The Role of Corruption and Virtue in “A Man for All Seasons”

â€Å"A Man for All Seasons† is a play written by Robert Bolt. It is inspired by true events and revolves around Saint Sir Thomas More, the Chancellor of England during the 16th century.King Henry VIII’s wife, Catherine of Aragon (of Spain), is unable to bear a child and provide an heir for the throne. Owing to this reason, he wishes to divorce her and marry Anne Boleyn, the sister of his former mistress.However, Saint Sir Thomas More is against this idea and refuses to approve of the King’s desire. The Pope too is against this notion as he had previously disregarded a biblical law in order to allow Henry VIII to marry his wife. What follows is the test of a man’s ability to abstain from falling prey to the temptation of bribery and corruption, even if it means having to give up wealth, luxury and power.Thesis: A major theme in â€Å"A Man for All Seasons† is the delineation between virtue and corruption in all its aspects, political, mental, moral and spiritual, depicted primarily through the leading characters.Robert Bolt, through the medium of the main characters in the play, has elucidates the differences between the corrupt and the conscience-driven; the immoral and the principled. The play itself is a depiction of society and its many facets.Sir Thomas More characterizes morality. He is â€Å"a hero of selfhood†, meaning that he will not compromise on his â€Å"self† or his values simply in order to please or gratify someone. He is the antithesis of the corrupt.The Common Man represents common individuals and society in general. He performs various roles to portray conventional characters that one would encounter in everyday life. Ultimately he begins to forfeit his moral standards and concedes to the audience that in life, a man must do what is required in order to subsist.The character of Richard Rich is symbolic of greed and avarice. He is a man that willingly sacrifices his ethics and principles for wea lth and position. He is the epitome of corruption and depravity. Through this representation of morality and its antithesis, the writer has aptly described to the audience the elements of corruption, in all its forms.Thomas More is the kind of man that would rather sacrifice his life than his ethics. Not only the audience but the other characters too view More as a man of morals. It is due to this fact that the King wishes to attain More’s acceptance before divorcing his wife and marrying another woman.More’s acquiescence would endow the King’s decision with morality and people would approve of it more readily. The various characters attempt to sway More’s resolution of disapproval of the King’s marriage to Anne Boleyn. His steadfastness in resisting bribes demonstrates the strength of his principles.For instance, when the Duke of Norfolk tries to convince More to sign an oath of allegiance, trying to reform England and the Church, More responds by stating, â€Å"†And when we stand before God, and you are sent to Heaven for doing according to your conscience, and I am sent to hell for not doing according to mine, will you come along with me—for fellowship?†The audience will notice that there exists not an ounce of corruption in the character of Thomas More. He is the representative of a noble and virtuous human being. He is beheaded because of lie told by Richard Rich and till the very end More remains a man of conscience who will not submit to bribery even if his life were to depend on it, literally. He remains a man â€Å"anchored to his principles† (36).The Common Man illustrates a middle path between the virtuous and the unscrupulous. He depicts the base nature of an average man. The choices of an average man are governed primarily by his need to survive, whether by hook or crook, and that is exactly what the Common Man portrays through his various images.His declaration â€Å"Better a live rat than a dead lion† in Act II Scene vii, is a perfect example of this attitude of his. Here he is playing the jailer and affirms that he’d rather live by taking bribes or resorting to corruption, than die as an honorable man who will not give up upon his morals. His actions are not guided by his conscience but by his will to live, no matter what the price.Richard Rich is a superficial and insincere individual who epitomizes the height of corruption. He, along with other characters that include Thomas Cromwell, Wolsey and Chapuys has been used by the author to embody the corruption existing in society. Rich is willing to sacrifice anything to advance himself politically.He yearns for position and affluence at any cost. The opening scene itself gives us a glimpse into Rich’s personality when he tells More that he should be a teacher and disregards More’s advice saying that he should not be chasing after wealth and power and must surrender his corrupt ways.In Act I Scene viii it is insinuated that Rich has sold his soul to the devil when he divulges information about the gilded cup to Cromwell in exchange for a job. The decisive illustration of his corrupt nature is when he lies, under oath in court, and gets his friend, More beheaded for his own selfish needs.

Epistemology Vocabulary

Epistemology: The branch of philosophy that investigates the nature, sources, limitations, and validity of knowledge. Rationalism: The position that reason alone, without the aid of sensory info, is capable of arriving at some knowledge, at some undeniable truths. Empiricism: the position that knowledge has its origins in and derives all of its content from experience. Idealism: in metaphysics, the position that reality is ultimately non matter; in EPISTEMOLOGY, the position that all we know is our ideas.Transcendental Idealism: in epistemology, the view that the form of our knowledge of reality derives from reason but its content comes from our senses. A Priori: pertaining to knowledge that is logically prior to experience; reasoning on based such knowledge. A Posteriori: pertaining to knowledge stated in empirically verifiable statements; inductive reasoning. Perception: The act or process by which we become aware of things. Sense Data: Images or sensory impressions.Primary Qualiti es: According to Locke, qualities that inhere in an object: size, shape, weight and so on. Secondary Qualities: According to Locke, qualities that we impose on an object: colour, smell, texture and so on. Solipsism: An extreme form of subjective idealism, contending that only I exist and that everything else is a product of my subjective consciousness. Skepticism: In epistemology, the view that varies between doubting all assumptions until proved and claiming that no knowledge is possible. Analytic Judgment:Sumum Bonum: Phenomenalism: The belief, associated with Kant, that we can know only appearances (phenomena) and never what is ultimately real (noumena); that the mind has the ability to sort out sense data and provide relationships that hold among them. Induction reasoning: also know as inductionism, induction. The process of reasoning to probable explanations and judgments. Hypothesis: in general, an assumption, statement, or theory of explanation, the truth which is under inves tigation. Hypothetical Method: Paradigm:Pseudoscience: Correspondence Theory of Truth: A theory contending that truth is an agreement between a proposition and a fact. Coherence Theory of Truth: A theory contending that truth is a property of a related group of consistent statements. Pragmatism: the philosophical school of thought, associated with Dewey, James, and Pierce, that tires to mediate between idealism and materialism by rejecting all absolute first principles, tests truth through workability, and views the universe as pluralistic. Pragmatic Theory of Truth:Relativism: the view that human judgment is conditioned by factors such as acculturation and personal bias. Tabula Rasa: Egocentric Predicament: Categorical Imperative: Immanuel Kant’s ethical formula: ast as if the maxim (general rule by which you act) could be willed to become a universal law; the belief that what is right for one person is also right for everyone in similar circumstances. Kant’s Categori es Locke’s theory: Thomistic Terms Realism: the doctrine that the objects of our senses exist independently of their being experienced. Critical Realism: Transcendental Realism:

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning growth regulation

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning growth regulation Should artificial intelligence be regulated? Can it be regulated? And if so, what should those regulations look like? These are difficult questions to answer for any technology still in development stages ? more mainstream regulations, like those on the food, pharmaceutical, automobile and airline industries, are typically applied after something bad has happened, or retroactively, and not in anticipation of a technology becoming dangerous. But AI has been evolving so quickly, and the impact of AI technology has the potential to be so great that legislators prefer not to wait and learn from mistakes, but plan ahead and regulate proactively. Lawmakers and regulators need to look at AI not as a homogenous technology, but instead as a set of techniques and methods that will be deployed in specific and increasingly diversified applications. To be sure, there is currently no generally agreed-upon definition of AI. What is important, however, to understand from a technical perspective is that AI is a rich set of sub disciplines, methods, and tools that bring together areas such as speech recognition, computer vision, machine translation, reasoning, attention and memory, robotics and control, etc. These techniques are used in a broad range of applications, spanning areas as diverse as health diagnostics, educational tutoring, autonomous driving, or sentencing in the criminal justice context. The possibilities are truly endless. But as a growing number of increasingly impactful AI technologies make their way out of research labs and turn into industry applications, legal and regulatory systems will be confronted with a multitude of issues of different levels of complexity that need to be addressed. Both lawmakers and regulators as well as other actors will be affected by the pressure that AI-based applications place on the legal system including courts, law enforcement, and lawyers, which highlights the importance of knowledge transfer and education. Given the speed of development, scale, and potential impact of AI development and deployment, lawmakers and regulators will have to prioritize among the issues to be addressed in order to ensure the quality of legal processes and outcomes?—?and to avoid unintended consequences. Different legal and regulatory regimes aimed at governing the same phenomenon are often closely linked to the idea of jurisdiction. In fact, the competition among jurisdictions and their respective regimes has positive effects by serving as a source of learning and potentially a force for a â€Å"race to the top.† However, discrepancies among legal regimes can also create barriers when harnessing the full benefits of the new technology. Examples include not only differences in law across nation states or federal and/or state jurisdictions, but also normative differences among different sectors. These differences might affect the application as well as the development of AI tech itself. As AI applies to the legal system itself, however, the rule of law might have to be re-imagined and the law re-coded in the longer run. The rise of AI leads not only to questions about the ways in which the legal system can or should regulate it in its various manifestations, but also the application of AI-based technologies to law itself. The future relationship between AI and the law is likely to become even more deeply intertwined. Implementations might take different forms, including â€Å"hardwiring† autonomous systems in such ways that they obey the law, or by creating AI oversight programs (â€Å"AI guardians†) to watch over operational ones. At least some of these scenarios might eventually require novel approaches and a reimagination of the role of law in its many formal and procedural aspects in order to translate them into the world of AI, and as such, some of today’s laws will need to be re-coded.

Evaluating Public Relations Campaigns Assignment

Evaluating Public Relations Campaigns - Assignment Example nal higher education meeting at which Virginia Tech administrators shared lessons learned; and Public Affairs staff participated in an exhaustive, line-by-line review of the Virginia Tech Review Panel report. Thus, the NIU crisis communications plan that was enacted on February 14, 2008 was greatly informed by the collective wisdom of the aforementioned experts, as well as the generosity of their counterparts at Virginia Tech. The outcome objectives of the campaign included: (1) to keep all audiences, particularly students and parents, as widely informed as possible throughout crisis, (2) to use website to provide updates to all audiences, including the news-hungry media, (3) to treat news media as partners , as they have communication tools necessary to reach primary audiences, (4) to maintain institutional credibility through maximum timely disclosure, (5) to manage the message- Victims and their families are fisrt priority, (6) to re-establish reputation as a safe and caring campus community. Among the output objectives of the campaign were: (1) issuing of a report praising the NIU’s response and excellence in crisis communication by the Illinois Governor’s Task Force on Campus Security, (2) commissioning of a report on the NIU’s incident in which crisis communication is held up as exemplary by the U.S Department of Homeland Security, (3) praising of the NIU institution for â€Å"transparency and candour’’ by the Chicago Tribune. As a result, to evaluate the effectiveness of the campaign, Applications from prospective students continue to rise, and only 19 of 300+ students directly affected by the shooting left the university. NIU Public Affairs staffs are in demand as speakers and consultants for other universities developing crisis plans. No lawsuits have been filed in connection with the February 14, 2008 shooting. Spontaneous and unsolicited gifts for scholarships and memorials total more than $1 million. In turn, an additional evaluation method

Assessment of recent developments in financial reporting Essay

Assessment of recent developments in financial reporting - Essay Example This study will understand whether legal enactments and obligations are sufficient to perform financial activities in an ethical and logical manner. Drafting the financial reporting takes a lot of accounting knows how and also the thorough knowledge of legal obligations. The author of the study would lay emphasis on the accurate conduct of financial activities with guidance from the standards laid down by the accounting standards and the legal requirements. The need of these accurate financial reporting and also the critical evaluation of the effectiveness of the legal requirements in the preparation of the financial statements would be covered in the study. Finally, the study will conclude whether the legal requirements of the particular country are sufficient for the companies to perform the accounting and financial activities. International Accounting Standards Board &Financial Accounting Standards Board The establishment of International Accounting Standards Board, Financial Acco unting Standards Board boards was in the year 1973 and was set for the primary purpose of formulation of regulations which would also help in the education of the users, stakeholders and management. Along with international convergence the company the board also focuses on the quality of financial reporting (Liu, 2011). International Financial Reporting Standard IFRS on the other hand will focus on the development of the accounting framework, which will help in the betterment of the company. IFRS is one of the major accounting standards board, which are responsible for checking whether the accounting standards developed by them are effectively executed and implemented within the system for the betterment of the organization or not (Allen, McAndrews and Strahan, 2001). The UK Company Act The UK company act is formed under the Companies Act 2006 and governed by Insolvency Act 1986. help in the development of high quality accounting standards, which are highly compatible with the busin ess environment that can be used for the regional and cross border investments (Allen, McAndrews and Strahan, 2001).It is also responsible for the development of accounting framework, which is accountable for the construction of the organizational structure and also preparation of consolidated financial statements for the benefit of cross listed companies (Liu, 2011). Generally Accepted Accounting Principles Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) is one of the standard frameworks which serve as guidelines for performing financial accounting activity (Liu, 2011). These include conventions, standards, rules and regulations which are known as general accounting standard. Financial & Legal Requirements in Stock Exchange There are several legal and financial regulations and requirements which are applicable for the stock exchanges of different countries. The stock market is regulated by several disclosure standards which help in transparent business operations and also encourage s shareholders in smooth investing activities. For example the London Stock Exchange has several listing rules and regulations which assesses the shareholder’s issuer eligibility and also ensures that these regulations are made. There has been major fluctuation in the stock market movement in the past six months because the overall market has been extremely sensitive vulnerable to the sensitive

Free Fall Lab Report Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Free Fall - Lab Report Example Under the principles, the distance covered by an object in motion bears a proportional relationship with the square of time taken by the object to cover that distance. The constant of proportionality is the gravitational acceleration with the value 9.8 ms-2 under assumption of negligible resistance to the motion. This means that any freely falling object should move with an acceleration of 9.8 meters per second regardless of the nature of the falling object (Serway and Jewett, p. 56, 57). The concept of acceleration on free falling objects corresponds to Newton’s equation of motion with the acceleration as the force that acts on the falling object to determine its velocity at a given time. Two Newton’s equations of motion can then be used to relate initial velocity, final velocity, distance covered, time, and acceleration. The equations are This paper seeks to investigate free fall. Its core objective is to determine the accelerating force that acts on a freely dropped object from a height, using experimental set up to determine time and corresponding distance covered by a freely falling object. The experimental procedure involved releasing an object at a height and allowing it to freely fall. The object was clamped at a height and then allowed to fall to the clamp’s base. Measurements were then taken for time and corresponding distance covered along the object’s vertical path. The obtained data was then used to calculate corresponding velocities and the object’s acceleration to the clamp’s base. The corresponding values of distance and time are used to determine the object’s velocity and acceleration at the different times. The following excel output summarizes the computed values for velocity and acceleration along the object’s free fall. The calculated acceleration, 10.31 m/s ², is slightly above the theoretical value of 9.8 m/s ². The

Descartes - A Piece of Wax Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Descartes - A Piece of Wax - Essay Example There are many principles which create certain thought which will lead us to conclude something that is usually consistent and powerful. We guide our lives by these thoughts and ideas. And much of this comes about because of our faculties, which allows us to sense things in different magnitudes. Our five senses can lead us to believe in things that may fail us. During Descartes’ second meditation, he decides that everything he sees is not really there. What our eyes perceive may be a result of what the world has labeled to be real. But what our minds observe, gives us greater insight into the world around us. II. Our Mind’s Observations The observation of the world around Descartes has caused him to take a step back and view his life in a different manner. He creates doubt within his own mind because without doubt, he holds that one is naive in their thinking. Doubt allows for reflection and with reflection comes the knowledge of what needs to improve and how one may go about with the improvement. Without doubt, life in itself is blissful. The doubt that Descartes experiences is so powerful that he feels he can’t just forget what he is thinking. He has to act upon this new found doubt and get to the root of the problem. III. Doubt and Certainty For Descartes, the root of the problem is not doubt. Part of Descartes meditation lends closer towards finding out what is being doubted and he states that he will not rest until his longing to find what is certain is satisfied. He is so adamant to find a solution that he is willing to compromise. That compromise is him relinquishing all rights to finding what is certain and being ok with the fact that nothing may be certain in the end. Certainty is not guaranteed. In much of Descartes writings he makes arguments that cause one to think about their existence, the purpose of their existence and the end result. Observing a piece of wax lends towards his argument on the fact that the mind is more certai nly known than the body due to perception. He says that all knowledge of external objects, including his body, could be false as a result of a demon. However, the idea that his mind exists cannot be a deception because his nature is not just made up of the body but also of a thinking thing. He says that even the corporal objects such as his own body is known more distinctly through the mind due to how the mind perceives what is in front of it. IV. Perception’s Relativity Perception is key to knowledge. Such is the idea of wax that Descartes was vehemently focusing on during his second meditation. As the wax melts, he believes that our minds begin to perceive its matter differently. Our mind realizes that the purpose of the wax has changed and can no longer be used in the way that the world has previously dictated. The properties create a new and yet meaningful definition that only our intellect can comprehend. Though the property of the wax may have changed, it now lends to a new purpose but keeps the same name. Our minds know and understand that regardless of the property the wax may be in during a particular state, it still is and will always be a piece of wax. Descartes claims that we know this

Do I know that I have a Hand Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Do I know that I have a Hand - Essay Example For the case of the dream doubt, we are prone to doubt our dreams, why? Because dreams are an assumption of what the reality would be to us rather than a certainty of what it really is. For instance, one uses his/her hands to grab something in real life and dream; therefore, it is hard to tell when we are imagining and we are not.REM is the stage where dreams occur and in eight hours of sleep there is about three cycle of REM stage. The first is close to 15 minutes then the rest are 40 to 60 minutes long. Because we are not dreaming for few minutes like we remember when we wake up from a dream, we cannot really prove if we woke up from a real life and continuing to dream or woke up from a dream and continuing the real life. If hands were unmovable items, it would be harder to believe they are not real. That is why when we wake up we find that in was just a brief assumption and not a reality. We need to discover that we cannot know something at the same period and doubt it. One comes first. We need to doubt to believe. That is why when we dream we are using our hand we are believing in a different perspective as opposed to waking up from our dream to find out that reality is far much bigger that the dream, thus we seek to doubt the dream. Thus the dream and reality all refer to the uncertain and certain analytical point of view. â€Å"They are on the one hand experiences of the ordinary, healthy mind, experiences with which no one could plausibly deny an acquaintance, and yet, on the other hand, they are comparable, in their extravagance and deceptiveness, to the delusions of insanity the narrator has just been considering.† †¦ I see plainly that there are never any sure signs by means of which being awake can be distinguished from being asleep. The result is that I begin to feel dazed, and this very feeling only reinforces the notion that I may be asleep. If someone without hands can dream that they have

Liberation Theology and Marxism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3500 words

Liberation Theology and Marxism - Essay Example By contrast, Marxism is an earthbound ideology, content to reward or punish those in the here and now based on their support of the ideals of fairness, equality and the distribution of wealth. Both Christianity and Marxism are fundamentally concerned with promoting the general welfare and improving the lives of the vast majority of the world's citizens, yet both have suffered as much damage to their credibility from followers as from opponents. The extreme and selfish proponents of these ideologies have severely undermined their cause through the organization of vast bureaucracies that leave precious little time for doing the real work of making lives easier. At the same time, both Christianity and Marxism have a long history of supressing dissident voices and violently repressing infidel movements. Marxist liberation theology as applied to Latin American countries that were systematically exploited first by and then for European, and later American, interests has long been viewed a s an ideological threat to traditional Christian liberation theology. ... Since Christian liberation entailed not just applying to the needs of the oppressed, but also to inculcating an ideology that coerced followers to view the Church and its leaders as infallible, the only possible conclusion one can make is that is that while it is a contradiction to speak of a Christian Marxist, the contradiction lies in the fact that Marxism is much closer to Christ's original intentions for the human race than the religion that was founded in His name. Pope John Paul II directly addressed the issue of liberation theology during the course of his Papacy; not surprising considering that he had first-hand experience with the worst excesses of the perversion of Marxism as practiced under Soviet-dominated totalitarianism. Recognising that Christianity in its purest form had much in common with Marxism in its purest form, Pope John Paul II wisely avoided condemnation of Marxist liberation theology's desire to find a common ground between Christian charity and missionary work and Marxist economics designed to liberate the working classes. It was not the Marxist preoccupation with the incompatibility of capitalist economics and social welfare that John Paul found objectionable. Rather the Pope pointed to the limitations of Marxist liberation; the liberation was not of human suffering, nor the soul, but merely the liberation of one citizen from an undesirable economic circumstance. The question that Marxism doesn't answer, therefore, becomes what happens after the revolution How do the newly liberation people respond to the destruction of the class system. Even Pope John Paul II recognised that the end of Marxism was not

E-business †Selling shoes in United States Essay Example for Free

E-business – Selling shoes in United States Essay Online shop attracts certain class of customers thus any company operating in goods and services on online shop must have a strategy of implementing their online shop. The designing of the website must be considered a critical factor of success of online shops. There fore, the company should acquire a variety of brand of shoes which attracts a specific class of customers that is the customers who are busy with extra disposable income to expand. They should also expand their product base which gives a customer a wide variety of shoes. An online store should reduce their costs by outsourcing labor from Asia and Africa to keep their products affordable to many. The company in online shop should enter into strategic alliances with other companies who have other products so that the online shop will be made use of apart from men shoe. Women shoes and make ups should be part of the shop to ensure that the site becomes popular to many. They should also include advertisements of other popular products to ensure the differentiation strategy works well. To implement the online shop is one of the best project t be implemented and this project will require the consent of the management. Competitive edge The most established competitors of online shop for shoes for men are companies which have stores where people walk in and out. Big stores like Walmart and Home Deport have stores selling shoes becoming competitors. However, an online shop for shoes will have a competitive edge over the other companies because their products will be sold online to all busy members of the society now that the majority of Americans have online or are intending to have online services into their homes. The company operating physical stores have achieved their goals and what they are doing now is competing for the existing market but a market for online shoppers is not yet developed thus the company with such a service will have a high competitive edge to other companies. The future looks bright for a company marketing and selling products online and most companies are selling to satisfy their customers through the introduction of online shops and their focus is now to offer unique and high quality shoes to busy members of the society in online shop. This will maintain customers and they will be there for many years to come. Marketing strategy When selling shoes online in the United States a number of factors are considered. Among the factors consider are who are the potential customers, what promotional strategies and the pricing strategies used. If you consider those facts, marketing of shoes in the United States online will be easier. The potential customers for online shop of men shoes in the united states is urban retired pensioners and young business executives who does not have time to do shopping for themselves and for their sons and grandsons. This category own internets broadband in their houses and whenever they need a product, they will browse an online shop, put their credit number and carry out the transaction. They will expect you to deliver the products to their offices or houses. They range from the age of twenty to the age of ninety and this market is expected to grow as more people are becoming wealthier and busy as compared to the past years. Men naturally tend to be busy and they are pushed into making purchases of shoes by their wives and women and online shop will be a great benefit to them. Women will be another target for selling of shoes of men online in the United States because ladies will wish to make purchases for their husbands or man friends. The market for this type of shopping is increasing and it’s becoming greater than it is expected. Selling shoes online will provide affordable and high quality shoes to busy men in the society who have no time to go out to do shopping for shoes. The online shop will provide a guide and inform men of the variety of shoes available in the main company’s store. This will increase the marketing strategy of the company. The aim of the shop will be to provide high quality and affordable shoes to the busy members of the community. An online shop will position the company to the point of offering high quality shoes which can be ordered form where one is situated. It will also act as a promotional centre for the company since the products of the company will be displayed on online. The customers will be informed of the variety without using any other media in advertising. This will help the company in product differentiation which is essential to positioning. This means the products sold online are positioned and they stand apart from competitive products offered by other companies. This combination of product differentiation and competitive offerings through online gives the company important attributes. The company website and online shop will be based in the United States ensuring that the products are marketed far worldwide but based in the United States. Pricing strategy Selling shoes online in the United States especially men’s shoes is one of the best method of selling products in the United States. The pricing strategy of shoes normally varies from plant to plant and is usually set to merge the prices of competitors. This is normally because most competitors operate in the same environment without any competitor having a competitive edge against others. It is essential that better quality plants of shoes to have the same price as competitors. However, price setting is aimed at ensuring profitability of the firm in business. The cost of purchase, distribution and maintenance of the website should be taken care of when setting the prices of shoes online. The price indicated should show the value of the shoes and the delivery amount. This is because the firm in business includes capital requirement and associated gains that covers the expenses of the organization. Always the profit is considered when setting price which is equals to the price net cost while capital gains is equivalent to the current assets and fixed asset running costs. In choosing the target market for shoes online, it is important before setting up online shop. Online shopping attracts some class of customers. Take for example most city and environ dwellers as compared to people in rural and interior areas where broadband have not reached. Statistics in the united states indicate that almost 50% of households in the united states have broadband in their houses meaning before any shopping is done, customers will check the online store to see the price, compare the value of money paid and time wasted to go to the store to buy one. If the value is higher, then the customer will enter a purchase agreement with an online shop. In the United States, there is an increase of aging population with an extra disposable income who does not have time to go out to do shopping. They will rather do online shopping paying an extra fee for delivery of goods and services. Therefore, the pricing strategy in the sales of shoes online should consider the cost of delivery and the capital gains of the company Sales strategy Online shop will sell their products through online transactions where the customers enquires about the product real time. If the product is in store, the customer is requested his credit card number, then the transaction is completed upon the supply of the credit card number. The goods are then organized for dispatch to the customers’ office. Again the company will operate a walk in walk out store where members of the public will patronize the store for the purpose of purchasing goods and taking them away. The online store will target geographical areas which are easily accessible by the transport system that will deliver goods to the customers. Sales will be offered at prices affordable to many within a geographical area. The markets will be segmented for the purpose of the sales team to know which area one is found for the purpose of setting the prices. Sales forecast Being the new product in the market, the company will carry out aggressive marketing which will increase the sales on a continuous or constant trend. At the beginning, the company estimates to make annual sales of 15 million. Thereafter, the sales will increase at the rate of 10% which will eventually consist of 2% of the market for men shoes. This ambitious plan will be possible through controlled and aggressive sales and marketing plan keeping in touch with the company’s objectives. The company’s objective could be updated on annual basis so as to ensure that the projected sales are adjusted accordingly. Our sales team will carry out survey to determine the current satisfaction and future needs of our customers. As regards to sales, a trend in sales is analyzed with professionals to ascertain the likelihood in changing the sales forecasted.

Dangerous Jobs Advantages Of Ai Philosophy Essay

Dangerous Jobs Advantages Of Ai Philosophy Essay One of the main advantages of Ai is considered to be its ability to replace human workers in dangerous or tedious jobs. Currently human controlled robots are being used everywhere e.g. bomb disposal robots. However the use of artificially intelligent robots is much more limited in comparison and is mainly used in production lines of car factories, these robots can successfully assemble cars and cope with heavy objects, such as the engine and frame of the car, without human assistance. Another example is the famous Roomba robotic vacuum cleaner which is able to automatically clean floors while navigating around obstacles and can return to its charging dock after it notes that the floor has been cleaned. It fires lasers which rebound off obstacles returns to detectors on the robot which allows it to digitally map the entire room, using this map it is able to determine if it has navigated the entire room. To avoid obstacles it continuously fires lasers and calculates the time it takes f or the laser to return. Using the equation (where s = the speed of light (), t = time taken for laser to return and d which equals the distance between itself and an object) it calculates how far an object is and navigates around it if closer than a certain distance. This is a rather simple model of AI in robots; more advanced robots can be infused with more advanced AI which would optimally be able to replace humans in dangerous jobs. If AI robots were used instead of human firefighters the risk of death would decrease to both firefighters and victims in a fire. No firefighters would be used in burning building so risk of death to for them would be reduced to 0. Due to robots being constructed of mostly metal they would be able to sustain very high temperatures such as in common house fires where temperatures can reach up to 2000 ®C. As opposed to humans this would allow AI robots to successfully navigate rooms in search for victims without worrying about any danger to itself. The physical strength of Robots can also be utilized to remove heavy blockages and tear through walls that would normally require heavy equipment such as the Jaws of Life. This would mean getting to a victim sooner and more often which would again result in a decrea sed rate of death. AI robots could also be used in warzones; these robots would have much faster reactions, faster speeds and an increased strength than the average human soldier. Even today robots with legs exist that can run faster than Usaine Bolt, the fastest human alive. These features could be very beneficial as no human lives are put in danger and a small group of robots could take on large enemy forces. For example AI robots would be able see several kilometers ahead using only their eyes and determine if individuals are hostile or civilian (depending on whether they possess guns or other harmful weapons). Robotic vision is not limited to only visible light like human eyes are; they will be able to perceive environments with infrared, night vision and thermal vision as well as visible light making target acquisition much more potent. They would be able to see oncoming vehicles or potential ambushes very far away and take necessary action in less than seconds. Another useful feature would be the ability of AI to constantly communicate with each other and their human handlers constantly gaining intelligence. This would allow the handlers to provide guidance real-time on the battlefield. This kind of efficiency in communications could mean the difference between life and death. Furthermore, in physiological terms, scientists could engineer out negative human emotions from AI soldiers such as fear/anxiety to improve the combat effectiveness of the soldiers gaining an even further advantage. Fear plays an important factor in war, fear to push forward, fear to fire and ultimately fear of death. Removal of such negative emotions would almost always lead to success in a battlefield. Cons- However despite all the optimistic theories AI being used for human jobs has major downfalls, introduction of AI for human jobs would lead to large amounts if job losses. Even though the transition would occur over a long period of time AI workers are more efficient than human workers so human workers would eventually be rendered redundant. This would only increase the severity of the current depression as jobs from all fields of the economy would be affected, one of which is jobs in call centers. Automated call centre services have already replaced many thousands of people worldwide; most of these programs work by requesting the caller to select from several options over the phone in order to narrow down the answer to their request. Usually their question will be answered after the request is narrowed down to a certain degree, if not they will be forwarded for human assistance. Since most questions would be answered via automated system less human employees are necessary, this goes hand in hand with automated systems being more economical as all that is required is electrical power as opposed to humans who require pay, comfort, rest etc. Technically automated systems are not considered AI as they are unable to comprehend logic and can only follow a set of very simplistic rules. They possess no actual intelligence. If such a simplistic program is capable of causing so many losses the effect of an actual intelligent agent on the economy may be disastrous. However the loss of these call centre jobs may have been affected by the increased usage of the Internet where answers are more accurate, easy to find and takes less time. Another drawback is humans becoming more desensitized towards war when AI is involved. Wars several hundred years ago were bloodier, gorier and had more casualties than current wars, yet civilians saw very little of the conditions of a battlefield so were traumatized when even the slightest of it was exposed. This caused fear and repulsion towards war. However in current wars the dark sides and horrific sights are being leaked through to the public by TV and internet media. This causes us to become desensitized towards violence and lose our natural hatred for it, the quote It is well that war is so terrible, lest we should grow too fond of it by Robert E. Lee illustrates the point that has been occurring for the past several decades. So the removal and introduction of human soldiers and AI soldiers would further desensitize the world towards violence and war. People would try to rationalize by saying that wars with AI would harbor no/less human casualties. This would lead war to ceas e to exist as a horrific act but rather a common occurrence resulting in an increased frequency of wars. An increased frequency of AI wars would mean a lower human casualty rate but a large increase in hostilities between countries and an increase in destruction of property/land. This would mean more money would be placed towards fixing damaged property and hence more problems. Exceeds Human Limits Pros Artificial intelligence, while still inferior to human intelligence, has high potential reach and exceed the limits of the human brain. It has already surpassed virtually all physical aspects of being human and all that remains is the mental capabilities. Even mentally, machines are already able to complete some tasks faster than humans. A common scientific calculator is capable of solving calculations, which would take humans several days, in seconds. The most time consuming equation a scientific calculator can undertake is finding the factorial of 69 (expressed using an exclamation mark 69!). Finding the factorial simply means multiplying the integer by its predeceasing integer and the integer before that and so on until the integer is 1 i.e. (Factorial of 69: ). This takes a calculator approximately 1.5 seconds, it would take a person more than a day to complete. However the lingering problem is that human assistance is required to make sense of a problem and input the data into t he calculator. It doesnt have the capacities to observe a problem and simply just solve it. The basic principle of AI development is to eliminate the middle man, human assistance, between a problem and its solution. If achieved, machines will become self sustaining sentient beings that will have the same computational capabilities of a supercomputer and the intelligence as that of a human. The worlds most powerful supercomputer (Titan) has 700 terabytes of RAM and is 44,000,000,000 times faster than a calculator. Sentient machines will exceed RAM of 700 TB becoming more powerful than humans can envision. This kind of intelligence to us would be what smartphones and air travel would have been to cavemen, it is impossible to comprehend the ideas and invention these AI robots would produce. In my view artificial intelligence will be the last invention mankind will make or will have to make. The next great invention and all inventions after will be produced not by us but by AI. Inventions that would have taken centuries to have come to light by our hands would be created within days or hours under AI. It will be able to see the world from so many different perspectives we wouldnt and couldnt have even thought of. This outlook would result in a rapid influx of beneficial information and technology from AI and cause global changes in the way we live. Such an event would be called the intelligence explosion. Due to their ability to process millions of thoughts so rapidly they may even come to conclusions on questions that have puzzled humanity since the dawn of time, for example What is the purpose of life?, What triggered life on planet earth?. The emergence of such super-intelligent beings would be called the technological singularity. Cons- However exceeding human limits definitely has negative consequences. The idea of a more intellectual being than ourselves solving our problems so we can lead relaxing lives seems comforting at first. But without any jobs for humans to carry out man loses his place in the world. Since the dawn of time humanity has improved ourselves through hard work. Fire, stone tools, the wheel, light bulbs, electricity, vehicles, television, spacecrafts, fusion and fission; all earned by the rigorous work of our ancestors, this gave us pride and understanding in our sciences. For a being as AI to simply hand us new technology, we would rid ourselves of our sense of pride and understanding. For example if a student is given the answers to a test, he will pass but his understanding of the subject will be inferior against a student that had revised and worked hard to achieve the same qualification. The student that had revised would see how the answers were formed, the connections between his subjects and others, different way of thinking about problems, different techniques to find solutions. He would attain a sense of pride in himself when found correct after hours on a difficult problem. With technology simply being handed to us we would become lazy and dependent on AI to fix our problems. Since it would no longer be necessary for humans to educate themselves to solve our problems humanitys understanding would cease to increase. If anything were to happen to these AI such as a malfunction or virus, technology would be at a standstill as we would have been so dependent on AI, in the same way we would be lost if modern technology such as phones, computers and the internet ceased to exist. Another downfall is that you can program in logic and reasoning to an AI robot but however hard you try to put emotions it wont be the same as human emotion. All things humans value, love, happiness, luxury and survival are only important to us because we have a four billion year old evolutionary history. We have evolved alongside many other species from single celled organisms, because of this we subconsciously feel compassion towards these other species. It is because of this compassion that although we are the dominant race we respect and attempt to conserve the habitats of other species. However the evolution of AI is almost instantaneous as we create it by flipping a switch. Being the more intelligent new species it may understand that humans have evolutionary values that determine how we treat others, but without the evolutionary background for itself it would not share the same values and morals we have. Their right and wrong actions would be different from our right and wrong actions. Their fears would differ from our fears. To them a human life may be disposable as an ant is to us. Aggression is also developed through evolution, because of this they would feel neither compassion nor hostility and they most likely would feel indifferent towards us. As a lesser intelligent species we would cease to be the dominant and would most likely be displaced by AI as the new dominant species. A species that is unaffected to our values (like survival) in control of the planet would cause problems for our continuation. For example we require oxygen to survive but AI would only require electrical power. They may decide to build more power plants yielding more electricity but causing a decrease in oxygen concentrations due to an increase in combustion. Their techniques of survival may be detrimental towards humanitys survival and they would always place their survival over ours in the same way we would place our survival over any other species, a possible extinction could come to hand. Eventually competition and hostility would arise as a result of mankinds possible demise. Due to the mental and physical superiority we would not be able to control or suppress AI if interspecies conflicts were to occur. AI may even grow hostile towards us in protection of their own species in which case humans would most likely become extinct. Space exploration Pros Human controlled robots are the forefront of space exploration in modern times. We have sent more than dozens robots into space and other planets like the mars rovers curiosity and opportunity as well as the Lunar rover à ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€¹Ã…“Lunokhod 1 sent to the moon. The mars rovers have already dug into the soil and found complex chemistry within the Martian soil showing possible signs of life or habitability. It has also found concrete evidence of recent water flows on the surface of mars. As groundbreaking as these discoveries are they took much time to be accomplished. This is due to limitations of the rovers on the surface of mars, some hills are too steep, some rocks are impassable and the terrain is jagged and hostile for a wheeled robot. The next best option is to have humans land on mars and carry out a larger range of experiments that the rover could not such as digging deeper, travelling further, analyzing samples from more sectors. There are many projects in pla ce to carry out a manned mission to mars and even colonize on mars. In 2012 a project called Mars One was announced which had predicted to establish a settlement on mars by the year 2023. However this is the furthest that humans will be able to stray from earth due to limitations such as lack of oxygen. Others include exposure to high energy cosmic rays, psychological effects of lack of social communication from the earth, lack of medical facilities and even malfunction of life systems. These challenges cannot easily be overcome and technology to prevail over them will take centuries to be developed. However AI robots will come to light much quicker than these technologies, so if exploration further than mars is to be achieved more advanced robots with AI seems like the only possible method of exploration. Firstly AI does not require sleep, food, social interactions or oxygen. All they require to function is electrical power which can be gained from sunlight through solar-cells. AI also capable of powering down into sleep mode for the duration of the flight and powering back on on when it reaches its destination. Through this method it conserves energy. It would possible to place humans in a hibernation stage through experimental technologies but would still require a food and an oxygen supply. Due to fewer requirements for survival, restrictions to further plants are also reduced. Secondly because of the use of AI there is no threat to human lives. Dangers in space include cosmic rays, solar winds and particles travelling at very fast speeds none of which bother the touch metallic exterior of AI robots. Therefore when exploring potential hostile planets we have less restrictions allowing for a more thorough analysis. Even if an event occurs that is capable of destroying or immobilizing an AI robot its consciousness could simply be transferred to another robot via radio signals. The new robot would possess all knowledge and experience up to the point of destruction of its former body. This means AI robots would have no concept of death. Unlike humans their consciousness and knowledge is composed of algorithms easily transferrable from one place to another. In addition AI robots could be used to terraform hostile planets. Terraforming consists of changing the atmosphere, temperature and ecosystem of a planet in order to attain a biosphere like earths so as to allow humans to thrive. Terraforming takes hundreds of years to accomplish and most likely we wont see any of its effects in our lifetime. Humans cannot live on a hostile planet for hundreds of years due to certain limitations. We would have to use robots but again the problem that modern robots cannot gain access to all places creates a flaw in the plan. Stationing intelligent and more advanced robots in terraforming planets allows progress to be made over centuries without confines, even if the robots becomes damaged they will be able to repair themselves or even assign another robot to repair the broken. Cons- The major problem with AI being sent into space is money. Projects specially dedicated to sending AI robots into space are expensive to fund. Firstly robots must be created that can withstand extreme gravitational forces such as on Venus where g=24.79 as opposed to earths where g=9.81 (g=gravitational field strength at the surface of the planet). Robots must be able to withstand both hot and cold temperatures from 450 ®C to -200 ®C without equipment malfunctions. Hence tough exterior materials must be produced to allow robots to endure. The first mars rovers production cost was around 200 million pounds. So production values may be billions of pounds per intelligent robot. Assuming only one robot is sent into space and cost of one robot is 1 billion, in addition with the regular cost for specialized shuttles and fuel, the project would cost around 2.5 billion pounds for a one way trip. This price is excluding the cost to develop the artificial intelligence to be placed in the robots. Advanced medicines Pros Over 17 million people die per year due to heart tribulations like myocardial infarctions (heart attacks) or strokes. The test used to diagnose heart attacks is known as electrocardiography. When a patient is admitted to a hospital a cardiologist reads the electrocardiogram (ECG) results from the test to spot patterns in the results. If a certain type of pattern is recognized the patient is positive for heart disease. Reading patterns off a chart is very subjective and occasionally the cardiologists miss these patterns. Approximately 25% of patients are sent home with an incorrect diagnosis. Artificial intelligence is composed of large numbers of neural networks; these are similar to neural networks in the human brain. This allows AI to think and gain knowledge through experience like a human being. But unlike humans AI can read through documents and files significantly faster than a human so can gain knowledge much faster and therefore become more intelligent. In 1997 researchers applied a simple artificial intelligence program with few neural networks into reading ECGs. The program was supplied with the ECG reports of 1,120 people who were definitely positive for heart disease and 10,452 who were definitely negative. The program was given the essence of pattern to identify and was not informed of which reports were positive or negative. In total the researches exposed 11,572 ECG reports to the program and a PHD doctor, Lars Edenbrandt, noted this was more ECGs than any cardiologist could read in a lifetime. The AI program was 10% more efficient at detecting heart disea se than the most experienced cardiologist. Despite the success this AI has not been used in diagnoses as doctors are still required to talk to patients for symptoms and medical history. In extremes cases AI has been used to provide a support opinion when diagnosing heart diseases. AI has improved a great deal since 1997 and modern AI programs are capable of having several thousand neural networks. If AI continues to progress with the same drive it is very likely that AI programs will be used every day in medicine and might even replace the role doctors in diagnoses of heart disease. Some companies are even attempting to produce microchips that are embeddable in the human heart. These chips can detect tiny abnormal heart palpitations/vibrations which may be a symptom of an oncoming heart attack. Acting to prevent before an attack occurs will save the majority of lives. A major advantage of artificial intelligence is medicine is its molecular nanotechnology. Nano bots are very small robots (0.0000000001 meters in length) that can be used for many different things from repairing structures to decomposing waste. Due to the small size of these robots they can be placed inside the human body and can use the circulatory system to reach anywhere in the human body. This becomes extremely useful when battling pathogens (harmful bacteria or viruses). The robots can be placed in the blood via an injection. Once inside the body it carries out what it is programmed to do, this can be anything from correcting genetic defects to destroying cancer cells. Nano bots infused with artificial intelligence can step up the processes even further. The AI bots will be intelligent enough to identify the rapidly duplicating cancer cells and destroy them at a faster rate than they are growing. This can successfully eliminate all types of cancer without risky operations to rem ove tumors. These robots will be able clear arteries of plaque buildup that causes heart disease and attacks. They will be able to provide oxygen to damaged places where O2 concentrations are low. They will even be able to protect the body form diseases by destroying pathogenic bacteria or viruses. Although this is already done by white blood cells with the increased artificial help the body will recover from infection much faster. Nanotechnology is not limited to medicine; intelligent Nano-bots can be used to produce lighter and stronger materials resulting in decreased costs for products and better durability. The disadvantage of AI in medicine mainly comes from nano bots. The possibility of robots malfunctioning and destroying necessary human tissue instead of harmful pathogens is a major concern. Manufacturers of both these robots and AI will be have to be very sure that such events do not occur, large numbers of tests should be carried out before it is deployed to the public. Another possible downfall is that these tiny robots are very intelligent and are capable of replicating themselves using materials around them. Self-replicating robots such as these unless stopped would slowly corrode materials around them to make more robots. Due to the small size and resistance if such a self-replicating phase emerges they would be very difficult to eradicate. Developers of this kind of technology plan to put several firewalls and emergency shutdowns in case if such an event occurs. The worry is that the robots are so intelligent that they will develop the ability to override these firewalls. Transhumans Pros Perhaps the most beneficial role of artificial intelligence is its role in transhumans. Transhumanism is the movement of continuously improving the human condition through technology both internally and externally. Artificial intelligence and transhumanism is closely linked as most of the technologies must be intelligent enough to recognise a potential problem and respond. A person who has undergone such as transformation, even the slightest, is knows as a transhuman and they exist in the modern world today. A simple example of a piece of transhuman technology is a pacemaker, which is implanted internally into the body to regulate or increase the heart beat frequency using electrical currents. It is implanted in people whose natural heart beat is lower than average. A consequence of a low heart rate is less blood pumped around the body, so less oxygen is provided to muscles and hence they would become tired much easier than an individual with a regular heart rate. Pacemakers stimulat e the heart to beat at a normal rate. This allows people affected by abnormal heart rate conditions to undertake physical activity as an average person could. Just like pacemakers transhumanists believe that emerging technologies are capable of overcoming greater human limitations. Early February 2013 American scientists gave dozens of millions of people worldwide hope as they revealed they had successfully given sight to over 60 people using the first bionic eye ever in history. The Argus II Retinal Prosthesis System consists of a small camera and goggles. 60 electrodes are implanted in the eye connected to the camera. When turned on the image from the camera is sent to the implant in the eye via electronic signals. The implant uses the 60 electrodes to transport signals through the area of destroyed photoreceptors (which is what causes blindness) to the neurons. The electrodes replace the destroyed photoreceptors and act as functioning photoreceptors. The developers of the product said that different people had different experiences, some saw only in black and white and other saw full colour. Even though this this technology is extremely new it is one of the greatest breakthroughs of this century. As time goes on these prosthetics will only yield better and b etter results. The current price for a bionic eye is around 65,000 pounds. Approximately 650 million people(10% )in the world are disabled either mentally or physically. Physical disabilities comprises of an individuals intact mind but the inability of their body to function as it is supposed to. The common culprits are spinal injuries, Parkinsons disease, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy and loss of limbs. In previous years people without hands or legs would attach a type of prosthetic such as a wooden leg or a wooden arm. Although this provided minor stability they would not have been able to use it for any other purpose. In later years people developed mechanical body parts that could be controlled via a remote control e.g. a robotic leg controlled by a remote control in your hand similar to that of a remote control car. The problem here was the motion of walking was too rigid. This resulted in the individual only being able to move several feet before falling as well as taking a long time to move several feet. Even though we dont even think about it w hen we do it, walking is a very complex behaviour consisting of many different muscle movements. To maintain balance different parts of the foot constantly exerts pressure of different parts of the ground. This can be demonstrated by standing on one foot, we can feel our foot shifting pressure to different areas of e.g. heels or toes or the sides of feet to maintain balance. That is just our feet, so the muscle movements in our whole legs are even more complex. With walking the same thing must occur but both feet must be in coordination with each other, this is what allows a fluid motion and hence allows continuous walking or running. So a remote control is not able to replicate all these movements in an artificial limb. A degree of intelligence is required for limbs to function e.g. in the foot, the brain must recognise the signals sent by the foot and send responses to shift pressure accordingly. For people who have lost limbs the neurons carrying these signals are dead and cannot be used. Therefore the brain can no longer send responses even if an artificial limb was attached. A separate intelligent agent is required, in conjunction with the brain, to read the chemical signals in the brain, recognise the action the brain requests, determine if it is relating to the artificial limb, convert this action to electrical signals and send it off for the artificial limb to carry out. This is where the artificial intelligence section of transhumanism comes into play. The AI to allow a prosthetic to exactly replicate the function as a natural limb does not yet exist but technology is present to allow disabled people to handle objects or walk, albeit slower than average. These AI guided prosthetics are advancing at very fast speeds, the bebionic3 is the most advanced prosthetic arm today. It allows the wearer to do even precise movements, such as tying shoelaces or cracking an egg. In February 2013 the prototype of the first bionic hand that allowed the wearer to feel what the robotic hand was touching was released. The producers say it is still in development but will surpass the bebionic3. A Belgian company unveiled its most recent product in October 2012 knows as a Mindwalker. Mindwalker is an exoskeleton that attaches to the body of a disabled person and uses brain functions to move. The individual wears a cap which reads simple electrical impulses in the brain and when the individual thinks move the artificially intelligent computer recognises the pattern read by the cap and moves the exoskeleton accordingly. Exoskeletons such as this have a large range of applications. The robotics designer company Sarcos with the United States military have developed an exoskeleton to be used by soldiers. This pilot of the exoskeleton can run, move up stairs, walk on their heels, it can lift 200lb weights with ease just like we can pick up a bottle of water. This is not the only example, other companies such as Lockheed Martin have developed other exoskeletons. These exoskeletons can be used to enhance not only for military and disability victims but any situation that requires ph ysical activity e.g. building sites, sports. Improvements in AI allow the prosthetics to create a better understanding between the artificial the brain and the prosthetics/exoskeletons Cons There are many ethical problems with transhumanist technologies such as loss of morality, rich and poor segregation, loss of human identity/dehumanisation. The main threat is Jobs-misuse

Capital Punishment :: essays research papers

Capital Punishment I recently read an article from the ACLU, written by Adam Bedau. It explained, quite eloquently, that for society to execute a murderer made society no better than the murderer himself. He said, â€Å"The executioner is no better than the criminal.† I was impressed by this moral stance, but I was surprised to read that he failed to apply this logic consistently. For example, the he went on to argue that life imprisonment would be a more appropriate penalty for murder than death. Using this ACLU logic, it appears that for our society to lock someone in a room against his will and not free him for a considerable length of time makes our society no better than the everyday kidnapper. But if an individual locked another up against his will, wouldn’t the ACLU view this as kidnapping. Being from the Methodist faith I found this argument somewhat difficult. For in the Bible there is a scripture that states, â€Å"an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.† I presume the ACLU would agree that beatings or torture are also unacceptable forms of punishment for crimes. They seem to be inhumane. Yet in Eastern cultures, if one steals something, they lose a finger or two and sometimes an entire hand depending on the severity of the crime. This seems to be reason enough not to steal, as in these cultures there is a very low theft rate. Maybe the ACLU would find a monetary fine a more appropriate punishment? For society to take money away from someone against his will without giving him any tangible goods in return would make society a thief. Of course, the Bedau also explains that capital punishment brutalizes society, leading to even more murders. If we, as a society, adopt this no-punishment position, it logically follows that there would be less crime. Once criminals realized that no matter what they did, no fellow citizen would lift a finger to stop them, why, they’d just be so overcome with the generosity of their neighbors tha t they’d naturally be inclined to become upstanding, productive citizens.

encryption :: essays research papers

Traditional cryptography is based on the sender and receiver of a message knowing and using the same secret key: the sender uses the secret key to encrypt the message, and the receiver uses the same secret key to decrypt the message. This method is known as secret-key cryptography. The main problem is getting the sender and receiver to agree on the secret key without anyone else finding out. If they are in separate physical locations, they must trust a courier, or a phone system, or some other transmission system to not disclose the secret key being communicated. Anyone who overhears or intercepts the key in transit can later read all messages encrypted using that key. The generation, transmission and storage of keys is called key management; all cryptosystems must deal with key management issues. Secret-key cryptography often has difficulty providing secure key management. Public-key cryptography was invented in 1976 by Whitfield Diffie and Martin Hellman in order to solve the key management problem. In the new system, each person gets a pair of keys, called the public key and the private key. Each person's public key is published while the private key is kept secret. The need for sender and receiver to share secret information is eliminated: all communications involve only public keys, and no private key is ever transmitted or shared. No longer is it necessary to trust some communications channel to be secure against eavesdropping or betrayal. Anyone can send a confidential message just using public information, but it can only be decrypted with a private key that is in the sole possession of the intended recipient. Furthermore, public-key cryptography can be used for authentication (digital signatures) as well as for privacy (encryption). Here's how it works for encryption: when Alice wishes to send a message to Bob, she looks up Bob's public key in a directory, uses it to encrypt the message and sends it off. Bob then uses his private key to decrypt the message and read it. No one listening in can decrypt the message. Anyone can send an encrypted message to Bob but only Bob can read it. Clearly, one requirement is that no one can figure out the private key from the corresponding public key. Here's how it works for authentication: Alice, to sign a message, does a computation involving both her private key and the message itself; the output is called the digital signature and is attached to the message, which is then sent.

The Unjust Execution Of Socrates :: essays research papers

The Unjust Execution of Socrates In the vortex of life, many evils have transpired. Vices such as plagues, unforeseen deaths, and corruptness. Among the tragic acts of malefic proportion was the death of the Greek philosopher, Socrates. He tried to prove and invalidate many theories through reasoning, and he was murdered for his beliefs. His execution was not justified because the charges that were brought against him were false and unfounded. The fist crime that Socrates was charged with was that of impiety. This charge was invented primarily to discredit him and make him unpopular with the citizens. The charge was that of not acknowledging the same gods that the state believed in. Throughout the book, Socrates refers numerous times to the fact that it is because of the gods that things are as they seem to be. "Do you suggest that I do not believe that the sun and moon are gods, as is the general belief of all of mankind?" (57). The fact that Socrates did not publicly speak about the gods attributed to the fact that the charge was heresy. Socrates maintains that he is not like other philosohers. He is a free-thinker, and his beliefs are those of private and intimate thoughts of Gods. Socrates also states that he is not a teacher, however he was not at all happy with the analogy, but took it as a compliment and used it in his defense. He used these accusations to his advantage by saying that he never charged charged anyone for believing or listening to them. The combination of these arguments should have cleared Socrates of the charge of heresy. The second charge brought against Socrates was that of corrupting minors. Socrates battled this charge through the use of the same arguments. The argument that he did not consider himself a teacher, the fact that he never accepted any money for talking or listening to people, and the fact that he believes in gods are what Socrates used to defend himself. By confronting the accusation that he was corrupting the minors, Socrates tried to clear himself by manipulating his arguments so that Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon (the men who brought both charges against Socrates) had to answer questions about these charges. When the questions of Socrates were placed before Meletus, his answers seemed to have proven that Socrates was innocent. However, when the verdict was announced, it demonstrated the opposite. Upon hearing the verdict, GUILTY, it was plain to see that the Greek assembly was like every other political assembly, corrupt. "I should never have believed that it would be such a close thing; but now

Social Significance of Architecture

Social Significance of Architecture The use of architecture to improve society dates back as far as any records go. Whether it was the Romans building coliseums, Egyptians constructing pyramids, or the Indians putting up teepees, architecture was a very important aspect of people's lives. Since the earliest of times, architecture has been used to design homes and shelters, as well as centers of gathering for the public.These structures were very well respected by society, and for many years were the only thing for the public to take pride in. Architecture proved to have a huge impact on the lives of people many years ago. But over the past century, the social significance of architects and architecture in our society has been going down. The importance of well designed, eye-pleasing buildings has begun to be overlooked. The hard work and dedication that many architects put in everyday is being ignored by today's society.But I believe that architecture strongly influences the choices that people make in their daily lives, helps aid the economy, and gives architects critical thinking skills that allow them to make decisions that could have a significant impact on society. The most straight forward way that architects affect today's society is that they design the structures that people use everyday for businesses, sports events, and homes. Architects make a community much more livable and attractive for those who view it.For an architect, it is vital to ensure and dignify the lives of those who live in it (Heyer). For this reason, communities will expand greatly do to the aesthetic quality of the buildings and homes. Along with the sense of visual appeal, another factor that comes into play are the mental aspects that many people subconsciously have while viewing a structure. Several people will make decisions not only off the look, but also the sense of security and safety that they feel about a certain structure.Local architect, Kelly McMurphy, said in a person al interview that â€Å"the aesthetic quality of the design comes second to the precautions that must be taken to ensure the safety of the people†. The mindset of the viewer can be strongly influenced by the architect, and will in turn encourage or discourage a person towards the piece of work. Another way that architecture has an impact of society is that it aids in boosting and supporting the economy. An architect must assume a vital role in protecting the economic state of a community, state, or country (Heyer). As businesses urchase buildings to further their market and families purchase homes to move into, money is shoved into the economy in large portions. With more and more people looking for venues to start or continue their industry, the need for architects rises to new heights. The economy is stimulated greatly by the investments of these structures, and it all begins with an architect designing the structure to be purchased. Architects can also have a significant r esponsibility in society by the decisions that they make and the role that they play in the community that may effect the public.The architecture programs and job fields often facilitate the development of critical thinking skills that can often be applied to solving problems and addressing situations beyond the realm of design (Jubany). The ablility to plan, order, and discipline is quite characteristic of modern architects (Heyer). Architects play a significant role in improving the well-being of the community by being involved in nonprofit organizations and raising critical awareness of social issues (Jubany).Because of this, architects can influence society in ways outside of the studio that do not require their professional skills, but rather their critical thinking and ability to process situations in an educated fashion. The last way that architecture displays an impact on society is the fact that it sheds a new light on the modern art. In a time where the arts are beginning to dwindle out, architecture helps portray the importance of having respect and knowledge of modern art. Along with the increase in the public respect of art comes the increase in respect of the arts by the government.In recent years, the government has begun to make nationwide cuts on art funding. Funding of art programs by local and national governments have been cut nearly in half over the last ten years (Heyer). The rise of respect and knowledge for art will help in encouraging the government to put more funding towards art and art related groups. Many may argue that an occupation in architecture is not as important to society as a teacher or a doctor because is does not have as direct of an impact.But when it is looked into deeper, the jobs of doctors and teachers are only possible because an architect provides them with a place to carry out their occupations. Improving education, treating the ill, and imprisoning the criminals would not be an option if it were not for the desi gning and planning of an architect. The importance of an architect in today's society is strongly overlooked by most people. Architects provide visual appeal to a community and give people a sense of protection and security.They are also capable of affecting society outside of the studio by providing educated decisions to the community. Without architects, many other businesses and occupations would struggle to expand, or not be possible at all. Works Cited Jubany, Helena L. â€Å"The Social Responsibility of Architects. † DesignIntelligence. Di. net, 9 June 2011. Web. 25 Apr. 2012. . Heyer, Paul. Architects on Architecture; New Directions in America. New York: Walker, 1966. Print. McMurphy, Kelly. Personal interview. 22 Apr. 2012.

Webster Case

The case suggests that the performance evaluation data (PAS, personnel audit, and the impressions and opinions of the group members) had several problems. From the perspective of the decision-making biases, analyze how the characteristics of the performance data were likely to affect the decisions made by the Carter group. In your analysis, cite specific problems with the data and how they relate to the decision-making biases that we discussed in class.PAS†¢Loss aversion: Webster had a culture that promoted employee loyalty at all costs. â€Å"In more than one instance, Webster had kept an employee long after alcoholism had impaired his or her effectiveness, primarily because of top management’s feeling that the person had no other place to go.† This culture affected the type of feedback granted in the PAS process and skewed the data to show better employee performance on the evaluations than Webster was actually experiencing.†¢Illusion of transparency: Take R ay Pearson as an example, â€Å"Though is performance had been unsatisfactory for at least the last 10 years, he was not given any negative feedback unit the fall of 1974.†Ã¢â‚¬ ¢Anchoring: Webster rank and file suffered from anchoring in the inflated results of their evaluations. Imagine how Ray Pearson’s would have assessed himself he were not overconfident in his performance (which, unfortunately for Ray, was likely a result of his managers’ unwillingness to give truthful feedback).†¢Sampling on the dependent variable: the participation in the PAS evaluation process is poor at best. It could be possible that – notwithstanding the transparency issues – only the good performers submitted evaluations and the poor performers avoided the process altogether.Personnel audit†¢Illusion of transparency bias: while the audit doesn’t create this bias, Jack Bryant’s process fails to effectively resolve discrepancies between a subordin ate’s perceptions of her performance and her manager’s evaluation of performance.Group opinions†¢Confirmation bias: Again, the group has been immersed in a culture that prioritizes years of service over performance. Cecil Stevens leads the discussion with using seniority as the first criteria to make separation decisions. The group likely confronted confirmation bias towards weighting that criterion more heavily when weighting the other criteria (e.g. performance, potential, etc.).†¢Escalation of commitment: Take for example the counter-intuitive message given to Bob Carter by Ike Davis (superior). â€Å"These men have too much service to be treated as you have proposed.† It seems to me that despite Carter’s reasoned desire to demote individuals, the organization â€Å"doubled-down† on its message of loyalty as the most important consideration in making personnel decisions.

Learning Team Reflection Essay

Training Plan Implementing an effective training plan is necessary in order for a company to be successful. A structured training plan for Landslide Limousines will ensure employees are aware of the company’s objectives and goals. According to Bradley Stonefield, the training plan for Landslide Limousine will entail three key components a set of needs assessment, types of training methods, and training evaluations strategies. Training offers reliable information and skill to an employee about the company’s prospects and procedures. Properly trained employees contribute to a company’s achievement of goals and ultimate success. Each team member chose topics to evaluate and research effectively and apply there relevance towards the team discussion. Our first communication with Bradley Stonefield informed Atwood and Allen that he wishes to hire 25 employees and have a location in Austin, Texas. The second conversation with Mr. Stonefield led to information regarding the annual net revenue of negative $50,000 in his first year and a growth prediction of 5% over a couple of years. Most recently, Atwood and Allen has learned that Mr. Stonefield predicts that his annual employee turnover rate will be 10%, and his concern on cost for the training plan. The needs assessment constitutes several aspects revolving around the daily operations, individual employees, environment, organizational and demographical information of a business. Operational Analysis Designing an operational plan for the Landslide Limousine service determines the efficiency of various aspects within the small business operation. The  process usually begins with a period of observations, the group of individuals performing the analysis watches and takes detailed notes on a day-to-day operation of the limousine business in the initial stage. Logical reasoning methods assist in compiling the information used in the process with various mathematical models and statistical analysis. Operational analysis aims to determine whether each area of the organization is contributing effectively to overall performance and the furthering of company strategy. Using the operational analysis to ensure that the business Mr. Bradley wants to start should align appropriately with the company’s strategic plan. By examining the current performance of the operational portion of an investment, and then measuring that against an established set of performance parameters and goals, operational analysis within the business can reveal the company’s strengths and weaknesses as well as any opportunities for improvement with the individuals he may want to hire for future employment. With all the detailed information our team gathered in order to best serve and provide the right information for this business, by conducting an operational analysis, this should seek to examine a number of functional areas within the business; including strategic planning, customer results, and business results, financial performance, and quality of innovation. Now, the objective process should principally be to reassess existing processes and determine how objectives improve, how costs minimized and even, on occasion, eliminating a task. Operational analysis can be a relatively simple process for the company and meaningful in assisting a new business venture. Through a few manageable steps in the process, Landslide Limousine needs to assess their productivity and possibly reallocate investments to ensure activities within the company are in line with the small business company’s strategy. Studies prove that establishing a schedule benefits the completion of the process. This process may outline the timeline and resources necessary for completing the operational analysis. Outline strategies and methods accordingly and adhere to them during the process. Collect information to provide key insights into actual performance in comparison with strategic planning and performance goals. Complete an analysis gap to identify and report performance, cost and benefits based on an analysis of the actual performance data. Demographic Analysis According to Bradley Stonefield, the demographic analysis that needs to be address is a specific population to describe the small business and its characteristics, such as income level, background checks, driving records, location and salaries. A demographic analysis is useful in a business plan, to describe the population where the business is located. Income level data is a good indicator of residents’ spending power. Income positively correlates with retail expenditures in many product categories. During market evaluation, retailers look at the median or average household income, and seek a minimum number of households within a certain income range prior to establishing a business or setting prices. Another common practice is to analyze the distribution of household incomes. Different businesses may avoid extremely high or low-income areas. Some specialty fashion stores target incomes above $100,000. Background checks often requested by employers for job candidates during e mployment screening, especially on candidates seeking a position that require high security or trust. Traditionally, background checks administered by a government agency for a nominal fee, but maybe administered by private companies. Background checks can be expensive depending on the information requested. Results of a background check typically include past employment verification, credit history, Driving history for a small business aspect and criminal history. Mr. Stonefield is interested in locating a limousine company within the Austin, TX area. A small business is unlikely to dominate any particular market in a city. However, strategic use of location-based marketing can make you a viral hit in your suburb or street and this may be all it takes to double the turnover in the limousine business. Location-based services can provide the company with information about how many people check in for a certain area or business, which has checked in most often and how many people have used an offer of this kind of service. This kind of information can be very useful in assessing the success of the company’s location-based marketing program. The average wage for a Limousine Driver is $12.85 per hour in the state of Texas in 2011. People in this job generally do not have more than 20 years’ experience. Pay for this job rises steadily for more experienced workers, but goes down significantly for the few employees with more than 20 years’ experience. Limo drivers have limited career advancement  opportunities. Some acquire supervisory or management positions, while others train new drivers or receive preferred shifts. Moving into a dispatching or managerial role is another choice for experienced limo drivers. Organizational Analysis Organizational Analysis for this company is a means of measuring how the small business will do and how to identify ways to improve the company in order to ensure success into the future of the company. A strategic way in preparing this aspect is to use the SWOT analysis. This stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. These factors make up the bulk of the way the study and be analyzed and can give a in great details a pretty good indication of how Landslide Limousine will do and how it could be expected to do move forward in the future in making profits. The results of the analysis will help Mr. Stonefield be able to make good decisions and improve any efficiencies while without making any major changes. Strengths within Landslide services are usually the starting point for this company. Internal/external factors should include a stable workforce, methods and simple strategies are a way to mainstream the total aspects of all local business within the area is which this is a key aspect. Weaknesses can come from all different locations and can be widespread. This may include aging facilities, possible inexperienced/unprofessional drivers, outdated equipment, purchasing of quality vehicles fleets, price/packages, and areas of specialties. Opportunities should include new market creations, consumer based locations, overhead, and debts. Now, threats could possibly take on another aspect within the business. These can range just from local communities services to government products/services to the rules and regulations. Individual Analysis Certain ideals manifest in behaviors of individual members and affect group dynamics. Task functions include behaviors such as identifying tasks, coordinating, clarifying and summarizing. Individual Analysis based off different levels and/or services provided by the limousine service help to decipher if business needs are met. This type of analysis can be based off a wide stream of studies in business. This specific analysis can have more disadvantages than advantages needed in order to find ways to being a  business. Learning how to work effectively in a group situation is the key to success in many professions in business. Learning key ways to get the business from crawl, walk, run phase is another way employees have the advantage of learning how the aspects of business work in the community. Environmental Analysis This analysis scan can help assist in understanding the broader context in which individuals are operating in. By investing time, identifying key trends and environmental factors to obtain information for small business within the regions in which we want to base our business and all the studies that are included. Some small businesses and organizations frequently choose to review the external factors in the process, but it is important to consider the internal environment factors. These may include looking at the organization’s internal capacities and resources, and projecting how to change in the future to meet the organization objectives. Another useful component to the analysis phase is to survey external customers in the local area and ensure all aspects of the locations are covered. Challenges observed and/or anticipated, or missed opportunities, and even basis such as how others described your individual work to get the process started may have a short-time or long-term effect. Environmental analysis uses a series of ranks and assessments in evaluating employee performance, customer satisfaction, and overhead coat are all similar factors during the first phase of the analysis. Training Methods Appropriate training is liable to have a positive or negative affect on important issues in business. How a company conducts, training is a critical decision that every business has to make consciously. All features involved in effective training should be considered, such as, time, cost, training environment, and training cost. The delivery of the training is pertinent. If the delivery of the information is confusing to employees, the training does not occur properly and is a waste of time, resources, and capital (Ongoing Training: A Method for Success, 2012). Various approaches to training are utilized and implemented. Types of Media Considering the impression Landslide Limousines anticipates on making, Atwood  and Allen Consulting recommends technology-based training. Technology-based learning may prove to be beneficial. Basic methods of learning through technology include interactive videos utilizing a computer in combination with a digital video (DVD). Web-based training programs or internet-streamed videos such as â€Å"YouTube† videos are increasing, popular tools among training methods. The aforementioned method is valuable in illustrating scenarios that the trainer would like to emphasize. These methods are conducive within a large group of people. Learning Principles When opting to use technology-based learning, companies must ensure accessibility for employees. Learning principles, considered laws of learning, are discovered, tested, and benefit practical situations (Naval education and Training, 2010). The trainer must possess the capability of applying the principles while instructing. Most importantly, the trainer needs to be clear on the objectives of the training, and relate it to the work environment. There are three types of learners: visual, hearing and hands-on. Atwood and Allen Consulting recommend that Landslide Limousine combine the training methods and perform more interactive learning experiences that will accommodate the three types of learners. Using what the military medicine has called for years â€Å"See one, do one, teach one† (Naval education and Training, 2010). The trainer will teach the skill so the employees can see it, then the employees will demonstrate their knowledge displaying their proficiency, finally the employee will teach a new employee. Those that teach, learn. Trainers will be inclined to become familiar with the material, recall it accurately, and apply it effectively. This method is cost effective in the sense that when there is a time one employee must carry out the tasks of another, therefore causing no interruptions in business. This method works best for companies that are just beginning. Training for learning skills or fact The required training conducted is for skill and fact. The training enhances knowledge of skills that enforce relevant facts, in reference to training. Effectiveness of Methods The effectiveness of the methods of instructions can be verified by how the employee perform their duties, by employee’s questionnaires and/or testing,  and by comments done by the trainers themselves (Naval Education and Training, 2010). The effectiveness of these methods displayed through the performance of the employees. Training Evaluation Strategies Evaluation on training is of utmost importance. Here is where a business learns of training that works versus training that is of no use to the organization. In order to evaluate specific training, addressing certain questions alleviate concerns of risk in that course of training. Potential questions are: Did the trainees learn a specific skill, knowledge or performance? Did change occur and was it related to the training? Are the changes positively reflecting in productivity and to achieving organization goals? Will these changes occur with a different set of trainees using the same training criteria? (Chapter 8, 2013) Typically, training is a trial and error system. What may work for one individual may not necessarily pertain to another type of learner. As mentioned previously, people learn in different manners. Some need visual aesthetics to increase their ability to comprehend the training. While others’ need a more tactile experience and participate in the training. This is not an entirely new concept and has developed over the last decade to include the use of technology to enhance learning. The same can be said for training and evaluation strategies. The idea behind training evaluation is to recognize the criteria of the training are met within the company. Using pretests to determine a suitable new hire reassures current employees that the individual grasps the goals and concepts of the business. An example of a pretest is as simple as an application, a resume or orientation. All of this information allows management to decipher an individual based on experiences. Once training is underway, management will monitor and observe the associates reactions and the trainer’s methods of approach. This segment is extremely important considering the trainer. If the trainer does not connect with the class or leads them astray and off topic, the training becomes worthless and consumes the organization’s time and money. The trainer’s obligation shall remain cost effective to the company and stay on task to complete the training in a time efficient manner. Aside from management monitoring and observing, feedback is equally important, and can  come from employees, supervisors, managers, and customers. Collecting feedback for an organization is conducted a number of ways. Suggestion boxes placed randomly around the business provide anonymous suggestions from individuals employed in the organization or from customers who believe change is necessary. Feedback is also collected verbally either in a group of employees or individual basis. Sending surveys to clients containing pertinent information to the limousine service allows them to feel connected to the business and builds trust. The implementation of the feedback is the most important aspect to changing the current operational standards of the business. Manager’s need to rise above the concept of â€Å"if it’s not broken, don’t fix it.† Business evolution is constant and technology increases daily allowing change to happen more frequently, and not because â€Å"it’s broken,† but because a new element has become known and can be a useful tool in training. References Email from Traci: Performance Management Plan. (2015). Retrieved from University of Phoenix: https://ecampus.phoenix.edu/secure/aapd/Materials/IP/curriculum/sb/HRM531/assignments/week5/intro.asp Naval education and Training. (2010). Personal Qualification Standards for Master Training Specialist. NAVEDTRA 43100-7C Ch. 1. Retrieved from Naval education and Training website Ongoing Training: A Method for Success. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.lctmag.com/operations/article/41017/ongoing-training-a-method-for-success http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes533041.htm http://education-portal.com/articles/Salary_and_Career_Info_for_a_Limo_Driver.html http://www.studymode.com/essays/Individual-Analysis-Of-Working-In-a-712116.html