Butterfly Lessons

"as the climate of the continent had changed, life had rearranged itself." -Elizabeth Kolber

Our earth has been through many different climate changes since the dinosaur age came to an end; each one seems to affect the animals and plants in the same way each time. As observed in the article "Butterfly Lessons", insect's patterns in particular are the easiest to either trace the flight patterns or in a mosquito's case when it goes dormant for the winter.

She also presents the idea that we live in a very different world than we did 20,000 years ago and now things like non-native species being introduced is very common and hazardous to the ecosystems around us.

Learning from animals

Our problems with predicting natural disasters and climate change could all be solved if we just paid more attention to the animals.

A bold statement but one that has been observed true multiple times.
Elephants started charging inland before the 2004 tsunami in southeast Asia; birds go quite before an earthquake happens in San Francisco; butterflies migrate patterns change as the planet warms and cools.
Every time something happens like this however, humans decided they need better technology to predict things like this, when really all they would have to do is pay attention. People who are lazy need technology. People who are wise listen to the world around them. If plants and animals are so inferior to the human race as many say, how can they have knowledge of these disasters before even our best technology?

Why not spend more effort looking and learning from the environment than destroying it in our attempt to recreate it?

Thinking Differently

In the field of Biomimicry, people are creating new innovative technologies by taking inspiration from the natural world. But by doing this, scientists have become even more touchy on the theories of where it came from. Intelligent Design is the theory that the earth and surrounding universe were created by a superior intelligent being. However, scientists will not recognize this theory as a true scientific theory even though there is evidence and as much scientific inquiry to back it up. Many claim that is too specific to one religion, however, many religions believe that the earth was created by their deity. Creationists are to blame for this controversy because without their extremist views that deny many scientific claims Intelligent Design would have been backed up in the Supreme Court trial by many other notable scientists.

Denial of Opression

These past few weeks on the news it has been Occupy Wall Street this and Occupy Wall Street that but depending on your few it is either wall street is an issue or it isn't. Now to be fair there are a few CEOs of billion dollar companies that reap ridiculous benefits and got their out of their own hard work and dedication. HOWEVER! Many CEOs have done NO work for their companies own a ridiculous amount of stuff and don't think twice about what they have that other people don't.

Those who believe that all CEOs have worked hard in their lives to get there are in denial. Denial about rich people's workmanship, Denial about their own mediocrity, Denial about what they can achieve in this day and age.

People who say that Wall Street isn't an issue are either working for wall Street or they are in denial. No one wants to say that our government is corrupt (and it has been since the end of Nixon's Presidency),  that politicians and big business owners care only about themselves, their money, and their campaign for reelection.


We are all in denial. We all try to rearrange our thoughts so that we don't have to worry about the nation, the environment, the world,we just have to worry about our facebook posts and what we are going to eat at dinner.

So it is no wonder that half of the country still doesn't know or care about what Occupy Wall Street means or what they are standing for. Life in America has become a life of denial and that is why we have fallen behind the rest of the world and why we are never happy.

And on that note, I am going to go outside, enjoy the trees and life around me, and soak up every minute of happiness for myself so that I don't become another mindless drone of consumerism.

Graded In Class Assignment

Themes of Luther Standing Bear statement:
- Native Americans did not see the land as something to be conquered but yet a "parent" who one could give and take necessary items for life.
- Animals and plants has just the same amount of right to grow and thrive as man does
- The Native American culture only dies when the ideas and traditions have died within the community


Chief Seattle Speech:
- The only way for their traditions to survive was to accept the protection and restrictions that the Governor was proposing.
- The red man's god and the white man's god can not be one in the same because God was not fighting for the rights of the red man.
- The Native Americans could not fight the fact that their numbers were dwindling and so they had to accept their fate.

Because the Chief Seattle Speech was not recorded and published the same year it was spoken, many translations or versions have been produced. The authentic version was lost to the winds of time as the words left Chief Seattle's mouth, however many have tried to copy and reinvent this speech even it means completely contradicting the true meaning. The American Indian Quarterly Journal wrote about this authenticity issue in an article called "Contemporary Reinvention of Chief Seattle: Variant Texts of Chief Seattle's 1854 Speech. It explains that even as recently as 1992 writers have tried to republish this speech in many different ways. The first published version however was in 1887 almost 30 years afterwards by Dr. Smith, a man who did not even speak the same language as Seattle.

To read more from this article: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1185598?seq=1

Seattle 1854

"I will not dwell on, nor mourn over, our untimely decay, nor reproach my paleface brothers with hastening it, as we too may have been somewhat to blame." -Chief Seattle 1854

In the pre-wartime America, the Native American populations were almost extinct except for the last few tribes on the western coast. During this year the governor of Washington state brought a treaty that was to be given to one of these tribes. When Chief Seattle was greeted by the governor he gave a very eloquent speech to his people about his thoughts on the treaty and the fate of his people.  This speech was one of the last from the great chiefs of the the Northwest Coast Indians although its authenticity is a very questionable. It was written down by a man who did not speak the language and was published 33 years after the actual speech was given.  Since then many publications of the variations of this speech have emerged, even with some of them completely contradicting themselves. 

But who is to say what the original truly sounded like? I think it is a matter for each person to decide for themselves. 

http://www.chiefseattle.com/history/chiefseattle/speech/speech.htm <-- the "original" speech

http://www.jstor.org/stable/1185598?seq=1 <--- a book describing the controversy of authenticy.

Exploring the natural world and what it has to offer technology

a flower that inspired a new drill and the way a shark moves which inspired different research methods

Shark skin actually inspired a new line of swimming equipment that reduces friction in the water.

This building in Zimbabwe actually mimics the ventialation system of a termite mound.