Virginia Tech Parking Problem

Today in class we discussed issues that Virginia Tech as a community has. Every day we, as students, are affected by these problems. One that stuck out the most to me was the parking issue. In the article, "Meters would solve parking problem" the editorial board examines this issue and one way to fix it. They believe that meters are the answer with local businesses getting the revenue with lots that they own. This would allow students to park for a certain amount of time without the fear of getting towed or a ticket.

 

            I somewhat disagree; I believe that the school should allow more parking for students not even having to pay a meter. We spend hundreds of dollars on parking every year with the risk of having to pay a 35$ ticket or a 100$ towing fee. Instead of tech building new dining halls and classrooms, they should be focusing on handling the population of people with cars on and off campus.

 

So what do you think, how should we fix this issue? Or is it even an issue worth worrying about?

shame of college sports

In the article “The shame of college sports” Taylor Branch talks about how college athletes are generating millions of dollars for University while earning “nothing” for themselves.  Throughout the article he talks about how companies sell their product by sponsoring teams and how all over the nation college students are being used to market merchandise from tickets all the way to shoes.

                Personally I don’t think college athletes should be paid to go to college. Why because someone is athletically gifted should they get a pay check? They are already more likely to get scholarships and have a lot of benefits being college athletes.  Many sports are sponsored so they get free clothing and gear; also many schools offer free tutoring and give their athletes a lunch most days.  I don’t feel it’s right that colleges are exploiting these athletes to make millions of dollars.

                What do you think? Should college athletes get a pay check for sports? Is it fair that Universities make millions off of these students? 

Have Humans Run Out of Creativity

The Benefits of Technology are Diminishing is a pretty self-explanatory title. In David Cox’s article, he aims to belittle modern technological advancements based on the fact no recent inventions matches up to past marvels like the wheel or fire. Rather, Cox sees all modern inventions as slight improvements over preexisting ones. The author also relies on statistics to illustrate his point that the peak of mankind’s creativeness has past and that we are currently heading for another “Dark Ages.” He attributes this downfall due to the fact our modern society is very wasteful in terms of resources. Two specific examples of wasted resources the author talks about are fossil fuels and the creativity of youth.

I find the author’s argument and support to be a little ridiculous. Claiming that our modern advancements haven’t been notable improvements upon the preexisting inventions from our grandparents’ era is outlandish. Hybrid vehicle technology is a great example of a necessary modern advancement that will allow the human civilization to better utilize our limited amount of fossil fuels. Despite the fact Cox criticizes our modern society for not conserving our resource we have had inventions that aim to do just that and the author does not acknowledge these as noteworthy. His extreme exaggeration can also be seen in the fact that he refers to the year 2024 as the next “Dark Ages.” In a society with Ipads and the Internet, where we are surrounded by information; how would another Dark Age even be possible, which was the result of a lack of information transfer.

Since our last writing assignment involved thinking about the future I was wondering what you thought the future would be like. Is Cox right, in that human creativity has reached its peak and that from here on out everything is going to be a slight improvement over something we already have? If you think we are following the path described by Cox, what has caused this downfall in human ingenuity? Or do you think Cox is wrong and that the future will hold technical marvels that no one can currently comprehend?