The Microchip for Pets: Controlling the Wild Monday, Apr 20 2009

The microchips used in animals to track them when they get lost, run away, or are kidnapped.

My dog, Charlie. He has been microchipped.

Not only does the government want to monitor who comes in and out of their countries, not only do people want to monitor who their children talk to and what they say, we now have devices to monitor where our pets are at all times. It is understandable that when one has a housepet, and the pet is kidnapped or runs away, it is imperative to find it as soon as possible because it is apart of your family. But forcing animals to be controlled and microchipped against their will (because technically, their will doesn’t matter) seems cruel. Of course, I am a hypocrite and my dog has been microchipped in case he is stolen or lost. But the fact of the matter is that we are pushing technology onto animals when they have no say about whether or not they want to be found when they run away.

We test animals in labratories to see if the make-up has an allergic reaction to them, to make sure that we don’t ruin our own faces first. We test cloning, fertility and steriod drugs on animals before we dare put them into our bodies. But they can’t say no. We don’t know if they understand what is happening, and even if they do, they have no choice but to be tranquilized and force to face their demise.

Technology is as good as it is evil.

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Looking for Planets Like Our Own. Monday, Apr 20 2009

NASA Seach for Earth-like Planets

I’ve always wondered if it was possible for there to be a world out there that is just as populated, advanced with state-of-the-art technology yet still has so many problems. Maybe these other worlds have been around for a while and have learned better. Maybe they’ve gone through the lives the we are living, realized that wasn’t the way to live, and have now changed their ways. Or maybe they were wiser from the start and knew that unlimiting ourselves in this technological way would pose as a problem in the future, so they never did it. Do they have the same God as us? Do they know better than to believe in God?

All these questions run through my mind when I ponder about whether there could be other worlds out there. Our world, and namely the United States, is so enthnocentric, that it is seemingly impossible for them to believe or be convinced of the idea that there could be another world out there that is far beyond us in terms of wisdom, technology and knowledge. We would like to think that we are the best, that we have thought of everything and that we are the first to accomplish anything great, but imagine what a wake up call it would be if we were to find out otherwise–if we were to find out that we are actually way far behind the rest of the Milky Way, and that we came afterwards.

What if these “aliens” turn out to look just like us? Or what if they are a species that we’ve never come across before? What if in their world, we are the “animals,” and what separates us from them is their progressive thinking and ability to communicate properly? What if our idea of proper communication is like the grunts and barbaric sounds that the cavemen used?

Just food for thought. Hopefully not, or hopefully so…

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Technology: An Aid to the Police Monday, Apr 20 2009

If we think back to a hundred years from now, police officers, FBI, and the like had to use manual means of tracking down criminals in order to arrest and prosecute them. There were no computers that they could use in order to see what sort of information the criminal was researching before committing a crime that they could use as substantial evidence to prove that a crime was pre-meditated. There were no tracking devices connected to the criminal’s leg in order to inform the police whether he was outside of the area of probationary confinement. There were no cell phones they could tap in order to track the exact latitude and longitude of the criminal. Everything was manual. If they didn’t find the criminal, and they happened to flee the country, hope could be lost in terms of ever finding that criminal.

Times have changed though. Not only are the government and the police monitoring criminals and non-criminals alike with technological devices to track their positions in the world and tap into cell phones, parents have no begun to use devices such as My Mobile Watchdog and Mobile Spy to monitor their children’s communication through their cell phones. These programs are being used to avoid sexual predators, track sexual predators, and to keep kids from communicating thoughts that their parents would not approve of being communicated.

It is unfair when we live in a world where our communication is monitored to such a degree that we have to not only make sure that what we are texting is not going to tip off the government, but make sure that it is not going to get us grounded. The Patriot Act was a movement in itself that took away our right to privacy within our own homes, when the government would have the right to listen to our phone calls and read our emails so as to “defend against terrorists.” But now, our parents can do the same so as to defend against doing anything they disagree with?

Technology may be moving us forward in the world, where we can achieve so much more than was ever imaginable because we can travel faster than before, communicate with people across the world in an instant, go to outer space; at the same time though, it is taking away our agency in being independent, free and self-determining individuals when we are going back to a time where we are dependent on the technology we have–we not only need it to survive, but use to to limit ourselves in seemingly barbaric ways.

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