600 words and 3 hours later

Most people believe that honeybees are just bugs that fly flower to flower, stinging whomever happens to walk into their path to the nearest flower. Bees actually place one of the most vital roles in modern day society. They account for 80% of all the pollination done in agriculture (backyard). If you are still not convinced, picture sitting at the dinner table and one third of all the food on the table disappeared. Bees do their part in the agricultural process by spreading pollen between flowers as they are blooming in the spring. Pollen is the male reproductive cell that all flower plants produce. As they fly from flower to flower, the pollen sticks to the bees and then steals a ride to whichever flower the honeybee goes to next. The pollen, which is one of the most nutritious substances in nature, is then used as a fuel source for the hive. However, since 2006 the beekeepers have noticed a sharp decline in their bee populations. This is a major problem because the estimated $40 billion agriculture business depends on these bees so that they can start growing crops again (Hagopian). Their sudden die off is causing a major buzz in the science community because they cannot determine a concrete cause for this issue. There are many different factors that can cause this die off, and there is now extensive effort to solve this problem because of their importance.

One of the major factors that scientists are looking at is the disease called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Colony Collapse Disorder is describe as the sudden disappearance of worker bees from the hive, even though there are babies to tend to, a queen, and ample honey supplies for them to feed on (Stankus). In the winter of 2006 to spring 2007, farmers noticed a loss of more than a quarter of the country’s 2.4 million bee colonies, which was attributed to CCD (pbs). Considering that in the winter months a honeybee colony has anywhere from 20,000 to 30,000 worker bees plus the queen, that means that there was a decline of tens of billions of individuals (backyard). These staggering numbers have caused an increase number of studies dedicated to the subject over the recent years. In the five years from 2008-2013, there was an increased amount of scholarly journals on the subject coming from different subjects of science. For example, 21% of the 140 references found in the study by Tony Stankus come from multiscience journal, an increase from 5% of the 192 articles used in his 1917 to 2007 study. Previously two-thirds of the references came from entomology journals, whereas in the new study the number is now down to 36%. The increased diversity of sciences studying this issue highlights the present danger. As the amount of information on CCD increases, the factors that cause this disease are slowly being narrowed down. Even though there are no pin-pointed causes, the scientific community has come to a general consensus that no single factor can be determined the sole cause, but a combination of many factors.

            The recent studies reflect the general belief for the main factors that all attribute to CCD. These journals focus on; viruses and how they affect the bees, low nutrition diets, toxins in the environment, and the dreaded Varroa mite. The most extensively studied virus is called Isreali Acute Paralytic Virus (IAPV). Symptoms of this virus are paralysis of bees, lower populations per hive, and premature dark coloring, all of which can indicate hive decline. Scientists have found IAPV present in bee populations from all over the world including China, Jordan, and Spain. It was found that when compared to IAPV-free bees, the bees that were infected had “significantly lower rates of homing”, which is the ability for the insect to find its way back to the hive. The infected population also showed a tendency to settle for food sources that contained lower concentrations of sugar. This behavior was not seen in healthy bees, in fact the healthy bees would not consume the diluted solutions at all, but they would continue to search for sugar-rich sources (Stankus). This behavior supports the hypothesis that the infected individuals are less efficient in hunting for food, or just desperate due to the ratio of energy spent to energy gained. The continued consumption of low amounts of food may lead to the eventual demise of the bee. Another virus that is rampant in bees is the Deformed wing virus (DWV). DWV causes bee larvae to have underdeveloped wings as adults and therefore cannot fly, which effects their ability to do their function as bees. Scientists have found evidence that honeybees have inherently weak immune systems that have “no measureable immunological response” to the presence of Acute Bee Paralyic Virus (ABPV), a genetically similar virus to IAPV.  This makes honeybees more susceptible to pathogens such as the IAPV and DFV viruses. 

Three Long Intros

            Most people believe that honeybees are just bugs that fly flower to flower, stinging whomever happens to walk into their path to the nearest flower. Bees actually place one of the most vital roles in modern day society. They account for 80% of all the pollination done in agriculture. If you are still not convinced, picture sitting at the dinner table and one third of all the food on the table disappeared. Bees do their part in the agricultural process by spreading pollen between flowers as they are blooming in the spring. Pollen is the male reproductive cell that all flower plants produce. As they fly from flower to flower, the pollen sticks to the bees and then steals a ride to whichever flower the honeybee goes to next. The pollen, which is one of the most nutritious substances in nature, is then used as a fuel source for the hive. However, since 2006 the beekeepers have noticed a sharp decline in their bee populations. This is a major problem because the estimated $40 billion agriculture business depends on these bees so that they can start growing crops again. Their sudden die off is causing a major buzz in the science community because they cannot determine a concrete cause for this issue. There are many different factors that can cause this die off, and there is now extensive effort to solve this problem because of their importance.

            I now see bees everywhere I look. No I’m not going crazy. One day, after struggling for almost an hour, my mom gave me the sudden idea to do my research article on honeybees. She got her ideas from a friend who is a supporter of local beekeepers. Most people would immediately ignore this topic, but I remember how interesting an article called “New studies find that bees actually want to eat the pesticides that hurt them.”  This article described how honeybees were attracted to flowers that had a pesticide whose main component was nicotine. This sparked my interest and caused me to research the topic more. I found that bee populations have been declining as much as 70% in Iowa over winter. This is an important topic because bee populations everywhere around the world are declining at a sharp rate. These bees are used by farmers across the countries to pollinate the food that we eat, or the food that we use to feed our livestock. Due to the complexity of bees, they have a delicate balance that can be upset by the littlest imbalance. When they experience an environmental stress such as pesticides they may begin to start behaving abnormally and then eventually die off. The death of large numbers of bees would be detrimental because then our food could not be grown as efficiently as needed. Not only are they needed to feed the growing seven billion people population in the world, but they also produce local honey that many people eat to increase their resistances to local allergies since their honey contains the pollen from all type of local plants.

            A world without honeybees would be one whose plate and fields would be significantly more dull than the one we have today. Even today our fields are beginning to have less wild flowers and other wild plants. The honeybees are responsible for the colorful plates that we have today. The managed populations of bees in America account for 80% of pollination in agriculture including, but defiantly not limited to, apples, avocados, blueberries, melons, and the clover that cows feed on. Since 2006 six, we have begun to see what this type of world may look like. In the winter of that year alone, over a quarter of the country’s 2.4 million beehives, which is tens of billions of bees, were lost to one disease called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Colony Collapse Disorder is describe as the sudden disappearance of worker bees from the hive, even though there are babies, a queen, and ample honey supplies for them to feed on. This phenomena has biologist baffled because of its quick impact and mysterious nature. This disease highlights the larger issue, that the bee populations can be so negatively affected by just one factor. A combination of many different factors including colony collapse disorder, global warming, monoculture, and pesticides have cause the national bee populations to decline by 30% over the last 5 years. The rate at which this is happening is increasing every year, last year being a 42% increase from the year before. The major problem of declining bee populations should alarm everyone because everyone has a stake in this issue. 

America, Home of the....Homeless

In the excerpt “America’s Wandering Families” by Loretta Schwartz-Nobel, the growing concern of starvation and homelessness in America is highlighted through not only statistics, but also real life accounts and the author’s interpretations. As stated in the introduction, many Americans believes that “nobody starves” in the United States. Schwartz-Nobel uses this excerpt to blatantly bring forth the issues of poverty and hunger to the middle-class/ upper-class citizens of America. That is her audience because she wants the people of America, who have the ability to help change some statistics behind these issues. I found her excerpt to be very effective in getting her point across. To build her ethos, Schwartz-Nobel uses a multitude of facts and statistics in the beginning of the article. She loads the beginning of her paper with facts because a majority her paper is narrative, but throughout the narrative she also includes prickles to help the people in the audience who look for hard facts to support claims. However, the most effective part of her excerpt is the use of pathos and narrative to connect the readers to people suffering from these situations. Schwartz-Nobel tells her story of visiting many homeless shelters in San Diego and describes her journey in a way that allows the audience to emotionally step into her shoes. Also during her visits, she uses three stories from three totally different people to show the issue of poverty of from all different perspectives. The story of her time with John, the Volunteer Director at the St. Vincent de Paul Village, tells his perspective of the homeless shelter. John provides a hopeful outlook on the issue, which causes the audience to believe that they can help. The story of Tina, a young new mom who recently entered this situation, illustrates to the readers that almost anyone can be thrown into this situation and it is not as easy as it appears to be to climb out of that hole. Her final testimony is from a single mother named Melissa, who is experienced living this life and struggles to feed her teenage son. Melissa was put into this story to demonstrate the illogical sense of the welfare/institutional system. More importantly, Melissa tells the hard truths of living the impoverished life. She talks about having to steal food in order to provide enough food for her and her son to survive. I like how she ends the excerpt with this testimony because the sometimes hard to digest information is what the audience reacts to most. In all, I found Schwartz-Nobel’s excerpt to be very effective is putting her point across due to her strong use of pathos and universal themes. 

Research practice

For my researched article, I chose to read “Caffeine makes for busy bees, not productive ones” by Ed Yong. This article is short but I found it to be interesting and it used enough research strategies to help me learn about this genre. I chose this article because it is from national geographic, and that magazine has built up its ethos as one that is good about the research it does and is not misleading. The title of the article also works to draw me in because the points out a connection between two things that I would not typically see together, caffeine and bumblebees. I like this article too because has the aspects of a research paper in it that would be useful to me. The beginning starts with a little background information describing the effect on caffeine on bees so that the readers can know exactly what the author means to talk about in this article. Yong also uses narrative during his paper during his paper to connect to the reader more. He talks about how he is drinking an early cup of coffee while he was writing this, and that makes the readers connect to him as a person more. It also serves a purpose to reflect how caffeine is important to humans too and it adds an aspect of caffeine that readers can compare to when deciding how caffeine effects bees rather than humans. Most importantly, Yong uses information from studies that other credible people such as scientists have taken. He uses question and answers during his essay to introduce how his resources apply to the topic of how caffeine effects honeybees, which makes the reader think more too. He ends the paper with commentary of what he has learned throughout his research, using skills such a drawing conclusions on how the bees are effected and using hard statistics to demonstrate the effect to people who need concrete results. In all I found his essay to be helpful but I think he should have put more prickles into his stories to make it longer and to help the audience understand the subject of bees more, it requires previous knowledge of bees to understand everything.  

 Yong, Ed. "Caffeine Makes For Busy Bees, Not Productive Ones." Phenomena Caffeine Makes For Busy Bees Not Productive Ones Comments. 15 Oct. 2015. Web. 18 Oct. 2015. 

Junk homework

In Lee Ann Fisher Baron’s “The Influence of “Junk Science” and the Role of Science Education”, she argues that America needs to reform its education curriculums so that students are better taught in the hard sciences and math. This article starts out like the other one I report, with a beginning excerpt that establishes the author ethos through her qualifications and accolades. Her article is split into sections in so that her readers can easily understand her points. The first two sections of the article talk about the differences between real science and “junk science”. Baron does not like “junk science” because it falsely convinces consumers of a scientific breakthrough that has no scientific evidence supporting it, such as the herbal supplements that many people claim to improve health. The author uses prickles to provide context about what real science really is and how it differs from junk science, which is effective in helping readers understand the differences. Her audience for this paper would be parents and adults in the educational system that have influence on what students learn. Her final section of her paper blatantly describes her greater purpose in writing this article, which is that schools need to “revive real standards” in schools across the country with regards to sciences and math’s. she does this by using goo and pathos so create a connection with the readers. The readers can feel how passionate Baron is about this discussion and it helps her be more effective in reaching people. Her call to action asks people to be better thinkers so that they can distinguish between good and false science. I like how the article is so short because it keeps my concentration and it gets to the point quick. I enjoyed both of these article because they are shorter and interesting. 

One thing

In Natalie Angier’s magazine article “One Thing They Aren’t: Maternal”, she presents information about how even though humans have a nurturing connotation of the word mother, it is not always the example we find in the wild. She is writing this article for The New York Times because it is approaching mother’s day and this offers another aspect of motherhood. Since it is a scientific piece, Angier uses the first part of her paper to establish her ethos as a renowned author and research scientist. I found that to be effective in me believing in what she said. She has only a small excerpt in the beginning in order to mirror how insignificant that “moms are great” is to this article. After her small introduction to being a mother, the author spends the rest of the article talking about how mothers from all kingdoms of the animal world are “coldhearted.” In order to do this she uses a vast amount of prickles and very little goo. I did like all the prickles she uses because they keep readers interested on the topic by presenting new, cool facts. Her lack of goo has little consequence in this case because the target audience is the more sophisticated readers on the NY Times who would want to read an intellectual piece. Angier’s goal is to present the information she wants to, so that her readers can realize how special our mothers are before their special day. In addition, her lack of commentary lowers the levels of emotion the readers have because the presents it in a way that makes it seem like what is happening is only natural. The goal is to demonstrate how mothers in the wild do what they need to so that at least some of their offspring survive. I do not like how the article ended so abruptly without any tying together of loose ends. I wish she provided more commentary then. 

iSurprised

                The informative essay iWeb by Nicholas Carr, as you can infer from the title, is a reference to the futuristic movie iRobot. This movie is about a population of robots that humans create with artificial intelligence to do all sorts of tasks for humans, but their minds eventually cause them to try to take over the world. This article is not quite as extreme as iRobot, but it does talk about how the internet and World Wide Web are constantly adapting to the human mind in order to make processes easier for humans. As the author points out many times throughout his paper, by use of many questions, the audience can see that many people believe the internet has already started to become similar to an artificial intelligence. With the case of google, the search engine contains a “page-rank algorithm” that ranks every website based on the amount of times the website has been linked to, the greater the amount of links to a site the better. Google practically thinks for you using this program, where the internet thinks which page would help you find what you are looking for best based on the general popularity of the webpage. Carr does a good job of using prickles, such as specific examples of the internet evolving ( the Mechanical Turk) and many quotes from industry professionals, to prove the points he makes about the internet. The only time I found his strategy of overloading with facts to be ineffective was near the beginning when the facts seemed to all be saying the same thing and near the end when the amount of knowledge being presented to you was just too much to handle. However, this technique does work well with his target audience, who are the tech wizards and internet enthusiasts who think that the internet is amazing. The internet is amazing but his audience needs to see the hard prickles of his argument to believe what the author is saying. I enjoyed this article for the most part because I found the topic easy to relate to but I thought the prickles could have been balanced out more by goo.  

peer review research paper

Min:

Like Carlie said, I think you did a great job with the goo of the story. I found it very easy to follow what you were doing and your thought processes. You did include a good amount of prickles and I do not think you need more, but I think it could use a little more in depth analysis of the prickles. For example, you could go into more depth about why taking breaks helps the mind remember the information better. In addition, I like how you had a strong plan of what you were going to do for the experiment beforehand. I like how the three options were separated in an easy to understand manner. I also think the question is relevant to a lot of people so that it’s easy to relate to. I actually was forced to take a break while analyzing this draft due to the fireworks and it helped me formulate my thoughts better (even though the break was forced because I could not concentrate). There were some grammatical errors but those are minor and can be fixed easily. I really enjoyed your experiment and think the draft is a strong base, the only significant thing I would do is expand more on the prickles or use more prickles to analyze your questions more scientifically.

Carli: 

I found your essay to be very interesting. This is mainly due to the fact a good majority of the things you said, I was one of those people you were talking about (do not worry it did not hurt my feelings). I think you did a great job of telling your story, but I think it could have had more in depth analysis of your feelings. Personally I know sometimes when I am bored, alone with nothing to do I cannot help but to pull out my phone. I forget I checked the same social media one minutes ago. In addition, you could talk about how often you find yourself in situations where you are uncomfortable or feel like you should pull out your phone because everyone else is. You had a good amount of prickles to expand on your narrative but I think it could use more, for example you could talk about the science of addiction to the “high” you get from your phone. You could have prickles about disorders where people think their phone is going off at all times and it is not. Finally I think you could be more specific on the things you used your phone for such as only calls or important texts. All in all I think it’s a well written essay. 

Draft section

Nail biting, also known as Onychophagia, is the severe habit of biting someone’s nail. Now almost everyone has does this before, in fact “about half of all children between the ages 10 and 18 bite their nails at one time or another”, according to WebMD. Nail biting becomes a problem when an individual continues the habit into their later ages and causes significant nail and psychiatric damage. The psychiatric damage is not the typically definition people would think of, but more similar to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). Many scientist today believe that nail biting is a spectrum of OCD in that its caused by an unnaturally strong urge to groom oneself. OCD is characterized by “persistent, intrusive, and distressing obsessions (persistent thoughts, impulses, or images) or compulsions (repetitive, excessive behaviors or mental acts)”, which basically means that a person with this disorder has strong compulsions to do whatever task makes them tick. OCD is believe to be caused by “alterations in the serotonin and dopamine signaling.” Serotonin and dopamine are both neurotransmitters found in the brain that have to do with the mood of an individual. Low levels of Serotonin has been linked to depression and dopamine is release when “something good happens unexpectedly”, such as the familiar sight of the free edge (cite what that is).

 Even though there has been no scientific evidence to back up the theory that Onychophagia is a spectrum of OCD, I find this to be the most accurate explanation of why someone, or me in this case, bites their nails. After biting my nails for a majority of my life, I have found that the sight of bitable nail causes me to have the greatest urge to just get rid of it. As my nails get longer I find myself constantly inspecting them for any excuse to bite off the free. Also the urge to masticate increases exponentially the longer my nails grow. I am not used to them being long and one day after about a week I couldn’t stop the urge to bite one nail, just one nail. The satisfaction  of biting the nail granted me a feeling of euphoria, but more importantly it got rid of my urges. However this example shows me that it will be harder than I thought to stop this habit cold turkey.