Gulf Oil Spill a “Dead Zone in the Making”? (August #1) August 30, 2010
Posted by NLu13 in School.Tags: g10, geography10b, news
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Gulf Oil Spill a “Dead Zone in the Making”?
Link to original article and picture: CLICK HERE~!
SUMMARY
As the title of the article states, the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is causing serious problems to the wildlife in the area. Although the spill may have not actually spread to some specific areas yet, the animals residing there are still heavily affected either way. Since some of these animals depend on others that are directly suffering from the oil spill for food, they are also affected. One example in this article is the effects of planktons. Although they are very small organisms, their effects on the world are endless. Not only are they a huge part of the food chain, they are also crucial in the reduction of CO2 emissions. However, they are so small that cleaning the off of them is still not something that can be done. Furthermore, planktons are not the only organisms affected. Another victim of this are the chattering shorebirds nearby. Although the oil spill has not effected then yet, there is still a chance that they will eventually be forced to leave their home soon.
REFLECTION
Personally, I think that this is a very big problem we are facing, especially the environmental impacts of it. Already, species are slowly dying all over the world and this is doing nothing but adding to the problems. And although most might not notice, I think this is also going to affect us humans as well. Since we eat the animals that are in the ocean too, we might also be harming ourselves. It is sort of obvious that no matter what, huge amount of animals are losing their homes due to the oil spills.
In my opinion, I think something more needs to be done to fix the problem. Although the ocean is a very ideal place for oil mining, I don’t think it should be allowed. We are getting oil, but the animals have to suffer in return and that’s not really fair to them or to the environment.
Questions that I have about this article is that are people actually making that much of an effort to help? And also, I’m curious if any bigger animals are effects. Although the article did mention birds, larger animals are not really mentions since it focus more on the shrimps, planktons and sea turtles.
WORK CITED
Dell’Amore, Christine. “Gulf Oil Spill a “Dead Zone in the Making”?” National Geographic News. National Geographic Society, 4 May 2010. Web. 29 Aug. 2010. <http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/05/100504-science-environment-gulf-oil-spill-dead-zone/>.
NEWS FOLIO: Bill Gates is Right On – We Can Feed A Growing Hungry World December 8, 2009
Posted by NLu13 in School.Tags: geography9b, gr9
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SUMMARY:
Bill Gates, one of the world’s richest person, had shocked people by saying that one way to defeat world hunger is to get products from poor African farmers. With help to add value to agriculture, it will be more sufficient and sustainable. It will also reduces the use of excess energy and be more environmental friendly. Bill Gates knows this and knows that not only will it help the poor farmers to make more money, it will also reduce world poverty because there will be more food production.
REFLECTION:
I my opinion, I think what Bill Gates suggested is a great idea. Not only will it help farmers in poverty in Africa, it will also combat world poverty and hunger, which is a world wide problem right now. However, my question is that will there be countries willing to help? Or will they not cooperate?
Work Cited
DeloreZ. “Bill Gates is Right On – We Can Feed a Growing, Hungry World.” New Geography, 25 Nov. 2009. Web. 25 Nov. 2009. <http://www.newgeography.com/content/001224-bill-gates-right-on-–-we-can-feed-a-growing-hungry-world>.
NEWS FOLIO: Unemployment Rate Nowhere Near White House Preditions December 8, 2009
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SUMMARY:
The article actually just shows two graphs of predicted unemployment rates and the actual thing in the US. As the graph shows, the actual numbers exceeds predictions and are increasing a lot more than the past years.
REFLECTION:
I think that it’s really bad that the unemployment rate is rising so fast in the US. I think that it will rise even more in the near future because of the decline in the world wide ecomony. In addition, this may also relate to Vietnam because the unemployment rate here might be rising also, which may cause a problem because Vietnam is currently already an LEDC.
Work Cited
Schill, Mark. “Unemployment Rate Nowhere Near White House Predictions.” New Geography., 7 Nov. 2009. Web. 25 Nov. 2009.
<http://www.newgeography.com/content/
001177-unemployment-rate-nowhere-near-white-house-predictions>.
NEWS FOLIO: Shortages and Confusion in Flu Fight December 8, 2009
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SUMMARY:
Basically, the article is talking about how swine flu and the vaccinations have caused confusion the many areas of the US. So many people go to get the shots that there are not enough to distribute it. However, there are also people that are furious about the development of the flu because they think it is not safe and isn’t test enough. There are even rumors that it is made from African green monkeys. A lot of people are caught between whether or not they should get the shot and if their child should too.
In addition to that, the article also talks a bit about distributing the shots to LEDCs. When making the contract, the world’s richest countries promised to provide shots for give the poorest of LEDCs shots that would cover 2-3 percent of the county’s population. However when the US saw that the shot could help prevent the person who had it, the said that they would give 10 percent mort of what it bought to the WHO.
REFLECTION:
I think that there is too much fuss about what is going on and that the media is really exaggerating information about the flu. In my opinion, it is just another flu, so why is it such a big deal?
On the other hand, I think it is very considerate of the US to donate part of the shots. Hopefully, those shots can make it to the LEDCs since I think that they LEDCs actually need it more since they’re countries that are more vulnerable to the flu. But I’m wondering will they actually use the shots for a to help? Or will the LEDC’s sell it to get more money to develop?
Work Cited
McNeil Jr., Donald G. “Shortages and Confusion in Flu Fight.” The New York Times – Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. 23 Oct. 2009. Web. 26 Nov. 2009. <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/24/health/24flu.html?_r=1&ref=health>.
BotNets…? November 18, 2009
Posted by NLu13 in Reflections.add a comment
In the last class, we watched a video about bot nets at the end of class. I was very surprised of how they works and how easy it is to spam and infiltrate a person’s PC/laptop. The first thing that I came into my mind as I watched the video was whether there were also bots in my laptop at home. Since it was so easy for bots to gain access to computers, it worried me as well.
I was also surprised at how easy it was to buy bots and gain control of hundreds of thousands of computers worldwide. No wonder there are so many spam messages all around the world. With merely a click of a button, any person could send thousands of spam messages per day and a typical person would have no idea who sent it. It was also really surprising how easy it is for those controlling the bots to access others’ personal information (like their bank account) and to steal things from it.
In addition to that, I had never expected that when sites crashes, it might had been intentional. It’s shocking that bots can also cause DDoS, which is when so many bots receive the order to access a certain site that the site crashes. Surprisingly, it too only a small amount of bots to do such a job.
Since it was so easy to spam computers and steal personal information from anyone in the world, no wonder so many people in the world lost money and experience ID theft all over the world.
Picture Credit:
http://i.zdnet.com/blogs/2007/06/botnet.gif
Debate about oil November 16, 2009
Posted by NLu13 in Uncategorized.Tags: geography9b, gr9
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In my opinion, the debates went really well. Oil was an interesting topic and everyone had a lot to say. However, there were a few that did not get to speak as much. The online debate was very interesting since it was my first time doing a debate without actually talking to each other. At first with the chatting wasn’t really working because everyone would be typing and it was almost impossible to read everything. The forum was a better way for me.
As for the live debate, I think it would have been better if everyone was given a chance to speak, not that I mind remaining quiet. However, I would have like to have spoken more since every time I tried, someone else was louder so I would get cut off. Still, it was very fun, but next time, I would speak more loudly.
For my conclusion of this topic, I think that although we do need to conserve the environment, we still have to drill for oil since oil is right now the source of energy humans depend on the most. However, we could reduce the amount we drill, but I don’t think that we should stop drilling for oil. Although there are alternative resources, non of them are as reliable and most of the world’s economy need oil to function so I think it’s better to continue drilling for oil, but just reduce it a bit.
Picture Credit:
http://wwwstatic.kern.org/images/kcMuseum/oilLogo001.gif
MDG Video November 16, 2009
Posted by NLu13 in Tools.Tags: gr9, ict9f
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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyM6W0LhZwg[/youtube]
In geography, we were talking about the millennium development goals. We also talked about ways we could contribute to help achieve the goals.
For ICT, I made a video about this topic. It’s made from Xtranormal in the form of a conversation.
XtraNormal- My thoughts November 5, 2009
Posted by NLu13 in Tools.Tags: gr9, ict9f
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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bzxqp1P7eqU[/youtube]
In my opinion, I think that this is a great tool to use. It’s really uncomplicated and the controls are easy to use. I enjoyed experimenting with it. It was really funny using all the different voices and characters. However, I do think that there should be a wider selection of scenes and characters. There were only a few characters. It would also be cooler if we were able to make out own characters and backgrounds.
Geography: Millennium Development Goals October 15, 2009
Posted by NLu13 in Reflections.Tags: geography9b, gr9
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There are various ways to achieve the Millenium Devolpment Goals(MDG). Instead of focuing on the all the goals, I’ll only talk about two of them.
The first one is universal education. One way to achieve universal education is to ask MEDCs that lend LEDCs money and the World Bank to not pressure the LEDCs to pay all the money so fast. Also, they can put the interest on hiatus for a while. That way, part of the money they make may actually be put into education. In addition to that, education in some countries can also be free so that families can actually send their children to school.
The other MDG that I wanted to talk about is environmental stability. One ways that this can be achieve is for governments to make strict laws to save the remaining environment. I really strongly think that this is what governments should do. There is really no point in saving the environment if multinationals continues to come in with factories and pollute the environment. They should also have to follow environmental laws to protect the environment. In addition to that, there should be ways to keep trees from being cut down and also ways to raise money to plant trees. For example small communities can have events that raise money to plant more trees.
Picture Credit:
http://subu.org.uk/files/Environment.jpg
http://www.dealio.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/back_to_school_banner.jpg
Geography: Essential Questions October 14, 2009
Posted by NLu13 in Reflections.Tags: geography9b, gr9
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Question: If the world continues to develop like this, how will it end up like?
I think that if the world continues as it is right now, the majority of the world’s population will suffer. More people will fall into debts and poverty. In addition to that, since prices of everything (or most products) are rising all over the world, it will eventually be very hard for people to afford even basic education, food and health care. Also since resources the world needs to function is slowly but surely decreasing, those resource will be gone soon and unless people starts to find alternative ways power their cars, use electricity, obtain clean drinking water, etc…most of the things we use now will not be available in the future.