Internet Tools Used

The internet tools we have used throughout the semester have been fantastic. Del.icio.us has been my most valued tool because of its ease of use and ability to add descriptions to all of your bookmarks. The blog has also been helpful because it allowed me to keep track of my research and document any progress made from week to week. Whenever confusion arose, I would always turn to my blog in order to find out what exactly was going on. The class wiki however was rarely used because I felt the blog and del.icio.us satisfied the areas of this class very well. I was also somewhat hesitant in having too many internet tools to manage as this can cause confusion at times.

Literary Essay Research

The Daily Observer: "Pope's 'Left Behind' Comments Spark Controversy"

Keywords used: "Left Behind Series" + controversies

Date: 05/1/2008

Hits: N/A

Relevance: 5

_____________________________________________

The New York Times. Editorial. "Apocalypse (Almost) Now"

Keywords used: "Left Behind Series" + editorial

Date: 05/3/2008

Hits: N/A

Relevance: 4

Literary Essay Outline

Dustin M Ficco

English 112


Literary Essay Outline

Preliminary Thesis: Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have written all of the books for the Left Behind Series. The authors themselves are quite interesting due to their backgrounds. These books have raised a number of controversies as a result of diverse content. Many wonder how accurately these books depict events forecasted in the Bible and whether or not the authors have the credentials to take on such a controversial piece.

I. Introduction
A. Author Backgrounds

II. Book Information
A. Important aspects
B. Plot

III. Book Controversies
A. Book is fictional
B. Written through the use of the Bible
C. Violence
IV. Authors
A. Credentials.
B. Biblical accuracy

V. Conclusion

Research Updates

So far I have found a couple of websites I would like to use in my project. Below I have included the tracking information for these sites.

Tim LaHaye's Biography

Keywords used: Tim LaHaye

Date Searched: 04/28/2008

Relevance: 5


Jerry Jenkins’s Biography

Keywords used: Jerry Jenkins

Date Searched: 04/30/2008

Relevance: 5

Research Proposal

Dustin M. Ficco

Research Proposal

English 112

Left Behind Series

I am proposing to write my literary essay on the Left Behind Series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins. I will discuss the book’s contents in a somewhat broad context as well as how these two authors found their information to use for their books.
A few key questions that I will be addressing are as follows. What are these series of books about? Are the books fact or fiction? Is it mythical or of realistic origin? Do these authors have the credibility to write such books?
I will be using internet sources for most of my research into both of the author’s backgrounds and legitimacy of what they are writing. For the summarization of the book, I will be using the first three books of the series because I feel they are of most importance.
The above research should be completed within the next week or so. This should allot me a considerable amount of time to complete the necessary research for this literary essay.
The biggest challenge that I will have to face when conducting my research is finding factual information. These books have sparked a great deal of controversy since their initial release. This has caused a vast number of writers and critics to publish editorials based on irrelevant information. Hopefully I will be able to sort through this information and find “facts” that are verifiable.

Research paper and proposal updates

Everything is great as far the research paper goes. I am somewhat confused as to what kind of visual aid needs to be provided with our papers. The research proposal remains the same. I am hoping to write the literary essay on the Left Behind series.

ENGL 112, Field Research

Although I had to make a last minute change once again as to whom my subject was, she also has extensive knowledge in theology and science. Her name is Christina Danley and she was extremely helpful and knowledgeable with the questions I had.

I learned from my interview with her that she believes with all her heart that public schools should give students the option to study creation as an alternative to evolution. She also stated however, that "the separation of Church and State should be put into file 13 where it belongs." She believes that students should not have either evolution or creation forced upon them; instead, let the students make a decision as to what they want to study. In my interview I also learned that Christina believes the Bible is by far more credible and accurate than Darwin's theory of evolution. One of her quotes was absolutely fantastic, "There is a scripture in the Bible which states that a fool says in his heart that there is no God. I don’t want to be the fool he spoke of when I meet up with him face to face.” I feel I learned a great deal from this interview and hope that it strengthens my paper overall!

ENGL 112, Week 9 post 1

I am still waiting for Mr. Gillis to confirm our meeting date. He is very busy and is trying to fit me into his schedule this coming weekend. I am sorry about the delay in getting the field interview completed, but I feel his comments will greatly strengthen my paper!

ENGL 112, Week 8 Post 1

Field Research Update:

I have decided to interview another person instead of Reverend Nathaniel. His name is David Gillis and he has extensive knowledge in the scientific field and its relation to religion. He is a far better candidate for an interview due to his scientific background. I will be conducting the interview early next week in person.

ENGL 112, Week 7 post 1

Upon review of classmate's search method reviews, I have decided that websites found via search engines will be most beneficial to my research topic. I am choosing to use a search engine to find information because of their ease of use as well as the different types of search methods that can be used; mathematical searching has helped me find most of the information I have now and will continue to assist in finding information to fill in the gaps of my research topic. I will primarily be using Yahoo and Google as the middleman for my searches. Both of these search engines provide good results and are easy to use.

ENGL 112 Week 6 Post 1

Whenever I do any type of research, my primary search engines are www.google.com and www.yahoo.com. Both of these search engines have enormous amounts of information in their databases.
I like Google because of its simplicity and ease of use. Another nice feature of Google is that they don't have pages of advertisements like Yahoo does. Sometimes however, it fails to return results I was expecting.
Yahoo on the other hand is probably my favorite of the two. I like it because of its ease of use and good returns of search results. Yahoo is also a great place to research companies in the stock market! It is a fantastic multipurpose search engine/news/money website. The only things I dislike are the pop up ads that I get from time to time.

English 112, Week 5 post 1

Listed below are a few periodical articles I came across that will be very useful for my topic.

Author: Chris Moon
Article Title: Evolution
Title of Periodical: Topeka Capital-Journal, The
Date: November 9, 2005
Pages on which article appears: N/A (online journal organized by articles for certain dates)

I found this article through http://www.findarticles.com/
The specific link to the article: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4179/is_20051109/ai_n15839735
Date Accessed: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 @ 10:40 A.M.

________________________________________________


Author: Dylan T. Lovan
Title of Article: Creationism backer calls evolution racist
Title of periodical: Desert News (Salt Lake City)
Date: February 9, 2008
Pages: N/A (online article)

I found this article through http://www.findarticles.com/
The specific link to this article: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4188/is_20080209/ai_n21305736
Date Accessed: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 @ 10:52 A.M.

________________________________________________

Author: Desert News (Salt Lake City)
Title of Article: Schools now teach 'religion'
Title of Periodical: Desert News (Salt Lake City)
Date: November 1, 2007
Pages: N/A (online article)

I found this article through http://www.findarticles.com/
Specific link to the article: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4188/is_20071101/ai_n21092285
Date Accessed: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 @ 10:58 A.M.

ENGL 112, Week 4 post 2

My plan for conducting field research on creation vs. evolution will involve two interviews (either in person or through phone/e-mail). One of the interviews will take place with a person that has extensive knowledge in regards to the evolutionary theory. The second interview will be conducted with our local minister, Revered Nathaniel Fosage; as he has extensive knowledge in all categories of Christian beliefs, including creation.

ENGL 112, Week 4 post 1

Listed below are the books that I came across that could contain potentially useful information.

Mesa State College - Tomlinson Library:

Name of author: Barr, Stephen M.
Title: Modern physics and ancient faith
Subtitle: Stephen M. Barr
Place of publication: Notre Dame, Indiana
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press
Date of publication: Copyright 2003

Name of author: Gale, Barry G. (Barry George)
Title: Evolution without evidence : Charles Darwin and The origin of species
Subtitle: Barry G. Gale
Edition: 1st edition
Place of publication: Albuquerque, New Mexico
Publisher: University of New Mexico Press
Date of publication: Copyright 1982

ENGL 112, Week 3 post 2

Due to my late arrival in this English 112 class, I posted my week 2 discussion after everyone else. As a result, I didn't receive any comments on my topic and ways that it could be narrowed down. However, I am going to narrow my topic down by focusing primarily on the effects of not giving students the option to study creation in a public school. I will also discuss the background of both creation and evolution.

ENGL 112, Week 3 post 1

Listed below are the following keywords that I derived from my research question:

John
Genesis

States
Schools
Religion
Policies
Politics

Evolution
Charles Darwin
1800s
Scientific theories
English Naturalist

God
Time
Animals
Humans
Nature
Laws of nature

Idea
Prediction
Thesis
Hypothesis

In order to complete this assignment, I downloaded the "Use My Research Question To Generate Search Terms" word document. I then searched through my research question and identified the primary nouns and phrases in order to obtain the keywords listed above. Lastly, I searched Wikipedia for valuable terms that could aid in searching for information at a later date.

ENGL 112, Week 2 post 2

Creation vs. Evolution

Research questions:
1. Could creation ever be taught in public schools again?

2. How could the reintroduction of teaching creation in schools effect the individual?

3. Should evolution be the only world origination theory taught in public schools?

4. What is creation?

5. What is evolution?

6. When did creation and evolution ideas surface?

7. Where were the ideas written?

8. Who developed the creation and evolution ideas?

9. Why are so many individuals siding with evolution instead of creation?

10. Would the world be a better place if creation was more widely acknowledged and accepted?

Question that best meets needs of writing situation:

9. Why are so many individuals siding with evolution instead of creation?

Refined question:

9. Even though God and his biblical teachings are still very prominent in the United States, why are a growing number of men, women and children siding with the theory of evolution as apposed to creation?

ENGL 112, Week 2 post 1

I have narrowed my creation vs. evolution topic down a considerable amount. The result is a more focused topic on why more individuals are siding with the evolutionary theory instead of creation. During some preliminary research, I found a few websites that will be very useful in further investigating my topic. The sites are listed and explained below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution: This is a somewhat thorough explanation of what evolution is, which person created this theory and how it was derived. Wikipedia is the source of this article.

http://www.allaboutcreation.org/: This website thoroughly investigates all of the aspects of creation. Where does the idea originate; why do so many people believe in the idea; how can creation be applied to the scientific discoveries of today.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2005-11-20-faith-edit_x.htm: This is an opinionative article published by USA Today, written by Charles C. Haynes. The article gives Haynes' opinion on how the abandonment of God (specifically creation) in public school systems has not effected anyone’s beliefs or mannerisms.

ENGL 112, Week 1 post 2

I have decided to conduct a research paper on creation vs. evolution. I chose this topic because I always find myself in an argument with someone else in regards to how outrageously mythical creation is compared to evolution. I want to draft an essay arguing that creation is infact more logical than evolution due to many factors which will be explained in the paper.
Creation is defined by a higher being (God) creating our earth and everything that inhabits it in just seven days! Evolution is defined by tons of particles from exploded stars forming together in near perfect spherical shape and producing our entire solar system all at the same time. Millions of years later, many frozen, water logged meteorites containing bacteria collided with the earth to create life-filled oceans. These bacteria transformed over billions of years into animal and human life.
I am unaware of the precise details that pertain to the evolutionary theory, such as how the exploded star particles came together all at once into perfect spheres to form our solar system. I hope to gain a little more insight on why so many people are siding with the theory of evolution. I am also looking forward to obtaining more detailed information on the Biblical creation of the earth; such as what objects and animals were created on which days.

ENGL 112, Week 1 post 1

I have been thinking of numerous topics to research. I have always been fascinated in Sir Isaac Newton’s Research and would like to know more about him as a person and some of his discoveries. It would also be interesting to write a research paper on Christianity vs. Evolution.