Monday, December 30, 2019

The Revolutionary Theory Of Class Struggle - 1796 Words

Benjamin Guerrero Prof. Fatovic / POT 3054 December 7, 2015 Progress through the Struggle Karl Marx, chief characteristic was singleness of purpose, his idea of happiness was to fight and his idea of misery was submission, his inspiration was the rebel slave leader Spartacus, who was a violent gladiator fighting for his freedom. His favorite motto was that â€Å"you must have doubts about everything† and lastly his favorite color was red. Many philosophers interpret the world, but the important thing is to change it and Marx wanted to explain the conditions under which many citizens lived. Since The Soviet Revolution from 1917, almost more than 30 countries have claimed to be inspired by Marx’s philosophy. The revolutionary theory of Class Struggle (PG 220, The Marx - Engels reader) have inspired a chain of revolutions throughout the world, but the Marxists states that have resulted, are not what he advocated for. These new governments were violent, repressive, oppressive and autocratic. One can find the promise of revolution hidden on his most famous and le ngthiest work, his book called Capital; A text that gave catalyst for the chain of ideas that have inspired a world movement. The aim was not for the moral protest but to write a complex, far reaching, interconnected series of books, articles and manifestos. Their aim was not at the moral protest at the evils of capitalism, but as an explanatory analysis of how capitalism actually works, how it came about and how itShow MoreRelatedSocial Conflict and Social Relations: The Marxism Approach1625 Words   |  7 PagesIntroduction Marxism is an approach of societal evaluation that targets societal conflict and class-relations making use of a materialist explanation of historical development, along with a dialectical view of social remodeling. Marxist evaluation uses economic and socio-political examination and applies it to the investigation and evaluation of the development of capitalism and the role of class struggle in systemic economic change (Walicki, 1997). Marxism develops on a materialist knowledge ofRead MorePolitics Is A Struggle For Power880 Words   |  4 Pages The idea that â€Å"politics is a struggle for power† is correct in relation to the theories of German sociologist and historian Karl Marx (1818-1883). The Marxist perception describes that power in a society is limited and defined by class structures. This theory details how power is primarily placed with the owners and managers of economic production (referred to as the bourgeoisie). As such, the struggles for power and its relation to politics are separated into how the proletariat and the bourgeoisieRead MoreThe Eighteenth Brumaire Of Louis Bonaparte Essay1539 Words   |  7 Pagessharp intensifications of class antagonisms in modern bourgeois society, which is the central idea of the theory of revolutionary change presented in the Communist Manifesto. Therefore, his analysis in the Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte allows us to understand how his theory bears out in practice. However, in the latter text, Marx also made some adjustments to his theory. He went from a simple, bifurcate model consisting of only a dominating class and a dominated class to a more sophisticatedRead MoreAdvantages And Disadvantages Of The French Revolution880 Words   |  4 PagesBonaparte took over the government in France and created a monarchy, regressing society rather than progressing. There was also lack of leadership among the classes which prevented the revolutionaries from organizing successful movements and effective strategies. The revolutionaries did not have an army as skilled and disciplined as the government which also put them at a disadvantage. The revolution started in urban areas so citizens living in rural areas were unaware about the reasons for revoltingRead MoreThe Manifesto Of The Communist Party Essay1526 Words   |  7 Pageseconomist, sociologist, and political revolutionary. When Karl Marx moved to Paris in 1843, he met Engels and together they both worked on several essays. However, Marx and Engels are best known for their revolutionary writings around the concept of Communism. Marx attained his primary intellectual influences from the work of G.W.F Hegel. Hegel’s main theory describes history as a process in which the world becomes conscious of itself as spirit. Marx furthered this theory and argues that man becomes consciousRead MoreDifferent Ideologies in Marx and Engels Communist Manifesto1085 Words   |  5 PagesCommunism movements were revolutionary or proletarian movements that were inspired by the ideas of Marxism concerning the social inequality that was a major concern in the 19th century. These revolutions aimed at replacing the then dominant capitalist era with socialism. Communism was driven by the ideas of Marx and suggested that the workers of the world were to be united and free themselves from the capitalist oppression, and this was to create a world run by the working class (Marx, Philip and FriedrichRead MoreDefining the Concept of Revolution804 Words   |  3 Pagesconsists of so many different struggles, challenges, bloodshed, complications as well as victory. Revolution refers to a fundamental change in power or governmental structures thats takes place in a comparatively short period of time. Revolutions have been taking place throughout most of human history. Many of these revolutions have its simmilarites and differences. This essay will focus on the Russian Revolution with the help of discussing two theoretical revolutionary approaches by Marx and Max WeberRead MoreCommunist Manifesto By Marx Engels1031 Words   |  5 PagesCommunist Manifesto presents an analytical approach to the class struggle (historical and present) and the problems of capitalism. I am more like concerning on bourgeoisie and proletarians. The reason I interested in this section because it introduces and explains the final conflict between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. Tucker (1978) states: The proletariat goes through various stages of development. With its birth begins its struggle with the bourgeoisie. At first the contest is carried onRead MoreWhat Is Socialism?780 Words   |  4 Pagessociety restructured according to the working-class principle of solidarity. It means an economy of democratic planning, based on common ownership of the means of production, a high level of technology, education, culture and leisure, economic equality, no material privileges for officials, and accountability. Beyond the work necessary to ensure secure material comfort for all, it means the maximum of individual liberty and autonomy. Working-class socialism - counterposed by Marx and Engels toRead MoreRussia s Revolutionary Fabric : Lenin1599 Words   |  7 PagesRussia’s Revolutionary Fabric: Lenin Lenin believed in a distinctly violent revolutionary ideology. Lenin claimed that he strictly followed Marxism, yet his policies and actions did not reflect it. One need only to read Lenin’s What is to be Done? and contrast it with Marx’s The Manifesto of the Communist Party to note the stark differences between their ideologies. Lenin believed that the working class could not reach class consciousness – the realization that capitalism exploits the working class --

Sunday, December 22, 2019

Intern At The Duquesne Light Company - 1680 Words

During the spring semester of 2016, I was fortunate enough have the opportunity to intern at the Duquesne Light Company in downtown Pittsburgh. During the course of my internship, I had the title of IT intern while working in the IT Department, specifically IT Planning Control. In IT Planning Control, we are responsible in a more managerial capacity. My supervisors oversee the business side of the IT, budgets, billing tools, and general business oversight. During my time there, I worked on a day to day basis with Patti Weiss, my other main supervisor was David Wolfe, who is part of the IT Leadership Team. During my internship, I was given multiple opportunities that allowed for me to both work in teams and independently, giving me a†¦show more content†¦It was definitely one of the more rewarding experiences to see my work go to use. It was also a huge help with my own personal understanding of database modeling and database structures. I feel that through this knowledge, I could definitely have a higher comfort level in a role that relied on a good amount of database knowledge. Another one of the tasks that I got to take on had to deal with our lease agreements. At Duquesne Light, we use various cell tower sites to attach our own equipment that picks up readings from meters, and then bounces those readings back to a data center. In order to attach our equipment, we pay leases to various companies that own the spaces that we use. The majority of our leases are paid on a yearly basis, but some of them are paid on a monthly basis. Up until now, we had only had our files semi-decently organized files put away into the filing cabinets and scattered throughout a network drive with very little organization. Because of this lack of organization, we were paying many of our lease agreements past their due dates and forcing us to incur late fees on top of our payments. I took on the task of organizing these files and setting up a payment schedule inside of our company SharePoint, which was being far underused. I had to go through and check the payment dates and find out when they were supposed to be paid, organize them in an offline backup, and take them online to SharePoint. By doing this, we have been able to avoid paying

Saturday, December 14, 2019

Should Batman Kill the Joker Free Essays

Should Batman kill the Joker? Have you noticed that in DC Comics Batman would always catch the Joker and send him to jail, but every single time the Joker would just escape and cause more harm to people. Since the Joker has killed and harmed so many people why doesn’t the Batman just kill him? Many people would agree that he should kill the Joker because it would end the suffering of so many lives, but Batman has his own philosophy; he believes that if he were to kill it would make him no better than the murderous criminals he has sworn to put away. Batman should not kill the Joker because like everyone else he is just another citizen of the city, and if one citizen were to kill another that would be murder even the Batman has to abide by that law. We will write a custom essay sample on Should Batman Kill the Joker? or any similar topic only for you Order Now Batman is also known as the billionaire bachelor Bruce Wayne and his sense of justice began to develop because of an event that happened when he was a child. Bruce watched his parents get shot during a robbery in an alley outside of a theater when he was very young; it was never a mugging because the robber never physically touched them which meant that they were murdered. If Batman were to kill the Joker it would make him no different than the robber that murdered his parents. One life is just as valuable as any other and as evil as the Joker is he has just as much of a right to exist as any other person due to the simple fact that he’s a human life. Batman’s mission in life is to avenge his parents’ death by ensuring no other child would ever suffer the same fate that he did by getting rid of all the corruption and evil in Gotham City. Batman has his own way of dealing with criminals and while he may break the law, he still respects it. Every man is entitled to due process no matter how many times he breaks the law. By killing the Joker Batman would prove all his detractors right by becoming as dangerous as his enemies. When Batman isn’t fighting crime he is just like any other person and just because he has a costume on it doesn’t make it right for him to murder someone. The law states that you will receive punishment for murder; it doesn’t matter if the person killed was good or bad. If Batman were to kill the Joker and get away with it then everyone could just put on an outfit, cover their faces, and murder each other. Just because someone has done something wrong it does not make it right for a normal person to kill him. Batman is not the justice system of Gotham. In fact, he has made it clear that he is merely the man who delivers the bad guys to Commissioner Gordon. The only reason that the Joker is still alive is because the justice system simply wouldn’t punish the Joker for what he has done. If the judges would just put a death sentence on him then he wouldn’t be able to escape and harm more people. The Joker has killed several thousand people, enough to get the death sentence a million times over, but the court is too obsessed on the fact that a guy dressed as a bat was the one who apprehended him. In the end Batman should just capture the Joker, bring him to the judge, and the judge should just give Joker the death sentence. How to cite Should Batman Kill the Joker?, Essay examples

Friday, December 6, 2019

Letter to Pedro, U.S. Citizen, Also Called Pete free essay sample

Who is the one speaking in the poem, or who is the persona? The persona in the poem by Rene Estella Ampere represents one who has taken notice of the contemporary problems In his hometown. 2. Who Is the persona speaking to? The writer of the letter Is speaking to Pedro/ Pete, his old friend whom he had shared plenty of childhood memories with. They both burled a cat, Simenon, together. They shot birds with slingshots In the summer. Pedro/ Pete Is now an American. 3. Who or what is the subject of the personas speech? And what is the purpose of the personas speaking to his addressee?According to (Logrolling Alumina, 2008), the persona talked about the socio-political problems of their hometown. He wrote to Pedro to inform him of the developments that were taking place in the town and how these advancements altered the simplicity and beauty of the town and affected the townsfolk. We will write a custom essay sample on Letter to Pedro, U.S. Citizen, Also Called Pete or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page He mentioned the destruction of the forests to make way for the feeder road and how this event in the modernization of their town affected the farmers. He also revealed the vices that the farmers were slaves to. He cited the behavior the people displayed In church. He flippantly discussed how women became more acquisitive.He was also able to imply that colonial mentality was operative In the minds of the people when he stated remember us to your American wife, you lucky bastard and P. S. Tasty, the old goat, Sends your lizard his warmest congratulations. The persona also meant to confront the problems at hand. 4. How does the personas language make us experience the poem in a sensually and emotionally intelligent way? The persona writes the letter very simply just like one from the province would. His wording is quite conversational. One may imply that he was indeed talking to an old friend whom he knew very well (http:// doormats. Multiply. Com/).

Thursday, November 28, 2019

Organizational Structure Essays (1207 words) - Management

Organizational Structure Organizational Structure Andrea Guadiana MGT230 June 17, 2014 Jay Tusten Organizational Structure Zale Corporation is multifaceted and operates under more than one name. Zale is among the largest jewelry retailers of America. They sell diamonds, gemstones, Silver and Gold jewelry, watches and costume jewelry over 1,100 stores and over 600 kiosks. They also have stores operating in Puerto Rico and Canada. Zale targets the value-oriented type of customer and high quality products with phenomenal customer service. These are Gordon's Jewelers, the flagship chain Zales Jewelers, and Piercing Pagoda. They also have nearly 150 outlet stores. In Canada, they opened approximately 200 stores which are Peoples Jewellers and Mappins Jewellers. Zale also operates websites where they sell their jewelry online. They have six online retail brands. These include their main online store, zales.com and their discount store, zalesoutlet.com. Gordon Jewelers also operates online via gordonsjewelers.com. Canadas Peoples Jewellers and Piercing Pagoda also have their retails brands, peoplesjewellers.com and pagoda.com. Insurance is even offered for in-store and on-line purchases at an additional cost. Zales functional organizational structure is unique and different from the type of divisional structure of department stores such as JC Penny and Sears or the matrix type of organization of Wal-Mart. Zale's is owned and ran by a distinct group of executive directors. The group consists of the following: chief executive officer, chief administrative officer, executive vice president, chief merchant and sourcing officer, executive vice president, chief marketing officer, senior vice president of merchandise planning and allocation, senior vice president of financial products, senior vice president and chief information officer ,senior vice president and chief financial officer, senior vice president of supply chain, senior vice president and chief of stores officer, senior vice president of human resources and customer service, senior vice president of real estate, senior vice president and general manager of Piercing Pagoda. That is not all. Each Senior VP also has their individual te ams. Their teams include vice presidents, directors and their subordinates. Each employee is selected based on their skills, knowledge, and experience of the role they are hired to fill. One of Zales competitors, JC Penny (JCP) follows a different corporate structure. Their organization is more of a divisional type of structure. JCP has a board of directors. There are twelve executive directors; one executive for each division within the company. Each division consists of a marketing, finance, and operations department. Unlike Zale, JCP sells a plethora of different goods. An organization that uses a hybrid structure is Wal-Mart. A hybrid combines the key elements of a functional and divisional structure. Wal-Mart sells even more different types of good than JCP. Wal-Mart crossed the retail boundaries and offers consumers the convenience of having one store to do practically all of their shopping. A Wal-Mart customer has the option of buying groceries, electronics, jewelry, house wares, clothing, and even automotive goods. Wal-Marts organizational structure is unique because they do not have just one CEO, they have nine; one for each division. This includes 21 executives, and five Senior Presidents. Since Wal-Mart has a broad, global market, their divisions must be broken into areas of specialty with one leader per each division. Zales organization structure breaks down in to six departments, each with their different functions. The first of these is the merchandising department. The merchandising department has one Vice President and six merchant teams who carefully select which products get sent out to stores to be put on the shelves for customers to purchase. The second department is Sourcing. In the sourcing department there is one Vice President and two directors who each have a team. Sourcing deals mainly with manufacturing. This department keeps track of all orders as well as profits and losses, searches for and negotiates the lowest costs of components, and serves as the main line of communication between merchants and vendors. The next department is marketing. The marketing department consists of the vice president and two directors. Then there are eight additional employees that work underneath them. Although Zale serves a variety of demographics, yet maintaining a professional and polished appearance is very important to the company. Most of Zales advertising is done through mail, yet email communications are also used. The next department is finance.

Monday, November 25, 2019

The Comparison Between the Two Different International Editions of Vogue Magazine

The Comparison Between the Two Different International Editions of Vogue Magazine Due to the ongoing process of Globalization, the contents of the most popular media-products are now becoming increasingly uniformed. This simply could not be otherwise, because the earlier mentioned process presupposes standardization. In its turn, the latter allows companies to substantially increase the extent of their commercial effectiveness.Advertising We will write a custom research paper sample on The Comparison Between the Two Different International Editions of Vogue Magazine specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More As Vrontis, Thrassou and Lamprianou pointed out: â€Å"The experiences of a growing number of multinational companies suggest that there are potential gains to be obtained by standardizing marketing practices† (480). At the same time, however, it is now becoming increasingly clear to marketing managers that, in order for a particular media-product to appeal to the targeted audience, it must be psychologically attu ned to how the audience members tend to perceive the surrounding socio-cultural reality. This creates objective preconditions for the media-products’ content to be semiotically consistent with what happened the specifics of an ethno-cultural affiliation, on the part of potential consumers. After all, today’s psychologists are thoroughly aware of the fact that it is namely the particulars of how one positions itself, in the ethno-cultural sense of this word, which defines the concerned individual’s existential mode more than anything else does. Therefore, it does not come as a particular surprise that, as of today, marketing strategies utilized by the owners of transnational media-corporations in different parts of the world, do take into consideration the discursively relevant aspects of the targeted audiences’ cultural uniqueness. In this respect, we can only agree with Sinclair and Wilken, who noted that: â€Å"While the economic logic of globalization might impel global marketers to seek the theoretical advantages of standardization, experience with the realities of linguistic and other cultural differences has obliged them to go some distance towards the ‘glocalization’ of their marketing campaigns† (147). In this paper, I will explore the validity of the earlier suggestion at length, while analyzing the discursive significance of the visual and textual messages, explicitly/implicitly conveyed by the covers of the UK and the US editions of Vogue Magazine (February, 2010). The most easily identified difference between the two covers is that, whereas, the US cover depicts a clearly Caucasian model (Jessica Biel), the UK cover depicts a model (Cheryl Cole) that can be best identified as a someone who has been born in the multiracial family. In fact, on the magazine’s cover, the latter appears to be at least partially Pakistani, in the ethno-cultural sense of this word.Advertising Looking for resea rch paper on communications media? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More In its turn, this can be explained by the specifics of how the policy of multiculturalism is being implemented in the US, on the one hand, and in the UK, on the other. Whereas, in the US, the policy of the multiculturalism enjoys a rather semi-official status, in Britain it is in fact being enforced upon citizens. Moreover, whereas, in the U.S., the representatives of racial minorities do not exercise enough political influence, in order to be able to directly affect the process of the country’s domestic and foreign policies being designed and implemented, this is far from being the case in the UK. After all, it does not represent much of a secret that, as of today, a growing number of British socially prominent intellectuals, as well as religious figures, does support the adoption of the Islamic Sharia Law, as the British jurisprudence’s integ ral part (Rodgers and Lindsey 8). This, of course, suggests that, due to the essence of demographic dynamics within the British society, the UK is on the path of becoming increasingly ‘traditional’ country, where more and more citizens are willing to affiliate themselves with the values of the religion-based morality. Partially, this explains the apparent dichotomy between the postures of the depicted models on the covers of the US and the UK editions of Vogue. For example, the cover-photo of Jessica Biel implies that the depicted model is an intellectually liberated woman, who is thoroughly comfortable with taking an active stance in life. This is because, as it can be seen on the cover, she is being represented in the manner that stresses out her emotional comfortableness with what happened to be her existential self-identity of a person, unaffected by the conventions of the ‘traditional’ morality. These conventions presuppose that women should present th emselves as essentially timid creatures, who can only realize their full potential while in the relationship with men. Yet, while understanding perfectly well the sheer power of her feminine charms, Biel does not seem to be willing to fetishize them, as if she wanted to say: â€Å"I am an independent woman and I am proud to be what I am†. This is the reason why Biel’s image conveys the subtle message of ‘liberation’ – the woman in question clearly thinks that there so much more to her individuality than merely her good looks.Advertising We will write a custom research paper sample on The Comparison Between the Two Different International Editions of Vogue Magazine specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More The same, however, cannot be said about the photographic image of Cheryl Cole, featured on the cover of the UK edition of Vogue. After all, there can be only a few doubts as to the fact that the manner in wh ich she has been photographed, implies her affiliation with the traditional virtues of womanhood, commonly associated with the notions of timidness, passiveness and shyness. The very defensive manner, in which Cole holds her hands (as if she wanted to protect its innate existential essence), suggests that on a subconscious level, she is aware of her own fragility, as an individual. At the same time, however, she appears to be simultaneously aware of the fact that it is specifically men, who can help her to realize the full extent of its existential potential – hence, the strongly defined spirit of a sexual seductiveness, emanated by the UK cover of Vogue. In this respect, Cole’s cover-image does seem to be discursively consistent with Weininger’s suggestion that: â€Å"A woman does not value herself by the constancy and freedom of her personality†¦ (she) can only value herself at the rate of the man who has fixed his choice on her† (123). It is needl ess to mention, of course, that there are male-chauvinistic overtones to the above quoted suggestion. Yet, they resonate perfectly well with how monotheistic religions (such as Christianity and Islam) used to treat women. Given the fact that, as it was pointed out earlier, Britain is on the way of becoming nothing less of a quasi-Islamic state, it makes a logical sense for the UK-based publishers of Vogue to strive to appeal to the religion-driven aesthetic tastes of British Muslims, which will soon attain the status of the country’s actual ethic majority. The legitimacy of this idea can also be illustrated, in regards to what appear to be the qualitative aspects of how both models are dressed. For example, as it can be seen on the US cover of Vogue, Biel wears a man’s shirt and a denim-costume. In its turn, this signifies even further the depicted model’s emotional comfortableness with the idea that women are not restricted to wearing only ‘gender-appropr iate’ attires. The reason for this is simple denim-fabrics, in general, and jeans, in particular, have traditionally been associated with the masculine virtue of industriousness (Woodward and Miller 7). Therefore, by willing to wear clothes made out of denim, women unconsciously exhibit their subliminal desire to cease being subjected to a patriarchal oppression, the important element of which has always been prescribing the representatives of a ‘weak sex’ to refrain from putting on these kind of clothes. Despite the fact that, as we have noted earlier, the religions of Christianity and Islam are equally oppressive towards women, in the US, the majority of Christians cannot be referred as ‘true believers’, in the classical sense of this word. One of the reasons for that that, as of today, the religion of Christianity in Western countries has ceased affecting people’s lives de facto, because the sheer fallaciousness of this religion’s d ogmas is clear to even moderately bright Whites.Advertising Looking for research paper on communications media? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More One of the reasons for this is that, due to its outdatedness, the Christian code of behavioral ethics no longer correlates with what happened to be the cognitive aspirations of modern people (Rawls 95).  Because in the US, fundamental Christians consist of intellectually marginalized outcasts, they are not in the position to apply any pressure upon those women who refuse to share their male-chauvinistic religious nonsense. The same can be said about Islamic fundamentalists in the US – the FBI is keeping them on a short leash. This is why, Biel’s decision to appear on the cover of Vogue, while wearing a denim-outfit, appears fully justified – she never had a reason to be trying to appease conservatively minded citizens, in the first place. In Britain, the situation in this respect is quite different. Because this country can no longer be considered thoroughly secularized, non-religious British citizens are now being unofficially required to refrain from positio ning themselves as intellectually liberated individuals, as the growing population of Muslims in this country may find it offensive. The validity of this statement can be well illustrated in regards to the recent incident of the British soldier Lee Rigby having been decapitated on the streets of London by the Muslim believer Michael Adebolajo in broad daylight. In the aftermath, high-ranking officials from the British army advised British soldiers not to wear a uniform, when they are off-duty, in order not to anger Muslims (Shiv 9). In my opinion, the earlier described socio-cultural situation in Britain partially explains the particulars of Cole’s appearance on the cover of the UK edition of Vogue. After all, as it can be well seen on it, even though she wears a clearly feminine yellow dress, due to being ‘lose’, it effectively conceals the model’s bodily curves. Yet, this is exactly what Muslim women’s traditional dresses are supposed to do, so th at when looking at women in these dresses, men do not get overly excited and consequently refrain from considering to commit the sin of adultery.  Nevertheless, it is not only the visual subtleties of the discussed Vogue-covers that hint at the specifics of the cultural climate in the affiliated countries, but the textual ones, as well. For example, in the left upper corner of the US cover, we can read: â€Å"Not in the mood? The quest for a female Viagra†. It is needless to mention, of course, that the pharmaceutical term ‘Viagra’ has the clearly defined undertones of masculinity, as the drug in question was designed specifically for enhancing men’s sexual potency. In its turn, the notion of male sexuality cannot be discussed outside of how men go about adopting a particularly active stance, while looking for female sex-partners and having sexual intercourses with them. Therefore, the combination of the words ‘female’ and ‘Viagra†™ implies that women who are cognitively comfortable with it, do not necessarily think that passivity/submissiveness accounts for the integral element of their lifestyles – quite on the contrary. Given the fact that ever since the time of its founding, the US remained an essentially secularized state (the country’s Constitution proclaims the separation between Church and State), it is not surprising that in this country, even moderately religious women do support the idea that it is fully appropriate, on their part, to explore their sexuality actively. In this respect, the situation in the UK is quite different. After all, the UK Constitution openly states that Protestantism is even today considered the country’s state-religion (Madeley 275). Partially, this explains why, as compared to what it happened to be the case with American women, British women have traditionally been deemed much more ‘classy’ – that is, more passive and shy in thei r relationships with men. The latter presupposes that, as compared to American women, British women are much merely likely to overlook the discursively derogative sounding of a number of terms, to which they are being exposed, such as ‘chic’, for example. Predictably enough, one of the topics, advertised on the cover of the UK edition of Vogue, features the word ‘chic’ rather prominently: â€Å"Office chic. New weekday wardrobe†. Even though that this term means ‘style’, it clearly resonates with the word ‘chick’, which is a slang-word that derived out of the notion of ‘chicken’ – hence, degrading women, as being somewhat less human. There is, however, even more to it – because the mentioned topic features the word ‘chic’ in conjunction with the word ‘weekday’, the combination of these two words implies that the physiological specifics of women’s gender-affiliation, makes them less adequate, in the professional sense of this word. After all, this topic implicitly suggests that, even when addressing their professional duties (during the course of weekdays), women never cease remaining solely concerned with the matter of their physical appearance.  Essentially the same line of argumentation can be used, when it comes to discussing the discursive significance of other topics, mentioned on the covers of the UK and the US editions of Vogue. For example, one of the topics on the cover of the US edition of this magazine state: â€Å"Clothing to borrow from your boyfriend†. Apparently, it never occurred to those who came up with this topic that there could be anything wrong about women wearing men’s clothes. The reason for this is quite apparent – the very secularized realities of a post-industrial living in America naturally predispose women to think of the extent of a particular clothing-item’s appropriateness, as such, that reflects its functional subtleties. Why not to wear men’s shirts or trousers, if the circumstances call for it?  The same thought, however, would probably never occur to British women. This is because, being traditionally minded, they tend to deal with life-challenges indirectly – that is, they tend to rely upon men, when it comes to addressing these challenges. Therefore, as opposed to what it happened to be the case with their rationally minded American counterparts, the majority of British women believes that it is namely their feminine charms, which allow them to advance in life more than anything else does. Hence, the meaning of the question: â€Å"Can you live without mascara?†, featured on the cover of the UK edition of Vogue – the fact that this question is clearly rhetorical, suggests that it is quite impossible for women to enjoy living, while sparred of the opportunity to apply a makeup to their faces. Apparently, the article’s a uthor was perfectly aware of what happened to the innermost essence of British women’s subliminal anxieties, in this respect. Given what has been said earlier in the paper, these do appear to be dialectically predetermined.  There is another topic, featured on the cover of the US edition of Vogue, which can be discussed, as such that reflects American women’s tendency to indulge in pursuits, which have been traditionally been ‘assigned’ to men: â€Å"Close encounter. The tale of an almost adulteress†. This topic suggests that the publishers of the US edition of Vogue do realize what accounts for the actual nature of female sexuality, as such that is being physiologically rather than socially defined. This is because the suggestion that it is indeed possible for women to enter into the adulterous relationship with men implies that, contrary to what many women themselves tend to think, their sexual desires are being just as strong, as compared to th e ones of men. What it means is that a particular woman’s ability to enjoy sex as much as she wants, does not solely depend on whether she happened to possess good looks or not, but also on whether she is committed enough to end up in bed with the man she covets (Musser 23). It is needless to mention, of course, that this subtly conveyed suggestion parts away with the conventions of the religion-based patriarchal morality, which objectualize women. Therefore, we can well speculate that this topic’s prominent display on the US cover of Vogue signifies the validity of the idea that the American society is indeed more progressive than the British one – at least in respect of how it treats women. Had this not been the case, the UK cover of Vogue would not feature topics that do advocate the legitimacy of women’s willingness to objectualize themselves, as something fully appropriate. Yet, this is clearly not the case. For example, the topic seen in the UK cove r’s bottom right corner, states: â€Å"What it takes to get a supermodel’s body?†. This topic implies both: The measure of a particular woman’s de facto worthiness is solely concerned with her physical looks It is entirely appropriate for women to strive to be as thin, as possible, so that they would be in a position to successfully marry off, and to consequently attain the dubious happiness of pursuing the lifestyle of a pretty but brainless ‘doll’ – at the expense of being unable to give birth to healthy children. After all, it does not represent any secret for physicians that unnaturally skinny women (such as supermodels) do experience troubles at childbirth. Yet, male-chauvinistic societies could not care less about women’s physical well-being, but only about whether women can serve men as sexual toys, which is why in these societies; women are encouraged to take part in the ‘discourse of thinness’ (Neff 10). Therefore, the earlier mentioned topic can well serve as an indication of the fact that, despite its formal affiliation with the dogmas of political correctness, the British society remains rather oppressive towards women.  Quite clearly, this is not being the case in America, where women are being encouraged to explore their existential uniqueness, without paying too much attention to what happened to their actual physical shape. As another topic, featured on the US cover (‘The refreshingly real Jessica Biel’) suggests, it is namely the depicted model’s intellectual open-mindedness, reflected by the woman’s comfortableness with being who she is, which deserved her the right to appear in this particular edition of Vogue. It is understood, of course, that Biel is indeed sexy. However, what adds more than anything else does to the aura of sexiness, emanated by the model, is that, as it was mentioned earlier, her very posture implies that she has no psychol ogical complexes, whatsoever, in regards to being a thoroughly modern woman. In the UK edition of Vogue, however, the notion of modernity appears subtly ostracized, as one of the featured topics does encourage readers to adopt a cyclic outlook on what accounts for the essence of historical dynamics: â€Å"The return of 60’s glamour†.  Even though that as a ‘thing in itself’, this particular topic is best referred to as ideologically neutral, there are strongly defined discursive connotations to it, because it implies that it is possible for the ‘past’ to return. Because there are indeed a number of good reasons to believe that the British society is undergoing the initial phase of the process of deindustrialization/clericalization (induced by the ‘invasion’ of Muslims), we can refer to the mentioned topic, as such that is being metaphysically consistent with the society’s ongoing qualitative transformation. As it was stat ed in the Introduction, in regards to the covers of the UK and the US editions of Vogue, there is indeed a good rationale in believing that Globalization does result in the standardization of the media products’ content. The very laws of a historical progress predetermine this state of affairs. Nevertheless, the culturally defined specifics of how the members of targeted audiences tend to perceive the surrounding reality, do affect this content’s societal implications. Therefore, even though that the US and the UK based editions of Vogue do feature themes and motifs that the magazine’s publishers consider being potentially appealing to women, the discursive significance the covered topics cannot be discussed outside of what account for the specifics of the socio-cultural climate in America and Britain. This once again exposes the fallaciousness of those sociological theories that treat humanity in terms of a homogeneous compound, consisted of the representatives of Homo Sapiens species. Apparently, one’s ethno-cultural affiliation does affect the concerned individual’s cognitive inclinations rather substantially. I believe that this conclusion is fully consistent with the paper’s initial thesis. Madeley, John. â€Å"Unequally Yoked: The Antinomies of Church-State Separation in  Europe and the USA.† European Political Science 8.3 (2009): 273-288. Print. Musser, Jamilla. â€Å"On the Orgasm of the Species: Female Sexuality, Science and  Sexual Difference.† Feminist Review 102 (2012): 1-20. Print. Neff, Jack. â€Å"Study: Stick to Skinny Models for Fat Profits.† Advertising Age 79.30  (2008): 4-28. Print. Rawls, Anne. Epistemology and Practice: Durkheims ‘The Elementary Forms of  Religious Life’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Print. Rodgers, Melissa and Cheryl Lindsey. â€Å"United Kingdom: Archbishop of  Canterbury Advocates Sharia for Britain.† Off Our B acks 37.4 (2007): 8-9. Print. Shiv, Malik. â€Å"Woolwich Aftermath: I am a soldier, Adebolajo Tells Old Bailey  Hearing.† The Guardian 6 Jun. 2013: 9. Print. Sinclair, John and Rowan Wilken. â€Å"Strategic Regionalization in Marketing  Campaigns: Beyond the Standardization/Glocalization Debate.† Continuum: Journal of Media Cultural Studies 23.2 (2009): 147-157. Print. Vrontis, Demetris; Thrassou, Alkis and Iasonas Lamprianou. â€Å"International  Ã‚  Marketing Adaptation versus Standardization of Multinational Companies.† International Marketing Review 26.4/5 (2009): 477-500. Print. Weininger, Otto 1906, Sex Character. PDF file. Web. Woodward, Sophie and Daniel.Miller. â€Å"Unraveling Denim: Introduction.† Textile:  The Journal of Cloth Culture 9.1 (2011): 6-10. Print.

Thursday, November 21, 2019

Planning for Project Implementation Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Planning for Project Implementation - Term Paper Example It is evidently clear from the discussion that the upgrading project of Bayshore community hospital could be faced by numerous challenges which could hinder the success of the project. These barriers could be identified as discussed below. Financing – the project shall be fully financed by the hospital. Though a provisional budget with estimations has been drawn, the years following the beginning of the project shall be financed from cash generated from the project. The projected cash inflow might fail to reach the projected levels; hence financial constraints. The hospital shall undertake intensive marketing for the project to ensure generation of enough capital for the project. The hospital shall also consider borrowing from the financial institution to avoid project failure. Staffing – the intended project might face staff shortage because of the activities involved. During the early stages, the project management team shall undertake training of several hospital sta ff to ensure conformity with the project. This will ensure that the employees remain informed about the project and its details. During implementation, other staff shall be hired for the project to ensure full staffing requirements for the project. Schedule – another barrier which could present surmountable challenge would be the schedule. The time allocated for numerous activities might become limited if problems occur midway. Though this might become inevitable, the project management team shall utilize the developed time budget for the project. During implementation, continuous monitoring shall occur to ensure conformity with the provided time deadlines and schedules. Evaluation of procedures shall be conducted throughout the project life to establish conformity with a schedule.

Wednesday, November 20, 2019

How Nurses Can Improve Nutritional Safety Research Paper

How Nurses Can Improve Nutritional Safety - Research Paper Example Monitoring of Patients †¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦..11 v. Replacement Meals†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦..12 Conclusion†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦..13 References†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦...14 Key Terms Standards: Refers to a level of quality against which performance can be measured. Protected Meal times: Described as protected uninterrupted time to focus on providing an environmen t conducive to eating, when there are no clinical interventions and all staff focus on people’s nutritional needs Screening: Refers to the process of identifying patients already malnourished or at the risk of becoming malnourished. Assessment: Refers to a more detailed process than screening where a range of specific methods are employed to identify and quantify impairment of. nutritional status. Nutritional needs or requirements: These are indispensable nutritional individual demands. Crockery: refers to tableware, eating and serving dishes collectively. Utensils: refers to implements for practical use; especially in a household. Introduction Nutrition and food experience are imperial to a patient. Not only is food essential for life and symbolizes a basic human right, but It is also a basis for extensive enjoyment, with vital social, religious and cultural roles all of which require deliberation within a health care unit. The provision of food and nutritional care in healt h care centers is a complex field of service and is the obligation of many members of the hospital team. This is a varied team that consists of the clinical staff: nurses, doctors, midwives, speech and language therapists, dieticians, domestic and catering health care assistants, and therapy assistants. For patients to get high quality service and get optimum benefit from food, all the members of the health care unit must work together and must â€Å"do their bit† in partnership with the caretakers. Nurses offer nursing services 24 hours a day, and for this reason, nurses are the only group in a health care center who have direct contact with the patient during meal times and any other time of the day. Therefore, nurses play an essential role in nutritional care and meal experience of the patients. Nurses have a broad obligation in a hospital. Their responsibilities include assessment planning, screening, serving, monitoring, practical assistance with drinking and eating and on occasion, preparation of food in the ward area. Nurses are answerable for their practice in the hospital in all facets of nutritional care, provision of food and drinks. Nurses should deliver services and care to the highest standard possible. Nurses and midwives in the United States are committed offering the best possible care and treatment to patients. As the health workers who spend most of the time with the patients, nurses have an enormous possibility to improve patient safety in relation to nutrition care, drinking and eating. This potency can only be realized by focusing on improving aspects of food, fluid and nutritional

Monday, November 18, 2019

Assignment 2 Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 2

2 - Assignment Example uence on children could not meet the case to label the photograph as "obscene", as there is partial display of genital hair and the photograph was pasted in Oncore premises, where children do not go. The most imperative reason to pursue Kathys argument and to conclude that the photographs, the art work are not obscene encompasses its social rationale. The photograph had a purpose, a motive to generate civic awareness about the safe sex with an intention to avert the cases of AIDS, one of the most dreaded and incurable diseases of the present epoch. AIDS has emerged as the leading cause of death under forty in Seattle area, hence display of safety measures cannot be considered obscene, it is also in compliance with the definition of material being obscene as per Blacks Law Dictionary. The art work is aimed at homosexual community. "Community standards" involved are those of the gay community rather than city at large. However, Oncore possess clientele of such communities but awareness is equally imperative among general community as well. Kathy pin-pointed homosexuals as they are the frequent visitors at Oncore, but if the issue is related with generating awareness about the safe sex to combat AIDS, then engendering consciousness in the mass is of greater significance. Kathy has shaped her arguments in the most logical and methodological manner by integrating the facts from basic law dictionary to the Mass Media Laws and also incorporated "Contemporary community standards" to reflect on the trustworthiness of the argument. Katy has meticulously placed each and every fact in a practical and coherent manner which are enough to gain the support of readers and audience to a greater extent. Display of obscene photograph which does not abide by the rules and norms set by the "Washington State Liquor Control Board", is again a violation of rules. The photographs were rejected on the basis of "partially exposed private parts of male anatomy". The photograph could not

Saturday, November 16, 2019

Energy Performance of Curtain Wall

Energy Performance of Curtain Wall Introduction Building envelope is used to separate the conditioned and unconditioned environment, the material used in envelop will affect the indoor environment of the building. For a commercial building, the electricity consumption of HVAC system and lighting system is related to the features of the curtain wall system, such as U-value, shading coefficient and visible transmittance. The energy performance of each curtain wall system will be studied in this chapter and it can separate into three sections: 1) U-value and Energy Consumption of HVAC system, 2) Shading Coefficient and Energy Consumption of HVAC system and 3) Visible Transmittance and Energy Consumption of Lighting system. U-value and Energy Consumption of HVAC system According to Bougdah (2009), U-value, a thermal transmittance coefficient, is used to measure the insulation property of a building element. As thermal insulation of curtain wall may affect the energy consumption of the building, the relationship between U-Value and energy consumption of HVAC systems is studied in order to analyze the energy performance of various curtain wall system. Based on table 6.2.1, the relationship between U-value and energy consumption of HVAC systems can be shown. The U-value of curtain wall system is directly proportional to the annual energy consumption of HVAC system. With higher values of U-value, the energy performance of the curtain wall system becomes poorer and it requires more electricity as the heat can more easily transfer from outdoor to indoor. On the contrary, the lower in U-value, curtain wall system can perform better energy consumption in HVAC system. Table 6.2.1 U-value and Energy Performance of HVAC System of Targeted Curtain Wall Figure 6.2.1 Relationship between U-Value and Energy Consumption of HVAC System Figure 6.2.1 demonstrates the directly proportional relationship between U-value and energy consumption of HVAC system obviously. With the saw-tooth pattern of the line chart, there are some types of curtain wall system which have three layers of glazing require more energy than two layers one. It means that there are other factors, such as shading coefficient, which may also affect the energy performance of the HVAC system. The relationship between shading coefficient and annual energy consumption of HVAC system will be discussed in the next section. Shading Coefficient and Energy Consumption of HVAC system According to Ander (2014), the shading coefficient of glass is a measure to determine the solar heat gain through the glazing. Radiation is a method to transfer heat from the outdoor environment to the indoor environment. For commercial buildings with curtain wall system, shading coefficient becomes another major factor that affects the amount of heat transferred to the building. The external envelope of the building is glazing which has lower insulation for heat transmission through radiation. Since the shading coefficient will affect the energy consumption, the relationship of shading coefficient and energy consumption of HVAC system is studied. Based on the table 6.3.1 below, the shading coefficient of curtain wall is directly proportion to the energy consumption of HVAC system. It means that the amount of annual energy consumption of HVAC system becomes higher with a relatively high shading coefficient of curtain wall system. With the lower of the shading coefficient, the lower the energy consumption of HVAC system, less heat transfer from external environment to internal environment. The major factor affected the shading coefficient of curtain wall system is the type of glazing. In this study, clear glasses and tinted glasses are used in various types of curtain wall. Tinted glass is a common glazing that used to construct the curtain wall system and Pfrommer (1995) stated that the tinting can produce various colours, such as green, bronzer and tinted glass can absorb solar radiation and reduce those heat and light transmission. Tinted glass can perform a better energy saving performance compared with clear glass which do not contain any chemicals to absorb radiation. However, the price of curtain wall system with tinted glass is more expensive than clear glass. Besides, the number of layers of curtain wall system is another reason affected the shading coefficient of that curtain wall system. It is easy to understand that the radiation transmission becomes lower with a higher number of layers of curtain wall system. Therefore, triple glazed curtain wall with tinted glass has the lowest annual energy consumption while single glazed curtain wall with clear glass has the highest annual energy consumption. Table 6.3.1 Shading Coefficient and Energy Performance of HVAC System of Targeted Curtain Wall Figure 6.2.1 Relationship between shading coefficient and Energy Consumption of HVAC System From the figure 6.2.1 above, a straight proportional relationship between shading coefficient and annual energy consumption of HVAC system can be identified. Type I triple glazed curtain wall system with spectrally low-e tinted glass which has the lowest shading coefficient has the best performance in annual energy consumption of HVAC system. However, Type A single glazed curtain wall system with clear glass which has the highest shading coefficient has the poorest performance in annual energy consumption of HVAC system. Visible Transmittance and Energy Consumption of Lighting System Apart from the attractive appearance, a high portion of natural lighting is another characteristic of curtain wall system. Unlike other external wall construction, curtain wall systems are constructed by glazing elements and more daylighting can pass through to the indoor environment of the building. Efficient Windows Collaborative (2014) stated that visible transmittance is the amount of light in the visible portion of the light spectrum that passes through glasses and it will be influenced by the glazing type, the number of panels, and any glass coatings. Based on the table 6.4.1 and figure 6.4.1, lighting transmittance is inversely proportional to the annual energy consumption of the lighting system. With a higher value of lighting transmittance, the amount of annual energy consumption of lighting system becomes lower. It means that more visible light transmitted from the external environment to internal environment and the target building can save more energy in lighting system. However, more energy is used in lighting system in case the value of lighting transmittance is in a small value. In this study, two factors affect the lighting transmittance of curtain wall can be identified. The first reason is the number of layers. More layers can increase the thickness of curtain wall, thus less visible daylighting can pass through curtain wall. This is easy to understand that triple glazed curtain wall system blocks more lighting than single glazed curtain wall and double glazed curtain wall system. The second reason is the type of glazi ng. From table 6.4.1, clear glasses always have higher lighting transmittance than tinted glasses. As mentioned above, tinted glasses can reduce light transmission. Although it performs good energy saving in HVAC system, it consumes more energy in lighting system. Table 6.4.1 Visible Transmittance and Energy Performance of Lighting System of Targeted Curtain Wall Figure 6.4.1 Relationship between Visible Transmittance and Annual Energy Consumption of Lighting System From the above figure 6.4.1, the inversely proportional relationship between visible transmittance and annual energy consumption of lighting system is shown. Type I triple glazed curtain wall system with spectrally low-e tinted glass which has the lowest visible transmittance has the poorest performance in annual energy consumption of lighting system. Nevertheless, Type A single glazed curtain wall system with clear glass which has the highest visible transmittance has the best performance in annual energy consumption of lighting system. Overall Performance in Energy Performance After assessment, the performance of each curtain wall system can be assessed. Using the ranking as the score to calculate the performance of curtain wall, curtain wall system with a higher performance score means they perform better in energy consumption of Building A. The performance ranking is converted to score from 1 (the poorest performer) to 10 (the best performer). As around 70% of electricity is consumed by HVAC system normally, the over score is equal to â€Å"HVAC System Score x 70% + Lighting System Score x 30%†. Based on the following table, Type J obtains the highest score in this study, whereas type B obtain the lowest score in this study. Table 6.5.1 Score of Targeted Curtain Wall System Type A Curtain Wall System Type A curtain wall is constructed by single glazed with clear glass. As there is only one layer of glass, the U-value of curtain wall is the lowest. Clear glass used in Type A cannot absorb radiation but it can provide more visible lighting to Building A. From the above reason, Type A obtains the highest score in lighting system and the lowest score in HVAC system. Type B Curtain Wall System Single glazed with tinted glass curtain wall system is similar to Type A curtain wall system. Nevertheless, tinted glass is used in this curtain wall system. Type B curtain wall system has a relatively low shading coefficient and visible transmittance compared with Type A curtain wall system. Type C Curtain Wall System Type C curtain wall system is double glazed with low-e tinted glass. The low-e coating can minimize the amount of ultraviolet and infrared light that pass through glass. As there is air space between two glasses, the U-value of curtain wall is lower than curtain wall system with one layer. And less heat can be transferred from the external environment to the internal environment since tinted glasses can reduce the heat transmittance through radiation. Type D Curtain Wall System Type D curtain wall system is double glazed with low-e clear glass. Compared with Type C, it has better performance in annual energy consumption of lighting system as it has a higher value in visible transmittance. However, clear glass has a poor performance in thermal insulation in which the amount of heat transmitted through radiation is higher than Type C. Type E Curtain Wall System The emissivity level of Type E curtain wall system is lower than 0.1. With a spectrally low-e value, U-value and shading coefficient of the curtain wall system will be reduced and the energy consumption of HVAC system also can be reduced. However, the visible transmittance will be reduced because of the low-e coating. Type F Curtain Wall System Like Type E curtain wall system, it performs a better performance than Type D in saving energy of HVAC system because of spectrally low-e coating. On the contrary, the annual energy consumption of Type F curtain wall system in lighting system is higher than Type D which has the same number of layers as Type E curtain wall system Type G Curtain Wall System Type G curtain wall system is constructed by three layers of tinted glass and its U-value is higher than previous curtain wall systems. It has a better thermal insulation compared to one layer and two layers because of increasing in thickness and number of air space. It ranks no.3 in this assessment because of its low value of shading coefficient and U-value. Type H Curtain Wall System Triple glazed with low-e clear glass has same U-value as Type G. Nevertheless, the visible transmittance of Type H curtain wall system is higher than Type G since Type H curtain wall uses clear glasses which cannot absorb radiation. As mentioned before, the thermal insulation of clear glass is relatively lower than tinted glass used in Type G. Type I Curtain Wall System In this assessment, Type I has the highest score. The emissivity of Type I curtain wall system is lower than 0.1. The U-Value and shading coefficient of Type I are lower than Type G system and it has the best performance in annual energy consumption of HVAC system. Type J Curtain Wall System Triple glazed with spectrally low-e clear glass has a better performance than Type I in the energy consumption lighting system. However, more heat can be transferred to indoor as shading coefficient of clear glasses is higher than Type I. It still ranks no.2 in energy consumption because of three layer glass and spectrally low-e coating of curtain wall. In figure 6.5.1, U-value and shading coefficient are direct proportion to the annual energy consumption of HVAC system and it means that both of them may affect the energy consumption directly. For energy consumption of lighting system, visible transmittance can influence the curtain wall performance. However, an interesting results is identified. The influence of shading coefficient is more obvious compared to U-value. Using Type B and Type D curtain wall system as an example, although Type B and Type D have similar amounts of annual energy consumption in lighting system, the U-value of type B is much higher than type D. It shows that the shading coefficient of curtain wall system is in the first priority during making decision on the types of curtain wall system. Figure 6.5.1 Overall Performance of targeted building in HVAC System

Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Privitization Essay -- essays papers

Privitization Every working American citizen contributes to Social Security. Anyone who has ever held a job has felt the frustration of seeing how much money the government takes out of their paycheck. Being told that we will all be able to collect social security when we can no longer work does not ease the frustration of having 6.2% of our hard earned money taken from us each payday. If individuals could have control of their retirement funds, this frustration could be eased. Being able to control our own retirement funds is an option that is being supported more and more by American workers. Currently, nearly 44 million Americans receive Social Security benefits. Of these 44 million, 61% are retired workers, 17% are survivors of deceased workers, 12% are spouses and children of retired workers, and 10% are disabled workers. Obviously, the major group of Social Security Beneficiaries is retired workers. Since the number of working Americans has not grown along with the number who are retiring, Social Security has become a black hole to the current generation of workers. We will pay into it most of our lives, but will not be able to collect unless a drastic change is made. Everyone has heard the ongoing debate over the past few years about what should be done to reform Social Security. The Social Security Board of Trustees estimates that by the year 2032, Social Security funds will be fully spent. There are several reasons for this, including the retirement of the â€Å"baby boom† generation and the assumption that the U.S. economy will grow at a slower rate than it has been. While republicans and democrats fight over whose plan is better, there is a simple alternative to Social Security: privatization. By making social security a private matter for individuals, everyone can benefit. One of the plans the government is considering includes partial privatization, but it is still centered around a flat tax deducted from the paychecks of American workers. The idea of Social Security is a good one. There are many retired workers who would not make it without Social Security. I have seen it myself. My mother has been in banking for more than 20 years, and during that time I have seen all kinds of people coming in to deposit their Social Security checks. The majority of them are middle class, retired workers, a... ...s. Since 1996, they have received an average annual rate of return of more than 14%. There are some who would argue that too many people might make poor investment choices, and end up going to the government for assistance upon retirement. There is no sure guarantee that this would never happen; however, this has not happened in Chile, Galveston, or San Diego. The purposes of mutual funds is to make a profit with very little risk. By investing into these and other low-risk programs, there is very little chance of people making poor choices that leave them with nothing. The simple fact is that privately owned retirement accounts would produce an income much greater than Social Security provides, and we wouldn’t have to face the problem of running out of money. Real life programs like the ones in Chile, Galveston, and San Diego show how successful Social Security privatization can and would be if only the government would give us the freedom to choose how to protect our future. The current system has failed. It’s just a matter of time until Social Security is bankrupt. It is time for the government to let the people decide how to provide for their own futures.

Monday, November 11, 2019

Technology Implementation

And technology implementation then there would be a lot of leak in the system as well that result in a very severe or drastic problem. In this way it can be say that software programs that developed to resolve a problem needs attention in all these metrics to work upon and to get a better result. If there is a better program written by a programmer who is reliable and portable efficient and of strong functionality then fulfill the better requirement in this case. Whereas if we are talking about the wireless information systems things become more sensitive as we are dealing on real time and gather a lot of security risks. Thats why after applying and implementing rules and regulations and following the standards will get the better resultsafter implementation of these steps architecture to develop a software program is required. When these wireless systems developed then these should cope with the problem fairly on real time. If an architecture of software program is designed in such a way that it is safe for security flexibility and other issues as well. If technology is implemented selected in an improved way then an information system can work well. If there are leaks in the design and programming tactics and technologyimplementation then there would be a lot of leak in the system as well that result in a very severe or drastic problem. In this way it can be say that software programs that developed to resolve a problem needs attention in all these metrics to work upon and to get a better result. If there is a better program written by a programmer who is reliable and portable efficient and of strong functionality then fulfill the better requirement in this case. Whereas if we are talking about the wireless information systems things become more sensitive as we are dealing on real time and gather a lot of security risks. Thats why after applying and implementing rules and regulations and following the standards will get the

Friday, November 8, 2019

Andersonville Prison in the Civil War

Andersonville Prison in the Civil War The Andersonville prisoner of war camp, which operated from  February 27, 1864, until the end of the American Civil War  in 1865, was one of the most notorious in U.S. history. Underbuilt, overpopulated, and continuously short on supplies and clean water, it was a nightmare for the nearly 45,000 soldiers who entered its walls. Construction In late 1863, the Confederacy found that it needed to construct additional prisoner of war camps to house captured Union soldiers waiting to be exchanged. As leaders discussed where to place these new camps, former Georgia governor, Major General Howell Cobb stepped forward to suggest the interior of his home state. Citing southern Georgias distance from the front lines, relative immunity to Union cavalry raids, and easy access to railroads, Cobb was able to convince his superiors to build a camp in Sumter County. In November 1863, Captain W. Sidney Winder was dispatched to find a suitable location. Arriving at the tiny village of Andersonville, Winder found what he believed to be an ideal site. Located near the Southwestern Railroad, Andersonville possessed transit access and a good water source. With the location secured, Captain Richard B. Winder (a cousin to Captain W. Sidney Winder) was sent to Andersonville to design and oversee the construction of the prison. Planning a facility for 10,000 prisoners, Winder designed a 16.5-acre rectangular compound that had a stream flowing through the center. Naming the prison Camp Sumter in January 1864, Winder used local slaves to construct the compounds walls. Built of tight-fitting pine logs, the stockade wall presented a solid facade that did not allow the slightest view of the outside world. Access to the stockade was through two large gates set in the west wall. Inside, a light fence was built approximately 19-25 feet from the stockade. This dead line was meant to keep prisoners away from the walls and any caught crossing it was shot immediately. Due to its simple construction, the camp rose quickly and the first prisoners arrived on February 27, 1864.   A Nightmare Ensues While the population at the prison camp steadily grew, it began to balloon after the Fort Pillow  incident on  April 12, 1864, when Confederate forces under Major General Nathan Bedford Forrest massacred black Union soldiers at the Tennessee fort. In response, President Abraham Lincoln demanded that black prisoners of war be treated the same as their white comrades. Confederate President Jefferson Davis refused. As a result, Lincoln and Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant suspended all prisoner exchanges. With the halt of exchanges, POW populations on both sides began to grow rapidly. At Andersonville, the population reached 20,000 by early June, twice the camps intended capacity. With the prison badly overcrowded, its superintendent, Major Henry Wirz, authorized an expansion of the stockade. Using prisoner labor, a 610-ft. addition was built on the prisons north side. Built in two weeks, it was opened to the prisoners on July 1. In an effort to further alleviate the situation, Wirz paroled five men in July and sent them north with a petition signed by the majority of the prisoners asking for POW exchanges to resume.  This request was denied by the Union authorities. Despite this 10-acre expansion, Andersonville remained badly overcrowded with the population peaking at 33,000 in August. Throughout the summer, conditions in the camp continued to deteriorate as the men, exposed to the elements, suffered from malnutrition and diseases such as dysentery. With its water source polluted from the overcrowding, epidemics swept through the prison. The  monthly mortality rate was now around 3,000 prisoners, all of whom were buried in mass graves outside the stockade. Life within Andersonville was made worse by a group of prisoners known as the Raiders, who stole food and valuables from other prisoners. The Raiders were eventually rounded up by a second group known as the Regulators, who put the Raiders on trial and pronounced sentences for the guilty. Punishments ranged from being placed in the stocks to being forced to run the gauntlet. Six were condemned to death and hanged. Between June and October 1864, some relief was offered by Father Peter Whelan, who daily ministered to the prisoners and provided food and other supplies.   Final Days As Major General William T. Shermans troops marched on Atlanta, General John Winder, the head of Confederate POW camps, ordered Major Wirz to construct earthwork defenses around the camp. These turned out to be unnecessary. Following Shermans capture of Atlanta, the majority of the camps prisoners were transferred to a new facility at Millen, GA. In late 1864, with Sherman moving toward Savannah, some of the prisoners were transferred back to Andersonville, raising the prisons population to around 5,000. It remained at this level until the wars end in April 1865. Wirz Executed Andersonville has become synonymous with the trials and atrocities faced by POWs during the Civil War. Of the approximately 45,000 Union soldiers who entered Andersonville, 12,913 died within the prisons walls- 28 percent  of Andersonvilles population and 40 percent of all Union POW deaths during the war. The Union blamed Wirz. In May 1865, the major was arrested and taken to Washington, DC. Charged with a litany of crimes, including conspiring to impair the lives of Union prisoners of war and murder, he faced a military tribunal overseen by Major General Lew Wallace that August. Prosecuted by Norton P. Chipman, the case saw a procession of former prisoners give testimony about their experiences at Andersonville. Among those who testified on Wirzs behalf were Father Whelan and General Robert E. Lee. In early November, Wirz was found guilty of conspiracy as well as 11 of 13 counts of murder. In a controversial decision, Wirz was sentenced to death. Though pleas for clemency were made to President Andrew Johnson, these were denied and Wirz was hanged  on November 10, 1865, at the Old Capitol Prison in Washington, DC. He was one of two individuals tried, convicted, and executed for war crimes during the Civil War, the other being the Confederate guerrilla Champ Ferguson. The site of Andersonville was purchased by the Federal government in 1910 and is now the home of Andersonville National Historic Site.

Wednesday, November 6, 2019

The History of Death and Burial Customs

The History of Death and Burial Customs Death has always been both celebrated and feared. As far back as 60,000 BCE, humans buried their dead with ritual and ceremony. Researchers have even found evidence that Neanderthals buried their dead with flowers, much as we do today. Appeasing the Spirits Many early burial rites and customs were practiced to protect the living, by appeasing the spirits who were thought to have caused the persons death. Such ghost protection rituals and superstitions have varied extensively with time and place, as well as with religious perception, but many are still in use today. The custom of shutting the eyes of the deceased is believed to have begun this way, done in an attempt to close a window from the living world to the spirit world. Covering the face of the deceased with a sheet comes from pagan beliefs that the spirit of the deceased escaped through the mouth. In some cultures, the home of the deceased was burned or destroyed to keep his spirit from returning; in other,s the doors were unlocked and windows were opened to ensure that the soul was able to escape. In 19th century Europe and America, the dead were carried out of the house feet first, in order to prevent the spirit from looking back into the house and beckoning another member of the family to follow him, or so that he couldnt see where he was going and would be unable to return. Mirrors were also covered, usually with black crepe, so the soul would not get trapped and be left unable to pass to the other side. Family photographs were also sometimes turned face-down to prevent any of the close relatives and friends of the deceased from being possessed by the spirit of the dead. Some cultures took their fear of ghosts to an extreme. The Saxons of early England cut off the feet of their dead so the corpse would be unable to walk. Some aborigine tribes took the even more unusual step of cutting off the head of the dead, thinking this would leave the spirit too busy searching for his head to worry about the living. Cemetery Burial Cemeteries, the final stop on our journey from this world to the next, are monuments (pun intended!) to some of the most unusual rituals to ward off spirits, and home to some of our darkest, most terrifying legends and lore. The use of tombstones may go back to the belief that ghosts could be weighed down. Mazes found at the entrance to many ancient tombs are thought to have been constructed to keep the deceased from returning to the world as a spirit, since it was believed that ghosts could only travel in a straight line. Some people even considered it necessary for the funeral procession to return from the graveside by a different path from the one taken in with the deceased, so that the departeds ghost wouldnt be able to follow them home. Some of the rituals which we now practice as a sign of respect to the deceased, may also be rooted in a fear of spirits. Beating on the grave, the firing of guns, funeral bells, and wailing chants were all used by some cultures to scare away other ghosts at the cemetery. In many cemeteries, the vast majority of graves are oriented in such a manner that the bodies lie with their heads to the West and their feet to the East. This very old custom appears to originate with the Pagan sun worshippers, but is primarily attributed to Christians who believe that the final summons to Judgment will come from the East. Some Mongolian and Tibetan cultures are famous for practicing sky burial, placing the body of the deceased on a high, unprotected place to be consumed by wildlife and the elements. This is part of the Vajrayana Buddhist belief of transmigration of spirits, which teaches that respecting the body after death is needless as it is just an empty vessel.

Monday, November 4, 2019

Health and saftey in the work place Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Health and saftey in the work place - Essay Example In safety audit process, the management and all the employees of the company should be knowledgeable and follow the guidelines to avoid as well as handle the hazardous situations in an effective manner. In addition, the employees are needed to enhance their skills and quality to have a better understanding about the safety measures based on which operations can be performed in accordance with health and safety system (Cahill & Kane, 2010). Government introduced new laws related to safety measures and can charge penalties if the company does not maintain the safety rules. The company at first has to request permit from the government to start up the business to assure the government that they take the necessary safety requirement for the company and its employee. The company should plan for the emergency requirement to fight with hazardous situations. After analyzing the adverse situation, it should introduce some core safety measures with the help of a mechanism. The company should take the feedback to set the preventive measures and aware the employees about the adverse situations, so that they keep themselves alert in perilous situations for reducing panic amid employees in such situations. These all are the safety measures that the company can keep in check to avoid accidental incidents in the workplace (Bigelow & Robson, 2005). The common safety audit has to handle some general issues regarding the safety of a workplace such as safety measures from fire, electrical problems, construction safety, proper maintenance of standard rules and regulation, mechanical and physical safety of the company. The engineering company should follow the guidelines of H&S measures to manage the risks associate with the same. To mitigate the risk associated with H&S, the company set the risk management approach. Risk management system provides

Saturday, November 2, 2019

Gender equality is no longer important or a relevant concept. Consider Essay

Gender equality is no longer important or a relevant concept. Consider this statement in relation to the position of women in contemporary society - Essay Example For many years before acceptance of this law the woman struggled for their rights. In 1854 the woman have got the recognition of the right to inheritance, in 1864 the unmarried women began to be considered as the independent individuals. The married women have acquired such right only in 1888. Since this moment they have acquired the right to dispose the property belonging them (Fortmann, 2006). Sex equality is the feministic treatment of equality assumes an equality of sexes, that men and women should have equal shares in the social authority, equal access to public resources. The equality of sexes is not identity of sexes, identity of their attributes, characteristics. The term egalitarian theory (in this case is a synonym of the term equality of sexes) has undergone at least four stages of transformation. The idea of absolute equality between people as sample of a socially-fair society was primary. Historical development has shown that such concept is utopian. The ideas of similar "equalizing" of women and men also have the sad examples of realization. Involving of women in heavy kinds of work, "double burden" loadings on women, occurrence of "straw" orphans - the left children. And the most remarkable – the mass attempt of women to break the female identity, having accepted mans behavior and mans game rules for equality with men. The second stage in understanding of the term ‘equality’ was comprehension of necessity of equality of the rights of all citizens of a democratic society. Realization of this certainly progressive principle of social development has shown its inconsistency and weakness from the point of view of realization of the rights separate marginal groups (women, national minorities, etc.). From here there is an occurrence of the third stage of egalitarian theory in social development. The equality of rights of

Thursday, October 31, 2019

Technical Description of the Process of Sleep Essay

Technical Description of the Process of Sleep - Essay Example Other equipment used in support with EEG, is one that measures eye movements that is called electrooculogram or EOG. The Electromyogram (EMG) on the other hand measures the muscle tension under the chin of a subject. As stated in Sleep-Information about Sleep, the practice in studying sleep pattern is EEGs, EOGs, and EMGs are recorded simultaneously on a continuous moving chart paper. This then determines the activities of three aspects – the muscle activity, the brain activity, and eye movements. The NREM sleep and REM sleep occurs in a cyclic manner during sleep state (Sleep, Sleep Disorders, and Biological Rhythms. They interchangeably happen to an individual during his sleep. Sleep starts with periods of NREM and then REM. NREM state has four different stages as determined by the frequency and amplitude (brain wave’s magnitude of periodic variation) of the brain activity. The first NREM stage is characterized by very light sleep. NREM Stage 2 has special brain waves called sleep spindles (burst of brain activity visible on an EEG) and K-complexes (brief high-voltage peak in EEG as defined by Wikipedia.org). Stage 3 and 4 of NREM is described by slow brain waves and in Stage 4 of NREM, it is hard to wake the person up. NREM stage 4 is deep sleep and cannot easily be awakened by external factors. During NREM, the muscle activity remains active and body function is the same with the waking state. The difference is that there is no eye movement.

Monday, October 28, 2019

Oligopoly and monopoly Essay Example for Free

Oligopoly and monopoly Essay An oligopoly is an intermediate market structure between the extremes of perfect competition and monopoly. Oligopoly firms might compete (noncooperative oligopoly) or cooperate (cooperative oligopoly) in the marketplace. Whereas firms in an oligopoly are price makers, their control over the price is determined by the level of coordination among them. The distinguishing characteristic of an oligopoly is that there are a few mutually interdependent firms that produce either identical products (homogeneous oligopoly) or heterogeneous products (differentiated oligopoly). Mutual interdependence means that firms realize the effects of their actions on rivals and the reactions such actions are likely to elicit. For instance, a mutually interdependent firm realizes that its price drops are more likely to be matched by rivals than its price increases. This implies that an oligopolist, especially in the case of a homogeneous oligopoly, will try to maintain current prices, since price changes in either direction can be harmful, or at least nonbeneficial. Consequently, there is a kink in the demand curve because there are asymmetric responses to a firms price increases and to its price decreases; that is, rivals match price falls but not price increases. This leads to sticky prices, such that prices in an oligopoly turn out to be more stable than those in monopoly or in competition; that is, they do not change every time costs change. On the flip side, the sticky-price explanation (formally, the kinked demand model of oligopoly) has the significant drawback of not doing a very good job of explaining how the initial price, which eventually turns out to be sticky, is arrived at. Airline markets and automobile markets are prime examples of oligopolies. We see that as the new auto model year gets under way in the fall, one car manufacturers reduced financing rates are quickly matched by the other firms because of recognized mutual interdependence. Airlines also match rivals fares on competing routes. In oligopolies, entry of new firms is difficult because of entry barriers. These entry barriers may be structural (natural), such as economies of scale, or artificial, such as limited licenses issued by government. Firms in an oligopoly, known as oligopolists, choose prices and output to maximize profits. However, firms could compete along other dimensions as well, such as advertising, location, research and development (RD) and so forth. For instance, a firms research or advertising strategies are influenced by what its rivals are doing. When one restaurant advertises that it will accept rivals coupons, others are compelled to follow suit. The rivals responses in an oligopoly can be modeled in the form of reaction functions. Sophisticated firms anticipating rivals behavior might appear to act in concert (conscious parallelism) without any explicit agreement to do so. Such instances pose problems for antitrust regulators. Mutually interdependent firms have a tendency to form cartels, enabling them to coordinate price and quantity actions to increase profits. Besides facing legal obstacles, cartels are difficult to sustain because of free-rider problems. Shared monopolies are extreme cases of cartels that include all the firms in the industry. Given that mutual interdependence can exist along many dimensions, there is no single model of oligopoly. Rather, there are numerous models based on different behavior, ranging from the naive Cournot models to more sophisticated models of game theory. An equilibrium concept that incorporates mutual interdependence was proposed by John Nash and is referred to as Nash equilibrium. In a Nash equilibrium, firms decisions (i. e. , price-quantity choices) are their best responses, given what their rivals are doing. For example, McDonalds charges $2. 99 for a Value Meal based on what Burger King and Wendys are charging for a similar menu item. McDonalds would reconsider its pricing if its rivals were to change their prices. The level of information that firms have has a major influence on their behavior in an oligopoly. For instance, when mutually interdependent firms have asymmetric information and are unable to make credible commitments regarding their behavior, a prisoners dilemma type of situation arises where the Nash equilibrium might include choices that are suboptimal. For instance, individual firms in a cartel have an incentive to cheat on the previously agreed-upon price-output levels. Since cartel members have nonbinding commitments on limiting production levels and maintaining prices, this results in widespread cheating, which in turn leads to an eventual breakdown of the cartel. Therefore, while all firms in the cartel could benefit by cooperating, lack of credible commitments results in cheating being a Nash equilibrium strategy—a strategy that is suboptimal from the individual firms standpoint. Models of oligopoly could be static or dynamic depending upon whether firms take intertemporal decisions into account. Significant models of oligopoly include Cournot, Bertrand, and Stackelberg. Cournot oligopoly is the simplest model of oligopoly in that firms are assumed to be naive when they think that their actions will not generate any reaction from the rivals. In other words, according to the Cournot model, rival firms choose not to alter their production levels when one firm chooses a different output level. Cournot thus focuses on quantity competition rather than price competition. While the naive behavior suggested by Cournot might seem plausible in a static setting, it is hard to image real-world firms not learning from their mistakes over time. The Bertrand models significant difference from the Cournot model is that it assumes that firms choose (set) prices rather than quantities. The Stackelberg model deals with the scenario in which there is a leader firm in the market whose actions are imitated by a number of follower firms. The leader is sophisticated in terms of taking into account rivals reactions, while the followers are naive, as in the Cournot model. The leader might emerge in a market because of a number of factors, such as historical precedence, size, reputation, innovation, information, and so forth. Examples of Stackelberg leadership include markets where one dominant firm dictates the terms, usually through price leadership. Under price leadership, the leader firms pricing decisions are consistently followed by rival firms. Since oligopolies come in various forms, the performance of such markets also varies a great deal. In general, the oligopoly price is below the monopoly price but above the competitive price. The oligopoly output, in turn, is larger than that of a monopolist but falls short of what a competitive market would supply. Some oligopoly markets are competitive, leading to few welfare distortions, while other oligopolies are monopolistic, resulting in dead weight losses. Furthermore, some oligopolies are more innovative than others. Whereas the price-quantity rankings of oligopoly vis-a-vis other markets are relatively well established, how oligopoly fares with regard to R and D and advertising is less clear.

Saturday, October 26, 2019

Predictability of Earnings and Reversion of Profitability

Predictability of Earnings and Reversion of Profitability 1. INTRODUCTION, RESEARCH QUESTION AND CONTRIBUTION In a competitive environment, economists say there is a mean reversion of profitability. Mean reversion of profitability infers that variation in profitability and earnings can be predicted. Although there are some literatures making an effort to find prediction in profitability and earnings, the findings somewhat cannot fully explain those variations. Early researches (Beaver 1970; Brooks and Buckmaster 1976; and Lookabill 1976) did not test the prediction formally. When there were formal tests, models were mostly time-series and identified only companies with long-earning histories (20 years). This approach causes the issue that long-term survivors might not represent all the firms. Furthermore, 20 years of data on earnings is an inaccurate estimation of the time-series model. Thus, the results found are statistically weak (Lev 1969; Freeman, Ohlson, and Penman 1982). There are some later researches attempting to identify those variations as well. Freeman et al (1982), Collins and Kothari (1989), Easton and Zmijewski (1989), Ou and Penman (1989), Elgers and Lo (1994) and Basu (1997) found that cross-sectional tests constructed more consistent evidence of predictability. However, Elgers and Lo (1994) found the unrealistic assumption that there is no correlation among companies due to changes in earnings and profitability. Moreover, most existing literatures do not investigate connection of the predictability of profitability and that of earnings. Contrastingly, like Freeman et al. (1982) and Lev (1983), this research paper is to answer the question: Is much of what is predictable about earnings due to the mean reversion of profitability? The result confirms the answer to question is yes. Those results are applicable to the real world. Therefore, the main contribution is the confirmation of economists presumption that there is a mean reversion of profitability in a competitive environment. 2. Data and methodology 2.1 A First-Pass Partial Adjustment Model for Profitability This test uses a simple cross-section partial adjustment regression in profitability changing for each year t from 1964 to 1995. This regression from t to t+1 is as followed   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   (1a)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚   (1b) where is total book assets of firm at the end of year t,is earnings before interest,is profitability measure, is expected value of profitability measure, is profitability change from year t to t+1 and is the profitability deviation from the expected value.   Ã‚  Ã‚   The paper uses a two-step method to identify equation (1). After doing regression to investigate differences in expected profitability among companies, the fitted values from the first-step regression are used as the proxy for in the cross-section regression.   Ã‚  Ã‚   In the first-stage regression, (dividends to book value of equity at the end of year t) is used as proxy for expected profitability, (dummy variable to capture nonlinear relationship of dividends and expected profitability) and (market-to-book ratio to find variation of expected profitability which cannot find by dividend determinants. In the cross-section regression, in (1) is the fitted value from the first-stage regression.   Ã‚  Ã‚   (2)   Ã‚  Ã‚   Due to the high regulation during the sample period (1964-1995), financial companies and utilities are omitted. This paper considers only the firms with more than $10 million assets and more than $5 million book equity. With these exclusions, 2,343 companies per year are taken into account. The interpretation is based on the average slopes and the time-series standard errors of the average slopes. However, with only 33 slope observation from 1964 to 1995, the estimation of autocorrelation is inaccurate. Therefore, this paper uses a less strict approach with t-statistics requirement of about 2.8 rather than the common 2.0. 2.2 A Nonlinear Partial Adjustment Model for Profitability This test is developed to investigate whether there is comparable nonlinearity in profitability characteristics with the hypothesis that the mean reversion of profitability results in the predictability of earnings. The nonlinear partial adjustment model equation is expanded from equation (1). (3)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   where is the negative deviations of profitability from expected values, is the squared negative deviations, is the squared positive deviations, is negative changes in profitability, is squared negative changes and is squared positive changes. , and are to capture the nonlinearity in the mean reversion of profitability and , and are to capture the nonlinearity in the profitability changes autocorrelation. 2.3 Predicting Earnings Freeman et al. (1982) and Lev (1983) argue that the competition causes mean reversion of profitability. This paper inspects the predictable changes in earnings and how much of the predictability brings the nonlinearity of mean reversion in profitability. The dependent variable is change in earnings, . The regression of change in earnings is (4)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   where is negative changes in earnings, is squared negative changes in earnings and is squared positive changes in earnings. , and are to capture the nonlinearity in the earning changes autocorrelation. 3. results 3.1 A First-Pass Partial Adjustment Model for Profitability The negative slope of implies that there is a nonlinear relationship of dividends and profitability. The significant positive slope of confirms the hypothesis that market-to-book ratio investigates variation of expected profitability which cannot find by dividend determinants.

Thursday, October 24, 2019

A Depiction of Three Ages in Robert Frosts The Road Not Taken :: Road Not Taken essays

The Road Not Taken: Depiction of Three Ages  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In his Explicator article, â€Å"Frost’s ‘The Road Not Taken,’† William George suggests that the poem includes â€Å"three distinct ages† of the narrator and focuses on the choices that this person must make at the different stages of his life (230).   George differentiates the primary speaker of the poem, what he calls the â€Å"middle-aged self,† from the younger and older versions, noting that the middle-aged version mocks the other two by taking a more objective stance towards his decision.   The younger and older versions â€Å"are given to emotion, self-deception, and self-congratulation, and both face a decision which the middle-aged speaker sees with more objective eyes than do his younger and older selves† (230).   George demonstrates that, while the middle-aged self is able to view his other selves objectively without delusion and self-aggrandizement, the younger and older selves are incapable of this kind of objectivity in their decision-making.   George’s analysis is broken into two parts;   the first part is an analysis of the relationship between the middle-aged self and the younger self, while the second part is an analysis of the relationship between the middle-aged self and the older self.   In the first part of the article, George suggests that the younger self is faced with choosing between two roads, paths that the middle-aged self understands are very similar; the younger self, however, refuses to accept their equal value and instead deludes himself with the idea of having chosen a less traveled path (230-31).   In the second part of the article, George describes how the older self is faced with choosing between telling the truth about his decision as a youth or lying about it;   while the middle-aged self fully recognizes that the choice of the past was not grand, the older self chooses to cover over this truth through deception and self-aggrandizement (231).