Crazy

It's been a while since I've updated this with anything besides school work. I am glad I was able to take advantage of my blog to help me with school and all, but that wasn't its original intent. I know I don't have many followers on my blog and I know this will probably go unread, at least for a while, but that really doesn't matter. I don't plan on spilling my soul to thousands on the internet. No, I have a different place for those inner conversations and revelations. This is more to remind those that are willing to listen that I am still here and have not become a hermit yet.

A lot has happened this year. Half a year, I guess. My last post was back in June. It's been a year of growth. I really feel like I'm growing up. Right now, school really blows. I've never been one to really hate school. I always have been that nerdy guy that enjoys going to school and learning. You can never have enough knowledge. And the more you know, the more you can do in the world. That's the mindset I went into school with this year. I turned down setting myself up for early graduation to take advantage of things like AP classes, Front Range classes, and scholarship opportunities. I was looking forward to really getting ready to head off to college this year. Boy was I wrong. With all the administrative bull**** this year, the school has really become a prison. I don't think the administration realizes that the institution of education isn't actually supposed to represent an institution. That's the joke part, guys, seriously. I knew that going in that this year was going to be different. We had a different school structure by switching to the acadamies, a new dress code, and a new super-intendent. I did not, however, expect to see everyone getting so royally shafted at every available opportunity. The walk-throughs are particularly ridiculous this year. Before, walk-throughs by the high-up admin like the super-intendent were conducted maybe once or twice a quarter at most. The supervisor would sit in the back of the class for the whole period, watching how the students and teachers interacted and how well they felt the teachers were doing their jobs. This year, somebody must have been smokin something because now they come through twice a week. Doesn't sound that bad, does it? Wrong. Instead of sitting through the entire class and really paying attention to get a real, in-depth experience of that teacher's style and interaction with his/her students, the supervisors (now in groups of twos and threes, the little hyenas) sit in the class for maybe a couple of minutes at most. Even if you can evaluate somebody that fast, I have a hard time believing you're paying attention when the only muscle that seems to be working is your mouth. And it gets better. After sitting and speed-dating with each other, the two waltz about the room. They don't walk, they may prance, slink, sulk, sometimes even buzz but they never walk, especially not silently. They scour the walls and boards for anything that should be there that isn't or vice versa. This usually involves the "objectives" and what not, but we'll get to that in a minute. My favorite part is when they disrupt students to "have them explain what they're learning". Yeah, because we all know you're too damn busy to shut the hell up for five minutes to find out for yourself. That and telling students what is and isn't appropriate to have out in what class. After they've thoroughly pissed the students off, they feel comfortable moving onto pissing the teacher off. This is done marvelously by bringing the class to a screeching halt so that our duo of duh can take the teacher out into the hallway to tell them what they think is wrong. Unprofessional, disrespectful, and downright stupidly contradictory to your job of getting these kids ready for their futures.
Objectives. These are the most retarded thing I've ever heard of. Not because of what they are or for what they are for. Obviously, they are meant to give the "students" (I personally think it's actually for the donkeys upstairs) an idea of what they are learning and what they are supposed to get out of the class unit. What makes these so retarded is the fact that they are to be written in "kid-friendly language." Um.........you do realize your in a high school right? I'm supposed to be learning words like pugnacious, epistemology, irreparable; not mean, think, and broken. I would rather like to get to college and speak like a normal 18-year old, not like an....oh, well an admin :). They've had quite the streak of stupidity this year too. One of our teachers was told she needed to "tone down the enthusiasm, she was being overly enthusiastic about her work". I forgot signed up to be taught by Ben Stein for all my classes (clear eyes, anyone?). This same teacher has had the immense privilege of repeatedly telling the admin that they are correcting her on how to teach the wrong class. As in "I'm teaching Civics this hour and you're correcting me on how to teach World History." Brilliant, just brilliant. When I heard about all this, I really wanted to call the zoo and let them know where those escaped monkeys got to.....
Other than stupid administration policies and decisions this year, there are other things that annoy me at school. At lunch, for instance, we are all crammed into the cafeteria. We have a gigantic courtyard not ten feet from the cafeteria door, but no, we're all confined to shoulder to shoulder sitting space. Now, I'm not against buddy-buddy relations and being close to other breathing bodies, but I don't appreciate having to act like a sardine for 30 minutes of my day. And you know how everyone looks forward to taking those free periods their senior year? Well, over at ACHS, unless you're apparently a dunce, you don't get that option. If you aren't in the bottom 40 of your class, you can't take free periods. How dumb is that? I couldn't believe that. It's not everyday that you're told that Captain Slacker and the Lay-Z-Boys get more privileges than the students who show up to learn.

On a more personal note, this year has been pretty rough. The economy just flat out sucks right now, so both my parents are in constant fear of losing their jobs. That puts a lot of stress on spending money. My mom is never really feeling all that great. Dad's in bad shape, won't admit it, and doesn't want to do anything to change it. My little brother is no shape for me to move out. I feel like he refuses to accept his growing responsibilities in the hope that it will make it all just go away. Sorry, buddy, but that's not how the world works. Trust me, I know. And now with my best friend living with me, I am constantly trying to make sure that he's doing what he needs to be doing to keep this family working. I constantly feel like I'm trying to grow up for the three of us. I'm pretty sure that this house will implode when I leave.
Since my last post I have been struggling with this relationship with a friend of mine. Things got so complicated between us. I really don't feel like re-hashing all of that stuff when I'm finally starting to feel like I can move forward again. I hope everything turns out alright between us. I would really hate to lose her as a friend. She's an amazing girl, she's just made some bad decisions like everyone else. I send all my goodwill to her. I hope you and I cross paths again when our lives are a lot more stable :)

Depressed Ecuadorians

A nice video showing an overview of Ecuador and its time during the Great Depression.

AP Statistics Project

This is a video presentation for AP Statistics on Time Plots. Since the video did not have the credits at the end like I originally intended, I will put them here:

Cast:

Brosse-Brosse Graph Presenters Chris Robinson and Steven Weber

Sports Coach Devin Bagby

Sports Runner Chris Robinson

Sports Graph Presenter Devin Bagby

Business Graph Presenter Devin Bagby

Scientists Chris Robinson and Devin Bagby

Camera Man Steven Weber

End Credits Chris Robinson, Devin Bagby, and Steven Weber

Special Thanks:

Camtasia Studio

Youtube

The AP Stats Class for Actually Watching This

Letting go, but not forgetting

As is the usual end to my nights as of late, I have found myself sitting at my computer and listening to music. Now that in and of itself is not strange, but I have also found myself deep in my personal thoughts. I know, I generally avoid trying to do that, but I guess I'm getting lazy in my summer days haha. Anyhow, I found that more often than not, I have come to a conclusion about some situation or another. It reminds me of cleaning out an attic. You can only look at a box or two at most a day, otherwise the task becomes so overwhelming and daunting you decline to even attempt it at all. Of course a nice element of chance is involved because I have no idea what will begin me down the road of thought and so the subject is always a pleasant surprise. Now, enough babbling and on to what I was going to blog about.

Letting go, but not forgetting. Powerful stuff lol. This is an area in my life that has gotten a lot of attention lately. And not just because of my own happenings. From the silent musings of a teenage boy to the mournings of loss of a grown man. I think that the phrase "letting go" has gotten a bad wrap. Letting go does not mean just forgetting it. It doesn't mean brushing off like so much dust and pretending it never happened. It doesn't mean blocking it from your mind and destroying all evidence of it. It DOES mean accepting it for what it is. Truly accepting it, not this "yeah, I guess I can't change it" crap. No, I mean, truly saying "it is what it is and I'm going to make peace with that and move forward with my life".
Recently, a friend of my friend passed away in an unfortunate accident. For very good reason, my friend was very depressed about it. I would be too. After a while of mourning, he realized that he needed to let go of his friend. He couldn't forget him, not if he tried. Besides that, he wanted to remember his friend for who he was and respect that. Yet he also couldn't let his friend's death keep him from living his own life. He realized that he could simply set aside a place for his friend in his mind and in his heart and say goodbye. He let go, but didn't forget.
I had my own little revelation of that. It wasn't as large and it didn't require anybody to die. A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a letter to someone close to me. A letter like the one I wrote is a rare thing for me to do. It is my way of putting all of the things I can never find the courage to say and really just put them into that person's hand. It's a big thing for me to write those kinds of letters. It's my personal piece of me, suddenly out there in the great big world. But I wrote this letter to this person and explained many of the things I could never tell her. I never gave her this letter. I had it sitting on my desk until tonight. I have read and re-read it many times. I never gave her this letter because it explained things that had the power to change our friendship. I didn't fully like the way things were between us and wished things could be different. Today, however, I realized that I am comfortable with the way things are. I actually came to this revelation as I was riding my bike, the calmness flowing through me. I enjoy our friendship. It's truly a friendship, one of the greatest relationships I have in my life. I love spending time with her and just love her dearly. My life definitely wouldn't be the same without her. Whatever was between us or whatever could have been between us isn't. And I'm finally okay with it all. Things are great between us. We're happy with who we are and who each other is and we have a great friendship. I am happy that we're happy. And I know I don't need anything more. From this point on, I'm letting go of all that's changed between us, not forgetting, but moving forward. I'm not scared of how things could change. I'm not afraid of what my words might do. So, I'm throwing this letter away. Not out of fear, but out of comfort. I don't need its comfort anymore. I don't need the security those words brought me. I am free.

"I have come to the realization that life is more than what I have accomplished
And life is more than the realization that we have accomplished nothing at all.
True success is so selfless, so drown in the lyrics of your life and give up the air that you breathe...You don't need anything..."
---Who Needs Air by The Classic Crime

Book Day!!!

Once again a favorite part of this term has come: Book Day! Due to our partnership with the Boulder Book Store, the Book Club is graced with the delivery of a box of books every so often. I love these days. I mean, what's more exciting than a box of free books? The last time we received a box of books, I picked up nine books. Consider that each book costs approximately $15. That's $15*9=$135. That's quite the savings. :D So today I practically skipped my way to Mayville's so that I could peruse the newest box. With my perfect timing, I arrived right on cue as Chris and Mayville arrived at the door with the books, meaning I didn't have to carry any haha. It seems that we had a large collection of romance-style books this time around. I really didn't feel like any romance books, so I only picked up one book of that style. Three of the books that I picked up were about the supernatural, two about vampires. In fact, one of my pick-ups today was the third installment in the Chronicles of Vladimir Tod series that I have been rather impatient to read. Great series, light-hearted with just enough seriousness to give the story real meaning. I can't wait to read this new addition. I picked up another, unrelated novel, and the last book I picked up was a short ethics book. I am interested to see if any of the "wisdom" held within its pages actually proves to be wisdom at all. We shall soon find out. Other than those, I still have about three or four books that I still need to read and review. All of my book reviews can be read on http://achsbookclub.blogspot.com/

The Layers of Life

Life as we perceive is not easy to decipher. I realize this more and more every day. I am finding that the Great Conundrum we call Life contains many layers. And, like the tumultuous seas, these layers rise and fall, overlapping one another at different times in our lives. At times these overlays are quiet and subtle, sliding like the tides on the beaches at dawn. At others, the layers crash and break, cascading over one another in violent roars. Our boat is tossed and turned, floundering in the sea of Life. This is the face of Life, I believe. The great blue vastness, reflecting the world we perceive. Yet, underneath the vast expanse, this reflective mirror, is teeming with conflict, resolution, ideas, virtues, past, present, possibilities of the future, and so much more that words cannot begin to describe.
So how do we deal with this coean? Do we take it as a foamy tyrant or a calming friend? What are the layers and how do we classify them? Most importantly, how do we control the layers of our lives to ensure the fullness of our experiences?
Much of this cannot be answered simply. In fact, many of these questions do not require an answer. They simply need an understanding, a conceptual visualization of why we perceive things as they are. This understanding is what guides us in our actions, our thoughts, our very characters. Whilst we all know that "ignorance is bliss", I truly believe knowledge and understanding are the keys to all that we do.

Facts are usless, prove it.....HUH? ~.`

So the blog topic is as thus: If facts themselves never prove or disprove anything, what else is involved in the proof of a statement? OKAY. So let's rewind a bit here. Facts. What are they, how do we see them, how are they used?

What is a fact? One edition of Webster's Dictionary defines fact as "thing known to be true; deed; reality." Dictionary.com defines fact as: 1.something that actually exists; reality; truth: Your fears have no basis in fact.
2.something known to exist or to have happened: Space travel is now a fact.
3.a truth known by actual experience or observation; something known to be true: Scientists gather facts about plant growth.
4.something said to be true or supposed to have happened: The facts given by the witness are highly questionable.

Now I particularly want to look at number 3. "A truth known by actual experience or observation." As we've discussed in class, experience is based entirely on perspective of the individual. Therefore, facts themselves must be subjective to the experience of the observer. For example, a man looking from one side of a two-way mirror is going to see nothing but his reflection. This leads the man to take as fact that it is a mirror. The person on the other side, however, is subject to a different facet of reality. She sees the man on the other side, leading her to assume that the "mirror" is in fact transparent and is more of a window. The perspectives of the two individuals in this case dictates what they view as fact. Fact is not just based on perception. Facts change as time changes. Take for instance a recent occurrence in my own life. On December 18, my sister-in-law was pregnant. As of ten o'clock that night, however, her pregnancy was no longer a fact. She had delivered the baby, and the facts changed. She went from being pregnant to having been pregnant. Facts are not the concrete, immovable things they are so commonly believed to be. Facts are as subject to the perceptions and whims of the observer as anything else.

So we return to the question of what else is involved in the proof of a statement? Well this begs the question: proof of what? Are you attempting to convince someone that what you believe to be true should be true in their eyes as well? Our class has already discussed the ramifications of "truth" and its associated deceptiveness and slyness. In the most basic of descriptions, truth itself is subject to the experience and perception of its observer. So this almost equates to a run-around statement. How can we prove something that is subject to perception using our very sense of perception itself? The answer is simple: there is no spoon. The answer does not lie within the actual proving of the statement. Success is achieved when both participants of the proof are aware of the statement and its implied associations. Each participant is then left with the choice of making his or her own belief of the statement and what it means to them. Their perceptions dictate its meaning and it is therefore unlikely that they will come to a complete agreement on the matter.

Perception is the very tool of the human mind. Truth, fact, belief, all are dependent on the perception of the viewer. So what is perception?
Definition according to one edition of Webster's Dictionary: SEE PERCEIVE. Of course, it does. Okay, over to perceive then. Definition: obtain knowledge of through senses; observe; understand.
According to Dictionary.com: the act or faculty of apprehending by means of the senses or of the mind; cognition; understanding.

The common thread? The senses. Observation. All of these factors are linked to the observer and their experiences on the matter. While my mother may see her curtains as fuscha (as what?), I only see them as being pink, given my color blind status (and complete lack of understanding as to what in the world fuscha even is).

In essence, all that can be accomplished by trying to "prove" something to someone else is the confusion associated with wondering why your compatriot, who you thought to be so sane and knowledgeable just moments before, is completely and utterly off their rocker. :D

This blog is cross-posted on http://doorstoknowledgeibblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/facts-are-usless-prove-ithuh.html

The Search for Moral Laws and Norms

This week's blog topic is as follows: “Our technologies establish the truth of many of our scientific laws.” Is there any comparable means of establishing moral rules and norms?


So of course the first task at hand is to make sure we understand the topic itself. The way I see it, the first quote states that the technologies we use on a daily basis (such as computers, cranes, even elevators) demonstrate the truth in many of the proposed scientific laws (such as gravity and Newton's laws of motion). These technologies show us each time they are in operation that we do know enough about the natural laws of the physical universe to construct tools in it that follow our rules and do what they are intended.



So the next part is the question itself. Just as technology demonstrates our understanding and operation of our scientific laws, do we have a comparable means for the finding/demonstrating moral rules and norms? Just as we can prove by dropping an apple that gravity exists (albeit the part about how it exists, i.e. as either a force of attraction, a result of curved space-time, or some other function is irrelevant in this case), can we provide a solid 'fact' that morals exist by a predetermined set of rules and guidelines? What are morals anyhow? After much discussion in class, we have come to the conclusion that morals are a person's personal sense of how to determine right and wrong. If that is so, then how can there be moral norms? Norms are things that we do during an 'ordinary' day that tends to be more routine than anything else. For example, my dad always wears pants. If he decided to wear shorts one day, no matter what the weather, it would be outside his norm. But as you can see by this example, norms are very specific and particular to the individual. What may be a norm for me, may be completely abnormal for someone else. It's all circumstantial.



Moral rules are another area that is difficult to say has an established set of boundaries. What can be considered a 'rule'? These are, once again, a personal phenomenon generated by personal values and beliefs. In essence, morals are our personal values and beliefs. So we can't really have an established set of moral rules and norms. That would be similar to comparing the rules of a corporate business whose intent and purpose is to construct buildings to the rules of a business whose intent and purpose is to restore nature reserves. The rules and norms are going to be vastly different. Even in the same field of profession, these rules vary. JC Penny's and Macy's are both department stores, but they have different selection process for merchandise and probably for different rules for their employees as well. The core of the business is the same, but that doesn't make them the same. The same concept can be applied to the establishment of moral laws and norms. Everyone has some set of moral laws and norms. The cores of these laws and norms are same in the essence that they are all their to govern our actions and beliefs. That does not, however, mean they are the same from individual to individual.

This blog is cross-posted from http://doorstoknowledgeibblog.blogspot.com/2009/02/search-for-moral-laws-and-norms.html