Discussion on Borcasly/White Articles
Reading the article “Straight talk about high fructose corn syrup what it is and what it ain’t” by John S. White was more convinced than Bocarsly. White talked about an experiment that shows HFCS has a link for the cause of obesity. Throughout the article, he focused on more on the social and cultural effects of HFCS and obesity. Studies showed that HFCS is a “unique case” because it has the same sugar composition as other fructose glucose sweeteners. As for obesity, there was an increase since 1970 for the consumption of caloric nutrients. Personally, I found White’s more convincing because he uses a lot more data compared to Borcarsly, he has more experience in understanding the food industry, and it was more informative. To add on, Borcasly didn’t really reflect on human behavior nor did he mention certain things, such as explaining charts that show HFCS and obesity across the world. Overall, White had a lot more experience with understanding the food industry and his article was more effective.
Discussion on Gay Genes Articles:
The first article “No ‘gay gene’” was a massive study home done by Jonathan Lambert where he talks about a recent study done on the genetic basis of human sexuality and stating that there’s a genetic factor that’s involved when it comes to one’s sexual orientation. This research was conducted by Ganna and it wasn’t very ground-breaking. Data shows that only 25 percent of sexual behavior is explained by genetics while the rest is based on one’s cultural and environmental background. In my opinion, this study is not valid because the sample is only focused on the male population and its ages from 40-70 years. As an alternative, we shouldn’t worry about the age range because at any age, one’s experiences with sexual orientation can change. Furthermore, there seems to be a lack of representation for minorities especially those who identify as transgender or intersex.
As for the second article, this was a study where Steven Riley is trying to state that scientists have a social duty and not study things that may result in having a social fallout. In my opinion, I don’t think scientists should base their research on what the public thinks. As a scientist, you research material that needs more clarification or needs an answer. Researching the public is not beneficial if there aren’t any facts or answers. To add on, having answers and data can be a lot easier for people to understand and it won’t leave people making speculations. Overall, I believe the purpose of this article was to inform and talk about limiting parts of studies that do not represent many people and groups.
Discussion of Lien and Vander Heiden’s A framework for examining how diet impacts tumor metabolism:
Lian and Heiden’s were trying to figure out how diets can affect cancer and whether or not it can either stop or slow down the spread of cancer cells inside a tumor. Their framework proposed four ideas on how diets would inhibit tumor metabolisms. They talk about how changes in dietary composition may affect one’s growth and lead to tumors, concentrations of metabolites can be changed by changing up components within the diet, diet-induced can affect how cancer cells utilize nutrients that help with growth and survival, and lastly, diet-induced changes create potential synergies and antagonism. In my opinion, this article is convincing and it provides information with supporting evidence as well. For instance, there are examples of ketogenic diet which can prevent brain cancer, shows many diagrams that contain different types of diets with the number of carbohydrates, fat, and protein, and showing diagrams that explain other experiments and results. In addition, both Lian and Heiden were very clear on what they wanted to state and prove diet can affect the availability of nutrients and metabolism of cells within the tumor (which they did). Although they go in-depth with their information provide evidence, and more, the article had its flaws. I did not like the fact it would repeat certain things and some parts were hard to understand with certain terms because I was unfamiliar with some of them which kind of threw me off guard. However, besides these flaws, this article convinced me and very informative.
Discussion of Continuous Traumatic Situations in the Face of Ongoing Political Violence: The Relationship Between CTS and PTSD:
This article goal is comparing and finding differences between CTS and PTSD. It starts off by talking about the profound psychological impacts on the human population. CTS is usually associated with political violence and social conflict. As for PTSD, it tends to be associated with emotional distress that can be caused due to war and terrorist attacks. In addition, the articles are trying to make a claim that CTS is much more traumatic than a one-time occurrence. In my opinion, I believe for one to live in fear constantly it can cause many psychological problems. However, that does not mean PTSD is any less of a trauma. As for the use of the words “trauma” and “violence,” many use these words to explain physical experiences and how it’s affecting their life. After reading this article, I learned a lot about CTS and understand there’s a difference between a person who has gone through trauma and how one reacts after being exposed to it.
Discussion of Young, Talented, and Fed Up:
After reading the article by Tingley, Lopez-Honorato, and Hermans, it talked about the issues of young scientist after post-doctorate years. It showed how many have struggled to not only find support but also funding for future researchers and studies. There were two concerns they were having problems with. One was time was being wasted on finding funds which resulted in not having enough time to conduct the research while the other was having a competition with the new scientist who had more experiences. To add on, Herman talks about being a woman and talks about how overwhelming it can be to work in a male-dominated field and how she deals with sexism and more. Overall, we can see how being in the science isn’t as simple as it sounds and it can be very difficult.
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