Final Blog Posting.

I have written many research papers here at Laguardia Community College. However I was not ever taught how to write one. Most of the classes that I have taken here required a research paper and quickly went over the rules and regulations pertaining to writing a research paper. I am the type of person that if I want to learn something I have to fully engage in that topic. English 102 allowed me to fully engage in the art of writing a research paper. For example I wrote a ten-page research paper in my Urban Sociology class but I learned urban sociology, not how to write a research paper. In other words, in this class I have learned how to write a college level research paper and I will use this skill for the rest of my academic career.

The advice I have for someone who wants to write a successful research paper in English 103 is the following. Always save your research sources. When I first started writing research papers I would have the bad habit of not saving potential sources and leaving it for “next time” to look for them again. True is, good sources are not easy to find. It is time consuming finding good sources for your paper. Regardless if you will use it or not, if you think there is a slight chance that you will use this source save it as a PDF or print it out. This will save you a lot of time and trouble. In addition to saving sources, I would say take your time with the milestones. Do not rush into them or try to breeze through them. The milestones are what will help shape your paper in the long run. The milestones made it possible for me to successfully complete a research paper for English 103.

My final research paper game plan.

During the next two weeks, I need to work on writing at least a few more pages for my final draft. I
currently have about 4 pages. I plan on adding these two pages after I find a few more sources. I also need to work on some structural and grammatical issues. My transitions are not up to par and could use some work. The feedback from Professor Dragen will help me in rectifying this problem. This is what I will do for the next few weeks in order to receive an A for my paper.

Close Reading of Film Stills in I, Robot.

I am analyzing the two film stills taken from I, Robot that were posted on the course website. The first photo I will analyze is the interrogation scene between Detective Spooner and Sonny. Detective Spooner who is played by Will Smith is interrogating Sonny who is suspected of committing murder. Will Smith looks very aggressive and is creating some sort of barrier between him and the robot by folding his hands in front of him (as one of the classmates stated in class). This was not noticed when watching the film. I also noticed that when Sonny replies to detective Spooner when asked the question if robots can write symphonies. The Robot reverses the question on him. The camera changes the angle after this question as to give the appearance of the robot giving the interrogation. Very clever work..

The second film still I will analyze is the huge interrogation scene. Detective Spooner and Dr Calvin have been on a chase looking for Sonny. He has found refuge within an assembly line of robots of his kind. The film still seems every emotionless. Detective Spooner and Dr Calvin are out numbered and are at the same time in total control. The robots have no emotional expression and all speak at the same time. As highlighted in the film, there is also a weird contrast between the lawlessness of Sonny and the obedience of the rest of the robots.

Mile Stone #3 Research Game Plan.

My research game plan for Milestone #3 is to look for 3 more sources. (i already have 3). My goal is look for as many sources as possible. The sources that are needed to complete the entire paper are 1 book source, 1 scholarly and 2 encyclopedia entry. I know that research can take a long time so I'm going to give myself a head start. Professor Dragan informed me in class that one of my journalistic sources is not credible enough, i was not aware of this information due to the newspaper being from England. (i don't know much about international newspapers). In the future i will make sure not to do this again.

Sharing my topic and describing two research sources.

The research topic I have chosen is "Portraying Robots in film". In this paper i will review and analyze the film I, Robot. The focus of this paper is to emphasize the idea of Robots and artificial intelligence carrying out tasks for humans and possible doing an even better job at these tasks. Thus creating a society that is completely dependent on artificial intelligence as portray in most Hollywood movies like I, Robot. Most people believe that world is far from a full on robot revolution this reality may be closer than we think. There are many scholarly and non-scholarly articles that support this idea. In this blog post I will present two articles that support this idea. 

I found my first article on the online subscription data case "Lexis Nexis". The article I will preset is "Artificial intelligence could kill us because we're stupid, not because its evil says experts" by Andrew Griffin. This newspaper article emphasis that we do not hold the intelligence capacity to create intelligence forms of "life". Human emotion is a very specific trait that is unique to us. Although the robots of the future will not be able to comprehend emotion. There intellectual capacity will be far greater then ours. Thus teaching us the way of life. Benjamin H Bratton states "The real philosophical lessons of A.I. will have less to do with humans teaching machines how to think than with machines teaching humans a fuller and truer range of what thinking can be (and for that matter, what being human can be)." (p.1).

Another article that I will use in my research paper an article I found on the data base Academic search complete. "Machines without principals: liability rules and artificial intelligence" by David C. Vladeck. In this article Vladeck introduces the idea of morals and principals when it comes to robots. He also relates many of tis findings to films. Vladeck states "But the law is not necessarily equipped to address the legal issues that will start to arise when the inevitable occurs and these machines cause injury, but when there is no “principal” directing the actions of the machine. (p. 150). I look forward to using these articles for my research paper.

Blog post.

Hello class!

My name is Michael Rivas; I am a 23 year old student here at Laguardia Community College. I was a biology major for a while but as of a few weeks ago I changed my major to Liberal Arts: Social Science and Humanities. One of my goals in life is to help people and with a degree in social science I hope to fulfill this goal.

Some more things about me, I currently live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn with my parents and sister. My parents are from Nicaragua but I had the privilege of being born here. They came here after the 2^nd civil war broke out in the 80’s and the rest is history. So back to me, I work for a recording studio design and installation firm based out of the Flat Iron district in Manhattan. I love my job but it is not consistent enough. I work like every other week. A long with school and work, I love martial arts. I am a 3 time international gold medalist in the discipline of Brazilian jiu-jitsu. I owe my life to Brazilian jiu-jitsu without it I would not be the man I am today. I hope you enjoyed my post and know a little more about me. I will see you all in class!

Best,

Michael Rivas

Welcome

Hello!

Welcome to my blog! My name is Michael Rivas! I hope you guys enjoy all of my posts!

Best,
Michael Rivas