The American Daunting. (pt. 1)

We are in a time of financial crisis. I am aware this will not come to any of you with shock. The forecast for the unemployment rate in the U.S. is going to stay at a steady average of 10% for the remainder of this year. The current rate has doubled in the last two years to it's present percentage. On the bright side, Even with a -2.60% growth rate, we continue to stand as the largest economy with a GDP of 22.91% of the world's economy according to the World Bank. Other then it's free market system, one major factor that stimulates the growth of our nation and pushes it above all others is our spirit of innovation.

Students with a craving to learn come from all over the world into the U.S. to be educated in our Universities and study in a diverse range of fields. Around fifty percent of graduate students are immigrants that have been our back bone and becoming more needed in our economy. They are the innovators that are developing new technologies for the U.S. which are producing new jobs in the country. As we are nearing an environmental catastrophe with global climate change and the rapid decline of bio-diversity, we are in need of a green revolution. We need these students more then ever to produce more sustainable products to not only protect life on our planet but to keep the American dream attainable. Science and engineering are what drive our innovation and keep us ahead in the global market system and other developing countries like Brazil, Russia India and China know this. The problem is that naturally born students studying in these fields from the U.S. are in decline. Science, being the underpinning result for innovation, has been under a steady attack by lobbyist groups establishing counter scientific studies to protect their corporations from financial disasters or from religious/spiritual groups who are afraid that human morality is at stake. (I am aware that the decline in the sciences are not wholly attributed to these outside influences but they are of my main concern for this article.)

There is a large consensus on anthropogenic global warming among scientists across the globe. Just look at the articles from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the U.S. Global Change Research Program, the Intergovernmental Arctic Council and many more. There are even 32 different National Science Academies from different countries that came together in 2001 in a joint effort to declare and confirm anthropogenic global warming. All these groups, plus many more are urging governments and it's people to take steps into reducing their carbon footprint. Yet despite all the evidences laid out and the global consensus among the science communities, only 51% of the American population is considered alarmed or concerned about climate change.

This year was the 150th anniversary for the publication of On The Origin Of Species by Charles Darwin. He has been considered one of the greatest scientists and thinkers of all time by many in the biological sciences. When one really looks into the science behind evolution, the evidence is enormous. There is more combined evidence for evolution then the majority of well-accepted scientific theories through out the U. S. population. Many try to belittle evolution by saying it is only a theory while not truly grasping what theory actually means in scientific terms. According to Biology-Online, a scientific theory is, "A well tested concept that explains a wide range/of lots of observations." Indeed, the theory of evolution has done just that. For over 150 years since Darwin published his theories, evolution has been tried and tested and has come out stronger every time. Go to any Museum of Natural History and see the numerous amounts of intermediate fossils from many of the species known today. When we discovered the genome and DNA it backed up evolution as well as all biological advances since Darwin'e time. All biological observations from hundreds of thousands of naturalists to scientists around the globe have not discovered one vital mechanism that could not fit into the evolutionary theory. Most biological scientists have been calling it a fact and many other are beginning to heed the call in the scientific community to do the same. However with the plethora of evidence supporting the theory of evolution only 39% of Americans say they accept it as true. If it is merely cause it is considered a theory then maybe some should gander at a short list of other well accepted theories like cell theory, germ theory, atomic theory, circuit theory; even the theory of gravity, and electricity.

Lately, when you turn on the television, to what I have deemed as the science channels (History, Discovery, Animal Planet, Nat Geo and the Science Channel) you will notice a flood of pseudo-scientific shows bombarding the air waves. I see more on Bigfoot, aliens, the Loch Ness Monster, and paranormal investigations then I do about history and science. (though I can grasp why the History channel might show some of these since they have been a major part of human history). If they were only on some of the time it really wouldn't bother me. My problem is that these are supposed to be shows about scientific advancements, new discoveries in science and mainly just simply shows about science. These pseudo-scientific issues have a channel, it if called Sci Fi. Consider you've become interested in science and decide to flip on the science channel to be informed on physics, biology or geology only find paranormal investigators tripping over each other walking through dark corridors, holding instruments that can collectively cause some of the other instruments to not work properly chasing around their own imaginations. Now I am not saying there is not any ghosts, though I really do not believe there are, I am saying their instruments are about as flawed as the science they are attributing it to. Ghosts or not, what they are doing is not science. One can not carry around instruments meant to find ghosts when no one even knows what they are physically made of, why they would even show up on instruments, or just simply explain how one is possible to even fit in the scientific model of the universe.

I have selected these three topics, anthropogenic climate change, evolution and pseudoscience because I will have a blog explaining what little I have touched on above in more detail later on.

Human Benevolence On Display

It has been over a week since a 7.0 earthquake devastated the most impoverished country in the Western Hemisphere. The Republic of Haiti is a Caribbean country that borders alongside the Dominican Republic on the island of Hispaniola. The earthquake occurred at 4:53pm Eastern time on Tuesday, January 12, 2010 and has since been in the hearts and minds of the global population. It has been estimated by the International Red Cross that 3 million people have been affected and on the 15th of January, the Haitian Interior Minister, Paul Antoine Bien-Aime' , anticipates that this disaster would eventually have claimed between 100,000 to 200,000 people. As terrible as the news has been, I am hoping for a moment to focus on the power of the human response to tragedy.

This without a doubt has been a decade of tragedies. Some of them have been intentionally committed by the hands of terrorists who seem to stop at nothing to destroy what they hate. To America, September 11th, 2001 is still fresh in our memories. Though America was hit hard, most of these attacks have been more focused within European Nations. London had a shock of their own on July 7, 2005 when a group of religious zealots placed three homemade bombs crafted of organic peroxide-based devices on three separate underground trains claiming many lives. Then there have been disasters from natural causes that we will never forget in our lifetime. Some would say they have been directly caused by anthropogenic global warming but it isn't easy to label them as such. There was the Asian Tsunamis, New Orleans' Hurricane Katrina, and the tropical cyclone Nargis that struck Burma and many more that have all happened within this decade. One thing that unites these horrific events mentioned is the amount of help the victims received from outside their borders.

Human Benevolence has been on display and it has not gone unnoticed. We have all seen the selfless acts from the men and women who serve in the National Guard, the International Red Cross, and a plethora of governmental and private organizations who have risked their own lives to salvage it for others. Haitians are seeing this effort in action as I type this out. Countless people from many different countries have come to together to raise money, pull survivors from the wreckage and to operate on the injured. Governments that never speak to each other are now working together to help relieve a people who are suffering. And let us not forget the businesses and corporations who have donated their products and services. Corporate entities like Walmart, Bank of America, Kellog, Western Union, Go Daddy, Coca Cola and Amazon have all pledged to donate hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars to support the relief effort of the Red Cross. Religious groups from Christian, Muslim, Judaism to humanists are all collectively doing their part as well.

There is a lesson to be learned here. We all have the ability to step aside from what would normally divide us, whether it be politics or religion, to perform the greatest of acts of compassion towards the men and women in such desperate need. Globalization, love it or hate it, if not directly responsible we can at least see it is at least indirectly responsible for this mass coexistence. A century ago, our international relations would not be where it is today. Contrary to popular belief, times really are getting better. More peaceful is our world today in regard to human relations. Sure we have numerous problems ahead of us, but times like this give me hope that we can get the job done. Through tragedy, the human race can come together, and my heart sings it's praises tonight.

Losing My Blog Virginity.

Like a virgin, I am blogging for the very first time. Though I am unsure if the comparison is accurate since I am blogging alone and no one will probably ever read my nonsense. The fact that I am new to the blogosphere remains. I became interested in keeping a blog of my own after receiving an invite from a friend who writes in her Ethical Omnivores blog.

I realized after looking through her posts that there is a great potential to influence others by blogging on subjects I research on my own time. (Some things I do not research happen to be grammar and punctuation so please excuse my blatant ignorance.) The potential I am referring to is the ability to show others that life does not have to be so polarizing. There is more to this world then mere black and white viewpoints. So my vision here is to color your world with the simple words I have learned to use. I will blend the hues of my spectroscopic mind and coalesce them into consonants and vowels to produce organised information that can change the very world that may have been long held on to.

As the title of this blog, My Own Inquiry states, this will also be a learning experience for myself. This is a chance for me to adapt in the information environment that surrounds me. My evolution begins as I write today and the changes will not be revealed till I look upon it later in life.

In my blog, I will make it a point to keep nothing sacred. Let the synaptic dissection begin.