Cradle to Cradle relates to my project...

After I've finished reading "Cradle to Cradle", I saw that many informations in this book related to different aspects of my project. For example, in Cradle to Cradle, the authors mentioned the cherry tree design and how everthing the cherry tree produced are capable of re-entering the ecosystem without any damage being done. Our food should also follow the cherry tree design. Without the additives, our food would be able to leave our bodies and still be able to benefit the environment as biological nutrients, not waste.
Also, in the last chapter, the authors talked about the X/Gray/P list. Well, our group recently found a list of additives that are categorized exactly like that, based on their toxicity level.
Another big concept that was included in the book was the question of design. The authors talked about how monoculture and our actions like building malls and concrete buildings that are not compatible with the environment, might improve economy but will cause every other aspects to decline. Same concept is used with food. Adding additives in our food might cheapen the manufacture costs and expand the selling period but it will harm the consumers' health along with the environment (i.e: waste from producing process food)
That's all we can think of for now when it comes to the relationship between Cradle to Cradle and our project...To be continued...

My group's research focuses on food additives and the harmful effects that the chemicals have on our health. Many reliable articles and published books supported the fact that food additives are bad for our health.However, while doing my research, I found an article from US Food and Drug Administration. They claimed that all the food additives existed in processed food in America are regulated by federal authorities to make sure that the food are safe to eat. Yet, certain chemicals in food additives are banned in many countries in Europe and even Canada. Many others have been proven by scientists and chemists to have the carcinogenic potential. Huhhh...Interesting. There is no argument that further research is needed but I still think that the FDA is somewhat bias. It is after all a governmental website controlled by the government. By now, I figured out that there are lots of things the government doesn't want its people to know. Would I still you the site as one of my sources? May be... It does offer some helpful information but I wouldn't use it as one of my backbone sources to back up my argument or refering back to it frequently.

My thoughts on Source Analysis...



This week, we are working on source analysis. Doing a source analysis allows me to test the liability of the source that I'm using for my research. After all, not all sources are created equal! I found the process to be a lot more complicated than I've expected since most of the sources I've found are either too general for my research question or too bias to be reliable. The five sources I've found were from Proquest, Google database, newspaper, and a published book. My favorite place to find articles on food additives is Proquest. They provide a wide range of articles written by different professions, from medical perspective to bussiness to just pure journalism. They also have information needed for a source analysis like the author, the date it was written, and the publisher. The body part of my source analysis was mainly based on different aspects of the source analysis worksheet such as who, when, where and etc...

On Friday, I found an article about a specific food additive that is used in butter flavoring. This chemical is reported to cause serious respiratory issue to the workers. If reliable, this article can be a strong evidence to back up my hypothesis to how dangerous food additives can be. That's why I decided to do a source evaluation based on the information we've learn in class.
First of all, I checked the authorship. I didn't recognize the author's name but since the article was found on Proquest, I think that can mean this article is somewhat reliable. Next is the publishing body. This article was from New York Times and their purpose is mainly to bring information to the public so I don't think they are set to be bias. The author also talked about the previous reports from California health officials about workers in flavoring factories and their health conditions, demonstrating his knowledge of what have already been discussed about this topic. In addition, Proquest is a well-design site and it has all the information needed for readers like me to verify anything that I wanted to. This article was written in May 6 of 2007, fairly recent and updated.
Overall, I think this article is quiet reliable and I will probably use it as a resource in my research process.

Q: How does your research question address Cradle to Cradle new design assignment ???

A: Our research question is: "How common food additives affect our health?"
Cradle to Cradle new design focuses on how things should be made to be biological nutrient. Therefore, I feel that my research question does address the new design assignment from Cradle to Cradle since food additives affect human excretion. Those chemicals in the additives go into our waste, which in turn go into the sewage system. In our effort to reduce waste, some of the sewage will turn into fertilizer. Now, when those fertilizers are contaminated with chemicals from the food additives, they can not be biological nutrients. Thus, food additives should be illiminated from the new design and be replaced with alternatives that will allow our waste to be biological nutrients.

Eco-effectiveness is the name of the game...

Eco-efficiency is the wrong solution to our environmental issues. Now, it is all about eco-effectiveness and how this design will actually bring a difference, a change to our everyday lives. I love the language of this chapter as the author used the compare and contrast technique to point out the difference between being efficient and being effective. It is gray, fluorescent-lit cubicle versus a sunlit area with natural views and fresh air. In addition, the author mentioned the concept of working on the right things instead of trying to be "less bad" while still doing the wrong thing. I feel this is focusing on seeing the big picture, instead of just looking at one spot. We are trying to solve the problem to the next level instead of just trying to cleane up the trail of damage that we left behind.
The argument of this chapter was strong as the authors tried to back up their idea of being eco-effectiveness and how much better it is compared to being efficient. Their description of a conventional manufacturing operation was a good example to really push readers to the effectiveness road. It sure made me want to stop being efficient and start being effective. They also offered examples of actions that have been taking in the name of eco-effectiveness such as the roofing design (pg83). They are not just scaring us into being effective. They are offering solutions and alternative routes to being so as well.
I found the structure of this chapter a bit confusing. The authors were kind of jumping around a little bit with the organization of different topic. For example, they went from the different kinds of book to cherry tree to being a native to the roofing example to growth and back to the cherry tree. I think the chapter could be more organized as they put the topics together more "effectively".
I liked this chapter because it offered hope for a better design. Eco-effectiveness will actually lead us on to the road of cradle to cradle, instead of cradle to grave like eco-efficiency. I love the example of the cherry tree and it made me feel better about myself since we have a cherry tree in our backyard. We are helping the world!!!

Summary vs. Paraphrasing

We did an assignment earlier this week to work on the summary and paraphrasing methods. It was interesting to learn the actual way to summerize instead of just trying to shorten and cutting information down to the shortest length possible. Now, my summary will actually include main points of the reading and impotant informations instead of just random sentences that were jumping out at me while I read. It also made me feel more confident while summarizing since I don't have to worry that I might be missing something as much.

I have a bit of a trouble with the paraphrasing techniques. Most of the phrases I picked during the assignment didn't get me to be as close to the actual text as I would like. However, I think since I've never really paraphrase before, it will take lots of practice to be somewhat good at it. I'm working on my paraphrasing techniques and hopefully, I'll be good at it by the end of this quarter.

Principle #2 best relates to our project question and reading. Design safer chemicals and products: Design chemical products to be fully effective, yet have little or no toxicity. (ww.epa.gov/greenchemistry)

This relates to our research question because we are trying to find safer alternatives to the toxic food additives in our everyday products.

This relates to the reading in Cradle to Cradle because it talks about producing materials that can be reused without creating byproducts that may be harmful to our environment.

I like the book "Cradle to Cradle" more and more as we read it. My favorite chapter so far is "Why being less bad is no good". I found this chapter to be not just eye-opening but also, effective, especially when it comes to giving us a sense of what is going wrong. The language was influential and convincing. "In a world where designs are unintelligent and destructive, regulations can reduce immediate deleterious effects. But ultimately a regulation is a signal of design failure. In fact, it is what we call a license to harm..." I felt a chill reading this... Powerful is definitely one of the words I would use to describe this section.
The main argument of this chapter was that being efficient is destructive. This claim was well supported by many examples such as efficient agriculture destroyed environmental health and variety of species. Efficient buildings can't stand natural disaster, creating more waste than non-efficient buildings, as they collapsed. It was very well organized in my opinion. The chapter moved from introducing efficiency, its characteristics and usages, to its flaws and downsides to the question of creating new model that is more effective rather than efficient.
I enjoyed reading this chapter very much. There was a lot of interesting information as well as logic that is quiet amusing. I love when the author talked about how boring and narrow can an efficient world be. That argument sure got me thinking...

My topic for the project ... FOOD ADDITIVES !!!

Food additives was my number one choice for this quarter's project. The reason was because during class, so many new informations came up during the dicussion. I didn't know the cheese that I've been eating for all these years can be considered to be "plastic"...WTH??? I rarely becomes excited over research paper but this time, I actually want to find more information on this. I also wanted to know how food additives contribute to the destruction of our environment, like during the process of making the cheese for example. I also would like to find out more about the alternatives to food preservatives/additives that can be healthy and good for our health and may be, keep our food fresh at the same time. I want to make some comparisions to foods with additives and foods without them, and see the effect on the product. Also, I'm very curious about how food additives might relate to the development of cancer. It might be a bit off topic since we are mainly focusing on environmental sustainability but I thought it wouldn't hurt anyone to just throw the idea out there.

Cradle 2 Cradle _ The Introduction...

This book is not a tree... Is there a better way to start a book about protecting the environment than the way Cradle to Cradle started? Personally, I have not seen it yet. I love the idea. Most of the books I've read about being environmentally friendly or how big companies' action is destroying nature are hypocrites. They blamed lumber industry for killing the trees and yet, the papers that made up their books are not recyclable. That's why I was so impress to realize that no harm was done to trees during the process of making Cradle to Cradle.

There was lots of chemicals and chemical compounds being mentioned during the first sixteen pages of C2C. Most of them were mentioned to highline the hazard chemicals can do to human health. The big concepts I found from this sections were how we can work to eliminate the concept of waste as well as doing things with "positive intention" instead of being "less bad". The distinction between recycle and downcycle was also talked about.

The main argument I found from this section was mainly around reinventing our view on economy and environment. Those two can be compatible, the authors claimed. They used their background, personal experiences as well as their knowledge about the subject to support their argument. The section about the authors' background and past achievements/ experiences is such an effective way to back up their argument because it showed that the authors know what they are talking about.

I love how they written the first chapter the way it was written. I feel like I'm going through a little re-examination of everyday things in my life, allowing me opportunities to take a closer look at certain objects like sofa and computer, which can be full with chemicals. However, the authors' background was a bit distracted from the first part of the introduction. If they had put the author's background section into a separate chapter, the structure of this section would be perfect.

I felt validated after reading the introduction because I know most of the information from the first part of the section since I've read "Stuff". However, the authors' background was interesting and I love how they only not pointing out what is wrong with the world but also, offering hope in how we can start doing better, like doing things with good intentions instead of being less bad.

In class Writing...

The class discussions suggested a few specific research focus for me. One of my research focus would be around how human activities can help reduce the waste that we are producing daily. I can use the book "Cradle to Crade" as my sources since the author was talking about doing things with good intentions from the start instead of trying to be "less bad" and limiting my choices when it comes to consuming. The way I would present my ideas would be through personal committment of certain activities that help reduced waste like recyling my plastic grocery bags or eating for vegetables and fruits from local farmers instead of McDonald's.

Another idea I have was to focus on how the wastes we produced affect our health or the future of it in a negative way. I can use what I've learn from Chemistry class as my supporting evidence. I want to check and make sure I have the correct type of evidence that can help me back up my argument effectively.

I don't have a great knowledge about these topics so I don't have anyone's ideas or opinions that I might want to verify or counter. However, as I do more research on the topics, I think there will be opinions that I would like to support or oppose.


Topic for group project:
Living better through Better Chemistry
Topic to consider researching:
Waste effect on health