Continuing Education

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 Hell yeah, Shel Silverstein!

I realized that, now that school is over with, there is the scarily real potential for me to end up more often than not sitting in my room pants-less watching Family Guy and eating Doritos. Although I need that kind of vacation I don’t want my brain to melt, so I think I’m going to try and make this my year of literature. I’m going to finally read all of those epic, earth shattering works (then maybe I can learn not to use cliché’s) that I never read in school like E.M Forester, James Joyce, Henry Miller, Ernest Hemingway, etc. Not all of their works, naturally, but I’d like the ability to start using their names as adjectives and really know what I’m talking about. I think I’ll come up with a comprehensive list and post it here, someday….If anyone wants to join me we can be awesome nerds and have a reading group!

I have tried to embark on this type of thing before…pretty much every summer I have declared that I’ll be reading something epic which rarely gets finished. But now I’ll really have time (finally) and it will be nice to keep my brain active. I usually am trying to do so but I feel like I’ve been slacking in that department lately, being wiped out with finals and certain inane classes and busy work at internships….

But! Here are some interesting things I’ve learned this morning from the New York Times annual “Year in Ideas ”

1)    We’re replacing nature with machines

(http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/news/2004/images/synthetic_trees_400.jpg)

 Ok, so this isn’t entirely true, and in this article they do make sure to refute that idea. But still, there is something slightly unnerving about us whittling down trees and ivy to their specific purpose and then finding a way to recreate that out of things that “resemble giant fly-swatters” and “leaflike modules that harness both solar and wind energy.” It is comforting to know that there are people out there who are able to be innovative with energy. Apparently, “when a breeze rustles Grow's [designer Samuel Cochran’s] leaves, tiny piezoelectric generators in their "stems" create a small charge.” We’re starting to get better and better at harnessing nature. But when will these things actually be usable? I guess it’s hard to tell on the East Coast- I feel like California gets all of the energy tricks, with all of their wealthy liberals and sun.

2)   We can print out batteries  

Which made the New York Times hint at a viewable paper rather than print. Good work staying relevant, NYT, although I think I’d rather read than watch most of your staff.

3) We’re making robots feel  

This section disturbs me quite a bit, actually. They’re describing how robots are often used for warfare, but now they’re going to make them ethical and feel guilt. Isn’t that part of the reason why we don’t want to be the ones fighting, to avoid the emotional aftermath? And whose ethical standards are we programming these poor robots with? Also, you can’t read an article about robots without this type of threat: “the software will actually allow robots to outperform humans from an ethical perspective.” Their superiority is always looming- eerie.    

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4)   The Japanese want lithium in our water supply! 

Because otherwise, we will obviously want to kill ourselves. Shades of Brave New World, anyone?

5)   Who owns the moon?

I mean, I thought we did, since we conquered it with a flag and all way back in the day. But apparently now that we’ve discovered frozen water the moon is totally a commodity again. We (and China) have been crashing things into it right and left, and now the amazingly forward thinking katrillionaire Richard Bronson has created commercial flights to the moon! If you have $200,000 I suggest you get on it. 

But how are we going to divide up this glorious satellite? Maybe this is what the UN is for.

(Also- I have always thought astronauts were the forgotten heroes- they get to go into fucking outer space! Why aren’t we still obsessed with them like in those good-old Cold War days? Since Lance Bass wasn’t allowed to leave Earth I thought we had standards. Bronson- way to lower those.)