With my little sister entering into high school next year, I am confronted again with the idea that the public schools of America might be under-rigorous. I realized that it is possible that a person could go to school and only take three years of math; basic math, algebra, and geometry. In science, a kid could take FOS (a comprehensive and extremely basic overview of earth, energy, and matter sciences), biology, and only one other class of science. Even though math and science may not be the forte of every single person, every student should have to take four years of every subject (even a foreign language).
Seniors get senioritis and take two classes their senior year. Freshmen in my high school fail out of FOS. Most people are heading off to a community college with extremely vague goals in mind for their future. This is not a pretty picture of part of the American educational system.
However, Americans do excel in creativity and individual thinking, a product of our less militaristic curriculum. But if kids were exposed to math and science in more depth, it is possible that there would be more interest in the subject, especially if they didn't seem so forbidden. The person who takes an enormous number of science and math classes that are advanced or at the college level is immediately given a prestigious place of brilliance in the smart-hierarchy of the collective teenage brain. However, the person who excels at language arts is less noticed and possibly thought of as weird or artsy. By keeping the langauge arts and social studies curriculum the same and widening the science and math curriculum, the schools of America could have a better chance at inspiring their students to do something better with their lives.
Another area of this system that desperately needs to be changed is the area of foreign language. At least at my school, foreign language isn't even required, allowing people who may have undiscovered talents to slip through the cracks. In addition, the language curriculum is enormously easy. In a third year French class, you would be hard-pressed to find a student who could understand the language as it is spoken.
America needs to change this system. It's inescapable and true, but when the shift does occur, no other system should be taken as a model. When the Founding Fathers built the Constitution of our nation, they took ideas from other sources but subsequently combined them into something more brilliant than anyone had ever imagined.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Is This What It's Come To?
Researchers have found that mice that lack a certain protein in their body that responds to the hunger hormone ghrelin burn fat faster than mice with the protein and hope to apply this idea to humans (http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/67610/title/Mice_missing_protein_burn_more_fat). I read this article, and instead of becoming awestruck, I was horrified.
Do we really need to alter our genome in order to make us immune to fatness?
For centuries, we've played with Nature, trying to alter it, moving organisms from one end of the world to the other, changing organisms, but humans don't seem to realize what a dangerous game they're playing. From the usage of antibiotics, which are admittedly a good thing, we have gained a plethora of antibiotic-resistant bugs, able to make us sicker than ever. By playing with the genes of our food crops, we managed to ensare ourselves in our own legal trap of greediness. We've destroyed so many ecological systems in our quest to dominate this world. And now, after thousands of years of hard labor and tight food, we have become decidely pudgy in the Western world. While people starve in third world countries, many people have enough to eat here in America. But in order to combat this horibble disease of heftiness, we are actually thinking about gene alteration? Inconceivable.
Scientists estimate that this gene alteration may be equivalent to 2.5 miles of walking, without walking! Strange as it may sound, it probably does work, if researchers can find the same mechanisms in humans. The problem is, however, that 2.5 miles a day is good for more than just your waistline; exercise maintains and builds muscle mass as well as providing the needed pressure for your bones. Nothing comes without hard work, even an attractive physique.
As children, teachers and parents told us to beware of the offers and ideas that seemed to be too good to be true. As we grew older, it became apparent that life was unfair, and all good things come usually after hard work. With the alteration of a gene, a person could be manufactured thin, but at what cost? We don't know all the exact mechanisms of the human body, much less the genome, and should probably be very careful before beginning to meddle with it. I am not suggesting that the alteration of genes is an inherently evil practice or should be thrown away, but I am saying that maybe we should be cautious and think before we go trying to do good where good is already there.
Do we really need to alter our genome in order to make us immune to fatness?
For centuries, we've played with Nature, trying to alter it, moving organisms from one end of the world to the other, changing organisms, but humans don't seem to realize what a dangerous game they're playing. From the usage of antibiotics, which are admittedly a good thing, we have gained a plethora of antibiotic-resistant bugs, able to make us sicker than ever. By playing with the genes of our food crops, we managed to ensare ourselves in our own legal trap of greediness. We've destroyed so many ecological systems in our quest to dominate this world. And now, after thousands of years of hard labor and tight food, we have become decidely pudgy in the Western world. While people starve in third world countries, many people have enough to eat here in America. But in order to combat this horibble disease of heftiness, we are actually thinking about gene alteration? Inconceivable.
Scientists estimate that this gene alteration may be equivalent to 2.5 miles of walking, without walking! Strange as it may sound, it probably does work, if researchers can find the same mechanisms in humans. The problem is, however, that 2.5 miles a day is good for more than just your waistline; exercise maintains and builds muscle mass as well as providing the needed pressure for your bones. Nothing comes without hard work, even an attractive physique.
As children, teachers and parents told us to beware of the offers and ideas that seemed to be too good to be true. As we grew older, it became apparent that life was unfair, and all good things come usually after hard work. With the alteration of a gene, a person could be manufactured thin, but at what cost? We don't know all the exact mechanisms of the human body, much less the genome, and should probably be very careful before beginning to meddle with it. I am not suggesting that the alteration of genes is an inherently evil practice or should be thrown away, but I am saying that maybe we should be cautious and think before we go trying to do good where good is already there.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Of the Mice that Saved Men
My AP Biology textbook is full of detailed explanations of important experiments that I must memorize, but I soon realized that nobody cares about the mouse. Biologists use this little varmint all the time in experiments, much to the dismay of PETA. One experiment comes up particularily in my mind; Griffin's experiment on bacterial transformation. In this groundbreaking procedure, Griffin used the pneumonia bacteria on mice, and many mice died. But from this experiment, so many lives have been saved. Now, scientists can use bacteria to harvest insulin and help diabetics live normal lives. This video shows PETA's stance on experimentation on rats and mice.
However wrong this practice is, we cannot, as one commentor so intelligently put it "expiroment with yourself" as scientists. In order to save lives, human lives, scientists have to choose. In addition, scietists also cannot "expiroment with prisoners, people from jail, where those so called "scientist" should be" because those people are human.
Amid this debate is the idea that a human life is worth more than an animal one. I have 3 beautiful, wonderful, lovely dogs, who I love to death. If there was a fire in my house and I could save either one dog or my mother, I obviously would choose my mother. If it was between a dog and another person who I didn't even know, I would choose the person every time, no matter if the person was the worst person alive. Why? Because human life is something beyond the animal. The moment we were given a soul, the moment we knew ourselves and the high "Moral Law", we became more important than animals. I don't say this out of pride of my humanity. What is there to be proud of? We managed to overpopulate the Earth, make ourselves fat, and allow our selfish impulses to rule our lives. And yet, there is some consciousness of having been chosen, some intangible feeling of innate superiority that we can sense.
Experimenting on animals is not right, and an alternative should be sought. HOWEVER, as long as that option is our only option, scientists should be allowed to continue experimenting on the mice and rats for lifesaving technologies. Now, companies shouldn't be allowed to keep animals to test shampoo and other things on, but in the name of life, this option looks better.
Griffin's mice died a sickly death of pneumonia, but in the end, they have saved thousands, possibly millions of people. If Griffin hadn't been allowed to experiment on the mice, we would still be trying to harvest second-grade insulin from slaughtered livestock and telling people that there simply isn't enough for them.
However wrong this practice is, we cannot, as one commentor so intelligently put it "expiroment with yourself" as scientists. In order to save lives, human lives, scientists have to choose. In addition, scietists also cannot "expiroment with prisoners, people from jail, where those so called "scientist" should be" because those people are human.
Amid this debate is the idea that a human life is worth more than an animal one. I have 3 beautiful, wonderful, lovely dogs, who I love to death. If there was a fire in my house and I could save either one dog or my mother, I obviously would choose my mother. If it was between a dog and another person who I didn't even know, I would choose the person every time, no matter if the person was the worst person alive. Why? Because human life is something beyond the animal. The moment we were given a soul, the moment we knew ourselves and the high "Moral Law", we became more important than animals. I don't say this out of pride of my humanity. What is there to be proud of? We managed to overpopulate the Earth, make ourselves fat, and allow our selfish impulses to rule our lives. And yet, there is some consciousness of having been chosen, some intangible feeling of innate superiority that we can sense.
Experimenting on animals is not right, and an alternative should be sought. HOWEVER, as long as that option is our only option, scientists should be allowed to continue experimenting on the mice and rats for lifesaving technologies. Now, companies shouldn't be allowed to keep animals to test shampoo and other things on, but in the name of life, this option looks better.
Griffin's mice died a sickly death of pneumonia, but in the end, they have saved thousands, possibly millions of people. If Griffin hadn't been allowed to experiment on the mice, we would still be trying to harvest second-grade insulin from slaughtered livestock and telling people that there simply isn't enough for them.
Mental Enhancement Is Code for Rebellion
This paper describes mental enhancement as containing the drugs I've been lectured against since elementary school. It seems to imply that some people believe these illegal substances (that are illegal for a reason) actually increase mental faculty and benefit the person.
Slam... slam... slam...
That was my head, against my desk.
Alcohol, PCP, shrooms... they all do something bad to your body. Now, not having a druggie connection, I can't tell you first hand or second hand what these things do to you. Taking shrooms (which is short for mushrooms, which I did not know) for an example of a hallucogin, I Googled "benefits of shrooms" and stumbled across The Invisible Landscape as an example of someone who supposedly believes these things are good. And now I'm scared that these people do actually exist.
Obviously, drugs are a bad thing. Why? As a form of mental enhancement, they do an awful job at making you actually smarter. After reflecting on my innate mental capacity due to my lack of shroom-ness, I realized that I too have an equivalent mental enhancer. Although it does seem to be less effective, I like to believe that someday, I might develop just as much as the people who use hallucogins. SCHOOL.
However, I don't believe that the paper meant to encourage the use of such substances, but rather to merely state that some people believe that they make you more creative. People who say this sort of thing are obviously trying to justify doing what every cell of their body screams against. Hence, rebellion is shrouded by the mysticism of MENTAL ENHANCEMENT.
Slam... slam... slam...
That was my head, against my desk.
Alcohol, PCP, shrooms... they all do something bad to your body. Now, not having a druggie connection, I can't tell you first hand or second hand what these things do to you. Taking shrooms (which is short for mushrooms, which I did not know) for an example of a hallucogin, I Googled "benefits of shrooms" and stumbled across The Invisible Landscape as an example of someone who supposedly believes these things are good. And now I'm scared that these people do actually exist.
Obviously, drugs are a bad thing. Why? As a form of mental enhancement, they do an awful job at making you actually smarter. After reflecting on my innate mental capacity due to my lack of shroom-ness, I realized that I too have an equivalent mental enhancer. Although it does seem to be less effective, I like to believe that someday, I might develop just as much as the people who use hallucogins. SCHOOL.
However, I don't believe that the paper meant to encourage the use of such substances, but rather to merely state that some people believe that they make you more creative. People who say this sort of thing are obviously trying to justify doing what every cell of their body screams against. Hence, rebellion is shrouded by the mysticism of MENTAL ENHANCEMENT.
No, I Can't Talk Right Now, I'm Charging My Cell Phone in My Head.
I was reading this report by a professional looking group of people that discuss the ethics of human enhancements. Whoever wrote this was extremely intelligent, because they keep citing studies (however vaguely) from places such as MIT. In the beginning section, they answer questions about human enhancement, and I was particularily interested in the "future" sections of them. Until I read that in the future humans will have neural implants in our brains that allow us to plug devices right into our heads.
Doesn't that seem a bit inconvenient?
To me, at least, it seems as though a normal, functioning human being wouldn't want to have a plug in their skull. Of course, scientists are still studying this area for therapeutic applications, but not so that I can charge my phone up by the power of my neural activity! While reading the section on page 15, I was reminded of the Borg, from Star Trek. They had implants in them, and they used them to connect to each other AND they plugged themselves in to sleep. (I remember this specifically because one of the episodes -- or movies, I can't remember -- had them adventurous crew try and defeat the Borg by jamming their signals and telling them to sleep. Then, for some unknown reason, the giant cube exploded.) It's one thing to change other organisms, but that kind of change in humans is a whole uncharted sector.
Most of this paper deals with the possible outcomes if people start upgrading themselves. When the phrase "enhancement divide" came onto my screen, I couldn't help but think of the movie Robots, where the pressure to upgrade was enormous. But if you think about it, those kinds of upgrades were mostly aesthetic, not meant for some higher purpose. Humans are shallow. If we are going to spend the money on changing our selves, most of us will make ourselves look better, not have a video game in our head (honest, they said it... page 15). We probably should worry about what new extremes we'll try to make ourselves look good instead of the ethics of implanting computer chips in our brain.
This organization seems legitamite, however. Its contacts are two professors at state univerisities. Bioethics is a sticky issue, dealing with the future and the present, while trying to convince the public not be scared of the new technologies. Going into medical research myself, I find that these areas are important to consider, especially with the rate that science moves today.
Doesn't that seem a bit inconvenient?
To me, at least, it seems as though a normal, functioning human being wouldn't want to have a plug in their skull. Of course, scientists are still studying this area for therapeutic applications, but not so that I can charge my phone up by the power of my neural activity! While reading the section on page 15, I was reminded of the Borg, from Star Trek. They had implants in them, and they used them to connect to each other AND they plugged themselves in to sleep. (I remember this specifically because one of the episodes -- or movies, I can't remember -- had them adventurous crew try and defeat the Borg by jamming their signals and telling them to sleep. Then, for some unknown reason, the giant cube exploded.) It's one thing to change other organisms, but that kind of change in humans is a whole uncharted sector.
Most of this paper deals with the possible outcomes if people start upgrading themselves. When the phrase "enhancement divide" came onto my screen, I couldn't help but think of the movie Robots, where the pressure to upgrade was enormous. But if you think about it, those kinds of upgrades were mostly aesthetic, not meant for some higher purpose. Humans are shallow. If we are going to spend the money on changing our selves, most of us will make ourselves look better, not have a video game in our head (honest, they said it... page 15). We probably should worry about what new extremes we'll try to make ourselves look good instead of the ethics of implanting computer chips in our brain.
This organization seems legitamite, however. Its contacts are two professors at state univerisities. Bioethics is a sticky issue, dealing with the future and the present, while trying to convince the public not be scared of the new technologies. Going into medical research myself, I find that these areas are important to consider, especially with the rate that science moves today.
Humans of the Future
There is no reason why humans should have survived the food chain, other than to be toothpicks for a bear or a lion. We don't have claws, particularily sharp teeth, or any sort of protective body armor. We are, quite wholly, soft and squishy bags of breakableness. And yet, humans have proliferized to such an extent that our population has begun, and in some cases has, outgrown the available resources. My three couch-dwelling dogs are better equipped to survive than I am, but somehow, they look to me to feed them and open doors. I believe that the survival of humans is a product of our sentient nature and our applied capacity for intelligence. This capacity that obviously exceeds any other life form is not of our doing and is not something to take pride in. But still, humans have developed technologies that allow them to change the very basis of life. That's an accomplishment all of its own.
But if you ask most people, they could come up with something they'd like to change about themselves. Taller. Blonde hair. Straight teeth. The ability to shoot lasers out of your palms. Some people go and have plastic surgery and other just simply wish. There are two main ways that human enhancement is possible in today. The first is physical alteration that affects that individual, not their offspring. The second is the genetic engineering of embryos. Of the physical alteration, there are three main areas that enhancement focuses on\\
1) Therapeutic enhancement- Therapeutic enhancement focuses on curing diseases, the prevention of diseases, and the repair of the body from an accident or a disease. This is most likely the least debatable of the three types, simply because every human should have the right to lead a normal , relatively healthy life. Enhancements in this category include vaccinations and specific medical procedures that go beyond Nature but are necessary to maintain that person's quality of life.
2) Physical Performance Enhancement- Every person in America is most likely aware of the usage of steroids in athletics. Steroids increase muscle mass and help an athlete run harder, faster, and longer. Unfortunately, the side effects of such drugs can effect the sexual reproduction and health of the person who takes them, male or female. Physical performance enhancement can also be seen in the attatchment of prostetic limbs, although this specific instance is more therapeutic than it is strictly enhancing. Enhancement should probably be defined in the sense of the change of a perfectly normal or acceptable person with no reason related to medicine or health, sometimes in direct contrast to good health. Many other "futuristic" technologies can be lumped into this category. Physical performance is the broadest, and possibly the most debated of the three categories.
3) Mental Enhancement- It's common in college for students who pursue the highest grades to take a drug called Ritalin, which allows the person to be able to focus easily. Scientists rank drugs that cause hallucogins and changed perception (illegal drugs and alcohol) in this category. Although I can't see their inherent enhancement ability, my school paper ran a hallucogin story where a person (who surprisingly chose to remain unnamed) said that using these kinds of drugs allows him to relax and explore. He also seemed to imply that these drugs helped him reach some higher level of creativeness or thinking without leaving any bad effects. There is a reason why scientists around the country are unanimously against usage of these drugs, and it isn't because the Man is trying to crush the free spirit of the younger generation.
Should we be changing ourselves to this degree? Every time I get a flu shot, I change my immune system, and every time another teenager gets braces, they change their natural structure. The debate isn't about these things, however; the arguments center around hypothesized advancements and current technologies that seem altogether frightening and exhilarating at the same time.
But if you ask most people, they could come up with something they'd like to change about themselves. Taller. Blonde hair. Straight teeth. The ability to shoot lasers out of your palms. Some people go and have plastic surgery and other just simply wish. There are two main ways that human enhancement is possible in today. The first is physical alteration that affects that individual, not their offspring. The second is the genetic engineering of embryos. Of the physical alteration, there are three main areas that enhancement focuses on\\
1) Therapeutic enhancement- Therapeutic enhancement focuses on curing diseases, the prevention of diseases, and the repair of the body from an accident or a disease. This is most likely the least debatable of the three types, simply because every human should have the right to lead a normal , relatively healthy life. Enhancements in this category include vaccinations and specific medical procedures that go beyond Nature but are necessary to maintain that person's quality of life.
2) Physical Performance Enhancement- Every person in America is most likely aware of the usage of steroids in athletics. Steroids increase muscle mass and help an athlete run harder, faster, and longer. Unfortunately, the side effects of such drugs can effect the sexual reproduction and health of the person who takes them, male or female. Physical performance enhancement can also be seen in the attatchment of prostetic limbs, although this specific instance is more therapeutic than it is strictly enhancing. Enhancement should probably be defined in the sense of the change of a perfectly normal or acceptable person with no reason related to medicine or health, sometimes in direct contrast to good health. Many other "futuristic" technologies can be lumped into this category. Physical performance is the broadest, and possibly the most debated of the three categories.
3) Mental Enhancement- It's common in college for students who pursue the highest grades to take a drug called Ritalin, which allows the person to be able to focus easily. Scientists rank drugs that cause hallucogins and changed perception (illegal drugs and alcohol) in this category. Although I can't see their inherent enhancement ability, my school paper ran a hallucogin story where a person (who surprisingly chose to remain unnamed) said that using these kinds of drugs allows him to relax and explore. He also seemed to imply that these drugs helped him reach some higher level of creativeness or thinking without leaving any bad effects. There is a reason why scientists around the country are unanimously against usage of these drugs, and it isn't because the Man is trying to crush the free spirit of the younger generation.
Should we be changing ourselves to this degree? Every time I get a flu shot, I change my immune system, and every time another teenager gets braces, they change their natural structure. The debate isn't about these things, however; the arguments center around hypothesized advancements and current technologies that seem altogether frightening and exhilarating at the same time.
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Food and Genetics
In this day and age, when people want to argue about science, they argue mostly about ethics. Is it ethical to terminate the growth of embryos in order to use their stem cells to help others? Is it ethical to ignore embryonic stem cells and the cures they may open up to us? Is it ethical to test on animals? What age should people be allowed to have genetic testing? How much genetic testing is too much?
But food is a different story. People have to eat. There's simply no way around that issue. In order to increase efficiency in producing crops, scientists change the genes of the plants. Using disabled viruses, scientists inject a small piece of DNA with sticky ends into the plant cell. This DNA travels to the nucleus and inserts itself into the genome of the plant. This gene could be anything from Roundup resistence to drought or virus resistence.
Santa Clara University Bioethics
Unfortunately, the Supreme Court decision has allowed companies to patent this technology AND specific genes, ensuring that no other company can manufactur their product at all. This also gives the company the right to sue farmers who keep the seed instead of buying new seed the next year. The most well-known of this case would be Monsanto's Roundup resistant soybean, as seen in the documentary Food, Inc. Science is encouraging the coporate takeover in agriculture, leaving smaller farmers to bow to the companies' wishes or be put out of work. This is not a new trend; at the turn of the twentieth century, farmers were increasingly going bankrupt because of the bad economy and the new technology needed to produce as much as the corporations and trusts could. But genetic engineering has highlighted the problem again.
Because the world's population is so enormous, humans must find more creative ways to come up with resources, otherwise the entire human population will be subject to Malthus's population laws. "Miracle seeds", used in India, China, and other developing countries, were thought to have been a large part of the answer, but miracles come at an enormous cost. Nothing is free, and these miracle seeds, resistent to viruses and able to produce more, have changed agriculture to such a degree all over the world that scientists dominate the growing of food.
Genetic engineering in food crops is not to blame for the ethical issues raised in its wake, just as the science behind the atomic bomb was not what caused the deaths in Japan in 1945. The people who are using the science, twisting it to their own ends, are the ones that need to be monitored and regulated. In relation to politics and economics, business people sometimes take the science out of context, trying to find ways to exploit the discipline. In the case of Monsanto, the practice of the modification of the genetic makeup of the soybean would help the farmer, but the monopoly Monsanto holds on the market of that specific gene has injured agriculture as a whole.
But food is a different story. People have to eat. There's simply no way around that issue. In order to increase efficiency in producing crops, scientists change the genes of the plants. Using disabled viruses, scientists inject a small piece of DNA with sticky ends into the plant cell. This DNA travels to the nucleus and inserts itself into the genome of the plant. This gene could be anything from Roundup resistence to drought or virus resistence.
Santa Clara University Bioethics
Unfortunately, the Supreme Court decision has allowed companies to patent this technology AND specific genes, ensuring that no other company can manufactur their product at all. This also gives the company the right to sue farmers who keep the seed instead of buying new seed the next year. The most well-known of this case would be Monsanto's Roundup resistant soybean, as seen in the documentary Food, Inc. Science is encouraging the coporate takeover in agriculture, leaving smaller farmers to bow to the companies' wishes or be put out of work. This is not a new trend; at the turn of the twentieth century, farmers were increasingly going bankrupt because of the bad economy and the new technology needed to produce as much as the corporations and trusts could. But genetic engineering has highlighted the problem again.
Because the world's population is so enormous, humans must find more creative ways to come up with resources, otherwise the entire human population will be subject to Malthus's population laws. "Miracle seeds", used in India, China, and other developing countries, were thought to have been a large part of the answer, but miracles come at an enormous cost. Nothing is free, and these miracle seeds, resistent to viruses and able to produce more, have changed agriculture to such a degree all over the world that scientists dominate the growing of food.
Genetic engineering in food crops is not to blame for the ethical issues raised in its wake, just as the science behind the atomic bomb was not what caused the deaths in Japan in 1945. The people who are using the science, twisting it to their own ends, are the ones that need to be monitored and regulated. In relation to politics and economics, business people sometimes take the science out of context, trying to find ways to exploit the discipline. In the case of Monsanto, the practice of the modification of the genetic makeup of the soybean would help the farmer, but the monopoly Monsanto holds on the market of that specific gene has injured agriculture as a whole.
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