Blog Post #12

Confirmation bias is the tendency to process information by looking for or interpreting information that is consistent with one’s existing beliefs. As an example when you are in an argument, you are doing everything you can to form your own viewpoint to win that argument instead of making an attempt to understand the other individual involved. People are not trusting all the facts, they are basically just protecting the information that they want to hear. One of the bad things about confirmation bias is that it really leads to flawed decision-making. With Confirmation bias, you are so blindsided by information and it's to the point where you are making assumptions about people before you even get to know them well. This can cause you to have trouble meeting people and making friends in college or in your life in general. A lot of people have confirmation bias with their political viewpoints or beliefs that are in their life in general. As another example, people often have a slanted confirmation bias when they are looking at their news sources. People already have a biased or confirmed viewpoint about specific beliefs, values, or stories in the news so they will not open their minds to things that differ from what they believe. News media sources are feeding very specific messages and aspects of political agenda so they will gain people who have a biased mindset about topics. Generally, it is important to open up your mind and ideas to things in the world or in life that may differ from your own specific bias or viewpoint deception. Confirmation bias can be dangerous and people should try to refrain from having this control their way of thinking or believing in life.

Blog Post #9

When looking at a key innovation that truly played an important role in American society, it is important to realize the essential idea behind the innovation diffusion theory. The specific area I decided to focus on was television. The first television came out in the year 1927 and it was rather basic but at the same time, it was functional. The television displayed black and white imagery and it had very few channels to choose from. The “early adopters” of this specific technology bought a single television set for their household and by doing this, it really brought families together.

Several individuals throughout society decided initially to not adopt this item because they were set on the idea of radios to get their sources of world information. It was also not a cheap item to purchase and not everyone could afford it. Although just about everyone today has at least one television set in their house, it was estimated in the year 2015, that only 2.6% of Americans did not have at least one television. The Television has come a long way in terms of pricing and there are a variety of affordable options for people no matter what their economic status is.

As a result, televisions are a positive invention overall and they have truly come a long way from when they were first discovered in the year 1927. Television allows people to gain knowledge about certain information and subjects that are occurring in the world and it provides them with a variety of sources for their own personal entertainment. The downside is that television gives people a lot of distraction from their everyday life and it causes people to become addicted to staring at a screen all day. 

(First Television set)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_of_innovations

https://www.businessinsider.com/how-many-tvs-in-american-homes-number-us-department-energy-20173#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20USEI%20survey,when%20the%20percentage%20was%201.2%25.

Blog #6 EOTO

While looking at the development of technology throughout the span of time in the United States history, it is rather important to examine the significance of the first television set. This might not even be something we really think about because television plays a huge role in our everyday lives and it is something we use on a daily basis to obtain news and various forms of entertainment. Television programs offer people a wide variety to choose from and through the innovation and invention of this technology, we have been fortunate enough to experience a high-quality visual effect. This is not something we have always been able to experience because television has come a long way and it was truly a huge accomplishment when it was first created.

The brains behind the invention of the first television set was Philo Taylor Farnsworth. This man is interesting and he truly has a unique background compared to most individuals. He was always bright and intrigued by certain scientific inquiries that most people were unaware of. Philo Taylor Farnsworth was raised in a household without electricity until he reached the age of fourteen. While he was enrolled in high school, Farnsworth began to conceive a system that could capture moving images. The system could then take those moving images and code them with radio waves and transform them back onto a picture screen. The invention was rather unique in how it scanned images with beams of electrons and this allowed to transform it into lines onto the screen. The main scientific idea of the television was for the sole purpose of turning sound into visuals. 

(Philo Taylor Farnsworth)

The first television set was successfully demonstrated on September 7, 1927, in San Francisco California. At the time of this innovation, Philo Taylor Farnsworth was only twenty-one years old. This impressive development was life-changing for several Americans. While television is not something we give much thought to, it was truly a huge deal for people in the early twentieth century. At the beginning of time for the revolutionized invention, American households only had a single television set for their whole entire family. Television when it was first created and for many years thereafter, was something that bonded families and brought them all together after a long day. People were not as fortunate in their selection of channel choices and television had only a few channels to choose from. In addition, television was broadcasted in black and white imagery which is completely different and basic from the visuals that it offers today. One of the main services a television set could provide people was the news. The television news was a more interactive and intuitive way for Americans to get information about the world going on around them. It was visually entertaining and a step up from the radio programs.

(First TV set)

While looking back through the history of television technology in the United States, it is important to reflect upon the success of the invention and how far it has come today. While television was a luxury for American families and it brought them all together in the early days, it is now such a huge part of our everyday lives. Television monitors are displayed everywhere we go throughout society and they are used to portray important details. In addition, most households have several televisions throughout their home and a variety of channels and sources of entertainment so people do not have to watch the same thing together all at once. The visual aspects of entertainment have significantly improved from what they once were in the very beginning. We should acknowledge Philo Taylor Farnsworth as a technological hero and be thankful for the invention he has brought into our lives today.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0016003234904154

https://www.electronicworldtv.co.uk/blog/why-was-the-tv-invented

https://stephens.hosting.nyu.edu/History%20of%20Television%20page.html

Blog Post #7

 

Before I worked on this blog post, I had never heard of the sources Antiwar.com and the American Conservative. These two specific segments are not something that you normally hear when you are thinking about news sources. It also seems like both of these news sources are unique in the sense that they offer a very anti-government approach towards the topics they are speaking about. These sources mainly cover the topics of the president and foreign affairs. It provides opinion-based feedback and specific insight on what the United States should do in several military and foreign relations situations. While speaking about the United States and its military involvement, it mainly criticizes the military involvement with the abundance of troops that America has on other worldwide nations. In a specific sense, it talks about the United States and it criticizes the relations that we have with Syria. These websites could essentially be unheard of because of how critical they truly are to our nation and their way the country is handling certain things. Although these websites can be deemed as unorthodox, I found them to be rather insightful and they really helped open up my eyes to a new perspective. These sites provide me with sufficient details and insight that you would not hear from generic opinion-based sources such as Fox News and CNN. As American citizens, we truly have the right to explore different opinions and make educated assumptions based on the information that we are told and because of that, these websites were eye-opening sources of information. I am intrigued by these sources and I look forward to using them in the future when I want to browse for information about current political topics.

https://www.antiwar.com/

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/web-categories/realism-restraint/

Blog Post #8

People may not even realize or think about it too much but the iPod is incorporated in all our iPhones today. The first iPod was released in October in the year 2001 and people were only able to store five gigabytes of music on it. Now, with the innovation and growth of technology, you can store thousands of songs on a single device. Forty-Seven percent of people use an iPhone on a daily basis. The popularity of the iPhone in the current day all has to do with how we used an iPod in the early 2000s era. People could easily fit the iPod devices into their pockets. It is not a very popular device now just because people have iPhones today and the iPhones all have the iPod music capability within the device. Over time, people have leaned away from the Ipods as the Iphones have become more popular throughout American society.

However, before the Ipods became popular, people used Sony walkmans to listen to their music. The walkmans had no screen to see what you would be listening to instead, it just had buttons where you would select the song and it had the functions of pause and play. The iPod had these functions but at the same time, it was more intuitive in the sense that it had a screen where you could see what song was being played, you could create playlists, or you could customize the device or other aspects to your own liking or preferability.

https://www.cnet.com/pictures/the-complete-history-of-apples-ipod/

Blog Post #5

As an American citizen living in the twenty-first century, it is important to realize the fundamental role artificial intelligence plays in our lives. Although there are some benefits of artificial intelligence, it is a huge invasion of our privacy. The utilization of facial recognition technology may be convenient since you can pay for food with your face, but at the same time, it gives companies access to something they should not have access to. Using someone else's face is an easy way to commit identity fraud and it is essentially a disaster waiting to happen. In another sense, websites are using data to see what kind of advertisements people were clicking on so they know your interests and exactly what you are thinking about. Facebook, for example, is collecting an abundance of data and they are seeing who has voted in an election. Overall, the negative effects are that the country of China is run by smartphones and they will catch up with America by the year 2025 in artificial intelligence and lead the world.

Artificial intelligence poses a threat to America and it is likely that it can take 50% of all jobs. As an example, artificial intelligence will take over the trucking industry which will take away many jobs but at the same time, it will allow for an endless amount of driving which can be very beneficial to the economy. This can also prevent traffic accidents from occurring. In a positive sense, artificial intelligence allows for intuitive mathematical and scientific studies about the universe that have not been determined before.

Lastly, artificial intelligence does a good service in the sense that it will change the future of breast cancer research. This will be very beneficial and life-changing to many women. Looking at artificial intelligence can give people positive feelings about the future world but in a similar sense, it can scare people about an invasion of privacy and it can make people feel uneasy. It is a huge threat to the economy and it will likely take away several jobs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dZ_lvDgevk

Blog #4

 

The first amendment in the United States Constitution condones people to express their personal beliefs and values as long as it is done so in a peaceful manner. That being said, it does not condone people to protest their own beliefs in a violent manner. The first amendment guarantees several clauses of freedom including two distinct ones, which are freedom of assembly and the right to petition. The freedom of assembly basically means that people can come together and collectively promote and express their ideas about a certain subject matter. In addition, the freedom of petition means that these individuals can collectively protest the government and come to them by expressing unfairness about a certain subject matter. While thinking about the first amendment, it is also important to think about the idea of “the freedom of speech.” Americans are allowed to speak freely about anything they want to because it is one of their essential rights of freedom.

A clear-cut example of the first amendment being exercised was the black lives matter protests. Several individuals involved in these protests peacefully executed their first amendment right of assembly while they held up signs and stood up for what they believed in. Many people who were involved in this movement may have protested because they felt like they could have been censored for their own beliefs on social media platforms. During black lives matter protests, people were protesting the idea of racial injustice because of police brutality that was occurring throughout the United States. However, these protests turned into violence very quickly once people started looting and rioting across the country. 

Several people involved in this movement were burning down stores and promulgating the area around them which was particularly unacceptable and it was to the point where they were unprotected against the first amendment. In the first amendment, it does not say anywhere that people are protected against causing violence and destruction against innocent human beings and their surroundings. Although people can protest their views, they can not be violent about it and that is what essentially goes against the core fundamental values of the first amendment in the United States constitution. 

https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-capitol-siege-race-and-ethnicity-violence-racial-injustice-afd7dc2165f355a3e6dc4e9418019eb5

Blog Post #3

 #4 Individual Self-fulfillment (or self-actualization) 

According to C. Edwin Barker, in his novel called “Human, liberty, and freedom of speech” Free speech enables individuals to express themselves and thereby create their own identity - and in the process perhaps, find kindred spirits. Freedom of speech thus becomes an aspect of human dignity, human agency, and autonomy. This general idea and description of self-actualization strongly relates to the fourth core value of freedom of expression.

 According to google self-actualization in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is “a realization of the fulfillment of one’s talents and potentialities especially as a drive need or present in everyone.” It is truly important that everyone is their own individual and unique self people should not conform to the norms of society because if everyone was the same then we would live in a rather boring world and there would not be much diversity. 

One of the very unique attributes about America as a country is that it is the single most diverse place on the planet because people from all over the world live there and create a better life for themselves and their own families. When people come from different parts of the world they are able to spread their ideas and cultural values upon separate areas within the nation. People in the country are able to enjoy and adopt these ideas so they can taste several different ways of life that are clearly different from their own. Large cities throughout America have unique cultural neighborhoods that offer people an authentic feeling so they can experience how other people live their life. Most other countries have their own way of doing things and everything is essentially unanimous because there is not much of a unique difference among cultures. 

Americans allow people to express themselves and be themselves to whatever appearance they want to as long as they are not creating any disturbances by breaking laws. The democratic system of government is imperative in the sense of how it allows people to be themselves and express themselves without facing any sort of punishment whatsoever. Other nations especially in the middle east, have strict governments and dictators that will either imprison or unfortunately murder people for being their own expressive selves. I feel very fortunate that I live in a society and country where I can be whoever I want and look whatever way I choose without being legally punished due to the freedom of speech.

 Another important area to consider when looking at free and individual expression within America is art. Many people are censored throughout their artwork depending on where they live in the world and it is not right that the government has such an influential decision on what a person worked very hard on and they consider their own masterpiece. 

As a result, I consider myself very fortunate to be an American citizen and that I have the fundamental and essential rights that I was granted. I can express myself on several aspects including my personal, religious, political, and beliefs without getting in any sort of trouble. I can look and dress in whatever way I want to without getting in trouble, and I can experience several cultures because of the idea of how people are allowed to express and spread their own ideas among each other.