BLACK GOLD!

Ughhhhhh. Can't we just use it all up so we don't have to hear about OIL anymore? Please make it stop! But honestly, oil is a huge issue in our world today. War, climate change, economic hardship, terrorism......it can be a contributing factor to all of these. Our speaker worked for exxon mobile.....funny. Although he seemed relatively neutral, we must ask our selves..."what does this person have to gain by me believing him...." as instructed to do so several times in our class. One of the best parts of this was the graph on plants that are most productive for making biofuels. I always thought ethanol from corn was a DUMB idea. So much of our grain goes to feeding livestock, and livestock is so subsidized by the government that it would be insane to give corn to our cars (unless we could all go veggie.......anyone? No? okay, just making sure people are still unwilling to give up their meat....). But seeing that certain plants might, and I say might, be able to lend us a hand with at least SOME kind of fuel addition.....thats at the very least encouraging. Lets grow that oil producing grass in Africa where it's native and promote a diverse ecosystem there while growing it, and having the people who own the land make money and make sure both parties on both sides are getting a fair trade. It's like shadegrown, organic, fair trade coffee, but for fuel and with grass. Now that's a decent idea. Our speaker told us that our energy needs are going to take REAL innovation. I am a optmistic realist. I feel like this will be hard, but.....uhhhh WE CAN FLY THROUGH THE AIR IN A F****ING CHAIR. We can go to the moon. Our cell phones talk to satellites in SPACE........in a matter of SECONDS. "Necessity is the mother of invention". Well, Earth, we need some new energy. Let's get our brains thinking

Sustainability

Medeiros is a great educators. Though not quite as strong as a speaker as Lynn, he is a wealth of knowledge and his enthusiasm runs deep. I think the overall feeling of his lecture was that humans have a responsibility to uphold the environment. This ties in well with the video we watched on consumerism and "affluenza". We have a responsibility to help our environment. He said in his speech "we forgot we need to care for Earth". I also liked "all for bling". The amount of what I call "gross" consumerism and greed in our society is horrendous. I don't think the free market was meant to cause this stuff, but it has. We have let our values change and become hollow. I always try to link for other people why things like a healthy environment is important for a healthy people and is important for a healthy economy. These things are all related. They are all intertwined. Just as we are all intertwined.....don't break the thread.........

Global Climate Change

I have a hard time swallowing the fact that there are still people who DON'T believe in global warming. It isn't hard to understand that we have an impact on our world. Why don't people just do a little research and figure it out? Please do what you can to change our world. Please. For our kids and grandkids. The worst thing that's going to happen if you try to lend a hand is you will have to wear a sweater instead of turning up the heater. It's obvious from the lecture that this SUCKS for the Earth. Our world is complex and hard for everyone to understand. That's why we have scientists. LISTEN TO THEM.

Lynn's Lecture

Lynn is a great public speaker. I felt like she kept me engaged the whole time. Her lecture was very informative as well. The intro was great, but the stats she gave out about people not believing the Holocaust happened or that half of America thinks slavery was moral, that blew my mind. I have taken a lot of critical thinking classes, and her prequel was very informative and instructive for someone who hasn't taken any critical thinking classes. "Every one is entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts". I liked her thoughts on changing beliefs. We do need to re-examine our beliefs a lot. I also agreed how sometimes, people who cannot critically think should not have a "seat at the table". Especially on critical thinking. Her fallacies list was awesome. Having a background in education, she was phenomenal. Visual, audio, comedy, involvement. It was awesome. I do think everyone needs a course in critical thinking. It does change you and how you believe things. Great chat not only for our class, but for our lives.

Interesting Note On Keely's Lecture

Keely talked about Hetch-Hetchy, which is a resivor that provides San Francisco with water. A cool side note, wintering ducks have been staying there and contaminating the water with excess fecal mater. How can you get rid of ducks without impacting the environment? San Francisco hired a group of falconers (myself included!) to fly falcons over the resivor to scare the ducks off the pond. HOW COOL! And it works!

Views on the Environment

Out of everyone in my family, I am the only one that shares a deep passion for our world. It's hard for me to understand where this came from. My father did raise me fishing a lot. And I did go camping a handful of times. Other than that, I am not sure where the influence came from. When I was really young, I had a book about sharks I carried everywhere with me. As I got older, I got into dinosaurs. It was hard for adults to hear me correct them when they called a dinosaur a duckbill...."no, it's a Parasauralophus." What five year old knows that? As I got older, I caught critters around the neighborhood. Snails, slugs, moths, caterpillars, but most of all, lizards and snakes. In second grade I got an iguana, Iggy. She grew to be four feet in a few years and it was cool having this little dinosaur around. I went through numerous reptiles (no they didn't die, I gave them away). Chameleons with horns, nocturnal geckos, all sorts of snakes, Bearded Dragons. In seventh grade I started breeding lizards, and would make close to $1000 every clutch of eggs. On weekends I would hike through the hills, sometimes in company, sometimes alone, lifting up old logs and sheet metal for snakes. By eighth grade, the people in my neighborhood knew whose door to knock on if they had a snake in their yard. By highschool, I'd messed with more rattlesnakes than most people have ever seen. As highschool came and other things took priority, the snakes and lizards left my rooms and were replaced with friends, girls, and parties. After highschool, I applied for an internship at an outdoor school. The year and a half I spent there has shaped me as an individual more than any other factor in my life, with the exception of my family, solely because they raised me. I was shown new knowledge, caring, and respect for our natural world. I developed an undying passion for knowledge, and an extreme desire to share it. I started spending vast amounts of time outside in the natural world. After my internship, I moved to Tahoe, and experienced the marvelous Sierras year round. When I ran out of money (no more Top Ramen, please!) I moved back home into my parents house, and got a job at REI. Now I am enabled to explore the outdoor world in numerous ways. These are the only things besides divine intervention I can say shaped my view of the environment.

Mother Society

I thought this was a good lecture. It reminded me a lot of the book we are reading right now, Ishmael. As we live in this society, we do agree to certain unspoken and sometimes unrealized things. Money was a good example. These sacrifices however let us integrate ourselves into society and have things like friends, family, cell phones and online classes. Our problem is not consumerism, but rather where our values are. What are we buying? Why are we buying this? I have a problem with people wanting to buy things just to keep up with the Jones'. HOWEVER, certain brands do indeed represent different ideas, and I think that if we want to live in society and be part of this Globalized economy, then choosing the brands that represent the best ideas is a good idea. Volcom "Youth Against The Establishment". I like that. Marmot and North Face respresent a good idea, a good theory. Hollister....not so much. When people come to value any of these things too much however, any material or brand or whatever....thats a problem.