PLN 11

The article “The Skyhook” by Jason Bellows talks about the invention of a plane that doesn’t have to land to pick you up off of the ground, called the Skyhook. The way this plane works is the person that is being picked up has a pack with an empty balloon and a bottle of helium and a 500 foot long cord that they use to attach themselves to the plane and be pulled in with. They inflate the balloon, then float up and let the plane catch them. Then they slide along the cord to the end of the plane were they are pulled in with a hook. The reason they made these planes was because they didn’t have long range helicopters and they were in the artic so they couldn’t land very easily so they invented the no stop pickup. Soon after they created the long range helicopter so they could do long range stop and drop instead of parachuting out. The reason this matters is, we could have perfected the Skyhook but the long range helicopter is a lot safer because you’re not getting picked up in mid-air. The reason this plane was built was because we didn’t have powerful enough helicopters to get men in and out of these areas. Lastly, these planes stopped being produced because we had invented the long range helicopter which was more maneuverable then the Skyhook.

PLN 10

The article “Village Hall to crack down on skateboarders” by Jennifer Choi talks about New Yorkers growing dislike of skateboarders. People in New York and all over the country are becoming more wary of the property damage and personal injuries skateboarders create. New Yorkers are very concerned of walking amongst skateboarders for fear that they will be injured in a collision. Property owners are also concerned over their liability when a skateboarder injures someone on their property. Lastly, the high cost of repairing property damage skateboarders create to benches, tables and hand rails creates real hostility from landlords. City officials have passed numerous laws to discourage inappropriate skateboarding, while spending millions of dollars to encourage safe skateboarding in skate parks.

PLN 9

The article “The Windscale disaster” by Gerry Matlack talks about during the Cold War, how the UK was inventing a new radiation grenade. The grenade would be given a lot of gamma rays to get it to emit all of its gamma radiation in one quick burst or an explosion. A teaspoon of the Uranium would cause an explosion the size of 100 tons of TNT. The explosion would also have a half-life of 20.35 years. Meaning that the radiation from the grenade would be radiating through that area for 20.35 years. Gamma radiation is what is used to kill off cancer cells and would cause major radiation poisoning in the people in the blast area. The reason the UK was inventing this was because they weren’t allowed, by army law after WWII, to make anything that had to do with nuclear and that kind of thing because they didn’t want to get involved in the Cold War even though they had won the war, there army had been decimated. When the Americans heard about this they put thousands of dollars into this project to try to catch up with the British. If both countries were able to build this grenade then they would have a greater chance of defeating the Russians.

PLN 6

The article "The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk" by Ben Taylor talks about how the story of Robinson Crusoe was created in the 17th century. It all started when Alexander Selkirk thinks that his captain’s boat is full of too many holes in the hull from all of the storms they have been through. The captain doesn’t like the way that Alexander is thinking, so they maroon him on Juan Fernandez, and island about 600 miles from Valparaiso which is off of the coast of South America. When the crew marooned Alexander they left him with a pistol, knife, hatchet, a navigation instruments, a bible, a flask of rum, and enough food for just a few days. After he inventoried the items that he had he realized that he could do what he wanted with his life know. Alexander spent a surprising four years on the island surviving by eating goats and plumbs. To keep himself in shape, Alexander would go and catch the goats. Not to eat them, but to keep track of his physical ability, he would carve a little notch in the horn. He also kept track of how many goats he ate over the four years that he was on the island and it was around 500 goats. He also found a freshwater spring on the island so he wouldn’t die of thirst. Once a Spanish boat docked at the island, and since Alexander was Scottish, he knew that the Spaniards would enslave him or kill him. So, he scrambled up a tree to avoid being caught and stayed there for two days until the Spaniards left the island. At the end of his time on the island an unidentifiable ship docked at the island to replenish supplies and he ran and signaled them and found that they were friendly and planned to sail with them back to England. Unfortunately, he died but after he got back to England and married twice. The writer Daniel Defoe was intrigued by Alexander’s story and decided to write a book on it called Robinson Crusoe and since it was so popular he had to write two more to make it a series. The main character, Alexander named Robinson was never alive to see the book but it got his story out and now the island is now named Robinson Crusoe Island which was changed by the Chile government in 1966.

PLN 5

The article “The Mechanical Battery” talks about a flywheel which is basically a cylinder on a spit. When a flywheel is spun, the gathered kinetic energy from the spinning will create energy that can be stored or used. The flywheel has been used in the past but hasn’t been used to its full potential. In Switzerland there was a bus with a flywheel engine which weighed around three tons. The bus could stop and the battery would take 30 seconds to 3 minutes to charge and could go about 3 to 6 miles at 30 to 40 miles per hour. But since the motor weighed so much and the friction of the motor was so great that the bus would have to stop regularly to keep moving. Today NASA is using the flywheel in space because there wouldn’t be any friction. While using two flywheels in an orbiting shuttle, we are able to steer the shuttle. If both are moving at the same speed then the shuttle will go straight but if one slows down and the other stays the same, then you can turn. The great thing about the flywheel is that it is 85%-95% more efficient then any other motor on the planet right now. If we figure out a way to use a flywheel in a car, then we could be very green very fast because the flywheel doesn’t have any emissions. The flywheel sounds like a great motor but I think that we should take the motor part off keep the arm and cook something on it.

PLN 4

On Dr. Warschauer's blog, he has the question posted: Lots of people think that computers are a waste of money, and that students should be learning important skills like writing and reading rather than wasting time on computers. Do you agree that computers in the classroom are a waste of time and money? Why or why not? In my opinion, computers are not a waste of time and money because they improve productivity. Prior to the mass use of personal computers there was the typewriter. Typewriters required you to completely retype your document after you had edited it and typed it for the first time. Computers enable us to type, edit, email and print documents without having to retype the document two or more times. This makes us more productive. If you are working on a project for school you can save the document on a thumb drive and take it with you anywhere to be used on any computer. You can also email the document to another person in your group and combine the documents. The productivity rate since computers were introduced has skyrocketed. We are now able to do research, copy and site our research in our papers without leaving the computer. Lastly, online shopping is available for everything that we can purchase in stores and have it shipped to us. Now there is no need to use your own gas when you can use someone else’s. Those are some of the reasons that I think computers are not a waste of time and money.

PLN 3

The article “Apple unveils iPad, bets on new device class” by Gabriel Madway and Alexei Oreskovic talks about the new unveiling of the Apple “iPad”. In an online survey before the meeting, 37 % of more than 1,000 people said that they would pay $500-$699 for the iPad. Nearly 30% said that they weren’t interested, and the other 20% said that they would pay $700-$899. This new device claims to be the new bridge between the smart phone and the laptop. What they are never really clear about in the article is if the iPad is also a phone, because if it is, then that would be a very large phone. The screen is over 9 inches which would require some very deep pockets in both meanings of the phrase. The iPad is almost the exact same as the iPhone, both can run movies, and music while playing games. The difference is the iPad comes loaded with Microsoft Office. It has a touch keypad which is separate from the actual iPad itself. It also comes with a SD card port and USB port. The iPad can display books like Amazon’s Kindle and with the iBook store; users will be able to find over 4,000 titles. The iPad price will be $499 with 16 gigabytes of storage and if you add an extra $130, you can add on the wireless internet package. Following the introduction of the iPad, Apple shares rose 5.5%. AT&T will be partnering with Apple again, which makes me think that the iPad is a phone, and if it is, hopefully it has speaker phone. It should have a speaker phone or Bluetooth on it because; I wouldn’t want to be holding a 9+ inch “phone” up to my ear. I think that the iPad has real potential but I will be in the group of the uninterested because I have an iTouch which is the same thing as the iPhone without the actual phone part. Not to be negative, but I don’t think this has been one of Apples best ideas.

PLN 2

The article “GOP Congressional Report Accuses ACORN of Political corruption, Widespread Fraud” by FoxNews.com talks about when ACORN was accused of corruption after it was found out that they had been receiving $53 billion since 1994 and have been marked as a tax-exempt business which means that when they receive money they don’t have to pay taxes on it because of religious of other reasons. But what ACORN did with that money is they lent it to Obama and his personal campaign while he was running for president. When you are marked as a tax exempt business you aren’t allowed by law to have a public political opinion about anything because you are for the people and by the people. So when they gave the money to the Obama campaign, they were breaking the law. I think that someone should have said something about that besides Fox News because this is a vital issue if one of our large aid type businesses goes political and promotes one party then it will only be covered by the other side. Also if only the people that watch Fox News are going to hear the truth and the people watching the other networks that are going to reinvent the truth to keep the people oblivious. Which goes with the quote “Ignorance is bliss” meaning that keeping the people dumb will keep them happy. Now by taking away the factor of the people that lent the money I probably would be typing this article on something else.

PLN 28

The article "Raiders of the Lost Lake" by Alan Bellows talks about a Russian drilling company in Antarctica that found, but did not disturb, an underwater lake the size of Lake Ontario in Michigan. The lake is underneath 2 miles of glaciers and hasn’t seen sunlight for about 500,000 years or more. If the drill were to breach the ice above the lake 60 gallons of kerosene would fall into the lake and contaminate it beyond repair. The kerosene was to keep the water from refreezing around the drill. The Russians were drilling there to take ice samples because they heard that Antarctica was once a very tropical are with palm trees and all that beachy stuff. Once Australia and South America moved away, they took the warm currents with them and deprived the beaches so that they eventually froze and formed the Antarctica that we know and love. When other scientist heard of the discovery of the underground lake they had a field day and made a pact with the Russians that no military force would be used to take control of Lake Vostok. Scientist had devised a plan to send a drill down that would make a whole that would refreeze after the drill was through. Once it reached the lake the drill would open and send out a camera that would take pictures of all of the creatures down there. Another reason that we don’t want the Russians to keep drilling is because once they reach the lake, all the pressure of the air and water will make an explosion that might send all the water from the lake and the kerosene out into the open air and expose all of the other lakes. This could be a massive learning experience for the science community but what they find may not be community appropriate, as in it might scare every one in the public. The things that could scare them would be the microorganisms in the water, though small could be dangerous or helpful to the community.

PLN 29

The article "A Large Hearted Gentlemen" by Jason Bellows talks about Jim Corbett and his uncanny knack to track large cats in the Indonesian jungle and not to kill them but to track and document them in their natural habitat. The only time Corbett would shoot an animal was when everyone was screaming about the man eating tigers and panthers. He would kill them and learn that they were hunting humans because they were either old or had injuries so they couldn’t hunt regular game. One of the man eaters that Corbett killed was a panther in the Indonesian jungle. He found one of the animals favorite trails and set a goat in the trail, hid in a mango tree and waited for the animal to come. On the 11th day that Corbett was in the tree the animal came, Corbett turned on his light and shot the animal. When he got out of the tree to examine the animal he saw that it had porcupine wounds in its leg that had been there for many years. As most little spikes like that dissolve, porcupine needles don’t, so when the needles go in they don’t come out without some one doing something about it. With the porcupine needles in the cat’s leg, the muscles started to rot and the bone was wearing thin, that’s why the cat hunted humans instead of regular game. I think the lesson from this story is that you shouldn’t make false presumptions when you don’t know the real answer or don’t judge a book by it’s cover.