Giving Christianity a Bad Rep

A couple of weeks ago in class, we did a little survey on what characteristics we think are the most important. "Religion" was one choice that many people seemed to put high up on their priorities list. Another one was "ethics". I think most people are able to practice both simultaneously, as the Bible encourages its readers to love their neighbor like they would love themselves. Many people take the Bible very seriously and really try to be the person the Bible wants them to be. I think this is great because (other than the gay marriage topic) religious people are usually kind and respectful of others.

One woman, Kimberly Lucas, has taken the Bible much too literally. The Bible may have indirectly caused her to murder her previous partner's two year old daughter. She then planned to kill herself and even wrote a suicide note in a Word document on her computer that investigators discovered later. In the note. Kimberly refers to Genesis 22 where God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, to him. In this story of the Bible, God stops Abraham from killing Isaac because this was just a test of his faith. Kimberly took it upon herself to sacrifice her partner's daughter, thinking that it would please The Lord. She claims in her suicide note that her pastor's "sermon really, really touched me yesterday, but God never told me to stop!". This chilling note was also directed at her previous partner's previous partner (the mother of the child), telling her that this was all her fault.

I think this picture accurately illustrates the disagreement there is within religion. Different interpretations cause people to act differently - maybe even in a violent way, a way that was not intended. Here, we see Obama and Osama making the same statement as they terrorize the country of the other. From the reader's point of view both look guilty. I think sometimes (and in the case of this cartoon) people rely on religion as a scapegoat for their horrible actions so they don't lose their status as a leader.

This picture also illustrates the relationship between politics and religion. I think religion largely affects politics, but there is some disagreement as to where we draw the line. Earlier this year, a religious family watched their son die during a seizure because their religion says The Lord will save the ill and medical assistance is not necessary. So, instead of calling 911 and saving their child's life, they prayed. The parents were then arrested for letting their son die. The relationship between religion and politics is a complicated one, and we still strive to strike a balance between the two.

I know religion is very important to many Americans, but instances like this and the actions of the Westboro Baptist Church give religion -Christianity specifically - a bad rep. Though the basic morals of Christianity are not bad, people interpret them in different ways. I think these extremists shine a bad light on religion and the original intentions of it. If things like this keep happening and religion keeps appearing as this evil force that drives people to do evil things, we will eventually have a completely negative view on religion.

Intelligent Streets Coming Our Way

Imagine living in a world where you never have to worry about the negative impacts of coal and oil on the environment. Where there is no pollution in the oceans. Where there are less car accidents. Well, this world isn't as far away as you think. In fact, it's right around the corner! Julie (fun fact: she breeds standard Poodles as a hobby) and Scott Brusaw, two married engineers who met when they were three and four, came up with the idea to create a "solar roadway" which they hope will replace paved and dirt roadways.

Basically, this "solar roadway" consists of solar panel tiles that serve many functions. Not only do they harvest energy from the Sun, but they also have the ability to filter storm water and snow (decreasing the amount of pollution in lakes and oceans), they light up the road for easier and safer nighttime driving, they heat up during winter time to eliminate ice from the roads, they can warn drivers when there is an object (like a fallen tree) in the road, and if they were made into a blacktop they could light up different configurations according to what game people wanted to play (like a basketball court or a four-square court). The manufacturing of these solar panel tiles would also generate more jobs, stabilizing the economy. It would also cost much less than keeping the current roads in the long run because so much money would be saved from not having to repaint and repave roads all the time.

To put it simply, our streets would look like they're from an eco-friendly version of Tron.

These two inventors are entrepreneurs - meaning they don't work for the government. All of their inventions are tested in their own backyard in Idaho. I think this really shows what an "American" is supposed to be like: working hard on their own to make America the best it can be.If this these solar roadways actually worked the way they were intended and were distributed as much as intended, they would produce 3x more energy than Americans use today, which would basically eliminate our dependence on fossil fuels. This seems all good and dandy, right? Wrong. This would put major companies in the oil, coal, and mining industries out of work. These companies basically rule the country and are very heavily controlled by the government.

This may seem like a brilliant new idea, but will the government let it happen? Will these massive mining companies let it happen? If the government actually lets these solar panels take over the energy industry, how would Julie and Scott's company be affected by it?

Congrats on the Pregnancy! -Your School

In our yearbook here at New Trier, we usually dedicate pages to various sports teams, adviseries, and clubs. Typically, this is how all high schools choose to approach their yearbook. A high school in Arizona has decided to take a different route by dedicating pages to pregnant students.

Two pages, titled "I'm working a double shift", are dedicated to photos of pregnant students or students that have already become mothers.

This is shocking to me. The yearbook is a place where the student body should be recognized for their achievements. Imagine forty years after you've graduated high school you're looking through your high school yearbook with your children, reminiscing about your young days. Suddenly you come across this page and say "Oh yeah, that was Ronnie. She had a kid when she was a junior". What would your kids think? What would you think?

Originally, the pages were supposed to address the hardships and struggles of being a young mother in high school. However, I think that they are (unintentionally) glorifying teen pregnancy by giving these teens 15 minutes - actually more like a lifetime - of fame. Helen Hollands, a Mesa Public Schools spokeswoman, states that "a yearbook is to commemorate the achievements of the students, particularly the senior class. Probably this would not fall into that category". I completely agree with her; teen pregnancy is not something to advertise.

The website that published this article also posed a question: Should high school yearbooks feature photos of expectant students? I thought this would be a no-brainer; no way should a school dedicate pages of its yearbook to pregnant students! I was somewhat surprised when I looked at the results of this poll...

As you can see, the amount of people who think schools should include pictures of pregnant students and the amount of people who don't think they should is about the same. Why do you think this is?

Printing Body Parts

Over the weekend I was surfing the internet and came across an interesting article. Neurosurgeons successfully replace a woman's skull with one produced by a 3D printer. This woman suffered a bone disorder that increased the thickness of her skull from 1.5 inches to 5 inches! This obviously caused many problems for her such as reduced eyesight and painful headaches. Without this surgery, the 22 year old woman would have most likely died "in the near future", says Dr. Bon Verwejj (the doctor who performed this much needed surgery).

This artificial skull, that was put in in place of the woman's actual skull, was made of an unspecified kind of hard plastic. Since her surgery, the "patient has gained her sight back entirely, is symptom-free and back to work". It is extremely impressive that this woman is able to recover as quickly as she did. Within only a couple of months, this woman's life was completely turned around.

As technology becomes more advanced and accessible, more amazing things are happening. If this woman wasn't able to get this surgery, she would've passed away. This artificial skull is able to save countless lives in the future.

Medicine and surgery are becoming far more advanced, extending the lifespan of humans. But, is this going too far? If humans become able to replace almost any part of their body with something produced by a printer, will we eventually become mostly machine made?

American Families Shelter Too Much

It seems like parents spend forever bathing their kids, dragging them out of the mud, and scooping sand out of their mouths at the playground. The mother of a family that I babysit is so paranoid about her kids getting sick from being dirty that she won't let her kids play in their own backyard without taking a bath immediately after. This made somewhat sense to me because I had always heard that infants are most susceptible to disease because their immune systems were so weak, so they should be kept clean and out of the dirt and mud.

I was surprised when I read a recently published article in Science Daily that infants that are exposed to many kinds of household bacteria, pollen, and pet dander are actually less likely to develop asthma and allergies. According to a study "infants who grew up in homes with mouse and cat dander and cockroach droppings in the first year of life had lower rates of wheezing at age 3". Now, all these "cockroach droppings" and "dander" in our homes sounds absolutely repulsive, but they actually improve the average infant's health in ways that you would not expect.

As it turns out, only 8 percent of children that suffer from athsma and allergies were exposed to allergens and bacteria in their childhood homes. This means that children that were exposed to what we think of as things that make kids sick are actually MUCH less likely to develop sicknesses.
I find this extremely interesting because it just shows how much parents shelter their kids in America. Earlier this year, we listened to a podcast about how parents these days are much too protective of their children and don't let them take physical risks. We can see that there is an actual health benefit of letting your kids fool around in the mud.

Women Can't Handle Men's Jobs

Recently, the Huffington Post published a piece about a New Hampshire state Rep., Will Infantine (R), who believes that the gender gap between women and men's paychecks stems from the fact that women are "lazier" than men. While debating the Paycheck Equity Act in the New Hampshire House of Representatives, Infantine gave a speech that may have gotten a little too heated. He claimed men are "more motivated by money" and "don't mind working nights and weekends" or "overtime, or outdoors in the elements", and mens' jobs are "more [sic] riskier".  Women have a long history of working nights and weekends and "overtime", maybe not for a paycheck, and they are definitely motivated by money!

This parallels the research that I've been doing regarding my Junior Theme paper about women's rights and marriage. I've found that the cause of this gap between paychecks stems from the fact that men believe women are less capable of working at the high paying jobs like men can. What makes them unequal? I'd like to know. I wonder what the two women senators in New Hampshire and the woman governor think about his comments?

These types of comments are unlikely to draw positive attention from other politicians that are on his side of the debate.  Infantine's party peers are likely to cringe at his comments, and this will probably even backfire on him in his future debates.

Brains Are More Active During Meditation

For thousands of years, people have been meditating. For just as long, scientists have wondered what actually happens in your brain during meditation. But recently, research of meditation has sharply increased. To me, mediation seems like a waste of time. Many more important things could be getting done and I would rather be doing something productive than sitting with my eyes closed.

I recently read this article and it turns out that your brain is actually extremely active during meditation. Jian Xu, a physician researching meditation, states, "I was surprised that the activity of the brain was greatest when the person’s thoughts wandered freely on their own, rather than when the brain worked to be more strongly focused."

Judging from Xu's research, when you just sit thinking, dazing off, your brain is actually doing more than when you're concentrating on solving a math problem. This reminds me of freshman year when KW classes had "relaxation days" where you could just lay in silence. Sometimes I would sleep, and other times I would just lay there thinking. These days would leave me feeling so relaxed and rested. But little did I know that my brain was most active during these "relaxation days".

How will education, test taking, and school in general change now that we know this? It is possible that this newfound research will stimulate schools to incorporate some sort of relaxation/free period into students' schedules. Though this seems bizzare and unlikely, it will probably have positive effects on stress levels of students and, ultimately, their grades 

Further research on the effects of meditation on academics will almost surely take place within the next couple of years and I look forward to the results of this research