Portfolio

Cover Letter

Terrell H.

Mrs.DeGravelles

Block 4

17^th of April, 2013

This portfolio is a collection of my creations. They all have their own merits and different qualities, resulting from what they required and my own personal quirks as a writer. I have, in overview three: a writing remix as Mrs.DeGravelles phrased it, a monologue like one sided discussion where I tell my opinions about the future of science n our world. Second, I have a Essay revision, worth fifty points and lets me choose a written piece we did earlier in the year and correct it for errors. In this I chose a Research paper, and hope I have fixed the overall tone and focus of it to be more of an analysis. Third, I have a Hits and Misses, where I basically look at what I've done, what out of it liked and what I hated. Of course, you knew all of this, but I hope the reiteration of the facts was interesting. To explain my choices overall, I definitely start with the writing remix.

            My personal interest was what originally drove me towards science as the focus for the writing remix. Science is something I've been interested in from a young age and free posts allowed me to express my interest by examining current trends in science. I always found it easier than most of my blog posts as, I had a drive beyond just school to do it. I actually felt some joy when writing about it. So, when given the choice I knew that I would need to pick something I actually had some interest in. Otherwise the entire thing would be excruciating boring and difficult to do.

            After I chose the general area of science, the next a step was which blog post focusing on science. I had computer science, XNA and several other subjects to choose from. Would it be the easiest, or the one that would interest me the most to work on? In the end I settled on the morality and future of genetics and computer science, concerning myself with figuring out my own opinions on them. This was a long process and was actually quite fulfilling for me personally.

            The essay revision was a different kind of hurdle. I had to choose between, from the beginning, the one I actually liked, and the one that needed the most help. In the end I the one that needed the most work was the one I chose. The research paper was good, but its problem was that it wasn't exactly an analysis of Stephen Hawking. It had too much background information, which made it lean towards a biography. This was probably the hardest project for me to do because it required me to really take a look at the essay as a whole, and look at its overall tone, rather than its overall theme.

            The first step of this process was entirely basic observation. I just had to look at the comments on my paper, and figure out the basic mistakes I had to fix. After this step is just the correction of things I personally didn't like, shifts in tone or problems in the way something came out in hindsight. Once I felt it had reached a certain degree where my problems and others problems with it were fixed I took the paper to the Writing Center to make sure the quality was good, and that I hadn't gone too far off track.

             Hits and misses was the third thing on my list, and it was, while simpler than the others, a bit interesting. I basically went back down memory lane looking at various writing assignments we've done over the year. The more interesting part was the actual decision making that was needed. I chose "Poem" and "Mind Uploading" for my hits as they seemed to be the most interesting from my memory. The misses were divided between the boring assignments and the ones that were easy but were agony to actually type. Eventually I went with a assignment that had been boring but easy, and one that had been very hard to do due to the requirements."Reading Details and Song Analysis-I Must Belong Somewhere" and "Character Development" fit what I wanted perfectly

            In this year as a total review I have definitely learned a few things about writing. The one that I think about off the top of my head are that writing won't always be a fun or engaging experience. Another would be that if you don't know where to stop, check the rubric to make sure its on track. But the most important thing I learned was that to really do a writing project, at least personally, I have to have some kind of control over what I write. Otherwise the quality will be sub par  I've also learned that the main thing I need to do is read over the assignment for grammatical errors. In my first two major assignments, that was most of the reason I lost points. I also learned that I need to make sure my writing remains focused on the necessary tenets for the project.

            But, I also learned that I have a few strengths in writing. One is that my vocabulary is an asset and it allows too often describe my thoughts in detail. Another strength I discovered I had is that I have a talent for imagery, or at least I can present a good scenario when I have too. On the free posts that we received, I was able to think out my own beliefs, and explore my own interests, which often allowed me to want to expand more on something, even when it was unnecessary.

            Naturally though, being human I've discovered a few corrections I need to make. One is that I should slow down. When I rush through something, whether it be a project, homework assignment, or a test, I can make unnecessary, frivolous mistakes, purely because I didn't pay close enough attention. Another correction I need to make is in my focus. While it doesn't happen so often my grades are affected adversely, it occurs often enough to be a problem for me. When I don't know what I need, I'm left grasping at straws, trying to do something I don't have a clear picture of in the first place. And when it’s something as intensive as this, it of upmost importance I read the entire rubric.

            In reflection, I have learned many things this year. How to be a good writer was one thing. I also learned to make sure I completely understand what I'm given. I have discovered strengths in my writing, but also common mistakes. But, I know with this knowledge, my future is bright.

            Essay Revision

Terrell Haughton

DeGravelles and Harper

Block 4 and 6

19^th of April, 2013

The Effects of Stephen Hawking on the World

When I was eight, I decided I wanted to be a scientist. My whole short life had been focused on reading as much as I could on the Big Bang, quantum physics, and more. As I got older, I began to search for someone who I could idolize in that field and I discovered Stephen Hawking.  I got several books written by him and read them twice, even though I hadn’t understood most of the terminology. By nine, physics was no longer my largest obsession, and I began to focus on the brain, but I still remember reading a chapter and dreaming of one day traveling to alien worlds, exploring their surfaces, meeting other beings with our intelligence. When received our first information on the research project, my first thought was biology of course, but then after I thought about it I decided to see just how much of an effect Stephen Hawking has had on the world.

Stephen Hawking has done many things in his life, especially after ALS, but he has brought physics to the consumer and laymen, and made great advances in the understanding of things nearly incomprehensible to the human mind. Hawking was born on January 8, 1942, in Oxford, England. . “Hawking was a keen child, but he was not the brightest in his competitive A stream class” (“Stephen Hawking”).When he was 21 years old, he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). Even with ALS he’s done amazing work in physics and cosmology, and his books have helped to make science less complex by simplifying it for everyone. Some have said that his ALS may have even enhanced his abilities like Hélène Mialet, “What happens when a scientist, such as Stephen Hawking, does not have the use of his hands, does not-or cannot-draw pictures and perform many-page-long calculations on paper? Does everything happen "in his head"? Are theories produced "theoretically”? ” (Mialet 2).This is an interesting premise, and I believe someone will look further into it, as it is an interesting possibility.

His theories would fill an entire book so I’ll focus on the ones that have changed the way we look at the world. In the 1960s, he and his colleague, Roger Penrose, demonstrated that black holes occur in nature much more frequently than scientists had previously believed. Extrapolating from Einstein's relativity theory, Hawking later suggested that the universe itself may have been a singularity before the cosmic event known as the Big Bang, which is one theory on how the universe began. In 1974, Hawking realized that black holes allow some radiation to escape; hence they were not entirely "black." This is because while the black hole is pulling all particles in, matter-antimatter pairs are continually forming within the vacuum and the matter or antimatter part of the pair is sometimes separated from the other due to the immense gravity of the black hole. They then collide with other matter or antimatter producing a small amount of radiation. Hawking's approach applied the laws of physics to a realm previously considered beyond the limits of those laws. In 2006, Hawking proposed that perhaps the universe had no single beginning point, but rather began in multiple ways that eventually narrowed down to a single universe. “This unusual application of quantum theory to the origin of the universe is typical of Hawking's approach: assuming the laws of physics will always work, in even the remotest corners of the universe” (Carver).These theories had a great effect on on our world by helping physicists to further question reality and books focusing on these theories brought their curiosity about the universe to the public.

Another theory created by Stephen Hawking, in conjunction with Leonard Mlodinow is MDR, or model dependent realism. It basically states that all theories are more correctly to be considered as ways to make a model of reality to understand it. For example, we have multiple theories to working any wave function as in, the Schrödinger equation can be mathematically transformed into other equations, such as Werner Heisenberg's matrix mechanics and Richard Feynman's path integral formulation (Dirac). But all are equivalent even one method takes longer than another. The theory will only be wrong when it does match up to the results of an experiment done in the real world. The idea that theories explain reality is not controversial, but what is the fact that Hawking considers the theory not to be reality but only an explanation of it, which many of today’s physicists believe represent the actual underlying physical reality of how nature operates (Poole).

All of these theories Stephen Hawking has created has deeply affected the physics community often sparking entire discussions of their theoretical plausibility and their effect on our world. His theory of the universe having no single point tom start with, not only eliminated the Big Bang theory, but also the belief, by some that a divine creator existed. Hawking radiation while not proven, greatly changed the underpinnings of quantum physics and told us that virtual particles do appear spontaneously within the space-time membrane, that maybe it will someday be possible to harvest this “vacuum energy.” MDR had more metaphysical effects on the world, especially the science-religion gap.

Later on in life, he began to focus on bringing physics to the common person in terms that could be more easily understood. His first book he wrote with this intention was A Brief History of Time, written in 1988. Similar to Carl Sagan’s book of the same name, it focused on the most potent questions man asks: “why are we here? What is the universe’s beginning? What is the meaning of the world” (“Stephan Hawking Books”). It received great reviews and, made him a common name even in non-science circles. He continued this pattern with multiple books, including: On the Shoulders of Giants, The Universe in a Nutshell, A Briefer History of Time, The Grand Design, and even children’s books, like George's Cosmic Treasure Hunt, and George and the Big Bang (“Stephen Hawking Books”). These books allowed young children and other groups to feel the joy of scientific discovery.

Hawking began to be mentioned in the news, press, magazines, and even was a guest star on the Simpsons.  As his fame grew, so did his effect on the world articles were written about his discoveries, some were critiques, others praising his abilities. One critique was by Charles P. Poole Jr., specifically focuses on The Grand Design’s effect on Christians and belief in God. He specifically focused on the anthropic principle, stating “Hawking and Mlodinow then assert, "Many people would like us to use these coincidences as evidence for the work of God" (p. 163). I myself am one of those many people, since it seems like the most reasonable conclusion to draw from these facts.” This suggests that Stephen Hawking’s effect on religion may be as strong as his effect on physics, with this article being made purely to focus on his book’s impact on Christianity.  Poole goes further to explain how The Grand Design doesn’t dispute religious faith saying, “To be logically self-consistent, Hawking and Mlodinow are obliged to accept the TP-, ATP-, and DTP-models as equally authentic representations of reality.” He uses another one Stephen Hawking’s creations MDR, to attempt to say that Hawking must at least accept God as possible to not contradict himself.

To explain, the TP, ATP, DTP models are the typical physicists model, atheistic model, and deistical model respectively. The typical physicist’s model does not mention a creator, while the atheistic and deistical models have contrary view on the existence of a divine creator. He uses the MDR model to say Hawking cannot refute the existence of God without contradicting himself. Although it is true that he and others agreeing with Hawking would have an inherent logical contradiction, the terms used by Poole require a certain amount of assumption about God’s behavior, stating he does not interrupt physics (Poole). He having no effect on the world, for instance, would mean that if Poole is talking of the biblical God, he is contradicting himself in the making of this argument. He would be contradicting himself because he ignores various examples of God interfering with physics in the bible. Personal feelings aside, the fact that the argument is inaccurate despite Poole’s research suggests emotional involvement. The fact that there is such a reaction for a magazine directed towards the Christian community is an example of his extensive effect on the world as a whole.

Ultimately, Hawking’s effect on the world is astounding, and it is quite possible he has revolutionized physics forever. But even if he has, it is far more impressive that he has brought science to the non-scientific and encouraged people to question and doubt their life and world. Hawking has truly changed the world of physics. Stephen Hawking has made an indelible impact on our world.

 

Works Cited

Carver, Rebecca. "Timeline:Stephen Hawking." The Guardian. The Guardian, 21 Jul 2004. Web. 7 Feb 2013.

Dirac, Paul A.M. Principles of Quantum Mechanics. 4, Rev, reprint ed.

             Oxfordshire,England: Oxford UP, 1981. Print.

Edwards, Chris. "Stephen Hawking's other controversial theory: Model Dependent Realism in dThe Grand Design."Skeptic Gale Biography In Context. Web. d18 Jan. 2013.<http://go.galegroup.com/>

Ferguson, Kitty. "Devouring the Future." Astronomy. Dec. 1998. SIRS Issues   Researcher.   Web. 18  Jan 2013. <http://sks.sirs.com/>

Mialet, Hélène. "The Extended Body Of Stephen Hawking." Interdisciplinary Science Reviews. Academic Search Complete. Web. 14 Jan. 2013

Poole, Charles P., Jr. "The Grand Design's unintended arguments for the existence of God”                                                                                                               Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith 15 Aug. 2006. Science in Context. Web. 18 Jan. s2013.<http://go.galegroup.com/>

"Stephen Hawking’s Books." Stephen Hawking. N.p.. Web. 21 Feb 2013

“Stephen Hawking." The Biography Channel Web. Jan 18 2013, < dhttp://www.biography.com/people/stephen-hawking-9331710>

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Detailed Description

      I walked towards the door hoping she had remembered my appointment. Sweating I walked in. 

The appointment had been remembered and I was happy. A consultant looked over my paper and 

said I was good to go. After this I asked my friends to read my essay, and my mom to tell me 

grammatical and ideological mistakes. From this I was able to correct some big errors in my essay.

The main changes were in structure length and focus. Hopefully through the help I was given, I 

successfully made the focus more on what it was supposed to be-analysis.

.Hits and Misses

Hits:

"Poem" on Sunday, April 14th, 2013

"Mind Uploading" on Monday, September 24th, 2012

Misses

"Reading Details and Song Analysis-I Must Belong Somewhere" on April 8th, 2013

"Character Development" on Tuesday, October 24th, 2012
Analysis of Rhetorical Situation

An Agnostic Manifesto
This world
A place of life and death 
Suffering and happiness
Both as sudden and fleeting
As a noon day breeze
But both cooling all the same
In these moments we see
The worlds true Absurdity
To wish us to search for answers
That will never be known
We all search
Every day
Everyone
Willing or unwilling
Sick and tired
Naive and wise
We search never ending
For their will never be an ending
This world is Absurd
But there is no other
No true logic to be found
We are born of it
Tempered by it and its servants 
No escape
We know this
Young and old
Lamenting and unthinking
But still we search
It is our burden we say
Our Humanity
And to lose it
Would be a tragedy itself
But is it so horrible
To live in a world of vendicated Absurdity
If we are Absurd ourselves?



Terrell H.
Dr.deGravelles
English 1
10th of April, 2013

                                    Writing Remix:Probably a Blog/Something
This is writing remix is meant to transform your writing to fit a new, public rhetorical situation. Probably will be the most interesting thing on the list. But on to serious writing. I would prefer the audience to be the general public. Specifying what I mean by general public, specifically the science oriented/nerd/geek type group, with no particular ethnic hroup within that. I choose this audience as I plan to focus on one of the future or cutting edge scientific discoveries I mentioned in the free blog posts you gave us throughout the school year.With some work I hope tailor this for my audience using high tech media, but if that is not possible possibly a article, or maybe even an editorial. This is far away from my  orginal audience, which was to be honest my teacher, Dr.deGravelles.
The main idea of any remix I will do is going to have a focus particularly on focusing on the effects of artificial intelligence on humanity's view of itself, or how XNA could be a boon to science but a danger to everything alive.My audience, I hope, will be interested in this information I am attempting to communicate with them, and will reach out and respond, plus this is mandatory. In the end I really hope this communicate my views to anyone interested and they will consider integrating my beliefs in theirs, and if they respond, vice versa. I feel this fits any requirements for a reason I choose, because as technology's advancement accelerates, so will humanity's knowledge, and with our experiments, the ideas of "playing God" and simply being wrong will come into play, more often than they do now. It is absolutely necessary that we consider ethics as well as our curiosity. What I am really hapy about is my new purpose's total difference from its original. The original was created because of my interest in the particular subject and meeting requirements. My purpose for the writing remix stretches further than just school but also to lofty hopes of somehow affecting humanity.
Now one thing of major importance is the change in stance. What's the point of rewriting something you've writen in the past if you glean nothing new from it? My attitude towards this project will be both more and less formal. This statement is contradictory in a way, but what I mean is that overall I will do my best and try to get as much a background on what I choose before launching the real rewriting of theproject. My original blog post(maybe a blog post, just a place holder) was less formal, with not as much knowledge about the topic. Before I am at the end of this, I hope to be as close to the knowledge of someone cutting edge in the field as possible. It will be less formal in a obvious way- the fact that it will not be in a format used often in a school project.
My personal interest was what originally drove me towards science as the focus. I believe, that if I correctly target my audience,the people will come to me, allowing for facilitation of communication. To do this my strategies, are a interesting title, and overall good video, if lacking in special effects, plus the genre itself, if simplified to avoid intimidation, will interest anyone with even only a remote interest in genetics or computer science. My orginal piece was similar, but no the same, specifically in my strategy. As the aim was only to meet the requirements, I had no need to try and attracting a crowd. The medium will be different, as I do not plan for it to be a blog post.
In the end, I hope that this writing remix will be interesting,educational, and require me to learn more in my favorite subjects. Plus, if it does all this it meet the requirements too.

Note: Originally the focus was going to be on one of the scientific posts I've done, but this was written instead. I felt like this was better for me to write as the original post's philosophical vibe was closer to me.

The specific post is In Defense of God: An Agnostic Manifesto.