Of everything that we discussed this semester I think the thing that amazed me the most was just the simple correlation between culture and science. I had never really thought about how things like religion and politics play directly into how we interpret science. Not to say that I was oblivious to the bias inherent in our system, just that I had never had it thrown at me and discussed in such detail. There are the obvious things where the bias is apparent, such as global warming and our last section of the class, but I was more surprised when we talked about things like apotemnophilia and corn and all the cultural implications these things have. I will also take away our discussions from the poster presentations and the trends that were observed our history and how they are directly related to cultural norms at the time.
I also found some of the more philosophical concepts, like the idea of Cartesianism and the language of science, very interesting. They are things so deeply imbedded in our lives that I didn't even realize their existence until it was pointed out to me. Overall, I think this course taught me to listen to all sides of a story and to find where my facts are coming from before forming an opinion on the matter.
I'm taking away similar thoughts from the course. There is a huge amount of information that runs much of my life that I had no idea existed, such as Cartesianism. They new ideologies and paradigms I understand as a result of this course will help me to understand other people that I wouldn't have before.
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