Wednesday, May 22, 2013
Saturday, June 2, 2012
Meta Post
My personal favorite post if the last quarter was "Fuel Efficiency: Is it Actually Improving?" Cars and alternate energy are both topics that I find very interesting, so I really enjoyed learning more about the history of cars fuel efficiency, as it is sort of a hybrid of both.
I believe that this post was one of my more coherent blog posts recently, but it is far from perfect. Looking back, I feel like I probably could have done a little bit more research in order to find more concrete facts that I would be able to include to further my argument/observations. I have also just realized that these issues are almost identical to those that I believed I was struggling with first semester. As the year has progressed I have also noticed that my favorite posts tend to be written about topics that I feel most strongly about. The one problem with this, is that I often end up focusing more on my opinions on the issues opposed to the factual evidence of the issues themselves.
One other thing that I could change to improve the post, "Fuel Efficiency: Is it Actually Improving?", would be to bring in additional examples. I only discuss the Model T and the 2008 Ford Ranger. There is such diversity in the automobile industry nowadays, using one pick up truck does not really give people an accurate idea of modern cars. Trucks tend to be less fuel efficient than most cars, and now getting up to about forty miles per gallon in a sedan is fairly common. Apart from being somewhat limited in perspective, it is pretty good.
While my blogs have become clearer as the year has progressed, they have also unfortunately been less and less frequent. Looking back at first semester posts, I had many simple proof reading mistakes and similar errors, but I was also blogging more regularly.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Logos
I recently became aware of the "Logos Quiz Game" for Apple devices. After a little research I found out that I am not the only one that finds the whole idea of the game kind of strange. For any of you that do not know, the basic idea of the game is to try to correctly identify as many different brands logos as you can. The thing that surprises most, is how fun this simple activity can be. It is very interesting and almost addicting to see how many different logos you are able to remember.
As Anthony Wing Kosner of Forbes writes in an article, linked here, in this day and age people are surrounded by advertisements nearly everywhere they go. He also goes on to mention the potential that this App could have for helping businesses improve their advertising. If peoples results could be saved and analyzed, then companies might be able use them in order to improve their logo in order to make it more recognizable.
One other interesting things that I learned about the App was that the creator, Javier Perez Estarriaga, originally was creating the app for self enjoyment and a challenge. It pushes you to try to recognize the smallest letter or fragment. But we see these logos so frequently that they are almost burned into our brain, so now most people can recognize most logos almost subconsciously.
One other interesting things that I learned about the App was that the creator, Javier Perez Estarriaga, originally was creating the app for self enjoyment and a challenge. It pushes you to try to recognize the smallest letter or fragment. But we see these logos so frequently that they are almost burned into our brain, so now most people can recognize most logos almost subconsciously.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
America's Obsession with Teeth
I recently read a BBC News Magazine article (Linked Here), that both made me laugh, and really take a minute to think about American values. Ricky Gervais (creator of The Office) was interviewed by an American journalist a few years ago about his role as a dentist in a movie. The journalist then complimented Gervais for wearing bad fake teeth for the role. Gervais then said "He was horrified that I could have such horrible real teeth. It's like the biggest difference between the Brits and the Americans, they are obsessed with perfect teeth." 
I had never really considered the idea of years of orthodontic work to be strange at all. It is true that straight, clean, healthy teeth are actually beneficial to your health, Gervais though, is more surprised with the extreme measure that people in Hollywood take. Jimmy Steele. a, professor at the School of Dental Science at Newcastle University, has come to the conclusion that British people are more worried about teeth being functional and to some extent natural, while Americans would like their teeth to be functional, but also incredibly aesthetically pleasing. Hence all the obsession with whitening, I did not really now that teeth naturally tend to be more of a cream color than white. It is only by using a variety of chemicals that you can get a tooth to actually look white.
The article also mentions that very much in contrast to Americans, most of the British public ridicules people for having drastic work done to their teeth. Living in America, I would be very happy to have a perfectly white and straight set of teeth, but it is always interesting to learn that everybody may not share our beliefs about somethings.
I had never really considered the idea of years of orthodontic work to be strange at all. It is true that straight, clean, healthy teeth are actually beneficial to your health, Gervais though, is more surprised with the extreme measure that people in Hollywood take. Jimmy Steele. a, professor at the School of Dental Science at Newcastle University, has come to the conclusion that British people are more worried about teeth being functional and to some extent natural, while Americans would like their teeth to be functional, but also incredibly aesthetically pleasing. Hence all the obsession with whitening, I did not really now that teeth naturally tend to be more of a cream color than white. It is only by using a variety of chemicals that you can get a tooth to actually look white.
The article also mentions that very much in contrast to Americans, most of the British public ridicules people for having drastic work done to their teeth. Living in America, I would be very happy to have a perfectly white and straight set of teeth, but it is always interesting to learn that everybody may not share our beliefs about somethings.
Monday, April 16, 2012
Fuel Efficiency: Is it Actually Improving?
While doing research for a paper about oil I came across some interesting facts about cars and their fuel mileage. In recent years due to the drastic increases in gas prices many people have been switching to FlexFuel cars. These cars run on a fuel called E-85 which is a mixture of 85% ethanol and 15% petroleum (Here is a link to an article about FlexFuel cars).
People tend to think that FlexFuel is a recent technology but I was surprised to learn that that is not exactly true. The first FlexFuel car was actually a version of the Model T Ford made in 1908. In addition to that, I was equally surprised to learn that the original Model T actually achieved better fuel mileage than a 2008 Ford pick up truck. Henry Ford predicted the transition to alternate fuel sources a while ago. He said in an interview with the New York Times "The fuel of the future is going to come from fruit... There is fuel in every bit of vegetable matter that can be fermented." The idea of using corn and other produce as a means to fuel cars with clean burning alcohol is not a new one, but for some reason it has not become a popular way to power cars. Ethanol burns very clean and in doing so lessens the harmful emissions that are being released into the atmosphere.
Even though the Model T and a Ford pick up are not really comparable interns of size and weight I would have expected that with a hundred years of technological advances we could have made our cars a little bit more efficient.
For more information see link
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