The Persian Wars

The Persian Wa rs tric D. Blanco Persia, known as Iran, was the largest empire the world had ever seen by the 5th century B,C. E. The name Iran derlves trom the word â€Å"Asyran,† and durlng the first half of the first millennium, the Iranian-speaking people moved gradually Into the area of the Zagros Mountains, the largest groups known as the Medes and Persians. According the author of The Greek and Persian Wars 499-386 3C by Philip de Souza, The Persians were part of a group of ancient peoples who spoke languages similar to modern Iranian (Souza, Pg. 9). The origin of the Persian Empire can be attributed to the leadership ot Cyrus the Great. A brilliant and powerful Persian king. he enlarged nearby Islands and united them Into one empire. Cyrus was able to create a vast empire that would last more than two hundred years. As time went by, the Greek city- states were under the rule of the Persians. The Persian wars began. But what was the Persian war? According to the â€Å" Encyclopedia of Ancient History, Greece†, it was a serious of conflicts fought between Greek states and the Persian Empire.Greece was Invaded twice during the Persian wars. The wars with Greece and Persla were a result due to rebellion, but who won the war? The Persians wanted to conquer more of Greece, then a war broke out, but how did it all began? After the death of King Croesus of Lydia died, Greece was under the rule of the Persian Empire which they much resented. In result to this, they fought to throw out the Persians. The city-state Ionia revolted. Athens and Eritrea supported the Ionians with a token force of twenty ships from Athens, five ships from Eritrea.The Ionian revolt was successful at first, but after the Greeks sailed home It was rushed. Persian temples had been violated, and whether they did it or not the Athenians and Eritreans were blamed for it. King Darius I of Persia ordered a punitive expedition to these two cities, but a storm smashed his fleet. Anot her fleet was assembled. and the tlrst Persian war began, Which city-state was saved, and which was destroyed from the fleet of Persia? Before finding the answer of which city-state was saved and destroyed, and victor, let's look at the important kings, generals during the wars.Darius l, he was the king of the Persian Empire during the first war. His son Xerxes took the title as king of the Persian Empire at the start ot the second war. Mardonius is a Persian general In both wars. Datls and Artaphernes were generals at the Battle of Marathon, the first war. 1 OF3 Marathon. At the Battle of Thermopylae, the second war, Leonidas, Spartan general, and king fought the Persians with three hundred men. In Thermopylae 480 BC by Nic Fields, Leonidas as the commander-in-chief, held off the Persians to their rear by a mountain track, the Anopaia path (Fields, Pg. ). Themistocles was an Athenian dmiral at the Battle of Salamis. Pausanias was also a Spartan general but at the Battle of Plataea. They are the important people during this time of event. Fought to the death, some survived, but who won the wars? Persians have returned home with a low supply of weapons after the first war, they were defeated by the Greeks at the Battle of Marathon. Persians attacked Athens to teach them a lesson for revolting against the Great Darius l, but the Athenians defeated the Persians. The second invasion returned with the new king, Xerxes.With a huge army he gathered, they ttacked the Greeks at Thermopylae. That's when the Spartans came in, with three hundred men under the leadership of Leonidas. The Persians ended up reaching the city of Athens and burned it. The Persians were finally defeated by the Greek Navvy in a bloody sea battle. Fewer than four hundred Greek ships under the Athenian general Themistocles beat twelve hundred Persian ships. Xerxes went home after the defeat. However, he left a large army in Greece. The Spartans and Athenians fought the Persian army. The combined f orces were able to beat the Persians.Looking back at the question, Athens was the city-state that was destroyed and Eritreans survived. The war may have been won by the Greeks, but when did it all started? According to the author of The Greek and Persian Wars 499-386 BC book by Philip de Souza, In 499 the Persians launched a major naval expedition against Naxos, the largest and most prosperous of the Cycladic islands. Herodotus presents this expedition as the result of an appeal by some exiled Naxian aristocrats to Aristagoras, the ruling tyrant of Miletos, to help them force their compatriots to ccept them back and return to power.Miletos was one of the largest and most important Ionian cities. According to the text, it had enjoyed privileged, semi- independent status in relation to the Lydian kings, which the Persians allowed to continue. The Ionians rebelled, some of the Ionian cities and island had been developing a form of democratic government when they came under Persian infl uence. Such developments continued in mainland Greece, especially in Athens, but the move to widespread popular participation in government was prematurely halted in Ionia.

‘Away’ by Michael Gow

Michael Gow’s play Away is the story of three different Australian families who go on holiday for Christmas in the sixties. By going away each family is hoping to resolve their issues. Although Away is set some time ago the themes and issues explored in the play are still relevant to a modern day audience, even one of a non-Australian background. Shakespearean plays that were written many hundreds of years ago and are still understandable and relevant to people all over the world today. Away is the story of three Australian families who go on holiday during the Christmas of 1968. Roy and Coral (the headmaster and his wife) are becoming increasingly close to breaking up. Their son was killed in the Vietnam War and Coral is still grieving for him. Tom and Meg were in the school’s production of A Midsummer’s Nights Dream. Tom has Leukaemia, and his parents, Harry and Vic, haven’t told him that he is going to die, but Tom has worked it out already. Tom and his family immigrated to Australia form England. They are going on holiday knowing that it could be their last together as a family, and are determined to have a good time. Meg is the same age as Tom and they both like each other. Meg’s parents, Gwen and Jim are going on holiday so Gwen can have a break. Gwen is a rather uptight and stressed person and thinks that to have anything good happen you have to make sacrifices. During each of the three families holidays there is a storm and they coincidently end up on the same beach. Away by Michael Gow is set in suburban Australia in the summer of 1968. However the specific time and place do not make it any less relevant to me. I could still relate to and understand what was happening in the play, even though it is set in a time before I was born. This is very much like Shakespearean plays that were written hundreds of years ago, even today people can still connect with the characters in them. It is interesting to note that Gow begins Away with a Shakespearean play, A Midsummer’s Nights Dream, and then choses to end it with another of Shakespeare’s plays, King Lear. Away, like Shakespearean plays is non-naturalism, a feature of this being the non-changing set. Throughout the production of Away that I saw the set remains the same except for basic props such as suitcases and a table. White sand covered the floor and lights were shone on the sails to show the hanges between scenes for the play. In the play Tom is compared to Chip Rafferty, a well-known Australian actor who died at age 62 in 1971. Younger people of today probably haven’t heard of him, but from watching the play and reading the script can safely assume that he was a famous actor. What makes Away relevant to an audience of today or from a non-Au stralian background are the universal themes present in the play. As long as the audience can connect and empathise with a character or understand a theme in the play then it will be relevant to them. Some of the themes in the play include death/grief/loss, racism, class systems, and relationships. The relationship between Gwen and Meg (mother and daughter) is quite strained during the play. Gwen is portrayed as a very uptight and stressed person, while Meg is in her late teens and has her own ideas about things. During Act Three Gwen and Meg begin arguing over Jim’s missing Christmas presents for everyone. The argument ends with Gwen saying how hard she tries to make things good for Meg, and Meg apologises. I feel that I can connect to Meg, especially in the scene where she is arguing with her mother. After that argument her father, (Jim) asks her why she did it, because he’d asked her not to upset her mother and she did. Meg replies that she couldn’t help herself. I know how she feels. You don’t mean to hurt the person or upset them but you just have to have your say, no matter what the consequences of that may be. I also feel that I can relate to Gwen, Meg’s mother as she reminds me of my own mum. The near constant stressing about everything, and wanting the very best for her daughter is very familiar. The issue of death is also covered in Away. Roy and Coral lost a son in the Vietnam was and Coral is still grieving for him. While Harry and Vic know that there son Tom is going to die from leukaemia. People all over the world, no matter what language they speak, what culture they come from, or which country they live in can understand and empathise with what these families may be feeling. The sense of loss and grief that comes with death is a universal feeling that can make the play relevant to so many people.

Reason of hotel price changing of Hotel du vin Birmingham Speech or Presentation

Reason of hotel price changing of Hotel du vin Birmingham - Speech or Presentation Example The reasons behind this increase are economic and based on market analysis. First, there is the increasing cost of products production and services delivery globally. This implies that for the last few years, the cost of rooms in major hotels has been increasing. However, despite the expected increase which has been steady over the years, a tremendous increase must have had another reason. As reported in marketingbirmingham.com earlier this year, the tourism industry in Birmingham city has been growing since 2012. This prompted the major hotels to advance their services to meet the expected demand. The development comes with expenses, and the market demand is expected to cover those expenses and make the process profitable. This is the main reason the bookings, as well as the prices of rooms, have increased over the last one month. In addition, market psychology has also played a part in the change. With the increased demand and modernisation of services, the marketers have used the principle of market psychology in which the customers are driven to assume that the most expensive provides the best services. They have therefore increased the prices in a competitive strategy to control the reasoning of the customers in which the economists call reverse psychology of marketing. Further, there has been an increasing need for the hotel industry to embrace technology in products and services delivery. Technology is costly but a major requirement in many industries today. This has prompted the hotel to increase prices, take advantage of the current demand with tourism growth and increasing revenue. Hotel du Vin Birmingham  . http://www.booking.com/hotel/gb/du-vin-birmingham.en-gb.html?aid=311984;label=du-vin-birmingham-WwDjdb06pLcrC70B425p8gS32443427113%3Apl%3Ata%3Ap1%3Ap2%3Aac%3Aap1t1%3Aneg;sid=4ca5973a3f39e1501dee98b8ba487978;dcid=1;ucfs=1;srfid=942ca71d04271f7f8199ebe93a58d025d2b2eabbX1#map_closed Sinha, I. (2006).  Reverse

The Relationship between Portrays of Abraham and Portrayals of God in Assignment

The Relationship between Portrays of Abraham and Portrayals of God in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam - Assignment Example There are three Abrahams with one covenant; this is because all the three religions view Abraham from a different perspective but the covenant in all the three religions is between God Almighty and Abraham. Christians view Abraham in terms of his faith and obedience in God, to Christians Abraham had a lot of faith and obedience in God and hence the making of the covenant. This is evident in Genesis 12:1-20 where God commands Abraham to leave his country and move to an unknown destination. The birth of Isaac shows that God keeps his promises to the righteous, faithful and those that obey him. Since Abraham was righteous even before he was circumcised, both the Jews and the Gentiles can become his descendants only when they have faith in the almighty God The Christians believe these to be the pillars that hold their religion together. Faithfulness and obedience are also evident when Abraham reaches sachem, where Yahweh pledged to Abraham that he would give Abrahams descendants that land, faithfully Abraham responded by building an altar. The Christians hold on to the faith that to both the Jews and the gentile Abraham is the â€Å"father of all those that are faithful. According to Christians believe Abraham rested has a special status in the world of the dead, Luke 23; 43 states that when the righteous die they rest in Abrahams bosom, a place believed to be paradise. Abraham being the ideal patriarch them bosom means paradise. The believers in the Christian religion believe that they should follow into Abraham’s footstep as his colossus faith and obedience in God showed them how to embrace Gods word with a universalism spirit and how to live well before God. The Muslim refers to him as Ibrahim, a man they believe to be the progenitor of Israel.  Ã‚  

Social, Economic, And Political Changes Caused By Globalization Essay

Social, Economic, And Political Changes Caused By Globalization - Essay Example Global wealth is currently shifting from less heavily populated American and European regions to the more heavily populated Asian region because of globalization. According to Lieber and Weisberg (2002, p.274), globalization helps people all over the world in the creation of a stronger and stable world. Supporters of globalization believe that globalization benefits the world through the promotion of such ideas like human rights, democracy, and freedom and that it enhances the success of the world through free trade, free investment, and better technology. According to Dharam Ghai (2003), free market and private enterprise are extremely important in determining the success of globalization. Cross-cultural businesses have been increased a lot as a result of globalization. Imports and exports between different countries were also increased because of the liberalized rules affected in many countries as part of globalization. Despite all these arguments in favor of globalization, some pe ople believe that globalization is nothing but imperialism. It should be noted that imperialism is the process of taking over of a weaker nation by a stronger nation (What is imperialism, n.d.). Critics of globalization believe that capitalist countries like America and UK are trying to loot the wealth of developing and underdeveloped countries in the name of globalization. Globalization is labeled as Americanization by the opponents. They pointed out that instead of globalization, glocalization is necessary for a country to progress properly. It should be noted that glocalization is the process of integrating local markets into world capitalism. It refers to a concept in which individual, group, organization, product or service upholds the local standards even while operating internationally.

Media Management - Event Planning Event Planning Essay

Media Management - Event Planning Event Planning - Essay Example INTRODUCTION The marketing is the need of every small and large business in today’s world of globalization. The emergence of social media and online bloggers has allowed businesses to market online at low cost. The businesses are taking full advantage of this cheap way of marketing. The options for market a product through different mediums depends on the size and budget of the company (Smith, and Zook, 2011). Nowadays, the perfect competition is prevailing in all the local markets and this intensity of competition made necessity for every local business to create marketing or promotional strategies to stay in the market with handsome profits and differentiated brand image. The event marketing is one of the best suited marketing tools for local area advertising because it directly targets the market of local area community. Most of the events are developed to get the attention of media. Companies want media to talk about them from time to time to publicize the business. Once t he local business gets succeeded in gaining media attention then it would become easy for the local business to create its unique brand image among all the local competitors (Kotler, and Keller, 2009). Event Development (The event is named as a â€Å"Cultural Evening†): The Wild Affair is a big chain of restaurants and the company is now introducing another restaurant in the new local market by creating an event in the area for targeting the local area customers. People that are living in the local area belong to different cultures so the event is organized by considering all the small and large communities living in the area. The event is designed under the consideration of cross-culture function of the society. The event will be arranged in the hall in order to attract large audience. The restaurant has the specialty in 18 different countries foods. So especially for the event the restaurant is designed or decorated with 18 different cultural themes to represent the food av ailability of 18 countries. Every country is represented by its national culture theme or with a small setup with waiters in wearing cultural dresses of each country. The core concept is to position the restaurant and create awareness of its offerings. The culture creates an emotional attachment with the customers. The company wants to connect the emotional attachment with its customer by providing them their cultural environment. Cultural values and cultural food has created a feeling in the consumer’s mind that he/she is serving in its own country. This idea of serving the cultural food with cultural values has made an emotional bonding with customers. This bonding will create the customer loyal to the brand. The restaurant has some additional attractive services as well that are customizing food according to the mood of the customer, additional top-ups and add-ons with the meals. Another perception for the event created is that the company is combining all the communities of the area under the one roof to unite them. This perception can be called as Societal Marketing concept. Alignment of Company’s Mission and Target Audience with the Event: The company’s strategy is to target each community individually and show respect for each community’s culture present in the society. The company has covered all the communiti

Crime Scene Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 1

Crime Scene - Research Paper Example In this case, we were presented with a homicide that appears to have occurred in the victims homes, where she was found dead, stabbed 13 times, on her kitchen floor. Given the information provided one can extrapolate a couple of different and plausible theories to solve this case. The Victim: The victim is lying on the kitchen floor. She has 13 stab wounds in her body. Stabs wounds of high numbers, excessive beyond just causing death, are sometimes identified as â€Å"emotional† attacks. Usually occurring when the attacker has a personal reason for attacking the victim. She has a knife near to her hand and she shows a number of bruises on her upper arms and broken finger nails. This would indicate that the victim fought back against her attacker. It is, also, means that there is a higher possibility of DNA evidence of the murderer left on her body or under her broken finger nails. As yet, there is no certainty if there has been sexual assault of any kind. Given that the victim is a sturdily built, above average height for female, and 140 pounds it is abundantly likely her attacker was a male; being that she is a larger than average for a female she would likely have an advantage over a female opponent. There are, also, a lot statistics to support the understanding that the homicide victims, who are women, the majority of their murderers are male, as opposed to other women (Brewer & Smith, 1995). The Scene: The crime scene itself has a lot to say about what might have happened here. The fact that the crime took place in the kitchen may have been chosen by the victim. She may have gone to the kitchen intentionally to get to the gun in the drawer or the knife on the counter. The house looks to be in turmoil, however, despite the mess, nothing was apparently stolen from the home. This pretty much eliminates that this homicide was incidental in the course of robbery gone wrong. Realistically this leaves two distinct options to consider. The first is that the crime was a premeditated act or a crime of passion. The fact, that there are no signs of forced entry or breaking and entering means that the victim either was comfortable opening her door to the killer or knew them well enough to invite him into her home. The knife on the floor may or may not be the knife used to stab the victim; knowing this would indicate whether the killer brought a weapon to the scene or used the knife from the victim’s kitchen. There is, also, the possibility that it was the victim who pulled the kitchen knife to defend herself. The family members, who were apparently not present at the time of the crime, are not specifically identified. It is fair to assume that the victim probably has no small children because most parents of small children do not keep loaded firearms in the kitchen drawers. If the victim’s family includes a husband, partner, boyfriend, or fiance then it will be necessary to further question her spouse or partner. In the majori ty of murders occurring among women, 30% or more, can be attributed to men whom they were presently or at some time intimate with (Marvell & Moody, 1999). The Family: When the family is informed one might want to watch the behaviors and actions of the family members. People behave in certain psychological ways when they receive heartbreaking information. The stages of grief are typical of human beings (Moldovan, 2009).So if someone’

Expatriate Salespeople Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Expatriate Salespeople - Assignment Example es, there may be legal challenges that determine whether or not expatriate salespeople can be used or if the market is unable to support a full-time salesperson. The times that there might be situations in which expatriate sales managers are supervisors of the foreign salespeople. However, there are some issues that should be addressed. Some of these include the inability to be able to communicate between the foreign sales team and the expatriate sales manager. Another issue that is often faced is when the expatriate is unable to adapt to the foreign environment in which they are required to work. Many times there may also be legal barriers that can be significant problems. Many of the skills that an expatriate salesperson is required to do is to be nonjudgmental, be able to react professionally if there is frustration in a situation, and must be empathetic of other people’s needs based on their own standpoint rather than the salesperson’s own standpoint. A person must also have an interest in the culture and the people and be respectful. The family may include an interview with the candidate’s family to ensure that the person is right for the job because the family is typically the people who know the person the best and their ability to adapt and work in new areas. The candidate’s family is critiqued to see if there is a problem if the expatriate salesperson will be gone to a foreign country for a significant amount of time. Expatriates returning to the United States are often dissatisfied because of a growing number of attrition of those who return. There is a much lower morale. Many times those coming from the U.S. find that there are several family related problems that have strained their ability to work things out by being away for so long. They are often dissatisfied because of the compensation levels and

Failed States and Effective Division of Labor Strategy in the Future Assignment

Failed States and Effective Division of Labor Strategy in the Future Post-Conflict Reconstruction Projects - Assignment Example Somalia, a country rated as number one failed state in the world, is either controlled by the foreign military or by the Al-Shabab militia. Warships from several countries patrol the waters off Somalia to curb the pirates (Kaplan, 2010). It is estimated that about 2 million people have fled Somalia and sought asylum elsewhere (Foreign Policy, 2010). This has also been seen in Afghanistan where the Taliban and foreign troops have more control of the country. Failing or failed states experience an economic decline, this is the case in Zimbabwe and North Korea where tyrannical regimes have stolen money from their economies leaving their markets on a verge of collapse. This has led to inequality with few elites benefiting from the national resources while the majority remains poor. This has also been witnessed in Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan. In Niger, a country also rated as a failing state, the government cannot provide vital services such as healthcare and education leading to a high illiteracy rate and high infant mortality rates. Zimbabwe has experienced a high rate of brain drain and it is estimated that one out five Zimbabweans has left the country in such of greener pastures. Failed states have also experienced a high rate of human rights deprivation as is the case with Sudan where brutality has been employed to subdue rebelling regions. This has led the president to be indicted for war crimes (Foreign Policy, 2010). Division of labor among states, international institutions, and non-governmental organizations should follow the following guidelines to ensure that they are effective in the context of future post-conflict reconstruction projects. Leadership roles should be left to the people of that country. The international community should just come in to provide assistance in solving the problems of that country.

Thirteen Reasons Why-Jay Asher Essay Example for Free

Thirteen Reasons Why-Jay Asher Essay Clay Jensen returns from school one day to find an obscure looking box outside leaning on his porch door with his name on the box. Clay was sceptic of the box, although he still opened it, to his own discovery it was 7 double sided cassette tapes recorded by his classmate and crush, Hannah Baker. Hannah two weeks earlier had committed suicide. On tape is the thirteen reasons why Hannah had ended her life so soon. Clay had wondered why he got these tapes from Hannah; unknowingly he was one of the thirteen reasons why. While I read The Thirteen Reasons Why Hannah committed suicide I felt as if in a way I was Clay Jensen, I always wondered why and when will Hannah bring â€Å"us† up. Every cassette tape was a new story and another reason why. Some reasons were little things a lot of girls go through in high school, others were situations girls or guys should not be put through at any point during their life. Although all the cassettes fit together like a puzzle in the end I love the mystery of not knowing what was next, the book made me always want to know more. After reading this book on my own I would strongly recommend it to teenage girls. The mystery, comedy and adventure brought me from smiling to tears within a turn a page. In the modern world that we live in today teens commit suicide often over break up to be bullied, teens don’t know how to handle some situations. Hannah gave up on her life because she did not know how to help herself, she tried asking for help then she lost hope in herself and made everything worse. The book The Thirteen Reasons Why shows that people will miss you when you are gone, no matter what you think you know someone will always miss you.

Nihilism in T.S. Eliot’s The Wasteland

Nihilism in T.S. Eliot’s The Wasteland Chapter 1 Introduction Nihilism is a very popular concept in English Literature and many authors have taken Nihilism as a theme in many of their works. The word Nihilism has long history. The word Nihilism is the resultant of the Latin phrase ‘Nihil’, which means anything does not exist. This term grew to be preferred with the newsletter of Ivan Turgenev’s novel Fathers and sons (1862) the place he used nihilism to explain the basic and rudimentary scientism supported by way of this character Bazarov who sermonizes a statement of belief of total negation. There are a couple of interpretations of the phrase Nihilism, as many critics have stated about Nietzsche that he believed within the literal dying of god. Nietzsche in lots of his works expresses a terror that decline of religion, the upward thrust of atheism, and the nonappearance of a better moral authority would thrust the world into chaos. The western world for a long time was depended on the rule of god for steering and direction and the way in which it gave order to society and which means to way of life or existence . Without this, Nietzsche says that society will move into an age of nihilism. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) is one of the most popular name to be associated with the concept of Nihilism, as he has referred and thereby included this concept in many of his works. He was a German thinker and philosopher of the late 19th century who defied and challenged the fundamentals of Christianity and conventional and traditional morality. Nihilism in step with Nietzsche is first of all the situation where the world appears to be without value, morals, the world after the loss of life of god. There is not any get away from the fact and whilst there is not any approach to reconcile oneself to it, since all of the method have utterly failed. This can be a predicament, an untenable trouble, a state of powerlessness that we cannot probably suffer. For the world seems to be without value precisely on account that the values we invested on this world are failing: they now not participate in their ordering or organizing perform. Nietzsche is probably associated with nihilism that put his factor ahead via saying that its corrosive and mordant results would eventually smash all moral, religious and metaphysical convictions and precipitate the finest trouble in human historical past Nihilism is a term which describes the lack of value and meaning in individual’s life. When Nietzsche mentioned that god is lifeless, he meant that Christianity has somewhere been lost as a guiding force in our lifes and there is nothing to replace it. Nietzsche’s philosophy arrives from the rejection, from outrage on the world, from the simple that world reasons. It is only once we learn to care for this pain, when we observe its vigor, that we will be able to appreciate the world as it is. This needs that we confront nihilism, now not most effective nihilistic attitudes or role but most of all the nihilism of what occurs, the nihilism of our lives. Nietzsche is famous for proclaiming death of god. Through talking concerning the demise of god, Nietzsche is maintaining come what may that god existed for a time and that he died, ceased to exist. Nietzsche is just not pronouncing that god literally existed and he actually died. What he means is right here is that the sugg estion of god performed a principal and a unifying function in western philosophical concept as good as everyday lifestyles, and that this proposal has ceased to satisfy its operate. The topics of nihilism and faith, nihilism and morality, and overcoming of nihilism. This thematic focal point reflects three primary features of view of which nihilism is massive for Nietzsche’s idea. The dying of god represents a predominant precondition for the uncompromising stance regarding the diagnosis of nihilism. After Nietzsche, the influence of nihilism has its clearest and most sustained effect within the huge area of morality; finally the doctrines of eternal return and the desire to power conceived as stratagems for the overcoming of nihilism. In all of the three sections, religion, morality and the overcoming of nihilism – a growing universalization of the predicament of nihilism makes manifest. Nietzsche, at the end of the 19th century mentioned that the approaching century will be the story of nihilism-the expertise of the dying of god and the simultaneous retention of the ancient expectations in regards to the which means, rationale and worth. For the duration of the transitional period of nihilism, humans will think that there is not anything rationale, meaning or values. In short, the world identity nothing-that is the expertise of nihilism-the interpretation of the new world order in phrases of the categories correct to the ancient, now defunct worldview. Nihilism is theref ore a transitional state that outcome from having one foot in the historic world and the opposite in the new of expectations proper to the Christian world view. The points that Nietzsche had put forward regarding Nihilism were critiqued by several religious challengers, and existentialist. One of the popular critics called Albert Camus, believe that the human beings generally logs and desires for higher order absurd. He also said that the death of god was insignificant and unimportant and that the entire mankind, do not need any higher authority or power and danger of divine wrath to live a contented, happy life full of morals. Nietzsche talked about the end of Christian morality in the world. Nietzsche in God is Dead stated that he believed that here is no longer a real essence or substance to conventional and traditional social, political and religious values. He witnessed that old values and old ethics, probity and morals, now, don’t have the same power that they once had. At this stage, he announced the death of god, stating that the traditional or time-honoured resource and basis of transcendental value, God, no longer did not ho ld any importance in modern culture and was efficiently dead to us. Generally, Nihilists believe in the fact that without any apposite and apt source of complete , universal, and inspirational values, then there cannot be any real values at all. Chapter II Unveiling Hidden Aspects of Nihilism in T.S. Eliot’s The Wasteland T.S. Eliot (1888-) was born and brought up in St. Louis, Missouri. He went to Smith Academy in St. Louis and after that the Milton Academy in Massachusetts, as his family was initially from New England. Eliot started courses at Harvard University in 1906, graduating after three years with a Bachelor of Arts degree. At Harvard, he was extraordinarily affected by teachers eminent in verse, rationality and abstract feedback, and whatever is left of his artistic profession would be formed by each of the three. Not long after the turn of the century, Eliot started seeing his poems and short stories in print. T. S. Eliot was a writer, screenwriter and scholarly commentator and a Nobel Prize victor for his excellent work. Some of his best known works incorporate the poems The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, The Waste Land, Murder in the Cathedral The Hollow Men, Four Quarters and the plays Murder in the Cathedral and The Cocktail Party. His most renowned exposition remains Tradition and t he Individual Talent. For his lifetime of idyllic advancement, Eliot won the Order of Merit and the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948. The Waste Land, by T. S. Eliot, showed up during an era when European culture was not knowing as to what to do with itself. Europe had quite recently risen up out of World War I, a war which had damaged the landmass , its general public and society. Numerous people of that time believed in the fact that society has become disordered, chaotic,coldhearted and humans without any sentiments. A feeling of disappointment, disillusion and criticism got to be proclaimed and nihilism became popular and came to the front. The poem then was known as a poem which reflected the condition after the war and how that resulted in degradation and loss of values and ideals,and further resulting, a loss in faith. The Waste Land also expresses the hopelessness which was present in that time in the society. People felt that nothing is left. The poem commences with the central character of the poem, of the wasteland, thinking about the spring: April is the unkind and callous month, variety Lilacs out of the dead land, amalgamating Memory and desire, blending Dull roots with spring rain. Winter keep us warm, covering Earth in dreamy snow, feeding A little life with dried tubers. This passage is an indication of the extent of the dilapidation, deprivation and corruption and degradation of man. The man has drawn and has gone so low into depravity, corruption, and decadence and evil that he now wants to live a life of unawareness and due to this they are not living a complete and a fruitful life. April, the month in which spring starts, is no more a happy time in which new life is commended and rejoiced, yet a coldblooded time of resurrection that reminds man that his own particular life is frightfully unfilled and is empty. The speaker then reviews the time he initially understood that his life has become empty, blank, vacant and bare. In the springtime, he says, he gave his mate hyacinths. When he gave a glimpse to her, then he noticed that his beloved arm’s were full of beautiful flowers and from her hair, water was dropping, then he anticipated to see joy, contentment, fulfillment and satisfaction on her face, but saw nothing. As of right now, he understands that genuine bliss cant be found in passing and temporary things. The world holds nothing for him- Oed und scoff das Meer-forsaken and vacant is the ocean. It is conceivable that Eliot resulted in these present circumstances same acknowledgment through a comparable reason, as he and his wife had an exceptionally miserable relationship. The hero then goes up against us a trip through society, an excursion that shows the full degree of human corruption and profound spiritual emptiness and blankness. In the first scene of A Game of Chess, an affluent couple is indicated at home, living futile lives and a life without meaning which is made out of dull schedules. Their relationship is constrained and simulated, every so self-assimilated that not one or the other can correspond with the other. The world war I is one of the most enormous disaster and misfortune in the history. The after effects of the war to had a drastic effect on the ordinary people. The condition of that time was also portrayed in literature, and in poems as well. T.S. Eliot is one of the most important war-poet who in his poem the wasteland, depicts the condition of mankind struck in paramount destruction and demolition following the war. The poem is divided into five parts and its puts forward some of the themes like social devastation, thrashing of joy and looking forward in future and belief in nothing. The poem begins with the first part of the poem named as, ‘The Burial of the dead’. In this section , the speaker can be Eliot himself, is describing the seasons. Spring brings reminiscence and the necessitate and need and then the speaker’s memory drifts back to time to munich, to childhood sled rides and to a potential romance with a hyacinth lady. He then goes on remembering som e other incidents which includes the fortune teller namely , Sosostris and then he finds himself on the London bridge. The third part ‘ The Heart Sermon’ opens with a picture of river. The speaker is sitting on the banks and muses on the deplorable condition of the world and then the scene shifts to maidens singing a song of lament and one of those id crying because of the fact that the world has lost its innocence to a similarly lustful man. The fourth section, ‘ Death by Water’, describes a dead Phoenician lying within the water. The speaker cries for rain and it finally comes. Second part of the poem is a very famous part which is named as ‘ A game of Chess’ which focuses on the aspect that humans share some similarities with the pieces just like there are on the board of chess. The title suggests the horrible conditions after the war for the complete society. People were living on the wasteland, and they have been clutched and compressed in a situation just as pieces in chess. One of the line of the second part of the poem which involves the fisher king myth and it underlines the infertility and barrenness of humanity after the war. There was no love , communication between the lovers and thus it resulted in no reproduction at all. The idea of nothingness and emptiness is the central theme of the poem, which is the symbol of realism of that society. The famous poem the Wasteland is divided into five parts which represents five totally different elements of earth, fire, water, etc, because of the hunter picture in a search. The effects of the war was as such that it did affected the physical environment but it also resulted in the loss of spiritual and moral life and its vitality, liveliness and strength. Because of this condition it was difficult for people to return on the previous innocence and it was marked by emptiness and a search which goes on its journey without any probable scope of improvement. The second part of the poem is also marked by hopelessness, degeneration, infertility, unworthiness and cruel condition of humanity. Humanity has no other option to flee and runaway. But people were still living and continuing there designated roles and was living in horrible conditions around them. The title of the second part is highly symbolic, just as in the game of chess there is an division based on hierarchy, in the same w ay humans are also divided on several parameters and social realities. The second part of the poem can itself be divided into two parts, the first one is concerned with the richer class and the setting is their respective households. And second part depicts the poorer class and the action takes place in a pub. The main subject matter of first part is despair , despondency and lack of optimism are portrayed here. The unproductiveness and aridity of the setting is a major theme which is highlighted by focusing on social classes and persons. The barrenness of marriage is also emphasised to all classes of society and the fact that love does not appear anymore. At the end, what is left behind is darkness, dimness and sadness and a crystal clear picture of the wasteland. Chapter III Conclusion Nihilism is one of the most celebrated notion in English language and many writers have taken Nihilism as a subject matter in many of their works. The word Nihilism has long history. The word Nihilism is the resultant of the Latin phrase ‘Nihil’, which means anything does not exist. Nihilism in step with Nietzsche is first of all the situation where the world appears to be without value, morals, and the world after the loss of life of god. There is not any get away from the fact and whilst there is not any approach to reconcile oneself to it, since all of the method have utterly failed. For the world seems to be without value precisely on account that the values we invested on this world are failing: they now not participate in their ordering or organizing perform. This can be a predicament, an untenable trouble, a state of powerlessness that we cannot probably suffer. Nihilism is therefore a transitional state that outcome from having one foot in the historic world and the opposite in the new of expectations proper to the Christian world view. There are many elements of Nihilism which are found in T.S. Eliot’s the Wasteland. The wasteland causes a sensation once it absolutely was printed in 1922. Nihilism with reference to the Wasteland talks about the end of Christianity and religion as a guiding light to the people because of the growing power of the evil and the victory of good over bad. The Waste Land, by T. S. Eliot, came up during an era when European culture and world was not knowing as to what to do with itself. Many people of that time believed that society has become disordered, chaotic ,and humans without any sentiments. A feeling of disappointment, disillusion and criticism got to be emphasized and nihilism became popular and came to the front. The poem then was known as a poem which reflected the condition after the war and how that resulted in degradation and loss of values , morals and ideals ,and further resulting, a loss in faith. The Waste Land also expresses the hopelessness which was present in t hat time in the society. People felt that nothing is left on which they can believe and attain solutions to their various problems. With his depiction of London as the ‘unbelievable and incredible city’ whose populace has been fixed by death, Eliot plainly depicts the sadness experienced by the British after the war. The city is not just possessed by the coagulated waterway of sighing masses which courses through its mist secured roads, however by the spooky memories of officers like Stetson who lost their lives amid the war. Like The Sound and the Fury, ‘The Wasteland’ endeavors to pass on the agnosticism of its day through its extremely structure and style. By its disconnected lines and various dark references, the poem introduces an age in which otherworldly and existential assurance.Remaining out of sight of this poem is the Fisher King, a legendary figure from Arthurian legend. His barrenness speaks to the sterility of the age, and his just trust is that somebody will ask him what it is that upsets him. In The Wasteland, Eliot is underlining the way that the issue for present day man is not to be found in the absence of bounteous answers, however in the absence of the best possible inquiries. The age that delivered World War I couldnt settle its own particular issues; just a come back to the knowledge that had gone before it offered any trust. These works impart a compelling truth: that in his ascent to power and investigative ability, humankind lost his direction. Perplexity rules and his tower is left to disintegrate. This is skepticism: the breaking down of all esteem; the lethal oversight of overlooking that the most valuable things that a man has are not those things which can be full in a wash room, put away in a ledger. Yet, as Eliot saw, there is trust: escape from the maze of negligibility is not found by pressing forward into the dimness, however by taking after the breadcrumbs of times long past once again to the doorway and to escape. The poem’s main element of ni hilism can be found in a manner that the death of Christianity and religion as a source of enlightenment and inspiration from is as it is dead because of the increased corruption and loss of values and morals. The poem also gives many examples in various sections about the degrading values and morals and the way people are becoming materialistic and only thinking about themselves rather than humanity on a whole. Works Cited:

Contradictions of Character in George Bernard Shaws Pygmalion Essay

â€Å"Manners are the happy way of doing things† according to Ralph Waldo Emerson.   According to Emerson people use manners as a front to make themselves look better.   Inherently, this will lead to a contradiction of the front and the reality.   One such man who is most concerned with manners is the protagonist of Shaw’s Pygmalion, Professor Henry Higgins.   Higgins is a man who displays contradictions within his character.   He is in the business of teaching proper manners, although lacks them himself.   In addition, Higgins is an intelligent man, and yet he is ignorant of the feelings of those around him.   Another apparent contradiction is that Higgins’ outer charm serves to hide his bullying nature. He manipulates Eliza and others around him to serve his own purposes, without any regard for her feelings.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Higgins, a teacher of proprietary manners, lacks those very manners which others pay to learn from him.   Ironically, Higgins believes that he is the greatest teacher of manners.   He announces that in â€Å"three months [he] could pass [Eliza] off as a duchess.†Ã‚   Higgins thinks that he can take any lower class girl and pass her off as a duchess.   He truly believes that he is capable of transforming Eliza.   Once the teaching begins, Higgins shows no respect for others in his life.   When he goes to see his mother, she reminds him that â€Å"[he] promised not to come on† her days when she is having guests.   He ignores this promise to his mother because he believes that his newest experiment is more important than his mother’s insignificant visitors are.  Ã‚  Ã‚   This behavior continues throughout the ... ...ulative experiments on life.   Higgins tries to use his charm to manipulate people into giving him what he wants, but when this tactic fails he resorts to brute force and abuse.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   It is amazing that a man with such great qualities and characteristics can also have the bad qualities that are opposite of those great ones.   How these traits can coexist in one person does not make sense.   One of the traits must be a false front.   This is the nature of the world.   When two opposites come together in the same place and do not alter each other, then one of them is kept up as a faà §ade.   At any moment in time this faà §ade can move or crack and the true nature of the person will come to light.   People who display too many contradictions in character are usually true hypocrites.

being independent Essay -- essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Graduating and getting out on your own is a difficult step to make. There are a lot of things that you have to take into perspective. The choices that you make when you get out of highschool believe it or not are crucial and life altering. Decisions that you have to make are ones like what you want your career to be, where you want to live, and a big decision is buying a house. In making these decisions you have to do a lot of research and things to be prepared. I did a lot of research in hopes of finding a career that I would like and three things that I could see myself doing was owning my own spa ($100,000 yearly salary), managing a spa($60,000 yearly salary), or being an Esthetician. After thinking long and hard about it however, I decided I would like to be en Esthetician. An Esthetician is a person who gives care to skin in a non-medical way. An Esthetician makes a decent amount of money which is important to have if I want to be able to afford a house.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Being an Esthetician would be fun because I enjoy working with people and I am good at working with them. I am also good with my hands which is necessary in my job Making other people feel better about themselves makes me feel better about myself. One set back in that job however would have to be foot fungus. Feet aren?t my favorite thing on the human body especially with any kind of fungus on them. Going into a job that has a high paying salary often requires experience or schooling. I would have to take classes and work hard to get my license so that it is easier for me to find a job. To become an Esthetician it is only required to have at least 17 weeks of classes which would cost under $1,000.00 and at the end of the classes I would graduate with my license in esthetics. I looked at job offers and have came to the conclusion that if I was an Esthetician I would make an estimated amount of $50,000.00 a year. That salary however can vary depending on your qualit ies and experience.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I plan on living in Long Beach, California and the reason being is I have always had the desire to live near the beach. Living far away I would have to take into consideration transportation. Being on my own requires you to be financially stable. So I figured out that if I had a 2002 Jeep Gand Cherokee La... ... in Long Beach which is a wealthy town. So the price of my house is very reasonable for the area I am going to be living in. It could be cheaper to take out a 20 year loan and pay $100 a month more which would cover the interest but with my salary it is better for me to take a 30 year loan.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I asked myself two questions at the beginning of this project, one being what if I run out of equity on my home with a reverse mortgage? I found that answer on www.google.com and it said that you can?t run out of money and they can not force you to move out of your home. Another question was, when I am old if I have to go to a nursing home what will happen to my house? That answer was also found on www.google.com and it was that if you are moved out for a year or longer then my home can be sold. All of these things and more have to be considered before you even buy a house. So researching and taking your time thinking about every detail is extremely important. You want to be able to afford what you have and still have money to save or spend at your discretion. I hope that one day this bit of research gives me some backing for when I actually do move out on my own.

Forward the Foundation Chapter 2

2 But Seldon, while he did not forget Amaryl's warning, did not think of it with any great degree of concentration. His fortieth birthday came and went-with the usual psychological blow. Forty! He was not young any longer. Life no longer stretched before him as a vast uncharted field, its horizon lost in the distance. He had been on Trantor for eight years and the time had passed quickly. Another eight years and he would be nearly fifty. Old age would be looming. And he had not even made a decent beginning in psychohistory? Yugo Amaryl spoke brightly of laws and worked out his equations by making daring assumptions based on intuition. But how could one possibly test those assumptions? Psychohistory was not yet an experimental science. The complete study of psychohistory would require experiments that would involve worlds of people, centuries of time-and a total lack of ethical responsibility. It posed an impossible problem and he resented having to spend any time whatever on departmental tasks, so he walked home at the end of the day in a morose mood. Ordinarily he could always count on a walk through the campus to rouse his spirits. Streeling University was high-domed and the campus gave the feeling of being out in the open without the necessity of enduring the kind of weather he had experienced on his one (and only) visit to the Imperial Palace. There were trees, lawns, walks, almost as though he were on the campus of his old college on his home world of Helicon. The illusion of cloudiness had been arranged for the day with the sunlight (no sun, of course, just sunlight) appearing and disappearing at odd intervals. And it was a little cool, just a little. It seemed to Seldon that the cool days came a little more frequently than they used to. Was Trantor saving energy? Was it increasing inefficiency? Or (and he scowled inwardly as he thought it) was he getting old and was his blood getting thin? He placed his hands in his jacket pockets and hunched up his shoulders. Usually he did not bother guiding himself consciously. His body knew the way perfectly from his offices to his computer room and from there to his apartment and back. Generally he negotiated the path with his thoughts elsewhere, but today a sound penetrated his consciousness. A sound without meaning. â€Å"Jo†¦ Jo†¦ Jo†¦ Jo†¦Ã¢â‚¬  It was rather soft and distant, but it brought back a memory. Yes, Amaryl's warning. The demagogue. Was he here on campus? His legs swerved without Seldon's making a conscious decision and brought him over the low rise to the University Field, which was used for calisthenics, sports, and student oratory. In the middle of the Field was a moderate-sized crowd of students who were chanting enthusiastically. On a platform was someone he didn't recognize, someone with a loud voice and a swaying rhythm. It wasn't this man, Joranum, however. He had seen Joranum on holovision a number of times. Since Amaryl's warning, Seldon had paid close attention. Joranum was large and smiled with a kind of vicious camaraderie. He had thick sandy hair and light blue eyes. This speaker was small, if anything-thin, wide-mouthed, dark-haired, and loud. Seldon wasn't listening to the words, though he did hear the phrase â€Å"power from the one to the many† and the many-voiced shout in response. Fine, thought Seldon, but just how does he intend to bring this about-and is he serious? He was at the outskirts of the crowd now and looked around far someone he knew. He spotted Finangelos, a pre-math undergraduate. Not a bad young man, dark and woolly-haired. â€Å"Finangelos,† he called out. â€Å"Professor Seldon† said Finangelos after a moment of staring as though unable to recognize Seldon without a keyboard at his fingertips he trotted over. â€Å"Did you come to listen to this guy?† â€Å"I didn't come for any purpose but to find out what the noise was. Who is he?† â€Å"His name is Namarti, Professor. He's speaking for Jo-Jo.† â€Å"I hear that, † said Seldon as he listened to the chant again. It began each time the speaker made a telling point, apparently. â€Å"But who is this Namarti? I don't recognize the name. What department is he in?† â€Å"He's not a member of the University, Professor. He's one of Jo-Jo's men.† â€Å"If he's not a member of the University, he has no right to speak here without a permit. Does he have one, do you suppose?† â€Å"I wouldn't know, Professor.† â€Å"Well then, let's find out.† Seldon started into the crowd, but Finangelos caught his sleeve. â€Å"Don't start anything, Professor. He's got goons with him.† There were six young men behind the speaker, spaced rather widely, legs apart, arms folded, scowling. â€Å"Goons?† â€Å"For rough stuff, in case anyone tries anything funny.† â€Å"Then he's certainly not a member of the University and even a permit wouldn't cover what you call his ‘goons'. Finangelos, signal through to the University security officers. They should have been here by now without a signal.† â€Å"I guess they don't want trouble,† muttered Finangelos. â€Å"Please, Professor, don't try anything. If you want me to get the security officers, I will, but you just wait till they come.† â€Å"Maybe I can break this up before they come.† He began pushing his way through. It wasn't difficult. Some of those present recognized him and all could see the professorial shoulder patch. He reached the platform, placed his hands on it, and vaulted up the three feet with a small grunt. He thought, with chagrin, that he could have done it with one hand ten years before and without the grunt. He straightened up. The speaker had stopped talking and was looking at him with wary and ice-hard eyes. Seldon said calmly, â€Å"Your permit to address the students, sir.† â€Å"Who are you?† said the speaker. He said it loudly, his voice carrying. â€Å"I'm a member of the faculty of this University,† said Seldon, equally loudly. â€Å"Your permit, sir?† â€Å"I deny your right to question me on the matter.† The young men behind the speaker had gathered closer. â€Å"If you have none, I would advise you to leave the University grounds immediately.† â€Å"And if I don't?† â€Å"Well, for one thing, the University security officers are on their way.† He turned to the crowd. â€Å"Students,† he called out, â€Å"we have the right of free speech and freedom of assembly on this campus, but it can be taken away from us if we allow outsiders, without permits, to make unauthorized-â€Å" A heavy hand fell on his shoulder and he winced. He turned around and found it was one of the men Finangelos had referred to as â€Å"goons.† The man said, with a heavy accent whose provenance Seldon could not immediately identify, â€Å"Get out of here fast. â€Å" â€Å"What good will that do?† said Seldon. â€Å"The security officers will be here any minute.† â€Å"In that case,† said Namarti with a feral grin, â€Å"there'll be a riot. That doesn't scare us.† â€Å"Of course it wouldn't,† said Seldon. â€Å"You'd like it, but there won't be a riot. You'll all go quietly.† He turned again to the students and shrugged off the hand on his shoulder. â€Å"We'll see to that, won't we?† Someone in the crowd shouted, â€Å"That's Professor Seldon! He's all right! Don't pound him!† Seldon sensed ambivalence in the crowd. There would be some, he knew, who would welcome a dust-up with the University security officers, just on general principles. On the other hand, there had to be some who liked him personally and still others who did not know him but who would not want to see violence against a member of the faculty. A woman's voice rang out. â€Å"Watch out, Professor!† Seldon sighed and regarded the large young men he faced. He didn't know if he could do it, if his reflexes were quick enough, his muscles sturdy enough, even given his prowess at Twisting. One goon was approaching him, overconfidently of course. Not quickly, which gave Seldon a little of the time his aging body would need. The goon held out his arm confrontationally, which made it easier. Seldon seized the arm, whirled, and bent, arm up, and then down (with a grunt-why did he have to grunt?), and the goon went flying through the air, propelled partly by his own momentum. He landed with a thump on the outer edge of the platform, his right shoulder dislocated. There was a wild cry from the audience at this totally unexpected development. Instantly an institutional pride erupted. â€Å"Take them, Prof!† a lone voice shouted. Others took up the cry. Seldon smoothed back his hair, trying not to puff. With his foot he shoved the groaning fallen goon off the platform. â€Å"Anyone else?† he asked pleasantly. â€Å"Or will you leave quietly?† He faced Namarti and his five henchmen and as they paused irresolutely, Seldon said, â€Å"I warn you. The crowd is on my side now. If you try to rush me, they'll take you apart. Okay, who's next? Let's go. One at a time.† He had raised his voice with the last sentence and made small come-hither motions with his fingers. The crowd yelled its pleasure. Namarti stood there stolidly. Seldon leaped past him and caught his neck in the crook of his arm. Students were climbing onto the platform now, shouting â€Å"One at a time! One at a time!† and getting between the bodyguards and Seldon. Seldon increased the pressure on the other's windpipe and whispered in his ear, â€Å"There's a way to do this, Namarti, and I know how: I've practiced it for years. If you make a move and try to break away, I'll ruin your larynx so that you'll never talk above a whisper again. If you value your voice, do as I say. When I let up, you tell your bunch of bullies to leave. If you say anything else, they'll be the last words you'll say normally. And if you ever come back to this campus again, no more Mr. Nice Guy. I'll finish the job.† He released the pressure momentarily. Namarti said huskily, â€Å"All of you. Get out.† They retreated rapidly, helping their stricken comrade. When the University security officers arrived a few moments later, Seldon said, â€Å"Sorry, gentlemen. False alarm.† He left the Field and resumed his walk home with more than a little chagrin. He had revealed a side of himself he did not want to reveal. He was Hari Seldon, mathematician, not Hari Seldon, sadistic twister. Besides, he thought gloomily, Dors would hear of this. In fact, he'd better tell her himself, lest she hear a version that made the incident seem worse than it really was. She would not be pleased. 3 She wasn't. Dors was waiting for him at the door of their apartment in an easy stance, hand on one hip, looking very much as she had when he had first met her at this very University eight years before: slim, shapely, with curly reddish-gold hair-very beautiful in his eyes but not very beautiful in any objective sense, though he had never been able to assess her objectively after the first few days of their friendship. Dors Venabili! That's what he thought when he saw her calm face. There were many worlds, even many sectors on Trantor where it would have been common to call her Dors Seldon, but that, he always thought, would put the mark of ownership on her and he did not wish it, even though the custom was sanctioned by existence back into the vague mists of the pre-Imperial past. Dors said, softly and with a sad shake of her head that barely disturbed her loose curls, â€Å"I've heard, Hari. Just what am I going to do with you?† â€Å"A kiss would not be amiss.† â€Å"Well, perhaps, but only after we probe this a little. Come in.† The door closed behind them. â€Å"You know, dear, I have my course and my research. I'm still doing that dreadful history of the Kingdom of Trantor, which you tell me is essential to your own work. Shall I drop it all and take to wandering around with you, protecting you? It's still my job, you know. It's more than ever my job, now that you're making progress with psychohistory.† â€Å"Making progress? I wish I were. But you needn't protect me.† â€Å"Needn't I? I sent Raych out looking for you. After all, you were late and I was concerned. You usually tell me when you're going to be late. I'm sorry if that makes me sound as though I'm your keeper, Hari, but I am your keeper.† â€Å"Does it occur to you, Keeper Dors, that every once in a while I like to slip my leash?† â€Å"And if something happens to you, what do I tell Demerzel?† â€Å"Am I too late for dinner? Have we clicked for kitchen service?† â€Å"No. I was waiting for you. And as long as you're here, you click it. You're a great deal pickier than I am when it comes to food. And don't change the subject.† â€Å"Didn't Raych tell you that I was all right? So what's there to talk about?† â€Å"When he found you, you were in control of the situation and he got back here first, but not by much. I didn't hear any details. Tell me-What-were-you-doing?† Seldon shrugged. â€Å"There was an illegal gathering, Dors, and I broke it up. The University could have gotten a good deal of trouble it didn't need if I hadn't.† â€Å"And it was up to you to prevent it? Hari. you're not a Twister anymore. You're a -â€Å" He put in hastily, â€Å"An old man?† â€Å"For a Twister, yes. You're forty. How do you feel?† â€Å"Well-A little stiff.† â€Å"I can well imagine. And one of these days, when you try to pretend you're a young Heliconian athlete, you'll break a rib. Now tell me about it.† â€Å"Well, I told you how Amaryl warned me that Demerzel was in trouble because of the demagoguery of Jo-Jo Joranum.† â€Å"Jo-Jo. Yes, I know that much. What don't I know? What happened today?† â€Å"There was a rally at the Field. A Jo-Jo partisan named Namarti was addressing the crowd-â€Å" â€Å"Namarti is Gambol Deen Namarti, Joranum's right-hand man.† â€Å"Well, you know more about it than I do. In any case, he was addressing a large crowd and he had no permit and I think he was hoping there would be some sort of riot. They feed on these disorders and if he could close down the University even temporarily, he would charge Demerzel with the destruction of academic freedom. I gather they blame him for everything. So I stopped them. Sent them off without a riot.† â€Å"You sound proud.† â€Å"Why not? Not bad for a man of forty.† â€Å"Is that why you did it? To test your status at forty?† Seldon thoughtfully clicked the dinner menu. Then he said, â€Å"No. I really was concerned that the University would get into needless trouble. And I was concerned about Demerzel. I'm afraid that Yugo's tales of danger had impressed me more than I realized. That was stupid, Dors, because I know that Demerzel can take care of himself. I couldn't explain that to Yugo or to anyone but you.† He drew in a deep breath. â€Å"It's amazing what a pleasure it is that I can at least talk to you about it. You know and I know and Demerzel knows and no one else knows-at least, that I know of-that Demerzel is untouchable.† Dors touched a contact on a recessed wall panel and the dining section of their living quarters lit up with a soft peach-colored glow. Together, she and Hari walked to the table, which was already set with linen, crystal, and utensils. As they sat, the dinner began to arrive-there was never any long delay at this time of evening-and Seldon accepted it quite casually. He had long since grown accustomed to the social position that made it unnecessary for them to patronize the faculty dinners. Seldon savored the seasonings they had learned to enjoy during their stay at Mycogen-the only thing about that strange, male-dominated, religion-permeated, living-in-the-past sector they had not detested. Dors said softly, â€Å"How do you mean, ‘untouchable'?† â€Å"Come, dear, he can alter emotions. You haven't forgotten that. If Joranum really became dangerous, he could be†-he made a vague gesture with his hands- â€Å"altered: made to change his mind.† Dors looked uncomfortable and the meal proceeded in an unusual silence. It wasn't until it was over and the remains-dishes, cutlery, and all-swirled down the disposal chute in the center of the table (which then smoothly covered itself over) that she said, â€Å"I'm not sure I want to talk about this, Hari, but I can't let you be fooled by your own innocence.† â€Å"Innocence?† He frowned. â€Å"Yes. We've never talked about this. I never thought it would come up, but Demerzel has shortcomings. He is not untouchable, he may be harmed, and Joranum is indeed a danger to him.† â€Å"Are you serious?† â€Å"Of course I am. You don't understand robots-certainly not one as complex as Demerzel. And I do.†

Job rotation in the Philippines Essay

The research investigates the employment transition of new graduates from HEI’s of Batangas. The employment success of graduates was measured in terms of the companies’ reasons for hiring and skills that the new graduate applicants supposed to possess so they will fit for employment. The researcher used the contributions of 12 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) of Batangas. Data were obtained from 106 human resource officers and unit heads from 61 business establishments in the cities of Lipa, Tanauan and Batangas. This study focuses on the employment transitions of new graduates to the labor market. What do we already know about the immediate area of concern? It was perceived that universities where students graduated from greatly influenced their employment success. The institution that established a reputation in terms of high quality of education is often believed to produce students that will most likely get hired than other students with unpopular schools. Also, the behavior of the applicant as a student is shown from school rankings. Good grades are important because employers may think it has an effect on the future work performances of an  employee. The human resource department gives examinations with questions about general information or questions related to the vacant positions to be filled up in order to measure the knowledge and characteristics of an applicant that could lead them toward employment success. Applicants were interviewed for clarifications of information or for recovering pertinent data about their applications that could help the hiring officers on their employment decisions. (What’s more important than the other? What gives more impact in the hiring process? Is having good grades or graduating from a popular university affects hiring status more that the exams or interviews an applicant has to go through before getting hired?) What are the characteristics of the key concepts and variables? Credentials. The labor market is consistent with asking for formal credentials as a requirement for the new graduate applicants. However, according to this research, results of the formulated questionnaires show that it is not an indicator of employment success. Credentials is just a mere requirement but not used as a tool for hiring and selection process. It is important to be presented and the applicant may have good academic performance but the information it contained, according to the respondents are yet to be verified if it reflects the employee’s future working performances. Higher Education Institutions or (HEI) Reputation. An institution that maintains a good reputation in terms of giving quality education produce students that has higher chance of getting employment success as the result of this research suggest and answers were given by the respondents from different labor market Human Resources officers or representatives. The research also proves that some companies are bias in hiring the graduates of a certain institution if there is an available position. This suggests that graduates from other HEI’s have a lower chance of getting hired. Higher Education Institutions or (HEI) Quality Assurance and Accreditation. The good reputation established by an HEI is also assisted by the quality assurance and accreditation examined and verified by external firms which may be local or international. Although reputation suggests a higher consistency as confirmed by the labor market of Batangas, it is certain that efforts in accreditation should be implemented by the HEI’s because it helps them a ttain a distinct reputation which will give their graduates equal chance on  getting hired. Employee Selection Process. Efforts on assessing job relevant characteristics were instigated by the HR’s during the hiring and selection process. They make use of tools such as examinations and interviews to further assess the applicants’ knowledge, capabilities and characteristics to get employed or be selected for a certain job position. According to the research, the labor market is highly consistent with selecting employees with desirable personality as suggests by the result in interviews implemented. Employment Success or Selection for a certain Job Position. The employment success doesn’t prove the new graduate applicants’ satisfaction with their entry in the labor market. They may be hired but some of the new graduates complain about their underemployment. According to the research, employers use tools such as examination and interviews as well as look upon the reputation of the schools in terms of accreditation to hire new employees. However, in the selection process the employers would most likely designate the employees to their job positions by using their credentials. What are the relationship between key variables, concepts and factors? The research aims to investigate the employment transitions by measuring the employment success, failure to get employed and underemployment based on the procedures or tools used by employers. The study shows that to attain possible employment success, a new graduate should be from a school with good reputation in terms of quality assurance. Another important factor is to pass the exam and interviews given by the HR or hiring officers. Credentials also played an important role although it needs t be verified and it may not be an indicator of employment success but employers used to designate employees to job positions. What are the existing theories, inconsistencies, shortcomings in our knowledge and understanding? The researcher used the social structure theories of middle range: the screening, credentialism and status construction theory. The over emphasis on credentials is not of great importance in employment success as emphasized on the study but it can’t be prematurely concluded since the local where the study is conducted is only limited in Batangas. How about the business districts in Manila (eg: Makati)? Some graduates of the HEI’s in Batangas may apply in Manila or  other business districts. Some applicants of companies in Batangas may have been graduated from schools in Manila or other places. What evidence is lacking, inconclusive, contradictory or limited? The quality of education is only measured using two factors: the reputation and accreditation. The research is not able to provide the evidence regarding the career landing of the new graduates from specific HEI that will prove the discrimination or the bias in hiring. The study did not focus on the employment success but also looks upon the failure to get hired and the underemployment, which were both lacking evidences. Why do we need to study the research problem? Literature provided by the researcher shows that although it was said that there is a shortage of employees in terms of job vacancies in the business industries and lack of competitiveness of the employees, ironically, there is a complain on being under employed. Also, literature regarding employee transition is deficient with empirical evidences. What contribution can the present study are expected to make? The study will help the education investors such as the parents or guardians of the students realize the importance of assessing institutions that will give them appropriate returns in the future. This research will also help the government sector in charge with the control and improvement of education industry make modification and enhancements with regards of quality assurance that would give graduates of different HEI’s equally opportunities in getting hired. What research method seems unsatisfactory? The research gave questionnaires with only 106 out of 200 were retrieved and completed. It is not stated whether the questionnaire floated has 1:1 ration with the companies in Batangas. The employees of the same company could answer the questionnaire, and if there were a difference in their answers, how would it reflect the hiring and selection process of the company as a whole?

“In Reification and Utopia in Mass Culture” by Frederick Jameson Essay

It is true that manipulation theory sometimes finds a special place in its scheme for those rare cultural objects which can be said to have overt political and social content: thus, 60s protest songs, The Salt of the Earth, Clancey Segals novels or Sol Yuricks, chicano murals, and the San Francisco Mime Troop. This is not the place to raise the complicated problem of political art today, except to say that our business as culture critics requires us to raise it, and to rethink what are still essentially 30s categories in some new and more satisfactory contemporary way. (Jameson 139)I initially read this quote as a praise of political art as so worthy an object of study that its complexities could not be fully addressed within the scope of Jamesons work. In other words, Jameson was humbly admitting that political art is deserving of its own lengthy analysis. Why, though, is Jameson incapable of addressing political art (and implicitly counter culture) for more than a page in his ninet een page essay describing modern culture?As I reread the quote, I began to hear a dismissive tone in the words special place and rare. How rare is overt political and social content? How rare are 60s protest songs? While the historicity of the category 60s can be appreciated, and indeed Jamesons use of it appears to be grounded in skepticism towards the authenticity of political art emerging outside of collective life, it seems as if Jameson is using it to contain a threat to his argument. The threat, that is, that overt political art and action have been present and overt since before the 1960s, and continue to persist now. I feel that, to a significant extent, his position as academic shields him from and allows him to theorize away a counterculture that has been very much alive and struggling. Or, as Hakim Bey opens his TAZ: The Temporary Autonomous Zone, Ontological Anarchy, Poetic Terrorism, CHAOS NEVER DIED.The production or assumption of a limited period of the 60s tends to perpetuate a nostalgic distance from a period of political art, counterculture, and resistance that never really ended (or began). In man y ways the 60s have come to resemble a safe countercultural commodity. One can easily find coffee table books on the collective rebellious phase of the baby boomers youth, or one can watch the Wonder Years or Forest Gump and recall a period before choosing to turn off, tune out, drop in. If these experiences are too lonely, one can visit my home town of Cleveland, Ohio with family and peruse the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame to study Beatles  artifacts or Jimi Hendrix guitars behind glass for a $10 fee. All of these commodities appear to recuperate political art and counterculture except for that they only do so in retrospect, and in a fashion that uses physical/spatial distance to construct a sense of historical distance that must be willfully believed. Just a few blocks away museum visitors, were they to instead choose to visit the Tower City Mall at public square on a Sunday, would likely encounter middle class kids and homeless people dissolving cultural boundaries at Cleveland Food Not Bombs. I dont propose, in response, a hasty rejection of some mythically totalitarian historical metanarrative, but rather I propose a more complete and honest history that dissolves the nostalgic distance between political art then and recuperated art now. Unfortunately for Jameso n, who has chosen to ignore the reality of such a history for the sake of a commentary on his own constructed meta-society, many post-60s examples easily come to mind. The punk rock movement, certainly with a strong collective component, produced material easily accessible to mass culture. The Sex Pistols Anarchy in the U.K. was released in 1976, and Crass was releasing agitating songs like Do They Owe Us A Living?, Punk is Dead, and Fight War Not Wars in 1978. Rage Against the Machine, arguably one of the more important alternative bands of the 1990s, initiated a radical Axis of Justice with System of a Down and donated all of its proceeds from a tour with U2 to organizations as overtly resistant as EZLN. Any middle class adolescent who frequented Ozzfest or other metal festivals in the 1990s and 2000s is likely aware of System of a Downs Steal This Album, or the lyrics to their politically charged Prison Song. Someone interested in hip hop enough to scratch the surface will likely encounter KRS-1s Sound of da Police released in 1993. And Radiohead, now international superstars, have just released their latest album essentially for free, bypassing the music industry entirely. Jameson might respond to me with a question like, yes, but why havent they worked?, expecting an answer affirming their status as commodities which could be subject to his ideology/utopia dialectic. My answer to such a question would be precisely my historical point: its in the works. Jameson cannot escape his own position within consumer capitalism in that it is his choice to perceive a large body of political art as contained within a diluted dialectic that imposes itself upon consumers. Perhaps a radically engaged and tactical  patience can be counterpoised against the image of the passive consumer. And besides, this is not to mention the countless DIY zines circulating around Infoshops, in radical circles, and across the hipster-radical bridge in trendy coffee shops. A nice account of post-60s anarchist praxis can be found in criminologist Jeff Ferrells Tearing Down the Streets: Adventures in Urban Anarchy, where he discusses his own experiences with collective activities as obverse as pirate radio, graffiti, and biking in critical masses. But are these practices rare? Perhaps only to those who continue to ignore, dismiss, and keep a distance from them. Are they exclusive? Well, this is not the place to raise the complicated problem of countercultural elitism and exclusion. For the rest of the items on Jamesons list, it appears as if he has chosen examples that fit his argument of rarity. When I searched for Clancey Segal on Google, for example, the only matching result I could find was Jamesons article! Perhaps my own ignorance is to blame for my unfamiliarity with the rest of the items on Jamesons list. If this is the case, how is it that I was able to come up with several examples of my own? Are they simply inauthentic, easily recuperated, or not overt enough? Am I a crazy radical detached from the revolutionary potentiality of mass culture? Or are my examples invalidated and recuperated precisely at the moment that Jamesons attitude of disengagement and struggle for theoretical security reposition them inside of some abstract near-omnipresent nightmare?Indeed, it often seems, provided one accepts the omnipresent nightmare situation, that any disbelief or skepticism towards such a macrocosm is analogous to falling back into the Matrix and being reint egrated into the naà ¯ve consumerist masses. But does the myth of the rarity of genuine and overt political art- and resistance in general- honestly acknowledge a totalizing or nearly totalizing condition like Guy Debords spectacle or Lewis Mumfords megamachine, or does it merely reveal its proponents inability or refusal to engage with political art and action of their contemporary milieu? To what extent does a fear of recuperation reproduce precisely the distance required for recuperation? The ideological component of Jamesons writing comes to bear in his own language: to rethink what are still essentially 30s categories in some new and more satisfactory contemporary way. I think Jameson redeems himself when his ideology/utopia dialectic of consumerism is pointed at criticism itself. Just as capital must re-create and recuperate a  utopian component in its commodities, Jameson and his perceived brotherhood of culture critics must re-think a rare and fetishized collection of genuine political art and acts to continue to theorize a hegemonic modern culture. If we directly engage in overt political art or action, however, the University can only have us, as rare historical events, in retrospect. Bey, Hakim. TAZ: The Temporary Autonomous Zone, Ontological Anarchy, Poetic Terrorism. Autonomedia. 2003. Brooklyn, New York. Ferrell, Jeff. Tearing Down The Streets: Adventures in Urban Anarchy. Palgrave. New York, New York. 2001. Song release dates gathered from www.allmusic.com

Long-Term Planning

â€Å"Pay yourself first† is a standard commitment device used by financial planners seeking to encourage disciplined saving and budgeting; it is also the principle underlying US payroll-deduction 401(k) plans. These plans are one of the most successful commitment devices in current use, and they are formulated such that contributions are automatically deducted from workers' pay before the money can be spent. As such, saving in 401(k)-type plans would be best for my personal situation, as participation rates in 401(k)-type plans, where payroll deduction is the norm, are at least four times as high as for Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs) (Mitchell and Utkus, 2004), where structured payroll deductions are uncommon. Additionally, I am given the liberty to exert some control over how my money is invested (subject to some constraints), and receive the risk and reward for those investments. Since my tax rate when I retire would be presumably higher than my tax rate before retirement, I would likewise be better off with a Roth IRA than a traditional IRA because I won’t have to pay tax on my withdrawals at the higher rates. I can withdraw the money I contributed to a Roth IRA penalty-free anytime, since I already paid tax on it so the government would not care. Since I would not probably need my money I invested in Roth IRA for at least five years from now, my money will be tax-free on withdrawal. The catch is that I cannot know for sure what my tax rate would be when I retire, but I can find several online calculators that will help me compare results with a Roth IRA versus traditional IRA. Further, the new Roth IRA provisions apply even if I am covered under my employer’s retirement program. Lastly, the SEP proves to be a promising retirement plan based on my personal situation. Although the SEP is an employer-provided retirement plan, record-keeping and tax reporting are simplified, a plus factor for me. The higher limit in a SEP makes this plan as attractive as the profit-sharing plan, but easier and less costly to administer, which are two of my foremost criteria when choosing a fitting retirement plan for myself. WORK CITED Mitchell, O. & Utkus, S. (Eds.). (2004). Pension Design and Structure: New Lessons from Behavioral Finance. Oxford, England

The relationships between the physical environment and economic activities are no longer important

‘Second life' has its own settlements, inhabitants, firms, markets, geography and economies. In January 2007, it even had its own political riot. What is significant about this? Well, its economic activity bears absolutely no relation to the physical environment. It is an entirely virtual world and, admittedly, a computer game – but the point remains. Their currency, the transactions, the profits and the losses may occur in the game's own currency but can be converted into real life US dollars. Also read this  Cheating in a Bottom Line Economy This is 21st century economic activity as the science fiction author's imagined it, and fundamentally, is totally isolated from the physical environment. This could certainly be the shape of things to come, as indications of it can be seen translated onto the non-virtual world. The physical environment is consistently being conquered by human activity – there is little requirement for physically conducive circumstances for an area to be entered into the global capitalist economy. Anecdotally, there is a real snow slope in Dubai – economic activity based around winter sports is happening in the desert. Arguably, humans still cannot conquer wilderness – settlement in Japan is restricted to the coast and the vast majority of mankind live close to coastal areas. Is this, however, more an issue of tradition than one of physical necessity? Certainly, conservative theory would suggest that people draw their identities from tradition, which can have important economic implications. Las Vegas typifies the ‘bright lights' view of the USA – yet having outgrown its aquifer it surely shouldn't exist. Where there are serious economic incentives, the physical environment pales into very little. This has seriously implications in, for example, settlement patterns. Examination of a pre industrial city, such as Potosi, in Bolivia, demonstrates the importance of the relationship between the physical environment and economic activity. These cities were centres of power, bringing together the wealthy and politically powerful – both underpinnings of economic activity – with their servants and slaves in one large urban area, thus representing the beginnings of hierarchal economic systems that have been replicated around the world. This was the start of urbanisation, but what dictated the locations of these economic hubs? Read also Recording General Fund Operating Budget and Operating Transactions The physical environment, from which everything was derived and upon which everything relied. These new cities were focused on the exploitation of a raw material such as coal or iron ore; Catal Huyuk in Turkey developed around volcanic glass, becoming one of the first economic centres. As these activities grew the industrial city emerged, bringing people together in a work force and selling the products of their labour in a market system for the first time – it was the physical environment providing the impetus and the raw materials that enabled both extended settlement and trade to occur. The relationship could not have been more important. However, what is the postindustrial city tied to? Very little – location of industry is no longer tied to traditional centres that formed due to the physical environment. ‘Footloose' industries can be observed in the UK and other knowledge based economies. The sunrise strip around the M4 corridor and silicon fen have not developed where they are because of an exceptionally good crop of microchips. They are focused around centres of learning – science parks attached to the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, or important communication routes that link them into the global economy – the M4, and important links to London. Read also Intro to Public Relations Notes Similarly, it is human economics that has ‘saved' those areas previously dependent on the physical environment. The decline of the mining industry in South Wales had a profound impact on the surrounding areas causing significant depression. This situation is being reversed with subsidies from the European Union; an economic body that rose from a belief in the law of comparative advantage as opposed to the physical environment. The relationship here between the physical environment and economic activity appears somewhat less significant than for pre industrial cities. If post industrial cities no longer rely on the physical environment for their economic activity, but pre industrial and industrial cities derive their location, habitation and economic activity from the physical environment of their surroundings, it could be argued that those nation states who have no undergone industrialisation have a greater reliance on the physical environment. Rio de Janeiro owes much of its grandeur and wealth to the physical environment – many of the municipal buildings were built on the influx of wealth from the extraction of gold in the 18th and 19th centuries. Today, the area is the biggest extractor of petroleum in Brazil from off shore fields; a position in continues to hold despite the opening of markets due to its resource endowment. Conversely, it can also be the physical environment that dictates a very different course of economic events; resource curse theory suggests that an endowment of a particular resource – such as diamonds in many African nations – can in fact lead to stinted economic activity as the economy develops in an unbalanced manner. The poor economic situation in these states would certainly suggest an important relationship between economic activity and the physical environment that must be understood for a solution to be reached. In a similar vein, some cities have not been able to cope with the move away from a close relationship with the physical environment. ‘Old' industrial cities, such as Sheffield in the UK and Lille in France are characterised by loss of employment in the primary sectors, as mining and other physical environment heavy industries decline. There are often high levels of social deprivation and population loss from the inner city as out migration occurs. This illustrates that the relationship between the physical environment and economic activity is just as relevant today as it was with the initial city forming influences – in this case, the location of the cities, a physical factor, on the periphery of post industrial development has lead to economic depression and social deprivation. Furthermore, the observance of the growth of the postindustrial city from pre industrial times has been focused on the core regions of the UK, the USA and Japan. This conservative view of development theory assumes that all development will undergo similar courses, thus implying that the relationship between the physical environment and economic activity in LEDCs is more important than that in MEDCs. Structuralists, however, will argue that this is not the case. The growth of these ‘core' regions has huge implications for the entire global economy based around human derivatives as opposed to physical factors. The periphery is, in essence, not affected by the physical constraints that some argue are the cause of its poverty. It is the economic actions of ‘core' elements of society that result in the economic situations in LEDCs. Studies that led to this ‘dependency theory' observed the actions of wealthy in Sao Paulo which had huge implications on the favela dwellers and the unskilled labourers of Brazil; this is translated on a global scale – the economic activity that keeps the poorest sections of global society in that position is arguably the result of the actions of the core nations which they have had most to do with in the past. If this is the case, there is little relationship between the physical environment and economic activity. In spite of all this, however, there is an undeniable economic impact when disaster strikes. The dramatic impact of the Asian tsunami is a clear illustration. The movement of the tectonic plates that in turn triggered the tsunami could not have been predicated, although it has been argued that the quick pinpointing techniques could have provided greater notice of the wave. Even if this was the case, what of the impact to the settlements, the farmland and the tourist industry that it destroyed? The economic implications of this were huge – raising the point that no matter how much humans attempt to harness the physical environment in pursuit of economic incentives, what initially allowed the development of the global economy can just as easily destroy it. The impact of natural disaster on economic activity is neither new nor restricted to LEDCs. Although the death count in LEDCS, such as the Kerala Earthquake, is usually higher than in MEDCs, the economic impact in MEDCs can be even more dramatic – the Kobe Earthquake, or the effects of Loma Preta ripping through San Francisco. Here, flights were disrupted when a runway ruptured, and damage to free ways and bridges held up over one million commuters for over a month. The economy that these commuters were a part of may not have derived directly from the physical environment, but the disruption and thus cost caused by the physical environment was huge. Even those natural disasters we have warning of have significant impact. The Stern Report recently emphasised the huge economic cost of climate change to certain regions of the globe, which in an increasingly globalised economy would have resounding effects around the globe. There is strong evidence to the effect that the current warming is human induced, and even speculation that it will be global warming that proves to be Malthus' final resource limit. As global temperatures increase, the Greenland ice sheet will melt. This introduction of fresh water will reduce the salinity of the Gulf Stream as it goes northwards and sinks, powering the global conveyor. If this ocean current is unable to sink, the global conveyor will cease to moderate climatic extremes around the globe. Whilst the UK may have handled this in the past during the Little Ice Age, in an economy dependent on roads, private cars and international travel, the economic disruption would be huge as the climate became colder. Limited snowfall has considerable economic impact today, making its potential impact huge. Economic activity itself, therefore, has reinforced the importance of the relationship between the physical environment and economic activity. Furthermore, given the attention paid to climate change by governments, the press, and NGOs alike, the carbon trading business is increasingly significant. Carbon Exchange, a firm that manages both voluntary carbon trading schemes in the US and administers the compulsory cap and trade system in the EU, has seen its share prices rocket to nearly i12 a share in recent months. Here, the impact of economic activity on the physical environment is giving rise to another 'round' of economic activity. Carbon trading is big business and completely inseparable from the physical environment. Is this, rather than a ‘Second Life' virtual existence of economic activity more the shape of things to come? There are other such examples of considerable profits being derived from climate change concerns – effectively; we are reverting to a system whereby economic activity is the direct result of the physical environment. In conclusion, it would appear that the physical environment did much to shape the initial economic developments of core regions, such as the UK, the USA and Japan. It has imparted traditions that persist by way of settlement patterns and economic strengths. If this is the case, a simple division can be made – MEDCs do not rely on the physical environment for economic activity where LEDCs do. However, this ‘model' cannot be held paramount, as it appears not to be the case; structuralist views point out the presence of highly developed and desperate poverty even within the same city as a result of dependency, rather than economic development as a result of the physical environment. In spite of this, there exists an undeniable relationship between the physical environment and economic activity that applies to both LEDCs and MEDCs – the impact of natural disaster. Furthermore, there is increasing economic emphasis surrounding climate change, particularly in MEDCs. Fundamentally, economic activity is an aspect of human activity. Humans are part of the biosphere, and in turn, part of the physical environment. Whilst we may not be as constrained by mountain ranges or climate extremes, as once was the case, it is doubtful there will ever be a situation where the relationship between the physical environment and economic activity is totally irrelevant.