Mario's Geography blog

2007-11-29T22:21:00.000-08:00

I had no idea that the advancementof sanitary water led to a huge growth in population. It makes sense, I guess that it was just something that I have never thought about. Water is an essential part of any living thing's life, and the fact that it being sanitary would lead to a longer lifespan. A longer lifespan coupled with the same natality rate would still lead to a larger population because people are being born and people are not dying at the same rate that they once did. I wonder what gave them the idea to use sand filters for the majority of their filters though. I mean I know that it would get rocks out and other bulky things like that, but I think that people would decide that it was not good enough. I wonder if they just had to settle with those filters for a while. What about the people before that? Did they always get sick from the water? Or were their bodies used to it, and they were already immune to it? But did the water taste better to them before it was filtered? I know that I like tapwater better than any other water just because that is what I have been drinking since I was small. I even like tapwater better than bottled water. It tastes a lot different than the water that I am used to. I will drink bottled water, but I do not prefer it. Well water however, I cannot stand. I can smell the sulfur in it, and I can taste it when it gets in my mouth. It's almost enough to make me gag.

2007-10-19T13:21:00.000-07:00

I think that it is pretty easy to find different ways that we are all segregated. I did not really realize that there was that many ways that we segregate ourselves. I think that it is just one of those things that are there and we do not really realize. In school of course we have our set group of friends. This dates all the way back to junior high. The popular kids hang out with one another. The jocks hang out with the jocks and the preppy pretty girls. The drama kids hang out with one another and the band geeks. The smart kids all tend to hang out with one another. Everyone places themselves in groups that they all have in common with one another. In high school people come together because of their personalities and their activities. A lot of the times it has to do with preferences in music also. It seemed in high school that all of my friends and I had the same taste in music and could sing along to all of the songs that we played. Of course there are people that just click no matter how different they are. In college, where the people are much more mature than in high school, a lot of my friends are completely different from me. We have almost nothing in common, but yet we appreciate each other and that’s the bases for our relationship. As we get older we start to bond with one another by our major, or our sport. These are the people that we spend the most time with, so it is only natural that we hang out together and work together. Now that my parents are adults that own their own home and work part time, they have their own groups that they hang out with. They have their friends from the bars that they hang out with. They hang out with their neighbors. They have friends from work. They are even friends with some of my friends’ parents. Those are the ways that we socially segregate ourselves. We segregate ourselves by age. My parents do not go out and hang out with my high school buddies, and I do not go out to Murphy’s to hang out with my parents’ friends. Just thinking about hanging out with my parents’ friends sounds funny. I think that it’s funny that we fought to integrate but we still remain segregated no matter what.

2007-10-12T10:08:00.000-07:00

I think that it is a skill to look at cultural landscape and interpret what it all means. I can look at an overhead of Chicago and see all of the buildings and the highways. The skyscrapers are a dead giveaway that Chicago is a very urban community, and that goes for New York also. Other cities in the United States would even be fairly easy to interpret. I am not really familiar with other cities like Los Angeles, San Antonio, or even Orlando. I do not really know what those would look like, but if I were to see an overhead and look at the amount of buildings then I may be able to tell that they are urban areas. But for big suburbs, like Kenosha, I may see it as an urban area. Although Kenosha is fairly urban, it is not really considered a big city. It has a pretty large population and a lot of landmass, but it has no real large buildings. It does have the Jelly Belly factory, and a few main roads, but there are no skyscrapers and the population does not exceed a million. It would be a pretty ideal example of a suburb, but I do not know where a true city is located close to here. Racine is large but I do not even know if I would consider it a city. With the pictures of Phoenix in class, I was able to tell that it was fairly urban, but there was a lot more vegetation than I picture a city having. Phoenix is a pretty prestigious city, I mean they do have a basketball team and they have a few universities there. I would consider it a big city, but after seeing the bird’s eye view of the city, I would reconsider whether it is a big city or not. It is probably a wide misconception that just because a city is well known, it is a large city with many inhabitants. I think that actually seeing the city gives a person a much better perspective as opposed to just seeing it on a map with just capitals and land elevation on it.

Immigration

2007-09-21T13:21:00.000-07:00

I grew up in a completely American home. Our family heritage is as American as heritage can get. We are American because our heritage is a complete melting pot. My father is Italian, German, and Mexican. My mother is a mix of almost all the people that inhabit the European continent. Our heritage is completely full of immigrants. Yet it is the general opinion in our household that there should be a cap on the amount of immigrants that should be let into the United States. I, for the most part, have agreed with this statement. As I think about it more, I realize that this is a fairly inhumane action. People have been coming to America for the last three hundred years in search of a new start where they can support a family, and hopefully flourish. I am not saying that we should not have any border control at all, but we should not be completely against immigration. The immigration that I disagree with is the illegal type. Illegal aliens are walking all around towns that border mine. If people want to come here and earn a living as an American citizen, then more power to them. But if they want to come here under an alias and earn a living as an undocumented illegal alien, then I say go back to your country. American citizens pay American taxes which pay for American programs. Illegals come here and they do not have a social security, they do not have any kind of documentation, and this allows for them to fly under the radar of taxation. What if they commit a crime? There is no way to find them. They take jobs from Americans that, although do not pay well, are a part of the American economy. American money needs to go right back through the American economy.

Immigrants do make contributions to our country. They supply a growing work force for cheap unskilled labor. They take a lot of the jobs that Americans do not see fit for themselves. There is also a strong positive correlation between the growth of our population and the growth of the American economy. If there is a greater pool of workers out there, people are forced to compete with one another for jobs, instead of places of business fighting for workers. Also there is a great amount of foreigners that are doctors and computer technicians. I would say that documented immigration is probably the best solution that I know of.

Geek Squad

2007-09-08T10:54:00.000-07:00

I completely agree with the statement that scientists are important. Of course, scientists are exact, so they are bound to come off as a little geeky. I do not really think that it is fair to call scientists geeky. A scientists job has a lot to do with conducting experiments to prove or disprove theories. In a way they are lawyers that do all of their own research. With all of the research and experimenting, they really do not have time to try and act "cool." Although some would say that they have plenty of time on their hands if they can sit at a corner for four hours just for the sole purpose of counting how many people stop completely at a stop sign. Of course when someone hears that, they think "they have too much free time," but it is not like it is just a petty experiment. Non-scientists have to see the experiments that scientists do and think of the pebble in the pond. If we found that nobody stops at a stop sign then people would not walk across the street until we could not see any cars at all. Also, squad cars would stalk intersections trying to catch people with rolling stops and blown stop signs. More people would get caught and heftier fines would be handed out. This is all because of a meaningless experiment that a scientist conducted. Scientists are responsible for a lot of things, from finding formulas for better cleaning product to chemotherapy and the possible cure for aids. So before we decide to call scientists boring or geeky, I think that we should thank them first.