Research Sources: Library vs Internet

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Teachers (like me) often try to force students to use libraries for their research. We assign essay topics like "Compare using a library to the internet for research." Students today constantly ask "Why can't I just Google it?" In fact, some even don't think learning anything is important because all information is available on the internet. Let's take a look at the reality.

First, I use the internet for research all the time. Even Wikipedia. The most important skill in research is finding good, trustworthy information. You can do this on the internet as well as in a library. The advantage to a library is that almost all of the information available has already been evaluated as trustworthy, whereas on the internet you are on your own. Remember, anyone can put up a website. They can give it a reasonable sounding name such as "Institute for Climate Evaluation" and then put up the most garbage information imaginable. So you have to be careful who you get information from on the internet.

Teachers seem to hate Wikipedia. They often state that this is because information on Wikipedia can change and the editors are anonymous. There is no central authority. But this is nonsense. Wikipedia consists of a community of people who are strongly dedicated to truth and accuracy. When I want a quick understanding of a topic, I turn to Wikipedia. But I would not cite Wikipedia as a source in a research project because it is at best a secondary source. That means it is repeating information that has been developed by experts somewhere else. That somewhere else is usually a peer-reviewed journal article. It could be available on the personal website of a researcher at a university. It is much better to go to the original source.

The problem is that if you are in high school and you are doing a research project, the depth of knowledge you are expected to develop is much lower than that of a PhD in the subject area. Your reading skills are not developed to the university level. You may not have access to peer-reviewed journals, which you could get through university libraries, but high school libraries do not have the funds to subscribe to. Therefore, it is much harder for you to access and evaluate original sources.

The sources in your school library are designed for your reading level. They are designed for your knowledge level. They are organized for your use, and the librarian is there to help you. In fact the easiest way to do the research is to go to the library and ask the librarian to help you.

Typing a search term (is it the right search term?) into Google gives you millions of websites to choose from. I have no doubt the right information is there, but can you find it? You may need to wade through dozens of sites to find what you are looking for. It's more like looking for a needle in a haystack.

Using the internet is convenient. If it's Sunday night and your essay is due on Monday, then it's all you have. But if you have a little time, using the expertise of your librarian should be a no-brainer.

How to use APA references: Just the basics

We edit psychology papers

In every new school year, another crop of scholars is faced with the perennial issue of using citations in their writing. Many people engage me to edit psychology papers. Of course, psychology is the main discipline to use APA, but many professors assign APA style as the reference style for papers in a wide variety of disciplines. Here are a few tips to make it easier. I'm keeping it short and sweet with just the basics here, so if you have more questions, check out some of my other posts under APA Style, or visit the OWL, which is a great source for writing advice in APA, MLA or Chicago style.

Use parentheses correctly

The first thing you need to know is how to use parentheses. When you put something in parentheses it adds to the sentence, but the sentence must be able to stand alone without it. When you use APA, you are told to enclose the author's name and year of publication in parentheses (Francis, 2015). Notice that the sentence above reads perfectly well without the part in parentheses. However, there are two ways to make a citation. Sometimes you introduce the author's name with a signal phrase at the beginning of the sentence. In this case, you only put the year in parentheses.

According to Francis (2015), blah blah blah.

What I see with some new writers is that they have got stuck on the idea that the author's name is always in parentheses, so they write: "(According to Francis, 2015), blah blah blah." That's quite wrong, since the words "According to Francis," are supposed to be part of the body of the essay, not extra. Notice also that the comma comes after the closing parenthesis mark because the parenthetical date belongs with the name.

Find the right source

The next place people commonly make errors is in citing material they found on the web. Now the first thing you need to know if you are writing a college or university essay is that you DON'T TRUST THE WEB. Use your college or university library and cite peer-reviewed journal articles that you access through the college library. You will probably need a log-in to use the college library, but they have access to journals that are written by experts in the field, and reviewed before publication by other experts in the field. That's why they are more trustworthy. So if you are writing about the history of gun control in the US then the Journal of Social Science is much more trustworthy than the San Jose Times. Choosing the right source will show your teacher that you are seriously researching and will be reflected in your mark. In high school, teachers are trying to get you to learn to simply use citations. In college, they are trying to teach you how to do research. If you are not digging deep, then you are not doing the job and your marks will reflect this lack of effort, even if your writing is good.

Cite the author's name

Once you have found a fact that you want to cite, the first thing you need to know is the author's name. Any journal article should provide this easily. If you have difficulty finding the author's name, then possibly it's not a reliable source. If the San Jose Times doesn't give a byline to the author, then it's about as trustworthy as a rumor you heard on the bus, but if you are citing a general publication like this and there is no author, then and only then, do you use the title of the article, enclosed in quotation marks ("Gun control bad", 2015). Often you find organizations that publish web pages with the information you need, and you can cite the organization as author (American Association of Gun Dealers, 2015). Neither of these is as reliable as a peer-reviewed journal article (Smith, 2015). Notice that in all these cases, you provide the minimum information to identify the article. Every citation must match a full entry in a reference list where you provide the name of the author, date of publication, name of publisher, and URL if you downloaded it from the web. Here are some tips for writing a reference list in APA.

Free Persuasive Essay Topics

One of my continuously popular posts has been some suggested persuasive essay topics. However, these go back a few years and may be dated. So I think it's time to suggest a few new persuasive essay topics.

First, let's review what a good persuasive essay topic looks like. It should be a topic that has two sides. Rational people could disagree. I asked a grade 8 class to write a persuasive essay. After showing the way the essay should address two points of view and make a decision favoring one of them, one student wanted to write about "Smoking is bad." I felt that this topic was a little weak, so I suggested that a good persuasive essay topic calls for action. He decided to change his topic to "Smoking should be banned." This is a better topic because arguments can be made against banning smoking. For example, people have the right to choose. A good persuasive essay topic is good because it requires the writer and reader to evaluate points of view and beliefs into a hierarchy. Which is more important? Public health or freedom of choice?

Unfortunately, my student decided to change his topic to "Civet cats are awesome." Now, while I have no particular opinion on civet cats, I don't think their awesomeness is a particularly good persuasive essay. There is no call to action. There is no hierarchy of values. No one can argue that they are not awesome, because even if you think penguins are awesome, there's no reason why both animals can't be considered awesome. In fact, I don't even know what awesome means or why it is important to evaluate an animal as awesome.

Scouring the headlines for good persuasive essay topics today, the first that comes to mind for citizens of the United States is the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. Many people are strongly opposed to this plan, but others support it. Let's suggest some persuasive essay topics on Obamacare.

Obamacare should be repealed, not expanded.
Obamacare should be expanded, not repealed.

Whether you are in favor or Obamacare or opposed to it, most people would agree that individuals need medical care from time to time. The difference in opinion is whether the state has the right to force people to buy medical insurance. The reason the Obamacare makes purchasing insurance mandatory is the young people, who are generally healthy, may prefer to save their money and take the small risk of needing significant medical intervention. Without these people buying insurance, the people who do buy insurance are all at high risk for needing to make claims. This makes the process impossible for the insurance companies who need to spread the risk across many people. In a place like Canada, where the state provides the insurance, everyone is in the same pool and the cost for each person is very low. One of the arguments against state provided health insurance is that people don't want a government bureaucrat making decisions about their health care services. (Why they prefer a private company employee who has an incentive to deny claims, I'll never figure out.) People are also opposed to government involvement in anything that the private sector could provide because they have a fundamental belief that the government should stay out of the free market economy. Whichever side of the debate you choose to write about in a persuasive essay, you should be able to find some informed people who have written on the topic. Make sure you cite the sources correctly in order to give your persuasive arguments some weight.

Global Warming is not as important as economic growth
Carbon dioxide emissions must be restricted to reduce global warming

Now, you might notice that I don't think the topic "Global warming is a hoax" is a good topic. That's because I don't believe any rational person could believe that a conspiracy of scientists is willing to undermine a century of economic progress just to keep their research grants flowing. In fact, any persuasive essay topic that relies on the assumption that a grand conspiracy is afoot is not a credible essay topic. A good persuasive essay topic about global warming would try to evaluate the risks of restricting carbon dioxide against the social justice importance of an industrial economy that people need in order to house themselves and feed their families today. Rational people who oppose restrictions on carbon might believe that a strong economy will be sufficient to be able to fund the mitigation that will be necessary to face a changing climate. They believe it is better to build levees, flood control, irrigation, and even move populations than it is to slow economic growth. Remember, a good persuasive essay isn't about persuading people to accept a lot of brand new facts, it's about persuading people to change the hierarchy of their values, or to recognize that their actions do not reflect the hierarchy of their values. I would argue, in a persuasive essay on global warming, that only industrialized countries have the luxury of debating economic growth against climate change. Poorer countries cannot afford climate change. Are rich countries willing to pay the cost to help other countries adapt? I doubt it. And low lying countries, such as the Maldives, can't adapt. They will be under water.

The most recent military adventure that both Canada and the US have joined in is also a good subject for a persuasive essay.

The West has an obligation to protect people from violent insurgent groups such as ISIS (ISIL)
Military action against insurgencies always has negative unintended consequences, so must be avoided.

If we trace back the conflict between extreme Islamists and the West, I think we will find that a key point in the history is Afghanistan 1980s. Of course, you can go back to the Crusades of the Middle Ages, but I wouldn't say those people were extreme Islamists. They were just people who wanted to live their lives when the Christian West decided they needed to "liberate" the "Holy Land." In Afghanistan in the 1980s, the West funded the rebellion against Soviet occupation. This set in motion the dominoes that culminated in the rise of the Taliban. And the only reason the West chose to fight against the Taliban is that they hosted the forces of Osama bin Laden as they trained for the 911 attacks. I'm not arguing about what the correct response to the 911 attacks should have been. What I'm arguing is that each time we fight against a foreign insurgency, we tend to create something worse. I think a different kind of solution needs to be found. Helping the military insurgency against the Soviets helped create the conditions for the Taliban. Overthrowing the government of Saddam Hussein led to a protracted war in Iraq; the war in Iraq led to a power vacuum which ISIS filled. But other factors led to the rise of ISIS. It partly arose in the chaos of the Syrian civil war, which, was not the West's fault. But undoubtedly the antipathy toward the West felt by many people of the Middle East is due to the West's continued interventions into the political affairs of the Middle East, and that dates back to the Crusades.

OK, but do we have an obligation to act to protect people? You could argue that we do. We are signatories to the UN Human Rights treaties. We believe in the rule of law and in the right of people to believe what they want and worship the way they want. At least some of the violence they perpetrate is wholly objectionable by any reasonable person. But I have to ask: if they were not beheading Western people and putting the videos on Youtube, would be be concerned. The Taliban were stoning women to death for several years before the West decided to topple them, and that was only because of the 911 attacks.

Persuasive Essay on Nuclear Power

I know nuclear power is much in the news right now because of the recent accident in Japan, so many teachers are assigning persuasive essays on the topic of nuclear power. I've had two inquiries recently through my form for asking questions about essays. Here are some ideas for other persuasive essay topics. One student, in Illinois, asked "im writing a paper on why nuclear power plants are bad but im having trouble stating my points can you help me."

 I'd have to start by teaching him/her to write "I'm" instead of "im." Next, use a question mark.

So I decided to write a little sample persuasive essay. I thought this might be useful for those who are looking to find out how to structure a persuasive essay. The structure is pretty basic. You put in some of the arguments for your thesis; you put in some of the arguments against your thesis; and then you explain why the for arguments are better than the against arguments. Read through the sample persuasive essay to see how I do this.

First this sample persuasive essay needs an introduction. Visit my Five Great Ways to Write an Introduction page for some ideas on how to begin this essay. What follows is the body of this sample persuasive essay. By "sample" I mean: Don't copy this and hand it in as your work. These are some ideas for you to research and document. I could be full of s**t when it comes to reasoning about nuclear power. Get some quotes from experts to back up these statements.

But seriously, I can give many reasons to be opposed to nuclear power. But in a persuasive essay, you have to consider both sides. So let's look at the reasons why some people believe nuclear power is a good solution to the growing need for energy.

Reasons for nuclear power

Nuclear power creates no greenhouse gasses. The amount of CO2 has almost doubled in the atmosphere since the beginning of the industrial revolution. Most scientists today believe that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is trapping heat and slowly causing the average global temperature to rise. Since heat is really a form of energy, the increased energy in the atmosphere is experienced by us not only in the form of higher temperatures, but also as more severe storms and extreme weather events. These are generally bad things. Burning coal and oil adds to greenhouse gasses. Nuclear power is a means of using the energy of radioactive decay, and thus does not burn coal or oil.

The sources of oil that we are using today are often either in difficult to reach places, such as undersea, or in the high Arctic. The oil extracted from these places is expensive. Oil from the middle east, or other places around the world may be a source of money for governments that are anti-democratic or corrupt. Oil from Canada's tar sands may have other environmental costs. Increasing the development of nuclear power may reduce the use of oil from all these sources. Unlike oil, uranium can be sourced in North America, bypassing the possibility of sending money to potentially unfriendly or unpleasant governments.

Reasons against nuclear power

Now that's about all the good stuff I can think of for nuclear power. In my opinion, there are many more reasons to be against nuclear power than to be for it. Before I specifically look at why I don't think the two arguments supporting nuclear power are valid, I will look at other arguments against nuclear power.

Nuclear power is not safe. In just over 30 years three major accidents have caught the world's attention. The most recent, Japan's Fukushima's reactor, is still ongoing. We do not yet know how many have or will die as a result of this disaster. But at Chernobyl, in 1986, hundreds died, and thousands were affected by radiation. The thing about radiation is that there is no safe level.

That doesn't mean we can be absolutely safe. We are exposed to radiation every day. Every place on the planet has natural background radiation. Radioactivity produces energy waves not unlike light waves from the sun. However, some forms of energy waves produced by radioactivity can pass through our bodies. Most of the time, this is harmless, but occasionally, an energy wave passing through a body can hit a strand of DNA, damaging the DNA. In some cases, this can cause the cell to become cancerous. Even sunlight can do this.

But obviously, the more someone is exposed to radiation, the more likely they are to suffer some bad consequences, like cancer. Therefore increasing the radioactivity in the air or water as a result of even tiny leaks from a nuclear power plant will increase the risk of people getting cancer. Often we can't even identify which people were harmed by a radioactive leak; all we can say is that statistically, the cancer rates went up.

Nuclear power is not economical either. Since the costs of a nuclear accident could be so high, insurance companies will not insure a nuclear power plant. Therefore the only organization that can insure a nuclear power plant is the government -- us. We are the insurers of all the nuclear power plants in our country. (Doesn't matter which country you live in.) The government of Japan will have to pay for all the cleanup and damages from the Fukushima accident. They are already raising taxes. The nuclear power industry is already subsidized; government grants, loan guarantees, and other incentives make nuclear power cheaper than it would be if the real costs were calculated. The costs of storing or disposing of wastes are not calculated either. Nuclear waste can be toxic for up to 240,000 years. It must be kept from leaking into the environment for that long. This is an unimaginable time scale from a human perspective.

Greenhouse gasses

Now, let's look at the greenhouse gas issue. Yes, it is true that nuclear plants do not use fossil fuels to generate electricity, as do coal plants, natural gas plants, or oil burning plants. But why not measure the CO2 produced during the many years it takes to build a nuclear power plant? Why not calculate the greenhouse gasses produced by mining, refining, and transporting uranium? These are substantial, as well.

A final thing that should be pointed out when writing about nuclear energy is about who is promoting it. Nuclear power is promoted by very big corporations. It is a very centralized form of energy production. Alternative energy sources are naturally more widely distributed. No one alternative source can answer all of the energy needs the way that oil or nuclear have tried to. Whether you are talking about solar power, wind power, geothermal power, tide power, or small hydroelectric projects, decentralized energy systems are more democratic because they don't require such vast concentrations of capital to come into play. It should be clear that if democracy is really our highest value (and aren't we constantly asking our young people to give up their lives to defend it?) then democracy in energy production should be our model.

What does this need to be a proper essay? For one, it needs some original research. Don't quote me, I'm just a grumpy old anti-nuclear activist. Get some solid statistics from actual organizations that have done research on nuclear power. A persuasive essay must be ... well, persuasive. And it needs an introduction and a conclusion. Here are some suggestions on ways to write a conclusion.

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