoveries from the public because they do not want to risk losing credit for their work. Nielsen perfomed this speech in hopes that these scientists, his audience, will join together to change the culture of science and share their discoveries as they find them. He uses all three appeals to help prove his point. He uses logos through examples of what worked and what did not work. Also, these examples along with diction and style were used to develop his persona, or ethos. And his and our wish for science to move forward to appeal to pathos. I do not think that he reached his purpose because this may sound like a great idea, but the scientists would put way too much at risk and would not want to lose credit for their discoveries. We will just have to wait and see if the Open Science Project is a success or not.

Is There a Link Between Cell Phone Use and Brain Tumors? AOW #25

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111020191848.htm

The article that I read this week was about a study done in Denmark that tested one of the most widely believed myths. They tested to see if there was a connection between mobile phone use and the risk of getting a tumor. This was claimed to be the biggest study ever, with about 360 thousand test subjects. The results showed that the same percentage of people who got a brain tumor between those who use mobile devices frequently and those who rarely use them were the same, proving that there is no correlation between the mobile device usage and the risk of tumors. The author of the piece was sciencedaily.com. This website offers up to date articles on all topics under the science category. The audience that this was directed to was those who believe that using a mobile device increases the risk for cancer. The purpose was to inform people that this myth was proven wrong and to tell them to live their life without worrying about how much they use their cellphone because of a believed risk of cancer. The piece accomplished this because it gave all of the information it needed to using logos and ethos. The piece used logos by going into deep detail about the experiment that proved a widely believed myth wrong. An appeal to ethos was made through the use of logos and the diction of the speaker.

6 Ways to Get Anyone to Believe a Clearly Fake News Story AOW #24

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-ways-to-get-anyone-to-believe-clearly-fake-news-story/

This week I read 6 Ways to Get Anyone to Believe a Clearly Fake News Story, which explained to me different ways that could be used to develop fake news stories. It mentioned that our society is ignorant on a lot of subjects and we are also to lazy to research what we read, so believing crazy stories happened to us many times before. I noticed as I was reading that a lot of the topics connected to the appeals. For example, one of the topics was about how we make specific studies more general to make it appealing to the reader. This appealed to the logos by sounding so smart that people do not understand you, but still believe whatever you say. Also, the article talked about how heart-wrenching stories made many believe stories that weren't true and I thought that that was a demonstration of how pathos is the most powerful appeal.

The author of the piece was Christina H, she has written many other pieces for cracked that have been viewed by millions of people. This piece was written in a time where Americans have all of the resources they need to research everything at the tips of their fingers, but never do because they are too lazy. This helped give the article a little humor because they had examples of news articles that weren't true. The reason this article was written was to provide the lazy American a realization of how lazy they are and hopefully change so we do not make mistakes like believing these news articles again. The audience that it was written for was the average, lazy American who believe everything they read, no matter how crazy the stories are. Rhetorical elements in the piece were in the ways to get people to believe clearly fake news stories. One point was that exaggerating scientific breakthroughs works because people do not know much on the subject, so the reader feels like the evidence applied to the logos. Also, the article said that heart-wrenching stories work because people do not want to sound heartless by denying them; this is also an application to pathos. The author reached their purpose because they effectively made me a little paranoid about where the articles I read are coming from and gave me a motivation to research the stories instead of just believing everything I read.

The Genome Revolution AOW #23

http://www.ted.com/talks/richard_resnick_welcome_to_the_genomic_revolution.html

In the video in the link above Richard Resnick talks about the advances in genome technology that many people are not aware of. He explained that the technology we have allows us to genetically sequence a human, and compare it to other genetic sequences to discover the source of a disease or sickness. People who were genetically sequenced and were helped in the end were mentioned to show the audience how useful this technology can be. The speaker in this video is Richard Resnick. He is CEO of GenomeQuest, which is a company that builds software to support genomic medicine. Before this, he was CEO of Mosaic Bioinformatics and a member of the Human Genome Project at MIT. He has been involved in many organisations involving genetics for a very long time which makes him very credible for this topic. The context that surrounds this speech is that we are having breakthroughs in this science that would be very helpful for all humans, but not many are informed of this or are using this science to its full potential. The audience of this speech is all humans who do not know how amazing this technology truly is. This is why the speech was made, to develop interest and inform the uninformed. The rhetorical elements used in this speech are logos, pathos and ethos. The logos was developed through the charts and graphs that project the information and predicted information that support the genetic technology and its usefulness. Pathos was in the piece of this where he tells the stories of individuals who were affected by life-threatening diseases and were saved by the technology of his company. This drew my emotions because I felt bad for the ill individuals and was happy to hear that they were saved by genetic technology. His ethos was established through all of the knowledge he gave us on the subject and the confidence in his voice. I believe that Richard Resnick did accomplish his purpose because he made me interested on this newer technology and informed me of all its amazing capabilities.

The Dog Strikes Back AOW#22

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-9EYFJ4Clo

Since last week was the Superbowl, I decided to rhetorically analyze Volkswagen's commercial which debuted during the game.  In the commercial there is a dog which, upon seeing a Volkswagen car drive by, attempts to run through the door flap to chase it.  The dog gets stuck on the way out because he is too wide to fit through the small exit.  This empowers the dog to want to work out so that he can fit through the door flap.  The dog works out and becomes fit.  The next time a Volkswagen drives by, the dog is able to run through the flap and chase the car.  The commercial then cuts to a scene in the cantina in Star Wars.  Two characters then argue about which commercial was better, this one, or the little kid who used "the force" in last year's commercial.  Then Darth Vader enters the scene and uses the force to choke the guy who thought the dog commercial was better.  This commercial came out while there is also a remake of the first Star Wars in 3D.  The commercial was made so that people feel that Volkswagen cars are better than other cars, leading to more purchases of Volkswagens. This commercial appeals to the general public as the audience, but mainly pet owners and Star Wars fans.  Some rhetorical elements of this piece are its allusion to other commercials and exaggeration of how a Volkswagen will benefit the public.  This exaggeration comes from why the dog exercised.  The commercial tries to say that it was because of its wanting to chase the Volkswagen, which would only add to the benefits of having a Volkswagen.  But the most prominent form of rhetoric in this commercial was the allusion to Volkswagen's previous commercial.  For the people that made the connection between this commercial and the Vader kid who uses "the force" now feel a deeper connection with this company and possibly a stronger wanting for a Volkswagen car.  I believe that the commercial accomplished this purpose mainly through this strong use of allusion.

Plant fuels that could power a jet AOW #20

http://www.ted.com/talks/bilal_bomani_plant_fuels_that_could_power_a_jet.html

This week I watched a speech made by Bilal Bomani on TED.com where Bomani described the work he and his coworkers had been doing.  They had been working on finding alternative fuel sources for jets.  They are using processes like climatic adaptation to create the perfect plant, then they take that plant to their "Open Pond" system to grow the plant large-scale.  They are mainly focusing on algae and halophytes, which are plants that can grow in saline environments.  Using halophytes is helpful because 97.5 percent of the world's water is saline, so finding a plant that doesn't have to grow off of the 2.5 percent of water that is freshwater would make it conserve useful resources.  Additionally, the facility is powered by solar cells and wind turbines, which aids the problem of renewable energy.  So far, the organization has been successful in finding many possible solutions some of the world's problems that include, water, fuel food and energy.  The speech that was given about this research is surrounded by a time where finding renewable resources is a huge issue.  This speech was given to show the world that new resources are being found, but the ways to produce them are still being perfected.  Some rhetorical elements used by Bomani were the use of humor, and an appeal to logos.  Bomani made jokes during his speech to keep it feeling lighthearted.  This made the boring parts of his speech, where he was listing facts, more interesting.  He appealed to logos through giving the scientific names of all of the plants involved and gave facts about their work and the environment.  By giving quantitative facts, people were shown how much work this organization has already done to a more accurate degree.  I believe he did accomplish his purpose because the speech has over 70,000 views, which means that many people have seen it and know that alternative resources are becoming a viable option.

Unit 3 Reflection

An individual and their government have mutual duties to each other.  The readings from unit 3 were able to help me gain a better understanding of these obligations.  Martin Luther King Jr.'s Letter from Birmingham Jail showed the importance of using your talents to better society.  The Declaration of Independence, by Thomas Jefferson, and "The Crisis, Number 1", by Thomas Paine, both reflected the idea that a government must govern in a way that is best for the people, and if this is not the primary motive of a government, then they are corrupt and must be put out of power.  These mutual duties must be followed in order to have a society grow and prosper.

An individual must use their talents to better their society.  For Martin Luther King Jr., it was his rhetoric.  He was able to persuade many people that African Americans weren't any less than whites.  He made his society better through the rhetoric in his speeches and other writings, which effectively impressed his ideas onto others.  Though the talents that better society do not have to be related to the use of rhetoric, other talents are just as helpful, and citizens are obligated to do whatever they can to improve their society.

A government must govern its people in way that benefits the citizens.  When a government does not have its people as top priority, they are corrupt.  This was shown through "The Crisis, Number 1" and The Declaration of Independence.  In Paine's piece this is shown because he tells the people that the British government does not care for them and tries to oppress them.  He uses this point to try to rally the colonists to revolt against the crown.  This idea was also reflected in The Declaration of Independence.  Jefferson states to the British government that the colonists are being oppressed and that they will have no more of it.  He also states that the colonists are creating their own new nation that is separate from Britain.  This displayed that a government must act in a way to benefit its people because if a government is without what is best for the people in mind, the citizens will not want to be governed by a corrupt system.

Overall, Unit 3 added on to what the other two units had taught me.  Through the readings of Martin Luther King Jr., Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson, I found that an Individual must try to better society through using the talents that they were given.  Also, a government must act in a way that is best for its people.  A society will be successful and sustain itself if both the individual and the government can fulfill their duties.

New Strain of Lab Mice Mimics Human Alcohol Consumption Patterns AOW #19

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/12/111212124555.htm

The article that I read this week dealt with a new strain of lab mice specifically bred to seek alcohol over other liquids in their diet. The article states that this is beneficial for us because we can study them to try to find the genetic reasons that humans become alcoholics. They state that being able to breed lab mice to seek alcohol proves that some of the reasons humans become alcoholic could be tied with genetics. The reason that they chose lab mice for this experiment is because mice share 80 percent of their DNA with human DNA. The scientists who perform tests on these mice are excited to begin testing with these mice. Today, many humans know of someone who is an alcoholic or are one themself, but we do not know much as to why some humans seek a lot of alcohol while others do not. The article itself had a purpose of proving to the audience, or those interested in the reasons behind alcohol addictions of humans, that they are achieving some progress in their tests. Some of the rhetorical elements in this piece were its appeals to logos and ethos, and the organization of the article. The author established their credibility through the appeal to logos, their wise diction, and the fact that their article appeared on a website dedicated just to science. They appealed to logos through the statistics that they brought, and, also, the examples that they stated from the experiments the scientists had been working on. There was no figurative language or imagery/allusion in this piece because stating anything besides the facts in an article like this would discredit the author. I believe that the author did accomplish their purpose because they made an interesting article which informed the public of the advances this organization had made in science.

What Does the World Want from America AOW #18

This week I finished my IRB “What Does the World Want from America?” This section deals a little bit on how the other countries view America but mainly focuses on how these reflections look to the United States.  A professor of U.S. foreign policy, Simon Serfaty, writes about how the other countries views on us change who we are.  He says, “…every president becomes what he did not want to be.  Since 1945, the pattern has periodically repeated.” (Lennon 145)  This shows to the other countries that it is not who we are that makes us act this way towards them, but their views of our country.  And since we cannot act in a way to please everyone, no one can agree that we act in the right way for them.  Some rhetorical components of this section were an appeal to ethos and pathos.  The appeal to ethos is, once again, made through the structure of the book.  Since it is composed of many well-educated professors, the credibility is already established.  As for the appeal to pathos, Professor Michael J. Mazarr writes about September 11^th.  This event is a sensitive topic for citizens of the United States, and he draws the emotions of his audience through talking about it.  Overall, I believe that Alexander T.J. Lennon achieved his purpose because he was able to get all of the opinions of America, and share them with the Americans who do not have a correct understanding of what people from other countries think about the United States.  Though it may have achieved its purpose, I would not recommend this book to anyone in high school and below because the way that the professors dictate their views is confusing unless you’ve had experience with it.

State of Imitation 2 AOW #17

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxYJb2ScuXM

This week I decided to rhetorically analyze the second state of Imitation commercial from State Farm.  This video is in response to all of the positive feedback from the first video where Aaron Rodgers is placed in a humorous situation where people have stolen his touchdown dance and say they don't know who he is or why he thinks that it is his move.  To them, the move is for the discount double-check that State Farm does to make sure you pay as little as possible.  In this commercial, one of Rodgers's teammates, B.J. Raji, has gone to State Farm and gotten a discount double-check, then he and the other people at the company do Aaron Rogers's touchdown dance and say that it is Raji's dance.  They then proceed to play a song and dance to it with "Raji's" dance.  The source this is from is the State Farm insurance company which is doing all they can to make as much money as possible.  They have been making humorous commercials recently to try to get more customers.  This commercial was created when many people watch sports and like to laugh, so State Farm put a humorous commercial on ESPN's channel.  This commercial mainly applied to those who are sports fans and are looking for insurance.  Some of the rhetorical elements in this piece included appeals to logos, pathos, and ethos.  Also, diction and allusion were big parts of this commercial.  The appeal to logos was the fact that State Farm will perform a "discount double-check" to make sure you get all of the discounts possible.  This alliteration of "discount double-check" goes along with diction in that it flows off the tongue and is easy to remember for a lot of people.  The pathos is in that the commercial is humorous.  This also goes along with allusion because it was funny when the woman said, "Come on, you said you were a dancer."  This connected to the first commercial where he tries to explain it is his touchdown dance and she just thinks that he is a dancer.  The ethos in this commercial is that two of the people who have a dangerous job with a lot of injuries go to State Farm to get their insurance.  I believe that this commercial achieved its purpose because it was able to catch the attention and possibly persuade any who saw it.

Mask-Bot: A Robot With a Human Face AOW #16

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111107161758.htm



This week I found an article on ScienceDaily.com that was about a robot called the Mask-Bot which is able to act as a head for a robot that models that of a human.  It has a projector behind it which projects its image onto the 3D, translucent surface that is its face.  This allows for a more realistic view from many angles.  The Mask-Bot also has different programmable faces and voices to customize to what the customer would like.  Possibly the coolest part about the Mask-Bot is that it is able to listen to someone talk, and by analysis of their tone of voice, pitch, and other technical aspects of voice it can create appropriate body language in the image of its face.  The team who created the Mask-Bot is currently developing language software to make it so that the Mask-Bot will be able to respond with a voice to the things that someone says.  This article was written in the current time where many scientists are developing newer technology for the people of the world.  Generally, the masses only see what has been released for consumers, but this article lets us know what is being developed.  This article was written to inform those who are interested in future technology about what is being developed and will soon be on the market.  This article used logos and ethos, but since it is an article attempting to inform people, it lacked figurative language and imagery/allusion.  An appeal to logos was made through all of the facts that the author brought in as well as the quotes he used from the scientists, themselves. This appeal to logos helped build his ethos with the wise choice of diction the author uses.  I believe that the author accomplished their purpose because they were able to keep interest while also giving many facts about the Mask-Bot.