When thinking back to my annotating process, I think I tended to mark up more than I needed to. For Project #2, I was tasked with reading an article by Charles C. Mann about the Wizards vs. Prophets ideas and ways of thinking. My thought process for this specific article was to mark up and separate the Wizards ideas vs. the Prophets ideas, so I could return later and quickly find the sections that I thought would be useful in the Project #2 paper I was writing. During Project #2 I also used an article by Lizzie Widdicombe about Soylent, which I reread before writing this paper so I could mark it up and make connections to either the Prophets or Wizards ideas so I could return later when I was writing. By making these connections in the margins of both articles, I could easily access the information and concepts I was planning to incorporate into my paper. If I thought there was an important paragraph in either of the articles, I would either circle it or put it in brackets and write a small summary in the margins so I can quickly return later during my writing process to grab information I needed to put into the paper I was putting together. I also tended to write questions into the margins of articles I was annotating, sometimes to keep my mind engaged in the reading but it also allowed me to push myself further and dig deeper into the sometimes difficult concepts I was writing about.
Journal #9, Charles C. Mann:
1.Page 2, paragraph 4. I noted this paragraph because it brings up Vogt’s ideas involving world population and over consumption. Even though I think the debate between Vogt’s and Borlaug’s ideas are extremely complex, I find myself agreeing with what Vogt says here. He brings up an important point by stating that “If we continue taking more than the Earth can give, the unavoidable result will be devastation on a global scale.” As humans we take a lot of resources from the Earth that we need in order to survive, but when do we start to take too much? This supply of resources is not endless and if humans continue to take more and more from ecosystems, there will be a time when our resources become scarce. I feel that if our world population continues to rise that we may run into the “devastation” Vogt was trying to warn us of.
2. Page 4, paragraph 1. I agree with this particular passage because it shows how Borlaug-style industrial farming will not work in long term use. Although industrial style farming may be beneficial for short term use, its long term effects have a negative impact on the ecosystem around it. I think Vogt’s followers, or Prophets, make valid points when they say industrial style farming will have a more severe “day of ecological reckoning.” Industrial farming will lead to excess use of soil, reducing the number of ecosystems available for crops and farming. The Prophets make another point that I coincide with; they note industrial farming will be too corporate based, with no care about the health of the ecosystems harmed. Once again I feel like I fall in line with Vogt’s ideas, I don’t think we should utilize big corporate industries who may care more about the dollar signs than the possibility that they are destroying ecosystems.
3. Page 5, paragraph 2. This passage I feel quite conflicted about because even though I agree with Vogt’s views and ideas, I agree with this particular part of Borlaug’s industrial farming. Borlaug’s goal was to create wheat that was immune to different kinds of rusts, but from this he created a wheat strain that produced much more grain than the previous wheat plants were making. One thing the author noted was that Borlaug’s wheat plant produced ten times the amount of grain compared to the old wheat plants. The importance behind this goes without saying, especially in relation to growing human population and increased amount of resources necessary to feed everyone. By using Borlaug’s genetically engineered plants, we could produce more food that has more calories. Along with producing more food and calories, we would use less land for planting, therefore reducing the impact fertilizer has on soil and water.
