How Much "Stuff" Do I Have?

I never realized the severity of my impact on Earth.  When making a list of all of the things I needed to survive, I found myself trying to live with a lot of things that I didn't need.  My list of things turned out to be comprised of 50 items: from toothbrushes to socks to pants.  For some reason, this number seemed very high to me.  I thought 50 items was a lot.  


I thought 50 was a lot, that is, until I counted the actual number of items I actually own.  After about 30 minutes of counting all of the "stuff" in my room, my tally was off the charts.  I was extremely embarrassed and really shocked to how much stuff I had.  Shirts alone, I had about 150, and which I really only wear 15 or so.  I have 7 jeans in which only 3 are used by me.  I was just really shocked by the amount of clothes I have.  And actually, as a matter of fact, my mom and I went through a lot of my clothes and took out about 20 shirts that don't fit me that we will be donating.  And there are still tons more to go.  Altogether, I had well over 400 items in my bedroom.  


This number really brings to fruition the impact on Earth that I have.  In GT, we looked deeper into how products are made.  On the box of a toy, it may say "Made in China" but where did those plastics come from?  Where did the ink come from?  Andrew and I looked at the impact that an iPhone 3GS had on the Earth and the effects are astounding.  Apple is one of the more environmentally conscience companies out there but the process of their products takes its toll on the environment.  For example, stainless steel is used to make an iPhone 3GS.  Stainless steel is an iron-containing alloy—a substance made up of two or more chemical elements—used in a wide range of applications.  Stainless steels are made of some of the basic elements found in the earth: iron ore, chromium, silicon, nickel, carbon, nitrogen, and manganese.  But where do these items come from?  Iron ore may be mined from Brazil, silicon may be mined from India, the nickel may be mined from Australia, and all of these items are shipped to somewhere else.  During this process, many greenhouse gases are being released into the air.  Looking at this, it makes one look at the bigger picture and not just the finished product.  Because where does the product go after it is thrown in the trash?

We took an Ecological footprint on this site here.  It determined, after a short multiple choice test, that stated

"If everyone on the planet lived my lifestyle, we would need 5.40 Earths"

Just the way it was worded, made me feel horrible.  That is just awful.  This makes me want to make a big difference in my life and try to make a difference in others as well.

This is a screenshot of my Ecological Footprint Quiz Results.

Green Team: Collaborative Consumption

How have you changed since we embarked? Why?


Every time I turn on the computer and open up Google Chrome, there is a certain regimen I go through, the certain sites I go on: Facebook, Youtube, Edmodo, PowerSchool.  However, what I realized over time, was that this daily fixation of sites that I go on, had me entertained for about a grand total of 5 minutes.  However, with the introduction of TED.com from Gifted and Talented Seminar II, there is a new site that has changed the way I spend my time on the computer: watching new and ingenious ideas that people are coming up with.  This site is amazing.  I have changed because this site and the TED talks that our teacher, Ms. Mystrena have showed us, have really inspired my classmates and I to really make a difference in our community.  Combined with the recycling about water bottles video called Tapped, and the Collaborative Consumption video we watched, we want to make a difference.  I've convinced my mom to stop buying water bottle cases (in which she would buy in cases of 36)  In all honesty, this class in general, since the beginning of my freshman year, has inspired me to make a difference in my life, in other people's lives, and if only a little, make a difference in the world. 


What have you learned?


Environment.  The World.  Green Planet.  Future.  Mother Earth.  It has just recently struck me that I am getting older (odd feeling really) and the older one gets, the more observant one gets to the world around them.  One's mind starts to get "polluted" with the problems of the planet and the worry-free days of childhood seem long gone.  But can they be brought back?  Not in a weird way, meaning living in my mom's basement when I'm 35, but what I mean is that, if the world had more of the care-free mind set of a kid, it would be a lot easier to fix the world's problems.  This, I think is one of the most important things I've learned all year.  We just watched a TED talk on a truly inspirational teacher who played the World Peace Game with his students and the children in the mere 4th grade solved the hypothetical issues of the world.  It can be found here.


How have you contributed as a team member?


I've helped with some of the letters in this Collaborative Consumption project.  However, in all honesty, I don't feel as if I have completed anything completely by myself, and I really like doing things with projects (I tend to take over).  However, I am currently working on the PowerPoint in which we will be presenting at the Board of Education Meeting on Monday May 9th, 2011.  I am trying to make it as eye-opening, visually and with information, and make it sound as "wallet-friendly" to the Board of Education.  I am also going to go evaluate the trash receptacles at our school, to determine, or get a good idea of how much my school does or does not recycle.  


At this point do you see this becoming something that stays with you? 


Not only have I seen the changes in the way I think, but I know for sure it will stick with me for my whole life.  Every time I throw something away, I wonder where it will go.  Learning a unit like this makes one very conscious of the world's problems.  And that, I think, is a good trait to have, however, I want to try to look at the problems with a pessimistic and optimistic point of view, both a realist and a romantic.  I want it to be a "optopesstic" view on life...not a real word...but can it be a real idea?  I have hope.

Groupon: Collective Buying Power & Collaborative Consumption

In class, we recently just watched a TED Talk by Rachel Botsman.  TED Talks are conferences by innovative people pitching their innovative ideas.  Every time I watch one, I feel inspired to do something, to think a different way.  This particular TED Talk was about "The Case for Collaborative Consumption" and it was basically a simple idea of sharing our items with other people, being smart about the way we handle our most pack-rat possessions.  Rachel Botsman talked about how technology is enabling trust between two complete strangers.  There are several sites on the internet in which people can trade their own old DVD's that they don't use for a DVD that they want, with a stranger.  Instead of throwing it away, it is a lot better to share it.  

    "We've wired our world to share...and that's creating an economy of 'What's mine is yours.' "

Watch the TED Talk here.


There are several websites online that promote collaborative consumption.  One such website is called Groupon.  Groupon is a deal-of-the-day website that helps one find deals in his or her own city.  Groupon promises businesses a minimum number of customers and the site offers deals and discounts accordingly.  Basically there has to be a certain number of people who sign up per deal in order for that deal to go into effect.  One can use it as gifts and it is a great way to get deals.  Once at the store, one just shows the printed out coupon, or even more eco-friendly, just bring it up on their mobile device.  No more having coupon-cutting parties! (My mom loves cutting coupons and I would often help her).  Groupon was founded by Andrew Mason in November of 2008 in Chicago.  Groupon takes 50% of every deal and their revenue at the end of 2010 reached about $800 million.  They even turned down an acquisition by Google for $6 billion.  The Wall Street Journal stated that Groupon is

"projecting that the company is on pace to make $1 billion in sales faster than any other business, ever".

 That is really impressive.  There are over 35 million registered users on Groupon.  And with its 6 million deals already made, it doesn't seem to be slowing down any time soon.  

For the Dead and the Living We Must Bear Witness

We learn about genocide.  We see genocide on television, on the internet, in the newspapers.  But can we feel what a genocide is?    Is it possible to feel the starvation that the Jewish people felt in the concentration camp of Auschwitz?  Before going on this trip, I felt as if I knew all there is to know about the Holocaust.  At the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in our nation's capital, Washington D.C., all of the exhibits there sent chills down my spine.  There is literally, a seemingly infinite amount of information that I have never heard about.  Hearing the voices of actual Holocaust survivors makes the tragedy all to real.  A number of 7 million Jewish deaths is just a number but when one can put a face to each and everyone of those people, the feeling is too surreal.  When one enters the front doors, one approaches the place where there are several pamphlets which are identification cards of a person who actually went through the Holocaust.

Identification Cards

 It is a face and one becomes attached with that person.  My person was Ivo Herzer.  I felt like I knew who this boy was, like I was his friend and as I went through each floor, I become worried that my friend wouldn't make it out alive.  But as I finished the exhibit, on the last page of the identification card, it says whether or not the person lives, my person lived.  It made me happy, although I did not know him personally, the feeling of genocide became real.  This museum was truly a life changing experience.  Shouldn't the world learn from this genocide?  "Never again...." But it happens today in Darfur. This trip really opened up my eyes.

The Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C.  You should definitely take a trip to this place one day in your life.

Visit the museum's online site here.

Future of Humanity

Well, after several weeks of working on our projects for Humanity, I feel overwhelmed with great information and Hope from my other classmates.  My group, Andrew, Alec, and I decided to do our project on the Future of Humanity.  Before doing this project, my thought was that the information of a project should have 90% of my focus and the presentation should be 10%.  That was sort of like a general rule of thumb I pretty much gave myself when doing any project.  But in doing this project, I have learned that the information, while still very important, should be 50% of my focus.  One needs to get his or her message out in the presentation in a nice, easy to understand way and that's how I determined what an effective presentation was.  I wanted to make a video that was simple and easy to understand, yet very powerful.  I tried my best to incorporate everything that we have learned into a a 5 minute video with a message that there his hope for the future of humanity.  I wanted to make sure that everyone got that message and that message was a big punch in the face, almost, in the video.  I wanted the audience to have genuine hope for humanity because my group felt the hope while researching for this project.  When we found a website giving a timeline of the future of humanity, it gave us a VISION.  And that was the biggest thing in our project.  Of course it wasn't completely accurate, no one knows for sure what the future holds for humanity, but we wanted to give hope for that future.  And we thought that if one cannot envision it, it cannot happen.  So with our video we hope people got that vision for a future with hope.  The future of humanity is bright and we think that the human species will one day become an empathic civilization: meaning we all care for one another and feel like we are part of the same family.  It is not a global government but the human species will feel like a connected family.

Ubuntu Can Make the World a Better Place- But What is it?

North Korea will strike South Korea if they perform their live-fire drill.  This statement scares me.  In a world full of greed, poverty, disease, and war, is there a way to make it better?  The answer is: yes.  There is hope for humanity.  And the key is empathy.  Ubuntu is a traditional African Philosophy that offers us an understanding of ourselves in relation with the world.  There is a common bond that exists between us, according to Ubuntu, and through this bond, through our interaction with our fellow human beings, that we discover our own human qualities.  A person is a person through other persons, according to the philosophy, which means we become human when we sense how another person is feeling, in other words, it is empathy.  This idea ties directly into what Jeremy Rifkin explains in this video.  He says that we evolve as a society because we acknowledge other humans due to empathy.

What this means to me, is that Ubuntu and empathy and make the world a better place.  We, as humans, already do this.  When the earthquake hit in Haiti, millions of people came to aid for those people.  I want to know how to make the world a better place.  And some people do not believe that this is possible.  But there is hope for humanity.  Through Ubuntu and empathy, the world will be a better place.  What is your idea of a perfect world, a utopia? Well, as I have learned, if human beings can extend their empathy to the entire human race, as one big extended family (seeing how we all come, genetically from the same lady) that would be the greatest Utopia of all.  Jeremy Rifkin's video was a real eye opener to show that the world can be a better place, it's not impossible. 

 

Look At All the Lonely People

The internet.  Is it just an extension of the human mind, spanning a global network?  Or is the internet a virtual world, where people come to escape their real life problems?  Erza Klein wrote an article, called "Being 'Fully' Human Online", where he explains that the internet is basically a world that humans have created where we can interact.  Interacting with others is what makes us uniquely human.  Socializing is what we yearn for and the internet is a place where those characteristics are exemplified.  I feel as if this is a great definition for what it means to be human.  This seems to be one part of the puzzle: Human beings are social creatures.  

However, Roger Ebert has a slightly different take on the internet, which sheds some light on a different part of humanity.  In "All the Lonely People", it talks about how if someone is lonely, what they will do in this day and age: go on the internet.  Some people might jump to a conclusion about anyone who spends all of their time on the internet, replacing reality for a virtual world.  However, there are stories behind those people that caused them to become lonely.  "Companionship. Love. Recognition." That is what human begins long for, as Ebert stated.  It seems to be the more advanced human beings become, the more those three things become necessary.  Just like how the body needs food, the mind needs satisfaction of those three things.  If somehow, they aren't felt by a human, they sometimes become lonely.

The internet.  Is it just an extension of the human mind, spanning a global network?  Or is the internet a virtual world, where people come to escape their real life problems?  I think it is a great example of what makes us humans: being social creatures.