Just as a fair warning, this blog and my paper contain detailed sexual content that might offend the faint of heart. If you think you may be offended or uncomfortable reading this blog, you are welcome to stop reading at this point. Otherwise, your comments and suggestions are more than welcome, as this paper represents 40% of my grade for the class.
My audience is going to be married BYU students who want to save money on expensive birth control pills, condoms, IUDs and other pre- and post-sexual contraceptives. One highly popular method (up to 56% of American women reported using this method in the last year) is coitus interruptus. This is when the man pulls out before ejaculating, thus saving his wife from unwanted pregnancy. This is one of the methods that is very common at BYU by Mormon students who either believe it is wrong to use artificial birth control, or who just don't want to spend the money to not have children.
What are the consequences of coitus interruptus on your family health?
Coitus interruptus can destroy a marriage because it doesn't always successfully prevent pregnancy AND it can lead to an inferior quality of sexual relations, which leads to marital and sexual frustration.
Coitus interruptus is only successful most of the time, but there are some ways that the sperm still find their way to the egg. The penis releases a fluid prior to ejaculation that can carry some sperm far enough into the woman's reproductive system to impregnate her. There is also a risk that he will not be able to control his ejaculation or withdraw in time to avoid pregnancy. Also, the man's semen is pleasurable to the woman, and if he withdraws before she has reached her orgasm, there is no way for the man to satisfy her sex drive after pulling out. When one or both partners fail to reach orgasmic climax, marital sex is considered less satisfying, and sexual frustration becomes common. Both unwanted pregnancy and failure to please one's partner are unhealthy for a family, particularly to the relationship between husband and wife. Spending a small amount of money on over-the-counter or prescription contraceptives will make your happier and will be more effective at delaying pregnancy.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Friday, April 4, 2008
FW: A tree in a forest
There's the classic question of "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it still make a noise?" But I think that a better question is "Does it even exist if no one can see it?"
A person is both the subject and object. "I" observe "me". As long as I am aware of my existence, I am an object. I am looking at myself. When I think, I'm talking to myself. And the things that I do depend on how I see myself. When I make decisions I have to think of myself as someone else might think of me. When I go to a job interview, I have to think about what my boss might expect me to look like or act like, or how my boss might be expecting me to talk. I have to think of all those things, and when I do that, I am observing myself. I become some imagined "other" that is watching me get ready and making judgments about me. I develop a dual personality that no other living thing has. I am two people, one subject, and one object. So if I somehow stop observing myself, I lose the ability to make decisions based on society. But I can't do that because humans are inherently social animals. Therefore, my existence depends on my ability to step outside of myself and control my actions from an external point of view. Consciousness can't exist unless there is an observable object. Reciprocally, no object can exist without some agent that can observe it. A human is the only living thing capable of filling both roles at once. That is why we are the superior life form on the earth. Nothing else exists independent of exterior forces. So if there is nothing in a forest that is capable of observing a tree, then the tree cannot exist. The idea of a tree can exist in the head of some animal, but the tree itself is no longer real, because nothing gives it reality through consciousness.
A person is both the subject and object. "I" observe "me". As long as I am aware of my existence, I am an object. I am looking at myself. When I think, I'm talking to myself. And the things that I do depend on how I see myself. When I make decisions I have to think of myself as someone else might think of me. When I go to a job interview, I have to think about what my boss might expect me to look like or act like, or how my boss might be expecting me to talk. I have to think of all those things, and when I do that, I am observing myself. I become some imagined "other" that is watching me get ready and making judgments about me. I develop a dual personality that no other living thing has. I am two people, one subject, and one object. So if I somehow stop observing myself, I lose the ability to make decisions based on society. But I can't do that because humans are inherently social animals. Therefore, my existence depends on my ability to step outside of myself and control my actions from an external point of view. Consciousness can't exist unless there is an observable object. Reciprocally, no object can exist without some agent that can observe it. A human is the only living thing capable of filling both roles at once. That is why we are the superior life form on the earth. Nothing else exists independent of exterior forces. So if there is nothing in a forest that is capable of observing a tree, then the tree cannot exist. The idea of a tree can exist in the head of some animal, but the tree itself is no longer real, because nothing gives it reality through consciousness.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
TA: Ideas for Paper C
I have to admit that I have no interest at all in health care. I don't have any strong opinions about the subject, and I don't really keep up with what is going on in the news when it comes to health. So I'm starting from scratch on these ideas and none of them are likely to be very refined.
1. I'd like to study rabies. I wrote one free write blog post on it, and I think it's fascinating.
2. Childhood obesity has risen to about 19% of white boys under age 18 years. I've read a little bit about the causes and effects of obesity.
3. Folic acid deficiency can cause spina bifida, a horrible-looking disease. Maybe I could talk to pregnant women about taking folate supplements, or I could extend that challenge to all women of child-bearing age to help avoid that problem in children that they may not be expecting.
4. Someone once told me that AIDS is a rich man's disease. He was referring to the fact that malaria is far more serious, but because AIDS is something that exists in the US and UK and other "civilized" countries, we tend to focus more on AIDS than malaria. I read in the National Geographic that experts estimate that almost 50% of the world's total population from prehistoric times until now has died of malaria. That's a huge proportion of humanity. That might be fun to argue, that malaria is a more urgent problem than AIDS.
5. Discovery.com features an article that talks about the study of squid beaks as a way to learn more about creating good artificial limbs for human patients.
6. I heard on NPR one day that there is a group of scientists that has created a prosthetic limb that is connected somehow to the brain of a chimpanzee. Their own arms are tied behind their backs, but with enough concentration, they can control a robotic arm next to them for simple tasks like grabbing and eating small foods. Maybe I could talk about that.
If any of these sound more intriguing than others, please let me know. I'm really in a pickle, and I don't want to have to talk about doctors or insurance or prescriptions, or politics, or government or anything like that.
Also, I don't know if there is any way to use this article in my research. I think it would be fantastic to write 2000 words about bike safety.
Also, is torture a health care issue?
1. I'd like to study rabies. I wrote one free write blog post on it, and I think it's fascinating.
2. Childhood obesity has risen to about 19% of white boys under age 18 years. I've read a little bit about the causes and effects of obesity.
3. Folic acid deficiency can cause spina bifida, a horrible-looking disease. Maybe I could talk to pregnant women about taking folate supplements, or I could extend that challenge to all women of child-bearing age to help avoid that problem in children that they may not be expecting.
4. Someone once told me that AIDS is a rich man's disease. He was referring to the fact that malaria is far more serious, but because AIDS is something that exists in the US and UK and other "civilized" countries, we tend to focus more on AIDS than malaria. I read in the National Geographic that experts estimate that almost 50% of the world's total population from prehistoric times until now has died of malaria. That's a huge proportion of humanity. That might be fun to argue, that malaria is a more urgent problem than AIDS.
5. Discovery.com features an article that talks about the study of squid beaks as a way to learn more about creating good artificial limbs for human patients.
6. I heard on NPR one day that there is a group of scientists that has created a prosthetic limb that is connected somehow to the brain of a chimpanzee. Their own arms are tied behind their backs, but with enough concentration, they can control a robotic arm next to them for simple tasks like grabbing and eating small foods. Maybe I could talk about that.
If any of these sound more intriguing than others, please let me know. I'm really in a pickle, and I don't want to have to talk about doctors or insurance or prescriptions, or politics, or government or anything like that.
Also, I don't know if there is any way to use this article in my research. I think it would be fantastic to write 2000 words about bike safety.
Also, is torture a health care issue?
Friday, March 28, 2008
RA: War (Bob Marley)
“Until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned, everywhere is war and until there are no longer first-class and second-class citizens of any nation, until the color of a man's skin is of no more significance than the color of his eyes. And until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race, there is war. And until that day, the dream of lasting peace, world citizenship, rule of international morality, will remain but a fleeting illusion to be pursued, but never attained... now everywhere is war. And until the ignoble and unhappy regimes that hold our brothers in Angola, in Mozambique, South Africa sub-human bondage Have been toppled, utterly destroyed Well, everywhere is war, me say war War in the east, war in the west War up north, war down south War, war, rumours of war And until that day, the African continent Will not know peace, we Africans will fight We find it necessary and we know we shall win As we are confident in the victory Of good over evil"
The audience of this song is Jamaican Rastafarians who want to be repatriated to Africa. They are the people who are hoping to someday return to Ethiopia, but are just waiting for the violence and oppression in Africa to end.
This song is an argument for tolerance and equality. The first half of the song is quoted from Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia. Marley gets a lot of credibility among the Rastafarians because they believe that Selassie was God incarnate. God carries a lot of credibility, especially when he is saying something that affects all Jamaicans. Racial inequality is what forced them to America in the first place, where they were left on a small island. Rastafarians see themselves as Africans, and so they feel strongly about the struggles of their fellow Africans. Marley appeals to ethos and pathos about evenly throughout this song. He also relies on logic when he quotes Selassie as saying, in effect "Until [x] there will always be war." He says that war naturally follows certain circumstances. It is caused by hatred and holding one person superior to another. These are things that hardly need proving for this audience.
His audience already agrees with him, but that's ok. He was trying to popularize Selassie's words so that eventually everyone would know the message. Marley's goal was not to convince Europeans and Americans to stop colonizing Africa or anything like that. His goal was to raise awareness in his own country and to fuel the Rastafarian movement. I think it worked pretty well.
The audience of this song is Jamaican Rastafarians who want to be repatriated to Africa. They are the people who are hoping to someday return to Ethiopia, but are just waiting for the violence and oppression in Africa to end.
This song is an argument for tolerance and equality. The first half of the song is quoted from Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia. Marley gets a lot of credibility among the Rastafarians because they believe that Selassie was God incarnate. God carries a lot of credibility, especially when he is saying something that affects all Jamaicans. Racial inequality is what forced them to America in the first place, where they were left on a small island. Rastafarians see themselves as Africans, and so they feel strongly about the struggles of their fellow Africans. Marley appeals to ethos and pathos about evenly throughout this song. He also relies on logic when he quotes Selassie as saying, in effect "Until [x] there will always be war." He says that war naturally follows certain circumstances. It is caused by hatred and holding one person superior to another. These are things that hardly need proving for this audience.
His audience already agrees with him, but that's ok. He was trying to popularize Selassie's words so that eventually everyone would know the message. Marley's goal was not to convince Europeans and Americans to stop colonizing Africa or anything like that. His goal was to raise awareness in his own country and to fuel the Rastafarian movement. I think it worked pretty well.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
FW: Frisbee story and a lecture
So my wife and I decided that it is finally spring (for real this time). On Monday, we put on our shorts and headed to the park across the street to toss a frisbee. It seemed like a fine thing to do. Our first few dates involved frisbees, and we haven't been able to play yet this year, so we looked forward to it all day. We were just starting to get back into the swing of things when I tossed it over the fence and into the road where it was immediately smashed by an oncoming convertible. We picked up the pieces and slowly walked to the dumpster. My wife poured in a handful of dirt on top of our frisbee, and we walked back home humming Amazing Grace. There is no moral to this story.
I went to a presentation this morning that featured Dr. Howard S. Becker, a renowned sociologist and jazz pianist. He gave a brief lecture on how to write better, specifically geared to writing in the social sciences. He had a lot of good things to say about how to revise a paper, and he said a lot about how to get started, and how to write clearly. But mostly what I remember is that he used "Invisible Cities" by Italo Calvino as an example of wonderful writing. He said that Calvino is "a winner", and that's good enough for me. The book is about Marco Polo and a fictional conversation he had with Kublai Khan. The great Khan asks Polo about the cities he has seen, and Polo begins to make up tales about strange and exotic cities. One of these cities is inhabited by a people that throw their garbage out on the street, and when it piles up too much, they leave and settle somewhere else. There are 55 stories, each 2-3 pages long, that describe lots of different cities. I think that sounds absolutely fascinating. It reminds me of Boccaccio's "The Decameron". Pretty interesting stuff. I'm a sucker for short stories, especially Italian ones. I might have to drop out of school so that I can read all these books that I never get around to. Sometimes I think the only way to get a really useful, well-rounded education is to drop out of college. But my wife would kill me, and I'd be next to that frisbee.
I went to a presentation this morning that featured Dr. Howard S. Becker, a renowned sociologist and jazz pianist. He gave a brief lecture on how to write better, specifically geared to writing in the social sciences. He had a lot of good things to say about how to revise a paper, and he said a lot about how to get started, and how to write clearly. But mostly what I remember is that he used "Invisible Cities" by Italo Calvino as an example of wonderful writing. He said that Calvino is "a winner", and that's good enough for me. The book is about Marco Polo and a fictional conversation he had with Kublai Khan. The great Khan asks Polo about the cities he has seen, and Polo begins to make up tales about strange and exotic cities. One of these cities is inhabited by a people that throw their garbage out on the street, and when it piles up too much, they leave and settle somewhere else. There are 55 stories, each 2-3 pages long, that describe lots of different cities. I think that sounds absolutely fascinating. It reminds me of Boccaccio's "The Decameron". Pretty interesting stuff. I'm a sucker for short stories, especially Italian ones. I might have to drop out of school so that I can read all these books that I never get around to. Sometimes I think the only way to get a really useful, well-rounded education is to drop out of college. But my wife would kill me, and I'd be next to that frisbee.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
TA: Laundry
What are the effects of doing laundry on general cleanliness?
My wife loves to clean. She is always trying to get all the dishes done because she loves the feeling of having a clean home. This is why she refuses to do laundry. Doing laundry might, at first thought, seem like a great way to sterilize your living conditions. But in reality, it can create such a mess that it is impossible to ever have a clean home again.
Think of what happens when your clothes get dirty. Many people toss them in a bin, and many other people toss them on the floor before crashing into bed. The dirty laundry needs to go somewhere, so most people then put it in the washing machine. While it's washing, you put on new clothes. This makes them dirty. So by the time you get your laundry done, you will still have dirty laundry that needs to be taken care of. This is the cyclical nature of clothing. You are never done with the task.
The major problem, however, doesn't come into play until the end of the drying cycle. Where do you put the clean laundry? Not in the same bin that you had all your dirty laundry in. Then you wouldn't have anywhere for your dirties. So you toss it on your bed, or on a clean part of the floor, or on the couch. Then the nightmare happens. You have to rush out the door because you're late for work (you knew you shouldn't have started in the first place, you knew this would happen. But you didn't have a single clean pair of socks...) and you leave your house with a big pile of clean laundry. How long does this pile last? It depends on how much you washed. It's tough to find time to fold so many clothes, so they sit there, on average, for two weeks. During this time, you pick up your clean clothes off the floor each morning as you get dressed, and before long, you've forgotten which socks are clean and which are dirty. After all, you have piled your unfolded clean clothes in the same place you normally toss your dirty clothes. When you can no longer tell which socks are which, round 2 of the laundry nightmare begins. You have to wash them all. Once again, you have no socks.
And just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, you suddenly remember that you didn't ever dry that batch of jeans, and now they're sitting, moldy, in the bottom of a damp washer. From last week. The funny pink slime comes with a funny pink smell, and now your whole apartment smells like bad cabbage. Good luck cleaning THAT. You now have to RE-wash all the jeans before you can even get started on the dirty socks. Your projected 2 hours of laundry has just turned into 3 or more. Your living space hasn't been clean for a week and a half, and now you have no clean clothes, and you've spent so much time doing laundry that you have neglected other chores. This cycle is vicious and never-ending.
I argue that since America has the resources to do so, we ought to buy a new outfit every time we soil one. This method will ease the stress of millions of laundry-doers nationwide, thus sparing innocent children from the unnecessary wrath of frazzled mothers. This change will be beneficial to society as a whole because everyone who currently does laundry will be saving time that they would be able to use for entertainment or educational, or a plethora of other non-stressful uses.
Sources: My apartment (2007-present).
My wife loves to clean. She is always trying to get all the dishes done because she loves the feeling of having a clean home. This is why she refuses to do laundry. Doing laundry might, at first thought, seem like a great way to sterilize your living conditions. But in reality, it can create such a mess that it is impossible to ever have a clean home again.
Think of what happens when your clothes get dirty. Many people toss them in a bin, and many other people toss them on the floor before crashing into bed. The dirty laundry needs to go somewhere, so most people then put it in the washing machine. While it's washing, you put on new clothes. This makes them dirty. So by the time you get your laundry done, you will still have dirty laundry that needs to be taken care of. This is the cyclical nature of clothing. You are never done with the task.
The major problem, however, doesn't come into play until the end of the drying cycle. Where do you put the clean laundry? Not in the same bin that you had all your dirty laundry in. Then you wouldn't have anywhere for your dirties. So you toss it on your bed, or on a clean part of the floor, or on the couch. Then the nightmare happens. You have to rush out the door because you're late for work (you knew you shouldn't have started in the first place, you knew this would happen. But you didn't have a single clean pair of socks...) and you leave your house with a big pile of clean laundry. How long does this pile last? It depends on how much you washed. It's tough to find time to fold so many clothes, so they sit there, on average, for two weeks. During this time, you pick up your clean clothes off the floor each morning as you get dressed, and before long, you've forgotten which socks are clean and which are dirty. After all, you have piled your unfolded clean clothes in the same place you normally toss your dirty clothes. When you can no longer tell which socks are which, round 2 of the laundry nightmare begins. You have to wash them all. Once again, you have no socks.
And just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, you suddenly remember that you didn't ever dry that batch of jeans, and now they're sitting, moldy, in the bottom of a damp washer. From last week. The funny pink slime comes with a funny pink smell, and now your whole apartment smells like bad cabbage. Good luck cleaning THAT. You now have to RE-wash all the jeans before you can even get started on the dirty socks. Your projected 2 hours of laundry has just turned into 3 or more. Your living space hasn't been clean for a week and a half, and now you have no clean clothes, and you've spent so much time doing laundry that you have neglected other chores. This cycle is vicious and never-ending.
I argue that since America has the resources to do so, we ought to buy a new outfit every time we soil one. This method will ease the stress of millions of laundry-doers nationwide, thus sparing innocent children from the unnecessary wrath of frazzled mothers. This change will be beneficial to society as a whole because everyone who currently does laundry will be saving time that they would be able to use for entertainment or educational, or a plethora of other non-stressful uses.
Sources: My apartment (2007-present).
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
FW: Whatever I feel like writing
One time I read a story, a fictional story, about a kid who replaced the hemoglobin in his blood with chlorophyll. Then he could regrow limbs and didn't need to eat because he got his energy from the sun. And of course his skin turned green. I made a sculpture to represent the book, and I had a big block of clay with a hand coming out one side, a plant coming out another side, and a metamorphic plant-hand in two different stages on the other two sides. I thought it was a fantastic way to represent the idea of the book. And I thought it would be a really interesting thing to think about on the bus ride to and from school. It doesn't make any sense realistically, but I started thinking about other medical possibilities. I wondered about whether or not you could meld two people into one. Suppose you scraped off all the skin off of one side of your body. It would heal itself. Suppose that you and a friend both did that, and then for the entire healing process, you held your open wounds against each other's. Would your bodies grow together? Would you have one big skin organ covering both of you? Would the DNA in the nucleus of your cells have to change to be compatible with both bodies? What would happen if you took the new DNA and cloned it? What would it look like? Hmmm... There's really no ethical way to find out any of those things. But sometimes I do think it would be fun to be a mad scientist with no morals; you could inject someone full of chlorophyll just to see what happens. What a career!
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