Research Project Progress Report: Week 5

        This week I did my rough draft of my research paper. The most valuable thing I learned was definitely not to leave things last minute so I don't get stuck doing work while I'm sick next time. The only challenges I faced was making my rough draft clean and coherent. Every time I start writing something its mostly brain vomit and I always have to go back and organize everything so it doesn't all look like random information everywhere. So the fact that this was such a long writing process everything came out kind of messy and random despite me trying to stick to my outline - I couldn't help just writing the next thing that came to my mind no matter how irrelevant it was. My goals for this coming week is to get a lot of work done on polishing my rough draft because it isn't anything close that I would actually consider passing in for a final. I'm going to want to go back and find the right spots to add in more things that I felt I left out the first time writing it, so its not just going to be plain editing and rearranging things. I feel like I got the hardest part out of the way which was get all this information down but I still feel like I have a good ways to go before a final.

Research Project Progress Report: Week 3

        This week I found a few more sources and finished my outline. I had a hard time starting my outline but once the ideas started flowing I was able to get it all done all at once. I learned that it would have been a lot harder if I had to make up the whole essay as I went along because coming up with the structure was already hard enough that trying to structure and write your thoughts and findings all at once would have been very messy. The one challenge I faced this week was meeting the deadline for the annotated bibliography...I still have to go back and finish that -cough-. My goals for next week is to get a start on that rough draft (which won't be anything I'll be able to finish in one day) and also to just finish the annotated bibliography so I can get that out of the way instead of just putting it off.

Research Project Progress Report: Week 2

        This week I went through to pick the sources I wanted to mainly use and started my annotated bibliography for them. I learned that I didn't have as much usable sources as I thought I did so I had to go back and look for more. A challenge that I'm facing is being able to come up with different types of sources. The easiest ones that might actually have relevant information are usually articles online. I'm hoping to find at least a few video sources like a documentary or an interview to add variety to my sources. A new question that emerged is what types of sources could I actually find that would relate to this topic that doesn't just include articles? My goals for this upcoming week is to find the last few sources I need to add variety and finish my annotated bibliography with them. I will also need to make sure that in the end my annotated bibliography is strong enough for me to do my outline for Monday next week.

Research Project Progress Report: Week 1

1. This week I found several sources from the opposing views database. From looking through these sources I learned that a lot of sub topics within "addiction to technology" have contrasting ideas. For example, I was able to find an article on how internet can disrupt learning as well as an article on how internet can improve learning. A challenge I faced was finding specific sources for my topic considering it's pretty broad and general. This lead me to question what it is that I want to focus on within the "addiction to technology" topic because it can mean a lot of different things and just searching for sources through the key phrase "addiction to technology" does not get me down on any specific path to take with my research. My goals for next week will be to possibly find a few more sources and then weed through all the ones I feel aren't really what i'm trying to focus on. Hopefully through eliminating and grouping sources I'll be able to get a better sense of a specific focus and a more direct path that I want to take in continuing my research.

The Pretties #8

“ ‘Your father always suspected that being pretty-minded is simply the natural state for most people. They want to be vapid and lazy and vain’ - Maddy glanced at Tally - ‘and selfish. It only takes a twist to lock in that part of their personalities. He always thought that some people could think their way out of it.”
Pg 708

Reaction: It turns out in the end that when Tally took the pills she took one herself and gave the other to Zane. The pill that Zane took contained nanos that ate the lesions away, while Tally took the pill that was supposed to stop the nanos after they finished off the lesions, which consequently left Zane with brain damage after the nanos weren't stopped by the second pill. But this meant that the pill that Tally took did nothing when taken alone, so Maddy figures that Tally was somehow able to 'think' her way out of the clutches of the lesions. Whats interesting is how Maddy says that it's almost like human nature to actually want to be air headed and happy. It really makes it seem that they're really not changing much in people's minds their only making sure to keep prominent a trait that most people are already born with.


Analysis: The author finishes off the book with the twist that Tally was able to cure herself without any use of the pill. He also criticizes traits of people in the quote that its the 'natural state for people to want to be vapid, lazy, and vain'. The really important part is how he describes it as 'locking in that part of their personality' rather than changing us to make us that way. It really makes us stop and think if that is what we're really like today in our own society. When you look at it, its not hard to see how some people seem to want to be ignorant, and detached from reality simply because its easier that way. Most people just want the easier life possible and what better way to do it than to dumb ourselves down and ignore the world in order to shut everything off. We'll always be 'happy' with the right amount of ignorance.

The Pretties #7

“This had been the place where the operation had been developed, from which the first test subjects had been drawn. The purpose of the brain lesions was to deter violence and conflict, so who better to experiment on than people caught up in an endless blood feud? Like rabid enemies in a locked room, the tribes trapped within the ring of little men would reveal anything you wanted to know about the very human origins of the bloodshed.”
Pg 628


Reaction: This part was probably the most least expected thing out of the whole book. I kept trying to figure out what the reservation was all about and how it could have possible been out there in the wild this whole time without anybody else finding out or without them eventually drifting into the but the whole thing flew right over my head. Apparently the reservation is a very carefully constructed 'experiment' that's constantly being run by city doctors. They keep these 2 tribes in a constant feud inside this reservation in order to study the violent human behavior so they'll know exactly what to condition people against back in the city. The wild people are kept in the reservation by what is referenced as 'the ring of little men' which are really little robotic voodoo dolls tied to the trees all around the reservations that sends a shock wave of pain to anyone that comes near them. Its crazy to think that the operation most likely originated from this case study.


Analysis: The author shows here the roots of the operation. By studying any destructive and negative behavior of the 2 feuding tribes in the reservation they were able to create the lesions to do exactly what they wanted to everyone's brains so they harbor any of the traits of the wild people in the reservation. It really shows what lengths these people will go to, to create their idea of a 'perfect' society. They use these people and let them kill each other out in the wild and study them in a form of some twisted experiment just so they can go back to the city and create their brain lesions based off of their findings. Every time you think you're starting to have this society figured out the author throws another crazy secret behind this civilization that just opens up a brand new group of questions that keeps you reading, looking for answers.

The Pretties #6

“God, he’d said. The old Rusty word for their invisible superheroes in the sky.”
Pg 523


Reaction: I never really noticed how there wasn't really any mention of religion in this series up until this point - apparently it's nonexistent. In this part Tally crash lands in some reservation after taking the pill and and running away from the city. She meets some wild people so the reservation actually ends up reminding me of the reservation from Brave New World. One of the reservation native talks about God and it leaves Tally referring to God as an 'invisible superhero in the sky'. Its definitely weird to have God referred to as that and it makes me question what kind of impact the lack of religion has on this society, whether good or bad. I would think that by not having religion it might make people think more logically by it might also eliminate just one more belief that would divide people and cause them to lash out against things.


Analysis: Here the author brings up the importance or religion, or in this case the lack thereof. Religion is completely nonexistent in this civilization and the main reason for that might tie back to Dr. Cables philosophy. She talked about how the 'Special Circumstances were the cure to human being's destructive behavior and negative impact on the earth. Religion, even though is something that very important for a lot of people and brings many people together, is the also source of many differences between people. If religion were to be allowed in this society then that would be something that could be different in people which would completely go against what this society is all about. Nobody fights or disagrees because everybody is the exact same way. Religion could not exist in this civilization because it would just create differences and separation which would eventually lead to society possibly going back to everyone fighting and competing against each other which is exactly what people like Dr. Cable fight against.