Zachary Hecht

“We see and understand things not as they are but as we are.”

            When passing judgment one’s past experiences and personal philosophy are everything. When seeing something it is  nearly impossible not to be subjective. The decision making process has been complicated by people’s perception. People’s different views of things based on perception are shown through the Rorschach test. The Rorschach test is that inkblot test that you always see in movies. This test is able to show how people view objects differently. You could be shown a square and call it a circle, I could call it a triangle. Our different perceptions will affect the way we view the shape. An individual’s perception is developed throughout a lifetime. The way a person is taught and who they are taught by are major contributing factors to their perception. Perception is responsible for many of the disagreements in the world and due to this perception is possibly the most important way of knowing when considering a person's understanding of the world.

            When deciphering people’s differing views, emotion must also be taken into account. When one attempts to understand an object or situation their emotional state definitely comes into play. If I am extremely upset at the time I am presented with an opportunity I will most likely view it negatively. However, you may be extremely upbeat and view the same opportunity with great fervor. Emotion is probably the hastiest way of knowing. This is because emotions can change from second to second depending on what is taking place. This means that one’s understanding of things can change from second to second. Due to this emotion lends itself to being an incredibly volatile way of knowing.  Emotion is just one of several ways of knowing that dictates our decisions and feelings towards things.   

Nick Berger Plagiarism

Cheating and plagiarism has become a larger issue than it ever has been.  This is party due to the internet and all the resources available as well as the competition to be better than the next person.  In today's world some people would do anything to be better even if it is totally immoral.  In any subject, cheating and plagiarism can consist of the same concepts such as copying other people's work or looking at the answers on a test.  If somebody were to cheat on a math test, it would be very difficult to do so because most of the time the problems are lengthy multi step problems in which it would be very hard to copy.  If there is a multiple choice test in a history class, it is easier to cheat because you can see letters for answer choices much easier.  Also in history, people's ideas about a topic can be researched and slightly changed by copying and pasting with the changing around of a few words.  To do this in math, one person must copy the entire problem from another.

Scott Birke Plagarism

Plagarism had become extremely prevelant in the past few decades due to the creation of the internet. With the creation of the internet kids are able to just copy and paste infromation they find online into their hw or paper. History is the easiest subject to plagarise. This is because history hw is very easy to do but also very easy to just copy anf paste answers into the appropriate places and make it seem like you wrote the words. If kids are going to use other peoples work i dont understand why they dont just site the work. If they were to site the work they wouldnt get in trouble because they are not plagarizing. Math on the other hand is a very hard subject to plagarise. Very rarely are you able to go online and find the exact problem you have for hw and be able to copy the steps to solve the problem. Plagarism in math usually happens by copying a friends work. Students can usually get away with this because if you solve a solution correctly then the work most of the time is very similar if not identical. This doesnt make it right though to copy your friends math hw.

Louis Arens-Plagiarism

For years, plagiarism, or the unauthorized use of an author's work or thoughts has been become very common among high school students.  So many students choose to plagiarize because it makes doing work such as essays a lot quicker and easier.  However, it is also punishable if caught and wrong for many reasons.  For example, an author spends a lot of time and hard work on what they do, and a student copying that work word for word makes the author's work less valuable.  Plagiarism also prevents students from actually learning from their work, because they are just assuming what they are copying is correct.  Two areas of knowledge in which plagiarism is very popular are math and history.  Plagiarism is similar in these two areas because essentially, a student is using another person's work for their own benefit in both cases.  However, they are different because math homework is usually plagiarized when one student copies another student's homework, even though this isn't allowed.  When a student plagiarizes in history, they are usually taking work from a person that they don't know personally.  Instead, work from the internet is copied.  This is even worse because authors put a lot of work into articles that they put onto websites and databases.  A lot of people are paid for their research, but students still take their work for free. 

Plagiarism-Alex Solomon

Plagiarism has become extremely common over the past few decades. It is very easy and convenient for a student to simply look up the topic that they are writing about, click a link, and then copy and paste whatever they find on that link. A lot of students think that because they found the information that they have the right to use it as if it was theirs. Fortunately, schools are finding ways to crack down on plagiarism. Websites like turnitin.com have the ability to calculate how much of an assignment is plagiarized. The problem is that very few teachers ask for assignments to be uploaded on turnitin.com and therefore plagiarism is common for all but the very big assignments. Two particular subjects that plagiarism is extremely common in are history and the arts. History is an easy subject to plagiarize due to how much of it is opinionated. Because history can go so far back in to the past, a lot of what is written on websites and in textbooks are speculative ideas that were invented by the brightest of historians. If students agree with these historians, which they tend to do, it is very common that the students will post the opinions of another historian without giving the historian proper credit through the use of citations. Art is probably the easiest thing to plagiarize. There is no turnitin.com for paintings or drawings. It is very easy for someone to purchase a painting or drawing and call it there own. The unfortunate reality of schools today is that teenage students have become very competitive and will do whatever they can to save time and get the best possible grades.

David Murphy Supermax prison

I believe that this prison is completely necessary and is very beneficial to all.  First it provides the near by town a source of income and a job supply which is very important in the economic recession that we are going through today. Second it gives the federal government a place to contain the most threatening criminals without serving the death penalty. Also since Alcatraz closed the other year it allows some of the high security criminals to be transferred to a secure prison. In regards to ethics I think there is nothing wrong with this prison, people committed unimaginable acts of terrorism against the nation and deserved to face a punishment as severe as this. Most of the time they hope for the death penalty and it can be an easy way out for them. But by placing them in this prison you are making them suffer until they die naturally. 

Alex Solomon-Supermax Prison

I believe that the existence of the prison is completely justified. If someone has committed a crime that is worthy of the living equivalent of the death penalty, they deserve to be put in a place in which they sit in a room for 23 hours of the day. It actually makes me feel more secure to know that although the United States government has only administered the death penalty once in the past 38 years, the worst criminals and terrorists are put away for a life in a place where they cannot escape or even see the sky. I do think that it is a tad ridiculous that they are in their rooms for 23 hours of the day and are in shackles for the other hour of the day. I would think that there would be a high suicide rate in the prison. Perhaps it is nearly impossible to commit suicide due to the limited resources that the inmates have. I think that the rules of the prison are a little harsh, but I do think that they are necessary in order to make the world a safer place.

Nick Berger Super Max Prison

The Super Max Prison has good intentions for severe punishment of criminals however, it may have taken everything to the extermities.  The rules set at this prison have cut off all contact that the prisoners have to the outside world or even life itself.  By not allowing a prisoner to interact or even see outside, he will learn nothing more because the ways of knowing are completely cut off.  They will never know anything by language once they enter the prison because they do not interact with other people or watch television.  They have no way of using their language to know certain events or ideas.  Perception, which is another way of knowing is also shut down because by sitting in a closed off room for 23 hours every day, the prisoner has nothing to perceive because he comes in contact with nothing else or anybody else besides the few objects that are in his cell.  I believe that this prison has gone too far in trying to punish these prisoners because it leaves them with absolutely nothing rather than the usual less than they had before.

Louis Arens-Supermax Prison

I believe that the people that are imprisoned in Supermax deserve the miserable life style that they now live.  The people that are in this prison didn't commit just any minor offense.  Instead, they most likely committed crimes that either did or could have caused the deaths of other people.  Obviously, their reasoning skills are clouded and they wouldn't benefit the outside world anyway.  The prisoners' perception of right and wrong is clearly misguided, which is very dangerous.  Terrorists and other murderers throughout the United States and other parts of the world seem to believe that killing innocent people is the right thing to do, but they really have no right to make a decision about who lives and who dies.  I also believe that putting a murderer in Supermax prison is more humane than sentencing a person to the death sentence.  The death sentence can be seen as hypocritical because ultimately the person who murdered someone else is also being killed by another person.

SUPERMAX PRISON Zachary Hecht Period 8

The Supermax prison has to be the worst place in the world. It would be creul and wrong to send any normal person there, but the people that are there more than deserve it; at least in my opinion. The decision of whether or not to send a person to the prison involves a degree of perception. It depends on if you feel the crimes justify this kind of punishment. This choice is left to jurors and their personal perception. I am curious as to how the prisoners are able to survive from day to day. You always here stories about people going insane from isolation. The emotions that these criminals must deal with from a day to day basis must be unlike anything most people have known. These prisoners have no decisions to make and they live completely structured lives. Their emotions do not get to factor into their decisions, they have been robbed of every choice.

Super Max Prison Brad Mulligan Period 8 Odd

I think that the Super Max prison is appropriate for higher level crimes, especially murders, terrorist plots, other terrible and harmful crimes, and such situations as described in the article.  As others have said in the comments while the prison may seem to violate natural rights these individuals gave up said rights when they committed their crimes.  However, one must take into account the different ways of knowing when deciding whether or not a person should be sent to this prison.  Using reason one can see that a minor criminal such as a shoplifter or the like should not be held on the same level as those who commit dangerous and harmful acts, and should therefore not even be threatened with time spent at the Super Max prison.  Although, perception is another way of knowing to look at it through, as others may find certain crimes worse due to the way they perceive them.

Scott Birke Supermax prison

This prison shuts the prisoners out from the rest of the world. By removing these men from the world they are stopping the stimulation of the mens brains. The way we as people know is by seeing doing hearing touching feeling. These men are cut off from all ways of learning by being contained into their cells. The only brain stimulation these men get is from the hour they get a day outside in a space where you cant even let your mind wonder, and when they pray. This prison not only prevents the prisoners from contact from the outside world but also prevents the prisoners from tapping into there brain power. These men after being in the prison for to long probably lose alot of their brain power and capacity to think.

Racism

Although I beleive that raising children to become racist is morally wrong, it is also wrong to tell someone how they should raise the children. As the children grow up, they will pick up similar behaviors as their parents, and will act accordingly. Because children see their parents as their heros, anything that their parents believe is right, then the children will believe the same thing growing up. I beleive that only as the children mature and learn that racism is morally wrong will they have to make the choice of whether or not what they were taught growing is right or not.

Adam Tamburello Period 8 odd

David Murphy

According to the article the kids were brought up in an environment where racist beliefs and morals were preached and valued, therefore they are not to blame for the harsh writing on their bodies or any racist remarks that they have made. They simply did not no any better because it was accepted in the household that they were growing up in. Although we try to live in a world of equality and white supremacy is a thing of the past I do not believe you can take away children from parents because of the beliefs that are taught in the house. It is the kids job to change their ethics and beliefs when they get older and mature enough to realize that what they have been taught no longer exist in today's society.

Nick Berger

The children in the article are not to blame for their knowledge and practice of racism.  Most of the knowledge a child collects in the early stages of its life is from its parents.  Children learn how to communicate, walk, etc. from their parents.  The same applies to something such as racism.  If the child grows up in a household full of racism where it seems acceptable they are only going to act similarly in the outside world.  According to language as a way of knowing the children hear what their parents say and act just like them.  Every kid when they are younger says that they want to grow up and be just like their parents.  Which means that they begin to act like them and pick up certain habits that they can only learn about by being around them for a long time.  The only way for these children to understand that racism is wrong is by them learning that it is not good and believing it.  If a child is told and now knows that racism is wrong and continues to practice it, the blame will now be on the child rather than the parents.

Scott Birke

Acorrding to the article the kids are not to blame for what they are leanring and saying. The kids which are at a young age are learning through their sense of hearing what their parents are saying and what their parents are teaching them. At a young age most of what children learn is through both what they see in the world and what they hear from their close family members. These children are being raised to believe that these racist comments they are learning are correct in society and there is nothing wrong with saying them. To them it seems right since they don't know other wise. Children are products of their enviroment.

Louis Arens

The parents in this article obviously support racism and perceive it as being correct and appropriate.  As a result, this will most likely cause their children to have similar views because the racist background of the parents affects the emotions of the children.  In this family, the children will realize that their parents are happy when they support racism, so they will be racist as well in order to please their parents.  The racist language used throughout the house that is offensive to specific groups of people will also encourage the children to racist for the rest of their lives because their environment is what will dictate their future behavior.

Alyssa Burns (not Benita)

Based on the way that the parents of the children percieve this issue, they believe that racism is correct. Perception is a way of knowing which is also derived from your experience and culture.