A Sociological Analysis of Ron Howards Apollo 13 Essay -- essays resea

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ron Howard’s re-creation of the happenings aboard NASA’s Apollo 13 flight combined some of the biggest talent in Hollywood to produce a masterful film. Apollo 13 takes us back in time, to the late 1960’s and early 70’s, when America’s NASA space program was thriving and the world stood aside to see who would reach the moon first. The impacts of space program are still evident to this day. It is even said that by beating the Russians to the moon, we established ourselves are the top power in the world and propelled ourselves to the status we hold today. While today our space program flounders in the public eye, this movie illustrates a time when NASA’s successes and failures held a huge sociological impact on American and even international life.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In many different aspects, the American space program and more specifically the rescue of the Apollo 13 crew really showed traits similar to those found in any three of the major sociological perspectives: functionalist, symbolic interactionism, and conflict. On one hand, it can be seen that NASA is a large structure formed of many smaller structures that keep is going. The government funds NASA, NASA hires crew to build and fly the ships and the different crews do their separate parts to come together as a whole and make it all work out (much as the crew on the ground did during the rescue mission of the Apollo 13 crew). Now on the other hand, the symbolic interactionism really shows itself in not just the rescue mission or space program itself, but involving everyone throughout the entire film. Symbolic interactionism determines how we place importance on things in life and how we form our opinions and priorities. Walking on the moon was the most important thing to Jim Lovell early in the film. However as events unfolded, Jim realized the real importance was life itself and his family and crew. Again, without symbols, Jim’s family wouldn’t have meant as much to him and he may have disregarded them altogether. The final of the three sociological perspectives is the conflict perspective. While this perspective becomes scarcely evident in the film, it doesn’t play nearly as important a role as do the other two. The only time that any form of power struggle appeared was early in the flight when Jim and Fred didn’t appreciate Jack being on their ship, probabl... ...xploited shortcomings and downfalls have brought public criticism and governmental funding cutbacks. Its successes are no longer praised in the American eye and have been put aside as a national priority ever since its glory days in the late 60’s and early 70’s. No longer does the space program serve as a uniting force, but as a program many think is unneeded when placed beside other national issues.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In conclusion, Ron Howard’s Apollo 13 was a riveting re-creation of the real events that took place more than a quarter-century ago. This movie serves as a model of American society and its sociological aspects. It illustrates various lessons in understanding society and social interaction not just among the three crew members aboard Apollo 13, but the entire NASA crew and all of America and the world that watched the events unfold. Although the space program’s influence on American lifestyle is not as significant as it was in the 1960’s and 70’s, its importance to the survival of mankind is vastly underestimated. Instead, much of American attention in this new century is directed towards warfare, terrorism and growing internal issues with the government.

The Nuclear Age Begins

The first nuclear explosion, named â€Å"Trinity†, was detonated July 16, 1945. Main article: History of nuclear weapons During the 1930s, innovations in physics made it apparent that it could be possible to develop nuclear weapons of incredible power using nuclear reactions. When World War II broke out, scientists and advisors among the Allies feared that Nazi Germany may have been trying to develop its own atomic weapons, and the United States and the United Kingdom pooled their efforts in what became known as the Manhattan Project to beat them to it.At the secret Los Alamos laboratory in New Mexico, scientist Robert Oppenheimer led a team of the world's top scientists to develop the first nuclear weapons, the first of which was tested at the Trinity site in July 1945. However, Germany had surrendered in May 1945, and it had been discovered that the German atomic bomb program had not been very close to success. The Allied team produced two nuclear weapons for use in the war, one powered by uranium-235 and the other by plutonium as fissionable material, named â€Å"Little Boy† and â€Å"Fat Man†.These were dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. This, in combination with the Soviet entrance in the war, convinced the Japanese to surrender unconditionally. These two weapons remain the only two nuclear weapons ever used against other countries in war. Nuclear weapons brought an entirely new and terrifying possibility to warfare: a nuclear holocaust. While at first the United States held a monopoly on the production of nuclear weapons, the Soviet Union, with some assistance from espionage, managed to detonate its first weapon (dubbed â€Å"Joe-1† by the West) in August 1949.The post-war relations between the two, which had already been deteriorating, began to rapidly disintegrate. Soon the two were locked in a massive stockpiling of nuclear weapons. The United States began a crash-program to develop the first hydrogen bomb in 1950, and detonated its first thermonuclear weapon in 1952. This new weapon was alone over 400 times as powerful as the weapons used against Japan. The Soviet Union detonated a primitive thermonuclear weapon in 1953 and a full-fledged one in 1955.Nuclear missiles and computerized launch systems increased the range and scope of possible nuclear war. The conflict continued to escalate, with the major superpowers developing long-range missiles (such as the ICBM) and a nuclear strategy which guaranteed that any use of the nuclear weapons would be suicide for the attacking nation (Mutually Assured Destruction). The creation of early warning systems put the control of these weapons into the hands of newly created computers, and they served as a tense backdrop throughout the Cold War.Since the 1940s there were concerns about the rising proliferation of nuclear weapons to new countries, which was seen as being destabilizing to international relations, spurring regiona l arms races, and generally increasing the likelihood of some form of nuclear war. Eventually, seven nations would overtly develop nuclear weapons, and still maintain stockpiles today: the United States, the Soviet Union (and later Russia would inherit these), the United Kingdom, France, China, India, and Pakistan.South Africa developed six crude weapons in the 1980s (which it later dismantled), and Israel almost certainly developed nuclear weapons though it never confirmed nor denied it. The creation of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty in 1968 was an attempt to curtail such proliferation, but a number of countries developed nuclear weapons since it was signed (and many did not sign it), and a number of other countries, including Libya, Iran, and North Korea, were suspected of having clandestine nuclear weapons programs

The Extent to Which the Principle of Sustainability Guides...

The Extent to Which the Principle of Sustainability Guides Land Use Policy Development The idea of developing in such a way that the present can meet their needs without future generations needs being compromised is not a new one. It has been practiced and continues to be practiced by many groups of people across the world. For example, this principle is embedded in Aboriginal beliefs that they come from the land, and must return to the land and so must be custodians to the land. The Brundtland Commission, chaired by the Norwegian prime minister, brought the concept to the foreground where the famous definition of sustainability was given. This essay will discuss the idea of sustainability, how†¦show more content†¦Ã¢â‚¬ËœLimits to Growth’[2] is a book that tried to explain how economic expansion must soon come to an end , because of environmental limits. ‘Our Common Future’, the sequel to this book, starts from essentially similar understandings of the nature of the economy-environment interconnections, but draws the conclusion th at growth can and should continue, however, this growth would take a different form from past growth, and should be sustainable. By the start of the 1990s about three-quarters of councils in England, Scotland and Wales already had a ‘green plan’ of some kind in effect or in preparation, some explicitly recognising the need to extend to global issues such as global warming as well as local matters. What was new in the 1990s was the degree to which central government began to give formal support to sustainable development, and to land use planning as a means of achieving it, in some cases producing the relevant policies and legislation in response to international commitments. Sustainability is now one of the UK governments key objectives. A commitment to national sustainability plans was a key component of the UNCED agreements in 1992,Show MoreRelatedReview Of Previous Empirical Literature1557 Words   |  7 Pageson expansion and the use of man-made, natural, and social capital. The fact that there are three different types of capital that can contribute to economic growth has led to a dif ference between weak and strong sustainability, as discussed by Pearce and Turner (1990), and Rennings and Wiggering (1997). 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