(Image source: Georgetown Law Center)

I just though I’d share an interesting article on morality:

“A team of psychologist recently asked dozens of college students to consider several morally charged situations. In one, a friend lies on his resume to land a job; in another, survivors of a plane rash consider cannibalizing an injured boy to avoid starvation. Students who pondered these hypothetical scenarios while sitting at a filthy desk with stick stains and a chewed-up pen rated them as more immoral than did students who sat at a pristine desk. In another version of the experiment, a nearby trash can doused with novelty fart spray had similar effect [...] New studies tend to support the view of David Hume that emotions drive moral judgement; Immanuel Kant argued that logical reasoning should be the driving force [read more].”

(Image Source: NY Times)

Note: The above image is an excerpt from the syllabus for Barack Obama’s 1994 Current Issues in Racism and the Law seminar.

I found this great article, “Inside Professor Obama’s Classroom,” written by Jodi Kantor, in the New York Times website while I was perusing through mountains and mountains of RSS feeds.

“We’ve asked four legal experts to take a look at then-Professor Obama’s course materials and offer some insight into what they say about Mr. Obama’s teaching methods, priorities and approach to the Constitution[...]”

The four experts are:

John C. Eastman
Randy Barnett
Pamela S. Karlan
Akhil Reed Amar

The four experts analyses  can be found here.

And below is a list of the analyzed documents:

Syllabus “Racism and the Law”

2003 Final Exam
2002 Final Exam
2001 Final Exam
2000 Final Exam
1999 Final Exam
1998 Final Exam
1997 Final Exam | answer memo
1996 Final Exam | answer memo

(Image Source: BusinessWeek)

Driving through our neighborhood one day, my brothers and I noticed that on almost every other house there was a for sale sign, and on the driveways of such houses there were at least one idle, neglected SUV and/or truck. “Tough times, man,” someone says in the car (I can’t remember who).

Obviously the price of oil and the crumbling economy contributed to the daunting and foreboding spectacle before us, but I for one was raised to believe that behind every negative situation, scenario, or outcome, there is always a positive note hiding, waiting to be uncovered. My brother Gilbert and I always engage in conversations having to do with the economy, society, and whatnot to try and build up our business acumen. On one of those days one of us commented, “It was about time people started caring about going green.”

Call it preparation meeting opportunity (a Stanford professor’s definition of ‘luck’) or whatever, but as I was reading the newest issue of BusinessWeek I came across an article that beckoned to my cultivated understanding about the positive impacts high oil prices have incurred. As a note of warning, I’m not proposing that we keep oil prices high or drive them even higher, since those who will be hurt by such a hasty economic policy would be those who are currently selling their houses at a discount rate.

In “The Real Question: Should Oil Be Cheap?” John Carey speaks of how in the past America dealt with a similar surge in oil prices and how Americans, after the price of oil went back down, went about their lives as if such an economic catastrophe never occurred:

America has been here before […] although the country was shaped by an utter lack of concern over energy costs, the 1970s oil shocks changed that […] the myth of unlimited energy took a tumble as oil prices soared. By 1980, crude had jumped to $103 per barrel (in today’s dollars). The country responded, buying smaller cars, passing stricter fuel economy standards, making industry more efficient, and boosting oil exploration and drilling. Americans learned to use half as much energy per dollar of gross domestic product as they did before the crisis—gains that have paid off handsomely. “All the heavy lifting we did in the 1980s to reduce reliance on energy has made us less vulnerable to the energy shocks today,” says Tufts University economist Gilbert E. Metcalf.

But that momentum toward greater energy efficiency was soon lost. Within five years, because of the substantial reduction in demand, the world was awash in oil. The Saudis slashed production from 9.9 million barrels per day in 1980 to 3.4 million in 1985—and still weren’t able to keep the price per barrel from plunging below $11 in 1986 (the equivalent of $22 today).

(Image from: http://www.migrainerelief.co.uk/migraine_pic.jpg)

Gilbert, one of my four brothers, has brought another article-worthy topic to my attention. This time around it was more indirect, however. After reading a specific article, he sprang out of his room enclosed by an omnipresent, jubilant, and radiating aura! He was so excited that I couldn’t tune him out. A bit bewildered by his awkward afternoon rendition of “The Hills Are Alive,” I inquired about his source of glee and anticipation. “There’s new breakthroughs in migraines! Go check out an article in Scientific American titled ‘Why Migraines Strike‘ by Dodick and Gargus,” he tells me with a hopeful smirk. After reading the article, I excused his afternoon antics under the spectre of just cause since he had good reason to celebrate.

How much do you know about migraines? Other than that they hurt like hell? Leafing through the article, I found facts that I hadn’t been aware of. For instance, did you know about “300 million people suffer from migraines” and that it has–according to supporting historical evidence–been around for about “7,000″ years? (Dodick & Gargus 1) However, despite being around for so long, there has been very little headway (pun intended) in garnering up deeper and more valuable understandings of such a pervasive ailment, social and scientifically.

One of the most disheartening fact about migraines is that it’s commonly misunderstood by those of us not affected by it in society. More often than not, when someone we know asserts that they are in a great state of pain, we shrug it off as if it’s ailment easily cured by over-the-counter medication or rest. Fortunately, such thought processes are, for the most part, nothing more than the result of pure ignorance. Aside from being a bearer of good news, the article has a great, empathy-invoking description about migraines: “For those who do not [suffer from migraines], the closest analogous experience might be severe altitude sickness: nausea, acute sensitivity to light, and searing, bed-confining headache” (Dodick & Gargus 1). By the way I’m not an individual who is speaking without having walked down the windy, hazy path of misunderstanding–quite the contrary.

Social misunderstanding, however, is just one of many layers that have prolonged the arrival of comprehensive migraine treatments that lead to better, well-informed citizens (like myself). The scientific community has, time and time again, erred in addressing and treating migraines, e.g. “only a few drugs can prevent migraine [...] all of them were developed for other diseases, including hypertension, depression and epilepsy” (Dodick & Gargus 5). With new research findings, as dicussed in the article, and increasing social awareness, there might be hope for the 300 million or so who suffer from migraines.

(Image source: Smashing Magazine)

From cars to undergraduate universities, over the years I have been subjected to my fair share of brochures, and I will be brutally honest, the aesthetic appeal and layout of a brochure has to capture my attention almost instantaneously or else I will not bother paging through it. In addition to taking photos, designing websites, creating complex digital images, and laying down intricate lines on paper, I have always wanted to create a brochure of some sort. Hopefully one day–maybe when my brother(s) and/or friends and I ever get a business going–I will get that chance.

Since we are on the topic of brochures, I felt the need to share an enlightening post from one of my favorite design blogs. I did not want to post all the of the images on my site, so you will have to click here.