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Article Title: Texas just defined a man and woman. Here’s why that matters.

Today I needed to turn in my Current Event Journal for Government 1302. I was doing an interview on the Texas Tribune article stated above. It talked about Greg Abbott signing a bill that defined man, woman, and discriminated against transgender and intersex individuals. The interview went well and I think I followed the rubric to the best of my ability.

I think I missed my chance on getting a grade at all though. It was 2 minutes late..I had everything completed and ready to go but it wouldn't download as a pdf from Word. I had to email it to myself, download it to the computer, and then turn it in. It was due at 11:59PM, I turned it in at 12:01AM. Sometimes seems like I have to do double the work to get the same outcome it takes other students seconds to do..If that makes sense.

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Useful Delusions: The Power and Paradox of the Self-Deceiving Brain by Bill Mesler and Shankar Vedantam

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Useful Delusions: The Power and Paradox of the Self-Deceiving Brain by Bill Mesler and Shankar Vedantam

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1. Discuss the Introduction from Useful Delusions. What stood out to you?

In the introduction, Useful Delusions: The Power and Paradox of the Self-Deceiving Brain, examines the idea that self-deception, sometimes viewed as harmful, can serve as a significant function in our lives. It also explains how humans tend to hold onto many kinds of illusions to survive emotionally, stay motivated, and build relationships in order to hold onto their own personal beliefs. These delusions help protect and sustain us in certain situations, but in others, they can be nothing more than a distorted reality.

2. What do you want to know more about?

I would like to know more about self-deception and the helpful aspect of it versus the harmful aspect. Also, I would like to know if it really does help strengthen relationships or shape society as it is today.

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Useful Delusions: The Power and Paradox of the Self-Deceiving Brain by Bill Mesler and Shankar Vedantam

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Journaling about anything sounded simple in the beginning, but it is much more difficult when you haven't journaled and don't know what to say sometimes. Especially when life is going on and every day passes by so fast, journaling is sometimes placed on the back burner. I will definitely make an effort to journal more, and hopefully it becomes a part of my routine. So far, my favorite part of journaling is the pictures I can attach to the post afterwards. Good night!

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Today I submitted my Annotated Bibliography, minutes ago, actually. I did find that putting it together to make everything flow was harder than I expected. It was easy to find all five scholarly sources, but giving a brief description of each one was brutal, to say the least. However, I am satisfied with the annotated bibliography and confident my paper will be just as well written and backed by research from the bibliography.

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I'm so late making journal entries and keeping up with it all. However, today I did see an interesting video of a woman pulled on the side of the road recording a work truck dumping thousands and thousands of oranges on the side of the highway. At first I thought, "let me find where they dumped it and get some oranges!" After watching the short clip a couple more times I started to wonder, why are good oranges being dumped in the first place if they look fresh? The bigger picture came to mind, there are some many organization that can benefit from those oranges and feed someone who would appreciate this small gesture. Something as small as an orange can create a big change.

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Making Arguments - Things to remember throughout the semester!

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Making Arguments - Things to remember throughout the semester!

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Characteristics include the following:

1. An explicit position

2. A response to what others have said or done

3. Useful background information

4. A clear indication of why the topic matters

5. Good reasons and evidence

6. Attention to more than one point of view

7. An authoritative tone and stance

8. An appeal to readers' values

We will return to the items on this list throughout the semester.

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9/08/2025 Lesson 3: Two Truths and a Lie Activity

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9/08/2025 Lesson 3: Two Truths and a Lie Activity

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Two Truths and One Lie, I've never played it but I had my significant other explain the game. This was a great exercise to research and discover what is real news and what isn't. Many of the students found the lie right away. I will say, all three news headlines were hard to believe actually happened at first. They did not have much to go off of when it came to the lie. Also, the only thing that showed up was a police officer delivering a pizza because a crocodile was under the owners vehicle..

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Questions saved for future Journaling!

1. Discuss the reading you have done over the past week. Identify titles/authors. What is something new that you have learned?

2. What do you want to know more about?

3. How does this reading connect to your writing in this class? In other classes?