Serendip is an independent site partnering with faculty at multiple colleges and universities around the world. Happy exploring!

Blogs

"To Be Or Not To Be"

Submitted by Karina G on Mon, 12/21/2009 - 4:40pm

Prodigal Summer: To Nudge or Not to Nudge?

Submitted by kdlz on Mon, 12/21/2009 - 12:29pm

Food for Thought

Kathy De La Hoz

Paper 9, ESem

November 6, 2009

Denialism

Submitted by mcasias on Mon, 12/21/2009 - 11:55am

Biology 103 Book Commentary

Zoonotic Diseases

Submitted by mcasias on Mon, 12/21/2009 - 11:52am

Biology 103 Web Paper 3

The Trickster in Prodigal Summer(Final Paper)

Submitted by nbagaria on Mon, 12/21/2009 - 7:17am

Food for Thought

The Trickster in Prodigal Summer

The book “Prodigal Summer” by Barbara Kingsolver seems to be chiefly about choices and how every choice that a character makes simultaneously creates and destroys situations for other characters in the book as well as for themselves. Hence, every character plays the role of a trickster. A trickster always falls into the trap of appetite. Similarly, the characters always fall into the trap of temptation.

Freakonomics by Steven Levitt

Submitted by ktan on Sun, 12/20/2009 - 4:15am

Congratulations, it’s a (Lady)Boy!

Submitted by ktan on Sun, 12/20/2009 - 4:12am

Boys and girls seem to learn their genders very early on in their lives, as apparent to their preference of colours (girls with pink and boys with blue), toys (Barbies vs. cars), and even their awareness of the opposite sex (cooties). But are all these stereotype a testament to the biological predetermination of gender, or are they manifested by societal influences? Is everything inherently biological, or can our actions—our environment—override this seemingly fixed component of our identity?

The Lives of a Cell

Submitted by ED on Fri, 12/18/2009 - 11:31pm

If Biology 103 has taught me anything this semester, it is that nothing and everything matters. Everything matters in the sense that there is no such thing as a real closed system and everything is related; the progression of everything affects everything else, in some complex way. Nothing matters in the amazing sense that, to our current knowledge, only humans consciously care about life on Earth and in the Universe on a long time scale… things do not “matter” objectively outside of human perception. The course has taught me quite a bit about the faultiness of human perception in that we believe our perceptions hold truth. We so easily forget other animals do not see, smell, hear, taste, touch, or sense the world the same way humans do.

Soul Made Flesh: Humanizing the Sciences

Submitted by hmarcia on Fri, 12/18/2009 - 10:31pm

Biology 103 Book Commentary

Soul Made Flesh by Carl Zimmer retells the story about the discovery of how the human brain works. Using historical events as his background, Zimmer provides a detail explanation of how this discovery led to a philosophical revolution that led to the creation of new ideas about Man, the soul, and God. By humanizing the people involved in the discovery, such as Thomas Willis (the founder of modern neurology) and William Harvey (the discoverer of the circulation of blood), he recreates the personal dramas and experiments of these men, which changed the way science worked and the views about our humanity. By solely focusing on England during the 17th century, Zimmer examines how the scientific world in Europe had common misconceptions and incorrect philos