On Passion and Self-Growth Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

On Passion and Self-Growth - Essay Example The American novelist, literary-critic, and story-teller Elizabeth Hardwick highlights that "The greatest gift is a passion for reading. It is cheap, it consoles, it distracts, it excites, it gives you knowledge of the world and experience of a wide kind. It is a moral illumination." I strongly believe in her statement as my journey in life has been filled with notable experiences derived from reading various books. Before my passion for reading is developed, I must admit that I was first obsessed in the stories my mom untiringly tells me before retiring to bed. Then, the exciting part of deciphering the meaning of the simple words on my earliest books came. Before I know it, I have become a voracious reader whose interests range from culture, sociology, and literature. Reading has sparked my curiosity and invites me to seek the mysteries of life. My passion for reading has hugely enhanced my intellect. Whenever I open a book, I often see myself unlocking a treasure box which will brings me into other places, provides me a glimpse of other culture, and conveys me a wealth of knowledge. It is amazing to know that every book shares its unique story. No matter how simple, each book offers and adds new ideas. Reading has enriched my intellect by bringing me to the world of Shakespeare, Milton, Julius Cesar and even as far as Aristotle's and Homer's. Reading introduced me to the radical ideas of Karl Marx, the different worlds explored by Gulliver, and the persistence of Helen Keller. Books broaden my horizons by adding new words to my vocabulary, polishing my grammar, and enabling me to find ways to communicate my ideas. My passion for reading enlightens me with knowledge and ushers me from the darkness of ignorance. Reading a book the second or third time does not diminish the knowledge that it offers. Being a passionate reader, I have discovered that it is not the writer which conveys and creates meaning in his or her compositions but in fact, the reader constructs his own comprehension on the material being strongly influenced by his background and experiences. Thus, I never really get tired of reading a single book over and over again as the knowledge it imparts vary each time. Aside from shaping me intellectually, reading also further my emotional development. As a thinking and feeling being, a story moves me and fills me with different kinds of emotion. I believe that the most important thing that my passion for reading brought me is the capability to understand the emotions of other people. Reading often requires empathy and putting one's self in the character's shoes. With this, I have developed the ability to accept, understand, and share the joys and sorrows of the people around me. I credit to my passion to reading the rapport I maintain with my social circles. I can say that my passion for reading is the largest contributor to my personal development. Books enrich and stimulate my mind while keeping me in touch with my emotional side. Reading has taught me the greatest lessons in life. I must stress that Denis Diderot identifies only great passions which can elevate the soul to great things. Considering all the things that my passion for reading accomplished in me, then, I can say that it must be the greatest passion a human can be blessed

Keynse v Friedman Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Keynse v Friedman - Essay Example A weak aggregate demand could cause unemployment to rise and starts a negative cycle of boom and bust in economics. The general thrust of a government whenever there is a threat of recession is to intervene and use fiscal and monetary tools to mitigate the ill effects of a recession. A key recommendation of Keynes during a down economic cycle was stimulus spending by the government by deficit spending which at first glance is counter-intuitive as it requires spending using money that a government does not have in the first place and might cause inflation and devaluation. If his ideas were adopted earlier, it could have made the Great Depression less severe and shorter. Milton Friedman (1912-2006) is a famous American economist in his own right and he won the coveted Nobel Prize in Economics in 1976 for challenging the ideas of Keynes. In particular, he argued there is always a persistent unemployment that government policies can only reduce to a certain extent. The trick, he argues, is give free market capitalism free rein in promoting jobs and thereby increase in the process the level of aggregate consumption or the so-called aggregate demand of Keynesian economics. He denounced Keynesian economics as as socialism with his famous remark that â€Å"there is no such thing as a free lunch.† He sees government intervention as interference of free markets and a dangerous act (Friedman

Problems and flaws in the American Education Essay Example for Free

Problems and flaws in the American Education Essay In this class we have read many articles related to the problems and flaws in the American Education. Many people in the United States believe our educational system is in crisis. In this essay, I will be comparing and contrasting the differences and similarities between two articles. The author of Idiot Nation takes us on a tour of failings of America’s schools. He touches on topics of cultural illiteracy and the relationships between schools and corporations. In another article, the author of In the Basement of the Ivory Tower confirms some of the suspicions about the policies and standards of American higher education. These articles share similarities and differences as well. Professor X, the author of In the Basement of the Ivory Tower, is a part-time instructor of English in a college. The author describes how many of his students need serious work in â€Å"basic skills†. Few of his students can do well in his classes. Other students may never pass, because they cannot write a coherent sentence. The Professor has encountered many students lacking the capacity to succeed in his English classes. Similarly, the author of Idiot Nation, explains how many of the students attending college are ignorant. They have serious problems in learning and knowing facts that they should know for fact. These two articles demonstrate the problems that college students have when it comes down to education. In contrast, Professor X relates to the students and has sympathy towards their problems, but the author of Idiot Nation, does not seem to relate to these students. Michael Moore is aggressive and does not justify the idiocy of the students. Professor X talks about how he wishes to help his students write more intelligent essays. He understands the students’ difficulties in learning and frustrations. Furthermore, he tries to find solutions, such as relating the literacy techniques they will have to study to novels that the students may have already read. As we can see, the United States faces major problems in today’s education. Many attempts have been made to establish and demonstrate these problems to the public. We may be able to read and view these problems in newspapers, advertisements, and book articles. Michael Moore and Professor X are authors of articles which depict and give a better understanding of the issues that are found in education throughout the country. Today many college students face problems because of their lack of intelligence.

Goals Systems Theory: Overview

Goals Systems Theory: Overview Jenna Lyles Section B 1. Equifinality: To understand the system property of Equifinality is to understand the old adage â€Å"There’s more than one way to skin a cat.† This means that ultimately the guarantee of success is not reliant on taking/completing any singular path, procedure, or means of fulfilling a system goal. No one way is the only way, as there are multiple ways in which an organization can reach its goal(s). Equifinality Example: This can be exemplified in the University of Central Florida’s attempt to garner more football game attendance. Initially the university promised large amounts of Link Loot. 1,000 Link Loot points if you come out to the UCF game! (The campaign sought to boost school spirit and morale. I mean, where else do you fully immerse yourself in the college experience if not at your university’s football games?) This attempt was successful, primarily amongst freshman, to whom the idea of Link Look seemed especially promising (it doesn’t fully hit you how broke you are until you’re sitting in your freshman community dorm eating a 38-cent cup of Ramen) because it promoted the chance at winning a scholarship. Game attendance did indeed rise, but then, UCF implemented a new tactic. UCF eventually ended the Link Loot process towards the end of 2012. This posed a problem, how would UCF keep attendance at a high? They university had to think of anothe r way—take another route—to ensure game attendance stay peaked. Well they found one indeed. When UCF started winning its football games we all noticed how much the advertising and broadcasting of our commendable record all over campus shot up. It seemed everywhere you turned our undefeated record was thrown in your face. Naturally, people that lacked school spirit or any interest in showing up at the game only to watch UCF get stomped, picked up. Attendance reached an through the roof again because of UCF’s steady effort to get the word out that the University of Central Florida meant business on the field this year. Thus, we have two different means of garnering football game attendance that were able to work interchangeably. The variety used meet the system goal (high football game attendance) stemmed from two different changes which yielded the same result. 2. Multifinality: Multifinality is the system property that can best be epitomized in â€Å"the pursuit of multiple goals by means of a single activity (Shah et al., 2002). Essentially, it is the notion that one act has the power to spawn multiple reactions. Multifinality is preferable to causes which produce one effect as multifinality is the equivalent of getting an exceptional bang for a regular buck, so to speak. Multifinality Example: At Oakleaf High School when one class ends a bell sounds signaling that students are to proceed to their next class a minute before the tardy bell (which declares them late if they have not reached their next destination) sounds a â€Å"warning bell† sounds. This let’s students know that they have approximately 60 seconds to get to their next class. To say that the halls of Oakleaf High School remained, until the shrill of that warning bell blasted, packed, was an understatement. To reduce the socializing that took place in between classes (that which our three vice principals thought aided tardiness) our principal (Mr. Broski) did away with the warning bell. The first week of the new policy showed promising results in more regions than one: tardiness was at a low, there were less accidents on the stairs (since people were not flying down them, racing to class), and the hallways were finally navigable! In this way Oakleaf High School (the system) killed not two, but three birds with one stone! The stone, or goal in this case, being the pursuit of reducing socializing in between classes. 3. Negative Entropy: Negative entropy is the system property by which a system is able to preserve itself and additionally promote the system’s growth. The notion of negative entropy extensively harps on the significance of a system engaging in necessary exchangesnecessary in that these exchanges permit system survival and success with its environment. In this way, negative entropy suggests that a system’s exhibits a definite dependence on a circulation of information/components shared between it and its environment. Negative Entropy Example: An example of multifinality can be found in the closing-down of Blockbusters nation-wide. Blockbuster was a booming movie and game rental business, before entertainment conveniences like Netflix arrived on the scene. Blockbuster remained closed to its environment in that by the time it considered incorporating methods liken to Netflix and OnDemand (online access to entertainment, mail services, etc.) it was too late and they had suffered irrecoverable blows to their revenue. Ultimately Blockbuster would go out of business, shutting down all of their corporate-owned stores. The CEO’s of Blockbuster primarily owe their failure to a stinted interaction with their environment. The failure to see and adjust to the world of entertainment around them, especially methods of renting/viewing entertainment from the convenience of your home, delineates how they ignored the very environment responsible for their system’s (Blockbuster’s) viability. An argument can definitely be made that the company might have otherwise avoided deterioration if they had maintained an ebb and flow of information between themselves and the progressing environment around them. 4. Requisite Variety: Requisite variety is another system property in which the imperativeness of the relationship between a system and its environment is addressed. Requisite variety is, in itself, self-explanatory. Put a simple â€Å"of† in the middle of requisite and variety and you end up with a concise explanation of the notion: requisite of variety. Meaning, the variety within a system (its inner workings, fundamentals, mechanics, etc.) imposes the requisition that the system’s environment be composed of a liken variety. Basically, the environment of a system should match the system’s innards itself, with regard to complication and diversity (for evolution and survival). Why is this necessary? A system that is ill-equipped to handle/adapt to the intricacies of its environment will be overrun with complication and falter. Requisite Variety Example: The easiest way for me to apply this property is to think about instances in which I (the system) have felt overwhelmed and unable to adapt to the intricacies of the situation around me (the environment). A year ago I was my neighbor’s go-to babysitter. She had the kindest, most docile baby boy: Ethan. He was no problem to babysit; easy to entertain, not a picky-eater, and knocked right out after a bedtime story or two. My means of handling him were ingrained and perfected, and so when Barbara (my neighbor) asked if would mind looking after Mateo and Carlos (Ethan’s cousins) I told her that would be no problem. Unbeknownst to me, Mateo and Carlos were far from the little angel that Ethan was. Mateo was lactose intolerant and Carlos had ADHD which was in full-throttle come 8 o’clock. On top of all of this, Barbara requested I watch the boys at their (Mateo and Carlos’s) house because Ethan was spending the night there. I found mys elf unprepared to surmount the obstacles my environment had set in my path; the change in house layout made it impossible to find simple items, I couldn’t find anything (nutritious, anyway) to feed Mateo, Carlos had Ethan on the brink of tears because he was tired and agitated and Carlos kept messing with him, and all three of them seemed unresponsive to my suggestion that everybody go to bed. The end-result was me calling Barbara to admit defeat and ask that she come back home. Thus we have I, the system, was not unable to keep up with the diversity and complications that my environment imposed. This resulted in system failure, as requisite variety confirms it will. References J.Y. Shah, A. Fishbach, R. Friedman, W. Chun, and D. Sleeth-Keppler (2002), â€Å"A Theory of  Goals Systems,† in Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, Vol. 34, M.P. Zanna,  ed. New York: Academic Press, 331–78.

The Native Kalapuyan Indians, Migrant Men, and Migrant Women :: American History

The Willamette River Valley: The Native Kalapuyan Indians, Migrant Men, and Migrant Women Introduction The first true white settlers of the Willamette Valley, men, women and children who made the arduous journey from Missouri to the end of the Oregon Trail, encountered little resistance from the native populations of the Valley. Disease, spread to the native tribes by transient explorers and traders, helped make possible the settlement of the Willamette Valley by these pioneers, almost without resistance. Further, the continued wave of white settlers that poured into this fertile valley completed the collapse of the existing Indian culture. Unlike the areas that the pioneers had just traveled through (those occupied by the Rogue and Nez Perce Indian tribes) there never was a ‘Willamette Valley Indian War.’ The Kalapuyans, natives of the Valley, were peaceable people who manifested a very different character from the Indians east of the Cascade Mountains.1 The attitudes of many men and women settlers to the Willamette Valley regarding the native population are best r eflected in a statement by Leslie M. Scott in The Oregonian: â€Å"Always it will be a source of thanksgiving that the destruction of the Indians of the Pacific Northwest by diseases spared the pioneers the horror of a strong and malignant foe.† The combined efforts of men and women and the lack of resistance from the native peoples, resulted in the successful settlement of white Americans in the Willamette River Valley. The following essay represents a collection of knowledge about the Willamette River Valley during the 1830's thru 1860's, with a focus on : understanding the native populations, the white men who traveled to and laid claim to the Valley, and the women who supported these men throughout the journey to and settlement of the Willamette River Valley. Part I ~ â€Å"Those who gave so much for so little: The story of the Indians of the Willamette River Valley† The Willamette Valley, the fertile trough of land nestled between the Coast Ranges and Cascade Mountains of northwestern Oregon, marked the geographic end of the Oregon Trail for pioneer Americans and immigrants to the Pacific Northwest. We should not forget that this land Mackey, Harold, PhD. The Kalapuyans: A source book on the Indians of the Willamette Valley, Mission Mill was also the home of a native people, the Kalapuyans, who had occupied this valley for about 10,000 years before the arrival of Euro-Americans in the early 19th century.

Free Euthanasia and Doctor-Assisted Suicide Essay - Assisted Suicide :: Euthanasia Physician Assisted Suicide

Euthanasia The purpose of this essay is to inform readers clearly and coherently enoughof the terms and issues in the euthanasia debate that they can make sense of the euthanasia question. Descriptions are in relatively simple, non-technical language to facilitate learning. The definition of euthanasia is simple: "Easy, painless death." But the concept of euthanasia proposed by adherents of the euthanasia movement is complex and has profound consequences for all. Because the subject involves the discipline of medicine (diagnosis, treatment, prognosis, medical ethics and so on) as well as the discipline of law, the general public will have difficulty understanding it without some knowledge of these matters. We begin with the definition of terms: * Euthanasia: traditionally, an easy, painless death. Now used to mean "mercy killing," "assisted suicide," or "involuntary euthanasia." * Voluntary euthanasia: death administered to one who asks for it. In practice, truly voluntary euthanasia requests may be very rare, since the patient rarely gives informed consent because the alleged consent is influenced by depression, improperly treated pain or other factors that are not controlled but could be controlled. * Involuntary euthanasia: death administered without the recipient's consent, commonly known as "mercy killing," as in the case of children or incompetent adults. * Active, direct or positive euthanasia: direct killing of the patient by administering lethal drugs or other direct means of ending life, or by withholding or withdrawing ordinary means of sustaining life such as food and water, protection from exposure and so on. * Passive, indirect or negative euthanasia: ambiguous. Can be the decision by patient, parent or guardian and physician to withhold or withdraw extraordinary means of sustaining or prolonging life, such as deciding against high-risk surgery for a patient dying of cancer or kidney failure. When the intent is not to cause death but rather to reject extraordinary treatment, this results in the acceptance of death or continued life, whichever occurs, but it is not true euthanasia. The terms "passive," "indirect" or "negative euthanasia" should not be used since they play into the hands of euthanasia advocates by confusing legitimate actions with euthanasia, thereby desensitizing people to the fact that euthanasia is killing. More importantly, passive euthanasia is sometimes defined by others as the withholding of lifesaving treatment with the intention and result of causing the patient's death. This is the equivalent to active, direct euthanasia.

Hypothesis through research Essay

Introduction This investigation aims to find the value of Young’s Modulus for a specific material, in this case nylon fishing line. Young’s Modulus (E) is a measure of a material’s stiffness, determined by the formula: The standard unit of measure for Young’s Modulus is the pascal (Pa). 1 pascal is the same measure as 1 Nm-2 (Nm being Newton Metre). A material always retains the same Young’s Modulus value regardless of how much it is stretched or strained, and this should be revealed in this investigation by gathering a definite value of the modulus for nylon. Hypothesis Through research that I conducted before starting the investigation, I have determined that the correct Young’s Modulus value of Nylon lies in the range 1-7GPa (the large range being due to different make-ups of Nylon with it being a compound). I should therefore be looking at achieving a final result within or very close to this range. Since stress is proportionate to strain in the Young’s Modulus formula, and the modulus value remains the same, I would expect the value of stress and strain to proportionally increase with each other. Experiment Plan In order to carry out this investigation into the value of Young’s Modulus of nylon, I will conduct an experiment to gather the values of stress and strain when increasing force is added to the material, and will take readings as weight increases until the breaking point of the nylon is reached. In order to calculate stress and strain, I will need to record each of the following variables throughout the experiment: Force applied to the material [F] (Newtons/N) Area of a cross-section of the material [A] (Metres-squared/m2). Original length of the material [Lo] (Metres/m) Amount of extension when the force is applied [L] (Metres/m) These variables will then allow the values of stress and strain to be calculated using the following formulas: This leads to a final Young’s Modulus calculation formula of: The set-up I will be using to carry out this experiment consists of the nylon fishing line suspended from a stand using a clamp, and another clamp to ensure there is no movement in the stand itself. I will create a suitable loop at the bottom of the hanging material so that weights can be added but will need to ensure this loop does not weaken any area of the material and cause a drop in the breaking point value, as this would compromise the reliability of my experiment and result in premature breakage of the length of nylon. At each stage of the experiment I will take readings of length using a standard 1m ruler, and will measure the area of a cross section by gathering the diameter value using a micrometer, halving this value to gather radius and then use the formula. Before any weights are added, I will need to take a control measurement of the length and area of the nylon before any stress or strain is applied. Once this is done I will proceed to apply weight in intervals of 100g (0. 981 N) and record the values of each variable stated at bottom of the previous page after each 100g weight is added, with the exception of original length which is a constant value and only needs to be recorded at the beginning of the experiment. I will continue to add weights until the material reaches its elastic limit and snaps, at which point I will record the force applied to break the object. In order to achieve an adequate number of results from each experiment to make a fair analysis and conclusion to the investigation, I will need to take a minimum of eight readings (i. e the nylon should withstand at least 800g/7. 849N). If this fails in the actual experiment then I will need to re-evaluate my plan and decide on a new method of conducting the experiment to meet this criteria. To increase reliability, accuracy and to eliminate possible anomalous results, I will aim to repeat the entire experiment three times to gather average readings.