Sunflower

Unfortunatly my sunflower was dehydrated after just a few days. We went on a tennis team for about 6 days and I asked my roommate to water the plant, however he never did so!
My neighbour molly gave me a picture of her plant from last year though for this class!:

The Phlogiston Theory

The following is mainly taken from wikipedia:

In 1667, Johann Becher published Physical Education. In it is found the first suggestion of what would later become the phlogiston theory. At Becher's time, alchemists believed that there were four classical elements: fire, water, air, and earth. In his book, Becher disputed this by eliminating fire and air and replacing them with three forms of earth. The third, terra pinguis, represented combustible properties. Becher believed that terra pinguis was a main feature of combustion which was released when substances capable of combustion were burned. Becher's theory was expanded in 1703 by a professor of medicine and chemestry called Georg Stahl who renamed terra pinguis phlogiston. The phlogistion theory as it is known today is mainly influenced by Stahl's representation.

The theory was an attempt of early scientists to explain the processes of burning, such as combustion. It states that phlogiston is a substance without color, smell, taste, or mass which is freed during the process of burning. A burned substance, now free of phlogiston, or "dephlogisticated", was considered to be in its true form. It was believed that oxygen was capable of absorbing only a certain amount of phlogiston, and that once it became fully phlogisticated it would no longer support the process of combustion. The fact that combustion stopped in an enclosed space supported this line of thought. Another relationship between oxygen and phlogiston that was believed was that phlogisticated air could not support life, since the job of air in the process of respiration was to remove phlogiston from the body.

Ironically, this early description was essentially opposite of oxygen's actual role in combustion.

Eventually, the phlogiston theory began to loose ground. One of the biggest observations that began this process was that when certain metals, such as magnesium, were burned, they actually gained weight. This was against phlogiston theory since burning was supposed to release phlogiston and make a substance lighter. Some tried to hold on to the theory anyway by suggesting that phlogistion actually had negative weight, others proposed that it was lighter than air, but these conjectures were proved false. During the eighteenth century, phlogiston began to be seen as a principle rather than an actual substance; when it was referred to at all, it was usually linked with hydrogen. Some scientists, most notably Joseph Priestely, held onto the concept of phlogiston theory throughout his career.

 

Deductive vs Inductive Reasoning

Deductive
 When a person uses deductive reasoning they are coming to a conclusion based on well known generalizations.  This type of reasoning starts with a limited number of simple statements then leads to more complex ideas that build upon the initial statements.  Using the first statements as a foundation, a person can then form more complicated principles and ultimately prove them.  Deduction is basically the direct application of knowledge in order to discover new knowledge.

Inductive
 Using inductive reasoning takes events and turns them into generalizations.  It creates general principles through circumstantial evidence.  It moves from an individualized observation of an idea towards forming a generalized opinion. 

Inductive arguments provide us with new ideas and thus may expand our knowledge about the world in a way that is impossible for deductive arguments to achieve. Thus, while deductive arguments may be used most often with mathematics, most other fields of research make extensive use of inductive arguments.

This is the link to an interesting and clear article on it:
http://www.nakedscience.org/mrg/Deductive%20and%20Inductive%20Reasoning.htm

Standard Operating Procedure

Standard Operating Procedure

Krista Kennedy & Jordan Perrine & Elbert Beekman

Sending a Text Message

1.0   Scope and Application

1.1   This procedure is used for sending information to another human being via cellular technology through a text message.

2.0   Summary of Method

2.1   Sending a text message will ensure that the person receiving the message will have a record of the information you wish for them to know.

3.0   Inter References

3.1   N/A

4.0   Apparatus and Materials

4.1   One activated cellular device(of any provider.. Sprint, AT&T, Verizon Wireless, etc)

4.2 Another activated cellular device carried by the person who wish to receive the information(again, of any provider)

4.3 Both devices must have some sort of text messaging provided on their cellular contract

5.0   Procedure

5.1   Turn on cell phone

5.2   From the home page click the button/part of screen that says "Menu"

5.3   From the menu, find the selection entitled "Messaging/Text Messages"

5.4   From the Text Message/Messaging menu, select create new text

5.5   In the slot labeled "To" type the number of the person's activated device who wish to send the information to

5.6   In the slot labeled "Add text" apply your cursor and begin using the keypad/number pad/or emotion icons/pictures to send the information you wish the other person to receive (ex. Hi)

5.7   Check to make sure the information typed is what you wish to send/ the number you wish to send the information to and click the button that says "Send"

5.8   Wait for the screen on your device to confirm your sent message

6.0   Quality Control

6.1   The end result should be a sent message with the information you provided to tell the person on the other line.

Mitochondrial Eve

The following has been taken from wikipedia:
" Mitochondrial Eve refers to the matrilineal most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of modern humans. In other words, she was the woman from whom all living humans today descend, on their mother's side, and through the mothers of those mothers and so on, back until all lines converge on one person. Because all mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is generally passed from mother to offspring without recombination, all mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) in every living person is directly descended from hers by definition. Mitochondrial Eve is the female counterpart of Y-chromosomal Adam, the patrilineal most recent common ancestor, although they lived thousands of years apart.
Each ancestor (of people now living) in the line back to the matrilineal MRCA had female contemporaries such as sisters, female cousins, etc. and some of these female contemporaries may have descendants living now (with one or more males in their descendancy line). But none of the female contemporaries of the "Mitochondrial Eve" has descendants living now in an unbroken female line."


This is an interesting article: http://www.trueorigin.org/mitochondrialeve01.asp

Mitochondrial Eve:



African American woman:


Asian Woman:



Latino Woman:



Caucasian woman:

Animal Testing

Animal Testing is a very 'hot' item in current debates and there is a lot of controversy surrounding it. There are a lot of people who cannot even discuss the issue, just like there are a lot of people who seem to just ignore the subject simply because they do not want to take a stand. There are pro's and con's to it but in my opinion there are far more con's to it than pro's.
First of all because so many animals are innocently killed after they have been tested. And if they are not killed there is a chance that they are severly injured or hurt. Besides that, testing animals is also very expensive. And most imporantly for me, there is no guarantee that the effect on the animal will be the same or even similar to the effect the drug will have on a human!

Burgess Shale

In class I learned about the Burgess Shale, something of which i had never heard before. It is located in British Columbia, in Canada, and was discovered in 1909. It was discovered by Charles Walcott and is one of the most important fossil sites on earth. It is located in the Canadian part of the Rocky mountains. It is especially famous for the exceptional preservation of the soft parts of the fossils. The shale correlates to a Stephen formation.

Below are some pictuers of the site:

               

 

Just a funny animation:

This is a map of the location of the Shale: