For the first piece of art that we had to complete we went to the Rodin museum to draw some inspiration from there. While there I chose to sketch a street lamp that I saw. Though it was daylight, I decided to draw the lamp as if it was dark outside. I tried to portray it as if it was emitting light, to do this I drew moths fluttering around it and attempted at creating shadows.

Wk 2 & 3

The second piece of art that I made was a collage. I took a canvas and painted it a solid orange color. I then cut out a few interesting pictures from magazines that I had and an old picture from home and glued them down to the canvas. After that I recycled some snapple bottle caps that were lying around my room and a broken artificial flower and glued them to the canvas as well. Lastly I draped a string of beads onto the collage using thumbtacks. I really enjoyed making this collage because I found a way to turn a lot of the stray, sort of useless objects all about my room, into something I like to look and and can hang on my wall.

For the third piece of artwork that I made I did another collage on a canvas. The first thing I did was paint it, this time it was not a solid coat but had more variation, I used blue and black paint. I went through much of the same process with this collage as with the last, looking through magazines for pictures that caught my eye and browsing through old photos that would work with the feel I was going for. I used duct tape for the picture and watered down glue to paint onto the backs of my magazine images so that it would produce a more thin and even coat. Lastly for an extra touch I used markers to create a few designs on the canvas and on the images and I cut out clouds to stick onto the image of the man by the train tracks.

Wk 4 & 5

The next piece I made was a painting of a nebula. I used watercolors because they do a good job of expanding on the page in a way that looks natural as opposed to the deliberate strokes of a paint brush that would come out using another type of paint. I restricted my mini nebula to a circle shape so that it is more compact and it looks like its own mini universe contained inside a small space.

After that I used colored pencil to color draw a picture of an alien. It is based off of a picture of my little sister.

The next drawing is based off of a picture that I saw. I really liked the picture because the stripes on her cheek show that she’s a warrior even though it may not look it. I used chalk pastels to color her in.

I based another drawing off of a picture of Jennifer Lawrence. Again I used chalk pastels to color. I used mostly muted colors save for the blue of her eyes because I wanted them to pop more.

Wk 6 & 7

In the 6th and 7th weeks I got really into drawing butterflies. I filled up this page with various drawings of butterflies that I drew throughout the weeks. They’re really beautiful creatures and I tried to capture how delicate they are by applying less pressure to the page when drawing creating a fainter, more subtle line than I normally would.

This next drawing is a depiction of a girl hiding her feelings behind a veil of material things, wearing a mask of indifference. At a time when I was feeling somewhat down on life I began to doodle in my notebook. I tried to channel my feeling through drawing and ended up personifying the feelings that I had at the time. This picture was created with pen.

I drew a picture of a man in a spacesuit and behind him were planets and other planetary objects. I used a combination of pens, markers, and pencils to complete this drawing. I think that space is a beautiful thing and this drawing reflects my desire to learn more about the mysteries of the universe.

Sean Morris

The Biological Factors of Crime

While we typically use the terms “bad to the bone” or “bad blood” as a figure of speech for someone we don’t like, it turns out that the terms might be more literal than what one might assume.  Recently the new science in the world has allowed for studies to be done into the biological factors of a criminal's body to determine what factors can cause someone to become a criminal.

Some of the research that has been found into this subject involves chromosomes. Essentially what chromosomes are threadlike strands of DNA in the cell that carries the genes in a linear order. Alternations in the chromosomes are part of what can lead to disorders in the body like down syndrome. In regards to how this relates to criminal behavior is that having an an abnormal number of chromosomes can be causation for a dictator. With some diseases that are further added in their toxicity based upon environmental situation some people can become a powder keg of crime waiting to go off. Alternatively it becomes up to the legal defense team to prove that their is a direct correlation between the disease and the actual crime, otherwise it's just spectral

Another biological factor that becomes a component into crime is addiction. Addiction is basically and typically when someone takes a certain kind of drug that activates the reward centers of the mind so much so that people have an insatiable desire to recreate and keep that “reward” going. Within the biological underpinnings of this condition is a trait that causes addiction to happen  more due to inheritance from a family member, most likely a parent. However the law will still arrest and prosecute individuals but without seeking any medical assistance for them.

In conclusion the law and neuroscience are still a road from which much distance must be traveled on. While we need to prosecute people who break the law to ensure a more productive society, we must also know when the prisoner of the system may be just as much a prisoner of his body.

Lie Detectors

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Lie detectors come in many ways to detect that someone is lying. Telling someone is lying can be judged on sweat or nervousness. Lie Detection can also be based on the study of the brain and getting wavelengths that spike this is a polygraph. Does looking at the brain instead looking at physical appearance more accurate? The answer to that question would be no it’s not as accurate as looking at a polygraph and examining the brain. A lie detector lets you know the physiological changes considered to be associated with lying. These studies of lie detection only started studies on this last year. The fMRI is not accurate because of course some people will be nervous being there and running tests. The machine will just make them even more nervous causing the machine to spike and incriminate themselves. The court system isn’t allowing the lie detection methods as evidence just yet due to the chance that it’s not accurate and stable.

The background info that the audience needs is that lie detectors aren’t accurate machines and that's why they aren’t brought into court just yet. The viewpoint of the person getting tested is that they are already nervous that they can have a chance to go to jail. The other point is that they are “accurate” but in most cases they aren’t. On the other hand people think that the people are nervous because they are wrong. Imagine being in their position.. First, being on trail would make a person nervous even if you didn’t do it. Then on top of that then being tested on would of course would make you nervous. I believe that these testing have to be further improved before they are used in the courthouse.