Category Archives: Society - Page 2

NASA triumph!

Posted by Reluctant on May 26, 2008 No comments

When Dwight D Eisenhower signed the N ational Aeronautics and Space Act, in 1958, I wonder if he had any inkling of what kind of an impact that action would have on the world. Not only did the act create the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), but also DARPA (Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency).

DARPA later went on to contribute significantly to the creation of the Internet and several other technologies we use each day (like GPS), but let’s focus on what came from NASA research. Everyone knows the many accomplishments of NASA in regards to space exploration; Apollo Missions, Moon Landing, International Space Station, etc. But what about all the other technologies we use that have come from NASA research?

From HowStuffWorks.com comes a countdown of the top 10 daily used products that have come from NASA research.

$112 billion for single parents

Posted by Reluctant on April 15, 2008 11 comments

A recent study indicates that American taxpayers spend $112 billion a year on assistance to single parents and divorces. Wow! That’s a lot of money. Should we eliminate assistance for single mothers? No, that would be seriously stupid. But the assistance needs to be much better managed. Some responsibility needs to go along with it.

The single parents need to show that they are trying to do something with their lives. That they are taking care of their families properly. Perhaps that their children are actually improving in school, etc. I know this is a complicated issue, but it seems that the politicians won’t touch it with a ten foot poll because of the fear of seeming uncompassionate.

It’s time for this country (as a society) to accept responsibility.

The Fear Epidemic

Posted by Reluctant on April 6, 2008 2 comments

Fear is destroying our lives. There are some that say that money is the root of all evil. If that is true, fear plays a close second fiddle. It’s crushing our society, our children and our families. It’s one of the most debilitating problems in the 21st century.

There are many who would argue that drugs, sexuality, crime, abortion and many other issues are more destructive to our society. However, there is nothing more socially acceptable, yet so destructive as fear. This isn’t the fear generated from horror shows, but fear of the unknown and the possibility of tragedy.

Let’s take a quick quiz.

Life After People – The History Channel

Posted by Reluctant on February 18, 2008 3 comments

While flipping through channels today, I noticed a miniseries by The History Channel called “Life After People.“ They had been running some ads over the past several weeks with an interesting line that went something like this… Welcome to Earth: Population 0.

It intrigued me and so I flipped to it. After just a few minutes into it, I realized that the show wasn’t all scientific, but was almost all political. And it was just a human race bash. I didn’t watch much, but the 10 minutes I did watch were rather disappointing and more to the point — disturbing.

Google adds Greater Salt Lake Area to Street View

Posted by Reluctant on February 16, 2008 No comments

Ratchet up the stocker fears. Google has just released Street View for Salt Lake (including Utah and Davis Counties).

Some of you may recognize the following locations. I’ll post about the fears and privacy concerns later.

Utah Legislature Bigotry

Posted by Reluctant on February 4, 2008 2 comments

A new law is currently being pushed through the Utah Legislature that will seriously hurt the people of the State of Utah. Among other things, SB81 would make it illegal for an employer to fire a citizen if an undocumented worker is performing the same responsibilities. WOW! Let’s all say it together — discrimination!

I’m so tired of the immigration debate. Actually, I’m not tired of the debate, I’m tired of the lack of substance on the side of the “anti-immigration movement.” I like to call it the bigotry movement. I was speaking to a friend of mine the other day about this and realized that there are so many people blinded by “illegal is illegal” argument. I totally agree that what they are doing is illegal. But so was so much of the Civil Rights Movement.

Scientists "prove" Adam and Eve — kinda

Posted by Reluctant on January 19, 2008 1 comment

Scientist recently studied mitochondrial DNA to determine ancestry at a large scale level. Their objective was to determine lineage across today’s major racial groups. They took 147 individuals from these groups and analyzed the DNA to determine their parentage. The results are quite astounding.

… the geneticists concluded that every person on Earth right now can trace his or her lineage back to a single common female ancestor who lived around 200,000 years ago.

Card pleads with Romney over illegal immigration

Posted by Reluctant on January 18, 2008 7 comments

Orson Scott Card has once again posted an opinion on the 2008 presidential race. Although Card indicates that the war is still one of the major priorities of this election, he speaks mostly concerning “illegal” immigration. The portion that really jumped out at me was the following (penned before the New Hampshire primaries).

Joe's Goals — Keep your resolutions

Posted by Reluctant on January 5, 2008 No comments

So in the spirit of the New Year and setting New Year Resolutions, I figured I needed something to help me track and keep my resolutions. I first had the idea to build something simply myself. An online application I could use personally and perhaps expand in the future for other’s use. Of course, when I have one of my brilliant ideas, I try to see if it’s been done before so I don’t waste my time.

Democracy, the best revenge

Posted by Reluctant on December 31, 2007 No comments

The recent assassination of Benazir Bhutto proved the volatility of young democracies. Two things have shown bright through this tragedy:

1) Americans should have a greater appreciation for the civility with which our political process is conducted. We often complain (me being the first) about the lack of true communication, abundance of hypocritical rhetoric and divisive language involved in our U.S. politics. Although it’s ridiculous we have to put up with these destructive elements, it’s gratifying to realize we don’t have to (and never really had to) endure this kind of violence.

Some might point out three political assassinations in our history (Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr, John F Kennedy). But these weren’t assassinations endorsed or supported by political movements. These were conducted by an individual or very small group of extremists. They are by far of a different nature.

2) The quote from Bhutto’s son, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari concerning revenge and democracy is just beautiful.

“My mother always said, democracy is the best revenge.”

The power in that statement is incredible. The people who assassinated Bhutto are those who are anti-democracy. But democracy will prevail.

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And they call me an Engineer

Reluctant ramblings of a computer geek