Category: jadden

Stone Money Rewrite – jadden14

The Idea That is Money

Money acts as a gear in the clockwork of today’s society. Take the gear out, and the whole clock stops working. However, did you ever once consider the idea that the money you hold in your bank account holds no value? Upon reading the article The Island of Stone Money, I realized that money could very well be an idea, or just an acknowledgement of value. The article describes an island called Yap in Micronesia that has a unique form of currency. On the island, the people used these gigantic, carved stone disks as their currency. The people would use these disks otherwise known as fei to buy houses and make other large purchases, and because they were so heavy they would sometimes just leave the stones where they were and acknowledge the owners. In one case, one rich villager sent workers to an island to make the biggest fei any of the villagers have ever seen. They went to the island, and created the massive fei out of stone, said to be perfectly carved. It was said to be the biggest fei they have ever seen, and because of its massive size, it held much more wealth than the other fei. On the way back, the stone was lost at sea during a massive storm. So, did the man lose his precious fei at sea? The answer is both yes and no. The villagers knew that the fei stone was his, and instead of considering it lost, they remember that the fei at the bottom of the ocean, was his. I’m shocked by the idea that these people just kept track of who owned certain fei, as someone could have their entire savings out by someone else’s house. Friedman stated that later on, the Germans took control of the island, and found that the island badly needed new roads and requested that the district chiefs repair them. However, They wouldn’t listen, so the government painted black crosses on the fei, as an attempt to claim their fei. The people of yap saw this, and then decided to fix the roads. The roads were fixed, the crosses were removed, now restoring the people of yap’s wealth. To me this seems counterintuitive to accept that by marking one’s fei automatically they lose their wealth, however, they accepted it. The people of the island revealed to us that money is not a physical object, and that you can have wealth without any physical identity to show for it, and that theory holds true to this day.

Further research led me to look for current economies that can prove this. Upon reading the article How Fake Money Saved Brazil, I can never look at the dollar bill the same way anymore. In brazil, there currency has an issue with inflation. Their currency is increasing in value day by day. At one point it was at 80%, which is astounding! If we had the same inflation rate in the United States, our economy would be in chaos! How people and shops in Brazil are able to operate is unbelievable, and the fact that the prices changed rapidly made it hard to buy goods at a consistent price. Holding onto money is useless in an economy like this, as the value of items will skyrocket and your money will hold no value. Political candidates tried to fix this, but in most cases it just made it worse. Presidents in the past tried to freeze prices, print money, but all of their efforts have been proven unsuccessful. The people of Brazil have managed to adapt to this economic system, even if its somewhat unstable.

The most unpredictable form of currency by far is cryptocurrency. Bitcoin, otherwise known as BTC, is starting to become accepted as a new form of currency in the United States and in China. In the article The Bubble Bursts on e-Currency Bitcoin, the crypto market experienced a significant crash in value. Right around April in 2013, Bitcoin reached an all time high of 266 USD, and was rocketing in value. Just three days later, it fell off a cliff. It went down to 54 USD, and people were left broke. This is very similar to a stock market crash, because of that some investors were able to predict this event and didn’t buy. Some people sold their bitcoins and took their losses, others held theirs in hopes of a rise in value. Today, you can buy a bitcoin for 4187 USD, and it will probably change once your done reading this. Cryptocurrency, like stocks, can sporadically change value in a moments notice. Think of cryptocurrency like a race car. It can take fast turns, accelerate and brake fast, and when in the wrong hands, can crash. The thing that’s interesting about bitcoins is, it’s just an icon on a screen, or a line of encrypted code. It has no physical backing, and yet people have become very rich off this.

Even in the United States at one point their was an issue with our currency system. In Friedman’s article, he talks about the gold standard and how it failed. France wanted to transfer its dollars into gold, and at the time US currency was backed by a guaranteed amount of gold, that was yours any time you asked for it. However, the United States didn’t want to have to ship all the gold overseas, so France agreed to just have them leave a note on a desk with the gold, kind of reserving it for them. This lowered the US dollar’s value, and helped raise gold value in france. This acknowledgement of value, is what money in the world today is. The value in your account, the cash in your pocket, is no longer backed by anything. It’s crazy to think that our cash isn’t really worth anything physical, but is instead a symbol of wealth. When you look at all the currencies and how they are backed, you will find out that almost every one does not have a set value. They run off what the government says they are worth. There is no more gold, or any sort of backing, just word or a stone in your yard. This idea that we call money is what paid for our house, food, and all our necessities, and is only that, an idea.

 

Work Cited

Friedman, Milton. “The Island of Stone Money.” Diss. Hoover Institution, Stanford University , 1991.

Renaut, Anne. “The Bubble Bursts on E-currency Bitcoin.” Yahoo! News. Yahoo!, 13 Apr. 2013. Web.

Joffe-Walt, Chana . “How Fake Money Saved Brazil.” NPR.org. 4 Oct. 2010. 9 Sept. 2017. <http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/10/04/130329523/how-fake-money-saved-brazil&gt;>

Critical Reading – Jadden14

Section 5

Secondary Traumatic Stress has been documented in the spouses of veterans with PTSD from vietnam. And the spouses of Israeli veterans with PTSD, and Dutch Veterans with PTSD.

  • The author is claiming that Secondary Traumatic Stress has been recorded from previous veterans, by their wives.
  • The author then proceeds to list two more valid points: the spouses of Israeli veterans and the Dutch Veterans also reported this. The tone seems very repetitive, and is said in a way that the author finds this almost not suprising, and uses this to point out the big picture.

In one study, the incidence of secondary trauma in wives of Croatian war vets with PTSD was 30 percent. In another study there, it was 39 percent. “Trauma is really not something that  happens to an individual,” says Robert Motta, a clinical psychologist and psychology professor at Hofstra University who wrote a few of the many medical-journal articles about secondary trauma in Vietnam vets’ families. 

  • The first sentence is backing the theory in the previous sentence. The author presents a statistic to properly support his claim.
  • “In another study there it was 39 percent” – the author presents another study, one with a higher incident rate, to show the importance of this issue.
  • “Trauma is really not something that happens to an individual” – claiming that PTSD not only effects the person with the disorder, but the families as well. This quote is from a well known psychologist professor from a university, a credible source.

“Trauma is a contagious disease; it affects everyone that has close contact with a traumatized person” in some form or another, to varying degrees and for different lengths of time. “Everyone” includes children. Which is something Brannan and Caleb lose not a little sleep over, since they’ve got a six-year-old in the house.

  • “Trauma is a contagious disease; it affects everyone that has close contact with a traumatized person” – continuation of the point made, labeling trauma as a contagious disease, spreading and infecting anyone close to them.
  • “”Everyone” includes children.” – the author is trying to create a form of innocence by adding in the fact that children are being subjected to this issue. This is to bring the audience’s attention to the fact that PTSD is a very serious issue that needs to be addressed.
  • The author then lists an example of a kid who is suffering from this, losing sleep over this disorder. This continues to drive the point that everyone is affected by PTSD.

Katie Vines, the first time I meet her, is in trouble. Not that you’d know it to look at her, bounding up to the car, blondish bob flying as she sprints from her kindergarten class, nice round face like her daddy’s. No one’s the wiser until she cheerfully hands her mother a folder from the backseat she’s hopped into. It contains notes about the day from her teacher.

  • The author introduces a new character, Katie Vines, who apprears to be in trouble.
  • “not that you’d know it to look at her, bounding up to the car, blondish bob flying as she sprints from her kindergarden class” – a vivid description of the scene is provided. Katie seems to be a very hidden character, who resembles her father.
  • The mother recieves her progress in the form of notes from the teacher.

“It says here,” Brannan says, her eyes narrowing incredulously, “that you spit on somebody today.”

“Yes ma’am,” Katie admits, lowering her voice and her eyes guiltily.

“Katie Vines.” Brannan was born here in Alabama, so that’s drawled. “Wah did you do that?”

  • Katie now comes off as mean after reading the first line of dialog, as she spit on someone in school.
  • She lowers her eyes as she responds, she knows it was wrong, and admits to doing the act. If she knew it was wrong, then why did she do it?
  • The response from the mother, she is stunned. The author notes she was born in Alabama, and uses a southern accent in the mother’s response.

Her schoolmate said something mean. Maybe. Katie doesn’t sound sure, or like she remembers exactly. One thing she’s positive of: “She just made me…so. MAD.” Brannan asks Katie to name some of the alternatives. “Walk away, get the teacher, yes ma’am, no ma’am,” Katie dutifully responds to the prompts. She looks disappointed in herself. Her eyebrows are heavily creased when she shakes her head and says quietly again, “I was so mad.”

  • The audience finds out that one of katie’s schoolmates said something mean to her. But there is a certain disbelief from the author.
  • The mother then presents how the daughter should have appropriately handled the situation. The daughter shows signs of dissapointment, the mother is furious.
  • The author describes with great detail the anger within the mother.

 

Summaries-Jadden14

  1. A Price Too High

1. It seems counterintuitive that people support nuclear power to counteract global warming, but fail to see the cost in both safety and budget concerns. Nuclear power, as efficient and safe as it is, still arises concerns with it being built close to cities and towns. The massive 9.0 earthquake that happened in Japan, led to a nuclear meltdown in one of its plants. These natural disasters could easily trigger a meltdown in the United States, and have in the past led to plant shutdowns due to safety concerns. The waste product from these plants are not very environmentally friendly either. When plant officials are questioned on how the waste is disposed, they often try to avoid the question. Not to mention the cost to build these plants, as nuclear power plants are quite expensive to build. Not only that, but ratepayers will have to pay for the rediculious cost-overruns, which today totals up to 200 billion dollars from previous plants. As great as reducing CO2 emissions would be, nuclear power might not be the best answer.

2. Polio Vaccination Campaign

2. It seems counterintuitive that Northern Nigeria denied the polio vaccine when its one of the most infected areas in Africa. In 2003, three states in Nigeria boycotted the GPEI immunization campaign to eradicate polio. Due to the political powers in Nigeria at the time, vaccination was abruptly silenced. There reasoning was that the vaccines had contained carcinogenic agents and parents should not let their kids get vaccinated. The Governors even got political figues to get up and speak about how America is corrupt and trying to mess with the vaccines. Some of the reasons Nigeria showed little support for vaccination could be due to its low health care utilization rates. In 2003, their ultilization rate was about 8% in Southern Nigeria. At the time, a majority of control over health care was led by each state government. Northern Nigeria was colonized by Islamic Jihadists, and the South Nigeria was colonized by Britain. The differences between southern government and northern government caused issues, as their attitudes toward medicine were vastly different. The Trovan Trial, a drug in the past the brought up how western health intervention was using unethical means, testing new drugs on patients. This led to people dying due to dangerous means of vaccination. Nigeria had its concerns, and there was nothing that the GPEI could do about it.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1831725/

3. Is Walmart Really Going Organic and Local?

3. It seems counterintuitive that walmart is claiming to go Organic and Local when it can’t even sufficiently supply its stores from local farms. Because walmart is such a large business, going local and organic is hard to do. Walmart makes up about 18% of all grocery sales in the United States. When questioned about which farms walmart gets its local produce from, the response led to other ideas. The three farms, located in North Carolina, Washington, and Arkansas, are non-organic. In order for walmart to become organic, it would have to buy from smaller farms at a higher price, and these farms could’nt fill the demand walmart requires. Walmart is not a charity, it is a business, therefore i’m doubtful it will spend more money and go through the hassle of buying from local farms. Walmart will continue to sell its produce, however they will continue to make a profit. So next time you go to the store and look for organic food, you might not be getting exactly what you asked for.

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2012/03/walmart-groceries-organic-local-food-deserts/

Visual Rhetoric—Jadden

0:01-0:02 The flag of texas is along what appears to be a white wall. Composed of three colors, red,white,and blue. There is 3 sections, a blue section on the left, with a white star in the center of it, and a white section above a red section on the right.There is also two golden rings along the left side of the flag, for attaching rope and raising and lowering it from a flagpole. In the video for some reason it seems to not be along the surface of the wall, but hovering, unattached to anything, due to the fact it is casting a shadow along the wall. There is a light in the background illuminating the flag. I am led to believe it’s indoors, however there is ripples in the flag indicating possibly a draft of some sort.

0:03-0:04 The flag’s blue portion starts to seep into the bottom section of the flag. As the blue pours in, it begins to start overtaking the bottom red section of the flag. It seems that the blue fading in could be symbolic of waves along a shore or possibly water flooding, as it enters the bottom of the flag in a flooding motion.

 

0:05 The blue that seeped into the bottom of the flag has completely covered the red section of the texas flag. The blue created waves as it filled in the flag, to make it seem the flag is being overtaken by water. The blue is mimicking the ocean now, as it sways back and forth along the flag, beginning to overtake the entire flag.

0:07-0:09 The blue starts to rock back and forth, overtaking a portion of the top white section of the flag. It does this in the same manner as waves would rock back and forth in an ocean. The white lone star within the flag remains untouched throughout the process.

0:10-0:11 The flag shows water rising and lowering as depicted by the blue covering more and then less of the white in the flag. Little ripples and waves are also being created by the blue section of the flag, making it seem more realistic.

0:12-0:14 The water level overtakes more of the flag. It starts to seep into the white section, covering more than half of the flag. The white lone star within the flag remains untouched by the blue. Larger waves are being created within the flag. It swells up and down, and becomes much rougher than the first set of waves.

0:15-0:16 The waves continue to appear on the flag. The blue has overtaken almost all of the white, and the wavelike motion has become very rough. It continues to swell up and down as if there is a bad storm at sea.

0:17-0:18 The waves and level of blue have lowered, and created a sense of relief. The blue on the right corner has a small hill, even though the level of blue has dropped. This could possibly indicate a wavelike motion getting much stronger, or possibly a gigantic wave could flush the flag.

0:19 It begins to level out the blue area, and the blue starts to lower out of the white section in the flag. The lone star is still untouched by the blue present in the flag. The waves have also now become much calmer.

0:20 The level of blue has now drained below the white and back into the red section. Waves continue to develop as the draining process occurs.

0:21 The level of blue is now almost entirely gone, as it drained away from the red section of the flag. There is now only a sliver of blue hanging off the blue section to the right, almost to the point were it looks like the original flag again.

0:22 The flag of texas is now restored to its original look. The blue has drained completely out of the flag and the original flag now stands.

0:23-0:27 The flag fades away. The same background is present, however there is now in black text, the words “Harvey can’t mess with Texas”. This reveals that this is an advertisement about hurricane Harvey and its effects on Texas. The blue represented the hurricane and all the flooding damage caused by the storm. The lone star could have possibly been symbolism that texas withstood the flood, as it remained unchanged throughout the transformation of the flag.

0:28 The text changes again, this time to a website link. This website link leads to the hurricane Harvey relief efforts in texas. A small logo from Ad Council appears in the bottom right hand corner of the screen.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qi-veEhVJUk

Stone Money–jadden14

Money plays a key role in today’s society. However, did you ever once consider the idea that the money you hold in your bank account or your wallet holds no value? What value does money hold? Upon reading the article The Island of Stone Money, I realized that money could very well be an idea, or just an acknowledgement of value. In the article, there is an island called yap in Micronesia that uses a large stone disk as their currency. The people would use these disks otherwise known as fei to buy houses and make other large purchases, and because they were so heavy they would sometimes just leave the stones where they were and acknowledge the owners.In one case, the yap set out on a mission to get a big fei stone. They went to an island, and created the massive fei out of stone from the island. It was said to be the biggest fei they have ever seen. Because of its massive size, it held much more wealth than the other fei. On the way back, there was some difficulties transporting the stone. The stone was lost at sea during a massive storm, and the entire island still acknowledged the wealth it held. I’m shocked by the idea that these people just kept track of who owned certain fei, as someone could have their entire savings out in front of someone else’s house. Friedman stated that later on, the Germans took control of the island, and found that the island badly needed new roads and requested that the district chiefs repair them. However, They wouldn’t listen, so the government painted black crossed on the fei, ultimately claiming the fei as their own. The people of yap saw this, and realized the situation they were in. Later on the roads were fixed, and the crosses were removed, restoring the people of yap’s wealth. To me this seems counterintuitive to accept that simply by marking one’s fei automatically they lose their wealth, however, they accepted it. I believe the people of the island of yap revealed to us that money is not a physical object, and that you can have wealth without any physical identity to show for it. The value of money can change, and has done so before.

Further research led me to look for current economies that can prove this. Upon reading the article How Fake Money Saved Brazil, I can never look at the dollar bill the same way anymore. In brazil, there currency has a rediculous inflation rate. At one point it was at 80%, which is astounding! If we had the same inflation rate in the United States, our economy would be in chaos! How people and shops in Brazil are able to operate is unbelievable, and the fact that the prices changed rapidly made it hard to buy goods at a consistent price. Holding onto money is useless in an economy like this, as the value of items will skyrocket and your money will hold no value. This makes it very intriguing to understand how the people in brazil save money, from what it sounds like, they don’t. Due to the rapidly fluxuating currency and price of goods going up, there is no reason to. The government tried to fix this, but in most cases it just made it worse. Many presidents in the past tried to freeze prices, print money, but all of their efforts have failed. There has always been inflation in brazil, and the people have learned to live with it.

Sometimes the best way to show how unpredictable money can be is to look at the digital kind, cryptocurrency. Bitcoin, otherwise known as BTC, is starting to become accepted as a new form of currency in the United States and in China. In the article The Bubble Bursts on e-Currency Bitcoin, I learned about how the crypto market experienced a significant crash in value. Right around April in 2013, Bitcoin reached an all time high of 266 USD, and was rocketing in value. Just three days later, it fell off a cliff. It went all the way down to 54$, and people were left with their devalued Bitcoins. This is very similar to our stock market crash, and because of that some investors were able to predict this event and didn’t buy. Some people sold their bitcoins and took their losses, others held theirs in hopes of a rise in value. Today, you can buy a bitcoin for 4187 USD, and it will probably change once your done reading this. Cryptocurrency, like stocks, can sporadically change in value in a moments notice. This currency is not quite like the USD, as it is much more susceptible to inflation. Think of cryptocurrency like a race car. It can take fast turns, accelerate and brake fast, and when in the wrong hands, can crash. The thing that’s interesting about bitcoins is, it’s just an icon on a screen, or a line of encrypted code. It has no physical backing, and is still widely traded to this day.

Even in the United States at one point their was an issue with our own currency. In Friedman’s article, he talks about the gold standard. France wanted to turn its dollars into gold, and at the time US currency was backed by a certain amount of gold, that was yours any time you asked for it. The United States didn’t want to have to ship all the gold overseas, so France agreed to just have them leave a note on a desk with the gold, kind of reserving it for them. This lowered the value of the US dollar, and helped raise the gold value in france. All over what may or may not be gold in the federal reserve. This acknowledgement of value, is what money in the world today is. The value in your account, the cash in your pocket, is no longer backed by anything. It’s crazy to think that our cash isn’t really worth anything physical, but it’s still there. We sleep soundly knowing that we have a set amount of value in an account somewhere, because the bank tells us we have it. When you look at all the currencies and how they are backed, you will find out that almost every one does not have a set value. They all run off what the government says they are worth. There is no more gold, or any sort of backing, just word or a stone in your yard. This idea that we call money is what paid for our house, food, and all our necessities. You may never get to even see your money, but you know it’s there.

 

Work Cited

Friedman, Milton. “The Island of Stone Money.” Diss. Hoover Institution, Stanford University , 1991.

Renaut, Anne. “The Bubble Bursts on E-currency Bitcoin.” Yahoo! News. Yahoo!, 13 Apr. 2013. Web.

Joffe-Walt, Chana . “How Fake Money Saved Brazil.” NPR.org. 4 Oct. 2010. 9 Sept. 2017. <http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/10/04/130329523/how-fake-money-saved-brazil&gt;>