(This was supposed to go up yesterday, but I accidentally hit "save" instead of "publish" :p )
So, I was thinking about the Curiosity rover that landed on Mars recently. I guess what really started the thought process was just reflecting on the video I watched about it. The rover took all these photos during it's descent. and so a video was assembled that gives a sort of "rover's-eye-view" of the whole thing. It really was cool.
And you know, that's what gets me about it. Here I am, sitting in my living room, drinking Coca-Cola and watching a multi-billion dollar exploration rover drop onto a planet over 50 million kilometers away (on a good day). And I'm watching it in 1080p. How crazy is that? The wealth of information available to the common (well, at least in 1st-world countries) people is staggering. With a few strokes of a keyboard or clicks of a mouse, we can access more information than entire libraries used to have available.
But are we any smarter? Honestly, I think not. Like, we have more knowledge, but are not smarter. I know, it sounds like an oxymoron, but I really think it's true. Perhaps it's an overused example, but just look at the pyramids in Egypt. I mean, those people had an abacus, and slave labor. And that was it. To this day there are vast arguments about how it was done. So for all our fancy computers, and internet, and wikipedia, we are still confounded by people who did math with beads on sticks.
Kinda ridiculous. But back to Curiosity. It has surprised me how little talk there's been about it, honestly. And even more so, how negative a lot it's been. People have no grasp or concept anymore about what discovery is. We are content on our "little blue pearl". Why do we need to go look at other planets? Compare that to the veritable planet-wide freakout of the moon-landing (which wasn't filmed in NEARLY 1080p). The whole planet was moved to exuberance because we had gone to the moon. We had reached a hand into the heavens and pulled ourselves into it. Now all people can do is gripe about how pointless it is to send something like the Curiosity rover to Mars. Neil deGrasse Tyson said in an interview that we, as a people, have stopped dreaming, and I think that's what it is. We no longer have any drive to reach into the stars, or really anywhere else, honestly. We're content to run the rat-race by day, and sleep away the night.
Kinda sad, don't you think?
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Monday, August 27, 2012
Introduction
Greetings to all. Before I get into details, I feel I must explain the method behind the madness... or at least why I'm starting this blog. I'm starting it for a class called Networked Audience. I'm supposed to use this blog as a launch-pad for discussing technologies that develop and leave a sort of 'paper trail' of my thought processes as the class progresses. But honestly, I think having a blog is kinda a neat idea, so I may (that is, I hope to) keep it running for more than just that.
Now, you may be wondering who I am. Well let's go ahead and sate that ravenous curiosity. My name is Nathan Wright, and I am a senior Media Communications major at Cedarville University, a private university in Ohio. I have been married 2 months and four days (as I write this) to the most wonderful and amazing gal I've ever met. I did a brief stint as an English major my first year and a half here at school, but really am more people oriented, so I switched to Communications. I love this part of the country, and I love this school, but most importantly I love Christ, so let nothing hide that fact.
My favorite color is green. I really love Snickers and Butterfinger candy bars. My favorite ice-cream flavor is Young's Dairy's "Cow Patty", which is chocolate with toffee, chocolate chips, and cookie pieces mixed into it. If I could have ANY car (and money/gas were a non-issue) I would want a Mercedes Benz CLK-GTR . I think my favorite sci-fi series (for now at least) is Warhammer 40,000, but honestly I tend to jump around a fair bit.
I have mild (self / un-diagnosed) ADD, and I seem to have given myself occasional dyslexia. No, really! It started as me just playing around with words, flipping letters, mispronouncing words, stuff like that. Well, mostly flipping letters around. Anyway, I started noticing that I would do that without thinking about it, and in situations where I didn't actually want to do it. So I stopped doing it intentionally, and the problem seems to have gone away. Weird. Anyway, where was I?
Oh, right! Pets! I must say, my favorite pets growing up were our ferrets. They smelled kinda odd, but thy were AWESOME pets. So cute and smart! Makes me happy just thinking about them. We had dogs too growing up. Sandy was a golden retriever, followed by a mutt named Sandy-Mandy when we moved and couldn't take Sandy with us. But Sandy-Mandy was kind of a jerk and bit my brother (though he did have it coming), so we had to get rid of her (now that I think about it, I don't actually know what we did with her. Odd...).
Which reminds me, I forgot to mention my family. I have my parents, Dad is a doctor and Mom is a stay at home mother (and a phenomenal one at that!). Next I have Brother, who is three years younger than me, and two sisters, who for the sake of anonymity will be referred to here as Sissy, the oldest of the two and by far the most gentle and kind soul I've ever met, and Sassy, who has (obviously) an attitude the size of a large whale. My family is probably what I treasure most in life. Dad was in the Navy, so many times, they were all I had. They were my only stability. Wow... that got reaaaally sappy. LET'S MOVE ON!
My dream occupation is voice-acting. It sounds like such a fun job, and I've been told I could do a great job at it. But realistically, with my major, I'll likely work in someone's HR department, maybe work as a manager somewhere. No idea, honestly, but wherever God leads, I suppose. Life is sure to be a grand adventure, and I'm pretty excited to see where it goes.
So that's me in a nutshell. Well, not literally, but you know what I mean. Check back every so often and see what my addled mind manages to scrounge up every so often!
~Peace Out!
Now, you may be wondering who I am. Well let's go ahead and sate that ravenous curiosity. My name is Nathan Wright, and I am a senior Media Communications major at Cedarville University, a private university in Ohio. I have been married 2 months and four days (as I write this) to the most wonderful and amazing gal I've ever met. I did a brief stint as an English major my first year and a half here at school, but really am more people oriented, so I switched to Communications. I love this part of the country, and I love this school, but most importantly I love Christ, so let nothing hide that fact.
My favorite color is green. I really love Snickers and Butterfinger candy bars. My favorite ice-cream flavor is Young's Dairy's "Cow Patty", which is chocolate with toffee, chocolate chips, and cookie pieces mixed into it. If I could have ANY car (and money/gas were a non-issue) I would want a Mercedes Benz CLK-GTR . I think my favorite sci-fi series (for now at least) is Warhammer 40,000, but honestly I tend to jump around a fair bit.
I have mild (self / un-diagnosed) ADD, and I seem to have given myself occasional dyslexia. No, really! It started as me just playing around with words, flipping letters, mispronouncing words, stuff like that. Well, mostly flipping letters around. Anyway, I started noticing that I would do that without thinking about it, and in situations where I didn't actually want to do it. So I stopped doing it intentionally, and the problem seems to have gone away. Weird. Anyway, where was I?
Oh, right! Pets! I must say, my favorite pets growing up were our ferrets. They smelled kinda odd, but thy were AWESOME pets. So cute and smart! Makes me happy just thinking about them. We had dogs too growing up. Sandy was a golden retriever, followed by a mutt named Sandy-Mandy when we moved and couldn't take Sandy with us. But Sandy-Mandy was kind of a jerk and bit my brother (though he did have it coming), so we had to get rid of her (now that I think about it, I don't actually know what we did with her. Odd...).
Which reminds me, I forgot to mention my family. I have my parents, Dad is a doctor and Mom is a stay at home mother (and a phenomenal one at that!). Next I have Brother, who is three years younger than me, and two sisters, who for the sake of anonymity will be referred to here as Sissy, the oldest of the two and by far the most gentle and kind soul I've ever met, and Sassy, who has (obviously) an attitude the size of a large whale. My family is probably what I treasure most in life. Dad was in the Navy, so many times, they were all I had. They were my only stability. Wow... that got reaaaally sappy. LET'S MOVE ON!
My dream occupation is voice-acting. It sounds like such a fun job, and I've been told I could do a great job at it. But realistically, with my major, I'll likely work in someone's HR department, maybe work as a manager somewhere. No idea, honestly, but wherever God leads, I suppose. Life is sure to be a grand adventure, and I'm pretty excited to see where it goes.
So that's me in a nutshell. Well, not literally, but you know what I mean. Check back every so often and see what my addled mind manages to scrounge up every so often!
~Peace Out!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)