Response to Alec's Post regarding Abortion

Abortion is a very touchy subject that I believe almost everyone in the United states has an opinion on. Every time the subject comes up you will find some who agree, some who disagree, and some who have no opinion at all.  I agree with Alec that this topic will probably never be solved, and will be a constant political argument.

         Although, I also agree with Alec that abortion should not be a legal matter. I think that it should be 100% up to the mother if she wants to keep her baby or not. I believe this because there are many situations where the women did not have a choice, maybe they were raped and became pregnant as a result of it. I am sure that women does not want to raise the baby of someone who sexual abused and assaulted her. Maybe a women got pregnant and she is ill and will die because she can not support both the baby and herself. Now I understand that this is not always the case, but all in all the women she be able to make her own decision on wither or not she wants to keep her child. Not the government and not a law that is put in place.  It is no one else’s problem other then hers.  Those who believe or don’t believe in abortion can do what they please when and if they are ever put in that situation.

         I also believe tend to believe the best in people and think that no one would have an abortion if they had another way out or someone to help them raise the child. This may not always be the case. People may make the decisions to keep or not keep their child for the wrong reasons. As I mentioned earlier, that decision is for the mother and only the mother. 

Demonstration Speech

            The young lady in the video demonstrated how to make chocolate chip cookies.   She started off with a statistic. This statistic was that chocolate chip cookies are the worlds most popular cookie. I thought this was a fun and interesting way to start her presentation. It caught my attention right away and made me want to pay attention throughout the rest of the presentation.  I also thought that her steps were easy to follow. She put everything in order beginning with washing your hands before you begin, to the ingredients used and the order they are used in. She listed out exactly what you must mix together and when.  One final positive point about her presentation was that the eye contact she made with the audience. When talking about the ingredients she used she was looking down and displaying them. When she was just talking about how to make things or the order to add the ingredients she was looking up and making eye contact with her audience.

         A few things that I thought she could have done better include: enthusiasm, repetition of the steps, mumbling, and finally a more thought out conclusion.  This young lady did not seem to excited about making her chocolate chip cookies. Even though she may not be excited or enthused about it she needs to act that way in order to keep the audience interested. If she is not interested in what she is demonstrating how does she expect her audience to.   I also thought she could have repeated her steps a few more times. They were simple and easy to follow but she only went through them twice which made it a bit hard to follow.  She also said “umm” and “like” a bit too much throughout the demonstration. This took away from her presentation. Finally,  I thought that her conclusion could have been a bit stronger. She once again did not repeat her steps or wrap up her demonstration at all. She just finished by telling her audience to take the cookies out of the oven and enjoy.  Overall, a good speech but as I mentioned there are a few areas that I would clean up a bit. 

Response to Gregory's Blog

I have decided to respond to Gregory’s Blog regarding Euthanasia. I myself decided to write about Euthanasia for my blog. It turns out that Gregory and I feel differently about this issue. He believes that life is to precious and valuable to end sooner then it is supposed to.  He also believes that people can make remarkable comebacks form being very ill. I agree with him that there are miracle situations.  I have heard of many myself. In contrast, there are also situations where the doctors have deemed a person terminally ill. That there will be no coming back from their comma, or there cancer because it has spread to vital organs. It is situations like this that people may not be able to come back from.  When a person is in so much pain that they can’t stand it, why not let them make the decisions for themselves to die. This will end their suffering as well as those of their family. It will also save the family from having to watch them go through this time of extreme pain.   I also agree that life is precious, if there is even a 1%  chance that a person can be saved then Euthanasia should not be considered. For, some that may not be the case. When there is a life of suffering ahead then I do believe that Euthanasia should legal for the patient to consider.  In the end, there needs to be extreme guidelines before Euthanasia should be legalized.  This will make sure that patients and families do not take advantage of it or misuse it.  Although, I am still for Euthanasia even after considering Gregory’s good points.  As I mentioned in my blog post, if we have the right to freedom then we should have the right to choose between life and death. 

Euthanasia

Being that my major is Psychology I have had quite some interest in Physician Assisted Suicide, also known as Euthanasia. Euthanasia is the voluntary ending of one’s own life by administration of a lethal substance (Balanced Politics). This injecting can be done by the physician or by the patient if they are able.  Euthanasia is often done when a patient has a illness or disease that is causing them great suffering. The “assistance” part is where the conflict begins.  There are physicians who can actually inject the patient with the drug or equipment to kill themselves. Although, there are many situations where the patient is unable to move or make the decision for themselves on if they want to die or not. This usually happens when the person is in a vegetable state.  When this happens the family often makes the decision for the person on whether or not they should live.  This is where ethics comes in.  Many believe that this is wrong because it is not the person themselves making the decision.  Many are afraid that if this becomes legal in other states other then Organ then people who are unable to afford to keep loved ones alive, will then make the decision for them to take part in Euthanasia. I believe that Euthanasia should be legal.  If someone is in so much pain, or is so unresponsive that they want to die, then I believe that they have to right to make that decision for themselves. When referring to patients that are non responsive, I think that a time period should be put on the person life in order for them to have time to recover if possible, as well as to give loved ones a chance to say goodbye.  All in all, if we have the right to our freedom then we should have the right to decide if we want to keep our life going in a time of extreme suffering or not. 

Demonstration Speech Self-Evaluation

After watching my Demonstration Speech I was pretty pleased. I thought that the explanation of my steps was clear.  I hope that this made is easy to follow along. I also made sure to repeat those 4 main steps multiple times to show the importance of them. I hope that this was engraved into my audience’s head.  Hopefully they can remember these steps themselves and try to recipe at home. I was also pleased with my display of the items a brought in. I myself am a visual learner so I thought that bringing in the items that I used the may my recipe would help people get a visual idea of what they would need if they themselves wanted to make it. Finally, I was pleased with the timing. I timed myself multiple times to try and make sure that I feel between 5 and 6 minutes. This paid off because I came in right at 5 minutes and 30 seconds!  I also thought I projected my voice well, and stood in a good upright position.  Finally, I think that my introduction and conclusions turned out well.  I had a little story in the beginning and then made sure to wrap up my steps in the end.

In addition, I think that there are many things that I can work on to perfect my public speaking.  I love to speak in front of people and usually do not get very nervous although, I do tend to start and speak too fast.  I think that during some part of my speech I did okay, in others I started to speak too fast and got my words a bit jumbled.  I also think that maybe I should have picked to demonstrate something a little less confusing.  After choosing this recipe out of my mom’s book and already buying all of the ingredients I realized that there were lots of steps and that it may be too lengthy for a speech like this that needs to be less than 6 minutes. I was able to wrap it all up into 4 easy steps but there were things that I found I wanted to explain further into depth. 

Laurel Miller - Heart Healthy

I decided to write about Laurel Miller's blog post. I did so because I myself wrote about Nutrition for my Informative paper.  This allowed me to read about what interested her in this area. My interests leaned more towards the Sports Nutrition area instead. I thought the blog that Laurel wrote about on Heart Health was a very interesting one. It was by Kelly who has been blogging for quite sometime now.  Kelly talks about the focus one must have on the health of their heart.  I agree with the post Mary put up that Laurel commented on.  It is good to read blogs or articles like this because it reminds you of the importance of good nutrition. Sometimes people get caught up in their day-to-day routines.  Family, friends, sports, and jobs keep people very busy.  This causes people do forget about what they eat on a day-to-day basis.  Reading a blog like Kelly’s that Laurel posted on can help remind all of us.

I can also relate to Laurel in that I too did not write on a specific topic of sports nutrition. It was more on sports nutrition as a whole and what foods you should eat, when you should eat them, and what could happen if you do not get them.  I did not ever touch on the effects of the other organs in the body or how nutrition may have an affect on them.  I also did not include any specific stories like Laurel said that Kelly did. I instead quoted different people who knew quite a bit on nutrition and experiments done to prove the importance of different nutrients. In conclusion, I think that Laurel makes a good final point when talking about how this post on Heart health gives her a better understanding of the importance of overall good health.  

Technorati Search

I read a blog on caffeine and its effects on sports performance.  This blog was written by Adam Fusfeld.  This blog was written on October 27th, 2010 at about 10:30AM. Based on this date, Adam's post on his blog has been active for about 4 days.  Adam Fusfeld has posted a blog on October 29th about NFL Jersey Ads. He also posted on October 31st about the NHL Commissioner and locker room talk. It seems that he writes on his blog about every 2 or 3 days at most.  That is impressive!  Adam has used several hyperlinks within his blog posts.  In his post about caffeine use in athletes he referred back to ESPN investigation, and a study done by the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition.  Adam linked both of these sites in his blog.  He did not link to any other blogs within his writings, but he did post the links and pictures to other blogs that were writing about the use of other substances within sports.  For example, there was a blog post on how Cocaine brought the Texas Rangers together, and also one on how a Harvard Professor thinks that all drugs should be legalized immediately. 

This blog has a picture of a Monster Energy drink can next to it.  This is an energy drink that is used by lots of athletes, as well as the regular everyday person. This fits with his post because he talks about the insane amounts of caffeine that energy drinks have in them. To be exact, it is about eight-times as much as a 12 ounce can of soda. Finally, he has an area at the bottom where you can view what other people have said about his post.  This is interesting because you can get a feel for what other people think about his post, as well as there ideas or thoughts themselves. 


I read a post that was commenting on the blog post that Adam has just posted. Henry Blodget comments on the caffeine overuse on October 27th, 2010.   He makes a point that there is not only caffeine in these energy drinks but also in pre-workout supplements.  These supplements are also a huge deal in sports. He comments that the NCAA has banned large amounts of caffeine usage and have earmarked large doses of caffeine as illegal. 

Organs for sale? Peer Response

I got a chance to read a few people's blogs who decided to write about the "Organ's for Sale" question set. Reading the comments that he made really made me think.  I wrote about this topic as well but felt quite different then Alex. I said that people should be able to sell their organs. I believe that this will help those in great need of an organ get one.  I didn't really consider that people would take advantage of this system.  I think that Alex makes a great point when saying that those who have a greater need for an organ should be able to get one before those who are not in a life threatening position.  I was thinking about this for quite a while and came to the conclusion that maybe a timeline may help.  Those who are in need of an organ in 6-8 months or less should get one first. When those people are taken care of then, and only then, can the organs be purchased. This is only an idea, but I feel that selling organs should be considered because if someone is willing to give an organ to those in need, even if it is for a price, that in itself is pretty astonishing.  I think to turn people away who are willing to do something like this would be a crime.  Once again, I see both sides in this issue, but I think that those who vote against the selling of organs need to think of what something like this may to for peoples lives.

I also got a chance to read a few more articles on lines discussing the selling of organs. It seems that people are more worried with there not being enough organs then people taking advantage of an opportunity like this. I think that our nation is in such dire need of organs that they don’t seem to care if we have to resort to selling them. 
<Alex's Blog LSC 100>

Organs for sale?

You own your body correct? Therefore, I believe that you can do whatever you want with it.  Even if it means doing some crazy stunt that makes you almost lose your arm or even smoking a pack of cigarettes a day which can damage your lungs. All of these things are choices you make with your body.  This is why I believe a person should have the right to donate or sell his or her organs.  I would like to think that if a family member of mine got in a car accident and was in desperate need of an organ, that they would be able to supply it for them. Situations like this would not be solved if it was not for people donating or selling their organs.  

I believe that a person who wants to donate or sell their organs need to be 100% healthy.  If donating the organ jeopardizes the persons health at all I don’t think that it should be allowed. Therefore, I think the person needs to go through a few tests in order to double check they are healthy enough to loose an organ.

 Reading the article by Martin Wilkinson only makes feel even more sure that selling your organs should be legalized. I have actually read several articles on how organs are in need. I think that in order for people to not take advantage of this right there needs to be restrictions. As long as the person is healthy enough to donate, and the organ is effective and healthy then selling should be allowed.  If you don’t need to organ then there is someone else out there that may really need it. I don’t think there is anything wrong with selling something that you own, and your organs are something that you own. Therefore, you should be able to do what you please with them.

 

After too many years of declining lung function, Ted Gerbig received his gift of life in July 2003; a single lung donated by a Green Bay man, David Duranceau. David was an organ recipient, having received a kidney and pancreas on April 21, 2003, and an organ donor, when he died of an intra-cranial hemorrhage on July, 10, 2003. On July 11, 2003 Ted received David’s gift of life and is now living a happy, healthy and productive life.    For more information on how the Duranceau family is promoting organ donation, log on to: www.davidduranceaufoundation.com 

TILOHL

I believe that Henrietta's Lacks story is a very important one for people to hear. I believe that this story will change the way people feel about the medical industry. The doctors took Henrietta's biological cells and are now making profits from it. This is not fare to her or her family. They should receive profit form it as well or at least should have been asked first. I also strongly believe that this story might change the public's mind of wether or not doctors need consent from patients before they take a biological sample. After hearing this story I believe that they should get consent in almost all situations, especially Henrietta's. At the same time I do believe these samples are important for the medical industry to make discovers about new medications and such. If it was not for Henrietta we may not have some of the cancer medication we do today. I think that if the doctors would have been up front in the first place that just maybe she would have voluntarily given her biological samples to them. I think that this would have also changed the impact of what the public thinks. The public would have probably been more willing if doctors were honest with their patients from the start.

I think that Rebecca Skoolt faced lots of challenges while writing this book. I think that it is a story that people of all ages should hear but at the same time many people may not be interested in a story like this. I believe she had to make the story more personal instead of scientific in order to attract readers who were not interested in the medical field but still wanted to hear about Henrietta Lacks story.

I anticipate many things while reading this book. Most of all I think I will experience frustration towards the doctors that took Henrietta's biological cells without getting her consent first. Her family had no idea about her biological cells being taken for experimentation purposes. I feel that if they would have known the cause and been asked first, that they would have been more willing. I have not read much of the book, but I imagine that I will also feel thankful for Henrietta's cells that were taken because they have helped the medical industry make many new discoveries about cancer.

Henrietta Lacks 1951