Entrepreneurship Snog

Entrepreneurship Snog Introduction Rob and Pablo, the co-proprietors of SNOG (a chain of U.K. based yogurt shops), mention that the secret behind their success lies not only in the type of product they sell but rather in the way in which they make each transaction an experience for their customers.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Entrepreneurship: Snog specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More What these two entrepreneurs are referring to is the general ambiance and feel that permeates a particular store or shopping area. This paper will examine the origins of yogurt chain â€Å"Snog† and the various entrepreneurial activities and concepts that contributed to its success within the U.K. market. Case Overview The U.K. yogurt shop market reveals a high degree of market saturation with brands such as Frae, Itsu, Moosh, Snog, YUforia, Yog and Pinkberry all competing for a slice of the U.K. consumer market. Furthermore, each company has their ow n variation of yogurt with some shops such as Snog advocating the use of organic ingredients while others pursue an approach of having unique flavors and overall affordability (Birkett, 2009: 21). With so many different stores and product variations already present in the U.K. market today this makes market penetration and the creation of sufficient brand awareness of a new yogurt shop all the more difficult to implement. What is Snog? The increasing awareness of health problems within the U.K. (such as obesity and diabetes) has contributed to a popular trend in many modern food products to target customers who want to derive health benefits from the products they consume. It is based on this that the yogurt enterprise â€Å"SNOG â€Å"is dedicated to providing healthier yogurt than its competitors (i.e. Pinkberry) since it is fat-free and uses natural ingredients with a mixture of fresh fruits, nuts and organic yogurt. Started by entrepreneurs Rob and Pablo, both men had come fro m diverse backgrounds yet were able to come together to start a coffee shop business concept that was quite successful and chose to branch out into other endeavors in their pursuit of a great entrepreneurial experience.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More In a recent interview they talked about how they developed the initial concept of the shops interiors and the method of sweetening their products through the use of a sweetener importer from Mexico. They explained how they realized success in during an economic downturn was possible by making their shop an experience rather than merely thinking of it as a shop and they even planned the happy ambiance that pervades most SNOG yogurt shops as a method of drawing people in and enhancing their purchasing experience. When examining the interview it became apparent that the pilot-in-the plane principle was at work regarding the success that SNOG enjoys at the present. As it was mentioned earlier, the entrepreneurs took great pains in the planning process especially in terms of developing their brand image and this resulted in the popularity that SNOG enjoys today. As Gilbert (2010) notes in his study examining the pilot-in-the plane principle the success of a business is directly tied to the course that an entrepreneur chooses to take, this can come in a variety of forms and result in a plethora of different outcomes however in the end what determines success or failure is how entrepreneurs choose to guide their business and deal with the ramifications of their actions (Gilbert, 2010:83 91). Based on this it can be stated that proper planning and sticking to a business concept that places an emphasis on brand image and stability can result in a stable and profitable company (Picker, 1993: 19). Environmental Factors Making it into an experience Rob and Pablo state the following regarding what it takes to become a successful entrepreneur now we are in a recession and we see businesses that are successful, I think the one thing you see that they all have is a form of experience for their customers which is the most important part in everything, so we made sure that there was an experience at Snog. The experience that Rob and Pablo are referring is not just the quality of the product itself but what customers feel when they enter into a particular establishment. In the case of Snog all their outlets have a warm and friendly ambiance which is not only family friendly but actually promotes, in their words, a happy feeling for customers. For example, it can be seen that in the case of Apple Inc. (which is considered the world’s most valuable company) all their stores, no matter what country they are present in, have a stylish and ergonomic design that looks clean, modern and cutting edge which has come to exemplify the experience of buying products at an Apple store.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Entrepreneurship: Snog specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Based on the popularity of not only Snog but of Apple itself it can be seen that by making their store into an experience rather than just a store this helps to encourage buying behavior among their clientele and even repeat visits. As such for any business that wants to increase their customer base it is important to develop the experience their venue provides so as to better appeal to consumers and create repeat business (Heap, Chua, Dornhofer, 2005: 85-88). Translating the Idea into an Opportunity The following is an example of the process utilized by Rob and Pablo in their examination of the U.K. market and how a yogurt shop that focuses on healthy offerings and a friendly ambiance can result in a viable business. Market Examination Dobson Chakraborty (2008) in their examination of consumer trends within U.K. in the past 3 years has n oted that people are generally becoming more self-conscious regarding their health and physical appearance (Dobson Chakraborty, 2008: 333 -341). While Dobson Chakraborty (2008) do not precisely indicate whether this is the result of health awareness campaigns or the mass media Dobson Chakraborty (2008) does recommend that strategies in targeting todays brand of consumer should therefore concentrate on campaigns and the creation of consumer products that emphasize no fat, no cholesterol and with comparatively low calories (Dobson Chakraborty, 2008: 333 -341). It must also be noted that Beattie, Dhanani Jones (2008) has noted a distinct increase in the amount of consumers that have a greater degree of awareness regarding environmental and social responsibility. As Beattie, Dhanani Jones (2008) states, consumer trends in product and service patronage have been changing as of late towards companies who are involved or promote donations, recycling and preservation of the environmen t (Beattie, Dhanani Jones, 2008: 181 219). How They Coped with Risk and Uncertainty Focusing on Brand Image Further examination of the methods employed by Rob and Pablo in coping with uncertainty and risk reveals that they placed a heavy emphasis on brand image and how this generated a great deal of consumer interest for their yogurt store. Evidence of this can be seen in the very name they chose for their shop which is synonymous with the act of kissing within British culture. By creating a slight bit of controversy with the name they chose, the entrepreneurs were able to generate a significant amount of public interest which they converted into the very way in which the brand itself is correlated with something that is pleasant, exciting, spine tingling and above all interesting.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More This is in direct contrast to the methods employed by other yogurt stores which focus more on traditional methods of brand formulation. This creates a certain advantage for Snog which has enabled the company to survive in an overly saturated yogurt store market and gives it a certain level of distinction as compared to the other brands available. As Neganova Neganova (2011) explains, a companys brand image helps to enamor it to customers in that through a distinctive way of presenting the companys products and services this enables it to distinguish itself from its competitors (Neganova Neganova, 2011: 261s of this can be seen in the brand image utilized by U.S. based Apple Inc. which has quite literally developed a cult following among millions of international consumers today (Barr Wright, 2010: 1-9). They did this by facilitating a brand image of distinctiveness and quality and further enhanced this by providing innovative products that subsequently created a whole new trend i n ergonomic design, stylish looks and above all advanced technological capability (Chandler et al., 2011: 375-390). Within the Middle East the telecommunication company Du which is based in the U.A.E has challenged the monopoly of Etisilat (a major internet and telephone provider which has been based in the U.A.E for decades) by providing cheaper services, better phones and above all as a new and hip brand image which has greatly facilitated greater consumer demand for Dus services (Masurel et al., 2002: 238). Another example can be seen in the case of the Philippines within South East Asia where the outsourcing company Convergys has in effect popularized jobs related to the customer service sector by presenting them in such a way that they appeal to new graduates of local colleges within the country (Prahalad Mashelkar, 2010: 132-141). These and other examples too numerous to mention show the importance of developing a particular brand image in order to entice consumers, win over potential employees or stay ahead of the competition (Hitt et al., 2011: 57-75). As such it is recommended for any company, newly established or not, to develop a brand image that appeals to the market segment they are targeting so as to facilitate a greater market share for the company. Focusing on Store Locations Another strategy employed by Rob and Pablo was to ensure that all Snog stores were placed in locations that have high pedestrian traffic so as to maximize the amount of people that take interest in the ambiance of the store and its product offerings. The pedestrian traffic alone that goes through Brewer Street on a daily basis is incentive enough to establish a store in such a location and makes the Snog shop there ideally placed in being able to take advantage of the daily pedestrian traffic in order to popularize the store’s image and offerings through various window displays and offerings on the street. It must also be noted that aside from the number of people that traverse Brewer Street on a daily basis the location itself is home to a variety of commercial areas such as department stores, food chains, restaurants, snack bars, fashion boutiques, etc which creates a spillover effect wherein people who finish their shopping from one store can go to Snog in order to rest and relax. My Entrepreneurial Profile In terms of the experience I have just undertaken in this project I have come to realize that there is more to entrepreneurship that just creating an effective product or service, rather it is necessary to develop a product’s branding, method of sales and consumer interaction. In fact when taking all the facts mentioned into consideration it becomes obvious that what I know now is still woefully inadequate in terms of being able to successfully establish my own business. I still need more experience in terms of understanding markets, determining what works and what will not. I need to be able to make mistakes in order to learn fr om them and as such I believe that it is necessary that I learn under more entrepreneurs in the future in order to understand what they did and the mistakes they made so as to avoid making them in the future. I plan to utilize this to my advantage by talking to as many entrepreneurs as I can, expand my current network and attempt to determine what the market needs and how I can provide it. By doing so I believe I can become a great entrepreneur and as such I owe a lot to this current project in enabling me to see what is necessary in creating an effective business endeavor. Enhancing my Entrepreneurial Capabilities All business endeavors have a certain degree of risk which can come from the interaction of businesses with market forces yet entrepreneurs can limit the amount of risk they are exposed to by taking the proper steps to ensure that their business stands on a solid and stable platform which acts as the best insulator there is against market risks (Farber, 2008: 73). As a st udent taking up this entrepreneurial course I have been taught numerous lessons which I believe will help me in my future entrepreneurial activities and as such I believe this gives me a distinct advantage over other people in the same career that have not received the same level of educational quality I have. Lessons I learned: Focus on Quality One of the most important factors in creating and maintaining a successful business is a focus on quality and ensuring that any product bought by a customer is not the result of inferior production or workmanship. What must be understood is that customers tend to patronize businesses that show that they care about their customer by ensuring the strictest measures are followed in product quality (Baum Bird, 2010: 397 412). In instances where a company has failed to live up to the expectations of consumers regarding the overall quality of a product it is often seen that such companies tend to lose customers in droves (Baum Bird, 2010: 397 412). This was seen in various technology companies such as Dell that neglected to implement proper quality control measures on its motherboards resulting in several computers being sold whose motherboards leaked chemicals when overheated. Such a fiasco was a nightmare for Dell and ruined its reputation with several of its customers in effect sending them to other companies as a result. It is based on this that it can be seen that a focus on quality is an important aspect for any company to follow in order to grow and maintain its consumer base. Adapting to Changes in Business Environments Another factor that businesses should take into consideration is adapting to changes within local business environments. What must be understood is that businesses dont operate within a vacuum and as such it becomes necessary to observe that occurs within local business environments and respond accordingly (Chell Baines, 2000: 195-215). This can come in the form of expanding during times of econo mic prosperity or cutting back and outsourcing specific aspects of the companys operations during lean economic times. Not only that, companies should be prepared to respond to changing consumer trends in order to stay relevant lest they fall into obscurity and stagnation (Chell Baines, 2000: 195-215). Reference List Barr, S, Wright, J 2010, Postprandial energy expenditure in whole-food and processed-food meals: implications for daily energy expenditure, Food Nutrition Research, 54, pp. 1-9, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost. Baum, J, Bird, B 2010, The Successful Intelligence of High-Growth Entrepreneurs: Links to New Venture Growth, Organization Science, 21, 2, pp. 397-412, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Beattie, V, Dhanani, A, Jones, M 2008, investigating presentational change in u.k. annual reports, Journal Of Business Communication, 45, 2, pp. 181-222, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Birkett, R 2009, Is yogurt the new ice-cream?, Caterer Hotelkeeper, 199, 4592, p p. 20-21, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Chandler, G, DeTienne, D, McKelvie, A, Mumford, T 2011, Causation and effectuation processes: A validation study, Journal Of Business Venturing, 26, 3, pp. 375-390, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Chell, E, Baines, S 2000, Networking entrepreneurship and microbusiness behaviour, Entrepreneurship Regional Development, 12, 3, pp. 195-215, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Dobson, P, Chakraborty, R 2008, Buyer power in the U.K. groceries market, Antitrust Bulletin, 53, 2, pp. 333-368, Literary Reference Center, EBSCOhost. Farber, B 2008, Sell: constructive criticism, Entrepreneur, 36, 11, p. 73, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Gilbert, D 2010, Integrating theory and practice for student entrepreneurs:: An applied learning model, Journal Of Enterprising Culture, 18, 1, pp. 83-106, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Heap, A, Chua, C, Dornhofer, J 2005, Why the forecast is cloudy for UK credit card securitization, International Financial Law Review, 24, pp. 85-88, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Hitt, M, Ireland, R, Sirmon, D, Trahms, C 2011, Strategic Entrepreneurship: Creating Value for Individuals, Organizations, and Society, Academy Of Management Perspectives, 25, 2, pp. 57-75, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Masurel, E, Nijkamp, P, Tastan, M, Vindigni, G 2002, Motivations and Performance Conditions for Ethnic Entrepreneurship, Growth Change, 33, 2, p. 238, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost. Neganova, V, Neganova, I 2011, Development of innovation products based on the consumers preferences, International Journal Of Management Cases, 13, 4, pp. 261-266, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost. Neuts, D 2011, Exercise your marketing muscles, Quill, 99, 4, p. 80, Literary Reference Center, EBSCOhost. Picker, L 1993, Getting ahead in a tough economy: Three approaches, Working Woman, 18, 1, p. 19, MasterFILE Premier, EBSCOhost. Prahalad, C, Mashelkar, R 2010, Innovations Holy Grail, Harvard Busin ess Review, 88, 7/8, pp. 132-141, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost.

Jane Austen Did Not Write Epics

Jane Austen Did Not Write Epics Jane Austen Did Not Write Epics Jane Austen Did Not Write Epics By Maeve Maddox A recent film on a romantic episode in the life of 18th century novelist Jane Austen (1775-1817) has called forth a lot of commentary on the web. Heres the blurb that prompted this article: Becoming Jane: Author Jane Austen (Anne Hathaway) eventually became famous for writing epic novels like Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. In popular usage, epic is often used to denote extraordinary length or size. For example, someone might try to ask a long-winded companion to get to the point by saying: Just give me the facts. I dont need an epic. Used to denote size, epic is almost always accompanied by proportions. Indeed, so clichà ©d is the expression epic proportions that theres a play with that title. Since the longest Jane Austen novel comes to only about 300 pages, the writer quoted above cannot have meant to use epic in the sense of size or length. When speaking of novels or poems, the word epic has to do with certain aspects of the story and its treatment. The baseline epics are Homers Iliad and Odyssey, stories of larger-than-life national heroes like Achilles and Odysseus engaged in struggles involving the fate of nations or entire races. In the classic sense, epics employ high-flown language. They have lengthy casts of characters, and they often take place over the course of many years. Some well-known novel and film epics are Tolstoys War and Peace, Mitchells Gone With the Wind, DeMilles Ten Commandments, Griffiths Birth of A Nation, Gibsons Braveheart, and Tolkien/Jacksons Lord of the Rings trilogy. The romantic misunderstandings of Miss Bennett and Mr. Darcy, played out in elegant 18th century drawing rooms, belong to a type of novel called the novel of manners. Manners here doesnt mean merely such things as opening a door for a lady or the saying of please and thank you. The novel of manners focuses on domestic matters as opposed to warfare and the realm of the male. The central character is generally a woman and such novels are often written by women, although The Forsythe Saga by John Galsworthy is an example of the genre. This kind of novel describes the way people living at a certain time in a particular place behave, how they arrange marriages, how they bring up their children, what they hope for, and what they settle for. Although usually thought of as a distinctly British genre, the novel of manners occupies a significant place in American literature. The novels of Edith Wharton, Henry James, Kate Chopin, and Claire Messud are novels of manners. Youll find a useful introduction to the genre and its feminist associations at enotes.com. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Fiction Writing category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:10 Grammar Mistakes You Should AvoidDriver License vs. Driver’s LicenseConversational Email

Persuasive Speech with outline Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Persuasive Speech with outline - Essay Example A young adult was involved in an accident and his kidney was a good match. My nephew’s story ended happily, but not so many actually do. II. I am certain that you can perceive the need for individuals such as you to donate your organs. Most students in this class have already claimed they prefer donating their organs when they pass away. However, you might be questioning the certainty and trust of the donation of your organs after demise. That is what I am going to address now. 1. Discuss about your choice with your relatives. Your relatives will be responsible for the donation preparations after your demise. If they are not aware of your choice of becoming a donor, your requests might be denied (Stevens, 2008, p. 12). 2. If you choose to donate your organs and eventually make no effort, no one knows your intent and your organs will not be donated. The consequences of this decision are that more people waiting for organs might end up dead while your organs could have saved their lives (Committee on Increasing Rates of Organ Donation, 2006, p.

MTV'S real life show does not present the true life of Saudi Arabia Essay

MTV'S real life show does not present the true life of Saudi Arabia - Essay Example The documentary as a whole does not portray the true picture of Saudi Arabia. Fatima represented herself as a woman who cannot have a job at all. She is shown to be working towards the launch of a new business of colored Abayas. An Abaya is a cloth that Saudi women wear on top of their clothes when they come out to work, schools, hospitals etc. Although she is not against the Abaya itself, she wishes to produce some in a variety of colors other than black. Fatima also highlighted some of the inhibitions of the culture saying that women are prevented from riding bicycles in the streets, despite the fact that a lot of places cater to bicyclists of both genders just like here in the United States. As will be seen, some of her contentions do not hold true. Firstly, colored Abaya has been in existence for a long time, and women have been wearing it for the length of its existence. Saudi women wear black for chastity similar to nuns in the United States. Nuns wear black clothes with white lines akin to Saudi women who make their Abayas black in color while matching it with others. Fatima seemed disinterested in finding the key to her problems. Her resolve was more towards simply being heard instead of actively seeking a solution. When she visited the American producer, she laid down false facts in front of them, facts that would shock them. Her aim was to make a commercial for her business for people who watch American TV. Her knowledge of the black Abaya is self-evident, she understands it to be part of her culture, but promotes it instead as a religious restriction, knowing full well that opposition to her colorful Abaya, as with anything out of the norm, would be expected. If she genuinely believed it to be a problem of the society t hat needed addressing, she would have spoken in the language of the people of her society, so that everyone receives the message and can communicate their assent or

Physician Assisted Suicide Essay Example for Free

Physician Assisted Suicide Essay Physician Assisted Suicide (Physician Assisted Suicide) also referred to as Physician Aid-in-dying (PAD) is practice in which a physician assist a terminally patient in the termination of his/her own life by prescribing a deadly/lethal medication. â€Å"The term physician aid-in-dying is used to describe the practice authorized under the Washington and Oregon Death with Dignity Acts†¦.† Starks (2009). In other words physician aid-in dying is the politically correct term. The act is only legal if the patient is terminally ill, has six months or less to live and must be mentally stable to make their own decision. I think Physician Assisted Suicide is unjust because I am a Christian, and based on my religion, it is against the law of God to take the life of another human being. Honestly I must say I contradict myself when it comes to this topic. In my personal opinion I would say Physician Assisted Suicide is ethically permissible because I feel the patient should be allowed to make their own decision when it relates to their own life. A physician’s job is to help alleviate the patient’s pain and if the patient has an illness that cannot be cured and the physician is sure there really is no more he can do for the patient why not aid the in dying. I think it will make things a little easier and more convenient because if a person really is tired of suffering they may decide to end their own life which may be very messy and will cause more devastation to the patient’s family. With the physician’s assistance, the family will be prepared and there will not be a big mess to clean up. From the outside looking in, no one knows what the patient is going through or how much they are suffering; no one understands how they may feel or how much pain they can bare. If they feel death would relieve them from th eir misery and remove the suffering, I think it should be their decision. I really do not see a difference in Physician Assisted Suicide and the refusal of life sustaining treatment (which is legal). If a person refuses treatment which without will cause them to die is it not the same as committing suicide, the only difference is the process will take a longer time period. Dr Timothy Quill states â€Å"the analogy is of one person sitting on the beach waiting for the tide to come in to drown and then another person walking into the ocean to drown.† Boyd (ND) When considering Physician Assisted Suicide and my religion I must disagree, though I am for people being allowed to make their own decisions when it comes to their own life my religion convicts me and tells me I am wrong because no matter how I feel about this situation personally it is still wrong in the eyes of God. Everyone is at fault, the physician is wrong because the bible says it is a sin to cause harm to someone or to take the life of another persons, even though the intentions are good it is against the laws of God. The patient is wrong because it is a sin the take your own life and it is wrong for all who a re in connection with the act and allowing it to take place. God loves us and he does not want us to suffer in pain or live a sad helpless, hopeless life, he will never put more on us than we can bare, even before he created us he knew what time we would be born and he knows the same about when we will die, who are we to try to take control over this? God performs amazing miracles, I have seen him do it, who is to say, before someone decides to end their life, and just before the physician administer the lethal medication, God does not allow for a breakthrough and heal the person. People do not have faith like they should and they do not believe this can be done therefore this is not a risk they are willing to take, most would rather take the easy road and do anything to relieve the suffering right now. Unfortunately, the bulk of this responsibility falls on the physician. Physicians care about their patients, their goal is to find out what is wrong with the patient, diagnose the patient with what they prove to be wrong and then treat the patient until they can either cure the illness or try to extend their life expectancy as long as possible. Ethical egoist may interpret Physician Assisted Suicide as a selfish act, for example, they could insist the physician is abusing the act by pressuring a terminally ill patient or their family to end the life of the patient by advising them it would be for the best because the patient is suffering and there is nothing more he/she can do for the patient. Of course the family would consider what the physician is saying because they do not want their family member to suffer, however, the physician may only be doing what he feel is best for the patient, at the same time a physician should never bring up this topic for discussion, he should allow the patient to address the concern first. There are many ethical issues facing assisted suicide. Many people get â€Å"the right-to-die† confused with â€Å"assisted suicide†. â€Å"While right-to-die cases are different than assisted suicide cases — right-to-die usually refers to the removal of feeding tubes or ventilators keeping unconscious or vegetative patients alive, as opposed to people actively deciding to end their lives†. (Pickert, 2009) Though Physician Assisted Suicide is considered unethical and illegal, recently there have been more calls in favor of its legalization. Some professional arguments in favor of Physician Assisted Suicide are respect for autonomy; self-determination, covering the facts that people should have the right to make their own decisions, they should be able to determine their own place, date and time of death if they wish. Another argument in favor is justice; fairness, this argument takes the matter to a legal level, it allows the patient the right to refuse treatment to perpetuate their life. Compassion; sympathy is argues that suffering is worse that the pain itself, it causes a person to breakdown physically, mentally, and emotionally due to the lack of independence, one may feel like a burden to others, physicians can give medicines to relieve pain but there is no cure for suffering. Honesty and Transparency would open doors for discussions and options, if it was legal is would make it easier for people to talk about it and for physicians to provide better care concerning the end of a person’s life. To this day people are still fighting to make assisted suicide legal. â€Å"Each year for 14 years, Wisconsin legislators have introduced an assisted-suicide bill. So far, all have died in committee, but 2007’s version is still on the table. California, Hawaii, Arizona and Vermont have repeatedly rebuffed assisted-suicide proposals, but each has faced another proposal in 2007. Most of these bills are virtually identical to Oregon’s assisted suicide law †. (Enouen, 2012) I’m sure many have heard or read or about Dr. Kevorkian, who was also in favor of Physician Assisted Suicide, in 1998 administered a lethal injection to his then patient Thomas Youk, on the 60 minutes TV show. In Oakland County, Michigan Physician Assisted Suicide is considered illegal therefore â€Å"Kevorkian was convicted of second degree murder in 1998, and sentenced to a 15-25 year term of which he served 8 years, and was released in 2007† Starks (2009). I’m sure Dr. Kevorkian has been Mr. York’s doctor for many years. I sure they had build a relationship together and Dr. Kevorkian care about him, therefore I’m sure it was not an easy task for the physician to complete, however he (Dr. Kevorkian) did what he felt was best for his patient. On the opposite end there is another group of professionals who oppose Physician Assisted Suicide arguing that it is ethically impermissible. Sanctity of life; due to religious reasons Physician Assisted Suicide is morally wrong. Exodus 20:13 states â€Å"Thou shalt not kill,† Brodman Holman (1979). â€Å"A 1997 study conducted by the American Medical Association (AMA) found that more than half of Americans believe physician-assisted suicide should be legal. Many patients decided to choose assisted suicide because they are afraid of the pain they will endure cause by their illness. There are some alternatives to assisted suicide such as pain management, to make the patients as comfortable as possible. â€Å"With very rare exceptions, physical pain can be eliminated or brought within tolerable limits by aggressive drug therapy-therapy which need not leave the patient in a stupor†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. Pain also has a psychological dimension which, if appropriately addressed, can significantly reduce the patients experience of physical pain. The isolation of illness can be reduced through the support of families and the community, as well as the creation of a caring environment in which one is treated†. (Linton, 1993) However, when people are told about alternatives to the technological treatments so many of us fear, and about the availability of pain control and hospice care, their support for physician-assisted suicide goes down to under one-fifth. This study seems to show that when people are informed about all of their end-of-life choices, they are less likely to opt for suicide.† Lynn Harrold (1999, 2006) Many argue that there is a passive vs. active distinction; passive is when one is allowed to die, active is killing someone. When someone refuse treatment or treatment is withheld and they die it is considered justified however when Physician Assisted Suicide is used it is murder and unjustifiable. Others argue that it could be a potential cause for abuse, poor populations with minimal healthcare may be pushed towards Physician Assisted Suicide, and it may become a cost efficient â€Å"way out†. If a family member is a burden to the family, and for insurance purposes, these too may be causes for leaning towards Physician Assisted Suicide. Another argument against Physician Assisted Suicide is professional integrity, it relates to the Hippocratic Oath which states â€Å"I will not administer poison to anyone where asked,† and I will â€Å"be of benefit, or at least do no harm,† Starks (2009) this is the oath that ALL physicians must take before officially becoming doctors. If they agree to Physician Assisted Suicide they are going against the pledge they agreed to, this could initially cause harm to the â€Å"integrity and the public‘s image of the profession,† it may also make it difficult for patients to trust them. Lastly and maybe the most important argument is fallibility of the profession; the fear that physicians could make mistakes, possibly misdiagnosis or prognosis. â€Å"There may be errors in diagnosis or treatment of depression, or inadequate treatment of pain. Thus the State has an obligation to protect lives from these inevitable mistakes and to improve the quality of pain and symptom management at the end of life.† Starks (2009) I think the more research I do agree that Physician Assisted Suicide should remain illegal. I solely make this decision based on my religion. Who are we to make judgment on when to end lives? We did not give life to ourselves or anyone else. I think she should have faith in God and know that he will never put more on you than you can bear. Suicide and assisting someone in a suicide is wrong. As it states in Numbers 35:30, â€Å"whoso killeth any person, the murderer shall be put to death by the mouth of witnesses: but one witness shall not testify against any person to cause him to die.† Brodman Holman (1979) People speak of showing compassion and caring for others, â€Å"killing is not compassion. That is Orwellian Newspeak, a language without meaning. If love is death and mercy is killing, then words mean nothing.† St. Clair (2009 Unfortunately the future affects of assisted suicide is currently undetermined. I personally think people will continue to fight for assisted suicide to become legal, however I do not think this will take place because wither way you look at it, many will still consider this murder. If I was in this situation and had to decide whether to allow my family member to live and suffer or allow them to end their life, I would choose to let them live, based only on my religion and knowing who my God is. This does not mean I wish for my loved one to live in pain or uncomfortable, however this does put my Lord and savior to the test. Through my religion and being raised as Christian I have learned that God will not put more on you than you can bare. At a time like this I will turn to what is known, in my religion, as a secret weapon, and at this point I will fast and pray. I will not ask God to allow my loved one to live or die, however I will ask that his will be done, and if it is his will for my loved one to live I ask for a full quick recovery, if its Gods will to discontinue their life, I will only ask for peace. No matter what situation I encounter I put God first and he enables me to make precise decisions. Personally I feel it must be very difficult to watch as a person you love and care for lay helpless, in pain, suffering from an illness, watching as they deteriorate not only physically, but mentally, spiritually and emotionally. Stepping outside of my spiritual realm I would feel terrible because I would feel I am allowing my loved one to suffer even if they had asked to be â€Å"put down† I may feel God is not healing fast enough and things are not going the way I think they should. Only for the love of the my loved one and to relieve their suffering would I agree with physician assisted suicide, however I think in the end I will feel terrible because I would have assisted in the role to determine when to end their life, knowing it was not my decision to make and not knowing if God was going to open a door and make way for a breakthrough for them to overcome the illness. Just knowing my God I know he can perform miracles and he can make a way out of no way, the hardest thing to do is to be patient. Therefore in the meantime, I would do what I could to make my loved one as comfortable as possible; I will encourage them and continue to pray. I cannot honestly say how I would react in this situation; just the thought of hearing of the death of a loved one and their request to end their life makes me feel as if my heart has been cut in half. At the same time it makes me ask myself, am I being selfish? Do I only want my loved one to live because I love them and I do not feel ready to deal with the death of them? Do their feelings even matter to me? Do I not care that they are suffering? There is so much more to making this decision than I have not really given thought to. If I do agree with the assisted suicide, how would the rest of my life go, will I have to live with the weight on my shoulders that I assisted in the death of my loved? Now this is something I do not think I can live with, just the pressure in the back of my mind would potentially cause depression to set in which will lead to other problems in my life as far as preventing me from giving myself fully to the remainder of my family and being all that I can be, it may also affect my job performance and other areas of my life. I do not think that is something I want to cope with. Therefore I think I would allow the doctors to do all they can do to make my loved one comfortable and ease their pain; I will pray sit back and allow Gods will to be done. I will try to make the last days as enjoyable as possible by spending as much time with them as I can and talking with them, reminiscing about our lives together and special memories. Until Physician Assisted Suicide is legalized nationwide, it should be brought to the forefront and to the attention of the public. Many do not know of this practice until they are face to face with having to make a life or death decision, or until they or a family member is on their death bed. The public should be educated on Physician Assisted Suicide, not to persuade them to agree but for information purposes, they will base their decision on their own understanding, however until everyone gets a full understanding they will all be skeptical. There is a big debate in the topic of Physician Assisted Suicide and both sides present convincing arguments, however it does not look as if an agreement is in the near future, however the Supreme Court did allow each state to pass their own laws on Physician Assisted Suicide and whether it would be legalized or not, nevertheless, as of right now the only state where it is legal is in Oregon, which means at the present moment, if a patient decides he/she wants to terminate his/her life they will need to book a flight to Oregon. References Andrew D. Boyd, University of Texas Southwestern at Dallas, Physician-Assisted Suicide: For and Against (ND) Retrieved from www.amsa.org/AMSA/Libraries/Docs/PhysicianAssistedSuicide.sflb.ashx Brodman Holman Publishers, King James Version (1979) Enouen, S. (2012) Life Issues Institute. Current Attempts to Legalize Assisted Suicide in the U.S. Retrieved from http://www.lifeissues.org/euthanasia/current_attempts.htm Helen Starks, PhD, MPH Assistant Professor, Bioethics and Humanities (2009) Retrieved from http://depts.washingtonedu/bioethx/topics/pad Jane St. Clair, 30 Logical Reasons Against Physician-Assisted Suicide (2009) Retrieved from http://janestclair.net/30-logical-reasons-against-physician-assisted-suicide/ Joanne Lynn, M.D. and Joan Harrold, M.D, Handbook for Mortals: Hastening Death: Arguments against physician-assisted suicide (1999, 2006) Retrieved from http://www.growthhouse.org/mortals/mort2526.html Linton, P.B., (1993) Chicago Tribune. Better Solutions Than Assisted Suicide. December 26, 1993 Retrieved from http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1993-12-26/news/9312260140_1_suicide-assisted-pain Pickert, K. (2009). Time U.S. A Brief History of Assisted Suicide. March 03, 2009. Retrieved from http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1882684,00.html

Vlad Dracula - A Makeup Plot :: essays research papers

Character Analysis – Count Vlad Dracula   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The man known as â€Å"Dracula† was Vlad Tepes (the Impaler) - a king in one of the historical parts of Romania. Born in 1431 in Sighasoara, Transylvania, Tepes grew up in a Germanic, and later Turkish atmosphere (as a prisoner from 1444 to 1448), became a tyrannical ruler that was feared throughout the lands, then died in 1476 in a fight defending his country.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Based off of the motion picture â€Å"Bram Stoker’s Dracula†, Count Vlad denounced God after the death of his beloved, Elizabeta. Allegedly, in his rebirth, Vlad (known in legend and in history as Dracula or Dracul) became an unholy demon to avenge Elizabeta’s death for all of eternity.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The form of Dracula that I’m portraying (he had many in the film, including a wolf form, dignified prince, demon, and bat) is seen in the beginning of the picture when he is first introduced in real-time. Jonathan Harker first arrives at the Romanian castle and is greeted by this creepy, cryptic, and subtlety intimidating old man. He is garbed in royal red satin as if he still rules this land and its . . . people. Though visually ancient, his eyes seem much younger than his body and skin present them to be; and his smile – his features crinkle up to this . . . hideous grin.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In the world of makeup design, this version of Count Dracula is quite complicated; the film didn’t win an Academy Award for Best Makeup for nothing! Gary Oldman sat in the makeup chair for a long time for this role. In analyzing his visage, we can see that the ancient face of the Count is aged very carefully by the extensive use of latex. The natural wrinkles of Oldman’s face were heightened drastically. The skin tone itself was of a sickly white – not albino, just white enough to be really old and still slightly human. Oldman’s eyebrows were completely covered (with the latex) and were replaced with slight strands of white hair. His cheekbones, bones on the top of his eyes, and chin cleft were nicely accentuated. Due to their dark and sunken nature, his eyes themselves are quite focused on and almost hypnotic – a well-known characteristic of the Count. Though he is very VERY â€Å"up there† in age, his weathered look give s him a sense of his struggling history and inner strength.

What is an Educated Filipino?

The conception of education and of what an educated man is varies in response to fundamental changes in the details and aims of society. In our country and during this transition stage in our national life, what are the qualities which an educated man should possess? What is an educated Filipino and what qualities should distinguish him today? Great changes have taken place in the nature of our social life during the last forty years. The contact with the Americans and their civilization has modified many of our old customs, traditions and practices, some for the worse and many for the better. The means of communication have improved and therefore better understanding exists among the different sections of our country. Religious freedom has developed religious tolerance in our people. The growth of public schools and establishment of democratic institutions have developed our national consciousness both in strength and in solidarity. With this growth in national consciousness and national spirit among our people, we witness the corresponding rise of a new conception in education- the training of an individual for the duties and privileges of citizenship, not only for his own happiness and efficiency but also for national service and welfare. In the old days, education was a matter of private concern; now it is a public function, and the State not only has the duty but it has the right as well to educate every member of the community- the old as well as the young, women as well as men- not only for the good of the individual but also for the self –preservation and self protection of the State itself. Our modern public school system has been established as a safeguard against the shortcomings and dangers of the democratic government and democratic institutions. In the light of the social changes, we come again to the question: What qualities should distinguish the educated Filipino today? I venture to suggest that the educated Filipino should, first, be distinguished by the power to DO. The Oriental excels in reflective thinking; he is a philosopher. The Occidental is a doer; he manages things, men and affairs. The Filipino of today needs more of his power to translate reflection into action. I believe that we are coming more and more to the conviction that no Filipino has the right to be considered educated unless he is prepared and ready to take an active and useful part of the work, life , and progress of our country as well as in the progress of the world. †

Deconstructing redemption in The Road

â€Å"There Is no God and we are his prophets†: Deconstructing Redemption In Corm McCarthy The Road. (paper under review: not for quotation) Stefan Skirmisher The University of Manchester Stefan. [email  protected] AC. UK 09/09/09 Abstract Despite its overwhelmingly positive reception, the apparently redemptive conclusion to Corm McCarthy The Road attracted criticism from some reviewers. They read in it an inconsistency with the nihilism that otherwise pervades the novel, as well as McCarthy other works.But what are they referring to when they Interpret redemption', the ‘messianic' and ‘God' In McCarthy novel? Some Introductory thoughts from apocalypse theory and deconstruction reveal a more nuanced approach that not only ‘saves' McCarthy from the charge of such critics. It also opens up more interesting avenues for exploring the theme of redemption and the messianic in contemporary disaster fiction. Introduction Justifiably effusive praise was heaped, by t he literary community, upon McCarthy multiple award-winner The Road (2006).But perhaps the most interesting reaction came in the form of critique of the allegedly â€Å"redemptive† and â€Å"messianic† tone of Its conclusion. Michael Cabochon's celebrated review of the book argued that McCarthy appeared to insert such a tone â€Å"almost†¦ In spite of himself',l that is, out of character with his usual nihilism. Another reviewer went as far as to suggest the novel â€Å"failed† the â€Å"modernist challenge: to write about a holocaust, about the end of everything†¦ What happens Is a redemption, of sorts, arguably absurd In the face of such overwhelming nihilism. 2 One wonders how McCarthy himself would respond. Perhaps we should begin by recalling the cautionary and prophetic injunction that Nietzsche appended to one of his last works, Ace Homo: â€Å"l have a terrible fear I shall nee day be pronounced holy: one will guess why I bring out this book beforehand; it is Intended to prevent people from making mischief of me†¦ My truth Is dreadful: for hitherto the Ill has been called truth. â€Å"3 Nietzsche feared the untimely nature of the truth he came to announce to a modernity whose ‘end' had only just begun.He predicted the unpreserved of us â€Å"murderers of God† to stand up in the ruins of the transcendent â€Å"old God† of metaphysics, and an unwillingness to create our own tragic pursuit of life. God, he would later write, would simply refuse die; the task of modern man was therefore to kill him again and again. He difficult and paradoxical redemption offered in The Road is very far from resurrecting the old God of metaphysics. Indeed, I would like to argue in the following that it interweaves themes both of resistance (the refusal to die) and mourning (the passing of irreversible loss).In doing so, the novel powerfully engages the reader with the very porous nature of redemption in the context of its post-apocalyptic environment. Engaging McCarthy text in this way invites a Adrienne, deconstructive reading of the narrative of redemption in contemporary disaster fiction in general. This is cause the conversations and thought-experiments employed by McCarthy attempt in many different ways to destabilize and provoke questions of the binary oppositions involved in that very discussion of redemptive ends (indeed, of the possibility of conceiving ‘ends' at all).There are oppositions such as the saved and the damned, the lost and the retrievable; the redeemed and irredeemable futures. McCarthy provokes the question, in particular, of what meaning we might possibly attach to human redemption and the â€Å"messianic† in an ostensibly irredeemable earth. What can be hoped for, sustained, and believed in? On the one hand, therefore, McCarthy pursuit of life and lives in the scorched wasteland bears all the hallmarks of Nietzsche tragedy – the â€Å"taming of ho rror through art†4 -as opposed to a comic rendering of the apocalypse (in which the righteous are spared the calamities of the end).On the other hand, the ambiguous sense of the messianic in The Road hints at more than lyrical or existentialist responses to tragedy. By tracing McCarthy exploration of redemption alongside developments in the continental philosophy of religion, first in the form of ‘death of God theology, and second, that of indestructibility of the messianic, I hope to open up some exploratory questions about the ambiguity of redemption in this highly influential piece of contemporary fiction.Ends of The Road Michael Cabochon states that for authors attempting a move into the futuristic post- apocalypse genre, â€Å"it is an established fact that a preponderance of religious imagery or an avowed religious intent can go a long way toward mitigating the science- fictional taint. â€Å"5 And so Cabochon believes that, in McCarthy novel, the father â€Å"f eeds his son a story'. By constructing the creed or injunction to â€Å"carry the fire†, the story is infused with a â€Å"religious sense of mission† that, incarnate in the hope given to the life of the boy, â€Å"verges on the explicitly messianic†. We would do well to pause in front of the implications of this word â€Å"messianic†. Who is saved: the boy? The promise of human community? And who or what comes to save? The boys saviors at the end present a hesitant, and uncertain departure: the guarantee only that others like him are alive. The messianic here would appear to take the form as much as a threat as a promise. And yet, taken from the Hebrew term for ‘anointed one', the concept of messiah in Jewish and early Christian literature is indeed bound up closely with the apocalyptic social upheaval. Certain expressions of the messianic thus anticipate both destruction (of the old world) and rebirth (of the new). In Jewish rabbinic thought what is crucial for messianic belief is its relationship with history and historic experience. It is visionary hope in the present for the way things could be, whether these are simply restorative or utopian. 8 The tradition that emerges is subsequently one of the announcement of such a promise of the future through the voice of the prophets.Anticipating Jacques Deride, the concept of the messianic announcement is the voice of the fringe, the outside of sanctioned, homogeneous discourse: â€Å"a call, a promise of an independent future for what is to come, and which comes like every messiah in the shape of peace and Justice, a promise independent of religion, that is to say universal. â€Å"9 Whilst The Road carries its own utopian and dyspepsia prophets, however, redemption is nowhere conceived or expressed as the restoration of peace. Nor is it infused with any hope in the renewal of the earth, or even of the narrative of new beginnings for the scorched landscape.McCarthy relentlessl y refuses reassurance that any return to a golden age is possible. The novel is an exploration of the irreversible, of â€Å"things which could not be put back†. 10 In what, then, consist its alleged religiosity, its messianic expectation, or â€Å"greater The clues lie in the relationship formed between a salvation to come (framed in the metaphor of the road itself: Mimi need to keep going. You don't know what might be down the road†12) and the ambiguous sense of endings running throughout the book. The father's own life represents a refusal of the simplicity of endings.His son must not lay down and die. Or, more precisely, he may not die of his own choosing, before the Father has calculated death's permeability on his behalf. The terror of the novel is thus generated within the narrative context of this slipping away of the control over the appropriate end. The son knows neither how to die alone, nor, symbolically, the function of the pistol in his hands: (â€Å"l d on't know what to do, Papa. I don't know what to do. Where will you be? â€Å")13 In relation to a search for the messianic, we must seek the sense of redemption only within this disestablishing sense of time.The messianic takes on a perverse sort of tension between the desire for end as closure, and the refusal to end, as the resistance of death, and finality. The boys terror at the task asked of him (to kill himself) is not complicated. But this struggle between ends and beginnings in The Road also expresses the paradoxical nature of the post-apocalyptic genre in general. If we accept James Burger's account of post-apocalyptic narrative as concerned essentially with â€Å"aftermaths and remainders†, then we must also follow his conclusion that it is always oxymoron: â€Å"the End is never the end†. The modernist assumption, in Frank Sermon's celebrated study, has been that the â€Å"sense of an ending† is what gives our living â€Å"in the middies†1 5 narrative meaning. But post-apocalypse means the very unsettling of those temporal frames. It â€Å"impossibly straddles the boundary between before and after some event that has obliterated what went before yet defines what will come after. â€Å"16 Indeed, we can see the influence of this scatological tension – a concern to much modernist and postmodernist literary exploration of the nature and meaning of narrative closure.Paul Fiddles' wide ranging study of such explorations suggests that if there is a malaise in the writing of closure into contemporary fiction, it simply reflects the more general environment of â€Å"constant crisis†, replacing the sense of completion and fulfillment of history, in which we live. 17 Such a paradox also partly reflects The Road as a study of the refusal of endings, and e ipso a refusal of the redemption normally associated with the narrative end. For our fascination is drawn not to those who are destroyed, but to those who refuse to die.If McCarthy style emulates, as some critics suggest, the biblical language of Revelation, they can't have missed SST. John's vision, borrowed probably from Job, that during the scatological calamities, â€Å"people will long for death and not find it anywhere; they will want to die and death will evade them. â€Å"18 A comedic articulation of this craving crops up in the Backbitten character of Ely, echoing precisely the post-apocalyptic dilemma: Things will be better when everyone's gone. They will? Sure they will. Better for who? Everybody. Sure. We'll all be better off. We'll all breathe easier.That's good to know. Yes it is. When we're all gone at last then there'll be nobody here but death and his days are numbered too. He'll be out in the road there with nothing to do and nobody to do it. He'll say: Where did everybody go? And that's how it will be. What's wrong with that? 19 McCarthy is arguably concerned, like Becket, to explore the experience of the death of God as instant paradox. That is, as a source of the death of hope for some, but also of an absurd affirmation of life by others, condemning them to a life of scatological suspension – of waiting, but for what?Our encounter with the ‘post' of post-apocalypse is, then, immediately one with the challenge of making narrative and ethical sense of the life that remains, rather than he purely nihilist gratuitousness of a death that won't come. It is more akin to Albert Campus' Rebel, 20 charged with the task of making an ethics of action in the absurd condition, without resorting to a leap of faith that removed the lucid reality of the absurd itself. It is the life of Sisyphus, who has made his rock his entire â€Å"universe† of meaning. 1 All talk of redemption and the messianic must take seriously this simultaneous presence of both the ‘end' and the refusal, or undesirability, of endings. The question that emanates from The Road is perhaps this one: what does nee do, given the knowledge of a certainty of the collapse of life, which might make walking possible along the remainder of the Road? How can this search operate within the traumatic experiment of post-apocalypse, of the never-ending? Dermis's interest in the concept of ‘apocalyptic time'.For Deride can be argued to echo the refusal of the security of endings that I have suggested lies at the heart of The Road. Deride refuses the scatological language of triumphal historicist (particularly in reference to Fuchsia's ‘end of history thesis), invoking Hamlet's fearful dictum, â€Å"the time is out of Joint†22 To express this refusal. Similarly, McCarthy frames the experience of this time of the ‘remainder' not as the aftermath of the singular catastrophic event. Rather, it is the perpetuity of catastrophe itself: the uncertainty of relationships, ecology, and the possibility for human community.The thought experiment becomes one of a tortuously open future, the absenc e of referents for forging new values, new rules, and new duties. The novel thus plays on the post-apocalypse genre by creating a dissonance of temporal perspectives. Time has already run out and is yet, for the boy, opening out inexorably: nothing has really knishes. For the father, the character of the time that remains is defined by the anxiety not only of the limited time allotted to him (who is really dying) but of the dubious gift of extending the time allotted the son into the future – and who's death he will not be able to oversee.Through the tender and contradictory relationship of the father and son, then, the genre of post-apocalypse is turned on its head. We grapple not so much with the post-modern fragmentation of endless traumatic symptoms,23 but the juxtaposition of these two impossible positions in the dialogue of father and child. On the one hand there is a protection of and desire for the end: the father's desire to secure the least tortuous conclusion to hi s son's life.And on the other there is the need for a beginning: the son's overwhelming concern for who and what must lie beyond: who exists? What are they like? Who looks after them? Who will guarantee their safety in the future? Apocalyptic Time Death, or limit, is thus explored in The Road as a painful loss of control over time. This resistance to the consolation of narrative ends represents the most unique and creative aspect of McCarthy apocalyptic style. But what can we say about ‘apocalyptic' literature in general that may shed light on the ambiguity of McCarthy redemptive turn?Literary apocalypses, in Jewish and Christian interdepartmental literature, intentionally sought to trace the limits of communicable discourse. It did this, crucially, against the political traumas of history, in which an old world was thought to be dying and a new one arising, which would completely overturn reality. Through visionary events bestowed upon favored emissaries or recipients, heaven ly truth revealed, through apocalypses, the â€Å"place beyond the limits of language†25 to unanimity. What is the function of this type of limit-discourse?Implicit to all apocalypses there is an ethically loaded injunction that the truth of the world is not all that is visible or conceivable by human means. 26 At its root, then, apocalypse claims that a deeper destiny and purpose lies underneath, and is here, through text and vision, disclosed. Revealed. It is this aspect of the coding of Revelation that so attracts Dermis's attention in his celebrated essay, On a Newly Arisen Tone in Philosophy. Dermis's fascination is with the figure of John and the complex symbolism of the fragmented, yard messages of the future contained in his vision.There is, believes Deride, something primal to Western thought in John's act as the messenger, this role of being the favored dispatcher of revelation and denouncing the false' ones, the â€Å"impostor apostles†. 27 Is there an echo of this cryptic prophecy in McCarthy – for instance, the language of God who is both announced and yet uncontainable, even within the friendly woman's talk of the â€Å"breath of God† that â€Å"passes from man to man through all of If so, the crucial lesson for an apocalyptic reading of McCarthy would be that apocalypse guarantees no certainties about future realities.On the contrary, it would be to resist the â€Å"temptation† of one apocalyptic tone, and to hear instead apocalypse as an â€Å"unmistakable polytonally'. 29 There is, in a deconstructive reading, only a deeper fragmentation and disestablishing of meaning and truth. And this is precisely the concern of Dermis's critique of an ontological and ‘contemporaneous' reading of history. As Fiddles puts it, narrative can be deconstructionist in the sense that, like the book of Revelation, â€Å"[the] ending deconstructs itself, and so disperses meaning rather than [completes] it. 30 This same ins tability and impermanence of discourse is prevalent within the illegal between father and son in The Road. The meaning of words and the possibility of language itself becomes shorn of its social or ethical grounds. McCarthy even poses the problem as one of the absurdity of text in the post-apocalyptic future. From the referent-less discussion of metaphor â€Å"as the crow flies†31 (to the boy, who has never known the existence of birds) to the man's memory of pausing in the â€Å"charred ruins of some library' and experiencing absolute dislocation between the value of words and the burnt remains of â€Å"the world to come†. 2 An attempt to speak in a world where words and meanings are disappearing mirrors ruefully the attempt to invoke faith in a world in which God is increasingly absent. The God of The Road is the impossible presence, the one whose name is invoked (by the father, and by the woman at the end) but whose very existence would pose only problems, not solu tions. To Ely, the possibility of the persistence of god or gods is a fearful prospect and impedance to the task at hand (of surviving?Or dying? ): â€Å"Where men can't live gods fare no better. You'll see. It's better to be alone. â€Å"33 But the existential struggle facing both the father and Ely is precisely the realization that, in he very act of their survival, something unshakeable of the trace of God (in the book it moves from â€Å"word†, to â€Å"breath†, to â€Å"dream† in that order) is incarnate. This appears, admittedly, as a curse to Ely, whose survival the father finds incredible.The fate bestowed on any unlucky enough to carry on down the road is to carry the remainder, the aftermath of this ineffability and this absence: â€Å"There is no God and we are his prophets. â€Å"34 It is, finally, in reference to the knowledge and memory of dying that any talk of the possible meaning of redemption must orient itself: hence hat must the remaining humans carry on being humans? The man questions Ely on this point: â€Å"how would you know if you were the last man on earth? † to which Ely replies â€Å"It wouldn't make any difference. When you die it's the same as if everybody else did too. 35 The framing of post-apocalypse narrative in this context reiterates the centrality of the question of remainders, of those who might remain to remember and to hold the consciousness of humanity and the possibility of discourse (and therefore of God? ) in their very surviving. God is Dead (again) The reference to God, and God's potential for solving the conundrum of the meander (perhaps, wonders the man, â€Å"God would know' that you were the last on earth) is typically McCarthy. He is concerned mostly to problematic belief rather than to reject it or affirm it entirely through his characters.The fragmented quasi- theological discussions echo the brilliant, extended account of the preacher who does theological battle with a dyin g faith in The Crossing. 37 But, once again, a deeper examination of what sort of theistic faith such references might imply goes some way to answering those readers unhappy with McCarthy redemptive conclusions. Ells sat remark bears similarities to attempts made in the sass to articulate a faithful religious response to the existentialist current, through a â€Å"Death of God Theology'. Alongside Thomas J. J.Altimeter, The protestant theologian Paul Italics famously argued for the language of modern theology to acknowledge not only the ontological inadequacy of speaking of God's existence (since the essence of God is a Being â€Å"beyond Being†). Theology must also acknowledge the failure of human experience to allow this access in the first place. For many of these thinkers the ‘God of the theologians' had died on the battlefields of Europe during World War l. To thus define God in negative terms was not only a semantic step. It was to couch Thee-logos as the discour se of absence par excellence.And certainly through the eyes of the other religious existentialists (Aggregated, Bereave, Dostoevsky, Auber) the search for God was the reaffirmation of the absurd, its crucifixion in the mystery of human suffering, not its resolution. Another exemplar, the Catholic convert Simons Well, had expressed it through the figure of Mary Magdalene on Easter Saturday: one moves towards the tomb motivated by death, an expectation of the corpse, not an optimistic pop in life. It is human suffering that motivates our movement â€Å"towards reality', and the mystery in which God (through his absence) is to be found.Likewise, influenced heavily by Nietzsche, Italics described the true act of faith of the believer as one who does not attempt to square the existentialist crisis of despair but who has â€Å"the courage to look into the abyss of nonbinding in the complete loneliness of him who accepts the message that â€Å"God is dead†. 38 A difficult God to f ind, to be sure, since for Well, Italics and others, the problem of nihilism was not to be squared by the gift of faith. It was to be lived in the paradox of human suffering – in the seeking, not the finding, of an answer to suffering.Perhaps The Road shares some features of these attempts to grapple with the death of God. But it is only really with Dermis's exploration of the messianic and time that deconstruction, to repeat, attempts to go beyond philosophy and society's obsessions with talking of the ‘end' of thinking, metaphysics, God, politics, Marxism, etc. Deconstruction tries to counterbalance this fascination with definitive ends by announcing the end of a â€Å"electronic† crisis rhetoric itself. Deride thus highlights the err possibility of crisis discourse as the last form of meaning that one clings to, and whose loss signals a truly existential death.The true crisis is that there may no longer be a â€Å"philosophy of crisis† : â€Å"there is perhaps not even a ‘crisis of the present world'. In its turn in crisis, the concept of crisis would be the signature of a last symptom, the convulsive effort to save a World' that we no longer in habit: no more kiosks, economy, ecology, livable site in which we are ‘at home†. 39 One recalls, in the light of this, the discussion in The Road of the possibility of both knowing, and not owing, preparing, and not preparing, for the â€Å"event†, the brief glimpse of which holds an elusive taint of horror over the narrative.Ely confides in the man: I knew this was coming. You knew it was coming? Yeah. This or something like it. I always believed in it. Did you try to get ready for it? No. What would you do? I don't know. People were always getting ready for tomorrow. I didn't believe in that. Tomorrow wasn't getting ready for them. It didn't even know they were there. 40 This intervention into crisis thinking problematical the very status of event – its u ndesirability, its uncertain definitiveness. It mirrors Dermis's critique of an Aristotelian, favored presence of the â€Å"event† itself.Ultimately, such a critique leads to Dermis's ability to pose a distinctively Jewish opposition to this privileging of the event: namely, the reassertion of a certain messianic, a therefore mystical, mysterious return to a revelatory messianic. It is, however, a messianic â€Å"without messianic†; â€Å"stripped of everything†,41 or in other words unbounded by the specificity of this or that dogmatism, religion, and metaphysics of salvation. In deconstruction, then, we can no longer speak of the privilege of the ‘contemporary. 2 What does that concept imply in the context of McCarthy narrative?It opens out the analysis to the concept of redemption without the guarantee of the ‘event' that would guarantee salvation in the manner of the promises of institutional religion. Such a sentiment recalls the â€Å"iconoclas tic† reformulation of hope that was prevalent in post-war Jewish critical theory (particularly in Ernst Bloch). This meant a redemption without reference to the face of God; only the notion of promise itself. 43 Deride expresses a notion of the future as being not a future-present' but as something perpetually out of reach.It produces, like death, the effect of interminable non-occurrence, perhaps in the manner by which the â€Å"event† of The Road is announced: â€Å"The clocks stopped at 1 Time itself, like discourse, and like belief, is suspended; shorn of its referent. The messianic impulse that survives even a book binding to the commitment of expectation: more akin, once again, to the suffering of the waiting Vladimir and Estrogen. The apocalyptic element of The Road, then, might not be the announcement of some catastrophic event in time either in the past (since this is never dwelled upon) or the future.It is rather the revelation of traces, of remainders and re minders, of the God who might also be dying since he â€Å"fares no better† than men when men can't live. 45 The apocalyptic always appears with a hidden face, in the impossible or inconceivable encounter with the end of all things, of death itself. The consolation offered to the boy by his father is that he has always been â€Å"lucky'. 46 Beyond irony, the word â€Å"luck† seems shorn of its associations with providence, destiny, and blessedness, and more like an unhappy covenant: an unspoken agreement that the boy is bound to continue, to keep going.The continuation of life is a brute fact for the boy as much as for Ely (neither apparently aware what keeps them going). And yet the boy is very unlike Ely, not because of his innocence, but because of his temporal language. What will happen, he asks of his father, to the other boy? To the man they abandoned? To the people imprisoned in the house? The conundrum for Ely is otherwise, and framed in the time that was. Wha t has happened; did we see it coming? What were we thinking? Even if we did, how could we have been expected to choose?If there is redemption in The Road, perhaps all we can say of it is the ability o ask questions of the future, as opposed to only those of the past, of mourning that which cannot be put right. Redemption without redemption The ‘event' is indeed problematic for post-apocalypse. But it is problematic not simply because finality is put off indefinitely (as Berger claims). It is problematic for its revealing, or disclosing, our lack of control over its arrival. Apocalypse is temporal catastrophe: a disruption of our chronic desires, time we possess, can control.The future is certainly terrible, but it is agonizing particularly for our thorniness into its uncertainty. Redemption, then, if it is relevant at all, must be seen as the ability to imagine that what one sees now is not all that there is. In the book of Revelation calamities are predicted that meticulously symbolism the passing of apportioned periods of time according to divine order, not those of powers and principalities. 47 In The Road, however, the father is possessed by his responsibility to Judge the ‘right time' of his son's end, and so spare unbearable life.The crisis recalls Abraham's struggle with God's command to act out the unthinkable, here repeated in the Father's own self-doubt: â€Å"Can you do it? When the time comes? When the time comes there will be no time. Now is the time. Curse God and die. â€Å"48 One passes over it easily, but by the end of the novel, the father's command to his son to leave him occurs by way of an admission of weakness; an apology for entrusting life with him: â€Å"l can't hold my dead son in my arms. I thought I could but I can't†49.Is this the conclusion thought to give some sort of redemptive lift to the narrative – a â€Å"fog leaf† to the unacceptable narrative of total disaster? 50 1 would argue cynical pe rspective, rather than the consolingly messianic one. In this view the ether's committal of the son to the future is not performed out of faith in the persistence of goodness. His commitment is, more simply, in the inability to cease suffering, to cease walking along the road. The father's sense of an open future is not hard to grasp in itself: it is the only thing left to offer his son.Yet what is the most significant imaginative turn in what follows? I would argue that it is not that the boy subsequently finds fellow travelers we are to believe are also the good guys who are â€Å"carrying the fire†. Nor even is it that they, like the woman, are also those that cosines the persistence of the divine in the world. Rather, it is an admission by all characters of a disestablishing uncertainty about that road that lies ahead. It is there in the implied pause of the man's response to the boy at the end of the novel: â€Å"He looked at the sky. As if there were anything to be see n.Yeah, he said. I'm one of the good guys. † 51 There is no evidence in what precedes this moment that any place the new community will reach can support life. Nor, I think, are we meant to intuit such a turn towards the future. One cannot ignore, in any case, the terrifying allusions that lie underneath McCarthy choice of the word â€Å"fire†. Cabochon is quick to point this out: the new hope for human community are people â€Å"carrying fire in a world destroyed by fire†. 52 But we can go further than this, since the irony recalls the central theme of another classic of the post-apocalypse genre.In William Miller's A Canticle for Leibniz, the scattered survivors of global nuclear war attempt to construct the new civilization by destroying all forms of scientific knowledge. They do this on the premise that such knowledge will lead inexorably to the same situation of nuclear terror. A secluded community of monks become the last guardians of ancient knowledge, pre serving it for such a time that knowledge will once again be responsibly applied. But the fear is vindicated by the recapitulation of humanity to a second wave of nuclear apocalypse at the novel's horrifying conclusion.

Food Pyramid Essays

Food Pyramid Essays Food Pyramid Essay Food Pyramid Essay I have always thought of myself s a person who knows nutrition and understands what is right however; when it comes to food I did not always do what was right. I love pastas, and sauces, pizza and chips, cake and cookies; but, who doesnt. Since then I have learned to balance the stuff I want and the foods that I need to achieve a balanced diet. The main problem on my first food pyramid tracker evaluation was that I was very much lacking In the fruit and vegetable food group. Since then I have bought fruit that was easily accessible so that I do not have any excuse to not have time. I have also made sure hat I eat either a salad or one steamed vegetable a day in addition to my daily VI. Another issue with my first tracker evaluation was the fact that I was not eating enough calories throughout the day. To correct this I am now eating smaller meals and more of them. Snacks of low fat string cheese, a small handful of almonds, a low fat yogurt and an apple are examples of snacks that I now eat throughout the day. By doing this I am speeding up my metabolism, cleaving the recommended amount of calories, and being able to maintain the balance of all different sources of nutrition. : These improvements are not only giving me a balanced diet and more energy but, they are also improving my vitamin intake. By making these changes my most recent food tracker was very much on track with where I would like to be. My calorie intake is now appropriate, my diet Is balanced, and the tracker showed a great diet and balance. The pyramid tracker and the nature of my diet not being balanced was only the beginning of wanting a change. I gained a lot of knowledge from our previous chapter based on vitamins, minerals, and supplements. As I learned a great deal I wanted to apply the knowledge that I did learn into my life style. Through the reading I decided that I wanted to set a goal to not need to take dietary supplements. I rather wanted to eat my vitamins and minerals through the food I decided to eat. By eating more green and leafy vegetables I can gain my Iron. By drinking carrot Juice in the morning I will be gaining all of the vitamin A I need. Have started to look deeply Into what I am eating and how it will help me achieve a long lasting life. By doing this I ill know if there is something I need to take, such as a supplement, or if I simply need to add more of an item to my daily diet. As I am not against supplements, I do not feel that they are necessary if a balanced diet is eaten. There are so many different issues with taking too many dietary supplements that I have taken the, more Is netter mental lilt on ten pills Ana let It go wit n ten Doodle Dull. I nave mentioned that the changes I had made recently made have all been to the positive. The most drastic change of all is that I am looking at food in a new light. Growing up with a chef as a grandfather has made me eat food as entertainment, enjoyment, and reward; because of this my choices and diet have never been as great as they are today. Now that I have changed my views on food I look to my new diet for energy, vitamins, and life. The balanced diet has made me want to work out more than ever and I feel that I will achieve a very healthy life style. Every day I research and learn more about foods and which are high in a vitamin or new ways to cook or serve an item that is healthy. I feel my largest gain from all of the changes is not the one that I am going to endure but, the gains that my family and children will now have. Like I said, doing and knowing are very different words. Many people fully understand what is needed to achieve a balanced diet however; doing this and sticking to it is hard. To gain the lifestyle of eating for energy, vitamins, and minerals takes huge changes. Grocery shopping, preparing, and getting use to the new foods is hard and you have to be dedicated but, the results are worth the efforts.

The Primitive Hut - Laugiers Theory About Architecture

The Primitive Hut - Laugier's Theory About Architecture The Primitive Hut has become a shorthand statement of principle that defines essential elements of architecture. Often, the phrase is Laugiers Primitive Hut. Marc-Antoine Laugier (1713-1769) was a French Jesuit priest who rejected the opulence of Baroque architecture prevalent in his lifetime. He outlined his theory about what architecture should be in the 1753 Essai sur larchitecture. According to Laugier, all architecture derives from three essential elements: The columnThe entablatureThe pediment The Primitive Hut Illustrated Laugier expanded his book-length essay in a second edition published in 1755. This second edition includes the iconic frontispiece illustration by French artist Charles Eisen. In the picture, an idyllic woman (perhaps the personification of Architecture) points out a simple rustic cabin to a child (perhaps the unknowing, naive architect). The structure she points to is simplistic in design, uses basic geometric shapes, and is constructed from natural elements. Laugiers Primitive Hut is his representation of the philosophy that all architecture derives from this simple ideal. In the English translation of this 1755 edition, the frontispiece created by the British engraver Samuel Wale is slightly different from the illustration used in the well-known, celebrated French edition. The picture in the English language book is less allegorical and more clear-cut than the more romantic picture from the French edition. Both illustrations show, however, a reasoned and simplified approach to building. Charles Eisen frontispiece from Essai sur l’architecture, 2nd editionPublic domain image from DOME, digitized content from the MIT Libraries collections, dome.mit.eduSamuel Wale frontispiece from the English translationIllustration in the public domain courtesy of Open Library, openlibrary.org Full Title in English An Essay on Architecture; in which Its True Principles are explained, and Invariable Rules proposed, for Directing the Judgment and Forming the Taste of the Gentleman and the Architect, With regard to the Different Kinds of Buildings, the Embellishment of Cities, And the Planning of Gardens. The Primitive Hut Idea by Laugier Laugier theorizes that man wants nothing but shade from the sun and shelter from storms- the same requirements as a more primitive human. The man is willing to make himself an abode which covers but not buries him, Laugier writes. Pieces of wood raised perpendicularly, give us the idea of columns. The horizontal pieces that are laid upon them, afford us the idea of entablatures. Branches form an incline that can be covered with leaves and moss, so that neither the sun nor the rain can penetrate therein; and now the man is lodged. Laugier concludes that The little rustic cabin that I have just described, is the model upon which all the magnificences of architecture have been imagined. Why is Laugiers Primitive Hut Important? The essay is considered a major treatise in architectural theory. It is often cited by teachers of architecture and practicing architects even in the 21st century.Laugiers expression is pro-Greek Classicism and reacts against the Baroque ornamentation and decoration of his day. It established the argument for future architectural movements, including 18th century Neoclassicism and the 21st century trend toward unadorned, eco-friendly tiny homes and small dwellings (see Books to Help You Build a Smaller Home).The Primitive Hut idea supports a back-to-nature philosophy, a romantic idea which gained popularity in the mid-18th century and influenced literature, art, music, and architecture.Defining the essential elements of architecture is a statement of purpose, a philosophy that drives the work of an artist and practitioner. Simplicity of design and the use of natural materials, what Laugier believes are architectural essentials, are familiar ideas that have been embraced by more moder n architects, including Frank Lloyd Wright and the vision of Gustav Stickley at Craftsman Farms. Laugiers rustic cabin is sometimes call The Vitruvian Hut, because Laugier built on ideas of natural and divine proportion documented by the ancient Roman architect Marcus Vitruvius (see Geometry and Architecture). Critical Thinking The popularity of Laugiers philosophy is in part because he offers easily understood alternatives to the architecture he scorns. The clarity of his writing is such that the English architect Sir John Soane (1753-1837) is said to have given copies of Laugiers book to his new staff members. Architects of the 20th century, like Le Corbusier, and of the 21st century, including Thom Mayne, have acknowledged the influence of Laugiers ideas on their own work. You dont have to agree with Laugiers visions, but its a good idea to understand them. Ideas shape everything we create, including architecture. Everyone has a philosophy that develops over time, even if the ideas havent been written down. A useful project is to put into words the theories about architecture and design that you have developed- how should buildings be built? what should cities look like? what design elements should all architecture have?  How do you write philosophy? How do you read philosophy? The Primitive Hut and Related Books Essay on Architecture by Marc-Antoine Laugier, English translation by Wolfgang Herrmann and Anni HerrmannBuy on AmazonOn Adams House in Paradise: The Idea of the Primitive Hut in Architectural History by Joseph Rykwert, MIT Press, 1981Buy on AmazonA Hut of Ones Own: Life Outside the Circle of Architecture by Ann Cline, MIT Press, 1998Buy on Amazon Sources Quotations and frontispiece designed by Mr. Wale for English translation of Laugiers Essay on Architecture (1755) in the public domain courtesy of Open Library, openlibrary.org

State some of the major student rights. What do you think should be Essay

State some of the major student rights. What do you think should be some of their matching responsibilities illustrate - Essay Example In this particular study, a new type of assessment is proposed, which is known as hybrid-problem based learning. Students have the right to be interactive and seek new ways to learn and stimulate their mind. Instead of having endless boring drills, students have the right to utilize the latest technologies that can facilitate their learning process. As a matter of fact, there is a strong push will be made by the school to develop a more â€Å"hands-on approach† in the dynamic learning environment. Younger students are further engaged in a process of collaboration and discovery as they explore the new spheres of the environment.  Ã‚   Matching responsibilities between students and teachers is respect. Students should respect their tutors and administrative staff because education is a privilege not a right. The effects of mutual symbiotic learning is essential for both groups to be sync and be beneficial for both. Technology and new methodology can play in this role. Another responsibility is to ensure that they are teachers are given new opportunities to work with new students. New opportunities is essential for learning and nurturing. This ensures a system of harnessing and development for both parties. This new methodology imposes key concepts of critical thinking that traditional techniques lack in their system. They must enjoy the learning process through simulation. For instance, I would highly suggest e-learning software and applications that can be integrated in their learning environment. If a student struggled with an issue, I would hope that they have developed the necessary skillset to rectify that is sue. Goodine, J.. Comparing computer software programs: Determining the most efficient system for teaching English language learners. Ed.D. dissertation,Northcentral University, United States -- Arizona. Retrieved August 1, 2011, from Dissertations & Theses: Full Text.(Publication No. AAT

Challenges Facing Destination Managers at Sydney for thr Essay

Challenges Facing Destination Managers at Sydney for thr Infrastructure of the Place - Essay Example The marketability of any particular tourist destination largely depends on the perceptions of different market areas. Such perceptions may be varied in nature. Huge investments are made on a regular basis by several countries to make a destination successfully available to the tourists (Beirman, 2003, pp.3-4). A country, trying to provide its tourists with different facilities, also has to encounter several challenges associated with the facilities and services. With the growing competition in the industry, the complexities have increased to great extents leading to greater problems with tourist destinations (Bramwell & Lane, 2004, p.78). The present study has considered Sydney as the tourism destination for study and discusses about the challenges encountered by the destination managers in the city. Sydney is the oldest, largest and the most popular city in the country of Australia. Both business and arts of the country are mostly delivered by this city. It is one of the most attrac tive places in the world delivering scenic beauty, geographical locations of waters as well as leisure activities. There are mountains as well as seas, along with several inland waterways and national parks (Sydney- General Information, n.d.). Sydney as a Tourist Destination: Sydney presents several places to visit for the tourists thus attracting visitors from across the world. Australia’s diverse wildlife, the galleries representing art, Sydney Opera House delivering beautiful performances and convict heritage site are all listed in the World Heritage list. Visitors can spend several hours at these places. The places also offer meals and leisure activities for the visitors. There are thrilling experiences for the kids as well delivered by places like the Taronga Zoo or Featherdale Widlife Park. Other tourist attractions that are of significant attractions include Luna Park, a fun-packed, harbourside amusement park and Sydney Tower Eye. The Sydney Tower is the uppermost spot above Sydney consisting several views of the harbour, beaches as well as the Blue Mountains (Sydney Attraction, n.d.). The Blue Mountains Region in Sydney has in the recent years attracted the most numbers of visitors. It has proved to be a place for immense recreation and relaxation. In the 1990s, the area had lacked its image particularly owing to the iconic natural and built assets. Later there have been several initiatives to improve the region and in the present times, the region drags â€Å"a large share of the tourism market† (Blue Mountains Regional Tourism Plan 2004-2007, n.d.). A tourism plan is also involved in this regard that has been consulted with several stakeholders. The target markets have also been segmented accordingly and these include the luxury travelers, the adventure travelers, the touring travelers, the peer group travelers as well as the family travelers. Both domestic and international visitors are targeted in this regard with the international co untries including UK, Germany and USA. The experiences of the nature, the heritage, the arts and culture, and the indulgence and rejuvenation have been the major appeals of this region (Blue Mountains Regional Tourism Plan 2004-2007, n.d.). Competitors of Sydney in the tourism market include other Australian cities like Melbourne, as well as other regional competitors like Singapore, Hong Kong, and Kuala Lumpur. This competition has led to a need for Sydney to market and promote their tourism in the industry