TOW #21 - IRB halfway review - Universe in a Nutshell, Stephen Hawking

Stephen Hawking is widely considered to be one of, if not the, greatest living scientists. His contributions to math science, and theoretical physics are undeniably earth-shattering. He is also known to have sent John Oliver to the hospital with one of the sickest burns of all time, especially for a theoretical physicist. His book, The Universe in a Nutshell, is about the universe and some popular theoretical physics concepts that are prominent in today's science world. He presents these theories masterfully, imparting the complexity and brilliance of the theories in language that a filthy 11th grade peasant like me could understand. Hi Caroline. He presents these with as much evidence as possible, and his analysis of that evidence is very clear, concise, and detailed. So far, he has described the backing of quantum physics, M theory, superstrings, and Multidimensional theory. He goes about this by citing several studies and displaying the mathematical calculations and equations that have been made so far to describe these. With precision, he breaks down the implications of these studies skillfully and with great patience. With the equations, he breaks them down better than freaking CPM did for the precalc curriculum. His efforts to make this book readable by the general public go quite a way - so far, this book has been fantastically easy to understand, yet still interesting and engaging.

TOW #19 - The Gettysburg Address, Abraham Lincoln - Written

On November 19th, 1863, following the Battle of Gettysburg, the bloodiest battle of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln gave a two-minute address to an audience gathered for a consecration ceremony of the Gettysburg battleground. Lincoln was the President of the United States, and was spearheading the largest conflict the US had seen to that point. Lincoln's speech served both to honor the fallen soldiers at gettysburg and to make a statement about the renewed purpose and cause behind the civil war. Lincoln achieves these ends by making strong use of repetition and reverent diction throughout the address. Lincoln repeats many different figures and words throughout the address to place greater emphasis on the ideas he presents. He repeats words such as "nation," "liberty," "freedom," and "dedicated" in order to reinforce the idea of a dedicated, free nation that he is trying to uphold by partaking in the civil war. The freedom part mostly comes from his then-new purpose of freeing the slaves, giving his war a moral backing - freeing those in bondage to support morality and the constitution. Lincoln's use of reverent language in the Gettysburg address helps to emphasize Lincoln's purpose in honoring the dead who lay at Gettysburg's battlefield. Saying things like "we cannot consecrate," and "far above our poor power to add or detract" give his speech an air of truly looking up to and respecting the men who died at Gettysburg, giving his speech an ethos that really touches the audience and helps them to understand the purpose behind the war and the great moral struggle that the UNion and Confedracy were entrenched in. 7/10 would read again

TOW #18 - The FIgure a Poem Makes by Robert Frost - Written

Robert Frost is one of the greatest American writers of all time. Primarily a poet, Frost also wrote plays and a select few essays, one of which I will be examining today. He lived from 1874 to 1963, and wrote for most of his time on earth. Most of his poems and writings focused on nature and the environment. In The Figure of a Poem, Robert frost makes great use of metapoetry and imagery in order to communicate his opinion on the forms that poems take on. He argues that the purpose of each poem is to be different in form and sound from any other poem by comparing the ecstasy that he believes to be inherent in any poem to something that is not statically held in place, the best parts of a poem are not restricted to one part in any form or mold of the like. He postulates that the joy and wisdom of poems are only restricted by joy coming before wisdom. Frost utilizes poetic writing in an essay about poems in order to prove his point, which is a fine point of metarhetoric. this only goes to show that his essay about poems, areguing that each poem should strive to be different from all others of its ilk, proves its own point by being different from any other poetic writing. Robert frost uses the same poetic imagery as a Pathological tool to open up his readers to the suggestions he is making. He uses beauty as a key to open the metaphorical doors of his readers' minds, allowing them to more easily accept the information that he puts out by making it sweeter to consume. All in all, Frost writes a compelling and convincing essay about the nature of Poetry by writing a poem in essay form.

IRB Intro - The Universe in a Nutshell - Stephen Hawking

Stephen Hawking is possibly the greatest theoretical physicist of all time. He's written many books. This is one of them. It is a theoretical physics book that is aimed at helping the general public understand very complex physics concepts such as supergravity, quantum theory, and many others in terms that are relatively easy to undestand. I have always been interested in this realm, and thus I feel this would be a good entry level book to familiarize myself with some popular concepts.

TOW #17 - If the Beef Doesn't Kill You - Visual

Shown here is an image produced by PETA, or People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. It showcases an attempt by Peta to convince people to not eat chicken, or not eat meat at all. It uses a mixture of traditional and visual rhetoric, as well as some well concealed logical fallacies in order to convince its audience of the dangers of meat consumption. First, they utilize evidence that uses unsure diction, such as "speculate" and "likely" while presenting the information as fact instead of possibility. Another strategy used is presenting potential risks of eating meat wihtout comparing it to what they present as a superior alternative, non-animal products such as fruits and vegetables. They say that "eating meat promotes heart disease, cance, stroke, obesity, and high blood pressure" without saying if vegetarian products do the same or not. PETA also utilizes a subtle logical fallacy by saying "The ONLY way to ensure tht meat won't kill you is to throw it out." This is a slippery slope, presenting information in such a way that makes the outcome appear far more drastic than it actually is. They also use a terrifyingly corny image of a chicken holding a gun pointed at the reader, which has an astounding effect in striking fear into the heart of us terrible carnivores. In fact, I think I'm going to become a vegetarian now. PETA's argument was extraordinarily effective, so much so that I have dropped my lifelong love of meat in fear of death. Thanks, PETA!

TOW #16 - Predictably Irrational - IRB first half impressions

Freakonomics is a book about human nature. More specifically, it is about the irrationality that is inherently present in human nature, and how it can be studied, predicted, and from there, hopefully avoided. It is by Dan Ariely, an israeli American professor of psychology and behavioral economics. The books first half by and large examines how humans have an inherent difficulty in making truly rational comparisons. When our mind is met with a comparison, we do not understand how to filter out some small details that may appear completely unrelated to the situation. We cannot make the connection soemtimes, and we can use that to examine our own patterns of thinking and dismantle and examine every inch of our reasoning in an attempt to find that and make ourselves more logical people in that regard. He uses many different studies and other sceintific endeavors and obesrvations to support the claims that he makes, as well as personal anecdotes, and even more research. These all go a long way to legitimizing his points about human behavior, especially some of the studies being double blind and some not, so as to show the difference in results when human nature can interfere in with the results as opposed to not being involved at all. In fact, the use of this meta-data truly goes a long way to proving both his premise and his conclusion - that we are irrational, and that irrationality is predictable.

TOW #14 - Heroism by Ralph Waldo Emerson - Written

Ralph Waldo Emerson was a transcendentalist writer and orator who spent time in the Transcendentalist "utopian society" of Brook Farm, socializing and living alongside the likes of Henry David Thoreau. Emerson has published many, many essays and writings, his most popular being a series of essays about fairly broad topics such as Education or Heroism, and titled accordingly. This essay is titled "Heroism", and is an exploration of what exactly heroism is, and what importance it holds in our society as a construct. Emerson begins the exploration of what heroism using an excerpt from the Roman conquering of Athens. Sophocles, the duke of Athens, is to be executed, and he makes a thoroughly moving speech full of heroic ideals and thoughts that it turns Martius, the man meant to kill him, to truly respect Sophocles and change his life. Emerson uses that passage to define heroism using this as the ability to say and do the right thing, no matter what happens. He then goes on to talk about how important heroism is in our society, referencing the works of Plutarch and saying, "We need books of this tart cathartic virtue, more than books of
political science, or of private economy." He thiks that heroism is very important to society because it's important to let people know the truth, that they are born into a state of what is practically emotional, mental, and violent war at all times. Heroism is embracing that, but not abusing it. It's acknowledging the abysmal state of life but not losing one's mind over it, but maintaining one's composure and making a better time out of it. I find Emerson's essay to be very convincing, all of his claims are very effectively supported by evidence and excerpts.