SWA #4

http://www.cartype.com/pics/5606/full/aston-martin_one-77_ad_08.jpeg
http://chivethethrottle.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/car-ads-500-add23wtmk1.jpg
1. I'm comparing two high end sports car ads. I found them on the internet both on car websites.
2. The audience is car enthusiasts, people obsessed with cars. People that really know what they're talking about. And usually the people who would buy these cars comes from this base of people.
3.
The Aston Martin-
Very simple black background, no flashy effects just a slight reflection of the car on what appears to be a black marble floor. The text says "Adding a piece of art adds value for life." "Body- Handmade aluminum" "Backbone- Carbon fiber" "Heart- 7.0 Liter 12 Cylinder."
The Benz-
Very similar black background but it appears to be sitting on black tarmac. The car has one of it's gull wing doors opened. The text says "A cockpit. Engine. Two wings. Is it still a car?"
4. The very sleek design of both of the ads made me pick these ads. While everyone is going gaga over new hybrids its nice to see somebody sticking to the reason we have cars. For speed, for elegance, for status. And these ads really play to that, they both don't mess around, no hidden motives. They just lay it out, buy our car because it's beautifully made, buy our car because it's the best and because in it you too can be the best. And let's face it buy our car because it can go fast and we know you want to go fast.

SWA #3

Kwame Appiah makes several arguments in the article What will future generations condemn us for? all of which are frankly quite ridiculous and very liberally biased. However, in light of the assignment I will address the topic of the environment since when you break down most liberal arguments you find this at the root of it anyway.
One major argument of the liberal hippies is that of organic foods. Which are supposedly much better for you, with less chemicals, and the farming processes are supposed to better preserve the environment. This is frankly horse manure, the american cancer associate released a statement saying that the pesticides found in fruits and vegetables in no way caused cancer. As for the farming processes if the entire world switched to organic farming at maximum farms could provide enough food for 4 billion people, this just in. Our world has 7 billion.
Every single argument like this for the environment turns out the same way when you actually look into it. Being environmentally conscious is a fad, people just want something to be angry about, they don't look at facts. They just believe everything they're told. Americans are naive. Which brings us into the photo of the girl with the leaf mask as an advertisement for the Prius.
I'll admit the Toyota Prius is incredible on gas mileage and its carbon emissions are astronomically smaller than that of most traditional vehicles. But that's where Toyota stops the story, what they fail to tell you is that while the Prius reduces carbon emissions it's also reducing much more. I'm sure you've seen the ads in support of stopping coal mining because in order to mine it countless mountains and landscapes are being destroyed. Well guess what's even harder to mine than coal. Lithium, the amount of lithium required to make a single Prius battery, has more environmental impact from it's mining than a Prius could make up for in TWO lifetimes.
Environmental arguments are all emotional, but we don't need emotion to keep a sustained planet, we need logic.

Response to "Get Smarter"

The internet is making us smarter, plain and simple. While some might argue that we can no longer focus on a certain article online anymore, I say it's because the internet has gotten us into a mindset where we can quickly determine whether or not information is worth our time. Yes, we may skip around from thing to thing but it's because we subconsciously prioritize our information. We have "evolved" to the point where we can process, categorize, and prioritize our information so quickly that it's almost second nature to us. In a single day we encounter as much information as somebody from the medieval ages would encounter in their entire life, so we have to evolve, we have to learn to prioritize our information other wise our minds would soon spill over from millions of useless facts. So yes it's true that we can't stay on one thing for too long, but it's not because we can't focus. It's really just that we don't care.

SWA #1

In English 101 my section was a technology themed section of English 101. So as you can imagine my papers were some what less than traditional. While the papers started off as simple close readings of technology themed text, I soon was writing about some less traditional works. For instance through out the course of the class we had to play through the video game Portal. So by the end of the class we were required to write an essay on a single level of the game. At first it didn't seem very difficult, however I soon realized how much deeper you have to examine a text when it has little to no dialogue, or even text at all. But because the game was something that really interested me, I was able to really look into the visual aspects of the game and really do a close reading of not text, but the emotions the game enticed to gamer to feel and through what mediums this was accomplished. I think this was my greatest writing success because I was able to look past the norm of textual media and really dig deep into a work and come up with a well written insightful paper.
My worst writing experience was probably my first research paper ever, granted I was eleven but still it was pretty terrible. I was supposed to do a research paper on santa claus (seeing as we were about to leave for winter break) and I thought it would be a great idea to quote the "Twas the Night Before Christmas" which seems like a rather logical way of researching santa claus right? Well by the end of the paper I had 150 words of my own work four pages of starting from the beginning to the the end of the entire "Twas the Night Before Christmas" story. But to this day I have learned to limit my quotes.