WEEK SEVEN BLOG ENTRY

THE SIX WORD POEM...This week's blog entry is easy. You have to create a 6 word poem with any theme related to the environment. The rules of the six word poem? It has 6 words. In this case, you also should focus on some theme of nature. Here is an example:

Birds, water, the ocean calls me.

Here is another: The fire destroys, green grass brown.

See the pattern? 6 words...environmental theme.
Create a 6 word poem and then comment on others that you see on here. Easy, right?

WEEK SEVEN READING

1. The Arctic sea ice melts

The melting of the Arctic's summer ice is considered to be the single greatest threat, and some scientists think we've already passed the tipping point. As sea ice melts and the Arctic warms , dark ocean water is exposed that absorbs more sunlight, thus reinforcing the warming. The transition to an ice-free Arctic summer can occur rapidly — within decades — and this has geopolitical implications as nations compete for the newly opened space and petroleum resources. Added to all that will be the damage that would result from the disruption of an entire ecosystem.

2. Greenland becomes ice free

The warming of the Arctic may also render Greenland largely ice free. While Greenland's ice loss will likely reach the point of no return within this century, the full transition will take at least a few hundred years. The impacts of the Greenland ice melt is expected to raise sea levels by up to 20 feet. Half of the 10 largest cities in the world, including New York City, and one-third of the world's 30 largest cities are already threatened by this sea-level rise. Today, those cities are home to nearly 1.8 billion people. Other vulnerable American cities include Miami, Norfolk and Boston.

 

3. The West Antarctic ice sheet disintegrates.

On the other side of Earth, the West Antarctic ice sheet is also disintegrating . Because the bottom of this glacier is grounded below sea level, it's vulnerable to rapid breakup, thinning and retreat as warm ocean water eats away at the ice. Scientists expect the West Antarctic ice sheet to "tip" this century, and there is evidence that it already began happening in 2014. However, the entire collapse of the glacier, which would raise sea level by 16 feet, could take a few hundred years.

4. El Niño becomes a more permanent climate fixture.

The oceans absorb about 90 percent of the extra heat that is being trapped in the Earth system by greenhouse gases. This could affect the ocean dynamics that control El Niño events. While there are several theories about what could happen in the future, the most likely consequence of ocean heat uptake is that El Niño, a natural climate phenomenon , could become a more permanent part of our climate system. That would cause extensive drought conditions in Southeast Asia and elsewhere, while some drought-prone areas such as California would get relief. While the transition to a world with more El Niños is expected to be gradual and take around one hundred years, the event could be triggered during this century.

5. The Amazon rainforest dies back

Deforestation, a longer dry season and rising summer temperatures are threatening the amount of rainfall in the Amazon. At least half of the Amazon rainforest could turn into savannah and grassland. Once that event is triggered, the changes could happen over just a few decades. This would make it very difficult for the rainforest to reestablish itself and would lead to a considerable loss in biodiversity. However, the reduction of the Amazon ultimately depends on what happens with El Niño, along with future land-use changes from human activities.

6. Boreal forests are cut in half

Increased water and heat stress are taking a toll on the large forests in Canada, Russia and other parts of the uppermost Northern Hemisphere. So are their vulnerability to disease and fires. This could lead to a 50 percent reduction of the boreal forests — an event from which they may never be able to recover. Instead, the forest would gradually transition into open woodlands or grasslands over several decades. This would have a huge impact on the world's carbon balance because forests can absorb much more carbon than grasslands can. As the forest diminishes, the climate will be affected — as will the Earth's energy balance. However, the complex interaction between tree physiology, permafrost and fires makes the situation tricky to understand.

 

 

Other concerns ...

As if that's not enough, there are a few other tipping events that scientists are also concerned about, but they are even more complex and harder to predict. Examples of such events include the greening of the Sahara and Sahel deserts, the development of an Arctic ozone hole and a chaotic Indian summer monsoon.

How do we keep from tipping over?

We know from measurements that the Earth has had many climate-related tipping events throughout its history. Today's situation is different, because humans are now driving these changes and the warming is occurring at a faster rate.

But as humans we also have the power to change the trajectory we're on — and possibly turn the situation around in only a few years.

http://www.livescience.com/51018-these-six-triggers-will-transform-earth-climate.html

 

WEEK SEVEN WRITING ABOUT WHAT YOU READ

I understand that there is now a political divide over issues of global warming--but forget all that. What does this article make you think?

WEEK SIX BLOG ENTRY

This could be the most difficult blog entry yet--you are totally free to write on any topic. Be original. Describe your breakfast. Explain how to fix a carburetor. Tell the class how deeply you love writing. Anything--it is up to you!

WEEK SIX READING

I am not sure what to make of this short reading...but enjoy it nonetheless!
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Is Free Thinking A Mental Illness?

Is nonconformity and freethinking a mental illness?  According to the newest edition of the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), it certainly is.  The manual identifies a new mental illness called “oppositional defiant disorder” or ODD.  Defined as an “ongoing pattern of disobedient, hostile and defiant behavior,” symptoms include questioning authority, negativity, defiance, argumentativeness, and being easily annoyed.

The DSM-IV is the manual used by psychiatrists to diagnose mental illnesses and, with each new edition, there are scores of new mental illnesses.  Are we becoming sicker?  Is it getting harder to be mentally healthy?  Authors of the DSM-IV say that it’s because they’re better able to identify these illnesses today.  Critics charge that it’s because they have too much time on their hands.

New mental illnesses identified by the DSM-IV include arrogance, narcissism, above-average creativity, cynicism, and antisocial behavior.  In the past, these were called “personality traits,” but now they’re diseases.

 

And there are treatments available.

All of this is a symptom of our over-diagnosing and overmedicating culture.  In the last 50 years, the DSM-IV has gone from 130 to 357 mental illnesses.  A majority of these illnesses afflict children.  Although the manual is an important diagnostic tool for the psychiatric industry, it has also been responsible for social changes.  The rise in ADD, bipolar disorder, and depression in children has been largely because of the manual’s identifying certain behaviors as symptoms.  A Washington Post article observed that, if Mozart were born today, he would be diagnosed with ADD and “medicated into barren normality.”

According to the DSM-IV, the diagnosis guidelines for identifying oppositional defiant disorder are for children, but adults can just as easily suffer from the disease.  This should give any freethinking American reason for worry.

The Soviet Union used new “mental illnesses” for political repression.  People who didn’t accept the beliefs of the Communist Party developed a new type of schizophrenia.  They suffered from the delusion of believing communism was wrong.  They were isolated, forcefully medicated, and put through repressive “therapy” to bring them back to sanity.

 

When the last edition of the DSM-IV was published, identifying the symptoms of various mental illnesses in children, there was a jump in the diagnosis and medication of children.  Some states have laws that allow protective agencies to forcibly medicate, and even make it a punishable crime to withhold medication.  This paints a chilling picture for those of us who are nonconformists.

 

Although the authors of the manual claim no ulterior motives but simply better diagnostic practices, the labeling of freethinking and nonconformity as mental illnesses has a lot of potential for abuse.  It can easily become a weapon in the arsenal of a repressive state.

 http://www.offthegridnews.com/how-to-2/is-free-thinking-a-mental-illness/

WEEK SIX WRITING ABOUT WHAT YOU READ

Is original thinking a mental disorder? What does it mean to be unique?

WEEK FIVE BLOG ENTRY

How does it change a country to have so many immigrants? Is the U.S. different for having been born of immigrants and then peopled by Irish in the 1840s, Germans in the 1880s, Chinese and Japanese in the 1890s, Italians in the early 1900s, and so on? How is a nation different after so much immigration?

WEEK FIVE READING

Does Immigration Without A Strong Minimum Wage Increase Inequality?

There has been strong debate over whether immigration helps increase income inequality by increasing labor supply so that those hiring workers, especially when job creation is still wavering, can afford to pay less.

To know whether this actually happens or not is difficult because there are so many moving pieces to the question. For example, earlier this year an analysis of H1-B hiring records suggested that median salaries of foreign high tech workers at some of the biggest tech companies — Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft — had topped $100,000 and were still on the rise. That sounds great, but to really know what that meant you’d need the median salaries by job category of native workers in the same companies to compare. If higher, then the continued influx of engineers could drive down, or at least slow the growth of, overall salaries.

In this Sept. 18, 2015 image made from video released by the Frio County Sheriff’s Department, immigrants exit a truck after law enforcement officers unlocked the rear doors in Moore, Texas. On Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2015, a federal grand jury indicted Drew Christopher Potter, 33, on charges of smuggling the 39 Central Americans. (Frio County Sherrif’s Department via AP)

On the other end of the spectrum are people with a high school or lesser education who are making far lower sums. Some broader studies have suggested that immigration accounted for only 5 percent of the increase in U.S. wage inequality between 1980 and 2000. That said this is old data from a time when outsourcing, or job emigration, was still quickly growing. In addition, the analysis was by David Card, an economist at the University of California, Berkeley who generally argues that immigration has no impact on wealth inequality.

A new study from Harvard’s George Borjas, an economist on the other side of the debate, suggests that evidence from around the Mariel boat lift (1980s) shows how immigration can put the most at-risk people into greater economic danger.

According to Borjas, 60 percent of the Marielitos were high school dropouts and low in skills:

A reappraisal of the Mariel evidence, specifically examining the evolution of wages in the low-skill group most likely to be affected, quickly overturns the finding that Mariel did not affect Miami’s wage structure. The absolute wage of high school dropouts in Miami dropped dramatically, as did the wage of high school dropouts relative to that of either high school graduates or college graduates. The drop in the relative wage of the least educated Miamians was substantial (10 to 30 percent), implying an elasticity of wages with respect to the number of workers between -0.5 and -1.5.

It’s not to say that if you allow immigrants into the country that wages will necessarily drop. One might say that immigrants often take jobs that citizens reject. But do natives turn down opportunities for being beneath them or because the wages have been depressed that they know making a good living becomes next to impossible?

There are no absolute answers in sight, of course, but it seems reasonable that in lower-paying, lower-skilled jobs, increased availability of workers could help employers continue to keep wages low. That would become an argument for a higher minimum wage. If large enough, people might not need as much government aid and social safety programs would not become a way to underwrite businesses by effectively enabling low pay.

WEEK FIVE WRITING ABOUT WHAT YOU READ

Do you see a relationship between minimum wage and immigration?

FACE TO FACE MEETING

As you know, we will meet on Saturday the 10th to write our mandatory and fabulous in class essay. You do not need to prepare anything for this essay, aside from starting to read Tortilla Curtain.
We will meet at CSUB in the Classroom Building Room 101. We will meet at 9 and are usually done by 11, even though we are scheduled to be there until noon.
I look forward to seeing you on Saturday!

Dr. S

WEEK FOUR BLOG ENTRY

As you start to read Tortilla Curtain, choose one line. Write the line here and discuss why that line stood out to you.

WEEK FOUR READING

Begin reading TC Boyle's Tortilla Curtain. You do not have to finish it by Saturday, but by all means get well into the reading of this novel. 

THERE IS NO "WRITING ABOUT WHAT YOU READ" FOR THIS WEEK.

TC BOYLE'S TORTILLA CURTAIN

Start to read this this week. We will use it to write our in-class essay on Saturday, October 10th. You do not need to finish it, but I think you will find it a quick read on a fascinating and important subject. Be sure you have gotten through about half of the book.
Also, note from the beginning that each chapter is told from a different voice. So the first chapter is from the voice of one character; the second chapter is told form the voice of another character.
Enjoy!