Final meaningful Essay

In the course of this year our main goal has been to find out what makes life meaningful or meaningless. What makes life meaningful and how people live there lives meaningful or meaningless while opening our minds to newer ideas. We will never have a definite definition of what is a good and meaningful life but we can share our own ideas of what we think, thought we may not agree we are all humans and we all live together on this planet. The question “what is our purpose on earth?” and “what were we put here for?” I find is asked a lot by people. I personally think we were put here for a reason so why not make the best of it, life is a playground, go have fun with it. How do we know where not living in a dream, that what we see is real. I think being able to question our own reality is also part of living a good and meaningful life, if we believe everything we hear what would our world be like. We live in a society that has a double standard. If you don’t follow the morals of the society then you aren’t living a good and meaningful life, and if your following the rules then you are living a good and meaningful life. I think fulfilling your own personal happiness is all you need to live a good and meaningful life. Why should anyone have control over how you make your own happiness. In our society we are taught from a young age what is right and wrong. But how do we really know what is right and wrong when the only thing we have to base it off from is what we have been told. The story we read in class about the guy who had to choose between saving an infant baby on train tracks or a expensive car he spent his whole life saving for is a good example of how everyone would raise there hand to save the baby because it’s a breathing living thing unlike the car that is just a accessory. How do you determine the importance of something, and are you a bad person for choosing the “materialistic” item over the human being. How do we really know what the right choices in life are. I say whatever makes you happy because I feel your own happiness is the only thing I can control. You cant control how society sees you, but you can control what makes you happy and I think if your happy what’s wrong with life. I find that when I’m happy I don’t focus on the little “bad” things going on in life.

The idea of a good and meaningful life affects us physically as well as mentally. We look upon fat people as bad and skinny people as good. That because your fat your not living a good and meaningful life because your too busy eating and damaging your body. You will never see an “over weight” male or female on the cover of vanity fare or Glamour because its not the idea they want to sell. The only place you will see an overweight person on a magazine is if its TMZ or another tabloid magazine. Our society is very superficial in the in the idea that only a size 2 person is beautiful when we all come in different shapes and sizes. Why let society telling how we should look control and affect how we live a good life.

At the beginning of the year we went outside and asked random people in the street was meaningful in there lives. A lot of people said there friends, family and children. Money, love and there pets. Being able to live comfortably without having to worry about if the bills are late and if you have enough money to get through the week I think is a good life in my opinion. Then there’s people like Paris Hilton who were given all the money they have and didn’t have to work for it. Do they deserve it? Are they living good and meaningful lives because it was handed to them? We look at this as not being fair but how can we judge other people. At the end of the day you are the only one who controls your life and you get to make any decision you want, do what makes you happy. But in my opinion you should go outside and do something fun because sitting on your ass all day doesn’t seam so fun. theres always options, choose the best one.

Collapse assignment #1

After reading about the easter island, something intresting i noticed was that these polynesian indiginous people were able to build 20 foot structures without any form technoligy. what i also found intresting was the island ecosystem was going through a change deforestation occured and extinction of plants happened.

Comparing what happened to this civilization to our own, i see us going in the same direction because we are currently going throught a state of global warming and this could possibly lead to our own dissaperence off the face of the earth. the differences are extremly visable, our society is dependent on industrialistic machinary. without it our society would collapse resulting in a demise in our population. On the other hand the eatser island people were hunter and gather's depending on there enviroment only to survive and relying on each other.

I can also connect this to when dinosaurs roamed the planet, they were also hunters and gather's and become extinct by a natural disaster.

Final Food Essay.

When we go to the supermarket, there’s a section for every kind of food. The Frozen section, the canned foods section and the section for fruits, vegetables and meats. When we look at the fruits and vegetables section in the supermarket the image of them being grown on a farm , sitting in the sun being taken cared of by farmers usually comes in mind because, that’s what industry commercials on T.V display to us. When in reality there being modified and sprayed with pesticides. Nor are they being hand grown by farmers, but are industrialized for production. Same goes for the meat industry. The abuse of animals has increased dramatically. The reason for why food industries must abuse there animals to get from them what they want is very unclear to me. There are more humane ways to kill an animal and its not to slit its throat and electrocute it. The living conditions as well for these animals is kept private because they don’t want us to know what they do to the animals before its sent to the nearest McDonalds or Wendy’s. The cows at a lot of these industrial places are kept in small confined areas with many other cows and its impossible for them to move and it adds stress onto the cow. The feed they also give the cows is meant to fatten the cows very quickly which isn’t healthy for the cows and it affects the quality of the meat. For the unfortunate chickens that get to be killed for McDonalds menu’s, the chickens are kept in unhealthy living conditions are beaten, electrocuted and have there throats slit before being into chicken nuggets or chicken sandwiches. By doing this to the chickens, they become extremely stressed making the chicken unhealthy, and making the chicken itself unhealthy. We may think that there may be one or two things on the menu that could possible be healthy but no. even the salads from McDonalds contain sugar and from the McDonalds Website it states “None of our products is certified as vegetarian” They also claim that 50% of there chicken nuggets are actually meat. I think that’s a bunch of shit because chicken is only one ingredient & there about 500 other ingredients so I don’t see how that takes up half. http://nutrition.mcdonalds.com/nutritionexchange/itemDetailInfo.do
There’s probably a percentage of Americans that do know this already but what percentage of Americans actually change there eating habits because of it.

America is big on the food industry because it’s a system that can make a lot more artificial food and it will cost us less but this system is affecting Americans health. In the present 1 in every 3 children is overweight or obese. The people who work at these slaughter houses are usually immigrants who will do a lot for very little pay. A lot of what they make these workers do is very dangerous, working with high powered and very sharp objects. A lot of these workers become severely injured and cannot work but have to because they cannot afford to take days off from there jobs. We rely on food to keep us alive and healthy. Food industries make it hard for us to make healthy decisions on food because fast food like McDonalds and Wendy’s is so accessible to us. Its much cheaper then going to the store and buying fruit that is expensive in some places. Its also comes faster then having to come home and cook all day. Because of all the artificial flavors and chemicals they put in fast food it taste good and makes us want to come back for more. The government sees the increase of health problems within the United States like heart Diseases, high blood pressure and diabetes within adults and children. It seams impossible to buy healthy food because its to expensive and the un healthy food is very cheap. Growing our own looks to be the only other option because there seams to be no other alternative for the industrial food system. I think we don’t speak up about the problem is because its not directly in front of our faces, we don’t see the damage it does and it makes it harder for us to do anything about it. I think the Future for American isn’t going to be good, the percentage of BMI (body mass index) for the average healthy person has increased dramatically meaning people are coming more overweight and obese. Its becoming harder for people to exercise and eat right, people are dying at younger ages and we seams to be ignoring the reason why.

The problem with our "Food"

When we go to the supermarket, there’s a section for every kind of food. The Frozen section, the canned foods section and the section for fruits, vegetables and meats. When we look at the fruits and vegetables section in the supermarket the image of them being grown on a farm , sitting in the sun being taken cared of by farmers usually comes in mind because, that’s what industry commercials on T.V display to us. When in reality there being modified and sprayed with pesticides. Nor are they being hand grown by farmers, but are industrialized for production. Same goes for the meat industry. The abuse of animals has increased dramatically. The reason for why food industries must abuse there animals to get from them what they want is very unclear to me. There are more humane ways to kill an animal and its not to slit its throat and electrocute it. The living conditions as well for these animals is kept private because they don’t want us to know what they do to the animals before its sent to the nearest McDonalds or Wendy’s. The cows at a lot of these industrial places are kept in small confined areas with many other cows and its impossible for them to move and it adds stress onto the cow. The feed they also give the cows is meant to fatten the cows very quickly which isn’t healthy for the cows and it affects the quality of the meat. There’s probably a percentage of Americans that do know this already but what percentage of Americans actually change there eating habits because of it.

America is big on the food industry because it’s a system that can make a lot more artificial food and it will cost us less but this system is affecting Americans health. In the present 1 in every 3 children is overweight or obese. We rely on food to keep us alive and healthy. Food industries make it hard for us to make healthy decisions on food because fast food like McDonalds and Wendy’s is so accessible to us. Its much cheaper then going to the store and buying fruit that is expensive in some places. Its also comes faster then having to come home and cook all day. Because of all the artificial flavors and chemicals they put in fast food it taste good and makes us want to come back for more. The government sees the increase of health problems within the United States like heart Diseases, high blood pressure and diabetes within adults and children. It seams impossible to buy healthy food because its to expensive and the un healthy food is very cheap. I think we don’t speak up about the problem is because its not directly in front of our faces, we don’t see the damage it does and it makes it harder for us to do anything about it.

Micheal Pollan's Argument

For this assignment please respond briefly to Michael Pollan's argument, in the first few pages of Omnivore's Dilemma, that we as a culture lack a stable food culture like the Italians or French, are obsessed with health, are confused and anxious about food, and therefore easily succumb to various expert-directed food fads.

What food experts do you and your family pay attention to - scientists, journalists, chefs, commercials on tv, doctors, nutritionists, health officials, book authors?

I think that his point is true that we obsess about food so much that we end up doing the wrong thing and adding extra stress if were doing it right and looking for fast results when it takes time. i think we do depend on other sources of food experts because i think we think with every new idea were gonna get different results and the thing is the results are all the same. it doesnt work.

my family watches the food network alot and thats where my moms gets alot of ideas for recipes and ideas for dinner. my aunt depends on exersise videos for her to work out thinking that its gonn make her slimmer & my uncle does his own thing and eats wat he wants and hes actually quite skinny.

May Day

Looking at the wikipedia website to get information about may day i think its kinda stupid. We cant even remember when they day is, if you went into the street and asked 100 people what day is may day and what's it about i don't think half those people are going to remember. we don't really celebrate it because we have forgotten about it. i don't think people even care about the holiday because its not as important as christmas and thanksgiving because there's nothing to do to celebrate it. And the website says the United States has its own labor day that isn't in may but at the beginning of september so we have two different things going on.

Grocery Store Shooping

When me and my mom go to the Grocery store my mother buys grapes and bananas, sometimes peaches and plums for herself. We don't buy fruits and vegetables and grains daily or weekly. my mom buys fruit for herself daily but vegetables and grains we don't buy at all. were not big vegetable and grain eaters. we are meat eaters.

Usually when i go into my supermarket they have all the fruit and vegetables right by the entrance. kinda hinting that thats the first thing they want you to see so they want you to buy more of it because it spoils quick and they want to get rid of it.

I've never really been taught to eat a wide variety of foods. or i've been givin the food and i refuse to eat it because I'm to picky or i just don't like it. My favorite meal is the one we have every sunday which is fried chicken cutlet with white rice. and a pattern i see with myself is I have to snack until i go to bed because if i dot feel full i cant sleep because it temps me to get up and eat something.