In an artilce, I read that at the University of Kansas, a new course is being offered titled "Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationism and other Religious Mythologies." This is an amazing step of a class that I find as a brave venture in a world that is so uninviting. There will definitely be complaints. The man that created the class, Paul Mirecki, has already been called a laughingstock.

EVERY ONE SHOULD READ AND DOWNLOAD; THERE IS NO REASON NOT TO.

Based on an article in the Canadian Press.

This is an absolutely amazing program that will put your idle computer to work at finding a cure for AIDS. It is estimated that about 40,000,000 people are currently infected with HIV; many of them children in developing countries. But you can help; download this program and when idle, your computer will automatically run a program that tests thousands of chemical compounds in the human body and how they react to a specific protein of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). Biologists are searching for a chemical that will attach itself to the protein coating of HIV and therefore hopefully render it dysfunctional.

It appears to me that there is a trend on this blog to find things that are controversial and then wait for others to comment so you can defend your position. Is that what we want the Web of Influence to be? Can it evolve into something more positive and uplifting? Some of the posters seem combatant and defensive. The cursing is becoming more frequent and we are influencing others to distance themselves from participating in the blog. Why would anyone want to comment on a post when they may be blasted by the sharp tongues of posters who take offense at another posters opinion?

I am starting a Snowboarding Club! There are three types of people who may want to join the club:

1.) You are already fairly good at snowboarding and you want to go this ski season. You would like to meet other snowboarders and may want to help others learn to snowboard. You want to increase your skill level though peer support and practice.

2.) You sort of know how to snowboard but would like to increase your skill level through peer support and practice. You want to meet others who like snowboarding.

I don’t think I can continue to live in a place that embraces and nurtures apathy as if it was virtue. But I sympathize; I sympathize completely. I mean, it’s easier to loose yourself in drugs than it is to cope with life. You see, it’s easier to steal what you want than it is to earn it. It’s easier to beat a child than it is to raise it. Hell, love costs; it takes effort, work.
-SE7EN (movie)

A man named Luigi Cornando (1464 -1566) was told by his doctors that were he to continue living, he would have to stop drinking alcohol and eat healthier. At a young age, Cornando began to eat half of his normal diet. Looking at his life span (102 years) is amazing given the time period when most didn't live for even 50 years. What happened?

A book I am reading describes that by decreasing your caloric consumption to 2/3 of what is needed by a normal human, life expectancy increases considerably. Why does this occur? According to Armand Leroi, the body goes into survival mode! Scientists have done studies concerning caloric restriction on rats, fruit flies, mice, and nematode worms. They have found that though the life span is increased by 10-50%, fewer offspring are produced, resistence to infectious diseases is increased. The age at which the animals develop cardiac diseases, infections, neurological disorders, and (suprisingly) cancer is increased.

Check out BabyCage.net the site dedicated to freeing the hands of mothers everywhere. Be sure to check out the accessories that include cage woodchips, attatchabe water bottle, BabyCage longterm feeder, and crying suppressor.

The cage has found much critical acclaim:

"I used to have to resort to using physical violence in order to get my 4 year old to listen to me, but now whenever he is acting up I just put him in his cage for a few days."

I am reading a book called Mutants by Armand Marie Leroi about genetic variety and the human body. It discusses many genetic disorders that cause different abnormalities in the structure and function of the body. The book is very interesting and has a great deal of information in it that is both intriguing and educational.

First, Leroi discusses the fact that what separates a mutation from a variant is that a mutation must be both rare and harmful. Every person has genetic variants that distinguish our hair, eye, and skin color. Interestingly enough, the average person has about three mutant genes in them that can cause invisible problems not visible to every day life. Therefore, are we not all mutants in addition to those who merely look different?

Go to the Google homepage and type in "failure" without the quotes. Then Click on the "I'm feeling lucky" button. What this button does is it takes you to the one page that google thinks is the best based on what you entered.

How could this page be the best fit according to the search engine? The word "failure" is not used on this page even once. Is the problem merely a glitch? What are the chances of a glitch doing this? Some say that this is merely a problem of a Google Bomb. This would influence google to place it highest on the list. But how can it be first if it doesnt even have the search word in it?

Is the technology of the word developing so fast? This seems like something from the future, but the future is here now I suppose. When I came across this, I was amazed. The videos are very interesting, and the idea behind it is just like weblogs only you can see everything that is going on. In class, we discussed one of the problems with weblogs; it is difficult to extrapolate the tone of the writer. Though punctuation such as exclamation marks and question marks, it is sometimes difficult to understand exactly what the person is trying to say. Insinuations are sometimes overlooked while reading the words rather than hearing or seeing the person say them.

Law Professor Gets Death Threats Over Pink Locker Room

SIDE 1:
Ok, Ms. Buzuvis has a right to her opinion and we have a right to disagree with her. In American culture, children begin life in the hospital nursery with a pink or blue (or mint green) cap and blankie. But let's face it, this is the twenty-first century and men everywhere can be seen wearing all shades of pink. Ties, tuxedos, shirts, jackets, shorts, and golf outfits to name a few garments. Ms. Buzuvis is quoted as saying that males wearing pink is "seen by many as a sexist and homophobic gesture." I'm curious. How many people think pink emasculates a male?

There are so many nostalgic things from our childhood that we have forgotten. Its so crazy all the things that a person can say: tv shows, toys, commercials, sayings etc. These things will make you say "OH YEAH!! I REMEMBER THAT!!" Just some things that I was thinking back on: Mr. Bucket, Are You Afraid of the Dark, Rocko's Modern Life, Goosebumps, Home Alone, Where's Waldo Books, The Ninja Turtles, etc.

"Feral children" is the technical term used for kids who were raised either by animals, or not at all. In general, they have had minimal to no human contact in their lives. There is a wide rage of documented feral children; there have been kids found that were raised by dogs, monkeys, goats, wolves, sheep, bears, and even cows.

The Invisible Pink Unicorn in all of Her holiness.
The Flying Spaghetti Monster with His noodly appendage.

.................PLEASE ALLOW YOURSELF
.....................TO BE ENLIGHTENED
.......................BY THESE LINKS

My great uncle Jose Santiago was in the newspaper recently. The article is very interesting considering that it is about Che Guevara coming to visit his father. The story is well written and very interesting.

To judge a person based on personal opinions, background, and views is to be biased in judgment. Susan E. Babbitt recognizes and defends this position well with the basic theme of human rights in Cuba. In Freedom and Democracy in Cuba: A Problem of Understanding, Babbitt asks others to look at the Cuban ideals from beneath a veil of ignorance. This original position is a way to look at the world as though class, race, sex, etc. are completely irrelevant and all humans are equal. Babbitt points out the way that a Cuban newspaper explains this; a Martian visitor comes to Earth and compares human rights and their effects in America with those in Cuba. This Martian lacks the globally dominant expectations about democracy and freedom that shade the way most people view the world. The Cuban newspaper and Babbitt would both agree that the Martian could give a fair investigation without the biases that the people in the world have today.

This is on the Bryn Mawr Computing Services website:

There's more on the website, but this is what the letter said:

(BEGIN EMAIL)

SENT: Wednesday, September 14th, 2005, 11pm
BUILDINGS AFFECTED: Entire campus
SERVICES AFFECTED: - All Network Services

Dear Community Members:
Late this afternoon we were forced to turn off our bandwidth management equipment due to an undocumented interaction between our equipment and Skype. Skype is an application used to make telephone calls over the Internet. Without bandwidth management several other applications are now consuming a significant amount of bandwidth causing significant network performance issues.

Sorry i havnt posted in a while... the school is having major problems with internet bandwidth apparently. My internet was not working friday morning when i woke up. I called the help desk and she asked for my name, room etc. She then told me that there were two people in my dorm who are taking up 80% of the bandwidth provided. She asked if i was downloading songs or movies from the internet. She then listed a bunch of programs which i assume are song/movie downloading programs (of which i know nothing about). All this made me wonder... isnt that illegal? If they know who is doing it, shouldt they talk to those people about the problems they are causing? They dont need to take legal action or anything, but at least let those people know what they are doing. I mean, I use my internet for this class, i check my BMC email, and I search the internet for other bloggs. Why is it fair that i dont have internet service because some people are using up all the bandwidth? Whatever.

Why arnt there as many comments as there were before? I think that the comments are just as important as the posting. There seems to be too much talking, and too little discussion or commenting. The last comment was like 15 hours ago. And then days and days after that. I remember when it used to be all within the hour down the entire column. What happened? Have we all lost interest in other's blogs? I have posted some really funny blogs about a paper by Jeremy Lavine.The hit count is still under ten.

I found a great site. It's free and if you sign up you put in your preferences for News Aggregator sites you might be interested in. I put science, inventions and something else and a medium sized list came up on the left and the window with the news is on the right. The system finds the sights based on your preferences like science, health, etc.

Also:
Food and Drug Administration

Lightning!!!
Jeremy Lavine
Period 3

What is lightning? Where does it come from? What does it mean? Does it have a meaning? Where does it come from? What is it made of? Is it made of light? Some might say it was made of light. Others contend that lightning is made of fire. People used to think that lightning was made of fire. Fire in the sky. Fire that killed people and knocked down trees. Before Benjamin Franklin. Benjamin Franklin was a founding father. He fatherly founded that lightning is made of electricity. Electricity in the sky.

Wonderful site from California on school lunches and how to decrease waste :

Here Lewis and Clarke College has a grass roots organization called Footprint that helps with the waste: I like the idea that all the wasted food from the day before was displayed for all to see the next day. That would decrease my appetite for a day but I don't know about

Here's an article in Health and online magazine. "Mean Girls, Grown Up" by Jennifer Foote Sweeney takes the mean girls, mean women view and uses bee euphemisms. Queen bees and Afraid-to-bee behavior between women. I think she could have included wanna-bees as well. Her take on the issue talks about each gender's unique hostile behavior. It's not that women are more mean. It's just that they exhibit their hostility differently.

This is from a kid named Jeremy Lavine. This paper was posted on a website. I think Jeremy is in either middle or high school. However, it may just be a joke. Whatever it is, it's funny as hell. READ ON! =D

Coming in like El Nino!
Jeremy Lavine
Period 3

El Nino is spanish. It is the spanish word for child. Like all things spanish, it is dangerous. It kills people and burns down trees. This child is more than a child. It really isn't a child at all. It is a storm. A deadly storm that kills people and burns down trees.

I found a lot of great blogs by going on the 2004 weblogawards site: near the bottom on the LEFT is a link that has hundreds of awards. Awards for design, content, etc.

Here are some blogs that I like and will link you to:

For the getting caught up with the rest of the world regarding news, etc this one is great. It's almost like scanning a paper. Columns (music, books, video, culture, & politics) with hyperlinks to blog posts and comments.

When women/girls get together they are constantly all trying to be top dog. Once the top dog is determined, the other dogs circle round to be friends with top dog. Until.... Something upsets the balance... and another top dog is crowned. It is only good for appearance sake to appear to be supportive and actually help another dog. It's the nice thing to do. But in reality all the dogs know they are just waiting until top dog makes a mistake and then the snarling starts and the fresh meat fight starts until a new top dog is crowned....and life goes on. The top dog must always be defensive. Whereas the individuals in the pack can be kind and complacent. Girls in kindergarten through college know this instinctively.

I found an interesting article on foreign policy and weblogs. The title just happens to be Web of Influence. Interesting quotes from the site include:

1.) "The top five political blogs together attract over half a million visitors per day."

2.) "Blogs are becoming more influential because they affect the content of international media coverage."

3.) "Their number has grown at an astronomical rate. In 1999, the total number of blogs was estimated to be around 50; five years later, the estimates range from 2.4 million to 4.1 million."

Cats in Sinks: Its about cats. In sinks.... If you like cats, this is a cute site.

Advertising through bums. Otherwise called Bumvertising

For those interesed in religion, here is the argument for the intelligent design theory. Being atheist, I found this site very interesting. I love to read and examine other theories. Just think about the significance of some scientific studies. Next time you see a graph or a chart that shows an "inverse relationship" think of Global Average Temperature Vs. Number of Pirates. How interesting. In addition to this graph, you should look at the website for theChurch of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. It is an interesting way to look at things. For all of those Christians out there, PLEASE don't be offended or anything. I am not trying to convert anyone, I am just sharing interesting things that I have found recently. You dont even have to go to them. If you do though, just think about how insane it seems that the Flying Spaghetti Monster could be real. That is my viewpoint of your god. For me, the idea of an intelligent being parallells the idea of a Flying Spaghetti Monster. I think the same way as Irreverend Mike does and encourage you to look through Bad Arguments for the Existence of God. if you can think of one that isnt on there that is a good argument for the existance of god, let me know. Also, here is a site to the lists of Biblical Indecency. Im not sure what point it is trying t o make but it is weird to look at how dirty the bible is in some places.

REVISION: Oh my goodness click here, there are lots of cool links in the second paragraph. Dont judge this just by the first paragraph. If you like science/slow motion videos, look at the full length version.

Anatomy of a Weblog by Cameron Barrett and Linking 1-2-3 by Lawrence Lee both point out some very different but interesting points concerning weblogs. Barrett points out and partially defines the different types of weblogs on the internet. He shows that there are many styles of weblog and that each one appeals to certain people. He also gives a very specific definition of a weblog. Lee, however, goes over the ways to find and link to the most up to date events on the web. The structure of this weblog is interesting; it is split up into subtitles that detail certain steps to successfully linking sites.

The topic of current controversy seems to be a certain someone's remarks. I sure that anyone who is familiar with Web of Influence can infer exactly what I mean by that. However, just for clarification, I will name the currently infamous WOI name: Glamourous. Her most touchy posts include

Niches and Witches,
The Gleaming Utopia Casting Shadows of Sadness,
and What is your sexual symbol?.

Each post has something that seems to border innapropriate on a public forum. Yet, what sets the definition of innapropriate in this day and age? How do we know when someone has gone too far? We know what offends us, but what right do we have to tell someone that they cant say what they want to? I hate to be cliche, but America is a free country.