Cats (FW)

I like cats. I enjoy the softness of their fur, the playfulness of their temperament, and the excellent companionship they can provide. I, however, do not own a cat. This is due in no small part to the fact that my dad does not like cats. I do not understand why. He sides with most people in his adoration of dogs and dislike of cats. That, however, is not to say I do not like dogs. I find it strange that people group themselves as either "dog" people or "cat" people. "Dog" people associating themselves with extroversion and boisterousness, "cat" people associating themselves with introversion and quietness. But why do people feel the need to group themselves in such a manner? Perhaps it is simply a feature of human disposition. People obviously have this group attachment mentality, as one can see easily from the formation of cliques. If people didn't have this desire, would there be such thing as a "cat" or "dog" person? Or is it a deeper, less frivolous connection? Perhaps we do see some sort of solidarity between our individual psyche and the generalized behavior of a species of animal. But then again, if people have a desire to fit in to a particular group, could they be wrongly interpreting themselves as a mechanism for fitting in? And, in that case, could that extend beyond the "cat"-"dog" dichotomy, to behavior, even entire personalities?

Maybe. Probably not.

In any case, cats are furry and awesome, and in fact, are the superior animal. QED.            

Aliens (CM)

An absurdity to some, a reality to others, the idea of extraterrestrials have captivated people's interest for centuries, and even more so in the modern world. The origins of people's belief ranges from solid scientific reasoning, to poor education, to downright psychosis. People's disbelief usually stems from internal skepticism, solid scientific reasoning, and in some cases, religion. I myself fall on the "believe" side, I hope for solid reasoning. To expound on that hopefully solid reason, I would like to begin with a staple of extraterrestrial belief, Drake's Equation. 

(Bad copying srry D: Please click the image)

R_* = the average rate of star formation in our galaxy

f_p = the fraction of those stars that have planets

n_e = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets

f_l = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point

f_i = the fraction of planets with life that actually go on to develop intelligent life (civilizations)

f_c = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space

L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space 

Through a series of very complicated estimations, and some very simple multiplication, the current answer comes out to be 36.4 million at current estimates. However, this is still not really the point of the equation. The point is to show how improbable it is that life doesn't exist elsewhere. When thought about, even only our galaxy is an incomprehensibly large place containing an estimated 300 Billion stars. If the majority of those stars have planets orbiting them, and in all of those solar systems there is the "Goldilocks" zone, where the heat from the sun is neither too cold nor too hot. In a galaxy and universe full of elements waiting to be formed into planets, than it would seem highly probable that a significant number of planets have formed in this zone. These planets would have been very similar, if not identical to the early conditions of our planet. The aliens, you might be wondering, come in not long after this. Though the molten and volcanic early planet may seem inhospitable, in 1953 Stanley Miller proved that organic compounds such as amino acids would be formed by running electric current through an abiotic chemical environment, one that would closely resemble the atmosphere of early Earth. This process, as I sit here typing my highly abstract thoughts into my semi-conductor powered electric computation machine, obviously works. 

As another point of information is the discovery of several "super-Earths" relativity close  to our solar system. These planets are larger than ours, but are in the same "Goldilocks" zone, and NASA says, are potentially habitable.

If this is what lies within our small view of the Universe from here on Earth, I can hardly imagine what lies outside it. 

http://www.space.com/20720-earth-like-alien-planets-discovery.html  

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake%E2%80%99s_Equation     

Vaccines (CM)

As much as people (myself included) hate vaccines, they are indeed a vital part of modern healthcare. They have been proven again and again has an effective method of preventing many diseases, such as measles, mumps, rubella and more. It would be very difficult to dispute their effectiveness. People still do however, and even more than that, that claim that vaccines are the cause of, mainly, autism of all things. The idea is intrinsically preposterous. Autism is a disorder that is not fully understood, and what we do know about it points to it being mainly genetic. That is even besides the point. There have been multiple studies showing that there is no correlation between vaccination and autism spectrum disorders (ASD). In addition to that, it is a well established statistic that as many as 1 in 88 people have some sort of ASD. That compared to the large amount of people that receive vaccines, its not hard to draw a pseudo-scientific relation between the two. A final, and very sad reason that people may blame vaccines for autism is that the parents of children with severe autism may simply be looking for something to blame. Sad, but it's not a unreasonable conclusion. Hopefully you can see that vaccines have been proven to be effective, and the surprisingly large faction that believes autism and vaccines are connected, are very wrong.

Some citations:
http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/data.html
http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10997&page=1
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/autism/      

A cornucopia of convoluted corrupting fallacies (CC)

As we have been discussing fallacies in class, and we need look outside of our classwork for examples, I new I needed to look no further than the Holy grail of fallacious reasoning and rhetoric, a veritable treasure trove of examples and a testimony to just how bad people's reasoning can be - Conservapedia. Written from "a self described American conservative and Christian point of view" (Wikipedia), it is also described by it's rival site, RationalWiki, as a " purposefully deceitful, heavily biased, conservative blog project  encyclopedia project". The site's use of fallacies are quite literally too numerous to list (as you will discover if you visit the site yourself), but I will list 3 of the best one here for your enjoyment. 

A good place to start is the page on Liberals. "A liberal is someone who favors increased government spending, power, and control, as in ObamaCare, as well as the censorship of Christianity.". My Webster's  dictionary says otherwise. "Liberal: Not literal or strict; tolerant; favoring reform or progress.". Wikipedia defines liberalism as "A political or social philosophy advocating the freedom of the individual, parliamentary systems of government, nonviolent modification of political, social, or economic institutions to assure unrestricted development in all spheres of human endeavor, and governmental guarantees of individual rights and civil liberties.". This is a very clear, yet poorly executed, example of a straw man fallacy.

Moving on down the auricle into a list of what "liberals" support and or practice, I see more fallacies than I even really care to mention. They seem to greatly using the appeal to tradition fallacy, as things listed include "Anti-Americanism", "Destroying the Christian foundations on which America was built on", "Ending western morality", and "Denial of traditional gender roles". None of these arguments have any real substance behind them, merely hollow appeals to tradition.

Moving even deeper into the article, we find this gem of a section "Liberalism and bestiality", entirely based on the total skewing, debasement and slandering of a professor of ethics, Peter Singer. They claim he supports such things as bestiality, infanticide, necrophilia, etc. etc. you get the idea. These claims are, of course, entirely false, but moreover than that the argument of the entire section is a a kind of reverse genetic fallacy, as well as a false cause and effect fallacy. Peter Singer supports bestiality, Peter Singer is a liberal, therefore liberals support bestiality. The article also repeatedly talks about the connection between atheists and liberals, and below the section it has a link to an entirely separate article about "Atheism and bestiality". Implying the argument that "Liberals are Atheists, Liberals support bestiality, therefore Atheism leads to bestiality" - wait what? Either way, there you have it, a genetic and false cause and effect fallacy all wrapped up into one nice little package.

I could write for pages and pages about the hundreds if not thousands of fallacies they employ throughout their thousands of pages of swiss-cheese consistency writing. But frankly, I have better things to do with my time, and I'm worried that that would just dignify it.

So I leave you with a link, and a quote from Dante. 

"Abandon all hope ye who enter here"

http://www.conservapedia.com/Main_Page                    

Metaphors (RD)

The more eloquent cousin of the simile, the metaphor is a rhetorical device that has been used and reused for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. The core concept of a metaphor is the comparison of two ideas, objects, experiences, etc. without the use of "like" or "and".

Examples of this device are everywhere in reading from the most casual of books, to the heaviest of literature. Perhaps one of the most famous metaphors, and one of the most phrases, "All the word's a stage, and all the men and women merely players", from Shakespeare's As You Like It compares the world we live in and the lives we live to a play happening, "And one man in his time plays many parts". It is obviously a brilliant metaphor, which is why is has stood the test of time.

Another, and almost as famous Shakespearean metaphor is the famous line from Sonnet 18 "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day". Here, he compares the fairness/beauty of the subject (probably a woman) to the splendor of a sunny summer day. This one is particularly effective because the love of summer and sunny days is cross-cultural idea, and is almost a social norm. As such, it makes it a very effective metaphor that has remained for hundreds of years.

As somewhat less well-known, but still famous example would be from Emily Dickinson's poem Hope where she writes "Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without the words, and never stops at all.". Here she compares the idea of hope to a bird that perches in ones soul and sings the song of hope. This is a very interesting metaphor, as she says "thing with feathers that perches" instead of bird. I imagine the purpose of this would be to avoid any sort of preconceived notions of birds. It instead allows the reader to create their own mental image of a "hope bird" perching in the soul. Overall, this is what makes is such an effective metaphor.

These three examples illustrate some of the most famous metaphors in literature, and also show why the metaphor is one of the classic tried and true rhetorical devices.  

Not quite fair and balanced.

The situation with the civil war in Syria is a mess. That is stating the obvious however, as any casual observer could see that. What is equally a mess is the reporting of certain media outlets on these events, namely, Fox News. I, however, cannot say that I am really all that surprised to find this little gem nestled in the sea of irrational, pharisaical, religiously biased reporting, subverted and twisted language, and of course, the ever-present fervent hatred of Barrack Obama. The article is titled "GOP Leaders should let Allah Syria's Islamic civil war". Let us notice a few things here. Firstly, even with the absence of inflection that comes with the spoken word, one can see the mocking tone that "Allah" is said with, the writer scoffing at the idea of a god different than his. Secondly, the writer very specifically that it is an Islamic civil war, exemplifying the classic American bias against anything middle-eastern. Moving into the article, the writer cannot help but once again point out just how much of a demon Obama is. "While America continues to become an economic and moral wasteland under this regime..." (Horowitz). The author has chosen to use the word "regime" instead of administration or presidency to obviate once again his hatred of Obama. The article goes on to provide various fallacious and biased reasons why intervening in Syria would spell doom for the United States, this idea personified in the statement "Our only interest in Syria is ensuring that as many Islamists on both sides are killed and keep each other busy so they can't affect our national interests or threaten Israel .". Indeed, the writer suggests that simply letting the "Islamists" kill each other is a very good option. It simply does not matter to him if thousands of civilians are caught in the crossfire. Not only is this statement morally rotten, but the writers, puffed up, pompous, ignorant blindly chauvinistic figuratively turns his nose up at the idea of lesser beings getting in the way of his grand plans, in this case, the repeal of the so-called "Obamacare". "Republicans should vote with a unified voice against this ridiculous escapade, and summarily reconvene the fight against Obamacare.". It's truly sobering to see that in the authors mind, the lives of hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children are nothing in the face of his dislike of a healthcare bill. This kind of deceitful, biased reporting proves that one must be truly careful when choosing what to believe.   

 Link to article - http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/09/03/gop-leaders-should-let-allah-sort-out-syria-islamic-civil-war/

Ethos, Logos, and Pathos in "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks"

The book I read,  The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, has one main focus that is seen throughout the entire work. That is, telling the story of Henrietta Lacks. In short, the speaker is the author, Rebecca Skloot, the audience is the general population, anyone interested in science/ethics, and people who don't know the story of Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta Lacks was a black woman who lived from 1920-1951. Her life was cut short by an incredibly virulent from of cervical cancer, which quickly killed her, but also just happened to launch a medical revolution. A sample of her tumor was taken against the wishes of her family, and it just happened to end up in the hands of George Gey, a tissue researcher that was attempting to grow immortal human cells, ones that replicated forever - and so he did. The HeLa cell line was born, transforming into a multi-million dollar industry, not which one single dime went to the Lack's family. More than that, the cells also caused the medical revolution, leading to the momentous creation of the polio vaccine. Does the cells usefulness justify the fact they were taken without permission, should the Lack's family receive a cut of the profits made off her cells, and who was Henrietta Lacks? These questions provide the general basis of the purpose of this book.    

Skloot establishes her ethos heavily in the first few pages. She establishes herself as an average high school student, and then an average biology student in college, but one who had a particular interest in the HeLa cell line, and more importantly, where they came from. She continues to make herself sound very average, simply a person with a great curiosity in a particular story. She also paints a very specific image of herself, "I grew up in a safe, quiet, middle-class neighborhood...." (Skloot 7), further expounding on her average-ness. Despite this, towards the second half and end, she herself enters the story, and begins narrating her actions as a character, developing herself along with the story and other characters.        

Logos is employed in this work mainly in a sort of section were the author digresses from the current narrative and goes on to explain scientific or statistical back story, such as explaining the basic function of cells, or giving statistical information such as "One scientist estimates that if you could pile all HeLa ever grown onto a scale, they'd weigh more than 50 million metric tons" (Skloot 2). The book remains story and character driven, though, and the employment of these sections wane as the book progresses, and the story goes more into the modern day, and the authors experience essentially finding out this story.    

The elicitation of pathos is something that happens often in this book, and with good reason. Henrietta grew up in the 1920-1930's, where a combination of poverty and racism made life very difficult for the Lack's family. Most reasonable people would agree that racism is unacceptable, and in fact a bane upon society, and as such the massive inequality between black and white people in those days is sure to stir some sympathy. Later on in her life, in the 1940's and 50's, she gets a super-aggressive cancer of the cervix, which metastasizes throughout her entire body, choking her from the inside, and eventually causing her painful death due to uremic poisoning, after her kidneys failed. Skloot's very vivid medic terminology, as well as her acute, and frankly at some points disgusting imagery truly captures her conditions horror, not to mention the emotional pain felt by her family and friends as they watch her die. Henrietta's personal story is not the only way the book elicits pathos, however. Later in the book, as Skloot actually gets close to the surviving members of the Lack's family, and their struggles with Henrietta's cells, it becomes more and more apparent that they are all caught in the middle of something that they wanted no part of in the first place. "It's not only the story of HeLa cells and Henrietta Lacks, but of Henrietta"s family-particularly Deborah- and their lifelong struggle to make peace with the existence of those cells, and the science that made them possible." (Skloot 7).