Friday, March 26, 2010

Reading

yay powers back on.. so i haven't read any books in a while. i wish i had the time and the attention span to read like i used to. the last book i really read for enjoyment was "the lost symbol" by dan brown. he is one of my favorite authors and was the once who wrote "the Da Vinci code". "da Vinci code" and "the lost symbol" were okay but i liked the book that preceded the two. My all time favorite book is "angels and demons" by the same author. i read it before the tom hanks movie came out and i believe it to be much much better than the film. the film wasn't bad for people who really aren't into reading but it killed it from my point of view. idk the film kinda ruins the whole imagination part of reading for me.
Basically its about this symbologist who gets entangled with a war between the Vatican aka the Catholic Church and a secret anti-Christ cult called the illuminati. The Illuminati are perceived as terrorists in this book and are trying to blow up Vatican city with some sort of futuristic superbomb. Its pretty much a scavenger hunt around Rome trying to locate the bomb and find the secret headquarters of the illuminati.
i liked this book because it tied religion and science well. I just found this book in my brother's house when i was a freshman in high school and got really into it. its more of a mystery thriller type novel. there's a lot of codes and cool ambigrams in this book too.
the chapters in this book are really short too so it goes by pretty fast. it makes it feel like you accomplish more when you're reading it haha. but in all seriousness if you want to read an interesting book that will make you feel smart once you get done with it. i recommend "angels and demons".

Thursday, March 4, 2010

wikipedia

I think wikipedia is a great source of information and has become one of the most used websites on the internet. For my stance, I wouldn't really know where to side with. I use it frequently for school and know why many other students would also use it. Like if a person were to google a subject, the first link would most likely go to a wikipedia article. So its very understandable that most students would use it.
As for universities trying to limit students from using it, I believe it to be a necessary action to prevent student laziness and temptation to plagiarize. Considering how many ignorant people can just alter someone else's work into something fictional makes wikipedia a very unreliable source at times. It is much simpler to just look at the references and see legitimate sources. There is no guarantee that the information is correct on the articles unless you crosscheck with other places.
I consider wikipedia a great starting point to find better analyzed information on a particular subject in its references. I think making wikipedia a source is a dumb idea to begin with. The information could change the next day. Students will always use wikipedia because of its simplicity and authenticity of the articles. Maybe professors should teach students how to use to better.