My Views On Solar Panels

Whenever I am asked what I feel is a genius idea or who I feel is a genius I always stop and think to myself "What is considered a genius?" I feel the majority of the kids in my generation will say that any Apple product or like Mark Zuckerburg or Steve Jobs is a genius. Although I feel they look at those products because they are so popular and that they are so widely talked about in everyday life. Now don't get me wrong all of these men are brilliant and ahead of their time but I do not feel that they are genius'. Instead I feel that they created something genius. To me: creativity is an idea or invention that helps benefit everybody. I believe a genius does not necessarily have to be a person but yet anything that is so revolutionary and useful that we all can benefit from it. In this TED presentation I am going to discuss why I feel solar panels are considered a genius idea and why they should be used more efficiently than how they already are.

Now I understand that being a pale skinned red head you would think that the Sun would be my mortal enemy. However I view the sun being an oasis of energy that we can capture and use to benefit the world. Solar panels are a renewable energy source. Since we know for a fact that the sun will come up the next day we will always have a consistent energy supply of resources. Even when it is nighttime we can gather enough energy during the day to keep us energy filled until the next day. Also the most used energy resource on earth is oil. What happens when oil is gone? What are we going to use for energy then? I feel this is the perfect time for us to use solar panels. Even now is a great time to use solar panels. We do not always have to be relying on oil now. That means less money spent on oil means making our economy stronger and more prosperous. From what I have looked up and been told, solar panels are actually a much desired and efficient way of gathering and using energy. Unfortunately much of today's society does not want to change from the social norm and only use oil and electricity as there main source of energy.

When I was younger I remember a few of my friends signed up for a car race where they had to construct a toy car that was not powered by oil. They decided to make theirs solar powered because they felt that it would be better compared to the others. Now they faced off against three other cars. One was a wound up car and the other two were powered by electricity. When it came to the time of the race the weather changed and the sun was blocked by clouds. Even though the clouds were blocking the sun and little to no sunlight was making its way through to their car, they were still able to win the race by a significant amount. This leads me to believe that solar power is in fact stronger than electricity since the sun is such a strong energy resource. With the energy of the sun always at our disposable I feel that we should take the opportunity to use it for our own benefit.

I want you all too just take a minute and think of what solar panels and solar power can offer to you. No more paying for gas, a more beautiful outdoor environment, and a much easier way of living that would cause you to be more financially stable. It can also benefit you in ways that I do not even know. All I'm saying is that we should give solar panels a chance to see what they can do to all of us. Thank you for your time.

My Idea of A Creative Genius Now

A genius idea that I find amazing is the Internet. I know it is not a physical idea that we can touch, but it is something that has changed lives in so many ways. Information is now easier for us to access and within seconds we can find out information that would require us too possibly spend hours looking in books for the answer. Though the internet would not be as significant if it wasn't for the World Wide Web or "www" for short. Now countless people are given the nomination of being considered the "creator of the internet" but we can all say that many people contributed to the creation and we thank all of you.

In my last blog post I stated that a creative genius is somebody who thinks or creates something that is ahead of their own time that benefits everyone in their era. After learning more about what a "genius" is and what you can consider is "genius" I feel that my definition is not 100% accurate. My revised definition of creative genius is: somebody or something that creates or does something that is ahead of their own time and benefits everyone in their era. Now that definition is a mouthful but I feel that accurately describes what a genius is. The internet has been such an influential idea/creation that it has everyone amazed at what it can do. Everything is done on the internet and you can find everything out on the internet. Communicating is done mainly by the internet now through multiple ways. This is why I feel that the internet is a great example of a creative genius.

Alexander Bell: Genius Example

My own idea of a creative genius is somebody who thinks or creates something that is ahead of their own time that benefits everyone in their era. Alexander Graham Bell is my idea of a genius. This man was the first to revolutionize long distant communication with others. He was credited with creating the first working telephone. I feel that he should be considered a genius because he had an idea that was ahead of his time. Without him we might now be discovering how to communicate long distance via the telephone. The telephone was the gateway to much of what we have created today. Alexander is also credited with finding techniques to help teach people who are deaf. Those techniques are still used today. Bell and some of his workers were also credited with creating the basic principle for the tape recorder, floppy disc and hard disc. I feel that he not only changed the way we communicate but also thought/created something that was ahead of his time. Not most people would have had the smarts or the ability to create something that we would still use today.

Is Education killing Creativity?

In class this week we watched a video of Ken Robinson's TED discussion on what he feels education is doing to creativity. He really goes in depth at how education today is causing kids to lose their ability to use their creative minds. After hearing his discussion, I have to agree with how he feels how kids are educated today is killing creativity.

During Mr. Robinson's lecture he talks about a young girl who was incapable of sitting still in class. When this girl was brought to the doctor to see what was wrong, he told her mother that she is a dancer. That girl was then enrolled in a dance studio and become a very successful dancer. Mr. Robinson feels that if she was acting that way today then she would have been put on medication to have her calm down. Usually her actions would be associated with ADD and most people who have that today are prescribed medication. He feels that if this girl was given medication to keep her from moving then they would not have realized that she would become a great dancer and an eventual famed choreographer.

I personally feel that education is killing creativity. Today schools always teach their students to do things the same way, what they are to be taught and how they are going to teach it. There is no change to the normal way of teaching and I feel this is what's killing creativity. Schools should teach more classes that require students to be more creative and not as much of using and remembering knowledge. If you use creativity to figure out problems and help better yourself than you are actually gaining knowledge.

Throughout my career as being a student I have had to use my creative side for multiple reasons. When it comes to doing projects and making visual presentations, I have had to be creative and figure out ways to present what my project is about. Whenever I have had to make something from scrap to visually show or represent something, I had to be creative or I would not get the inspiration to create it.

Revision At Its Finest

Revision is the single most important technique in writing in my opinion. If you are good at revising your piece of work than you can basically write a near perfect paper. That means you will not have any punctuation errors, grammar mistakes, run-on sentences and having anything that is unnecessary in your paper.You also have to have the time and patience when going through the revision process. When it comes to my writing and revision process, I need to go back and see if I have written anything that I just do not need in the paper. I also gotta read my writing out loud to myself and see if it makes sense because I tend to mix words up. Plus when I revise when I try to be creative, I sometimes will think of more to type and my paper will just get even better!!

Creative Genius: Henry Darger

          I have only one thing to say about Henry Darger: creative genius. His level of creativity was off the charts, to live the life that he did and manage to write a book over 15,000 pages long. Now I do not feel that  he was mentally ill. I feel that he just had a very different way of looking at the world and he took events that happened in real life, and changed it into a fictional story and put it into his book. He may have had aspergers though but he was obviously still well enough to live on his own. I also feel that the life he lived and how others treated him affected his writing. Early on in his life I do not feel that he was treated very well because most people thought he had something mentally wrong with him. Though later on in his life most of his neighbors treated him exceptionally well and had nothing bad to say about him. They said he always kept to himself and was always very nice and considerate to everyone.
          Though I have already mentioned this, but I feel that Henry had a very different view of the world. By different, I mean he created his own world while living in the real world. He'd use events that have actually happened and would just make an entire life story in a fictional setting out of it. He even made weather forecasting for 10 years in his fictional universe. The time and effort that he put into this is unbelievable. Years of his life spent working on this creative masterpiece. I wish that I could have just a glimpse into his mind and see what was going through Henry's head. To see how he viewed things and how he would change things into a new story, or chapter, or world. I know it may seem weird, learning about somebody who lived a very unusual life and spent his whole life writing a 15,000 page story that will go back as one of the most creative and innovative stories ever written.

Creativity: Cleese v Myself

This week in class I was asked to watch John Cleese's speech on creativity and reflect on what he felt creativity was and also give my own little input on my view of creativity. Being a rather decently length-ed video/speech (around 30 minutes), I got to listen to Cleese give his ideas on what creativity is and how someone can be creative. I will admit that I did agree with some of what Cleese said but he did not sell me on everything.

John Cleese's view of creativity, is that everyone is in their own little shell and that they have to get out and become free in order to be creative. John Cleese also said that creativity is “not a talent, it’s a way of operating” Cleese also says that “creativity is not an ability you have or don’t have. Creativity is not related to IQ.”He feels that it doesn't matter how smart you are compared to somebody else, he feels we are all equally the same when it comes to creativity and that it is solely up to us to figure out how creative we truly are. He had two examples of creativity operating like machinery: closed and open.  To Cleese, creativity is not accessible in the closed mode. Closed mode is used when people are at work and when creativity is not needed. His view of open is when people are creative and having an “open” mode to what he/she is thinking about. Mr. Cleese also told us 5 conditions that will more likely get us into the open mode. Space, time, time, confidence and humor are Mr. Cleese’s 5 conditions for getting us into the open mode. He feels that if you are thinking of a creative idea then you need to use these 5 conditions to assure that you have a well thought of idea.

I will admit, I agree when Cleese says that creativity is like operating a machine, but I do not agree with him when he says that creativity is "not a talent." Even though I feel it is a way of operating, I do feel that it is a talent in some way. Some people may just be more creative than others and this is because they may have a more vivid imagination. The more vivid your imagination is, the more creative you will be, and I feel that Mr. Cleese fails to realize this. Mr. Cleese's 5 conditions of creativity actually made a lot of sense to me and I felt that was actually rather clever of him. Each "condition" that he talks about is something that I have found myself to use when I try and think of something creative. The time it takes to think of something creative is very time consuming, and we then take even more time to think if our idea makes sense and if we even feel if it is good enough or not. My biggest complaint with Mr. Cleese's speech is that creativity is not a talent which I feel is incorrect. Throughout time people have been known to be more creative than others and have thought of things that not many others would have had the thought of.

Well that concludes this weeks blog for First Year Seminar. I hope you all got a little input on my view of creativity a little more and what I felt about Mr. Cleese's view of creativity. I would love to hear about how you feel about my blog and how you feel about Mr. Cleese's views.