Ocean Ecology

"Sooner or later, we will have to recognise that the Earth has rights, too, to live without pollution. What mankind must know is that human beings cannot live without Mother Earth, but the planet can live without humans." - Evo Morales

Since the ocean covers 71% of Earth's surface, it's only reasonable that the marine ecosystem is one of the biggest ecosystem in the world. It's also one of the most diversify ecosystem, with coral reefs capable of having more than 1000 species per square meter. However, in recent years, we human have been destroying the ocean ecosystem and making many ocean species gone extinct. This act needs to stop or else the biggest ecosystem in the world is going to be destroyed.

Why do we need to preserve the ocean ecosystem? First of all, the ocean contains many mysteries still remained undiscovered. Even with the knowledge and technology we have now, humans have only discovered 5% of the entire ocean. Some scientists said that we know more about space than we know about Earth's ocean. The estimated number of species in the ocean is about 1 million. Of all that, we've only discovered about 226,000 species. This means that there are still hundreds of thousands of species left out there still waiting for us to discover. This means that ocean legend like the Kraken might actually exist, we just haven't found it yet :). But if we humans destroys the ocean ecosystem, those mysterious and possibly out of this world creatures would have gone before we get a chance to discover them.

Second, the ocean ecosystem is a huge source for fisheries. Every year, in the US alone, ocean fisheries provides 1.2 million jobs, 38 million dollar worth of income, and 140 million dollar worth of sales. Not to mention, the ocean is a huge source of food. From fishes, shrimps, scallops, caviar, to those huge and deluxe lobsters, the ocean have given us many raw materials used to create millions of delicacies. So if we destroy the ocean ecosystem, we also destroy a huge source of income for any country in the world, not to mention removed millions of delicious dishes from our menu.

What have human done to the ocean ecosystem? If you Google human's affect on the ocean, there will be a huge list of many different horrible acts that we human have commited to the ocean. From over-fisheries, pollution, eutrophication, to introduce new species, ocean acidification, and climate change, because of our acts, 39% of marine wildlife is gone, and 30-35% of ocean ecosystems world wide is gone.

So if you're reading this, I sincerely hope that you will spread the information to everyone you know about this problem so everyone can be aware of the harmful effects that we're doing to the ocean. If many people understands the important of ocean, hopefully, in the future, ocean ecosystem will be protect.

Gender Equality

"A woman is human.
She is not better, wiser, stronger, more intelligent, more creative, or more responsible than a man.
Likewise, she is never less.
Equality is a given.
A woman is human." - Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calender of Inspiration

Many religions in the world worship female godness. From the Egyptian goddess of nature and magic Isis, the Chinese goddess of sea Mazu, to Mother Mary in Christianity, women have always appear in many culture's mythology. And then there's the female that is worship most of them all, mom. We worshipped her so much that we called our homeland Motherland and the nature Mother Nature. It's obvious that the women are worshipped in many cultures on Earth. But at some point in time, the status of women and men were reversed. Somehow, women became discriminated by men, refused of basic human rights such as education and getting a job, and is only seen useful as a caretaker. So today I'm going to talk about gender inequality.

We're now living in a better world where sexism wasn't as widespread as before. With the help of the Internet, many people now aware that women are needed to be treated equally. No longer are the times when female were heavily mistreated by virtually everyone in society. Now, in most countries, women are allowed to vote, to learn, to love, to make their own decisions, and live their life the way they wanted. But even with all the freedom and rights that women have fought for, societies nowadays are still crawled with traces of discrimination against female, from school, work, to relationship, and family.

One of the most common signs of sexism is the gender pay gap in work places. According to many studies, women are usually paid lower than their male counterpart, regardless of individual skills. It doesn't matter if the job is corporate, government, education, retail, or medical, if you look at the chart showing earnings between male and female employees, you would find that women's earning are usually, if not always, lower than male's. Why is that?

There are many factors that researchers came up with to explain the reason behind this peculiar income disparity. From the difference in physical, mental, and emotional strength, education and experience, to social status, pregnancy, marriage... women are being unconsciously discriminated not only by men, but also by women, too. A study at Yale University where leaders at scientific research institutes were given identical job applications with either male or female names. Participants, both men and women, rated male applicants as more qualify and hireable than their identical femal applicant. These participants also selected a higer starting salary and offered more career mentoring to the male applicant. As you can see, even when a woman has the identical skills as a man, she's still being short-changed by employers, which results to lower income and less chance for promotion.

Up there is just one of the many instances in society where women are discriminated. Women are also being unfairly treated in families, relationships, marriage... It's important that we stand up and defend women from discrimination because they are just as good as men. I once heard this saying about gender equality that I really like: "The only thing men can do that women can't is growing a beard." And even that's possible for some women. In a society as advance as it is today, we need to be aware of the fact that women are just as capable of doing what men do, therefore they should be treated equally as men. I'm not saying that women should do everything that men do (there are things that men are more suitable doing), but that we should treated women equally and indiscriminately. If you find this interesting, please share it with people you know so that gender inequality can be erase and women all around the world can be just as free as men.

Tobacco Use

"Giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I've done it thousands of times." - Mark Twain

I bet almost all of you have already heard someone saying "Smoking is bad for you", right? But have you ever wonder why smoking is bad for you? Don't get me wrong here, smoking will definitely kill you. But what is it that's harmful about tobacco? And why are people still smoking even though most of them probably know that it will reduce your life? That's what I'm going to talk about today.

Ok, let's start with some general facts. Do you know that the World Health Organization (WHO) has estimated that approximately 15 billion cigarettes are smoked worldwide everyday? Holy crap! That's twice the population of Earth. And out of all that, 1 in 3 cigarettes smoked in the world today is smoked in China. That''s 5 billion cigarettes per day in a country of 1 billion, meaning that everyone in China is smoking 5 cigarettes per day. Talk about serious health issues.Not only do they have to worry about toxic factory gases, now they have to be aware of the millions of people around them smoking? China is like a torture cell for your lung or something.

But seriously, why do people smoke so much? And what are the harms of smoking? Let's start by analysing what cigarette is. Wikipedia identified a cigarette as "...a small cylinder of finely cut tobacco leaves rolled in thin paper for smoking." It might sounds like nothing, but a study shown that a cigarette contains more than 7000 chemicals, 69 of which are known to cause lung cancer. Because of its toxicity, it's known for causing 1 in 5 deaths in the US every year (or about 400,000 people). Out of that, 50,000 people died due to "secondary" smoking, meaning that you breath in the smoke that the smoker releases. Not only that, smoking also reduce your life expectancy. People who smoked are expected to live a shorter life than those who don't by up to 13.2 years for men and 14.5 years for women. But that's not all, smoking also increase the risk of having heart diseases and many types of cancer, affects your circulation, fertility, and even give you sex problems.

So why do people smoke so much? Insofar as we know, smoking causes huge problems to your body. Well, the answer is Nicotine. Nicotine is a psychoactive chemical found in tobacco, and it's addictive. That means that when you're used to smoking, it's very hard for you to quit. A study shows that 69% of smokers want to quit completely. But they couldn't because smoking is just so addicting. Moreover, a study has discovered that every day, nearly 4000 teens in the U.S. smoke their first cigarette, while 1000 start smoking in a daily basis. This is alarming because a) Your not-fully-developed body can't take the tolls of cigarettes like an adult's body can, b) when these kids get addicted to smoking, it's going to be harder to quit once they grow up and realize the damage of smoking and c) smoking is going to ruin your future. People tends to avoid hanging out or hiring someone who smoke. My friend once told me that when he returned to his primary school to visit, he saw a 5-grader smoking. That's just wrong. What have society become that small children have already begin to smoke at the age of 10?

So what can you do if you want to quit smoking? First of all, get rid of all of your cigarettes. Then try to ask for your friends and family to help you with quitting smoking. While it's true that you can accomplish this task by yourself, it's always better to have someone to look after you and stop you if you try to smoke again. Then try to develop a plan to eat healthy and work out so your body can recover from all the smoking. If you eat healthy and exercise, in a couple of months, your body will return to normal. But if there are times when you just can't fight back the urge to smoke, try one of these methods: a) Try chewing gum, b) Medicine (must be prescribed by your doctor), c)Nicotine Replacement Therapy (works best if you get behavioral therapy and support from family). Below I've list some links that can help you to quit smoking.

This is just a quick blog showing you some of the effects of smoking and how you can quit it. Smoking is harmful for your body and you shouldn't try to smoke, even if someone offers it to you or your friends told you it's cool to do it. If you know someone who smoke a lot, be sure to share with them things that you've read in this blog so they can understand what the risks of smoking are. If you want to know more about tobacco usage, you can find them in the links at the bottom. See you later and remember: "Smoking is bad for you."

Links:
http://www.patient.co.uk/health/smoking-the-facts
http://www.lung.org/stop-smoking/about-smoking/facts-figures/general-smoking-facts.html
http://www.factslides.com/s-Smoking#
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cigarette
http://www.webmd.com/smoking-cessation/quit-smoking
http://www.helpguide.org/articles/addiction/how-to-quit-smoking.htm