This is The Palmer Report

Sterility in Architecture. A Manifesto.

2010-05-16T02:30:00.003-04:00

The United States is turning into a hermetically sealed, sanitized environment. Bright lights, wide hallways, tile floors. Easy access, wide doors. Sterile. More and more buildings are starting to look like hospitals. Look at newly renovated historic buildings. The insides are clean drywall, harsh overhead fluorescent lighting, tile floors. It is probably the MOST irritating thing for me to walk into a wonderful building from the early 1900s or before and be met with the same sterility of a building completed yesterday. For Ohio State people, a good example of this is Jennings Hall. This type of interior is dominating commercial and domestic design.

Another example is of newly done wood flooring/paneling. Look for seams. It is nigh impossible to find them. The surface is so perfect, so sterile. What is interesting about perfection? My room has beautiful old hardwood flooring (sadly covered up by carpet at the moment), and it isn't a sterile, smooth surface. You can feel the grain, see and feel the joints. It is authentic to its material properties. It is wood trying to be wood, not wood trying to be concrete, or glass, 0r tile. All of this deception is driving me insane. The next time I see a bastardization of authenticity with new garbage, I just might go postal. Maybe I'm a classicist, but I would rather be a classicist than someone in favor of half-baked plans of renewal.

Ok, so we're finally getting to the argument here... That argument is that I like excessive, bordering on frivolous complexity in circulation. The more unnecessary twists and turns your path takes form Point A to Point B, the better. The further the ideas and form seem from functional, the better. I like the option for people to be left to their own terms to explore. The more nooks and crannies, the more uncomfortable interstitial space, the better. The places I like the most, are the places one should like the least. Little else gets me more excited in the experience of a building than finding idiosyncratic floor layouts and complex series of rooms. The procession through several delightfully dingy spaces is infinitely better than one sterile space. Modern hallways lead directly from place to place, lit harshly from above. There are few bends in the path. For example, the donkey path city will forever have a more rich and complex urban fabric than the tabula rasa approach of a Voisin town plan. The micro of this scale produces the same effect. Layout of rooms sets the tone for exploring a building. The more spaces to explore, the more interesting (usually) it is.

The spirit of exploration is something that has always been with me. Recently, I feel this spirit has weakened in my thoughts about architecture. I am too afraid to take risks in my line of thinking. The possibility of failure is all too evident at all times. I realize, that to create truly interesting work, I will need to think in an interesting way. The return of complexity to architecture has been a long time coming, and I find it to be necessary. There is more to a space than the pure function. The interesting aspects of a building come through tireless detail. The parts contribute to a total, interesting whole. The qualities are based off of both a generative process to develop a strategy of circulating, but also with consideration to the experiential aspects. Buildings today clearly have little thought behind them in regards to the quality of a space. It is rendered in shades of gray, consistently and cleanly sheathing the good character with poor design. This needs to stop. We collectively need to regain a sense of "bad" design, and return a sense of backwards logic to architecture.

A Late Admission.

2010-05-15T01:59:00.003-04:00

I'm really, I mean terribly, bad at admitting things. I can never admit I am wrong, or admit failing. I can never admit fault, or that I just can't do something. If you have doubts, my sister, or anyone who knows me well, can definitely attest to this failing to own up to my wrongs. This is something I am having to come to terms with, in the constant campaign to try and stop being so stoic. Being stoic can be good, but I'm not a good stoic.

Recently, I've been hit really hard with this failure to admit. Working with others can be... frustrating, to say the least. I'm really not a team player. (I'm working on this. It's hard for me). I do my best work alone, or maybe with one other person to toss ideas around with. When I work by myself, I'm "always" right. So, it is in these group situations where I feel the highest need to be right all the time and the stoicism sets in. As far as my ego is concerned, I am literally never wrong. That's what's nice about opinions, you aren't wrong. Maybe that is why I have such strong opinions... hmmm that is something worth considering. Back to the point though, I just cannot find the respect and humbleness in my heart to just say, you got me, I was wrong. You just don't want to entertain the thought that you aren't the smartest guy in the room. Everyone thinks in different ways, so intelligence can be hard to judge, but you can't help but thinking that your brand of intelligence is more, well, intelligent. So this leads to not admitting things. This happens very frequently. I can rectify my actions in my mind, but there is no way to express feeling bad about being a jerk except for not being a jerk. In my mind, I feel bad about being a bad person at times, but no one knows the tumultuous thoughts, just the actions. My actions need to speak truthfully.

This late admission is something long coming. Being wrong sucks. No one likes to not be the smartest one in the room, but the thing is, you usually aren't the smartest guy in the room. Deal with it. I'm struggling in that respect, but maybe with a little more humble, and a little less self centered/serving attitude, this can be achieved. I admit (in a late fashion), to being a snob.

Cycling and the Seven Lamps of Architecture

2010-02-15T05:07:00.000-05:00

Sacrifice

Truth

Power

Beauty

Life

Memory

Obedience

These are the Seven Lamps of Architecture according to John Ruskin. The one in particular I want to concentrate on is Sacrifice.

Sacrifice. What does it mean to sacrifice? To give up part of yourself for the benefit of the whole. To maximize happiness for the most amount of people without regard for your own happiness. To work harder than necessary to achieve beyond the norm. Basically, enduring something so that you will eventually get something better and the loss you felt in the moment will be made worth it by the reward your sacrifice earned you. This is pretty common knowledge and sports teams across America and the World have adopted slogans and cheers that involve sacrifice. This is something simple yet important.

Cycling is a form of much enjoyment. I genuinely enjoy riding my bicycle, as many people do. I also have the desire to go fast on said bicycle. Once again, many people are going to agree with me here. The thing about going fast is you get this sense of insecurity. There is a level of safety that you give up to go fast. You also get the feeling of wind in your hair, zipping around at high speed; immersed in your surroundings. Cycling is great for this. So what does Sacrifice have to do with this? In short; everything.

If I say I want to go out to the East of High neighborhoods and just fly around, that only means one thing. I want to ride fast through the tough urban environment that is off-campus at OSU. The curved roads and changes in elevations give the ride enjoyment and complexity that you just can't get anywhere else. How fun would it be to just drive a car around? You lose something when the resultant is not earned. You complete a fine car ride through the off-campus area and upon returning you realize that you were in no ways enriched or strengthened.

Cycling is different. When I finish a tough but fun ride, I'm sweating. I'm tired, maybe a bit sore and really happy. This is something that a car cannot give you. You can put the top down on the convertible and ride with your hair flapping in the wind, but you will never recreate cycling. The sense of flying, the speed at which you move and the lack of a covering. Cycling is so exposed and simple that there is a great joy in it. If you don't sacrifice, you don't ride a bicycle. The feeling of reward achieved through sacrifice cannot be achieved any other way. Now, this isn't to say there aren't other means of movement or recreation that don't involve great amounts of sacrifice, I'm just focusing on one that is particularly enjoyable to me. The great thing is, they all share something very elemental in common. The feeling that we must pick up the old Ruskinian tenets into some new forms of logic and march on; or ride on I should say.

I'm With COCO

2010-01-13T03:12:00.004-05:00

Show your support.

Image taken from http://www.sirmikeofmitchell.com/imwithcoco/

Give this man's site a look, he's a good artist.

Hunting; An Ethical Quandary?

2009-12-31T00:33:00.005-05:00

Ok, so here's the deal. Animal rights is an important issue, and it is why I am writing this blog. Not everything about it is clear to me though, and one issue is particularly muddy. Hunting.

Where does hunting fall in the ethical category? Now, with the conventional animal rights approach, it is a definite no-no. And this makes sense; killing an animal is wrong, so how can hunting be right? It involves ending the life of an animal in a painful manner, thus depriving it of its own valuable right to life. Definitely wrong. Correct?

But...this situation isn't so simple. There are further implications of hunting. Most notably that there are actually positive consequences. Lets throw away the entire pretense of this blog post for a minute, and think about what can be positive about hunting; particularly deer hunting. Why is there a hunting season? Well, for sport I guess, but why is the control so strict? Why is gun season only one week long? The answer for this is population control. The whole reason we even have hunting as far as the government is concerned is to control animal populations. If an animal population swells far above what the ecosystem can maintain, many animals will die of starvation; quite painful. Another pretty negative side effect of high deer population is the incredible increase in cars hitting deer. This not only kills the deer, but damages vehicles and causes injuries, even deaths to drivers. If we don't contain them, they overrun. If they overrun, we kill them with our cars, they starve to death. Not much positive there. If we do control them, many are killed by artificial means, but the remaining population lives better, and less deer are hit by cars.

So, with that said, what is right? Quite frankly, I'm not sure. I personally choose not to hunt. Since not everyone is required to believe the same on the topic of animal rights, are people who hunt also right in their own sense? I know this is starting to sound like a bit of ethical relativism, but maybe there is a little going on here? By hunting, you are doing bad, but in a roundabout way causing good. By not hunting, you are doing good, but in a a roundabout way doing bad. Quite a paradox. Now of course this wouldn't be an issue if we didn't destroy the populations of their natural predators, the wolf, but wolves in the system also involve the death of many deer. You cannot stop the food chain from happening, so I guess it is just who to 'blame' for the dirty job of being at the top.

After writing this, I am not a whole lot closer to completely defining what I believe, but there was some progress. I am interested to hear your thoughts.

Of all the majors, why must Architecture be the most wasteful?

2009-11-13T21:58:00.000-05:00

This has really been bugging me lately, so I thought I would write it down. What has been bugging me is that I am part of a system that is hypocritical to say the least. This system is architecture school. We profess to be on the 'cutting edge' of green technology and we appear to be so concerned with green design and environmental consciousness. So, if we are so concerned about these things in theory and design, why are we so wasteful in a physical sense?

Model making is the single most wasteful activity I have taken part in whilst in academia. Every week, three times a week, all of us architecture majors have assignments due. Sometimes they are small assignments, just a couple of drawings or a study model. Sometimes they are large, such as a big site model or several sheets of drawings. Other times, they are enormous, like our final reviews. Huge models, sometimes several feet square, and often three or more 24" x 36" sheets of drawings. Yes, this is necessary, in a sense, to get our ideas across, but why must it be done so wastefully? Convincing people to radically change their habits with model making is stupid, so I will not do that. Instead, I would like to offer some suggestions.

Save your scraps! I say this with near certainty; if you keep your scrap materials, someone WILL use them. Unless they are pathetically small pieces of chipboard, plexiglass, whatever...someone will find a need for them. The best thing we can do to reduce waste is to be more responsible with our models. Unfortunately, recycling is a narrow option for chipboard. After doing some research, I have found that few companies take this material because it is not very valuable. Unlike corrugated cardboard, chipboard is made of a low-value pulp material that has little resale value. So, take it cradle to cradle, reuse what you already have.

Another spot of serious waste is with paper. I understand that much paper is required for architecture, and it's probably not going to change. The question I have though is, why is the students used paper not being recycled?! Paper is not hard to recycle, and there is NO reason why we don't have paper bins in every single studio. I know of one, ONE paper recycling bin in the entire building, even though architecture students use more paper than most. How hard could it be to place paper recycling bins in the studios?

In conclusion, changing our environmental habits is simple a matter of how much you care personally. It is a collective individual movement. You must use your own actions to benefit the whole, and it only works if everyone does it. I know I've got up on my soapbox before and pontificated about this, but I'm serious. Simple changes CAN make a difference, so I hope you will strive to be part of the change.

Life with a darker exposure

2009-09-28T01:41:00.000-04:00

On the way back from work a while back, I had my sunglasses on. It was slighly before 9 o'clock, so the sun was setting and it wasn't overly bright outside. Nevertheless I had my sunglasses on and when I gazed upon the sunset, it was ablaze with fierce orange, yellow and pink colors. I was stunned, so I took them off and gazed at it with naked eyes. The sunset lost all of the fierce drama, and instead had washed out pastel colors, lazily diminishing as it got later. I did this several more times for effect, and had a bit of a revelation. What is our life like when we see things exactly how they are, without the rose-colored glasses?

The plain and simple thing is, life isn't always that beautiful, great, enjoyable, whatever adjectives you want. We often see what we want, but not necessarily what is true. How often does this happen? If we don't see things for what they are, and don't realize it, how often are we in some sort of fictional la-la land of our own imagination? This thought just occurred to me, but what if we are experiencing life 'incorrectly'? What if things really aren't going well, but we just refuse to accept that and don't realize our denial? It is sort of like another thing I have been experiencing lately. I think my distance vision is getting to be marginal. Is this a because my distance vision actually is poor? Or because I expect too much out of my eyes? Give some thought to these sort of things.

I have come to see, that a lot of my first year of college was like this. I had a fake enjoyment of many not so enjoyable things around me. When I finally realized this, things were not so good for a while. You feel worse than you would've, had you just accepted the undesirable things in your life and dealt with it. Maybe this is a pessimistic way to look at it, but living truthfully is the best thing you can do for yourself.

Other than that, I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this post, but I have had part of this written in my drafts for a long time and it needed finishing. Comments?

My New Friend: A Poem

2009-08-27T00:53:00.003-04:00

Working at the store today,

I came across something interesting,

a friend of sorts.

He had little inky eyes,

and a thin wry smile.

Do you want to be my friend?

I said.

Why, maybe I would,

he said.

We had fun, he danced around.

I just stood there and laughed.

I told him a job needed done.

The slicer needed working.

While I sliced, something happened.

My friend, he started to scream.

I winced as he bled.

It was all my fault.

My friend, my index finger;

was dead.

On the extrinsic moral value of being religious

2009-08-08T01:59:00.001-04:00

Now, don't let that title scare you off. I swear, this isn't as complicated or as pointless as the title states. It is just a thought I had. It probably isn't even original, but this is the first time I thought of it, so it's new to me. Well here we go... What is the true value of religion?

This question, may be answered by selfishness. Sort of like how karma can be looked at as veiled selfishness, can't religion be as well? With karma, if you are a good person, good things will happen to you. That is ultimately selfish; do you follow? On to morals... if you believe in nothing, what motivates you to be a good person? You must develop a code of conduct for yourself, for fear of becoming a nihilist, a black hole of moral meaning. There are many moral theories, and I won't go into them here, but do you see why it's important to have some sort of theory governing your actions?

Seeing as 76% of Americans identifiy as being a Christian, it seems like there are many who choose the route of religion to define their morals. So now we are brought to the point, is religion just a way of extriniscally motivating people into doing good? What would religious peoples do without a promise of something good at the end? I would like to think that the result would be the same, regardless of the promise of heaven or not, but who knows. If when you die, you simply die, what motivation is there to do good in your life? In Christian theology, it is the promise of heaven. For non-theists, it is pushing daisies, and simply that. Is happiness the only true, motivator or all people? Is religion truly extrinsic?

Here is my stance and my feelings on this. I am a Christian, Lutheran to be more exact. My morals are governed by religion, but also by my effect on others, be it positive or negative. I want to assure happiness to myself and others. Call it Christianity with a little bit of humanism mixed in. And yes, I realize that is a contradiction, but why can't a Christian also hold some values of a humanist? People and their happiness comes before imposing my beliefs on them. Call me an anti-evangelist, I don't care, but if someone doesn't want your religion; don't bother them with it. Helping others and creating as much happiness for as many people as you can is pretty important. So, back to the point...

If religion is a creation to make people moral, then how good of a job is it doing? This is a very difficult question to answer, as there are plenty of moral non-religious folk, and plenty of religious folk out there who are complete hypocrites. It is also a difficult question because on the topic of religion, people aren't willing to consider the possibility that what they believe in isn't real. That possibility can never be completely extinguished on this Earth, because it is called faith for a reason. We don't know for sure. So what if your faith is a farce. Were you a good person for nothing? Now this is where the true extrinsic motivation or religion comes in. If you are purely extrinsically motivated, then sans religion you may cease to care about morality. If you are truly moral, I believe you will be truly moral regardless of faith or creed. So, if you are truly moral, thus not needing motivation, why be religious? After all, it seems like a lot of work. Faith is something that can ground you, make you fasten to something higher than yourself. It can bring enlightenment for some, happiness for others. Everyone has a different faith experience. The crux of it all though is a belief. The belief that there is something bigger than you out there. The promise of something better after this life. The comfort you need when life has been hard to you. Whether it is real or not, although I believe it is, religion has certainly done much good in this world. I cannot say that the track record is perfect, there are plenty of mess-ups along the way (i.e. the Crusades) but the idea of God has not, and will not cease is very powerful. Religion changes lives, whether positive or negative, and that is undeniable. So, is that why we are motivated to help others and conduct ourselves in a positive manner? I feel like we'll never know this answer. All we can do now is look inside ourselves and discover where we draw our morality. Are we intrinsic or extrinsic people? Morals are fairly serious and decide a large amount of who you are. I believe it's time we pay more attention to their derivation; and possibly discover more about ourselves.

Post Script

This started out as a simple question I asked myself. It ended up being a soapbox speach about faith, where I stand and how I feel. I'm sorry how things ended up, I really am. But... I left it there, and not extrinsically ;) I seriously want your opinions about this. Comment or otherwise contact me if you are interested.

Environmentalism Apathy

2009-07-31T02:29:00.000-04:00

There is not much, if anything that pisses me off more than environmental apathy. Maybe I'm insane, but I don't even know how to understand not caring about the environment. There is so much wrong with our current state of affairs, and when people don't realize that we must make changes, I go nuts. Here are my biggest beefs with the apathetics.

1. Recylcing - How can something so simple be so difficult to people? When I ask why someone doesn't recycle, there is never a good reason. "Oh, we burn our trash" or "We just don't recycle." My response to that? I just "don't want to associate with you anymore." For example, the nearest recylcing center to me is in Findlay, about a fifteen minute drive. Most Arlington residents go to Findlay a few times a week to shop, etc... or work in Findlay and are their every weekday, plus some weekends. So, my response to people who don't recycle, yet travel to Findlay regularly is, what's holding you back? Laziness? Complete apathy? Ignorance? Come on, what gives? It takes fifteen minutes out of your precious time, but if everyone did it, maybe our landfills wouldn't be so, well, full. Plastic bottles take 450 years to decompose in ideal conditions, let alone a landfill which is far from ideal. Do you want your kids, and their kids and so on to deal with your 20 ounce bottled messes?

2. Ignorance - Our environmental problems are very real, and very present. There is Something New Under the Sun as the book by J.R. McNeill says. That thing is pollution, in our lakes, rivers, streams, oceans, soil and air. That pollution hasn't been there since the world has existed, we did it. We have exploited our natural resources and carelessly littered our planet with toxins and wastes. Man, the great creator, and destructor. It is so obvious that pollution is our fault, that not doing anything about it is more than just foolish, it is morally wrong. How much utility does being careless have? It creates much happiness for a few (CEO's of polluting companies) and much pain for everyone else who is affected by their environmental carelessness. How much overall gain is there? We are charged with being good stewards of the Earth, when are we going to start? All of us. Environmentalism is a team effort, that is started and grows with individuals.

3. Excuses - "Well, if China doesn't clean up their act, it doesn't matter what we do." Bullshit. Pure, and simple. WE are the ones so unwilling to change, WE are the number one polluters, WE are not setting an example to other "inferior" countries by continuing to be extremely wasteful.

Don't believe me? Read this article from "The Washington Post." We, the United States, are the number one offenders. It's time to face the music and make changes. There are many things you can do, and I shall list some below.

What YOU can do.

This is by NO means a comprehensive list. These are just recommendations, some obvious, others not so, that can be done to reduce our impact on the Earth.

Recycle - Do I need to explain this?

Buy Local - If you buy products produced and sold locally, what are the gains? The gains are simple to see; since the production is closer to the market, less fuel is used in transit. Also, if you buy local, you support your local economy, encouraging more goods to be produced in your area, snowballing the positive effect.

Buy Used - If you buy a used product, its environmental cost has already been actualized. If you were to buy that same product new, that would cause more production. Used however, is a form of recycling, and you can find some pretty neat things by looking in used stores. Overall, limiting our consumerism is a good idea. It saves money, and the environmental costs of production.

Take a Shorter Shower - The average shower flows at about 1 gallon of water per minute. Take 1 minute off of your daily shower, and that's 365 gallons saved per year. Take two minutes off, that's 730 gallons. You get the point. This is a very simple and easy saver of resources, time and money. Also on these same lines, turn the water off when you shave and brush your teeth. You really only need it on when the device needs to be cleaned off.

Ride Your Bike - If you aren't going far, and have a light load, why take a car? It may be convenient, but let me slap something incovenient on you, we are slowly destroying the environment with our fossil fuel burning car emissions. Take a bike. It is good exercise, and the only environmental costs are the initial production of the bike and the food you must eat to nourish your body for bike riding. By riding your bike 20 miles per week for errands in a city, you can save 1 gallon of gas. If everyone did this, imagine the ruduction of emissions and petroleum consumption?

Now, these changes we can all make are minute, at best. The thing about environmentalism is, we must cooperate. United we stand, Divided we fall. This rings so true with environmentalism. If one person does all they can to reduced their impact and no one else helps, the overall impact is nonexistant. If millions become more aware, the impact can be large. We must work together to help save the planet. Every little bit counts.

Apples, the most sinister of all handfruits?

2009-07-22T00:44:00.000-04:00

Well, are they? I mean, they are always the fruit that gets poisoned in movies. Thoughts? Please comment.

Why I may soon eradicate animal flesh from my diet.

2009-07-07T01:06:00.000-04:00

When I revealed this to my mother, she accepted it with much more ease than I ever could have imagined. My father though, was a completely different account. A few nights ago at the dinner table, my mother, who I had already told, made a comment in passing about me thinking about not eating meat anymore. My dad then asked me if it was true, and I said yes. He couldn't believe it. It was probably the funniest show of unsupportive parenting I've seen a while. I could hardly suppress laughter. Moving on though to why I might actually take the plunge away from animal flesh consumption...

For most of my life, I never thought twice about eating meat. Well, maybe once or twice, but the Bible says that humans are meant to have domain over all other animals, and then without another thought, I ate my cheeseburger. Now, this doesn't work for everyone. Many people don't believe what the Bible says, and for morals/ethics, I don't think that you can use religion to define it. This never occurred to me until taking a moral philosophy class last quarter at OSU. It makes sense though, not using religion as a basis for morals. Not everyone believes in religion, so why should they follow a moral code from something they see as a complete farce? Also, the Bible doesn't always give you clear ways to act morally, so you have to fill in the gaps. This is where moral theory comes in. You wipe religion out of the equation, and develop a system that everyone can follow, regardless of faith. Now, there are many theories and theorists, but that is a completely different discussion. The only one I am going to go into is Peter Singer and a book called Animal Liberation.

Singer wrote it, and for my Philosophy 130 (ethics) we read one passage. The argument is pretty straightforward, as most Singer is, but the conclusion isn't quite as clear. The basis of the argument is animals can feel pain. That is undeniable. If animals can feel pain, then they have interests, avoiding pain and pursuing pleasure (basic utilitarianism). Because they have these interests, it is wrong to cause them pain. The second part of this is that some animals have something above just interests, they have the rigth to life. If an animal is self-aware and can feel pain, it is morally wrong to end its life. There is no way the satisfaction of a cheeseburger outweighs ending the life of a cow. Now, there is much debate about self awareness, but most simply defined, it is the ability of the animal to perceive itself as existing as the same being in the future. Basically, it knows what is going on and if you end its life, you are clearly in the wrong because of the similarity to humans. Debate about self awareness and the ability to tell if an animal is self aware aside, killing an animal is pretty easy to be seen as wrong with this logic.

Now, the conclusion, isn't quite so neat. Since the basis of the "interests" argument is pain and pleasure, if you don't cause pain to a non-self aware animal, are you in the right? Well, yes, sort of. Is it possible? I do not think so. If you can kill a non-self aware animal painlessly, you can eat it, but can that be done? I'm still waiting for someone to name a way. Thus, it is only logical that according to Singer, vegetarianism is required from a moral standpoint.

I find this difficult to disagree with. Yeah, meat tastes good and I eat it a fair amount, but does my pleasure outweigh the pain of ending an animals life or is even necessary for me to be eating animal flesh? No and no. Ending a life is presumably the biggest loss you can incur upon a being, and your simple pleasure of a good taste in your mouth can't outweigh that. For the latter comment, is eating meat necessary? I think that eating meat is completely NOT necessary. Now, thousands of years ago, hunter-gatherers needed to kill animals to survive. In today's world though, do we actually have to kill animals to survive? Absolutely not! You can live and eat quite healthy without eating meat. If someone can give a good, unreputable explanation why eating meat in our civilized society is necessary, let 'er rip because I want to hear it. And "it tastes good" is NOT a legitimate reason. Now, in poorer nations where they do have to eat meat to survive, is it wrong? To be logically consistent, yes, but is starving a logical alternative? No it is not. This is sort of like how I see abortion. Wrong, yes, but in some situations, it may well be necessary to avoid an undue amount of pain and suffering. Starving children seems to be undue pain and suffering.

In conclusion, I believe that eating meat is wrong, and I might be stopping soon. The biggest obstacle in my way is probably eating at home. There won't always be a vegetarian option, like at school. Also, it seems wrong for me to impose on friends or other people if I'm at their house and require vegetarian food in contrast with their non-vegetarian food. There is also the ridicule from family and friends, but I don't really care about that. If they really think I'm a loon, they can read this post to see where I'm coming from or realize that quite a few people think deeper about what goes into our meat eating habit. The biggest hurdle however, is getting over never eating so many foods that I love so much. I love cheeseburgers, steak, BBQ chicken, lamb, etc... It is hard to see life without those foods. But, in the end, does my pleasure outweigh that of ending the life of an animal? And that answer I believe, is a no.

For all the Twitter-haters out there...

2009-06-05T18:34:00.002-04:00

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1603637,00.html
I recommend reading this slightly outdated, one page article about twitter, especially if you are a "hater"

I just don't understand the hate. At first, I was so, so reluctant to tweet. I thought it was kind of silly, and I wasn't sure what others would think. Now quite frankly, I'm pretty addicted and could care less what people think about it. Twitter is fun and entertaining in its simplicity of form. You can "follow" friends, actors, whoever really, and their tweets show up on your home page where you can read them. Now, this may seem super pointless to people, but to me, and a few million other people, it is a most excellent diversion. There are plenty of facebook junkies out there and that is perfectly acceptable. Why not twitter? If anything, twitter is better to be "addicted" to because there is much less to do on the site. I spend a fairly short amount of time daily on twitter, yet publish several tweets, often from my iPod touch or mobile while on the go. It takes a few seconds to type, then its done. Also, you can use the sweet term "I just twatted" to describe tweeting in the past tense. I find that rather enjoyable, even if it isn't overly appropriate.

Now, if twitter isn't your thing, that's totally ok with me. Some people just don't want to asnwer that ever looming question, "what are you doing?" and that is perfectly alright. I happen to like answering that ever present question and do so several times daily. I keep up with random things about a few friends and check out cool links that a few people I follow post. My simple pleasures of tweeting don't affect a single twitter-hater but I seem to receive a fair amount of grief for it. If you don't like it, don't tell me about it. Why waste your time preaching to a not so captive audience? If it was something harmful, then maybe the hate is warranted, but twitter is most certainly harmless. You may say that it turns your brain to mush, but I believe facebook is far higher on the brain degradation scale. Social networking; more like Social Notworking. These wonderful diversions are simply a result of the technology age, and I welcome them. Tech is kinda my thing, and if you have a problem with that, I'm sure there are plenty of other luddites out there you can complain to. But please, spare me your wasted breath and leave my silly pastimes alone.

There's a chain from your hand to mine and I can't let go of it...

2009-06-05T17:57:00.003-04:00

Ever listen to a song, I mean really listen to it, then something hits you like a ton of bricks? Whatever it is that hits you is almost an ethereal, spiritual feeling. It is a feeling that can't accurately be put into words, but it succeeds in putting everything out of your mind. All you hear is the voice, the guitar, the whatever. All that matters at that moment in the universe is what you are listening to. Everything else is dropped, you don't need it. I don't know why it happens or how I happened upon this feeling, but I just experienced it.

I'm currently working on my Architecture portfolio and listening to an album I had listened to completely several times before. For me, this album is incredible and my current favorite, but to most people it is nothing extraordinary. Something however, strikes me about this album and I have been listening to it a lot lately. There are several emotionally and politically charged songs, but one especially I listened to. It is called "Citizen Go Back To Sleep." For the many previous times I had listened to this album - called Rust by No, Really - I had not been too affected by anything else. This time, the ninth track on the ten track album, "Thousand Yard Stare," absolutely slayed me. It was the experience I mentioned above. The lyrics, the powerful voice, the pounding piano and the rhythmic and simple guitar. That's it. I was encompassed by chills and emotion. I don't know the full meaning of these feelings. It was that 'hear it once, gotta hear it a million times' feeling, but there was something else there as well. As I continue to try and figure out exactly what this song speaks of, and what triggered my burst of emotion, I recommend you check out this album for yourself.

http://www.jamendo.com/en/album/7365
I suggest you download it and listen to the whole thing. This is my current favorite album, hands down. Pure, beautiful, simplicity. That's it. I find it to be very powerful that so much is done with so little. Especially listen to track nine, "Thousand Yard Stare."

If you happen to read this and listen to the songs. Please, tell me what you think. Am I crazy? Do you agree? Do you feel something else? I want to know. Maybe I'm crazy, but something about this song/album really got to me. I hope you check it out and maybe discover something about yourself as well.

The Public: 1 Time Warner: 0 - Unfortunately, it's not over...

2009-04-22T16:21:00.004-04:00

Well, it appears as if Time Warner Cable has seen the light, for now:
http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090416/ap_on_hi_te/tec_metered_internet

This however doesn't mean that the debate is over. This article is quite current, just last Thursday (04/16/09), so more information is sure to come. Here is another article similar to the first that gives a slightly different view. This article is from last Wednesday (04/15/09):
http://www.betanews.com/article/Tests-of-Time-Warner-broadband-cap-rescheduled-debates-continue/1239815400

These talk more of delays and less of completely shelving the issue. What is their plan? To let it go for a few months and hope that people forget about it? Take a look at this quote from the first article by Time Warner Cable's CEO Glenn Britt

"It is clear from the public response over the last two weeks that there is a great deal of misunderstanding about our plans to roll out additional tests on consumption-based billing,"

Misunderstanding? Really? I think it's quite simple, and I firmly believe that everyone that is in a test market would agree. I think the only misunderstanding here is Time Warner Cable not listening to their customers, and I'm certainly not alone in that belief.

Lastly, I am sorry for partially misinforming you with a blog that was a little behind the times. Although this debate is not over, it isn't quite the hot issue it was before I saw this article. It is my mistake for not checking before posting. Continue to keep updated though, as this could change again. Thanks for reading.

My YouTube Video of the Day:
Inspired Bicycles
^^^completely blew my mind, everything in it

A sucker punch to the consumer, courtesy of Time Warner Cable

2009-04-21T16:38:00.000-04:00

This: http://www.gamerswithjobs.com/node/44497?page=1

For those who rely on Time Warner Cable for internet, this is, potentially, the bleak future. In case you missed the near criminal injustice in the article that is currently in 'Phase 2' this is it in a nutshell:

Time Warner is currently testing a system in four cities where they will charge you for internet usage based on usage. The more gigabytes you use, the more you pay. Pretty simple. Very unfair.

This could very severely change the way most of us use the internet. For example, let's take Time Warner's introductory plan, and try to make that 5 gigabytes for $29.99 actually mean something. Lets say you enjoy YouTube (as many of us do), keeping up with your favorite shows on hulu (which is also common, one must assume), download music (either legal or illegal), and also have a NetFlix account (less common, but still a factor to consider). YouTube videos are small, conservatively estimated at around 10-15 megabytes (could not find reliable data), so they may seem insignificant, but if you watch a lot of YouTube, these will add up. Now look at hulu; the video quality isn't excellent, it is considerably higher than YouTube, making larger file sizes. So lets conservatively estimate a hulu video size at 200 megabytes (as I could not find the appropriate data for this). Now, onto the big guns, the NetFlix. At 8 gigabytes a pop, an HD movie is quite a large file to stream. Now lets refer to our aforementioned price plan. Do you see the problem? One NetFlix movie puts you over the cap for $29.99 a month, which I think is safe to say approximately the amount per month that your internet is at home.

Ok, so you might be saying, but I don't have NetFlix, nor do I want it. Lets break it down then, without that large 8 gigabyte movie. Here are the values we will use:
YouTube Video = 15 mb
30 minute show on hulu = 200 mb
average song = 4 mb
average webpage = 1/3 mb

You watch 20 YouTube videos a month
You watch 2 shows a week (8 a month) on hulu
You download 10 songs a month
You visit 100 web pages (this means every single page you load from every site you go to, not just the total amount of sites)

These usages add up fast:
300 mb of YouTube
1600 mb of hulu
40 mb of music
33 mb of webpages

These make 1973 mb, or approximately 2 gb
Well, now, that isn't near 5 gb, and you are right about that. Although, I can safely say that this example is very light usage. If you download music via file sharing, such as BitTorrent, Limewire, etc... you could amass quite a bill. Or, on a more legal side, if you watch a lot of tv online, download songs from iTunes or Rhapsody, that habit could be affected. Personally, this is quite a problem for me. I'm currently watching The Office on nbc.com every week, plowing through Arrested Development and Stella on hulu.com, watching the occasional Family Guy episode, also on hulu.com, downloading small quantities of music, and browsing tons of web pages. On my own, I approach 5 gb. This is a problem, seeing that at home, I would be sharing an internet connection with my family (four other people) that all use the internet. Even though their usage probably will not match mine, every page and video adds up.

Now, at school, this seemingly has no effect. You can use your internet limitlessly, with reckless abandon, sucking up as much bandwith as you want! Right? Yes, as far as I know, but do you know who provides OSU internet? Time Warner Cable

So, what if Time Warner decides to up their rates to the university for the massive usage? We, the students will be left picking up the tab, in the form of some other stupid 'technology fee' or a tuition increase. That, is exactly what we don't need; to pay more for college.

I guess the moral of the story is, Time Warner is treading on thin ice here. They are practically an internet monopoly, limiting prices and speed, but are they about to limit its innovation by limiting content as well? For an explanation on how they could possibly cut down innovation, refer to this article by The Washington Post

Well, that is all that I have to say about this topic. If you wish to contact Time Warner Cable, email them at realideas@twcable.com, or check out the website SaveTheInternet.com where you can find out more about this and the main overarching issue of Net Neutrality. Thanks for reading.

This blog: An evil plot to destroy the internets

2009-04-14T00:38:00.002-04:00

I for one, found this hulu comercial to be very funny. Along with its overall cleverness, I particularly liked the scene where it shows Alec Baldwin, and the man whose brain is being gelatinized, in alternating frames laughing manaically. I don't know why, but things like that just inspire myself to laugh. Anyway, moving on to the more boring stuff, the analysis...

The quote: "hulu, an evil plot to destroy the world. Enjoy" really got me laughing. This phrase, at a glance, can mean many different things. To someone so naive, it could really mean, that hulu is an evil empire that should scare the shit out of you. Or, it could mean that they have a sense of humor. I hope that most people can differentiate these two. Beyond that aspect even, this line reveals even more. It almost blatantly shows who the target audience of hulu really is; teens and young adults. For must of us, if we showed our parents this comercial, they would probably enjoy it, but to our classmates, the level of appreciation is a bit higher. The whole theme of brains being 'gelatinized' seems pretty kooky and immature, and that is just the right type of humor for their audience. I mean, take a look at most 18-24 year olds YouTube favorites lists, and you'll get my drift. Hulu has mass appeal to the market whose mass appeal is the internet. Us.

So much time is spent on the internet in this day and age. Hulu is just another company capitalizing on this online revolution, and offering a very handy service. The video makes mention of turning off your computer and television as a silly notion, and sadly, it is. So maybe our brains are turning to mush after all, and this whole 'internet' thing is just an evil plot. How interesting. You can think about it if you like, I'm gonna go back to enjoying my jaded life with a brain of mush.

My YouTube Video of the Day:

The MacBook Wheel

Twitter and Facebook, a new kind of online revolution?

2009-04-08T14:34:00.003-04:00

As the internet becomes more and more popular, new trends rise and fall. One trend that is now wildly popular, and will remain so, is social networking. Sites like Facebook and Twitter make it so easy to follow every action of your friends that it takes virtually no effort. You log on, view your news feed and voila! You have just learned some juicy gossip about some random person you met at a party once and decided to become friends with on Facebook.

On Twitter, the level of following can be even more intimate. It is less big picture details, more up to the minute life updates. Imagine Facebook, but you can only update your status. Enter, Twitter! This seemingly pointless web application can actually do more for your relationships than you think. As mentioned in the New York Times article "Brave New World of Digital Intimacy", it can strengthen relationships. It gives you a closer look at the lives of people you may not know overly well. It also can be a useful resource for finding out information. In the NY Times article, Laura Fritton joked that "she no longer buys anything worth more than $50 without quickly checking it with her Twitter network." This places the spotlight on an increasing trend of peoples lives moving online.

The above quotation raises questions of whether the online social networking revolution is a good or bad thing. There are plenty of benefits, such as the one described, or for strengthening weak relationships amongst acqaintances. This raises the question of what effect does this online life have on real life and real life relationships?

The strata of my existence

2009-04-07T15:29:00.003-04:00

Looking into my personal stores of sustenance, you find a variety of unhealthy sodium ridden snacks and such. A box of 'Nilla Wafers, Cheez-its, Oreos, Easy Mac and a few varieties of soups, chocked full of sub par noodles and enough sodium to dry out the entire state of Rhode Island. You also will find a case of XXX Vitamin Water I was forced to waste my last seven swipes from last quarter because of neglecting to efficiently use them. On a healthier side, I also have some fresh fruit of the citrus variety and an odd cup of yogurt or two. This whole collection is finally capped off with my two addictions; chewing gum and coffee.

Now, based on the assumption that your food reflects your attributions, you would probably be left to assume that I am an out of shape, lazy college student who doesn't sleep and drinks coffee and chews gum like they're going out of style. Now, these assumptions are, of course, false, but I do believe your diet, especially snacking, can possibly reflect your own attributes. For instance, you may notice that none, or little, of my food would be defined as breakfast material. This is because having lots of breakfast food means you usually wake up early. The notion of me waking up early is entirely false, instead preferring to awake around nine or ten in the morning with a few rays of late morning sunshine glowing through the cracks in my curtains.

The notion of defining oneself by one's consumption is kind of a presumptuous thought in my opinion. For instance, I happen to like pretzels a lot, but don't have any (a travesty if there ever was one), so you would have never known that I had a fancy for them if I hadn't just told you. Also, trying to place qualities on people from their possessions is sort of judging isn't it? And judging is bad, mmmkay? It is related to a thing we call prejudice, and take a look at history, or in our modern world, to see how well that has served society. In case you have lived in a cave for the majority of your life, prejudice sucks, and humanity will be better off when it is gone.

Now, if you actually wanted to get to know someone, you would do more than check out their cupboard right? Even though it at times can be a struggle, human to human communication remains popular. Having friends, acquaintances, and significant others is a large part of our daily life, and cannot be undervalued. So go on, open up the fridge door and get to know the people in your life better.

My YouTube Video of the Day:
Brohemian Rhapsody

Also, check out Internet People

The Web, Never Gonna Give You Up

2009-04-01T14:57:00.000-04:00

I love the internet. No, I really do. There is so much out there, so much humor, truth, and also, misleading information. You can find out nearly anything, just from a few minutes of your time and a deft hand at google searching. There is also this aspect of the internet, blogging. The fact that the internet is run by user created content is just awesome to me. We all would like to think we are making a difference somehow right? Enter, the internet! You can blog your little heart out, post YouTube videos, and share information, instantly! With a world already dependent on the net, and only to grow more dependent, it's kind of mind boggling to think of what the future holds. As a resident geek, this is fascinating to me. Technology, mass media, current issues, all this stuff is interesting, and important to me. The internet leaves it all at your fingertips. Which is pretty cool, don't you think?

I leave you today with this interesting article here.

And...

My YouTube video of the day:
Internet People