Got Milk?

The nineteenth century is not just known for Realist art and literature; it also marks a significant time in the scientific community.  Two very prominent scientists lived during this era, both of whom made substantial contributions to modern society.

               In 1862, while examining micro-organisms, French chemist Louis Pasteur discovered, what he believed to be, the source of many food borne illnesses. He determined that by heating foods to a precise temperature and then rapidly cooling them, the growth of harmful pathogens could be drastically slowed down. This new method of pasteurization greatly reduced the risk of ingesting unsafe microbes and today is considered standard procedure as regulated by the FDA. Only a few years after Pasteur’s breakthrough, another Frenchmen by the name of Auguste Gaulin discovered a process by which he could prevent the fat globules in milk from separating into cream. The technique used during homogenization applies extreme pressure to raw milk that forces it through a series of small pores or tubes in order to break up the fat and create a uniformed emulsion; the first machine ever patented to do this was a three-piston pump that Gaulin created 1899.

               Having only seen raw milk once, I am thankful that these two men were around long before I was born.

Henry Ford: The Model T

One of the most revolutionary persons of the Industrial Age is without a doubt a wealthy pioneer named Henry James Ford. Ford was a prominent visionary who had a unique fascination for cars. From a young age Ford only dreamt to make cars affordable for everyone thus he introduced the orginal Ford - The Model T. Before Ford’s Car was readily known to society cars were only a luxury of the very fortunate wealthy class.

Base Model T

So how did ford reduce the cost of his vehicles? Wouldn’t he end up upside-down in revenue if he was manufacturing cars and selling them for less then what they cost to make? This was apparent and Ford recognized this as he redeveloped an idea by a gentlemen named Ransom E. Olds called the “assembly line.” In 1901 Olds came up with a way to make manufacturing quick and efficient by having individual groups of people assemble individual parts to a machine. Ford took this idea and added a belt driven assembly circuit and teams of workers who had special duties during their specific shifts. By adding the belt manufacturing his cars cut down time and cost. He was then able to sell his cars at a lower price due to the higher supply he had on hand. It was a great idea and the quality of the build never suffered because his workers were refreshed every 6-7hrs. at his factory in Detroit. In my opinion, I admire anyone like Ford who can see beyond the ordinary and look forward past the “box.” Ford’s marvelous strategies were so grand that they are still what we use today in industrial manufacturing and farming produce. Ford’s Model T had many versions similar to what we see today in the automobile industry.

Study By Jay Giles
  


  

The Lion King: Saga of a Song

Most people who's watched the Lion King probably only remember the characters such as Simba and Mufasa, as well as the infamous song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight." What people don't know is how the song came about and where it came from. The song was originally written in 1939, by a man by the name of Solomon Popoli Linda. In 1939, inside of Africa's only music studio at the time, Solomon began rehearsing songs and later recorded the song "Mbube', which translates into the word "Lion". Now fast forward all the way to the 2000 years. A South African journalist named Rian Malan, wrote a feature article for the magazine Rolling Stone, describing Linda's story and estimating that the song had earned US $15 million for its use in  the movie "The Lion King" alone. After Disney at first gave his family or heirs no money from the record or even recognized him as the song's composer, Solomon's family finally came intuition and sued Disney for the rights of the song. Since then, the two parties has come to a mutual agreement and settled the suit for an undisclosed amount of money. 

What Does Atomic Matter?

It seems to us modern people that the atom is just general knowledge that everyone is taught about in their middle school physical science class. The Idea of the atom hasn’t always been around, until, surprisingly in 4th century B.C. Greek Philosopher Democritus asked himself this question, “If you break a piece of matter in half, and then break it in half again, how many breaks will you have to make before you can break it no further?” The only reasoning he could gather is that eventually you can no longer break the matter right? There must be an end right? He called this ending unit an atom – a solid indivisible sphere of matter.

Democritus' Model

Democritus’ theory was later dismissed by a few respected Greek philosophers and was blind to the world until the 1800s where the main principals fathered the atom’s physical make-up. In 1897, English Physicist J.J. Thomson introduced the first atomic model known as the “Raisins in the Pudding” model.

Thomson's Model

Thomson discovered that the atom did in fact exist after he discovered electrons through experimentation. He knew the electrons were negatively charged and could not exist by themselves so he claimed the matter (wood, metal, gold, etc.) had to be positively charged. Thomson’s model was accepted until 1909. Ernest Rutherford blew his own mind as he decided to test the existence of electrons with the newly introduced technology of alpha rays (positively charged photon beams). Rutherford’s experiment was simple: shine the beam through a piece of gold foil and watch the beam refract off the electrons on the nucleus of the gold and scatter on the backside. His hypothesis proved false as the beam did not have direct paths out the back end but actually refracted in all different directions even back at him. He concluded that the electrons did not in fact reside on the nucleus but rather floated around it. The problem he faced then was, “Well what kept the nucleus from pulling apart?” He then claimed there had to be some uncharged particle in the nucleus to help cancel out proton charge. He called these neutrons – later proven to exist by Physicist Planck in 1930.

Rutherford's New Model

Just 4 years after Rutherford’s model was active Neil Bohr a Danish Mathematician proposed a more uniformed design building off Rutherford’s Model. It consisted of a nucleus with levels or “orbital paths” that the electrons followed - similar to planets orbiting the sun. Each energy level could hold a certain number of electrons and once that threshold was broken that level was said to be “excited” and the electron must move to the next level up. Bohr’s model is still accepted today and used in chemistry to follow changes in ionized atoms. His model is not the contemporary model. The last model came to existence in the 1930’s and 1940’s as scientist acknowledged that electrons follow no specific path as stated by Bohr, but instead can be any one place in the atom at anytime. This is represented by the “Electron Cloud Model.”

Bohr's Model

It is my admiration for such physical scientist that inspire me to have the want to invent and discover new things. I like to see something so small as an atom and later the discovery of quarks an even smaller  to become something as vast as planetary objects or galaxies. I wanted this to illustrate mostly how ideas can mature overtime. And we should never as people stop looking for an explanation even if we think we might know a "definite" truth - we don't. A recent event I hated to see go was the dismissal of NASA's space program.

Study By Jay Giles

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

    The Vietnam Veteran Memorial is one of the most historic landmarks in the country. The memorial which resides in Washington D.C., is a long plaque that lists every man and woman who were a part of the US armed services that died during the war, as well as the individuals who fought during the war. A group of eight architects and sculptures broke ground for the memorial on March 23, 1982. The makeup and design for the Veterans Memorial was chosen out of a group of unanimously selected. The design that was drawn out by Maya Ying Lin, a 21-year-old Yale University architecture student from Athens, Ohio, was the winner from the 1,421 entries. Next to the Memorial is a sculpture of three men named "The Three Soldiers". The statue was completed and unveiled in. The sculpture depicts three soldiers that are purposefully identifiable as White American, African American, and Hispanic American. The statue and the Wall appear to interact with each other, with the soldiers looking on in solemn tribute at the names of their fallen comrades. Last but not least, part of the memorial is the Vietnam Women's memorial, which is located south of the main wall. It was designed by a woman named Glenna Goodacre, who dedicated the Women's Memorial on November 11, 1993, to the women of the United States who served in the Vietnam War, most of whom were nurses. The woman looking up is named Hope, the woman praying is named Faith, and the woman tending to a wounded soldier is named Charity.
These Memorials will always be a rich and very important part of our nations history. Without these brave and courageous soldiers and women, the world as we know it would be completely different. 

Diderot, My Love

      Denis Diderot was a man with far more wisdom than his years allotted him; the creator of the encyclopedia, “encyclopedie”, he thought of the world as a whole rather than a collection of disagreeing societies. Reason and rationalism were his motivation to change the world in which he lived. As a child born in Langres, France, he was raised with Christian values and educated by the Jesuits but soon became fascinated with a variety of subjects outside of his religion. In 1729, while studying in Paris, he discovered a world unbeknown to him, a world filled with knowledge and many unanswered questions. Many historians claim him to be the “brightest light of the French Revolution”, leading his country into a new age. Both state and church rejected most of his theories because he dared to threaten the power of the land at the time. The disrespect of tradition and authority expressed in his findings infuriated rulers and elders alike, he was, ”the first great writer who belonged wholly and undividedly to modern democratic society.” Prior to his death in 1784 he wrote thousands of articles that encouraged the study of science and questioned the legitimacy of government. Poetic in nearly everything he addressed, Diderot in fact played a huge role in forcing society into the modern world we see it as today.

Boroque: acceptance of change

In a sense, every generation has a boroque period. Changes in style and acceptance to those styles have been ongoing from the beginning of time. Some recent examples of music and style changes in America are the 70's hippi era, 80's punk rock, and hip hop in the 90's. Not to mention changes each war has brought upon us. 

The boroque years were from 1600-1750.Boroque was the birth of elegance. A softer more romantic style was born. Sensual music and art surrounded people helping to bring out the emotions they previously had to hide in order to be viewed as "proper". Extravagant architecture arose making the cities beautifully designed showing the magnificence of what the human imagination is capable of.

Rebellion, as well as acceptance of the rebellion, sparked many of the changes of the boroque era. Although people have always looked down on rebellion, without it we would not be where we are today. The pilgrims rebelled against what the Catholic view of religion and therefore sought out a new land. The fall of the Ming empire was caused by rebellion of the Manchus which led to the governments financial fall. 

The acceptance of the changes of the arts by the church opened many doors for expression through beautiful music, paintings, fashion, and sculpture. The enjoyment through site, feel, and sound helps define who we are. I am thankful to any past rebellion, good or bad, for they have helped each country grow and learn from our failures and achievements. I look at the world as a baroque, a large irregularly shaped pearl, that is constantly being buffed and shined, trying to be made perfect by each opinion. Eventually the pearl will either break, or be shined to perfection.