Advancement as a writer

My development as a writer has really accelerated in this semester. With writing three very long papers, I was able to see myself as a writer develop throughout the length of these papers. I think the most important point as to why I have developed as a writer from these papers was that I was able to write about topics that I found very interesting as opposed to old books that I found extremely boring. This is something that allowed me to actually enjoy what I was doing while writing and to enjoy the research I did for my paper. Another technique used in the class that really helped me develop my writing was the individual discussion sessions about the different research topics. These helped me get a feel for how good of a topic mine was and how much research I could really do. I also thought that a lot of the videos shown in class were helpful to giving us a good feel as to what the research paper is about. A good example of this were the videos on the goo vs. prickles. Overall I am very happy that I took this class as it has helped me advance as a writer immensely.

Peer Review science feature

Brendan’s paper:

               -I thought the lead was really good. It was very interesting and brought me into the paper very well.

               -Could have developed the intro lead a little bit more to make it a more effective hook.

               -I found all of the examples that you found very interesting. Especially the large part about the 3D printing.

               -I think you could add a bit more of a comprehensive conclusion to wrap up the paper and your thoughts on 3D printing.

               -Transitions are good

Kelly’s paper:

               -I think you had a great first sentence that sparked a ton of interest to keep reading but after the first sentence you went right into the heart of the paper. I think you could do a little more with the lead.

               -I think the first paragraph can be broken up to be smaller paragraphs that are more specific to one sub-topic,

               -You did a good job of simply explaining the cost benefits of making and selling meth.

Spencer’s paper:

               -Good lead

               -good data to support points

               -Needs a better conclusion to either wrap up the paper or expand on the future

Science lead

The pharmaceutical industry has become one of the largest industries in the world with the introduction of new drugs every year to treat any symptoms that one human being might have. If any one person went into someone’s house, they would most likely find an array of pills to treat countless amounts of undesirable symptoms. This has become somewhat of a problem across the United States. Putting aside the illegal use and distribution of prescription pills, even legally prescribed pills can be a massive problem because these medications don’t affect any two people in the exact same way. This makes it very difficult for doctors to correctly prescribe the medication that someone might need. There is however a new field of technology that can be the fix for this problem. The new technology of digestible computerized pills will allow doctors to monitor the exact effects of pills on the person taking the medication. With the information gained from these pills, there is no telling what kinds of advances we could make in medicine.

Overview of science feature topic

For my science feature paper, I will be writing about the new field of digestible technology. With the FDA just recently approving the first ever digital pill, this topic of research will be blowing up to epic proportions in the coming years. The possibilities for this field of research would give doctors a faster and simpler way of monitoring patient’s health through the use of brand new technology.

1.      Introduction.

-Intro of the new field

2.    Discussion

- History and current use of digestible medicine (medical pills, supplements…)

3. Current Research that is going on now and new technology that has come out

4. Future of this field of research and technology

5. Conclusion

Conference week assignment 3

For the comparison assignment, I read student 2’s and student 7’s essays. The first thing that brought me into these two essays and essay is the titles. Student 2 had a very good title called “The fountain of youth”. This got me very interested in what this essay might be about. While this title was very grabbing, the other title I didn’t think was quite as good in terms of bringing the reader in. The title of student 7’s essay was simply “Abu Ghraib”. This told me what the essay was going to be about but didn’t necessarily leave me with a desire to want to continue reading. As for the essays themselves, I thought both were very well written features in which I feel that I’ve learned something. Both had strong introductions that got me pulled into the essay. I could see that a large amount of research and time was put into making these authors experts on the topic. Something that I took away from these essays was the technique of being able to be informative and scientific while still making the essay very enjoyable to the reader.

Conference week assignment 2

For the second assignment I read, “So who can we kill?” by Michael Crowley. This science feature was about the government’s use and misuse of unmanned drone technology. There really wasn't very much science in this feature at all other than a few comments about the drones themselves. Most of the essay talked about the government itself and Obama’s actions regarding the drones. The author used some story like techniques to describe the problems with the unmanned drones and even more specifically, the irresponsibility of the government in using them. This article also took a turn to an issue that can be considered even larger and that is the seemingly unchecked secrecy that the government is allowed to use with they’re power. In my opinion, this was a great essay in explaining the controversial issue of the use of drones and the secrecy that the government overuses with them. There wasn't very much science or prickles in this essay at. This is ok however because this topic doesn't necessarily need a lot of prickles to be effective. For that reason though, I wouldn’t really think of this essay as much of a science feature paper but rather a controversial essay about a government issue.

Conference week assign 1

For part one of the assignments, I read the article, “If only they could talk” by Hannah Bloch. This article initially drew me by its interesting title. It got me first thinking of what could this author possibly be talking about and what she could want to be hearing from these things that supposedly can’t talk. As I got into the article some more and realized that it was the Easter Island heads that she was talking about, I became even more interested in the article. I’ve always been very interested in this mystery. I really enjoyed reading about all of the speculation and history of why and how the Easter Island heads got there. Unfortunately this article tended to lose my interest a little when diving into such details as the ideas of earth conservation. I do think this is an extremely important topic to keep in mind, however, it was not what I was originally interested in reading about in this article. I did like the following of the single archaeologist to give the essay structure. Overall I thought this was a well written science feature. 

Nerf blaster post

This article definitely brought back some great memories of having Nerf wars with my neighbors. We would each have our own arsenal of Nerf blasters to use for our cause. We had a ton of fun pretending like we were agents in various armies across the world. With that being said, this wasn't necessarily my favorite article we've read. I didn't quite understand the point of the essay and I felt as if the author was giving me a boring lecture about the history of Nerf. I do agree with a lot of the points he made however. I agree that Hasbro building these Nerf guns is a tough engineering task. The engineers had to develop toy guns that had enough power to have fun with yet they had to be weak enough that they were safe to use for kids. I felt that the structure of this essay that the author used was very linear and boring. It seemed to me like he was just going through the history of Nerf like a lecture. While this may be a viable structure for a lot of essays, the topic of toy children’s guns as a huge business is something that I think can be made much more interesting than this author did.

Black Holes

This article was extremely interesting and remarkably easy to read for me. The author did a fantastic job of explaining black holes with a tough balance of hard facts about a topic I could never hope to fully comprehend with simple comparisons to daily life that helped me better understand the significance of black holes. The structure of this essay made me really feel like I was being taken on a journey by which I would have learned something in the end. The author started off with great comparisons of events similar to the creation of black holes to get the reader interested. He then continued these comparisons until finally getting to the black holes, in which the reader can understand just how truly unbelievable they are. The next section of the essay goes into giving the history of science of black holes. After the history section the author gets to the most important part of the essay; his attempt at explaining black holes in a simple way for the reader to hopefully understand. Again, I thought the author did a great job here in explaining black holes in a simple matter for us to understand while at the same time, not making us as readers feel like he is talking down to us as curious 4 year olds. The ending of the article was my favorite part. I loved how the author left us with an abstract, open-ended thought to really make us as the reader go crazy. The thought of us being in one of those black holes is just absurd to think… or is it? We can never really know the answer to that and the more we as readers think about it after reading the article, the more I appreciate the authors technique in writing this piece.

Peer Review Inquiry paper

Spencer- I thought that your paper has a really interesting and controversial topic and the paper itself has very voice. This is a topic that is always being debated and gets more and more controversial as the debate goes on. I thought all aspects of the paper were very well written. I do think that paper is missing research that will help your credibility and help the reader understand the question.

Marlon- This is a really interesting question to be asking. I really liked the introduction that you had. It caught my attention and got me very interested in the paper. I think the body of the paper itself could include a lot more analysis of these curse words like why is it that people use them and what they literally mean vs. what we use them as.

Sapna- I think you have a really interesting topic to discuss. The introduction does a very good job of clearly stating the question of the inquiry to the reader however, I think that it could be improved by adding some personal anecdotes or stories from other people about burritos to give a good hook to the reader. You seem to have done a lot of research into the history of burritos. This is good and it helps the reader get a good understanding of burritos. I do think that there may be a little bit too much of this however. Since the question of the paper is to find the perfect burrito, I think there needs to be more personal fieldwork (description of eating burritos). I noticed that in your conclusion, you didn’t clearly mention whether or not you found the answer to your question. Being an inquiry paper, I think your conclusion should include this. Overall this is a very good rough draft and there is a lot of good information to work with and mold. 

Inquiry prewriting

The question that I am aiming to answer for my inquiry essay is how and to what extent, if any at all, has modern technology made our lives easier. I chose this reason for several personal reasons of interest of mine. One of the major driving forces behind this inquiry question is that I have always been very influenced by and very interested in technology throughout my life. My dad works in sales for a large global networking company called CISCO Systems. Because of this, he has always been bringing in new technology from work to try out and use which has always sparked my interest. Another main reason for me choosing this topic is that I am a BIT or Business Information Technology major. In this major I am going to be dealing with a large amount of cohesion between the business world and the technology world. Essentially, I will be finding ways to create new technology and use that technology to allow businesses to run more efficiently and be more successful. I feel that I already know a great deal about the latest and greatest technology, however there is always more information that can be found by researching. I would also like to take a look at some of the first forms of our modern technology and see how quickly it has evolved in this digital age we are in. For my field research, I plan to come up with some experiments where I will cut out certain devices from my daily lives to truly see how much this technology has made my life easier or harder.

Ten people at my table

Ten people at my table:

-Young person like myself who grew up in this technology age

-Older person who grew up before modern technology

-Someone who works in the business world of this technology

-Psychologist to see how this technology is possibly affecting our thinking

-Physician to see the negative effects of this technology on our bodies (ex. Eyes, wrists, etc…)

-Sociologist to look at the effects of technology on our culture as a whole

-Engineers to see what is going through their heads while thinking of new technology

-People who have had their lives saved by new technologies in hospitals

-People in high ranking management positions at technology companies like IBM, Microsoft, and Apple

-Small business owners who use technology to grow their business

Student inquiry comparison post

For my two student inquiry’s, I read student 5 and student 6. Student 5’s inquiry was about the tedious task of being a college student and eating healthy. I thought this was an interesting and well written essay. I really enjoyed reading it because I am a college student and I am someone who definitely wants to stay as healthy as possible. I also thought that it offered some good tips and advice to eat healthier while still saving money. The second essay that I read was about the physical and mental limitations of pushing your body to its breaking point. Again this is another essay that I can relate to as I am a big athlete and someone who exercises very often. When looking at these inquiry papers back to back, there are a couple of techniques that the authors used that I will be aiming to emulate in my own paper. In both essays, the authors focused primarily on field research that they did to answer the question of their paper. By using this technique, the authors establish their strong credibility and connection with the reader. Another technique that was used in these essays was to cite quotes from experts in the field that the inquiry was about. For example, student 5 would use quotes from nutritionists while student 6 would use quotes from athletic trainers. Reading these essays has shown me some good tips and techniques that I can use myself in my inquiry paper.

Hot Air post

This article addresses an issue that I believe is going to become a much more serious problem in the coming years. The idea of climate change due to human actions is something that has been hugely debated and researched in the twenty first century. The primary issue addressed in this paper is that this, almost strictly scientific, topic has turned very into a left-wing vs. right-wing political debate. Right-wing republicans have the weathermen on their side while left-wing democrats have the environmental researchers on their side. The author of this article addresses the major problem of this debate is that the hard factual research done by scientists is being partially ignored because the weathermen who are in the public eye, do not believe the research of these scientists. This dilemma is drastically slowing the solution to the problem of climate change because the public only sees the views of weathermen who ignore the research done. As for the structure of the essay, it is very interesting to look at the underlying political debate going on here. The reader can clearly see that the author is on the left wing side of the argument. Although the author does seem to take a clear stance which can ruin his credibility, he does keep his credibility in my opinion by using a multitude of good factual evidence and statistics to back his controversial views.

Consider the Lobster post

I found this article very enjoyable to read because this is a question that I have found myself asking myself. Growing up in the New England area myself, I witnessed my fair share of Lobsters being boiled alive. I found myself thinking in the same way that DFW was. I wasn’t necessarily demonizing the chefs who were cooking said lobster because I myself enjoy eating them. I was however thinking about whether or not the feelings that the lobster could be feel in that scolding pot were comparable to something that a human could feel. When looking at the essay as a whole, I find it very interesting how DFW starts talking about the MLF and the inner workings of the event but then quickly and abruptly switches into a massive new argument. He talks about all of the different types of people at the festival and the effect that the festival can have on the economy of the New England area. He then smoothly transitions into talking about the main point of the essay which is how the lobsters themselves might feel about being boiled alive and devoured. Something very interesting to look at in this essay is the opinions and views of DFW at the start of the essay and the end. I do believe that his views changed slightly throughout the essay. My assumption is that DFW came into the essay not so much hating the idea of boiling lobsters alive however, after all of the research he done, he was appalled at the idea of it. Being a fantastic writer however, DFW never clearly states that in the essay as to keep his credibility and transparency. 

Is Google making us stupid post

This essay was very interesting to read for me because it is very relatable to my own personal inquiry question. Carr does a wonderful job in the structure of this essay by introducing the question with a grasping scene from a well-known movie then transitioning into the meat of the question while still touching back on that original scene. By alluding to the scene, he gets the audience’s mind moving in the direction of the question. This is key to writing a strong inquiry essay because as an author, you could never know what is on the reader’s mind before delving into your essay. By starting with an interesting anecdote, you as the author accomplishes the task of gaining the reader’s attention in the direction of the question you’re trying to answer. I was slightly disappointed in the title of the essay however. I feel that by asking such a specific question, you really need to primarily address that main question with some other anecdotes thrown in. I do understand why the title is what it is however I would’ve liked to have seen some more discussion about google itself rather than the history of how people used to read literature. Another way that I think would have made this title more meaningful would be to start off the essay with an interesting hook that talks of about google.

Looking at Women post

The author of this piece does a good job of presenting the inquiry question of why does the world look at women as lesser human beings to men in the way of the 3 basics of well written inquiry questions. The first piece of the 3 way method, personal and auto-biographical, is addressed immediately in this essay. The author starts the essay off with an anecdote about when he was younger and had his very first experience of looking at a girl more as an object then a person. This is a powerful note due to the fact that, at the ripe young age of 11 years old, he was already putting women down unintentionally. The second piece of the method, facts and concrete information, is addressed by talking about products in our daily lives that put women at a lower standard then men. One example he gives are large posters of models. He explains that the posters are clear proof that men simply want to look at attractive females. The poster itself cannot communicate or show personality, but this market is still a huge draw for men to dump money into. The third and final aspect of the method, poetic and human experience, can be seen on the last page. The author gives many examples of metaphors and symbolism to explain how the world treats women as lesser human beings and objects in comparison to men. 

The Overly Documented Life post

It took me a little while to really understand why we were assigned to read this article. While this article was extremely interesting to read, I was slightly confused. About five minutes or so after finishing the article, I realized why it had been assigned to read. While reading the article and especially after reading the article, I found myself having conversations in my head about this very interesting topic. I was thinking about how this idea of recording every moment in my life would affect me and the people around me. I was basically having an entire theoretical dinner conversation in my head. This is when I had my “Aha” moment. I realized that this is the point of an inquiry paper. It is to present a very simple and open ended question to spark conversation and deep thought. Even though the initial question of this article was based around our memory and if we have warped ideas of what happened in the past, I found myself questioning deeper ideas as far as even what kinds of fights in relationships are beneficial to a relationship. An inquiry article, as seen from this paper, can be extremely interesting to read and I imagine even more enjoyable to write. Reading this article and thinking about the meaning of it made me excited to start working on our inquiry paper in class.

Review critiques

Kelly’s review of MMLP2 critiques:

               -I found myself at many points throughout paper questioning whether or not you enjoyed the album or not.

               -As someone who is not familiar with much of Eminem’s work or personal life, I tended to be very confused when you were talking about the events in his life and references to his past albums.

               -I thought that you had great descriptions of some of the aspects of the album. 

McKenzie’s review of Pearl Harbor critique’s:

               -I thought you did a good job at explaining the positive parts of the movie and explaining why in your opinion that the critiques were not valid.

               -I thought there may have been a bit too much plot summary.

               -Some sentences were a bit too long and run on like but that can be fixed in editing.

Spencer’s review critique

               I really enjoyed reading this review. It was very well written with little to no mistakes or poorly written sentences. You had great voice in this review which I felt established good credibility. I loved that you analyzed and picked apart every aspect of the movie from the score to the cinematography. A couple things that I feel you could add would be to add some sources from other critics. Whether they liked the movie or not, adding some other opinions and then either agreeing with them or disagreeing with them and backing up your point will add to the overall credibility of your writing. Again, I loved that you analyzed all of the parts of the movie however I do think that some nice flowing transitions could be added between the different sections. Some of the transitions feel a bit clunky to me. Overall, really good job on the review though. It definitely made me interested in the movie.

Review Intro Paragraphs

Stylistic

Going into college, I knew I was going have to make an upgrade on the laptop that I had. I had been using a three year old Macbook Pro which I had loved for what it could do for me, but being in a technology governed business path with an engineering minor, I knew it wouldn’t be able to do the job I needed it to. So I began looking through countless reviews of laptops explaining the pros and cons of each machine. These amazing new machines seemed to be an extension of these owners and that is exactly what I wanted. I wanted a strong machine that could do everything I needed it to do, when I needed it to do it. After searching for hours a day, I narrowed my search to two different brands, ASUS and Lenovo. Both leaders in the market, I knew they would both be able to produce computers that would do what I wanted. This is where the truly powerful reviews came in. I needed to differentiate which would be better for me. Ultimately, I decided on the Lenovo Y50 and I could not be happier. The reviews that I read were the driving force behind this important decision and now it is my turn to help some lost soul find their true mechanized soul mate with my review of this magnificent, motorized machine.

Conventional     

In college, the technology that one uses can determine many outcomes of their experience. Whether that’s grade, friends, or simply overall experience. This is why it is extremely important to choose the correct technology, such as new laptops, when coming into college. This is where reviews come in. Before purchasing any new gadget, the consumer should read up on plenty of reviews of different products to see which would be the best. A good review needs to be thorough yet simple enough for the reader to understand. In my personal experience, reviews of laptops can vary very much and that is why it is very important to scour the internet for different sources and opinions on the product of choice. I have recently purchased a new Lenovo Y50 laptop. I have generally been very happy with my experience so far. I believe that with all of the new products coming out, we as consumers must contribute our opinions to help other potential buyers make the best decision they can when buying a laptop. In this review I will be discussing the specs, feel and raw experience that I have had with my Lenovo Y50.

Review Comparisons

For my review paper, I am writing about my laptop that I had purchased at the end of the summer, the Lenovo Y50. This is Lenovo’s newest model laptop of the Y series and was only out for several months when I bought mine. I read two reviews, one critic and one user, on the laptop. The critic review came from TechRadar.com and was written by Kevin Lee. TechRadar is a well-known critic site for electronics. This review I thought was very thorough and overall without much bias to cloud the judgment on the laptop itself. I read several user reviews on Lenovo’s website by various anonymous writers who had bought the laptop. These reviews were much less thorough and generally much more focused on a few aspects of the laptop that users either really liked or really hated. Lee, as opposed to the anonymous buyers, seemed to be doing his best to disregard his own personal likes and dislikes about previous Lenovo products and tried only to focus on this laptop. Lee’s professional review of the laptop also seemed to focus much more on the laptop itself rather than the price. This makes sense due to the idea that, if the reader has chosen to read this review, he or she most likely already knows the price of the laptop and is considering buying the computer. This is contrary to the user reviews in that most of the user reviews discussed the quality of the laptop in regards to the price of the Y50 and other competitive laptops. Another difference that I had noticed in these two different types of reviews was that the professional review tended to compare this laptop with one or two other laptops in the market. Whether he was comparing the performance, hardware, or the general feel of the laptop, he would always mention another product that might be better or worse for the consumer if that is a specific area they were looking for. The user reviews however mostly commented on only the Y50 as that is the laptop that they were familiar with. 

Short Film Review

For my short film, I watched Voice Over by Martin Rosete. This film was beautifully made. It kept me guessing the entire 10 minutes as to what was possibly going on. It takes a true creative genius to tastefully keep the viewer guessing as to what is happening when you have a narrator telling what is actually “going on.” Throughout the entire film a narrator, quite descriptively, tells the story of what kind of predicament you, the viewer, have found yourself in. Whether it’s panicking at the idea of simultaneously trying to get oxygen while fighting off an alien life form from eating away at your body, or struggling to find a detonator to save the woman you love at the expense of dying yourself, or clawing desperately at a rope that is attaching what seems to be your very life itself to a boat that represents the cold death that awaits at the bottom of the ocean depths, this movie constantly keeps you on the edge of your seat, gasping for air. And that is the common denominator in all of these scenarios; gasping for air. It is only in the end of the film when the viewer can truly see what this idea of gasping for air is about. You the viewer are about to have your first kiss and you are nervously gasping for air. These three scenarios are nothing more than extreme metaphors to show the feeling that you would feel before that innocent first kiss. When thinking back on the film, Rosete is a true master at getting the viewer to feel exactly what he wants the viewer to experience. Over the course of the film, I curiously found myself physically holding my breath and having painful butterflies in my stomach. It almost felt as though I was experiencing my first kiss all over again, I just didn’t realize that that was what I was feeling until the end. This film is a true example of how literature can play with your emotions however the author sees fit.

Godzilla review

After reading John Ebert’s very descriptive review of the 1998 version of the ever popular Godzilla saga, the reader should easily be able to tell that Ebert did not like this movie; not one bit. Ebert spends over one thousand words completely dismantling this movie into what it truly was through his eyes; a poorly acted, horribly written, and simply terribly made attempt at a movie. What is very interesting about this piece of writing is that Ebert does a very good job, in my opinion, at staying fairly transparent and credible. From reading the review, I didn’t expect to actually think his argument was valid simply because he was so one sided. I think that it is very difficult to give a review of a movie that has absolutely no positive remarks yet not let your own emotions get too much in the way to completely lose credibility. Personally I have never seen the 1998 version of Godzilla but I can sense from this review that it may not be the movie for me. Being a fan of the action genre myself, I can completely understand where Ebert is coming from when he talks about all of the impossible acts that Godzilla carries out in the movie. Putting the fact that the movie is about a 300 foot tall sea monster aside, there are some scenes that Ebert describes, such as Godzilla being able to fit into a subway line, that just do not match up even to the crazy storyline of the movie. In the end, I do think that Ebert was able to get his point across in such a way that even someone who hasn't seen the movie, like myself, can understand the caliber of this movie and still respect Ebert’s opinion. 

Yeezus reviews

I found that reading both of these articles back to back was extremely interesting. In the first review by the NY times, the writer explained how Kanye West had the foundations and artistic ideas to build a wonderfully moving album. However in the end Mr. West, as they referred to him, completely missed the mark on what this album could have been. The writer explained that Mr. West could’ve been trying to create an album that spoke strongly about civil rights and the dark times that African American people from poor areas have to live in, but in the end the album was mostly about sex, drugs, and women. This review was in complete contrast to the review in the pitchfork article. Pitchfork, which mainly reviews music, discusses the brilliance of Mr. West’s album Yeezus. This writer explains that the true message of this album, masked beneath a hard layer of some typical rap/hip-hop language, is one of a man who has reached a dark, almost zen-like state. He explains how every part of the music has been thought about to portray this message. From the hard, electronic, and almost painful beats to the careful selection of collaborative artists from Mr. West’s own “chi-town”, this album has the making of a true poetic masterwork. I found it very interesting how these two websites had completely opposite opinions in the music. My opinion is that the NY Times, being an organization known across the world for their wide range of articles, tended to look more so at the music itself and the outer feelings of the music, whereas pitchfork, who only deals with music, took much more time and effort to look deeper into the true meaning of not only the music but the other artists in the album and even the allusions to past event and songs. 

Caring for Your Introvert Analysis

I found this article, Caring for Your Introvert by Jonathon Rauch, very interesting in terms of the writing style and thought process behind it. From what I understood from the article is that the purpose of this article is to raise awareness about introverts and to address any misconceptions that the audience has about the matter. It is worth noting however that Rauch is an introvert himself, which explains the bias in this article. From reading the article, the reader can tell two different characteristics about Rauch. One, he is very proud of being an introvert and thinks very highly of introverts as a whole. And two, that Rauch absolutely cannot stand the introvert counterpart; the extrovert. When talking about all of the misconceptions that the public has of introverts, such as them being antisocial and generally odd, Rauch seems to feel almost personally hurt by these thoughts and becomes very defensive in explaining why introverts are not only just normal people, but that they are smarter than everyone else. With the same passion that Rauch praises introverts, he also bashes extroverts as a whole. In one particular section, Rauch discusses how extroverts are unintelligent and the large majority of what they say has little to no significance at all. I found this article very ironic in some aspects and I found that the irony of this article can be summed up in one very small section. In the section asking if introverts are arrogant, Rauch almost immediately leads off by saying something along the lines of, no we are just more intelligent than everyone else. I believe that most readers and audiences could clearly see that this article is written by someone who is very biased on the matter and makes very little to no attempt at masking his bias.

Wasteland Analysis

In the article Wasteland written by Frederick Kaufman, Kaufman recounts and analyzes his search for the truth about where our waste goes once we forget about it and how it eventually circles back to us. Kaufman uses immense imagery towards the beginning of this article to explain just how grotesque the problem of our overflowing waste is. Before reading this article I had not had much knowledge on the problem of our waste. I knew there was some problem with it but I hadn't realized the magnitude of the problem. After hearing Kaufman's firsthand accounts of scenes he experienced while on his search for the truth, I now realize how much of a problem we really do have. I was especially intrigued by Kaufman’s accounts towards the end of the article when he was talking about his experiences with the CEO of Synargo. Kaufman seemed to know exactly what the problem was with this waste company even before he started talking to the CEO; the real question that Kaufman seemed to have was whether or not the CEO could own up to the problems and if he had any plans to fix them. Being a business major myself, I completely understand where the CEO of Synargo was coming from in terms of finding the most cost efficient way to dispose of waste and recycle it into a useful product. However, I do not agree with building cost efficient business models at the expense of our environment. This was a very interesting article I thought and as for the writer’s technique and voice, I thought it was wonderful. One particular spot where his description was very good was when he was describing the building where he was meeting the CEO of Synargo. Kaufman spent a large amount of time in creating a vivid picture of the meeting place in order help the reader understand the façade that this company had of being a proactive, environmentally friendly corporation. Overall, I thought this was a very well written article about a topic that all people in the world need to be more aware of.