Arts Blog

The Giant Ashtray by Damien Hirst probably intended to raise some awarness about smoking and the dangers it poses by creating a giant ashtray and with real cigarett buts and packs. This work does not demonstrate much skill of the artist because it the ashtray is very simple in design and it filled with lots of cigarette butts that anyone could fill.
This work is an imitation of common ashtrays, but in a smaller scale. It communicates the dangers of smoking by bringing up the scale of the ashtray, it is easier to conceptualize how much danger a person puts itself by smoking too many cigaretts. It attempts to educate people by showing them very simply, how disgusting it is to smoke, and how many cigarets you actually smoke if you were not to trash them imidiately.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/galleries/controversial_art_in_new_york/controversial_art_in_new_york.html

Natural Science Blog-Monster Study

The Monster Study was an experiment on 22 orphan children in Davenport, Iowa, in 1939 conducted by Wendell Johnson at the University of Iowa. Johnson chose one of his graduate students, Mary Tudor, to conduct the experiment and he supervised her research. After placing the children in control and experimental groups, Tudor gave positive speech therapy to half of the children, praising the fluency of their speech, and negative speech therapy to the other half, scolding the children for every speech imperfection and telling them they were stutterers. Many of the normal speaking orphan children who received negative therapy in the experiment suffered negative psychological effects and some retained speech problems during the course of their life. The experiment was kept hidden for fear Johnson’s reputation would be tarnished in the wake of human experiments conducted by the Nazis during World War II.

http://listverse.com/2008/03/14/top-10-evil-human-experiments/
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.pediatricskillbuilders.com/images/big/speech.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.pediatricskillbuilders.com/st.html&usg=__6taq5I5SVeWdorqKDsKpR3DLQ_A=&h=305&w=393&sz=136&hl=en&start=5&sig2=8t2xvDQ6vShFO8EvQe-CXg&itbs=1&tbnid=mV_0OabeYsWofM:&tbnh=96&tbnw=124&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dchildren%2Blanguage%26hl%3Den%26gbv%3D2%26tbs%3Disch:1&ei=Hl3OS9kwwvjwBtKJjSw

Human Sciences Post

The Loftus and Palmer Eyewitness Testimony wanted to prove wether people's memory is malleable.

They used loaded questions to distort the memory of the subjects that were shown a video of a car crash, and when asked to state the approximate speed of the cars, the answers varied depending on how the question was asked.

This study helps prove that loaded questions, or influenced by misled information, people change what they have percieved and creates something new that combines facts with imagination in order to be in agreeance with the false information.

http://www.holah.co.uk/summary/loftus/

Ethics Blog

Assisted Suicide a Crime or Not a Crime
Euthanasia

http://breakthroughtogod.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/144.jpg

The only four places that today openly and legally, authorize active assistance in dying of patients, are:
1. Oregon (since l997, physician-assisted suicide only);
2. Switzerland (1941, physician and non-physician assisted suicide only);
3. Belgium (2002, permits 'euthanasia' but does not define the method;
4. Netherlands (voluntary euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide lawful since April 2002 but permitted by the courts since l984).

In England and Wales there is a possibility of up to 14 years imprisonment for anybody assisting a suicide.

France does not have a specific law banning assisted suicide, but such a case could be prosecuted under 223-6 of the Penal Code for failure to assist a person in danger.

Japan has medical voluntary euthanasia approved by a high court in l962 in the Yamagouchi case, but instances are extremely rare, seemingly because of complicated taboos on suicide, dying and death in that country, and a reluctance to accept the same individualism that Americans and Europeans enjoy.

http://www.assistedsuicide.org/suicide_laws.html

I think that assisted suicide is a form of murder, and I belive that suicide is bad. Suicide under God is very bad because you murder yourself, and it is a sin to kill and it is much worst to kill yourself. Also, there have been cases when a patient, after a very long time, recovers miraculously, with no medical explanation, hope should be the last thing that should be lost.

Mathematics Blog

http://catherinephilosophie.wordpress.com/
This tree is an example of a fractal occuring in nature because the branches that break up into smaller, and smaller branches break up in a repetitive pattern.




http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=lZHBwItfaEM&feature=related
This video shows various examples of fractals in nature. This video shows mainly how fractals shape flowers. Flowers have many different shapes and colors, but this video shows that many flowers have their stigmas shaped by fractals.

http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/dspolitic/Frame.htm

Origin: Dr. Seuss. From the American point of view, during World War II, propaganda.
Purpose: American propaganda, it serves to persuade americans to buy U.S. saving bonds.
Value: This shows how many americans viewed the progress of the war. Due to the fact that it was published during World War II, it is a primary source.
Limitations: It is american, therefore it is biased against the nazi's. It is a cartoon, so everything is exagerated.