blog # 9 Pink Sime by Demand.

Ah pink slim. Let’s stop thinking about this item from the stand point of a consumer or parent with a child in school. Let’s instead look at pink slime from the aspect of the producers.

                First the producers are looking to make enough money from their product to pay for the supplies, resources, and the labor to create the product. They also need to have enough after all of those costs are covered to pay themselves.

                It is well known that if a leader has to make decisions that affect a large group of people someone will not like the decision made. Look at the history of industry of beef, early companies would get protests from the public that they were throwing away too much meat. The solution was to give the scraps to the dog food industry. This allowed for more of the cow to get used. However, the public still complained that the dog food companies were getting to much of the good meat. the beef industry realized that in order to get all the meat they were going to have to engineer a way to get all the meat separated from the fat. This process is where we get the pink slim.

                Now the health aware public is protesting once again. The companies are going to have to develop another method to remove the editable meat from the non editable fat. This will cost more for the science to develop. There are people who ask why the companies don’t just send the extra back to the dog food companies. The answer is because there is fear that the public will again protest about the loss of the good meat.

                It is said that Big business is greedy, that is not a proper statement. The true statement is people are greedy. They compare what they are paying for beef, and how much beef comes off the cow. The public either wants more meat for the price, or lower price for the meat they get. Big business does everything they can to meet that demand. However, they do not want to spend a lot for it would raise the price the consumer has to pay.

blog #6 Team Work Thorugh Video Games

     “Keep your eyes on that flank, there is a unit headed that direction.” “Don’t worry I got it covered. I am not going to let them get through.” At a quick glance this conversation can be deciphered as a conversation between a military commander and a trooper. However it can also be a conversation between two teenagers on opposite sides of the country. Team work is a skill that is skill that just about everyone needs. It is a skill that we try to teach our children early in their lives. The games of today have a very interesting method to help people hone those skills.

                I was playing dungeon defenders with my children and realized that it provided an interesting team building exercise. My daughter and I were playing on my X-Box down stairs, my son was on his in his room, and my daughter’s boyfriend was on his in Kansas. The X-box has internet connections, and headphones, which allowed us to talk as if we were in the same room. The game pits four players against an almost never ending horde of mythical creatures. At the start of the game there is a limited amount of resources to create blockades. We have to figure out were the best placement of these blockades, and which character’s style of blockade is better in that position. We then plan out the best starting position for our characters, and as the horde make their advance we keep each other informed on our status and our position. If one of starts to get overwhelmed we ask for some back up and one or more of the others can then move to assist.

                There are several games out that use this same type of cooperation, games like Halo, Call of Duty, Plants vs. Zombies, just to name a few. Everyone playing these games is working together to complete a goal the game provides. Usually this goal becomes more complicated as the players progress through the levels. The people who are playing these games are all over the world. This dynamic not only helps people practice teamwork. The internet provides some anonymity so the issues with age, race, religion, and sexual preferences are not even approached. Most gamers just want to have fun playing their game with the help from someone.

                With the games and technology of today, people have a fun way to practice the team work skills. To survive in the world you have to be able to work with anyone.

blog #5 Is This Where We are Headed

As I watch this clip I laugh at it’s over exaggerated view of how we can live attached to our electronics. Humans are one of the best at changing and adapting to changes around us. I can diffidently understand why there are those that can believe that this could very easily be our future.

However, people are unique and unpredictable, which means some people would be content with the life in the video, but just as many would rather get out, move, interact, and artists would feel the need to create.

 What resonates with me the most would have to be the fact that there is no one who stands out everyone is the same, and in our nature some have the need to be different. Take how our children change how they dress to be different than their parents. This sign of rebellion is in us all we would not thrive without it. However, it is the statement that is being made. It states that we had lost the rebelliousness and our scociety has become stagnant.

There are a lot of people in the world who are fearful that this is where society is headed. The people who are fearful do their best to inform the public that this future is not all that fictional. This movie is designed mostly as a warning to us. It is a fictional look at a distant future but it makes the point that if we don’t pay attention to what we are doing to ourselves this could very easily become real.

Blog #4 Sank by a Mirage?!!

On April 15, 1912, the H.M.S. Titanic struck an ice berg and sank. It was one of the biggest disasters of its time. In February of 1992 I sat down in the high school library and began my research on the Titanic, for my senior term paper. Little did I know that I would follow the Titanic's story from that point onward. I have watched just about every documentary that has been produced about the disaster. They have always ended with the questions “Why did the lookouts not see the ice berg until it was too late, and why did the ship in the distance not render aid?” 

                In April of 2012 National Geographic followed Tim Maltin on his journey to test his theories and try to reconstruct the events that lead up to the disaster,Titanic case closed. What he finds is that is that the best answer to the mysteries was due to a mirage.  Most people think that mirages only happen in the desert. However, there are also mirages on the open water. They can create a false horizon line. Sailors call this a soft horizon.  Over a great distance a mirage can give the illusion that a steady light can flicker.

                Tim reviews the survivor testimonials as well as comparing several different captains’ logs from other ships that had been in the area where the Titanic sank. He discovered that there were several commits about refraction.  He concludes that the conditions were perfect for this soft horizon.  The lookouts of the time used the stars of the night skies to make out the outline of an iceberg usually giving them enough time to warn the pilot. However, with a soft horizon the skyline is not where it should be therefore, the lookouts did not see the iceberg until it was too late.

                This soft horizon made it difficult for a signal light operator to decipher weather a light in the distance is flashing Morse code or if it’s just the flickering from the refraction. This was the reason Tim gives for the other ship not coming to the Titanic’s aid when it was signaled.

                There were several areas that “if” could have saved the Titanic. If the lookouts had requested the captain to slow down due to the difficulty of seeing with a soft horizon. If the Telegraph operators had made a stronger attempt to contact each other. The design of the ship meant that, if the Titanic had struck the iceberg head on then she would have remained afloat, and might even been able to limp to a near port.

                They claimed that the Titanic was unsinkable; because they believed that there design was good. However, you have to always keep in mind no matter how strong or how well built our visions are, mother nature will remind us that she is still more powerful.

Imagine what you will know tomorrow.

Tommy Lee Jones’ charter, K, is talking to Will Smith’s charter about what he might know tomorrow. First he says that fifteen hundred years ago the people knew the earth was the center of the universe, and five hundred years ago people knew the earth was flat. He ends with the statement “imagine what you will know tomorrow.” What we know about anything is usually with the help of technology.

                Fifteen hundred years ago it was easy for people to believe that the world was the center of the universe due to natural observation of how the sun, moon, and stars traveled across the sky. However, wit invention of the telescope in the sixteen hundreds, Galileo Galilei began charting the starts movements in the sky and determined that the earth was not the center of the universe.  The commit that we knew the earth was flat may not have been correct due to the fact that the telescope helped most of the astronomers during Galileo’s time began to spread the round earth theory. 

The advances of technology have given us the ability to know more about anything we choose to know about. We can use computers to search the internet for a page were someone posted what they know, Thus knowledge can be passed within minutes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Technology has given business the ability to have customers around the world. The use of aircraft can get a business product any were in the world.

 

 

   Children are using computers to gain knowledge before they ever start school. Children stat playing video games as soon as they start to develop the coordination to recognize shapes.

 

 

 

 

 

Technology has made it possible for people to get recognized for their talents. With the use of video recording someone who can sing several different parts to a song can record each part and then tie them together as one performance. Technology has made it possible for home buyers to find a new home across the country and know if there are any stores near the home. Photographs of neighborhoods taken from space can give a home buyer a feel for the area they wish to move to.

 

 

 

 Technology has given delivery drivers an easier time finding their customers. Most delivery drivers use Guidance position systems to get directions to the location of their delivery.

The ways that technology advances means that the commit that Tommy’s charter makes: “Imagine what you will know tomorrow.” just might include the previous line about being alone on this planet.

 

Crown Tournment post #2

                In my first post I talked a little about my hobby, the SCA. This past weekend Arizona’s kingdom held the semi-annual crown  The tournament is a double elimination tournament: therefore, each fighter gets to fight at least twice. There are two classes of fighters one is the knights, they have proven their mental and have been recognized by their peers. The second class is the fighters who have not yet obtained knighthood. Keep in mind that there is more to being a knight than just being a good fighter.

tournament. Every 6 months a tournament is held in order to decide who will reign as king. The best fighters in the kingdom gather with their best armor and their consorts. Each fighter fights for the honor of making their consort the queen.

                I am not a knight, however I normally fight in this tournament. It gives me a chance to face fighters that I normally would not get a chance to fight. I also use it as a gage of how well I am doing as a fighter. I chose not to fight this time around due to my school schedual. If I had managed to win the day I would not be able to do the position justice, for the demands of school would take all my focus. Hay, I could have a good day.

                The list of fighters for this crown was long. There were forty seven fighters on this season’s list. The pagentery started with each fighter introducing themselves and their consorts to the current crown. The next step was for the fighters who are not yet knights to challenge the knights. The challenges set the first round of the tournament, and the fallowing rounds are set by the minister of the list. The rounds progress with great fights, and acts of valor and chivalry.  A fighter might give his opponent a second fight to avoid any question about the winner, or give his opponent a chance to catch his breath during a long fight. The end of the day brings three fighters to the final round.

                His majesty declares that since all three fighters have had one loss each, that the first to defeat the other two will be the victor and crowned prince until their coronation. The fighters then gather their heralds and retainers, and make ready for the final round. The heralds introduce their respective fighter and their consorts with all of their accomplishments. The heralds do this as would Chaucer, from the movie A Knight’s Tale.

                The first fight is between Duke, Sir Craven, who has reined a king four other times, and he fights for the honor of his lady, Duchess Elzbieta. Craven faces Baron, Sir Morgan, who has made it to the finals of crown several times, and fights for the honor of his lady, Baroness Elizabeth. The fighters start by saluting and honoring the current crown. Next fighters salute and honor their consorts, and as a show of chivalry each fighter salutes and honors his opponent’s consort. Then the fighters salute and honor each other. Finally the King calls the fight to begin. The knights fight honorably, but only one can be victorious. Duke, Sir Craven wins the first fight.

                The second fight Duke, Sir Craven must face Sir Franbald, and he

Craven vs Morgan

Craven vs Franbald

fights for the honor of Baroness Irina. The fighters give their salutes, and then the king starts the fight. Once again the knights fight honorably, and Duke, Sir Craven stands victorious.

                The day was enjoyable and the fighting was spectacular. It does not matter if I am fighting or just watching crown tournament is always an event worth going to.  

Craven and Elzbieta