Psychology Case Study - Eric B. Essays - Psychology,

Psychology: Case Study - Eric B. Case History of Eric B. Eric is a 6-year old African-american male who was raised in an impoverished inner city neighborhood in Chicago. Drugs and violence surrounded his daily life. With a single-mother who involved herself in a series of relationships with abusive boyfriends, Eric found himself beat with a belt, and may have been sexually assaulted. His mother was not home that often, and he was forced to sit outside on the stoop so that his grandmother, that also lived with them, could sell drugs. His mother was uneducated and supported the family with her public assistance grant. He has never met his father, and his uncles are in jail. His father was convicted of robbery and drug charges but Eric was told that he was shot to death in an attempted robbery. He dreams of one day avenging his father's death and acts it out when he plays alone. He has a history of terrorizing animals and killed the family cat. He also did poorly in school, being diagnosed with attention deficit disorder. He is constantly inv olved in fights and has no companions. When home, he mostly involved himself in action movies and cartoons. Eric b efriends a boy who lived next door to him. One day he steals the boys bicycle and when the family comes to claim it, Eric threate ns the boy by saying that he was going to kill his baby brother. A few weeks later, Eric broke into the apartment and assaulted the baby, beating him nearly to death. According to Eric Erikson, a student of Freud, his psychosocial theory states that you have to move through stages of development to have your needs met. One needs to be psychologically ready to move on to the next stage. This depends on the social environment they are in Eric, being six years old is in the iniative vs. guilt stage of Erikson's Stage Theories. In this stage, he is suppose to be ready to take iniative in his own activities and make plans and goals for the future. If his mother does not allow him to take iniative then he will feel guilt for his attempts at independence. He may also be in the industry vs. inferiority stage. This means he should be aware of his responsibilities such as homework and chores. He should be able create a sense of industry, if praised and rewarded by his mother. If not, then he will feel inferior. He would also be influenced by his peers and teachers. However, this is merely how is should be, but is not how it is for Eric. Lack of iniative is not the problem. Without a parental figure present, Eric was forced to take on too much iniative and make too many decisions on is own. He feels no guilt in being independent but according to Erikson, should feel inferior due to the lack of praise and reward from his mother. According to Jean Piaget, and his stages of cognitive development, kids construct their knowledge of the world through reorganization and they move to higher levels of psychological functioning. Piaget looked at how kids think of themselves and their environment, when moving through each stage. In these stages, children select what they see and they interpret. In the preoperational stage, ranging from ages 2-7, children should have a mastery of language and use words to represent objects. In this stage, children cannot use developmental capacities systematically. They are quite egocentric, having the tendency to interpret the world through your own position. They attribute their own thoughts to inanimate objects, known as animism. For example, a child may say that the sky is sad because the sun is not shining. They have no sense of centration, a tendency to concentrate on one aspect of a problem, like having tunnel vision. These are called conservation studies, which are a series of tests for children to test their concepts of length, quantity, area, and volume. For example, if you were to place two glasses in front of a child, one tall and thin, the other short and stout, filled with the same amount of liquid in each, he will think

The logical problem of evil and the freewill defense

The logical problem of evil and the freewill defense Introduction The purpose of this essay will be to evaluate the logical problem of evil and free-will defense. The aspects that will be focused on in the essay will be the logical problem of evil where the concept of God and the key attributes that are in conflict with the existence of evil will be discussed.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on The logical problem of evil and the freewill defense specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More The free-will defense as a response to the logical problem of evil will also be covered in the essay as well as how the free-will response demonstrates the existence of evil to be logically inconsistent with the existence of God. Objections to the free-will defense as a logical solution to evil will also be presented in the discussion. Logical Problem of Evil The problem of evil according to Inwagen (188) is defined as the label for an intellectual problem that is contrary to emotional, spiritual, psychological and theological problems. The prevalence of evil in the world or the logical problem of evil can easily be used to form a basis for an argument that is against the existence of God or any other omnipotent being. The logical problem of evil states that if God really existed he would be an all powerful and morally perfect being who would not allow any evil or immorality to exist in the world. But since there is a lot of evil in the world, God does not exist and this basically forms a basis for the logical problem of evil. According to the logical problem of evil, the continued existence of evil since the beginning of time is a prelude to the fact that God is non-existent (Inwagen 188). The response to the logical problem of evil is the existence of a morally perfect and omnipotent being that has the relevant knowledge of evil and how to deal with it. God is an omnipotent being who is pure, good and morally perfect and can be able to deal with evil. The concept of God is basically made up of Him being an omnipotent being, His knowledge of evil and His moral perfection. God is seen to be a morally perfect and omnipotent being meaning that he can do anything as long as it is not an intrinsic impossibility. Because omnipotence and moral perfection are the non-negotiable components of God, the implications of this is that if the universe was made by an all powerful being and that being was less than omnipotent then the atheists would be right in assuming that God did not exist. A morally perfect being would not allow evil to exist in the world and him being omnipotent would mean that he has the power to control the existence of evil. The implication of this statement is that such a being is either false or is wholly ignorant to the occurrence of evil (Inwagen 192).Advertising Looking for essay on philosophy? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More One of the key attributes that is in conflict w ith evil is moral scorn which according to Inwagen (191) is the safest kind of evil because it is easily taken for granted by most people. Scorn which is generally a form of moral insensitivity is a type of evil that is committed against a person’s emotional and spiritual feelings. It is meant to belittle the actions, opinions or comments that individuals make towards something of common interest. Moral scorn conflicts with general scorn because it can be used against individuals who disagree with others by demonstrating self-righteous acts or moral posturing. Moral scorn is meant to belittle the actions or opinions of other people without necessarily being backed by evil feelings such as malice or hatred. Moral scorn deflects an argument from employing any forms of evil to one that employs self-righteousness or moral posturing meaning that it eliminates the occurrence of any form of evil completely (Inwagen 191). Freewill Defense The free-will defense is the only response to the logical problem of evil because of the existence of rational, self-aware and good human beings who have a free choice or free will to take part in evil or good. The free-will defense explains the presence of God to be that of an omnipotent being who grants human beings with the power of free choice and free will. Free-will is a great good created by God to outweigh the existence of evil in the world and it is therefore seen as a defense to the logical problem of evil. The simplistic form of free-will points to the fact that evil exists in the world and the existence of God as a morally upright being. If evil did not exist in the world, there would be no need for human beings to decide whether they will engage in evil or good meaning that the free-will defense is meaningless (Inwagen 198). Because God created human beings to be rational when it came to choosing between good and evil, he would not be in existence if people lacked the free-will defense when choosing between right and wrong. Free-will means that a person is morally responsible for the choices they have made bearing in mind that they had the choice to do otherwise. Free-will provides human beings with an option to choose what they think is right regardless of whether or not they think it is evil or good. The choice of free will therefore points to the existence of evil in the world and since free-will is a moral choice derived from morally right and rational human beings, it points to the existence of God as an omnipotent being (196). The free-will defense addresses the logical problem of evil because it offers human beings with an alternative to committing evil. Free-will provides people with a chance to be morally responsible for their actions though they had the chance to do otherwise. The simplistic form of the free-will defense can at best be used to deal with the existence of some forms of evil as opposed to a vast amount of evil that originates from the acts of human beings.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on The logical problem of evil and the freewill defense specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Objection to Free-will Defense An objection to the free-will defense is that it fails to address the logical problem of evil because free will and determinism are compatible concepts that co-exist in the world. This means that God as the omnipotent being could create a world where human beings were free to commit evil but also do good. This seems to be a surprising argument to make but it has a strong basis based on philosophers such as David Hume and Thomas Hobbes who held the belief that free will and determinism were perfectly compatible concepts that could coexist in a world full of both evil and good. These philosophers argued that free-will meant being free to do what one wants to do while determinism involved making the right choice based on what a person wanted to do. If free will and determinism were c ompatible therefore, an omnipotent being could create a human being who had a free choice to choose between evil and good (Inwagen 199). A person’s free will is therefore what one wants to do with regards to the above analysis meaning that a free will is an unimpeded will. A creator who would want to offer people with a free choice would only need to arrange matters so as to achieve the intended desire in human beings. This means that if a human being had a desire to commit act x instead of y, they would be able to achieve that desire because they have the option of x and y implanted in them. If every human being with a free will always did what they felt was right there would be an abuse of free will and evil would not exist in the world through the human abuse of free-will. This means that the free-will defense is not a suitable response to the logical problem of evil based on this objection. Inwagen, Peter. The problem of evil. New York: Oxford University Press

Marketing Plan for Tesco Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Marketing Plan for Tesco - Research Paper Example Tesco is the largest of the four leading London supermarkets, namely, Morrisons, Asda and Sainsbury’s. In addition to its food business, Tesco controls an important online business and non food business. Tesco is the third biggest food retailer in the UK, with manage of about 31% of that nation’s food retail market; Tesco had effectively thwarted an attempt by wal-mart to take hold of the largest share of the British market. Tesco had also already recognized process in a dozen countries in Asia and Europe and had completed that the U.S offered the maximum opportunity for sustained company development. Tesco’s rise has been comparatively recent. In history recognized in the UK as a conservative retailer with a â€Å"pile it high, sell it inexpensive† method to store image and marketing, the reformation of the company came regarding through a countless of innovations and strategies. These incorporated diversification into a broad range of nonfood goods and s ervices, the utilize of multiciple store arrangements, growth of a private tag or house store product for manifold products, and efficient marketing that assisted found its standing as a market manager. Tesco’s rise also contributed to what some analysts differentiated of markets and the organization of supply chains were retail- driven, while the US model of tended to be further produce driven, as a minimum until the early 1990s and the access of Wal-Mart and its control more than its own supply chains.

Hedging an Equity Portfolio Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Hedging an Equity Portfolio - Essay Example Cross hedging capabilities may depend on various factors. First is the degree in which the spot and futures currencies are negatively or positively correlated. Secondly, this also depends on the level of accuracy of the estimated risk-minimizing cross-hedge factors. In addition, time is an important factor in this process and therefore the capability of cross hedging depends on the stability of the optimal cross hedge proportions over a given duration or period of time. Moreover, this also depends on the potential risk reduction from portfolio cross-hedging. A hedger is any individual or institution that minimizes the variance of expected monetary returns on a currency spot position with regards to a position in the currency’s corresponding future contract. There are various reasons for hedging in a financial set up. First is for the purposes of managing volatility in cash flows. Secondly, hedging is important for the purposes of checking the market value of an organizationâ⠂¬â„¢s shares. Hedging is also used for the purposes of managing volatility in accounting earnings. In addition, the management of balance sheet accounts and ratios can also benefit from hedging. For fund managers, performance information with regards to their hedging activities should be provided without restrictions or resistance from the fund manager. This is because funds may avoid reporting because of poor results. Such funds usually have below average returns in comparison to other funds and in addition, omitting them may result in an upward bias. On the other hand, there might be other funds that have become very successful as a result of growth in areas that they may not have actually wished to attract new investments. These funds may also decide to leave the database for a very different reason. Tentatively, their performance is likely to be superior to that of the average fund. Whereas there might be difficulties in attaining accurate estimates of these two effects, it is believed that the reported returns are usually biased upwards. Secondly, hedge fund databases have a limitation of reporting data only on funds still in existence or those that are new and rapidly growing. Funds that are no longer active are usually eliminated from the database. This practice in turn leaves an upward bias to performance statistics. This is because funds that are closed are likely to be poorly performing. Another type of bias can be referred to as the instant history bias. This occurs when a fund is included on the database for the first time and is therefore permitted to backfill its historical records. This type of bias could be estimated through the calculation of the average of the returns since introduction and later comparing them to the average returns since the fund joined the database. There are different hedge fund styles that are applicable in the financial markets today. Generally, hedge funds are not strictly regulated investment components that engage the use of a wide range of

Analyse website traffic data Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Analyse website traffic data - Essay Example However, there have been significant improvements since 30/06/2006 reaching a figure of 80,000, on that date. By Hour of Day: the activity tends to increase by around 7.A.M. and reaches its zenith by around12.59 PM. Noon. The activity tapers down after noon and reaching its lowest ebb at 11.PM. The highest activity recorded is at 12.59 PM and the lowest at 3 PM. Activity by day of week: The activity by day tends to increase after Sundays with Wednesdays registering the most peak activity of hits. It is lowest during the weekend on Saturday recording 2494 hits on that day of the week. One of the main reasons why some of the results may not be valid may be due to the presence of invalid or incomplete data, due to technical or other reasons. Therefore a certain provision for errors has to maintain while collating statistical datas. On certain occasions, there may be mismatch between the total website hits in the summary and the website hits in the daily visitor activity. This is because the summary indicates only passed or validated requests, whereas the daily activity indicates all activities, valid or invalid. Website traffic helps to evaluate the positive and negative areas of websites. â€Å"However, the data receive from host company can be overwhelming if it is not able to understand how to apply it to particular business and website. It is essential to examine the most basic data - the average visitors to the site on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis.† (Johnson, Cameron, 2007). Color choices and layout and design aspects could be regimented. Additionally the website needs to be updated on regular basis and newer and better features incorporated so that the visitors and hits could be conspicuously increased over a period of time. The use of â€Å"CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) and XHTML (eXtensible HyperText Markup Language) to design and

Music, Culture and Value of Music in a Digital Future

Music, Culture and Value of Music in a Digital Future The uses of Music, Culture and the value of ‘free’ Music In a Digital future â€Å"We’ve lost a whole generation of kids, who grew up downloading free music from the web and cannot fathom paying for it† Abstract The past ten years have witnessed an enormous growth of musicology within the music and entertainment industry with questions concerning musical meaning and the extent to which it’s informed by cultural experience and socially derived knowledge. Groundbreaking developments are increasingly encouraging the demand for new products and platforms from consumer markets that have grown up downloading music knowing no better than to find their entertainment through the internet with the illusion that it is free. This dissertation looks at the early forms and purposes of music up to present day, factors threatening the music industry and what has affected it over recent years. The increased use of the internet, cheap software equipment and other technological art forms, have changed the way we sell, listen to and buy new music. I want to investigate what effects will this have on the industry in the future and what does this mean for artists and the way music is created and valued. Introduction Introduction will contextualise the central theme and notion of the work and describe my motivation and intensions. I will focus the introduction on the chapters individually. ‘The industry has been hanging off the edge for some time’ (McQuinvey, J. Date. P.). Chapter 1 – Talk about the development of technological devices related to new formats, and the main purposes of music up until today. Chapter 2 – Talk about the technological developments which have an effect on the way we buy and listen to music. New devices and gadgets are demanding newer ways to attain music and how we consume new music. Chapter 3 – Talk a little about the different types of people using and making music, how this is affecting record labels and what will happen in the future. As the development and discovery of technology grows and grows from early dates to present day, enabling more and more possiblilities†¦. Cultures and social activities are affected by radical technological change†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. ‘One of the primary proponents of this categorization was William. F. Ogburn. He argued that in most cases it is the sequence of technology that causes social change’ Over the past however many years, digital downloads have been fought against buy, major labels, causing decades of copyright and pirate copying of music films and entertainment mediums. 2005 onwards†¦ Today in 2008 the subject of digital downloading and the internet is being redefined and recognised by the major record labels hoping to create a future with easy access to new music quickly and cheaply. Starting new web sites for downloads etc. People want faster choices and ways to attain their entertainment. The fast changing cultures within society Growth of music technology Internet sites- Amazon competing with major companies to sell a wider range of products as more and more people are buying online instead of using high street shops and other retailers. Modes and categories inherited from the past no longer seem to fit today’s reality, experienced by a new generation. Chapter 1 – (Progression of early forms of music, formats and purposes) For centuries music has been the biggest form of entertainment within households, pubs, clubs and events ever since the recording of sound, but since the early days of music the purposes and the means to consume music has grown considerably up to the 20th century forcing formats, technology and the music industry to change with time. This chapter will outline the progression of technology associated with music and its means of use in relation to new entertainment. When ‘Bartolomeo Cristofori’ became the inventor of the piano, identified as a stringed keyboard instrument with mechanically operated rebounding hammers, Cristofori’s invention became a success and around 1922, a survey was carried out which shows that the piano was the most popular instrument used in over 25% of the average household. Along with many other musical instruments dated before and after the piano, instruments were used for enjoyment and entertainment and at times for families and friends who would gather together to play and sing songs on special occasions. When the very first phonograph was introduced by Thomas Edison around 1878 and the Edison Speaking Phonograph Company was established. The phonograph would be treated in the same way as a piano or organ as families would again sit around and listen to records or family stories within the home but Edison realised the opportunities he had created with his invention. Edison’s invention enabled the possibilities of using the phonograph to perhaps dictate a letter, dictate books for the blind, make family recordings of their voices, music boxes and toys, clocks that announce the time, and a connection with the telephone company to record conversations. In 1857 Frenchman, Leon Scott de Martinville was the first to have invented his documented phonoautograph machine which was able to record sound waves but only created a visual analogue of the waves, until around 20 years later when Thomas Edison allowed two innovators to re-develop the later phonograph which became the gramophone. The gramophone used disk shaped materials to record onto which produced better recording quality and a longer playback time. American inventor Emile Berliner then created a process which allowed the sound tracing to be etched side-to-side in a spiral onto a zinc disk, this master would then be electroplated to create a negative which would then be used to stamp duplicate copies onto vulcanized rubber (and later shellac), a process which would change the means of music forever, a process now known as the mass reproduction of musical entertainment. The process to record, duplicate and play back music opened endless forms of entertainment and the industry were set to take the world by storm, selling records and making profits to consumers. The gramophone quickly outsold and overtook the phonograph and by the end of World War 1 the disc had become the dominant commercial recording format. A technological development which has had a major impact on music in this century is sound recording. Over the past seventy years the concert audience has been transformed from musical amateurs to a large number of potential buyers. The birth of sound recording started as a mechanical process, and with the exception of the Telegraphone in 1899 this process remained until the 1920s when a group of groundbreaking inventions in the field of electronics revolutionized sound recording and the young recording industry. Sound transducers were introduced such as microphones and loudspeakers and a few various electronic devices were made for the purpose of amplification and modifications of early electrical sound signals resulting in the mixing desk. Inevitably, over time all these components and inventions have had an affect on the way musician’s record music, the uses of music and the growing demands of the music consumers to attain music. These electronic inventions created the means for growth and development within the music industry opening a wide range of possibilities for the recording process. Although many inventions and ideas were yet to be discovered, early music and its uses had progressed from a means of confined entertainment within the household to a possible, world wide product with which Emile Berliner’s early duplication process played a large part when it came to distribution and portability of recorded music. As time passed, increasingly people were able to buy recorded music which would be played on a gramophone wherever it may be. Emile Berliner realized the market wanted a range of music which can be bought, stored and played at any given point, the money earning potential would be high and with the importance of his discoveries, decided to start ‘his very own’ brand of recorded music which up until today, with the changes and the new strains on the industry has been extremely successful with the famous dog and gramophone design of ‘His Masters Voice’ (HMV). Music was now, not only being used just for enjoyment or purely for entertainment but was now, being recorded, duplicated and distributed to consumers around the world who are able to replay music over and over and enjoy their collections when ever and most importantly where ever. The next major progression concerning music which would increase the needs of high quality equipment was the introduction of descriptive and respective music tracks within film. The years 1920-1928 were known to be the golden age of silent movies. Early movies were accompanied by music scores containing pieces usually played by an organist, pianist or an orchestra depending on the class of the theatre. Sound tracks however were introduced to cinema audiences around 1926-1927 even though technology to add sound to film was discovered in 1911 it took another 15 years or so to be introduced and implemented into movie productions. The use of music within film during this particular period was predominantly used to raise the attraction of early movie productions which would change forever after the opening of Pandora’s Box in 1927 and the increase of technical achievements which led Al-Jolson to ad-lib a few spoken words in ‘The Jazz Singer’. Recorded music for films then after became extremely successful within the movie industry and over the next few years Warner Bros. took control of this area (now a multi-billion pound industry) by producing ten all-talking films with accompanied sound tracks and scores leaving the silent movies on the shelf. This production process increasingly outlined the importance of having good quality sound systems to playback the music and sounds on film. Music will always essentially be a huge form of entertainment in many ways but now different music was being used for more reasons than originally supposed. With the on going growth of equipment and technology music became a money making product after the discovery of sound recording, music began to be used to compliment or help describe a visual performance rather than being an individual form of entertainment, it was now coinciding with other art forms and was boosting the popularity and profits of associated productions. With the discovery of magnetic media music will be promoted on a mass worldwide scale and allow the public and potential music buyers to listen to broadcasts over the air. The first radio broadcast which involved music was said to be in 1906 at Brant Rock MA, when Fessenden played his violin, sang a song and read a few verses from a bible into his wireless telephone on Christmas Eve 1906. It was classed as a broadcast because it was designed for more than one listener and was pre-announced rather than a one to one conversation. 1920 saw the first licensed radio broadcast, as Frank Conrad’s company was asked to go on air on a regular basis to send out music to the listeners and would sell radios to pay for the service. Radios were advertised in local newspapers to households and within a few years there were hundreds of stations entertaining thousands of people who had bought or built their own receivers. It was no longer, that an audience had to sit in their own home and manually operate a gramophone, no need to necessarily buy records from HMV and will no longer need to worry about play back time of records as the public could listen to the radio everyday, and tune in to their favorite radio stations free of charge. Growing factors underlined the importance of good quality equipment to further the success of music and the portability of music, which led to new discoveries of early formats and storage devices such as magnetic tape machines, cassettes tapes/players to audio cd’s. After the rubber and shellac records, which were the primary recording medium at the time, a new means for recording came about in 1934/35 when Joseph Begun of Germany built the first magnetic tape machine which was used for mobile radio broadcasting before creating the first consumer tape recorder which provided the ‘3M Company’ with a billion dollar industry. Magnetic tape machines became very popular storage and recording devices in radio stations and recording studios as they offer higher quality recording and longer continuous playback of recorded material, the most beneficial aspect of the invention of tape was its portability. Eventually two track tape machines were introduced which extended recording possibilities within the studio but magnetic tape was never used commercially by consumers until the release of the first compact audio-cassette tape in 1963 by The Phillips Company of the Netherlands. With a cheap and easy recording medium such as the cassette tape combined with a cassette tape player, It could be argued that this sparked the ever destructive and ongoing battle of music piracy. Taperecorders/players were sold with built in radios as standard and by the touch of a button it was possible torecord sounds and music straight from the radio. After Phillips had patented the cassette tape in 1965 and decided to make it free of charge all over the world, companies then started to design new portable recorders and players to compliment the compact size of the cassette tape. One of the popular models of tape players was the Sony Pressman which was a monaural tape recorder released in 1977. The next year in 1978 Sony founder and chief advisor Masaru Ibuka requested the general manger of the Tape Recorder Business Division to start work on a stereo based model of the earlier Sony Pressman which birthed the Sony TPS-L2 headphone stereo Walkman in 1979 that would completely chan ge the way consumers listen to music. Theyll take it everywhere with them, and they wont care about record functions. If we put a playback-only headphone stereo like this on the market, itll be a hit. What made the Sony Walkman such a big hit was the portability that it was offering to its consumers. Ever since the invention of the piano/organ, phonograph, gramophone, record players, wireless recorders and receivers, although, all mediums allowed the consumer to listen to music in various ways, none of which actually enabled the listener to become portable, ‘on the move’ to be able to listen to their material literally wherever they wanted. Recording and listening to music from this point onwards almost became a hobby for a generation of people who would listen to the radio to try and catch their favourite song to record to tape, allowing them to repeatedly replay the material and start a collection of stored music. Many types of storage formats have been introduced by this point but very few which are truly beneficial to the storage and quality of music mediums. After the magnetic media such as: wire, core memory, drum, card, tape, disk and OM disk came many floppy disk formats which played a great part in early computing storage formats. Different versions of optical mediums were introduced ‘optic data disk’ coming before Sony proposed a standard for the compact disk (CD) in 1980 but was followed by formats such as: DVD, HD-DVD, holographic, Blu-ray DVD and developments with OM disks. The introduction of optical mediums saw Sony’s standard CD to hit the very top in high quality recording and storage mediums. CD-R’s are a ‘write once, read many’ optical medium (WORM) which is a recordable version of the CD and holds a high level of compatibility with standard CD readers unlike CD-RW’s which can be overwritten many times but has a lower compatibility level with CD readers and the disks are slightly more expensive. CD’s became the most popular medium of music and data storage due to its capacity and ease of recording but there is one flaw in its design as after a life span of around 2 years it’s possible for the CD’s data to degrade with time showing a coloured dye as a result. CD’s hold a standard capacity of 700Mb where as the introduction of DVD’s upped the capacity to 4.1 GB but was mostly associated with movies projects which contain much larger files. CD’s are still the highest quality recording/storage medium to attain or store music on outside of a computers hard drive but with newer, smaller compressed formats such as MP3 on the market the option of buying a CD compared to a smaller and cheaper alternative looks bleak with time, so we see the CD taking a backseat to let newer recording and storage devices into the scene. Chapter 2 (A demanding society) In today’s society where consumers are demanding faster, cheaper and easier methods of gaining entertainment, they also demand a new outlook towards devices, gadgets and components with which to view or listen to their product. This chapter underlines the changes of which new technology has an effect, they way society and subcultures are shaped by technology and how technology is forced to develop and become more advanced to meet the needs and perceptions of its consumers. In recent years the ‘compact disk’ has ended the forty year reign of the twelve inch LP, with which came consequences for production, distribution and marketing, and in turn disks and tapes have been threatened by technologies which can deliver high quality sound via cable direct to potential consumers, eliminating the need for the already established pattern of product marketing and distribution. Although the invention of the phonograph and gramophones were considered important aspects in creating the a mass market for music and entertainment, â€Å"the record industry has been shaped by the need to cope with its volatile market so its established practices and institutions have been constantly undermined by technological innovations which not only offer new and better ways of doing things but, as we shall see, have generally had the effect of increasing the consumers choice at the expense of the industries ability to control its market†. (Scott, D. Martin, P. 1995 p.209) There are many important connections between technology, musical characteristics and social groups, and as it may be argued that the fundamental coordinates of a musical form are not determined by its social base, but each social group or subculture corresponds to certain acceptable genres. During the 1970’s and 1980’s the idea that the characteristics of a musical form could give life or influence to the social reality of a culture became more and more popular with incorporated sociological categories such as class, ethnicity and importantly age. â€Å"In 1987 John Shepard extended this type of analysis to gender, arguing that different voice types or timbres in popular music gave expression to different kinds of gender identities†. (Clayton, M. Herbert, T. Middleton, R. 2003, p. 7, p. 14) The 1990’s saw different factors concerning the cultural study of music and the analytical evidence with particular social categories such as, class, ethnicity, age, subculture and counterculture. This had been replaced with a more embracing and persistent concern with social identity. With the concept of youth culture, it’s assumed that teenagers share similar leisure interests and pursuits and were involved in some kind of revolt against their parents and elders. The arrival of youth culture is said to be linked with the growth and increased incomes of early working class youths which allowed greater spending power and the means to express their individual interests and styles which caused large markets to develop more interest for the youth culture, most notably resulting in music and fashion. It’s with particular music styles, genres and clothing styles and labels that predominantly place our identities within a culture or subculture, which technology helps shape and create aspirations in a similar way. â€Å"Teenage culture is a contradictory mixture of the authentic and the manufactured: it is an area of self-expression for the young and a lush grazing ground for the commercial providers†. (Hall, S. Whannel, P. 1964, p.) â€Å"The compressed file format known as MP3 is at the centre of debate towards file-sharing and digital downloading and is thought to be downgrading towards the level of audible quality in music. Yet the mp3 is also a cultural artefact, apsychoacoustic technology that literally playsits listeners. Being a container technology type for recorded sound, the mp3 proves that the quality of ‘portability’ is central to the history of auditory representation and shows that digital audio culture works according to logics somewhat dissimilar from digital visual culture†. (Jonathan Sterne, 2006. New Media and Society, Vol. 8, No. 5, 825-842 DOI: 10.1177/1461444806067737) Today’s young generation aren’t so aware of the historical factors and important issues which lead to the advances, demands and uses of audible quality music but more so, on the social aspects of consumption, portability and quantity of music. A spokes person for the Recording Industry Association of New Zealand, Terrance O’Neill-Joyce, argues that: â€Å"The problem is not with the actual technology of MP3, which he believes is being effectively used by many music producers, but rather the ineffective means of securing remuneration for artists. It’s a case of technology outstripping legislation and a lack of proper commercial framework being established as of yet† (Shuker. 2001 p. 65) MP3 is a technology encoding, recorded sound, so that it takes up less storage space than it would otherwise. The size of an MP3 file makes it practical to transfer high –quality music files over the internet and store them on a computers hard drive, where as CD quality tracks take longer to download and transfer. The MP3 file has become very popular as a way to distribute and access music even though there has been enormous debate over the economic and cultural implications of this new technology. For the typical music consumer the MP3 file is considered a blessing as anyone can access a wide range and varieties of music mostly for free as well as having the option to compile their own albums of single tracks from their favorite artists without having to acquire the whole album itself. For artists and producers the MP3 allows them to distribute their music possibly to a world wide audience without tackling the political processes and mediation of the music industry. For mainstream artists on major record labels the MP3 raises concerns of profit loss from consumers due to illegal downloads which are free of charge and easy to attain. On the other hand for strictly internet distributed music producers and publishers the MP3 opens up many opportunities for smaller, more innovative labels and companies. (Shuker. 2001, Pg 65) Each new medium of technology, communication or entertainment that’s introduced to a mainstream audience creates drastic changes towards the way in which we experience music, this also has implications for how we relate to and consume music. The changes and advances in technological recording equipment open, both constraints and opportunities relating to the organisation process and production of music, while the developments within musical instrumentation allow the emergence of ‘new sounds’. Most important of all, each new recording format or device used for transmission inevitably alters the previously established process of music production and consumption; they also raise questions about authorship and the legal status of music as a property and the ongoing battle with piracy and profit loss. Napster software was introduced in 1999, designed as a search engine, communication portal and file-sharing software that facilitated the sharing process by granting users access to all other Napster and the mp3 files they choose to share. Within a few months, transfers of music files using Napster reached millions per day, and at its peak, it was estimated that as many as sixty million people were using the site. â€Å"Whereas Napster requires users to first log onto a central server to access other users MP3 files, these newer networks allow direct user-to-user (P2P) connections involving multiple file types. These innovations expand the universe of file sharing activity and make it virtually impossibly to track users of the files they choose to share† (Garofalo, 2003 cited in Shuker, 2008 pg, 23) Digital distribution continuously threatened the music business and the control of music by the record companies. This method also lowers manufacturing and distribution costs while putting pressure on marketing and other aspects of the process. With the industry failing to stop illegal downloads and P2P (peer-to-peer) distribution of recorded music over the last five years, record labels have finally decided to adapt their business to suit the way its consumers get hold on their music. It’s becoming more and more apparent that albums and artists are making very little or no money in the music industry because of the lack of physical CD sales as the majority of money spent during the traditional production process goes towards many aspects such as the production, promotion, duplication and distribution of a product. Mainly within the music business P2P technologies are a positive means for consumers and creative artists because all costs of production, promotion, marketing and distribution are dramatically lowered. These new technologies and approaches to digital distribution means old and new artists are able to earn more profits through selling singles and albums through P2P networks as the production process costs a fraction of the album or single. Because they can charge less they earn and sell more which means more artists will benefit financially and the industries broad range of music will receive a wider market to distribute to. â€Å"It is easy to see that we are living in a time of rapid and radical social change, it is much less easy to come to terms with the fact that such change will, without doubt, affect the nature of those academic disciplines that both reflect our society and help to shape it† (Hawkes. 2003. p.7) The growing concern with the music industry today is focused heavily on the affects of digital downloads and the fall of physical album/record sales sold in high street music shops and online stores. The debate continues as sales in the US as well as the UK have fallen due to a number of factors involving the growth of technology and the way we consume our entertainment. According to recent industry researchers, figures show that today’s music industry (UK), has suffered a drop of up to 11% of record sales in 2007, but download sales boosted the singles market by nearly 30% last year as single sales increased from 67m in 2006 to 86.6m in 2007, up 29.3%. Despite there being best-selling albums from artists like Amy Winehouse and Leona Lewis, only 138.1 million albums were sold in 2007, compared with 154.7 million in 2006. Amy Winehouses Back to Black was the most popular album of 2007, with 1.85 million copies sold. Leona Lewis debut album Spirit came second, even though it was only released in November. Music industry body the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) put the 10.8% fall down to copyright theft and difficult retail conditions. Having the option of album unbundling is also a problem as consumers are able to select which tracks they want to download from each album, this means albums are not being sold as whole units and says a lot to the artists themselves about what their audience wants. Music Industry Analyst Michael McGuire of Gartner Research told Agency France-Press news agency: â€Å"It comes back to consumers being in complete control of their media experience†. Mr McGuire said fans were sending artists a message: â€Å"While you may have put a lot of thought into the sequence of the album, I only like these three songs†. BPI chief executive Geoff Taylor said: â€Å"The UK market has shown considerable resilience in recent years while global recorded music markets have declined.† Recording companies have a major influence on the music we listen to and shape what’s known as popular music within society. The term ‘popular music’ defies a precise straightforward definition and is usually over looked and the understanding of the term is taken for granted. To fully understand the term popular music it’s necessary to address the general field of popular culture within cultural studies. (See: Studying Popular Music Culture, Tim Wall). In this instance I refer the word popular music from the historical term for popular as the ‘ordinary people’, these days the meaning of the term has expanded, ‘all music is popular music’ meaning ‘music that is popular with someone’. â€Å"Young peoples musical activities whatever their cultural background or social position, rest on a substantial and sophisticated body of knowledge about popular music. Most young people have a clear understanding of its different genres, and an ability to hear and place sounds in terms of their histories, influences and sources. Young musicians and audiences have no hesitation about making and justifying judgements of meaning and value† (Willis. 1990: 59 cited in Shuker. p.98) The music industry is big business, and international multi-billion dollar enterprise historically centred in the United States with the United Kingdom making a significant artistic contribution to the industry and developing trends as well as the emergence of Japanese media technologies playing a major part in the music industry for its commercial designs of gadgets and devices. Recording companies are the most important part of the music industry and fall into two main groups: ‘the major’ international labels and the smaller ‘independent’ labels who’s structures and operating processes take on a similar role, blurring the distinctions between the two. These differences I will try to evaluate later on in chapter 3. The major labels are renowned for sourcing young talent, recording, promoting, marketing and distributing his/her music which has a powerful effect on the popular consumer, cultures and subcultures due to the image associated with that particular genre or style of music which is marketed, but its future is usually determined by the listener themselves. â€Å"For after the commercial power of the record companies has been recognised, after the persuasive sirens of the radio acknowledged, after the recommendations of the music press noted, it is finally those who buy the records, dance to the rhythm and live to the beat who demonstrate, despite the determined conditions of its production, the wider potential of pop† (Chambers, 1985: Introduction cited in Shuker 2001 p.23) Consumers are becoming less influenced by the major record labels with the help from the internet as consumers have more freedom to discover new genres and styles which are delivered in new ways. Record labels will always have a certain level of influence to its popular markets but now its the customer who decides on what they really like and want to listen to without feeling outside of the ‘popular music’ category. â€Å"I think there are many benefits for a musician not being signed to a label. I’ve seen first hand, from my experience at major labels, where they will sign up and coming artists b

Comparing and Contrasting Society in the Book, The Lathe of Heaven and

Comparing and Contrasting Society in the Book, The Lathe of Heaven and the Movie, Matrix In the book The Lathe of Heaven, by Ursula K. Le Guin, there are many similarities and some differences in society in comparison to the movie Matrix. The two stories settings take place in different locations. Although, throughout both stories many huge changes are made, the people in the societies remain unaware of the changes. Then, similarly, only a certain few individuals are knowledgeable of the true reality. A difference between The Lathe of Heaven and the Matrix is the place setting. The Lathe of Heaven's characters are in the real world. The real world is physical and tangible, filled with items that tiger senses. People have feelings and react differently to situations. Each one depending on the person and the circumstance. The real world is the truth, the truth is reality. Although, this reality is changed with one night's dream, from George Orr. Orr is a man who has the ability to change truth, including history and every humans view of what reality is. When Orr dreams, h is thoughts become reality. With one dream he changes today, and the history. Orr is the only one who is aware of the original, true reality. In the Matrix, however, what the society believes to be the real world, is really a computer program invented and run by Machines. In the Matrix, Machines have taken over the human population and created a world, known as the Matrix. This world is only lived out through the minds of the people, as the people are kept in holding tanks. The world, or Matrix is a computer program, and only known to be a computer program by the Machines and a few selected individuals. Similarly, in The Lathe of Heaven and in the Matrix ... ...er begins to manipulate his dreams, abusing his ability to change reality. Orr decides to inform a lawyer, Heather Lelache, with hope she will aid in preventing Orrs dreaming. Together the three of them are the only ones aware of the dreams, and therefore the only ones knowledgeable of the original truth, true reality. In both stories, the novel, The Lathe of Heaven, and the movie, Matrix, the societies compare and contrast. The stores share in similar themes and plot but have different aspect to the changes made in society. The changes in society both, positively and negatively affect and influence the people. Included are powers that are overbearing and controlling that need to be stopped, such as the Machines and the dreaming. Similarly, both stories involve people who want to change the world for themselves and ones who prefer to allow God to plan the future.

Jasper Jones Essay

Bullying is a huge problem in schools, communities, and homes. Bullying doesn’t just happen at a certain age, but it happens at any age. Bullying happens all over the world and is a huge problem that’s happening around the world. After The Vietnam War the Australians hated the Vietnamese. † It took 521 Australian lives and left many soldiers with permanent disabilities† (the Vietnam war). The Australians lost the most people ever in this war. After that war any Vietnamese person would have gotten bullied. bullying causes suicide. Because it makes you feel bad about yourself.It makes you feel like you are incapable and/or undeserving of being loved and standing up for yourself.When a bully does something to embarrass you everyone sees it and that makes you feel like a failure.It makes you feel inadequate.It doesn’t cause just depression.It makes you hate yourself and others and maybe even the world for tolerating such behavior. If you thought that the effects of bullying disappear as soon as your child gets out of school, you are horribly mistaken. Social bullying like circulation of rumors and gossiping could prove to be more harmful than bruises or black eyes suffered in a school fight. The psychological effects of this social type of bullying extend long beyond the school days and linger into early adulthood. This leads to depression and anxiety even when the victim has attained adulthood. Recent studies reveal that there is a connection between â€Å"relational victimization† in adolescence and depression and anxiety in early adulthood. Instead of going physical, like threatening a child with physical violence, social bullying tries to undermine a child’s social standing and relationships by making them pariahs, keeping them out of social activities or spreading rumors that can hurt.

Why has the South Beach Diet been successful?

It is said that the success of dieters in weight loss supported by the South Beach Diet, is totally caused by the science behind the plan. If you interest in South Beach Diet, you can realize that it is a logical, and also healthy method which help you lose weight effectively. Certainly, you want to know how it works. Simply, let talk about what the basics of metabolism is. It is indicated by a series of processes when food is turned into fuel for the body. If these processes are optimzed, you are able to lose weight easily. Moreover, metabolism is affected negatively when the blood glucose levels are high.The only way to stabilize high blood glucose levels is to increase the production of insulin. If not, you are able to catch diabetes. There are three phases in The South Beach Diet. It takes two weeks for the first phase. The main task is to remove carbohydrates, level blood glucose, as well as fire up your metabolism. Time for weighting loss is down when you reduce your high sugar levels. By removing an entire food group, you’ll do this easily. However, if you use this method for long periods, you’ll probably feel unhealthy. It’s useful for short periods ( two weeks only ).The phase 2 is began with the improvement of your metabolic function evidently. At that time, you can enjoy progressively foods from all of the basic food groups came from South Beach Diet. Unless your goal weight is over, the progress will still be continued. Certainly, you need these kind of food groups to have a good health too. You also learn how to choose foods better to optimize metabolism positively ( without having high glucose levels ) . About South Beach Diet, you’ll easily recognize the the difference between †bad carbohydrates† and â€Å"good carbohydrates†.Apart from, the concepts of â€Å"good fats† and â€Å"bad fats† are also discovered by the dieter. Obviously, the foodstuffs which have lower numbers on the Glyce mic Index are good. In short, The South Beach Diet give you a chance to lose weight quicly as well as effectively. Moreover, it still helps you to maintain this for the long term. Beginning with the metabolism in Phase One and increasing foods from all of the basic food groups progressively in Phase Two, you’ll be able to recoginze the different clearly. That’s all what The South Beach Diet works for us.

Anthem Essay essays

Anthem Essay essays We made it. We created it. We brought it forth from the night (59). I believe about it because us humans create objects, and let it into the light by inventing it. So, I think in a way, all inventions are in the dark until we create them and bring them into the light. The book Anthem talks about how their minds create things, things that came from the light in their minds. I do not surrender my treasure, nor do I share them (95). We all have something that we call a treasure. Anthems treasure is the spirit, which all of us say different about and feels different about. I guess my treasure is a little bit of this and that. One is how I feel about certain things that I would rather die than expose. The other one is that I wish that I could just erase from my treasure. I do not know what causes it, all I know is that it is there, and shall always be too. What is my freedom if all the creatures even the boched and the impotent, are my masters (97) Anthem talks about how life is from taking orders from people while being like slaves. I feel like this all the time, of my life everyday. I feel this way because of all the objects we cling to. Objects such as school, water, food, and taxes. But, most of all what I get is that under someway somehow, we are all under some kind of slavery. Food and water are the two that I believe, is the worst type of slavery in this case. Some people stave themselves because of the way they think about themselves. While others, are just the opposite; they eat as much as they want, but still dont like the way they are. So, I guess it all goes hand-in-hand with the way we all think about ourselves. People dont like the way they look, so they do what they think is best. So maybe we are our own slaves to ourselves. ...

Equality Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 1

Equality - Essay Example While there are notions that connect equality with the similarity and sameness of identity, they identify equality with similarity, rather than sameness. However, probing further, the concept of equality is distinguished from the definition of identity, as two identical things may not be equal......(Gospath, 2007) In addition, the Marxist definitions have simplified the concept of equality as being a system of relations where every one has equal rights, privileges, and status. As per this theory, the concept of equality has been the result of development of concepts related to freedom and universality. It has cited the equality definition being not true in many societies of the world, like Afghanistan where the gender equality is still not present, as females are not treated at par with the male members of these tribal societies. The Marxist theory further propounds that due to the amassing of wealth by a miniscule percentage of the society, inequality was more evident than equality. Similarly, as per this theory, the religious equality was seen more in the form of inequality as the priests and other Godmen had more privileges and rights than the general masses....(Eq) Both of these cannot co-exist. It is often seen that with different levels of power and wealth accumulation, the real justice is not possible, as more powerful will always try to exploit the weaker section of the society. As per Friedrich Nietzsche, (Human, All Too Human, #92), justice is a trade, which has originated among those who are equally powerful. While he maintains that justice is just the payment and exchange within the characteristic of trade, everyone gives what the other person wants and each gets what he wants in return. It has been emphasized several times that fairness, being a form of justice, is possible, maybe rarely only, among equally powerful people only. Hence, justice cannot be treated at par with equality, as the basic character of justice is to trade on reasonably

Learning Styles Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Learning Styles - Essay Example The score of 3b means that I am a fairly well-balanced individual on the two dimensions of the scale. According to this result, I can learn best as either a visual or a verbal learner. Visual learners are good at remembering best what they see as opposed to verbal learners who work best with words. Visual learners prefer the use of diagrams, timelines, pictures, films, flow charts and demonstrations in order to grasp what is being taught. On the other hand, verbal learners make the best of their learning when written and spoken explanations are made (LeFever, 1995). Being a fairly well-balanced type of learner, I have the qualities of both a visual and a verbal learner. I can, therefore, fit in well in any of the above two teaching environments.I believe these results are quite accurate since I have experienced a positive result while learning in the above two kinds of environments. I also believe that I have an upper hand compared to most students who fall on either side of the scal e since I can be able to adapt to any teaching environment I fall under. ConclusionAfter taking the test and scoring a 3b, I am more confident on the type of learner I am due to the double advantage I possess of being able to learn in both a verbal and a visual environment. College education being mostly in form of lectures, I will capitalize on my verbal learning strength by working in groups and trying to better my understanding by explaining teachings and concepts to other students.