Lots has changed since the last post, this book progresses very quickly. Logan meets over 10 new characters in under 50 pages. The character that sticks is Jess, Jess is the sister of the runner Logan killed in the beginning of the book. They’re suddenly in the whole adventure together, whether Jess is up for it or not. Logan has also gotten trapped and captured throughout all of the world, being in the snow and ice of the north to the mountains in Mexico.
This whole book reminds me of the Bladerunner 2049 movie. This whole dystopian world that’s sad and has different combinations of worlds and terrains throughout the story. Then there’s the way they explain the technology of the time. They have hologram advertisements, high tech biometrics, and then a outcast agent with a futuristic gun. A regular citizen in our book progresses in life very quickly because of their age limit of 21. You’re not allowed to keep your own child just to help this process of them growing up. In the book they also turn into thrill seekers in the latter years of their life just because they know what’s to come at 21 years old. But compared to a normal citizen now, they really aren’t that different in Logan’s Run the progression of life is much faster. Instead of being wild and crazy in your 20’s and 30’s it’s your teens and even younger. I will comment on Sofia and Mercedes blogs
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So far we have a new and quite different earth. The world is at what's called critical mass so the solution is to have people willingly killed off at age 21. All your life there’s a crystal in your hand and every 7 years you have a color assigned with the situations you were in then. Once you’re 21 the crystal starts blinking red and black, then you have to go get finished off by what they think is the creator of the whole world. The book follows Logan, a DS officer. DS officers track down people trying to escape on their 21st birthdays, these people are called runners. DS officers are generally just our modern police officers when they’re not chasing criminals. Yes I have, so far the world reminds me of the Blade Runner world, with all of the high tech buildings and scanners they use. But the whole overpopulation aspect is completely new. The only real similarity is that the book takes place on earth, but it’s in the year 2116. I will comment on Sofia and Mercedes blogs New York Times
April 5th, 2018 “Virgin Galactic Conducts 1st Powered Flight of New Spaceship” By The Associated Press Link to article: https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2018/04/05/us/ap-us-virgin-galactic.html This article is about one of the new commercial space companies, but this one is under the Virgin name. The company is Virgin Galactic, they are a company who has now re-entered the scene after a fatal incident in 2014. The company aims to have tourist flights go into the low reaches of space. This once again is an exciting time for space travel, but for the public this time. The dream that anyone can see the stars up close is slowly becoming more and more of a reality. It seems that all of these dreams are being made real, not by the government but by the million and billionaires of our world. The goal of Virgin Galactic is different than most, they aim to continue suborbital flights and have multiple planes running at a time. A suborbital flight is when the aircraft flies from the ground, to just into space, and comes back while not going one full orbit of the earth. These planes would all be able to fly and be reused for multiple flights, this will bring down the cost immensely. The rocket has been adapted over the years to be much safer, and have a larger rate of success. The rocket was launched from New Mexico, this is where they plan to have a sort of airport in the future. This is a fairly recent event happening about a week ago. The rocket is technically two aircraft, the WhiteKnightTwo and the SpaceShipTwo. WhiteKnightTwo is a custom-built, four-engine, dual-fuselage jet aircraft, designed to carry SpaceShipTwo up to an altitude of ~50,000 feet. SpaceShipTwo is a reusable, winged spacecraft designed to carry eight people (including two pilots) into space safely and with high frequency. The rocket launches and carries it’s payload at supersonic speeds (Mach 1.87 or 1434 mph) it achieves the speeds in it’s 30 second burn. The whole company was halted in 2014 when a launch went south and the co pilot released the rocket too early, ending in the rocket tumbling and eventually exploding. I’m personally extremely excited because this goal is much more quickly achievable, rather than SpaceX’s multiplanet idea. Although SpaceX is making very quick progress at getting a flight to a pedestrian around the moon, this would cost tens of millions of dollars while Virgin’s flight would be only in the hundreds of thousands initially. I’m also really glad that they started again on this goal of having these planes constantly flying, it would’ve been very disheartening if they stopped completely. I will comment on Elena and Nia's blogs. Andrew Dafnis
3/5/18 Period 3 The New York Times Feb. 6, 2018 “Falcon Heavy, in a Roar of Thunder, Carries SpaceX’s Ambition Into Orbit” Kenneth Chang Link to article: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/06/science/falcon-heavy-spacex-launch.html The article is about Elon Musk and his space exploration company SpaceX. The launch that this article was about is the Falcon Heavy rocket, capable of launching over 150,000 pounds of payload into low earth orbit. This was the test flight for this complex rocket, and was not expected to do all that well. The initial announcement of the Falcon Heavy back in 2011 urged excitement in a new “Space Race” But this time with private companies and government run companies. At the time the Falcon 9 rocket that they were using had limited capabilities and had a low carry weight for the payload. Since then the rocket has been improved upon and has solved some of the problems the Falcon Heavy was going to solve. That doesn’t mean the Falcon Heavy is useless by any means, the launch early this February proved successful when it carried it’s payload of one Tesla Roadster into space and eventually orbit around the sun and mars. The next plans are to launch two passengers in Falcon Heavy around the moon and back. This has been delayed and SpaceX has said they’re putting more of their effort into the B.F.R.. This rocket would replace both the current vehicles, and is planned to be for interplanetary use. The payload of this rocket would be more than double any of the single rockes currently on the market. This is going to be SpaceX’s focus for the next decade or so, it is planned to be ready during the mid to late 2020’s. The Falcon Heavy launched off of the same launch pad in Cape Canaveral Florida as the Saturn V Rocket, the Saturn V was used throughout the 70s and was the rocket that brought us to the moon. The Falcon Heavy test flight happened on February 5th 2018, it was SpaceX’s first launch of the year. SpaceX’s belief is that we should be a multi planet-species. This idea has sparked the building of their rockets, and overall quickness of the situation. SpaceX is special now because of this new “Space Race” more private companies are getting involved, like Amazon’s owner and new owner of Blue Origin, another private rocket company. Space doesn’t only launch rockets for their amusement, they’re now launching payloads for government organizations, like Nasa. Just last month, Boeing needed to launch top secret satellites into earth’s orbit and used the falcon 9 rocket to get them there. I’m personally really excited because space travel hasn’t advanced in decades, it gets me evidently more excited because their all private companies who have very little restrictions. Government companies get stopped and stalled a lot of the time, but with a billion entrepreneurs backing these countries not much can stop them. The speed at which they are advancing is the best part to me, and we’re able to see this progression because of ways to watch launches, i.e. live streams. You must include the link to your current event. If you do not have the article you will only receive half credit. I will comment on Nia and Chloe's blog posts. Once again lots have happened since the last post, Ender was moved into a new planet that took three months to get to. This is where he is going to command school, while here he is in his room when a mysterious older man is sitting on his floor. This man he finds out is who won the first invasion and is the only reason humans still exist, his name is Mazer Rackham. He is going to become Ender’s teacher until he is ready, he gives Ender his old squad again with the best of the best. They hold their daily practices and battles, and Ender during this whole time follows every order Mazer tells him, when he says eat he eats. Ender gets worried about his health when he can’t sleep and is constantly worrying if he’s good enough or not. Then one day Mazer says this is his final test and battle. If he wins he’ll had made it farther than any student before, if he fails it’s all over. The final battle is at the same simulator he has been using, but now all of his superiors are there watching. Ender finally wins the battle after taking the largest risk he has taken yet, but he did it and all of his superiors are screaming with excitement. Mazer now tells him none of this was simulation and that all of this was real, he was really controlling the ship and he did it, he killed all of the buggers. Ender is a hero to all of the human race but he is kept at this base in space for safety, then the book ends with him finding something unusual. He found a bugger that was still alive and he took it with him preserving it. There is a sequel to Ender’s Game, but I haven’t read it so I’ll make my own still. Because the last book ended with Ender and his sister Valentine travelling to new planets and trying to colonize, I think he would have to change personality wise. In all of Ender’s game he was constantly in high pressure situations with firearms. In this sequel, he would be much more calm because he’s with his favorite person in the world, but there would be moments where he would have to use his instincts and skills. I think his main conflict would be the human race. He should at the beginning of the story raise the bugger he got at the end of the last book which is also the last one he knows about. But, as he’s raising it he should stumble upon a colony of them who are still in hiding and the one he’s raising can be the last queen they’ll ever have. Because, Ender thinks that lots of humans, or at least the ones in the government, are evil killers he’ll want to go back and take over showing how good the buggers can be. Since the last few human interactions with buggers were wars, no one will want them being accepted, that’s where the war starts between the buggers and Ender’s colony on one side, and the humans who aren’t accepting on the other side. I imagine that lots of the plot is Ender finding who is really on his side in this war. This sequel I think should be the end of this series, and it’ll end with no one left, just the animals on earth are alive. I would recommend this book to a friend because there were lots of unexpected events/things the teachers did that made it extremely interesting. I’ll comment on Nia and Nadine’s blog. Even more has happened since last week, Ender became a commander. Once he became commander he had a large following. With that following came enemies, one was a guy named Bonzo. Ender knew he hated him and wanted to kill him but he assumed that the teachers would protect him. As soon as the day came and the fight started he realized he’d have to attack alone. He ended up winning and killing him, but no one ever told him because he left very quickly. Ender’s army immediately dominated the leader board and became undefeated, they also had the most unpredictable strategies and soon people copied him. They were the first army to have more than one battle in a week, then the next day and the next so on every day. Now Ender has graduated battle school and lived on earth for a few months now. The army became worried about how discouraged he is, and is now allowed to see his sister Valentine.
If I were a character in the book I’d be friends with Dink. Dink was one of Enders old leaders, and he went against the grain and understood what the leaders were really trying to do to them. My character I think would be similar to Dink and be a friend to Ender. I’d also be someone he would always trust with not much mystery. I think I’d have the same struggles as Ender because I would be friends with him. Bonzo and his group would probably hate me, and try to stop Ender and I. Bonzo has hated him for being so good, he also disliked anyone that approved of him too. So far the book has picked up dramatically with Ender getting traded around everywhere to different groups, leaders hating him, and him still staying with his original friends. But now the book started following his brother and sister back on earth, Peter and Valentine, they have been conspiring to take over the government through the internet. They made fake identities and spread their ideas through discussion boards throughout all the internet.
The three characters I’ll talk about are Valentine, Peter, and Colonel Graff. Peter and Valentine have been getting along better and better because of their current plans. They have been spending so much time with one another after hating each other that their parents are getting worried. Both of them had only met Graff once, when he took Ender to the boot camp two years ago. Valentine was asked to meet Graff at her school, to help Ender because she was the only one he ever liked. She is extremely paranoid that he found out about the fake identities. After they talk, she is allowed to send one encouraging letter to Ender. Overall not the best relationship because it’s all on top of an unstable tower of trust. I would tell Ender that he probably shouldn’t trust the letter, even if it might truly be Valentine writing the government could tamper with it. He should also take more precautions before doing what he usually does, he currently is just blindly doing stuff without thought. The relationship of Valentine and Peter doesn’t have a large impact with Graff. But them together, just them. Together they are a force to be reckoned with, their fake Identities allow them to affect the government in this world and that could easily lead to messing with Ender. Ender is a special six year old, born with one purpose, to help save the world and become a leader. He’s technically owned by the government and doesn’t have a lot of choice. Ender gets his monitor out of his neck so now he thinks not being watched and he’s not special anymore. Ender thinks he is now unsafe so he gets in a fight, and ends up killing the child. That’s when he passed the final test and was accepted to battle school.
So far I know just about that, and I know he is more special than most. The “buggers” they talk about in the story are a alien race that attacked 80 years ago and almost wiped out the human race. Next I think Ender will get lonely and have no friends for most of the book, he’ll be probably hated because he is the best too. I do think that somewhat soon in the story there will be another attack from the buggers, that will probably kill and be before he’s done with his training. Yes, I do like the book so far it’s a very different plot with the kids being 6 to 10. I also really enjoy the switches from author's point of view to character point of view. I am going to comment on Joseph and Nadine's blog. Nadine's Blog: https://nadinemfletcher.weebly.com/reading-blog-post-1 Joseph's Blog: https://jg2020.weebly.com/irbp-1 Link To Article:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/23/climate/glacier-collapse-avalanche.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fworld&action=click&contentCollection=world®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=3&pgtype=sectionfront New York Times JAN. 23, 2018 "Bigger, Faster Avalanches, Triggered by Climate Change" By Kendra Pierre-Louis This article was about massive glacier that collapsed in Tibet in 2016, then three months later a larger collapse happened in the same region. This short gap in between left the scientists baffled and unable to explain the cause until recently. Luckily not many people live near the collapse of the second one, but the first one took the lives of about nine humans and hundreds of animals. A glacier collapse on this scale has only happened a handful of times before, but never back to back in the same region. Both glaciers were so fatal because of how fast they were. They reached speeds of up to 186 MPH, and traveled as far as nine kilometers. Each of the glaciers moved enough snow and ice to fill one million freight car trains for 7,500 miles. There’s only one comparable glacier collapse that’s been recorded, it was in 2002, the collapse of the Kolka glacier in the Caucasus mountains. The Caucasus collapse was even more devastating, taking the lives of over a hundred humans and once again animals. The scariest aspect of this glacier collapse is how far it went, 19 kilometers at 189 MPH through a valley until it stopped. The reasons as to why this is happening have brought up many theories with some answers. But one that’s unconfirmed and is agreed upon is climate change in the area, specifically rising temperatures. The higher temperatures made the air hold more moisture than usual when it rained, the icey air usually doesn’t hold much moisture at all. Then when it snowed the glacier became even more overloaded and thick. The warm water from the rain dripped and streaked through to the center of the ice making it even more unstable, and it was only a matter of time until the ice broke. This glacier had even more odd characteristics, like its slope. There’s two types of glaciers, flat glaciers and steep glaciers or even both at once. A flat glacier collapses over a period of time and rapidly at all, and can be on a flatter surface like a plateau. A steep glacier is attached to a mountain and is more like a wall that the ice and snow is attached to, these can reach speeds of 250 MPH when this collapse. But the glacier in Tibet was the third option, a flat glacier with the speeds and brute force of a steep glacier. I think that this whole event is a real eye opener of how large of a problem climate change is. Climate change should be taken much more seriously than it currently is, whether it’s whole governments acknowledging, or citizens trying to help. If something on this large of a scale happened in a more urban climate, or even near a city there’s not a lot of warning that can happen. I will comment on Nia Asbills and Josephs blog posts. |
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My Current Events Blog PostsAbove you'll find the links to all the current events blog posts I'll be making.
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