Hotspots in Business Revisited

In my previous post, I discussed three hotspots in my field of study, business:

Volunteers through Vivint's CSR program

1. Corporate Social Responsibility (Corporate social responsibility is a means for businesses to use their profits to address social issues, but some argue that this goes beyond the responsibility of business.)

• Historical Connections During the Romantic Era, a theme that emerged was increased empathy. In reaction to the empiricism of the Enlightenment, a shift was made from hard-cut systems and skepticism to an emphasis on feelings, compassion, and identification with the plight of others. Moreover, during the Romantic Era society became more concerned with looking after more vulnerable groups rather than just the elite few. In many ways, the Romantic Era’s push for empathy is mirrored as Millennials and Generation Z-ers demand that their workplace goes beyond their normal business to helps vulnerable groups. Just as in the Romantic Era, individuals are expecting the businesses they work for to consider the plight of others and then use the profits and resources they have to help those individuals in the form of CSR programs.
  

Hot Spots in Journalism

• Journalism in Politics

When it comes to politics, there is a lot of controversy because politicians hold power and with power, comes responsibility. There is a lot of criticism that goes on because most people, when they think journalism, they think of the people who leak all of the gossip and secrets. Publishing quotes from people can cause chaos and for this reason, it is important to get the facts right and to not be persuaded by others or even popular opinion. It is often hard to find that balance. (see 

http://www.mediahelpingmedia.org/training-resources/advanced-journalism/712-the-relationship-between-journalists-and-politicians)

• Freedom of the Press

There is a lot of controversy about how far journalists can go with the word “freedom” when it comes to freedom of putting out words. It has become hard to tell where to draw the line. When it comes to the freedom of the press, Trump says that the problem is ignorance and not getting facts right. (see https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/05/opinion/trump-free-press.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FFreedom%20of%20The%20Press&action=click&contentCollection=timestopics&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=5&pgtype=collection for his opinion)

• Freedom of Speech

The question on what this means and if it means you can say anything is still pretty vague. As people freely express what they wish, there are problems created, but what do we do about this? The question is still out there.

(https://www.history.com/topics/united-states-constitution/freedom-of-speech)

As I read more about these headings I can't help, but think about how important self expression is. Sharing what you might deem as important and beneficial to an individual is inspiring, can be creative and can change perspectives. With all that and these bullets above, it isn't easy and with everything we do, we can do, but a lot of times, we must filter ourselves, but not filter our creativity.

Going into journalism myself, learning and studying more about all these things has opened up my mind in ways that I have not thought of. Moving forward and being aware of these things is important and I can see that now.

 

Photographing A Christening While Studying the Reformation

A couple of weekends ago I had the unique opportunity to attend and photograph a Christening in the Catholic Church. This was an interesting event to attend while learning about the Catholic Church and the reformation. Most of my exposure to the Catholic Church and to Catholic people came while serving my mission in Mexico where I’d always run into some very dedicated Catholics every where I went, but actually participating in a religious ceremony with them a couple days ago opened my eyes. Their decorum in this ordinance and love for Christ and their love for love is explicitly evident and that cannot be denied. Though, I do not agree with the religious practices in the baby baptism, I still feel that what happens in those churches is a way of acting in faith even if it isn’t the way that I believe in. Those people chose to be in that room and I think the Lord sees that and accepts that faith acted upon. All of this brings me back to Martin Luther and his thoughts on faith. In “Martin Luther’s Conversion,” he mentions that “The righteousness of God is revealed, as it is written: the righteous shall live by faith.” This stands out because we all were created by God and He loves us and accepts our types of devotion to Him no matter what they are. This concept of sola fide is interesting to me. I might have this wrong, but my understanding is that the Protestants believed in this concept with Martin Luther and the Catholics were more the works part of faith. If the catholics were works based people back in the reformation, I believe that this has shifted in a way. I can see that these people had a lot of faith in their practices, but then again the question is, “does that faith only happen within a religious ceremony?” I guess that is a question that we can all ask ourselves. Do we really live what we believe or is it all to merely look a certain way. The reformation, even though it was a hard time for some people, it was a time where all faiths and beliefs were challenged. It served as a reminder that whatever was believed in needed to be firmly believed in to be able to last the test of time and pressure from the outside sources that were surrounding the religious people of the time.
Art in this stained glass window brought me to a familiarity that I couldn't feel within the ceremony, but it did remind me of Christ. 

Hot Spots in Graphics and Design

Appropriation Art

Appropriation is taking possession of something (object and/or image) that already exists. Artists who use appropriation is in no way trying to pull one over anyone, but rather putting these objects and images in a new context without transforming their original concepts. The earliest form of appropriation art was in 1912 by Pablo Picasso who created a glass bottle and guitar out of newspaper clippings discovered this form of art and design, but this does not dismiss the fact that an artist runs the risk of accusation and lawsuits due to plagiarism, non-original and copyright infringement. This is one that Andy Warhol became much familiar with when he was sued by Campbell's Soup for his portrait of the Campbell's Soup Can. 

more reading...

A Literary​ Discipline

When an author writes, they face the task of creating characters which develop throughout the book. An editor then brings form into the writers' text like a carver brings form to a block of wood or stone. A graphic designer could add new layers of meaning to the text they are structuring —  they’re capable of permeating the immediacy of a single word, phrase or expression with narrative. Writers, editors and designers all speak the same language. 

An example of writers, editors and designers speaking the same language, I am currently reading Honoré de Balzac’s classic novella, “The Girl with the Golden Eyes”, the first 30 pages Balzac is basically walking the reader through Paris describing how horrific and awful it is. An artist name Eugene Delacroix created a painting called ‘The Death of Sardanapalus’ which depicts a society of chaos, giving Balzac’s textual description of Paris a new layer of meaning.

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Not Self-Expression

Self-expression is the way we declare our personalities, our feelings, thoughts and ideas in a variety of ways. Throughout my two years at Salt Lake Community College studying graphic design, most of my professors would constantly state that graphic design is a service rendered by you for other people and that your own design idea(s) were irrelevant. So, we were taught and trained to follow specific instructions given in the form of assignments and projects. 

Presentation days were the most boring and longest days of my life, not because I hate speaking in front of the class (I really do hate speaking in front of a large group of people), but enduring a whole two hours of students presenting on the same thing, using the same terminology only with a twist in sequence in the process of completing the assignment. This is true in the sense of a marketing profession or a product designer but not for graphic designers who draw inspiration from their own ideas and interests.  

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We are constantly surrounded by graphic design, whether we notice it or not. It is the visual communication through the combination of typography, photography and illustration which creates a symbolic representation of an idea or message. It is on the clothes we wear, the cars we drive and the candy wrappers we immediately discard after devouring its contents. Some of us may have drawn a mustache or two on an image on our handouts, added curly hair to a character in a book, filled in the holes in the letters p, o, capital A or even added serif and tails to printed text. You may have done this unconsciously, but you were able to add a new layer and idea to something even if boredom inspired you, it is a form of self-expression in the form of graphic design.

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Hot Spots in Computer Science and Animation

1) Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) has captivated the minds of authors and readers for years. With the day of super-intelligent AI fast approaching, concerns are quickly rising to the surface of research. AI offers the promise of a raised global standard of living, and also the threat of autonomous weapons and killing machines. More information about the future of AI can be found here : Benefits and Risks of Artificial Intelligence- Future of Life Institute

2) The Internet of Things
Smart homes, cars, fridges, and washing machines have proven their value to the world in significant ways in the past few years. Unfortunately, such items can also be hacked into by outsiders, endangering us and all that we own. As programmers and engineers push towards the future, they run the risk of going to far. At what point does progress become dangerous, and is it worth the risk? For more information follow this link to read about two security officials that took complete control of Chrysler vehicles. AFTER JEEP HACK, CHRYSLER RECALLS 1.4M VEHICLES FOR BUG FIX

3) Animating Genders
Animation is known for depicting characters emotions through proportion changes and facial distortion. While silly and unappealing, it has made characters seem real and very human. However, female leads often are not depicted this way however, because it risks sacrificing their aesthetic appeal. This gender-bias stems from long held rhetorical tradition. For years, people have associated exaggerated expressions with female villains and side characters, and not with heroines. It's been this way for so long that it's almost a rule of rhetorical decorum for animators. Follow this link to read about the controversy with the female leads of Disney's Frozen. “Frozen” Head of Animation Says Animating Women is “Really, Really Difficult”

As computer science and animation student, I'm concerned with depictions of women in animation. These persisting issues have deprived millions of people from relating to strong female leads. Don't these long standing traditions and expectations deserve to be challenged? It seems that everyone, both animator and viewer, would benefit from Immanuel Kant's advice to break free of tutelage and tradition and to "Sapere aude,"  "Dare to know", or in this case dare to try something that hasn't been done before.

Hot Spots in Psychology

Psychology and Neuroscience: Allies or Antagonists?

The relationship between psychology and neuroscience is a complicated one. An esteemed psychology professor once told me, “I think eventually the field of neuroscience will eat away at psychology until psychology becomes obsolete.” I disagree. These points of view raise some interesting questions: How are the mind and the brain different? How are they related? Can we really measure intangible things, like the mind? Should we stick to studying things we can see with our own eyes? How do these fields work together? Can they peacefully coexist?

(See: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/talking-apes/201702/is-neuroscience-the-future-or-the-end-psychology)


Ethics in Psychology Research

The Institutional Review Board (IRB) is responsible for approving all of the potential studies that will be done in the field of psychology. Their purpose is to make sure that all of the research is ethical. The IRB has established several rules and guidelines that must be met in order to approve a study as ethical. However, this still leaves lots of gray areas in which subjective decisions are made, making it a critical issue of psychology today.

(See: https://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20151212/MAGAZINE/312129979/policing-the-ethics-police-research-review-boards-face-scrutiny-as-feds-propose-new-rules)


Perceptions of Psychology

A lot of “flashy” and well known psychology topics, like Freud’s theories of the id, ego and superego; Rorschach tests; and Briggs-Meyers Personality Tests are not actually accepted as credible elements of modern psychology. Some claim that these theories or tests explain everything about people and their behaviors, while psychologists would be very skeptical. It is important to educate the public about the shortcomings of these theories and tests so they can understand psychology on a deeper level, and so they don’t believe in things that are unreliable or majorly flawed.

A video about Rorschach tests-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jRMOTjBPjI
An article about Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Test-https://www.medicaldaily.com/personality-tests-are-not-accurate-myers-briggs-personality-test-not-reliable-416652


I think the most interesting of these three issues is the public’s perception of psychology (but the relationship between psychology and neuroscience is a close second!) I think the way we present psychological research can sometimes be overcomplicated, resulting in a lack of interests from those who are not specialists in the field. I think if we can communicate modern research in an effective and interesting way (while still maintaining the core truths of the research), the public will be better educated about their mental health and the world around them.

Hot Spots in the Medical Field

·      State Regulation of Fast Food Chains

Policies that counter fast food consumption might offer governments a way to tackle the growing obesity epidemic. In a study I recently just read, nations with stronger government regulations—such as producer protection, price controls, intervention on competition, and taxes—experienced slower increases in fast food purchases and average BMIs. The lack of regulation of fast food could be fueling our country’s obesity epidemic. (See https://www.futurity.org/fast-food-need-government-regulation/)

·      Mandatory Child Vaccinations

No US federal laws mandate vaccination, but all 50 states require certain vaccinations for children entering public schools. Most states offer medical and religious exemptions; and some states allow philosophical exemptions.Each year, about 2.1 million people die from vaccine-preventable diseases. Many children may not receive their necessary first year vaccinations because of lack of availability, religious beliefs, and safety concerns. Vaccinations have significantly reduced the disease rate throughout the world. (See https://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center/global-immunization/diseases-and-vaccines-world-view)

·      The Right to Free Health Care

Proponents of the right to health care say that no one in one of the richest nations on earth should go without health care. They argue that a right to health care would stop medical bankruptcies, improve public health, reduce overall health care spending, help small businesses, and that health care should be an essential government service. Opponents argue that a right to health care amounts to socialism and that it should be an individual 's responsibility, not the government 's role, to secure health care. They say that government provision of health care would decrease the quality and availability of health care and would lead to larger government debt and deficits. (See https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/the-state-of-healthcare-in-the-united-states/health-care-as-a-human-right/)

Out of these three topics I feel like I am most passionate about the last. I personally believe that health care should be a basic human right. Because progress towards Universal Health Coverage involves a range of complex technical challenges, it is easy to forget that moving toward it is a political processthat involves negotiation between different interest groups in society over the allocation of health benefits and who should pay for these benefits. Although these are valid concerns, there are much more benefits to the U.S. adopting a dorm of national health care system than to keep its current system. This current health care debate hits close to home for every American.

Hot Spots in English Education

Validating Vernaculars

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash

Traditionally, English instruction has focused on the "correctness" of students' use of language and grammar, which has marginalized every child who has mastered one of the many English dialects, such as African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) or "Spanglish," for lack of a more official term. Educators and researchers are now learning that spending precious classroom time to rid students of their native vernaculars is harming their school and standardized test performance. In classrooms that teach towards comprehension rather than correctness, students enjoy their studies more, their grades pick up, and their standardized test scores rise. (See Moving Students Towards Acceptance of "Other" Englishes, NCTE 2016)

Hot Spots in Mental Health Psychology

Detecting Anxiety and Depression in Children

Researchers at the University of Vermont discovered that using artificial intelligence (AI), we can detect anxiety and depression in children at a high accuracy rate. Children often have trouble expressing how they are feeling which maked their anxiety and depression difficult to treat, but AI could make it so that the symptoms are detected earlier, meaning the children would be treated earlier instead of having to struggle through life with their symptoms. More Info

Hot Spots in Regenerative Medicine: Grow Your New Liver!

For those of us not familiar with regenerative medicine, it is the latest and greatest thing that has been happening in the world of medicine for the last 30 years. Regenerative medicine seeks to use biochemistry, molecular biology and engineering to heal the body. While regrowing organs can be a wonderful promise for many, advancements in gene therapy and stem cell research have met their fair share of controversy today. Let’s take a brief look at some hot spots in the field today.

• Stem Cells

Hot Spots in Immunology

• Vaccination
  Due to a falsified study published by an unscrupulous doctor, vaccination has become the public scapegoat for Autism. A huge amount of research has been done to verify this connection. Each new study has found the original claim of vaccines causing Autism to be false, but the public belief still exists. Many parents have gone to great lengths to prevent the vaccination of their children. The nation has recently been suffering from outbreaks of Measles, a virus that can be easily be kept out of the population when the majority of citizens are vaccinated. The reported cases and death toll of this outbreak are climbing fast. https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/13/health/measles-update-cdc-800-cases/index.html

• Balancing Potency and Side Effects in Cancer

Hot Spots in Statistics

Hot Spots in Statistics:

• Statistics in Sporting

In the last few years, statistics has played a more prominent role in the decisions of front offices in terms of who they sign and what shots they want players to take. There has been some backlash from players, most notably after CJ McCollum made shot after shot from midrange in Game 7 against the Denver Nuggets and all of those shots that were made were considered "bad shots". Players shot their opinions back and said that if he was not taking those shots, they do not win the game and that a good player will take those shots that might not be statistically good shots, but it was the best shot to take at that time. (More Info)

• Statistics and the Anti-vax movement

There is an overflowing cornucopia of information from veritable sources disproving that vaccines cause autism. Yet that belief remains. For some reason, people put more stock in stories that have been passed down rather than statistics which show that 1 in 500 who contract measles who have not been vaccinated will die from measles-related complications whereas 1 in 1,000,000 who are vaccinated will contract measles. (More Info)

• Lack of Appreciation for Statistics and the Environment

The issue with statistics and the environment stands in stark contrast to that of the anti-vax movement. The biggest issue with statistics and the environment is that there seems to be an impenetrable bubble of apathy surrounding the majority of the human inhabitants of the world. Statistics such as 100,000 marine animals a year die from plastic entanglement and approximately 1,000,000 sea birds die as well, are not enough to motivate people to action. What is sad is that this is the case because it does not increase businesses bottom line to be environmentally aware. (More Info)

Of these three, I am most passionate about statistics and the environment right now. It reminds me of Stephen Covey's theory about quadrant 2 living about focusing on things that are important but are not urgent. We are so trained to think about what is urgent and important or what is urgent and not important, and oftentimes what is neither important nor urgent before we seek to do productive things before they are urgent. The environment has been in the not urgent, but important category for a long time, and if we had started caring a long time ago we could have gotten ahead of the issue. Now it is becoming increasingly more important and urgent, but the need to get to work by taking a car is more urgent and so we still find ourselves taking our car. The need to efficiently carry my groceries is more urgent, so plastic bags are used. The task now is to disarm people of their apathy and replace their apathetic armor and shields with resolute swords and axes to wield drastic changes in how we treat the world we live in. 

Hot Spots in Psychology

• Mind-Body Debate

Is the mind a separate part of the body, or is the body an extension of the mind? Which is in control? Does the mind control the body via thought, or does the body control the mind via hormones? (More Info)

• Nature or Nurture

Are the behaviors of people based on genetic influences (nature) or environmental learning (nurture)? Is it a combination of the two? What is the proportion of natural and nurturing influences on people's behavior? (More Info)

• Reductionism or Holism 

Can human behavior be understood by breaking it down into smaller parts, or is it better understood as a whole? Is the best way to understand behavior looking at the smallest measurable activity and working up to the large scale? (More Info)

Hot Spots in Business

Hot Spots in Business

• Give-back programs

Especially within the past ten years, businesses have seen significant demand for their business model to include a “give-back” program. Also known as corporate social responsibility (CSR) or social impact work, these programs are expected to address a social problem using business products, manpower, or revenues. For example, a company might use its resources to address unsafe parks in Salt Lake to poor access to water in rural Kenya. There is little disagreement on whether solving social issues is a good thing or not; the controversy is raised, however, in if business should be the means to do so. Milton Friedman, a highly recognized economist, argues that give-back programs go beyond the scope of what businesses should be. He states that “there is one and only one social responsibility of business to use its resources… [and that is] to increase its profits… without deception or fraud.” Anything beyond that, Friedman argues, is the wrong way to do a good thing. (See https://lucidmanager.org/milton-friedman-corporate-social-responsibility/.)

Hot Spots in Equality: Is Inequality Among Us Good or Bad?

The Failure of Forced Equality

One of the dominant features of history over the last century has been the repeated attempt by mankind to achieve a utopia of equality. The idea of forcing equality in income was advanced and popularized by Karl Marx, and this idea has been tried time and time again.

However, we have seen that this idea of forcing income equality has failed time and time again. It failed for the Soviet Union when collectivization resulted in a massive famine which killed millions. It failed for Maoist China, when collectivization also resulted in the starvation of tens of millions of people. More recently, the country of Venezuela has implemented wealth redistribution policies, but this has resulted in mass violence, chaos, and shortages of food and basic items of hygiene.

Laissez-Faire Economics and the Origin of Inequality

The other side of the ideological coin is laissez-faire economics. The French phrase “laissez-faire” translates to “let do” in English, which suggests that laissez-faire economics is let-do economics, or hands-off economics. However, laissez-faire economics results in income inequality. Why?

The philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in his writing On the Origin of Inequality among Men , puts forth the idea that inequality derives from the ownership of property and the difference of abilities and talents. He also said that man was the most equal and innocent when they roamed by themselves and hunted. It seemed to me that when we gain equality we lose progress, and when we gain progress we lose equality.

Laissez-faire economics has also been practiced in many instances throughout time. For example, US President Ronald Reagan cut taxes during the beginning of his administration, in an effort to grow corporations and increase the net wealth of the nation. However, critics of laissez-faire economics point to the Reagan administration as the time when the wealth disparity in the United States widened tremendously, and when the inflation-adjusted wages of the middle class stagnated.

Specialization over Inequality

Inequality hurts, let’s face it. For me, it was always a hard pill to swallow when I saw rich 18-year-old students driving their cars around Heritage Halls, while I was without a car at 22 years old. Also, it was always disheartening to see extroverted individuals get loads of success while my relatively introverted lack of enthusiasm was a large factor in my paltry level of success. The proper response to a perceived inequality is being grateful for the talents that we have been given, instead of envying the perceived gifts, talents, and/or possessions of others.

The economist Adam Smith discussed specialization in his work The Wealth of Nations, where he wrote: “This advantage, however … will give a superiority to the country which enjoys it, rather by depressing the industry and produce of other countries, than by raising those of that particular country above what they would naturally rise to in the case of a free trade.” By applying this principle of specialization to our differing talents and abilities, we each can contribute something unique to the world, better than many others can.