Dec 31

Free Speech

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Our freedoms of speech, religion, press, petition, and assembly are set out in the first amendment in the United States of America’s Constitution which defines what America strives for. Citizens have the right to speak their minds about whatever issues they believe in without being persecuted. Of course, there are some laws and regulations on how far citizens can go to speak their minds. For example, a person will not get away with bombing the pentagon to show his or her disdain for the government. However, a student should not get suspended just because they wear an armband that protests what they believe is wrong. As long as students are not disturbing class or school in general, they have the right to wear what they believe in or are protesting about. Schools should allow protests that do not involve disruption of class and not suspend students who protest peacefully.

This is what happened in the Tinker v. Des Moines court case in 1969. A group of students decided to wear black armbands to protest, basically, the Vietnam War.  However, some high school principals of Des Moines did not appreciate this.  When they heard about what these students planned to do, they encouraged the school board to make a school policy that no black armbands were to be worn on school property, and if worn the student would be asked to remove it or be suspended until the armband was removed.  Three students proceeded to school wearing the black armbands and they were suspended. (Tedford, 2009).

First, the policy was created before the situation happened. This action was taken to scare or “chill” students from exercising free speech. It would have been understandable to create the policy after the students’ protest if it caused any disruption.  However, the students came in and wore the armbands peacefully. Secondly, the school board’s policy against the armbands violated the first amendment. The court case states clearly that “in wearing armbands, the petitioners were quiet and passive. They were not disruptive and did not impinge upon the rights of others. In these circumstances, their conduct was within the protection of the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment” (Tedford, 2009).

Protesting should be accepted at schools, but with regulations so things do not get out of hand. Schools do not allow protest because they are afraid that situations will get out of hand. If students are allowed to protest on school property it will give students an idea of what freedom of speech is about. Maybe if schools allowed small protesting to go on, students may learn how to protest without getting physical or out of hand.  The students who wore armbands protested in a way that did not cause any disruptions. Schools need to see that not all protests are bad.

The first amendment was installed for a reason, namely, to express our opinions without persecution. If students learn to protest in a peaceful way during their time at school, then there would be less violent protest. The court case, Tinker v. Des Moines, shows that it is possible to see that protesting at school is protected free speech and will not cause a disruption in the learning process.

-GW

 

Posted in: General.

Dec 30

Space Debris Inhibits Exploration

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There have been many remakes of the Chicken Little story, but what they all have in common is that the little chicken truly believes that the sky is falling. Of course she was mistaken and the only thing that fell on her head was an acorn.  It is a scientific fact that the sky cannot fall, but things in space can come crashing down to earth, which will make it seem like the sky is falling for those who lack intelligence. There are two types of objects that fall from space: natural occurring objects like comets and asteroids or human made objects like satellites and spaceships.  For the past few decades humans have been sending satellites to space so they can study Earth. Naturally, man made objects, like the satellites, are not meant to last forever and they eventually stop working. After years of orbiting some of these dead satellites are reentering the Earth’s atmosphere and the media have been reporting the news of these falling or fallen satellites. Not only are falling satellites a threat to humans, debris just orbiting the earth can be harmful for working satellites and the astronauts. The space junk is already big, but when satellites collide into other satellites more debris is created, causing the space junk to grow even more.
All eyes were on the sky as major media outlets reported the descent of satellites falling from space orbit and reentering Earth’s atmosphere and ultimately crashing into parts of the Earth. NASA confirmed that the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite, UARS, fell back to Earth on Saturday morning, September 24, 2011, (NASA). Even more recently, on October 20, 2011, the associated press confirmed that, “pieces of a retired German satellite hurtling toward the atmosphere may crash to earth this weekend …”(washington post).  There are many more news reports like these all over the newspapers and TV, but aero.org has information on what satellites have fallen and when future ones will fall.
NASA and other programs create models to predict when the debris of satellites will fall and a general location of where it will fall. They even predict how much will burn up while reentering the Earth’s atmosphere and how much will survive. However, none of these predictions are exact and predictions can be changed many times until the satellite falls. The news agencies report about these satellites until they are done falling and when nothing newsworthy happens like someone getting hurt will go on to other news more noteworthy to them. Then the cycle will repeat when another satellite is supposed to reenter the Earth’s atmosphere.
Why exactly do satellites come back to earth? From a scientific perception, aerospace website explains:
“Objects in orbit are exposed to atmospheric drag, just as aircraft and automobiles are near the ground. In space, of course, the atmospheric drag is much less than that experienced closer to the ground but, over time, even a small amount of drag can result in a satellite’s reentry into the denser atmosphere.
Objects orbiting at low altitudes may be removed from orbit by atmospheric drag within weeks, months, or years depending on the object and its altitude. Objects at higher altitudes may remain in orbit for hundreds or thousand of years” (aero).
In simpler terms, the gravity pulls on the satellite and it gets dragged into the Earth’s atmosphere causing it to crash back to land. This is why objects that orbit the Earth will not stay in space forever.
The likelihood of more debris falling out of orbit is a real threat. Humans have been in such a hurry to put material into space that a tipping point will soon be reached. Earth’s orbit is littered with scientific, military and commercial satellites to such a degree that it is impossible to track all the space junk. Tracking is important to keep astronauts and working satellites safe, as well as monitor the instances when a satellite falls back to Earth to adequately warn inhabitants upon which it may fall. Also more debris is created when satellites crash into each other and the pieces break off creating smaller debris. Space junk will just continue to grow until a solution can be discovered to lessen debris in space, and therefore lessening falling debris.
Without an effort to find a solution to space junk, further exploration and use of the space around our planet could become impossible and the likelihood of major damage and death to life on our planet could become a harsh reality. There will be news reports of people being impaled with space debris and then the news will have something noteworthy to report.  Sad, but it is true. The good news is that scientists have been studying the problem of space garbage for many years, and solutions are being worked on to clear space of junk and keep the planet safe from fall out. There is not however an easy solution to the problem, nor a one-size-fits-all solution.
Our planet Earth is now encircled by a human-made asteroid belt. As more activity and collisions occur, the belt gets tighter and thicker. Some scientists believe that Earth’s belt is at risk if the problem is not addressed soon. In these difficult economic times, it is difficult to imagine governments or corporations spending great sums of money to research and develop the projects that will lead to a solution to space junk; however, if this is not done, we may be unable to explore and use the next frontier which is space. In the children’s story of Chicken Little the animals were afraid when they thought the sky was falling; today, in real life, while the sky is not falling there are objects that we put there that are falling, and it is time that we acted to clean up the mess before something tragic occurs. It would be a shame if our legacy to the future was self-imposed imprisonment on a planet raining space garbage from the sky.
-GW

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Apr 10

The Arlenes – Music

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Visit the website of the music group: The Arlenes! Click here: http://thearlenes.com.

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Apr 03

Artists: Call for entries

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NAMIWilliamson.org is calling for art entries. This is great painting weather – wild storms…sunshine -

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Mar 03

Environmental Health – Monarchs

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Environ

Environmental Health

mental Health


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Mar 03

Wild Strawberries

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Visit the Ingmar Bergman Foundation to see more about his works:

…Besides, behind-the-scenes footage relating to eighteen of his films have been donated to the archive, including The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries and Scenes from a Marriage.


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Feb 27

Lux

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One lux is equal to one lumen per square metre:
1 lx = 1 lm/m2 = 1 cd•sr•m–2.

Illuminance Example

Illuminance

Example
10−4 lux Total starlight, overcast sky[2]
0.002 lux Moonless clear night sky with airglow[2]
0.01 lux Quarter moon
0.27 lux Full moon on a clear night[2][3]
1 lux Full moon overhead at tropical latitudes[4]
3.4 lux Dark limit of civil twilight under a clear sky[5]
50 lux Family living room[6]
80 lux Hallway/toilet[7][8]
100 lux Very dark overcast day[2]
320–500 lux Office lighting[9][10][11]
400 lux Sunrise or sunset on a clear day.
1,000 lux Overcast day[2]; typical TV studio lighting
10,000–25,000 lux Full daylight (not direct sun)[2]
32,000–130,000 lux Direct sunlight

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Feb 13

14th annual Great Backyard Bird Count

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Get ready to have some fun, count some birds and make a difference, because the 14th annual Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) takes place February 18 through February 21.
Anyone can participate. Simply watch and count birds in your yard, a nearby park, or maybe at a school. Then report what you saw by entering your bird list online at GBBC

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Nov 17

Google ebooks

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See what’s new: view and download the story collection “Slow Children At Play”.

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Sep 07

Bookshelf

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Here’s a way to share some books on your reading list.

http://www.shelfari.com/

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