Reaping the Whirlwind Essay

Fighting human rights is a long and complicated process and â€Å"Reaping the Whirlwind† by Robert J. Norwell is a classical work, in which the author traces the development of human rights movement in one of the cities of American South – Tuskegee, Alabama, specially concentrating on the rights of black-skinned community. The book gathers unique aspects of this region, as well as attempts to link them to national and global human rights development. Norwell is perhaps the best person to write such a book as he is a native of Alabama and holds a PhD degree on history. Norwell takes the reader from 1880-s to 1960-s, telling the story of Tuskegee Institute and it’s principal Booker T. Washington (1856-1915). Tuskegee appeared to be an outstanding example of human rights development. The local Afro-American community appeared to be educated and professional enough to promote their interests, including the ones in education, to overcome the position of conservative white officials. Norwell pays attention to both successes and disappointments of human rights movement in Tuskegee. The key idea of the book, is that in Tuskegee the black population managed to realize their own idea of harmony with the white Americans. In the later chapters Norwell concentrates on further development of the situation and describes how reality stepped away from accommodationalist views of Washington. Those ideas, which have been created in a small closed society were adapted by the rest and became essential for the whole nation. Human rights were won not only by legal and judicial means but also by persuasion, harsh disputes and even fighting opened violence. The book demonstrates how declared rights of African Americans gradually became factual and true. The first edition of the book ended in 1960, however in later editions Norwell updated the last chapter and briefly told of the latest development of human rights on the South from 1960-s until now. Norwell supposes, that Washington’s care of Afro-American activists created a base for human rights to flourish after World War II, because he managed to prepare enough leaders for the movement. Finally he concludes, that Washington should be more likely called a father of human rights movement than DuBois. In total the book is well written and quite easy to read. It is written for both those, who are interested in the subject and those, who require professional knowledge in the field of human rights development of the South. The book gives a picture of real struggles around human rights, which are often different from romantism of martin Luther.

Environmental Scan

There are two things that could affect an environmental scan; they are internal and external environments. Benefits can arise from doing an environmental scan on a business, which in turn can only add to the value of the business. Two companies will be covered; their internal and external environments will be described using an environmental scan. What competitive advantages each company has and what strategies(s) each company is using. How each company creates value and sustains competitive advantage through business strategy? What measurement guidelines each company is using to verify its strategic effectiveness? Also how effective are the measurement guidelines that each company is using? These two companies are Coca Cola and Wal-Mart. A environmental scanning (2011), according to Business Dictionary, â€Å" Careful monitoring of an organization’s internal and external environments for detecting early signs of opportunities and threats that may influence its current and future plans. In comparison, surveillance is confined to a specific objective or a narrow sector. The whole process can be seen as information seeking and managerial learning for the business. The internal environment for Coca Cola is inside the business’s control. There are some key attributes in this environment that include competence in production method, through management skills and successful communication. How can Coca Cola monitor the internal environments? They have to do an evaluation of the operations and take any action on the factors that cause inefficiencies on any stage of production and the consumer process. On the external side of it Coca Cola has to know that with the external environment it could affect the entire business, and the economy. Ups and downs in the economy, principles and attitudes from Coke’s consumers and demographic patterns greatly control the success of coke. What is competitive advantage? Competitive advantage (2011), according to Business Dictionary, â€Å" A superiority gained by an organization when it can provide the same value as its competitors but at a lower price, or can charge higher prices by providing greater value through differentiation. Competitive advantage results from matching core competencies to the opportunities. † Coke has a tough marketing sense and a brand name that you are sure to know. Wal-Mart has been able to maintain a competitive advantage allowing them to use many strategies. Their low prices is a very good strategy, it seems to be the best strategy they have had to date. Wal-Mart also treats their employees well, their aisles are well organized and clutter free. The technology that Wal-Mart uses helps them to stay ahead of the game, also there is the up to date inventory technology. Branding accounts for the highest percentage of Coca Cola’s value, its percentage is 80. Coca Cola has a strong global foundation In conclusion, by conducting routine checks on the business environment and keeping track of what is going on in the business will make a great impact on the business. A key element to a successful business is doing an environmental scan, understanding the risk and managing them appropriately.

Security & EConsumer Awareness

Security & E? consumer Awareness When you buy a product from an online store you expect the company to keep your data safe from loss and damage. For the company to do this they need to look in to threats to the data and how to stop this, a company needs to know the laws of data protection and different ways to prevent this like firewalls and antivirus software and encrypting the customers data to stop people reading it, this report will tell you about the types of threats ways to stop these and the laws of data protection.All companies should do a risk assessment; they should do this to make sure that the data on the computer is safe. A risk assessment finds risks and then rates them and then says how they will be fixed. Threats to your data through an Organisations website Data intercepted by copycat website or phishing Data intercepted by use of copycat web site. The way they do this is to send you an e? ail for example saying you have to check something on your bank and at the bot tom of the email there will be a link that looks like your banks website but in fact it sends you to a different website that looks the same and then you enter your detail to your bank then the owiners of the copycat website will be able to take your identity and your money. Here is an example of how they do this underneath. As you can see the address in the email will be spelt wrong or have something extra like this one has an ip address in the front this is a big give away because professional bank website would just have the bank name, this kind of e? ail is usually blocked by your spam wall in your e? mail address but if you do get an e? mail from the bank type the URL in the search bar or search engine The one on the right is the correct one because as you can see there is no number in front and it just says the banks name, also you can see there is https which stands for hypertext transfer protocol secured this is only on the official bank website to try to stop hackers. Usual ly the banks logo will be next to the URL address as you can see from the example above this is another way to check if the banks website looks legit.Companies can help people not fall for these traps by providing bank protection software to the entire user; many banks do this now and run this with your normal protection like Norton but the best way to prevent these scams is to teach people how to avoid the traps this has the highest effectiveness against this scam but the computer also has to have anti? virus software that also looks for these scams and this will give you the highest effectiveness against you falling for this trap.The effectiveness of these preventions is very high but this depends on the versions of the software that you have and if the software reads it as a threat or the real thing but the way that has the best effectiveness would be to teach employees and customers about the threats and show them examples of how they would really send them for example they woul d send â€Å"Dear† then your name rather than â€Å"Dear Customer† because then that would show they know you and not just trying to guest who you have accounts with, this would be the best way to prevent these scams and I feel would have the highest effectiveness against this scam.Key loggers Key loggers are used to intercept your data which you type into your keyboard hacker usually use this to get passwords to bank amount and any other thing that requires a password. A key logger remembers everything you type and everything you delete, for your computer to get a key logger on it you have to download it because it software but key logger are usually hidden or disguised as another piece of software so you download it be accident, a key logger runs in the background of your computer so you don’t even know that its running.The way to block key loggers is to make sure your fire wall on and after you download any software use should scan it using your virus protect ion software. This can happen by employees using the company’s internet to download things that they are not meant for. The way a hardware key logger works the device is put in between your keyboard and computer tower then on the same computer open up note pad and each key logger comes with a three digit code that you have to hold down at the same time to bring up what has been key logged on that computer.To prevent key logging these companies can installer anti spyware, but now programs like Norton and MacAfee have this type of protection built in as well, this will only work if the program is kept up to date this is because there are new virus and bugs being made all the time. The effectiveness of these types of protection is very high as long as the anti? irus software is running at its highest version by being kept up to date, but it is not 100% because some key loggers may not be detected because there not in the protection software’s virus database or they might not be detected because there inside another program that’s not detected as a virus.To protect against hardware key logger in a office there are many ways like adding CCTV and keypad locks to doors but these might all catch who doing it and not stop it right away so by the time the cameras are checked the information may be already stolen which could have bad effect on the company and its reputation but if you used both of the measure to try to prevent key logging you have the best chance to prevent in with a very high effectiveness of achieving protection against key logging. Data copied by employeeYour data can could become copied by employees and of loss or copied by human error problem with this is that human error is very hard to spot because most of the time the files are moved, copied, loss or deleted but accident so the employee could be given personal data away unaware that they are doing it, if corporate files are lost or stolen they can be valuable to the company o r loss the company a lot of money. Dishonest employees will copy the files a flash drive like a USB or external hard drive if it a lot of information with the information they copy they will sell to other companies for large sums of money, they couldAs you can after you open it in notepad it gives you options to see what has been reordered along with other options. This type of key logger costs around ? 30 pound which is cheap is you were taking people banks details or selling information to other company. use the information to create a fake identity for them or they could use them to empty your bank account which could give you big debt and a bad credit record, which mearns you could be refused loans, credit cards and a mortgage for your house.The way that this can be prevented is to disable USB slots on all computers and give the employee work e? mails that can be monitored. The effectiveness of these preventions is good but not 100% because depending on the job the employee will still have access to the internet which mearns they might not use the company email and use their own which mearns some of the fixes wouldn’t work and to data could still be stolen.Another way that would make there protection against data being stolen very effective is to add levels of access to information meaning only employees with the right access level can get certain information from the servers which would allow pretty high effectiveness against information being stolen because it makes the group smaller that has access to it meaning if it was stolen it would be easy to find who did it meaning that the risk of getting caught is higher so this adds the scare factor to stealing the companies personal information or bank detail because the risk of getting caught is very high which mearns the effective of this method is very high. Data sold by employeeIf the employee sells the data they can make a lot of money by selling to gangs to make fake identities or to other compan ies so they can try to sell you products through the mail or over the phone, if your information is sold people could run big debt up in your name or even take the money that you have been saving up in your bank. The way the company can prevent people from selling their data is to have CCTV watching the offices and disable the USB ports on the computer this will prevent people from plugging in portable memory in the pc and copying the data across, also the company should use internal monitoring on all the pc in the offices and a check after work hours should be carry out to see if people have copied any information across or sent it using the internet.Also the company could make employees sign an agreement that will show the employee what would happen if they were to steal the data and this might prevent it because they may feel that the chance of getting caught is higher. The effectiveness of having CCTV around the office is very high the reason for this is because if they feel tha t they are being monitored the chance of them getting caught becomes a lot higher meaning the risk for reward may not be worth it but the best way to prevent this would be to disable the USB drive and monitor the computers using internal monitoring software this would have the highest effectiveness against people stealing data because if they steal the data they are going to get caught because of the monitoring software meaning again the reward isn’t worth the risk. Data sold by companyThe company is allowed to sell data to other third party companies for a lot of money the reason they do this is so the other company can also they to sell you products over the phone or by post, this is only allowed if the person doesn’t tick the do allowed third person parties to see my information, if this box is not ticked the company is allowed to sell it on to all of it third person companies but some companies sell it without the person permission if this happen and the company id found out it will be closed down because of the laws it has broken. An example of this is when a phone company sold information on about when contacts run out so other companies could phone up and try to sell phones and contacts, the article is show below. Companies should train employees so that they don’t make mistakes and also make them aware of the Data Protection Act.The way the company could prevent this is to make sure they are up to date with the Data Protection Act and if they are planning to sold this information to third person parties they need to make sure they have permission from the customers because if this information is sold without them knowing or agreeing they will use trust in the company meaning they could loss customers. This would be one of the only ways of preventing this because if the company wants to sell the information they will because it’s up to the board of directors and they can’t really be restricted by anything in the compan y because they could bypass most blocks that would stop employees because they have control of the monitoring and have the highest access level.The effectiveness of this prevention is very low because in the end they company has the final say on were the data goes and who can have access to it, the reason for this is because they can do what they want with the data, so no matter what protection the company has to prevent employees they could go ahead and sell information for more profit. Data stolen by hackers Your personal information could be intercepted by hacker when you are signing on to a website or where your information in store on a company server and hacker have broke the firewall and decryped to code then the hacker could sell your data or use it for there own personal things like buying cars and house or even running up un? payable debt.An example of hacker steals company data is when a hacker claimed to have broke into a t? moblie server and got information about addres s and corporate information, the article is shown below. The article states that the hacker has got people personal information and is now going to sell the information to the highest bidder, to stop these companies should be running regular checks to see if any information has been copied by hackers. There are many ways the company could stop hackers from taking and gaining access to their information, the first way would be to make sure the company has an up to date firewall that will prevent hackers from gaining access to the network, along with this though they should also have anti? irus and spyware software install this would make sure if an unwanted visitor was on the server the information would be secured and the visitor signal would be blocked. The next prevention would be for the company to encrypt there data so that if hacker intercept the data when its being transmitted they will not be able gain anything from it because it will encrypted with an 120 bit encryption or h igher meaning they would not be able to break it or would take a long time. Also the company could make sure that the data is transmitted across the faster route to get to its destination meaning there are less places for the hackers to intercept and gain access to the information.The effectiveness of a firewall in a company is very high because this will stop unwanted people being able to snoop on the server or network but his will not stop the hackers 100% because firewalls are not unbreakable by some high level hackers but if you were to have firewalls and then have anti? virus and spyware software installed this would make the effective a lot higher because they would have to break and bypass a lot more system and have a higher risk of getting caught before they find what they what meaning this has a high effectiveness against the hackers. The effectiveness of stopping hackers intercepting data by encryption and making the chain of transfer shorter is very effective because encr yptions are hard to break of take a long time even for the best hackers.So if you have all these preventions it will have a very high effectiveness against the company’s information being stolen. In correct or out of date data stored by a company If you send the company wrong information such as phone number, address, postcode etc. This can be bad because if the company think you are sending wrong information be you’re not the owner of the account they will contact the bank and the bank will lock the account until the owner comes into the branch. Also if wrong information is stored on the server they could be sending your private information to the wrong address like bank statements or private letters so it’s always important to keep your information up to date so your information doesn’t end up in the wrong hands.Also companies should update records to comply with Data Protection Laws, this makes sure that all data it kept safe and only people with the c orrect access level gain access to the information also this prevents the company from transferring details to other people without your permission. There are many ways to prevent in correct or out of date data being stored by the company the main way to update and back up information weekly and send it to a different off site server, this will make sure the information is kept up to date and stored correctly meaning wrong information in used. Another way would be to make sure that the wrong records aren’t edited is by only allowing them to edit new record and if they want to access a existing record they have to bring it up and the server will only allow certain edits to the data this would prevent the wrong data from being stored on the server.Also only certain people should have access to stored data this will prevent people from opening it to view it and then changing something so the data is stored wrong because this could be bad for the company because private informati on could be sent to the wrong people which could mean the company break the Data Protection Act and could be held responsible. The effectiveness of the preventions is very high also as this backing update and updating is done weekly and is stored different location to the main information the reason for this is because if it stored in the same placed if the data is changed or corrupted it could also happen to the backup copy of the information. If it wasn’t stored of site backing up the information would be pointless.Also making sure the information can only be changed and access by certain people has a high effectiveness because there less people that can change it by human error meaning the information will be stored correct. Loss due to error or Hardware failure A company could loss data by hardware failure, if a company loss data by hardware failure it can cost them time and money so the company should always have their data saved in two different server in different buil ding, basically they should do a backup every night so if there is a hardware failure they can go back to yesterday’s work and personal, so yes they do loss some stuff but not everything.Sometimes big companies get virus which is set to destroy valuable data or corrupt valuable data big companies should run regular checks to check their firewall has not be attack and broke by a virus because when they do the backup to their second server the virus could get sent there and the all the information could get deleted or corrupted which would loss the company money and customers. Data loss comes from the state data spill, Data loss can also be related to data spill incidents, in the case personal information and cooperate information get leaked to another party of people or deleted. Also backup policies should be in place and backup should be checked occasionally to see if they work or not and if they are effective as they might not work.A way to prevent loss due to hardware failu re is to make sure your technology is up to date, a way to do this would be to upgrade the hardware regularly this will give it less chance of failing because it will not just break down due to age or become ineffective. The effectiveness of upgrading hardware is low the reason for this is because the hardware is very unlikely to fail if it well looked after and kept at a low temperature this will ensure that you will not lose data due to hardware failure. The effectiveness of backing up data on an offsite location is very effective because it will stop data from getting corrupted but needs to be regularly re? acked up so it’s kept unto date, the reason this works so well is because if the original data on the main server is loss and corrupted the backup version of the data will be unaffected because it has not connection to the original server where to main data is stored the reason for this is there only an active connection when the data is being backed up to the offsite s erver and this minimise the risk of the backup data being corrupted. Along with this you need to make sure the server is secure has antivirus software installed the effectiveness of this is high but this kind of software can always be bypassed but will allow good security against low level hackers who are trying to destroy data, if this security is used and the data is backed up weekly it will have high effectiveness and will minimise the risks of data loss due to human error or hardware failure. Natural disastersAn over looked type of data loss is via nature disasters such as floods, fires, hurricanes or earthquakes if one of these hit the building were you were storing all your data there data would be loss without any chance of recovery because the server would be destroyed, so companies should back there data up to different building away from the first server so if that server get broke by a natural disaster. Also your server should be stored off the ground floor because then t here is less chance of the flood reaching your servers and the last thing is all server rooms should be fitted with co2 sprinkler not water because water will damage the server do this and your data is more secure from fires. The effectiveness of backing up data on an offsite location to prevent loss due to natural disaster is very effective because it will stop data from getting corrupted but needs to be regularly re? acked up so it’s kept unto date, the reason this works so well is because if the original data on the main server is loss and corrupted the backup version of the data will be unaffected because it has no connection to the original server where to main data is stored the reason for this is there only an active connection when the data is being backed up to the offsite server and this minimise the risk of the backup data being corrupted, but this will only be effective if the offsite location is in different area to the main server so if a natural disaster hits o nly the main server is destroy or damaged. The effectiveness of putting the server of the ground floor to prevent flood damage is high because to will stop the floor reaching the servers and damaging them but this would only work if the foundations of the build were sthrong because if the floor was sthrong and the building was weak the building may fall meaning the prevention was pointless.The effectiveness of having fire prevention is high but there is still a risk of loss of data the reason for this is that if the fire starts in the server the co2 sprinkles will go off but some of the data will be loss before the fire is put out, but if all these preventions are used together it will give you high effectiveness against natural disaster damage and loss. When you’re searching a website for a product and buying products from a websites you need to know that your details are secure and that no one can take your identity or use your money on other products you don’t want, there are ways to check the website is secure so that people can’t get your details, the three main ways are looking for the HTTPS, the padlock and the security certificates the three ways are shown below. Padlock HTTPS Security Certificate SET which stands for Secure electronic transactions is standard protocol for using your credit or bank cards over an insecure networks like the internet ecure electronic transactions is not a payment system but some protocols and formats the let the user to employ the existing credit card payments on an open network, it gained to gain traction. VISA now premotes the 3? D secure scheme. Websites and computers now use firewalls to stop hacker, Trojans and spyware these firewalls come on the website and computers but you can buy better firewalls like Norton firewalls stop identity thief and lots of other things that take data from u and could take your money these firewalls are a big advancement on security but people are still find ways to get passed them that’s why you have to buy the new version of Norton every year and update daily to ensure new viruses can be caught.Also websites and companies use user names and passwords this is to stop people getting to the system and taking data and using it to steal peoples things, also big companies use access levels for example MI5 use access level to stop new employees seeing top secret data and to make sure people only see what’s in their pay grades also employees should have passwords but they should have to change them regularly to avoid revelation. Antivirus software is available to buy from shop or online, antivirus software protects you from identity thief, stolen details and etc. There are many antivirus software’s some of the main ones are Norton and MacAfee these cost about ? 5 per year this is because it protects you from many different dangers that could make you loss item or stolen your thing like work and all of the firewall’s and vi rus protections offered by Norton is shown below. When data is being sent from a computer to a server that contain personal and credit card data information the data in encrypted to stop people intercepting the data and reading it the encryption changes a password for example from jamesjamesjames it would change it to something like rygf84943gv43g3t83vg347vt539v, so if someone took that data they would be unable to use it. For example Game. co. uk tell you that they encrypt there data with a 128 bit encryption so this mearns its petty much unbreakable. When a company is working with data like personal and bank information all of he employees have to agree and sign the data protection act this mearns that they agree to keep any information there given a secret, for example they can’t download data and give it to another company or another person because then they would be breaking the data protection act they have signed and could get fined or go to jail to up to 10 years. Als o there are laws that also stop an employee or a company giving data away to other companies or people but big companies find ways to get around this because they are legally allowed to give your data to third person party of their company unless you say otherwise. Business that keep personal and bank information on site should have physical security like cameras and guards and even guard dogs if the information is they import, they need this because it’s no good having amazing fire walls well someone could walk and a pick the server up and walk out.The DPA which stands for Data Protection Act 1998 is a UK act of parliament which is a UK law on the processing of data on identifiable of living people. It’s the main piece of info that governs use to enforce protection of personal data in the UK. The DPA does not mention privacy it was made to bring the law into line with the European Directive of 1995 which requires members to start to protect people fundamental rights a nd freedoms. This law is very effective and people get caught and feel the law hit them every day around the world. There are 8 data protection principles that relate to the data protection act 1998 they are as followed: 1.Personal data shall be processed fairly and lawfully and, in particular, shall not be processed unless – (a) At least one of the conditions in Schedule 2 is met, and (b) In the case of sensitive personal data, at least one of the conditions in Schedule 3 is also met. 2. Personal data shall be obtained only for one or more specified and lawful purposes, and shall not be further processed in any manner incompatible with that purpose or those purposes. 3. Personal data shall be adequate, relevant and not excessive in relation to the purpose or purposes for which they are processed. 4. Personal data shall be accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date. 5.Personal data processed for any purpose or purposes shall not be kept for longer than is necessary for th at purpose or those purposes. 6. Personal data shall be processed in accordance with the rights of data subjects under this Act. 7. Appropriate technical and organizational measures shall be taken against unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data and against accidental loss or destruction of, or damage to, personal data. 8. Personal data shall not be transferred to a country or territory outside the European Economic Area unless that country or territory ensures an adequate level of protection for the rights and freedoms of data subjects in relation to the processing of personal data. The most important of these is 7,The CMA which stands for computer misuse act 1990 in an act of parliament this was introduced partly in response to the decision and R v Gold & Schifreen 1998, the act has nonetheless become a model for which many other counties have drawn to when making their own visions of the CMA. The Consumer Protection Regulation mearns if you sell goods or services to c onsumers buy the internet, TV, mail, phone, or fax you need to stick to consumer protection regulations the key parts of these regulations mearns that you must give consumers clear information including details of the goods or services offered delivery arrangements and payment and you must also provide this information in writing and the consumer has a cooling? off period of seven working days.

Winning at Change Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Winning at Change - Essay Example The ingredients for good communication are that it needs to be direct and personal and not lean through memos; it should be correct as a precise message produces best results; euphoria is to be avoided at small achievements and the larger goal must be pursued relentlessly until realized; and the blame game must be abandoned. Change programmes should have a large spread with timeline for each segment. Within this smaller goals are easier to understand and become achievable. Effective partnerships must be built with various stakeholders first by engaging the right persons within the organisation for each job and then making strategic partnerships to cement relations with outsiders. Teamwork is essential and forming a winning team means building confidences and delegating authority. The vision is the binding force and it must be meaningful and beneficial for everyone. The intentions must be clear; ambitious but practical. Conflicts between stakeholders must be resolved through give and take, keeping the vision in mind. An organisation has leaders at all levels and each one performs the universal task of explaining the vision and encouraging others to step up their efforts in achieving them. Leadership is critical in change management and a leader is dynamic and caring and the organisational transformation depends entirely on them. A successful transformation requires eight steps. First a hard look at ground realities of market conditions, potential crises or opportunities will establish the need and the urgency for transformation. Secondly, forging coalitions or partnerships and encouraging teamwork to ensure smooth functioning. Thirdly, a clear vision is required to create motives and strategies. Fourthly, the effective communication of vision through any mean is necessary to galvanize actions. Next, people must be empowered and barriers and obstacles must be removed; thinking out of the box

ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT - Essay Example Some individuals monitor themselves in every condition and try to improve with time and circumstances. The ability to adapt in such individuals is always high. They utilize their social environments as a source of information. They are concerned about their actions in social gathering, social comparison information and demand of different situations. Various factors of internal and external environment influence individuals in different ways. Moral norms, attitudes, motives, social roles, type of family and guardianship, economic conditions, gender and social view towards particular gender, language and symbols and others influences value system of an individual. It has influence on their decision-making ability, level of confidence and self-perception. Risk is an uncertain situation. Fear of unknown is the most common threat of people experiencing any kind of risk. Risk can be of two forms i.e. inner risk of an individual like low self esteem, low level of confidence, language diffi culty or lack of ability while outer risk can be risk of not getting proper education, recognition, risk from cultural and community life, risk from society and many others. â€Å"In the last decade, the focus has shifted from burnout to secondary traumatic stress due to the recognition of the specific challenges of working with traumatized individuals. Whether we are addressing the impact of working with others in general or those, who have been traumatized, research agrees that we have a responsibility to maintain our own health and wellness as counselors (Iliffe & Steed, 2000; Miller, 1998; Savicki & Cooley, 1982; Sexton, 1999; Sherman, 1996) (as cited in OHalloran and Linton 2000) People react to their adverse situations differently. Some people lose their ability to work or perform under stress or high risk situations. This influences their decision-making abilities and positive development. At the same time, some individuals react differently to stressful and risky situations.

Environmental Ethics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Environmental Ethics - Essay Example Both authors have provided different categories of costs and benefits obtained from ecosystems, and more universal environmental principles. However, Steve Kelman does not agree with Freeman’s argument that cost-benefit analysis can be related to objectives mentioned above (e.g. human health protection, security, etc.). According to Kelman, regulatory judgments concerning the environment, security, and health are moral issues, and hence analysis of cost and benefit is improper since it necessitates the implementation of a poor moral mechanism. Kelman strengthens his position with several illustrations, majority of which concern individual or private judgments. He claims, in these circumstances, supporters of cost-benefit analysis, like Freeman, should abandon any moral doubts about human rights violation, deception, and corruption. These arguments about cost-benefit analysis can be used in addressing the poor food manufacturing process of fast-food companies, as discussed by E ric Schlosser. In his article, Schlosser gives a series of accusations against the unethical practices and processes of fast-food companies, such as refusal to give medical privileges, creating modern-day slavery, aggressive marketing to gullible children; these are the strategies employed by fast-food companies to maintain high profitability. Given this, and an idea of the arguments of Freeman and Kelman, cost-benefit analysis in this case may or may not be appropriate. Using the similar premises of Freeman and Kelman, cost-benefit analysis may be appropriate in determining how fast-food companies have powerfully changed the agricultural sector of industrialized nations, such as the United States. These fast-food companies, like McDonald’s, have generated marginal benefits to agriculture by centralizing production. However, because of this production consolidation, farmers and small enterprises are vanishing. There are also drastic alterations in animal domestication and foo d production which caused spates of food-related diseases, like the foot-and-mouth disease, mad cow, bird flu, and others. This situation, according to the arguments of Freeman and Kelman, may be subjected to cost-benefit analysis because of the nature of its effect to environmental policy. However, in terms of actual threats to human health, in accordance to Kelman’s arguments against the moral deficit of cost-benefit analysis, the case of poor food production practices is unviable. The unethical way fast-food companies conceal to the public the actual health perils of their products substantiate Kelman’s argument. Furthermore, the industry of meat packing even benefits more from government protection or immunity. Question 2 According to Christopher Stone, corporations should not be socially responsible because they are inherently irresponsible. The primary justification Stone provided is that nobody, from the ordinary citizen to large organizations, has a basic idea of the nature and requirement of corporate responsibility. In order to develop a model of his argument, Stone raises fundamental issues and thoroughly

Objectives Assignment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Objectives Assignment - Essay Example 1. As a result of screening and educating the vulnerable persons and people with pre diabetes, 50% of the Native Americans will adapt to a healthy lifestyle changes, thereby reducing the new incidents of diabetes according to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. (Affective) 2. As a result of facilitating and encouraging the individuals with family history of diabetes and obese individuals for regular, moderate physical activity, Native Americans will be able to reduce new incidents of diabetes by 50% according to the American Diabetes Association (Klein et al, 259). (Psychomotor) 3. As a result of early detection and professional treatments, American Indians can prevent 70% of the incidents of diabetic retinopathy and diabetic related renal failure according to the National Health Institute. (Cognitive) 4. As a result of increasing the availability and the accessibility of professional health care services, Native Americans will be able to prevent complications of diabetes by 50 percent according to the findings of the National Health Institute. (Cognitive) 5. According to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) American Indians will be able to prevent more than 50% of the new incidents of diabetes as a result of reducing body weight and maintaining healthy weight throughout the life. (Psychomotor) 6. According to the American Diabetes Association due to introduction and implementation of national policies related to dietary and lifestyle changes, Native Americans can effectively reduce new incidents of diabetes by 30% (Klein et al, 260). (Cognitive) 7. Considering the findings of the vast number of researches conducted on American Indians for 30 years, American Natives will be able to reduce new incidents by 25% as a result of consumption of low fat and low caloric diet (Yancy et al, 769). (Psychomotor) 8. As a result of the awareness programs

Major Project Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3750 words

Major Project - Research Paper Example Wisconsin in February 2011 fell under a dispute of collective bargaining and budget deficit. The governor of the state, Scott Walker introduced a bill regarding the budget shortage of $3.6 billion over the subsequent two fiscal years and said that it would be overcome if certain measures were followed. The governor in order to balance the budget deficit of the state proposed to confiscate collective bargaining from the public sector employees. The negotiation would only be restricted to their wages but it would only be increased up to consumer price index. The employees need to contribute more for pension and medical benefits but there would be no bargaining power. The employees in their working period had made a few contributions for pension benefits and now it is not possible to remove such benefits. The unions were of the opinion that the issue was a political attack to weaken the substantial support of the government workers from the public employee union. However, the government said that they were just conducting their duty for the welfare of the state otherwise the state would suffer from budget pitfall. If such proposal is approved, then it would affect the government workers, teachers, nurses and various other professionals. However, the government had decided to prepare the ultimate proposal related to the collective bargaining and would not accept the proposal of union members. The governor was of the opinion that stripping the public employees of the rights of collective bargaining and restraining the subjects of basic wages would provide the state a flexibility regarding the finances to be attained in sequence and also spare the tax payers from misery (Williams, 2011). These types of issues can be solved by logical obligation of cost on each side. Such issue can arise in any situation in the state but it would need to be solved by negotiating, taking into concern the welfare of both sides. The eligible public employees are also required for the gov ernment sector. Thus, the favorable decisions from the part of government are important for heartening the employees. This type of union is organized in order to improve the public service related to their improvement of wages, general welfare, working conditions and collaboration between employees and employers (Public Employee Union Local 1, n.d.). The collective bargaining right was given to the employees by law. The governor of a state suddenly could not remove such right of bargaining power from the employees. The paper covers the historical context of public employee union by citing examples. In this paper, the entire dispute of Wisconsin and their results has been discussed. Finally, the summary of the paper is discussed with critical analysis of both negative and positive basis. 2.0 History of Public Employee Unions Labor unions have been termed as "private combinations of workingmen" that endeavors to raise wages and boost the working conditions of the union members. The jo bs of Government constituted the ‘healthy’ part of structured labor where outside competition provides little or no discipline against union incompetence, privilege and price. In 1960, the union members were 900,000 which became 4 million by 1970, 6 million by 1976 and in the

Develop a tv show Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 1

Develop a tv show - Essay Example .† If we talk about the demographic profile of the audience, both the sexes, and both the genders, can see this TV show and benefit from it. The education level must be graduation, in order to better understand the theme behind the show. There is no limitation of ethnicity or race, since everybody is invited to take benefit from this show, without giving regard to ethnic or racial differences. The show will be broadcasted in (type the name of your country here), but slowly it will be promoted to other countries, because for us, all children are the same, and the profit of all children belonging to the whole world, is wanted. However, the teachers and parents must be at the income level where they can afford to get their children watch the show through DVDs, or by taking them to cinemas. At present, the area of intended audience’s residence is urban, but it will be carried to suburban and rural levels very soon through the efforts of our team. Johnson, Jessica A. â€Å"Parents and Teachers Need to Team Up to Help Lift Children out of Poverty. The Columbus Dispatch. The Dispatch Printing Company, 2012. Web. 5 Nov 2012.

Grant Proposal Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Grant Proposal - Essay Example Statistical data from WIC tell us that 50% of the new mothers in this area initiate breast feeding but only 14.5% maintain breast feeding (WIC). This implementation plan will put into place a peer to peer breastfeeding program. The aim would be to improve the numbers of maintained breast feeding mothers and infants. The program is a peer to peer (buddy program) to support mothers attempting to breast feed. As noted, many women initiate the attempt (50%) but those who manage to continue are only (14%). There are many reasons for this, some of which are lack of support, confusion, fear, and anxiety (Stube, 2009). The primary goal of this program would be to increase the numbers of women who are able to maintain breast feeding. Keeping mothers breast feeding at least the first few months could improve the health of both mother and infant (Stube, 2009). It has been shown through several recent studies that peer coaching improves the continuation of breast feeding. Hoddinott, Chalmers, and Pell (2006) supported the fact that in some areas this has increased up to 35%. This is further supported by a quasi experimental evaluation done by Olson, Haidir, and Vanggel et. al. (2010) in which they found that peer to peer counseling improved initiation by 27 points and increased duration by 3 week. In Bangaladesh Hollander showed that peer counseling increased breast feeding at five months by 70% and Shafer, Vogel, and Vigas (2009) showed in their randomized control trial, an increase of 6% initiation and 9% continuation in rural low income women. Referral Peer support is provided through a network of volunteers that are trained in the problems related to breast feeding as well as having been successful at breast feeding themselves. This training will be initiated through the WIC and LaLeche League International program to assure that the new mothers are getting the support that is needed. The idea is to choose a supporting peer that has the same culture and socioeconomic background as the mother to be supported. The new mother may be referred in several ways including WIC, Public Health, Food Stamps, physician, social services, self referral and others. Access Once the mother has been referred she is contacted by a peer and given information, including classes that she can attend that prepare her for the breast feeding process. This includes such procedures as needed to harden nipples, decreasing pain on initiation of breastfeeding. After childbirth, the provide nonmedical assistance as needed to reduce frustration and anxiety in the new mother who is attempting to breast feed. This includes the mother who goes back to work. Often, the transition from breastfeeding to pumping and bottle feeding is extremely difficult (Dennis, Hodnett, & Gallop, 2002). The peer who has been successful through this transition can help quite a lot in improving this transition, keeping the mother breast feeding for a longer period of time. This program would be based in the community clinics in each of these counties but the peers are available through the hospital setting as well as phone. Telephone counseling and support are available 4 times per day. Peer Training Peers will be expected to attend classes on basic breastfeeding management, nutrition, infant

M1A3_Team develop and Leadership Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

M1A3_Team develop and Leadership - Essay Example The size of the team was determined based on the roles of all the team members. As such, the ten positions were necessary in an effort to increase the efficiency of the team (Daft & Lane 2008). The team was constituted in 2009 after the founders realized that it would play a crucial societal role. In addition, the â€Å"Tuckman’s Stages of Group Development† was instrumental in the formation of the team (Daft & Lane 2008). The team members acknowledged that members had similar interests. Moreover, each of the team members had to have exceptional ability to sing with the intention of producing better songs. Indeed, there is a distinct relation between the team and the goals, which it seeks to accomplish throughout their activities. For instance, the team focuses on inspiring the people they interact with through their activities, for example, singing (Hedgeman 2007). The major goals of this choir team include maintaining the group for a significantly long time. In addition, the group focuses on inspiring individuals through the songs. The group also focuses on creating a mentor position in its immediate environment. The mentor position will be instrumental in enhancing the inspirational levels (Knight& Fink 2003). The members of the choir collectively decide on the goals of this team. Consequently, this collective decision on goals enhances rapid growth of the choir. Since the team aims to inspire through their songs, they can develop as a team. Moreover, each member should be responsible to achieve perfect execution of the goals of the team. The team achieves this target when they constantly meet for their rehearsals (Maddux & Winfield 2003). Every member of the team is accountable in fulfilling the goals. Additionally, extensive levels of interconnectivity and connection in the team are supported. For instance, team members must meet on regular basis for practice; furthermore, they communicate on the team’s advancement. They can

Democratic Consolidation in Nigeria Essay Example for Free

Democratic Consolidation in Nigeria Essay This development was heralded as an avenue to usher in democratic stability and good governance. However, contrary to widespread expectations, the post-military regime became an avenue for the explosion of violent ethno-religious conflicts in Nigeria. As a matter of fact, since the emergence of democracy in May 1999, not less than one hundred ethnically and religiously instigated conflicts have occurred in Nigeria which resulted in loss of lives and unquantifiable material and psychological damage. Drawing from documentary research and findings, this paper probes the persistent spate of ethno-religious crises in Nigeria and its harmful implications on democratic consolidation in Nigeria. It investigates the history, causes and manifestations of ethno-religious conflicts in Nigeria and maintains that unbridled lust for power, corruption, religious intolerance and the failure of the government to deliver democratic dividends, have resulted in these conflicts between ethnic and religious groups in the country. In the light of all these then, can democracy thrive in an atmosphere of crises? Can Nigeria come out of ethno-religious conflicts? If so, what steps can the government take to rein in the menace of these crises? Finally, the paper provides submissions for curbing this social epidemic, which has become a permanent feature of the Nigerian social polity. Keywords: Nigeria, Ethno-religious, Crises, Democracy, Development Introduction Democracy could be said to be a seed: when you sow bountifully, you reap bountifully. Thus, one of the dividends of democracy, which Nigerians have reaped in abundance since the transfer of power from the military to the civilians on May 29, 1999, is the rising wave of ethno-religious conflicts with devastating and untold consequences on lives and property (Jega, 2007: 116). Nigeria is a very populous nation in Africa with diverse cultural heritage. In fact, the country has a population of over 140 million and over 400 ethnic groups belonging to different religious sects as well (Salawu, 2010: 345). Since the attainment of independence, Nigeria has remained a multi-ethnic nation, which has been grappling with the problem of ethnicity on the one hand and that of ethno-religious conflicts on the other hand. At the inception of independence, for administrative expediency the various ethnic factions were fused and merged together by the colonialists. Then, the colonial masters left and things started falling apart, the center no longer held. No ethnic group desired to see the other. Little wonder then that the former Secretary of State at the British Colonial Office (1952-1959), Sir Peter Smitters regretted the action taken by the British to merge diverse ethnic groups into one in Nigeria. According to Ali (2004) cited in Adebayo (2010: 214), he was reported to have lamented that it was extremely dangerous to force diverse radical and social entities into single rigid political structure. However, that statement was medicine after death; the deed had been done. Indeed, a conglomerate of almost four hundred ethnic groups, each having its distinct history, language, culture and political systems before the colonial rule, all preserved in mitigated forms with the British system of governance super-imposed and named Nigeria really had future implications for unity. The colonial administration, for administrative convenience, compressed and merged the various ethnic groups in their respective regions, making Hausa/Fulani, Igbo, and Yoruba the major ethnic groups and reinforced the three political/administrative divisions – the north, the east, and the west, under appropriate constitutional arrangement. At independence and post independence era, the status-quo of the colonial era was retained under that infantile freedom, with every group retaining its tradition, language, and culture while sharing the common central institutions in a federal arrangement (Adebayo, 2010: 214). As a result, these major ethnic groups, because of their opportunistic positions were seen as consistently dominating the political and economic scene before and after the attainment of independence in 1960 and this led to agitations for state creation by the other â€Å"minor† ethnic groups who saw themselves as the marginalized groups. However, the more states were created, the more the complaints of marginalization and inequality by the new minorities against the new majorities in each state (Abdullahi and Saka, 2007). Consequently, the proliferation of ethno-religious and political turbulence in the country is therefore necessitated on the one hand by cultural, communal and religious differences and on the other hand by fear of domination nursed by the minority groups. As if what constitutes the federalism is not satisfied, there have been agitations for reversing back to the old regional autonomy of the different groups for the purpose of determining the pace of their development and control of their respective resources. These pernicious phenomena of ethnicity and religious intolerance led to the incessant surge of ethno-religious conflicts, which gave birth to the many ethnic militias today like the O’dua People’s Congress (OPC) put in place by the Yoruba in the south-western part of the country to fight for the protection and defence of Yoruba in Nigeria; the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB), fighting for the cessation of the Igbo ethnic tribe in Nigeria; the Bakassi Boys; the Egbesu Boys; the Ijaw Youth Congress (IYC), the Igbo Peoples’ congress (IPC); the Arewa People’ Congress (APC) and the Ohaneze Ndigbo among others. This might probably be the feeling of Elaigwu (2005: 12) when he writes †¦the violent protests in the Niger-Delta over perceived injustice in resource distribution; the Itsekiri-Ijaw violence in the Delta; the resumption of the Ife-Modakeke communal violence; the menace of Odu’a Peoples’ Congress (OPC) and the accompanying violence in Lagos and Shagamu areas; the formation of the Arewa Peoples’ Congress (APC) and the Igbo Peoples’ Congress (IPC); the MASSOB feeble attempt to resuscitate Biafra; the Sharia crisis and the demands for a confederation; the South-South demand for the control of its resources; and all the recent interethnic/religious conflicts in various states across the country are all part of the bubbles of the Nigerian federation. They are based on the historical structures of mutual fears and suspicions among Nigerian groups in a competitive process. They reflect dissatisfaction of Nigerian groups with the state of the federation. With the emergence of all these ethnic militias and the deep divide between the various ethnic groups, religious intolerance became more violent and bloody with more devastating results using the ethnic militias as the executing platforms of ethno-religious agenda. Federalism thought to be an approach to national unity, resulted to anarchy in the country. A number of steps were taken to at least mend the disunity and disarray prevalent then and promote unity among the various ethnic groups. These included the establishment of federal institutions in some states of the federation, promotion of national cultural and sporting activities, and, more significantly, the National Youth Service Programme (NYSC), just to mention a few (Adebayo, 2010). Although these steps yielded pockets of successes in achieving national unity, the â€Å"unholy† marriage of convenience of the ethnic groups still begs for irrevocable divorce. While the ethnic rivalry held sway, religious pluralism, which culminated in many crises, shook the country to its very roots. The pernicious effect of this trend is not entirely surprising given the fact that religion is so sensitive to Nigerians that many are not only ready to defend it at all costs, but are ready to die for it. Hence, religious pluralism which resulted in religious intolerance was fused with ethnic rivalry, producing the recurrent spate of ethno-religious crises. And because of the violent nature of ethno-religious conflicts, which often take the form of riots, sabotage, assassinations, lynching and maiming, kidnappings, armed struggles, guerilla warfare and secession in Nigeria, they undoubtedly pose dangerous threats to democracy in Nigeria and Africa as a whole. Yes, as Jega (2007: 116) truthfully stated, the genetically engineered seeds of democracy planted by our colonial masters and further successive military regimes have grown to mature crops for harvest. Instead of democracy yielding peace, stability and security to lives and property, it seems to have yielded a return, full circle spate of ethno-religious conflicts and violent eruptions. Thus, the discussion of ethno-religious conflicts in whatever context becomes all the more necessary given the fact that there is a phenomenal recurrence of these conflicts around the nation thereby increasing its threat level to democratic consolidation in Nigeria. It is against this backdrop that this paper attempts to probe the history, manifestations and implications of ethno-religious crises in Nigeria since the dawn of democratic dispensation. Causes of Ethno-Religious Crises in Nigeria According to Awolowo (1990: 35), the notion of Nigeria as â€Å"a mere geographic expression† was engendered by the forceful packaging by colonial authoritarian fiat of unwilling communities of diverse origin and culture under the same polity. Consequently, relations and political behavior of the peoples are characterized by mutual suspicion and invidious hatred since they are strange bed-fellows, who were only coerced into the nation-state via amalgamation. Until 1960, Nigeria was a British colony. Like most colonies, it was not constructed for internal coherence, but rather for the administrative convenience of the British (Shively, 1997: 39). Over 400 different languages and dialects are spoken within its borders, and there is also an important religious split, as the north is primarily Muslim and the south is predominantly Christian, making her not only at ethno-religious crossroads but also at linguistic crossroads. As diverse as these ethnic groups are, they are also not accommodative of each other’s religion and professions of faith. This state of intolerance has added up to fuel the spate of crises in Nigeria. It should be noted that religion has always been the platform for frontal expressions of ethnic aggressions and conflict. Hence, ethnocentric politics, sectional solidarity and primordial interests became prominent features in the nation’s political practice. Sectional and individual virtues and interest rather than collective virtues and national unity are advanced and exalted. Thus, communal orientation precluded any attachment to the state and the syndrome of the ‘son of the soil’ took preference over merit and competence in the choice of policies and leaders. Although as Obasanjo and Mabogunje (1992: 4) aptly observed, colonialism provided scaffolding of holding the different communities together, not much change was achieved in altering communal mentality and predilection. Nonetheless, the persistent military incursion into government and politics did much harm for the body polity as national issues was mostly tribalized and primordial virtues extolled. These regimes had primordial outlook and sub-national mentality under which the northern part of the country was favoured brazenly, on one hand, and the southern part was deliberately dealt with in terms of appointments, contracts, location of government establishments, political oppression and repression as well as provision of social services and infrastructures. As a result, ethnic sectarianism has left a trail of destructive violence and even threatened the territorial integrity of Nigeria (International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, 2001). Indeed, after long years of authoritarian rule, when the military clique and their civilian collaborators privatized the Nigerian state (Ukiwo, 2003), politicians in the emergent Fourth Republic were all too anxious to claim control of the state and its oil wealth as well. This thus led to an unbridled competition for political relevance and spheres of interests among politicians, especially in the context of the division of the country into geopolitical zones, states and local governments and the fact that distribution of benefits among the political class depended on the ability of each member of the ruling class to deliver his constituency. This lust for power has led to the neglect of the needs of the masses and the demand for peaceful co-existence. Instead, the rulers continue to enrich their pockets through corrupt dirty means and seek for elongation of tenures for selfish gains. In the circumstance, ethnicity, religion and other sectarian identities are exploited, resulting in avoidable violent conflicts among component units of the country. The persistence of mass poverty and increasing income inequality, largely as a result of the transformation of the fortunes of politicians and their allies from jobless neighbors to emergency billionaires in less than two years after capturing power, have deepened popular alienation. It has also called into question the legitimacy since 1999. Consequently, some of the easiest things to do in contemporary Nigeria are to mobilize an assassin, vigilante, ethnic-cum-religious militia, rioter, crowd or rented pro-government demonstrator. The result could only be imagined. The power lust of the political cliche is one of the perceived causes of ethno-religious crises in Nigeria. Another reason responsible for ethno-religious crises in Nigeria is the wrong interpretation by those who claim authority to the understanding of the holy books. If not so, one wonders why people act contrary to the teaching of the holy books (whether the Quran or the Bible) in matters pertaining to peaceful co-existence, unity and sanctity of life, and property. As it is a serious disease for someone who does not have a full grasp of the interpretation of any of the holy books to claim authority to knowledge, many of the so called ‘religious leaders’ use their shallow knowledge to put up interpretations to suit their selfish ends banking on the ignorance of their followers. Lamenting on the wide gap between the teaching and practice of religion among its adherents, Adebayo (2003) cited in Adebayo (2010: 219) identified some factors responsible for using religion as instrument of polarization, among which is leadership tussle, which also culminated in the proliferation of many denominations in the country. Also, sectarian jingoism, as well as excessive patriotism to one’s religious sect, which consequently transformed to fanaticism, is another major factor contributing to this social menace. Salawu (2010) also noted that the failure of the Nigerian leaders to establish good governments, forge national integration and promote what can be called real economic progress, through deliberate and articulated policies, has led to mass poverty and unemployment. This has resulted into communal, ethnic, religious and class conflicts that have now characterized the Nigerian nation. Poverty and unemployment have therefore served as nursery bed for many ethno-religious conflicts in Nigeria because the country now has a reservoir of poor people who warmongers as mercenary fighters. What this means theoretically is that poverty and unemployment increase the number of people who are prepared to kill or be killed for a given course at token benefit. This explains why all ethno-religious crises that ever occurred in Nigeria have a large turnout of people (including the under-aged) as fighters. Lastly and very importantly, and not the least, the ethno-religious conflicts in Nigeria also have some historical antecedent (Salawu, 2010). This is because many governmental actions during the colonial rule and after independence encouraged, to a large extent, the sowing of the seeds of ethno-religious conflicts that are found to be rampant in the Nigerian nation today. Over the years, many events in Nigeria have led to the politicization of mistrust, intolerance, violence and acrimonious relations between the mainly Moslem north and the Christian south of Nigeria. To this extent, there has been an unfortunate insertion of ethno-religious discrimination and incompatibility in the structures of the Nigerian State since the colonial period. The political events of the January 15, 1966 coup and the July 1966 counter-coup further entrenched ethno-religious configuration in Nigeria. This is because the killings and counter-killing that followed the coups which took ethnic and religious colorations as the Muslim dominated tribes in the north were set against the Christian-dominated tribes of the southern region.

Authors illustrate what is creativity

Authors illustrate what is creativity What is creativity? (not meant to provide an encyclopedic view of its primary object-matter Creativity has a rich and long history. Yet, the intriguing thing about it is that most people feel intuitively what creativity is, but find it hard to define it. The cause is the terms complexity and vagueness. There is, in fact, no single, authoritative perspective or definition of creativity. A few â€Å"personal definitions† by various famous authors may illustrate this disparity of views: Originality is the essence of true scholarship. Creativity is the soul of the true scholar. Nnamdi Azikiwe The creative person is both more primitive and more cultivated, more destructive, a lot madder and a lot saner, than the average person. Frank Barron Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen. Robert Bresson A hunch is creativity trying to tell you something. Frank Capra I have great belief in the fact that whenever there is chaos, it creates wonderful thinking. I consider chaos a gift. Septima Poinsette Clark Our inventions mirror our secret wishes. Lawrence Durrell â€Å"The creative individual is a person who regularly solves problems, fashions products, or defines new questions in a domain that is initially considered novel but that ultimately becomes accepted in a particular cultural setting.† Howard Gardner (1993): From things that have happened and from things as they exist and from all things that you know and all those you cannot know, you make something through your invention that is not a representation but a whole new thing truer than anything true and alive, and you make it alive, and if you make it well enough, you give it immortality. That is why you write and for no other reason that you know of. But what about all the reasons that no one knows? Ernest Hemingway Everything vanishes around me, and works are born as if out of the void. Ripe, graphic fruits fall off. My hand has become the obedient instrument of a remote will. Paul Klee An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail. Edwin Land The artist produces for the liberation of his soul. It is his nature to create as it is the nature of water to run down the hill. W. Somerset Maugham Creativity is not merely the innocent spontaneity of our youth and childhood; it must also be married to the passion of the adult human being, which is a passion to live beyond ones death. Rollo May When all is said and done, monotony may after all be the best condition for creation. Margaret Sackville Our current obsession with creativity is the result of our continued striving for immortality in an era when most people no longer believe in an after-life. Arianna Stassinopoulos â€Å"The ability to produce work that is both novel (original or unexpected) appropriate. The creative individual persists in the face of resistance.† Robert J. Sternberg (1992) In order to create there must be a dynamic force, and what force is more potent than love? Igor Stravinsky The imagination imitates. It is the critical spirit that creates. Oscar Wilde â€Å"Creativity is the ability to illustrate what is outside the box from within the box.† -The Ride It is almost as if you were frantically constructing another world while the world that you live in dissolves beneath your feet, and that your survival depends on completing this construction at least one second before the old habitation collapses. Tennessee Williams A line will take us hours maybe; Yet if it does not seem a moments thought, Our stitching and unstitching has been naught. W. B. Yeats What, then, is Creativity? Firstly, here is what it is not: Its not just a faculty reserved for artists (musicians, painters, actors), only for writers/authors, scientists, business leaders, or academic ‘stars Its not just for children. Throughout our lives it is a part of us and of our personality. Some people display and apply it more than others, and by doing so it defines their lives. Creativity is timeless. Verdi composed Falstaff at the age of 80. Titian painted many of his best works late in life, and lived to be 100. Tolstoy wrote Resurrection ten years before his death, 82 years old. Creativity has several meanings defined by the transitions Person?Process?Product The meaning of creativity is descriptive: Johnny is so creative! = Person The meaning of creativity is a happening: Children lose track of time when immersed in play = Process The meaning of creativity is the end result: What is produced or completed. = Product (www.sla.org/conf/conf_sar//Barrancotto%20-%20creativity.ppt ) A commonly accepted view of creativity is that it is a mental and social process resulting in the generation of new ideas, terms or concepts. In rare instances these new ideas, terms, or concepts may be original, i. e. unknown previously. Most often, however, they emerge as a result of new combinations of known (existing) ideas or concepts, improvements on them, and associations between them. The mental and social process called creativity must run in some real or virtual environment. This environment has been studied from many points of view and in many scientific disciplines, for instance in philosophy, behavioral and social psychology, psychometrics, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, economics, business, and management. The studies have focused on everyday creativity, exceptional creativity and even artificial (computer enhanced) creativity. The results of the studies show clearly and convincingly that whatever approach is creative in one field of human endeavor can hardly be applied directly in a different field and produce creative results. Thus, an approach that leads to some creative results in, say, mathematics or psychology, will not necessarily produce any creative results in art, business, or psychology. The studies, however, have not lead to any unique and generally applicable definition of creativity. In the absence of a generally valid and accepted definition of creativity, it is always possible to set up a pragmatic set of requirements creativity should satisfy. They might run as follows: Creativity must result in something â€Å"new† as perceived by the people involved. The term new can have a variety of meanings, possibly requiring litigations to prove the validity of this or that meaning. Creativity must result in something that in the eyes of the creators is â€Å"better†. Again what is better? It is a matter of individual or group choice and preference. At this point, we disregard ethical issues stemming from situations in which the creative effort of an individual or a group leads to something â€Å"better† is perceived as something (considerably) â€Å"worse† by another individual or group. Creativity must affect the human life in some way. This implies that the creative result can be or has been implemented, often by technical means. Creativity, as considered in this book, reflects the creativity of the typical segment of the human population, rather than the unique blend of ability, motivation and serendipity dramatically exceeding the social and psychological norm, and resulting in major breakthroughs. Such exceptional abilities were manifested in the works of Leonardo da Vinci, Mozart, or Fuller, to name a few exceptionally creative people. Creativity is a property inseparable from the creative man. It does not exist suspended in the nowhere. For this reason, a number of psychologists studied the circumstances under which creativity in man manifests and what the peculiarities of that person are. Before we review the most significant research efforts, it is good to review briefly the fields of human activity in which creativity has played a major part. Creativity in various contexts There are many perspectives and contexts in which creativity and its importance can and must be studied. This plurality of of views of creativity makes it hard, if not impossible, to file creativity under a single heading. The simplest solution is to consider the various approaches as undisciplinary, rather than trying to form a coherent overall view. The following sections examine some of the areas in which creativity is seen as being important. Creativity in psychology and cognitive science Psychology and cognitive science are the primary arenas for the study of the mental and social process resulting in the generation of new ideas, terms or concepts and any other forms of creative thought. A large number of famous psychologists have contributed to the study of the mental and social processes. Their work is reviewed in a separate section. Examples of psychological thinking and research can, however, be found in most branches of human endeavor. (A psychodynamic approach to understanding creativity was proposed by Sigmund Freud, who suggested that creativity arises as a result of frustrated desires for fame, fortune, and love, with the energy that was previously tied up in frustration and emotional tension in the neurosis being sublimated into creative activity. Freud later retracted this view.[citation needed]) Creativity in science and mathematics Mathematics is a highly abstract discipline that, nevertheless, permeates more and more other disciplines. At the same time, mathematics scares most students. From the point of creative thinking it is therefore natural to ask: How does a mathematician think to produce something new, better, and affecting the human life? Several outstanding mathematicians have described their thinking and summarized their views of creative mathematical thinking. The French mathematician Jacques Hadamard described the process in his book Psychology of Invention in the Mathematical Field, using introspection. Hadamards thinking differs from that of authors for whom language and cognition are inseparable in that it is, in his own words, wordless and often accompanied by mental images. Hadamard asked 100 leading physicists in the beginning of the previous century how they arrived at their problem solutions. Among his test subjects were giants of science, like Gauss, Poincarà ©, Helmholtz. He found that many of the responses were the same as his own, i. e. They viewed the whole solution suddenly and spontaneously (Hadamard, 1954, pp. 13-16). Helmholtz and Poincarà © ere personalities of their own class. ***** Referring to Helmholtz, Hadamards process comprises four steps (i) preparation, (ii) incubation, (iv) illumination, and (v) verification. It thus differs from the five-step model proposed by Graham Wallas in that Step (iii) intimation, was left out (ibid. p. 56). Another outstanding mathematician interested (in his latter days) in the methodology of problem solving was George Polya, of the ETH, Zurich. He wrote four books on the methods that people use to solve problems, and to describe how problem solving should be taught and learned. The books (the publication year is that of the issue used) are: How to Solve It (2004), Mathematical Discovery:On Understanding, Learning, and Teaching Problem Solving (1981); Mathematics and Plausible Reasoning Volume I: Induction and Analogy in Mathematics (1990), and Mathematics and Plausible Reasoning Volume II: Patterns of Plausible Reasoning (1990). The most important among these books probably is How to Solve It, in which Polya provides general heuristics for solving problems of all kinds, including mathematical ones. The book offers advice for teaching students of mathematics and comprises a mini-encyclopedia of heuristic terms. It sold over one million copies and was translated into many languages. Other mathematicians who made statements on the topic of problem solving include G. H. Hardy and Marie-Louise von Franz. In his Mathematicians Apology (1941), Hardy states, among others: I am interested in mathematics only as a creative art. The mathematicians patterns, like the painters or the poets must be beautiful; the ideas, like the colours or the words must fit together in a harmonious way. Beauty is the first test: there is no permanent place in this world for ugly mathematics. A mathematician, like a painter or poet, is a maker of patterns. If his patterns are more permanent than theirs, it is because they are made with ideas. I believe that mathematical reality lies outside us, that our function is to discover or observe it, and that the theorems which we prove, and which we describe grandiloquently as our â€Å"creations,† are simply the notes of our observations (Hardy, 1941). Marie-Louise von Franz collaborated with psychiatrist Carl Jung who worked on archetypes and patterns. According to Jung, archetypes organize images and ideas. This is an unconscious process that cannot be detected until afterwards. Marie-Louise von Franz discovered an important recurring factor: the simultaneity with which the complete solution is intuitively perceived and can be checked later by discursive reasoning (von Franz, 1992). Creativity in diverse cultures Creativity is a scientific concept that is mostly rooted within a Western creationist perspective. Franà §ois Jullien (1997, 1989) examines the concept from a Chinese cultural point of view. Julliens point of departure is the necessity to work on reducing the distance that separates the Chinese and the European modes of thinking, and restart philosophy. Fangqi Xu et al. (2005) reported on the availability of creativity courses in various countries. Lubart and Sternberg (1999) studied extensively the cultural aspects of creativity and innovation. The authors conclude that creativity, like intelligence, is something everybody possesses. Creativity can be developed. Creative people are able to generate/intuit new and possibly unpopular ideas. They can also work with determination to make these ideas accepted by others. Creative people have the willingness to take sensible risks to go against the crowd in effective ways. Creativity in art and literature Requirements on creativity in the arts and literature differ from the requirements in other fields. While in most fields of the human endeavor, both originality and appropriateness are necessary (Amabile, 1998), in the fields of art and literature creativity is reduced to originality only, as a sufficient condition. Yet, the fields of art and literature for most people represent the true domain of creativity. The different modes of artistic expression do not represent an entirely homogeneous environment. Yet, a continuum extending from â€Å"interpretation† to â€Å"innovation† can be postulated in all established artistic movements and genres. Here, practitioners gravitate to the interpretation end of the scale, whereas original thinkers strive towards the innovation pole. In spite of this coarse division, some â€Å"creative† people (dancers, actors, orchestral members, etc.) are expected to perform (interpret), while others (writers, painters, composers, etc.) get more freedom to express the new and the different. In judging theories of art, several alternatives can be considered. One alternative is the artistic inspiration, comparable to invention. It provides a taste of â€Å"the Divine† in the form of transmission of visions from â€Å"divine sources† such as the Muses. Another alternative is the artistic evolution, comparable to crafts. It focuses on obeying established rules and imitating or appropriating, which results in subtly different but conflict-free and understandable work. Finally, if the creative product is the language, there is the artistic conversation, as in any â€Å"-ism,† stressing the depth of communication. One of the basic questions in looking at artistic creativity, given the uniqueness of the artistic product, is the question of authorship. Many scholars have worked on it. Two rather similar views, even though a generation apart, are the views of the French philosopher Michel Foucault and the Serbian scholar Davor DÃ…Â ¾alto. Foucault claims that all authors are writers, but not all writers are authors. He exemplifies his thesis by the fact that a private letter may have a writer it does not have an author (Foucault, 1969). An author, according to Foucault, exists only as a function of a written work, as a part of its structure. However, the interpretive process is â€Å"the author function.† Thus, for a reader to assign the title of author to the writer of any written work is to confirm that certain standards of the text are working in conjunction with Foucaults idea of â€Å"the author function.† DÃ…Â ¾altos work (DÃ…Â ¾alto, 2003) is based on examination of the relations between personhood and authorship in the context of the post-modern society and the globalized world. His theory stipulates that art represents an expression of the personal identity of the human being, having an existential importance. Human creativity is a basic feature of both the personal existence of the human being and art production. Creativity is thus a basic cultural and anthropological category, since it enables human manifestation in the world as a â€Å"real presence† in contrast to the progressive â€Å"virtualization† of the world. In other words, approaching artistic creativity Foucault focuses on the author function, whereas DÃ…Â ¾alto talks about a real presence of human manifestation in the (possibly virtualized) world. Creative industries, professions and services Creativity is perceived as increasingly important in creative industries and related professions. Creative industries constitute a family of human activities that generate a non-tangible value expressible in monetary units, either by means of creating and exploiting intellectual property or by means of providing creative services. This heading covers such activities as art and antiques markets, architecture, advertising, design, fashion, film, music, performing arts, publishing, computer software services, radio, TV, and the like. Creative professions are any of those involved in the activities listed, including some aspects of scientific research and development, product development, marketing, strategy, curriculum design, some types of teaching, and similar activities. The creative professional workforce is becoming a more integral part of the economies of industrialized nations. It is estimated that in the USA alone, approximately 10 million people work as creative professionals, but there may be twice as many. Accurate estimates are difficult to make, since many creative professionals actors and writers in particular also have a secondary job. Creativity in engineering and sciences Fields such as science and engineering have experienced a less explicit (but arguably no less important) relation to creativity. Simonton is one of many authors who show how some of the major scientific advances in science and engineering can be attributed to the creativity of individuals (Simonton, 1999). Borderline cases exist, too. A good example is accounting. â€Å"Creative accounting† is a popular term denoting unethical practices. However, Amabile suggests that accounting, too, can benefit from creative approaches if these are kept within ethical borders (Amabile 1998). Excellent example of the â€Å"creative leap† can be found in the realm of sciences, be it mathematics, physics, chemistry, medicine, or any other branch of science. Isaac Newtons law of gravity is popularly attributed to a creative leap he experienced by Newton when observing a falling apple. Creativity in organizations According to Amabile, to enhance creativity in business, three components are necessary (Amabile, 1998): Expertise, i. e. technical, procedural, intellectual and tacit knowledge, creative thinking skills, i. e. the flexibility and imagination with which people approach problems, and motivation, particularly its intrinsic variety. The importance of the combination of knowledge and creativity is best exemplified by the unprecedented success of some far-eastern nations, notably Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, Korea and Thailand, which have in recent years been joined by India and China. Economic views of creativity Almost a century ago, Joseph Schumpeter (1942) introduced the economic theory of creative destruction, to describe the creative way in which old ways of doing things are destroyed from within and replaced by new ways. Economists like Paul Romer see creativity as an important element in the recombination of elements to produce new technologies and products. Romer (articles published in 1986 and 1990 amounted to) constructed mathematical representations of economies in which technological change is the result of the intentional actions of people, such as research and development. This is how economic growth becomes a reality and leads to capital. Romer also saw the importance is conditions that demand change, as follows form his popular saying: â€Å"A crisis is a terrible thing to waste†. Creativity is also an important aspect to understanding entrepreneurship. The creative class is seen by some to be an important driver of modern economies. In his 2002 book, The Rise of the Creative Class, economist Richard Florida popularized the notion that regions with â€Å"3 Ts of economic development: Technology, Talent and Tolerance† also have high concentrations of creative professionals and tend to have a higher level of economic development. Florida, R. (2002). The Rise of the Creative Class. New York: Basic Books. Romer, P. (1986). â€Å"Increasing Returns and Long-Run Growth†, Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 94, No. 5 (Oct. 1986), pp. 1002-1037. Romer, P. (1990). â€Å"Endogenous Technological Change†, Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 98, No. 5, â€Å"Part 2: The Problem of Development: A Conference on the Institute for the Study of Free Enterprise Systems.† pp. S71-102. Schumpeter, J. A. (1942). Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. New York: Harper and Brothers. 5th ed.

Food Clustering For Diabetes Diet Health And Social Care Essay

Food Clustering For Diabetes Diet Health And Social Care Essay The common way for Diabetes Educators to inform diabetes patients of their nutrition therapy is by introducing food substitution. The existing categorization mechanism is not efficiently for classify the food for diabetic patient. Clustering Data Mining (DM) Techniques can be a very useful tool to collect food items with the same elements into groups. This paper looks at the use of K-mean to Cluster food dataset into groups based on food elements using RapidMiner tool .The output from the clustering algorithm will help other recommendation systems software to provide patient with a good recommendation for there diabetes diet. Keywords data mining; diabetes, data set ,K-meant. 1. Introduction Food and nutrition are a key to have good health. They are important for everyone to maintain a healthy diet especially for diabetic patients who have several limitations. Nutrition therapy is a major solution to prevent, manage and control diabetes by managing the nutrition based on the belief that food provides vital medicine and maintains a good health. Typically, diabetic patients need to avoid additional sugar and fat for finding the substitution from the same food group [4].The effective clustering from the various actual nutrients is needed to apply. The clustering will encourage diabetics to eat the widest possible variety of permitted food to ensure getting the full range of trace elements and other nutrients. This paper is set out as follows. Section 2, introduces some related work of data mining and diabetic diet. Section 3, describes the used data set and summarize the main features that it contains. Data preparation process is presented in Section 4. Section 5, describes the materials and methods used in this study. In Section 6, the conclusion is given. 2. Literature Review Li et al [1], this study proposed an automated food ontology constructed for diabetes diet care. The methods include generating an ontology skeleton with hierarchical clustering algorithms (HCA)also it is used intersection naming for class naming and instance ranking by granular ranking and positioning .This study based on dataset from food nutrition composition database of the Department Of Health the dataset. Phanich et al [2], proposed Food Recommendation System (FRS) by using food clustering analysis for diabetic patients. The system will recommend the proper substituted foods in the context of nutrition and food characteristic. They used Self-Organizing Map (SOM) and K-mean clustering for food clustering analysis which is based on the similarity of eight significant nutrients for diabetic patient. This study is based on the dataset à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“Nutritive values for Thai foodà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  provided by Nutrition Division, Department of Health, Ministry of Public Health (Thailand). 3. Dataset Description This study is based on the dataset provided by The USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference (SR)[3].the Values in the database based on the results of laboratory analyses or calculated by using appropriate algorithms, factors, or recipes, as indicated by the source in the Nutrient Data file. Not every food item contains a complete nutrient profile. The used data set is an abbreviated file with fewer nutrients but all the food items was included. The Dataset contains all the food items with nutrients with 7540 records and 52 attributes. Table1, 2 and 3 show data set attributes and their description. In order to check for missing value I used Rapid Miner tool. Table 4 present sample of data set. 4. Data Preparation The quality of the results of the mining process is directly proportional to the quality of the data. I need first to prepare the data set by applying Data preprocessing strategies. Data preprocessing is an important and critical step in the data mining process, and it has a huge impact on the success of a data mining project. The purpose of data preprocessing is to cleanse the dirty/noise data. Fig. 1 shows the different strategies in the data preprocessing phase. In this study I focused on data cleaning and data reduction. Figure 1 strategies in data preprocessing Table 1 description of data set attributes from 1- 24Table 2 description of data set attributes from 25-48 Table 3 description of data set attributes from 49-52 Table 4 Sample of dataset Shrt_Desc Water Energ_Kcal Protein Lipid_Tot Ash Carbohydrt Sugar_Tot othersà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ BUTTER,WITH SALT 15.87 717 0.85 81.11 2.11 0.06 0.06 BUTTER,WHIPPED,WITH SALT 15.87 717 0.85 81.11 2.11 0.06 0.06 BUTTER OIL,ANHYDROUS 0.24 876 0.28 99.48 0 0 0 CHEESE,BLUE 42.41 353 21.4 28.74 5.11 2.34 0.5 CHEESE,BRICK 41.11 371 23.24 29.68 3.18 2.79 0.51 Data Cleaning Data cleaning, also called data cleansing or scrubbing, deals with detecting and removing errors and Inconsistencies from data in order to improve the quality of data [6]. The aim of data cleaning is to raise the data quality to a level suitable for the clustering analyses. The Methods used for data cleaning are fill in missing values and eliminate data redundancy. Missing value: It is common for the dataset to have fields that contain unknown or missing values. There are a variety of legitimate reasons why this can happen. There are a number of methods for treating records that contain missing values [7]: 1. Omit the incorrect field(s) 2. Omit the entire record that contains the incorrect field(s) 3. Automatically enter/correct the data with default values e.g. select the mean from the range 4. Derive a model to enter/correct the data 5. Replace all values with a global constant Within this study both missing and unknown data have been set to zero. Duplicated Records Duplicate records do not share a common key and/or they contain errors that make duplicate matching a difficult task. Errors are introduced as the result of transcription errors, incomplete information, lack of standard formats, or any combination of these factors [7] . The data set used in this study include data objects that are duplicate. Using RapidMiner to removing duplication .As result from this process the 7540 records decreased to 7139 record. Data Reduction Data reduction can be achieved in many ways one way is by selecting features [5], The used data set contains many Irrelevant features that contain almost no useful information for data mining task As [2] I will focus only on eight attributes out of fifty two attributes, as they are important for diabetes diet. The eight nutrients include: Carbohydrate Energy Fat protein Fiber vitamin E Vitamin B1(also known as thiamine) Vitamin C Data Normalization Data normalization is one of the preprocessing procedures in data mining, where the attribute data are scaled so as to fall within a small specified range such as -1.0 to 1.0 or 0.0 to 1.0. Normalization before clustering is specially needed for distance metric, such as Euclidian distance, which are sensitive to differences in the magnitude or scales of the attributes. The K-Means typically uses Euclidean distance to measure the distortion between a data object and its cluster centroid .However, the clustering results can be greatly affected by differences in scale among the dimension from, which the distances are computed. Data normalization is the linear transformation of data to a specific range. Therefore, it is worthwhile to enhance clustering quality by normalizing the dynamic range of input data objects into specific range [8].in this study I will normalize data to the range of [0, 1] . Figure 2 show the result from the data preprocessing Figure 2 Result from Preprocessing(Data cleaning , Data Reduction , Data Normalization) 5. Data Analysis Methodology After data preparation, a second step is using a K-means to cluster food data set. In order to work with optimal k-value as [2] used the Davies-Bouldin index [9] to evaluate the optimal k-value. The k-value is optimal when the related index is smallest. For this study, I used K=19 since it gives the smallest value. The final result is the food clusters which foods in the same group provide the approximate amount of the eight nutrients. Data analysis solution RapidMiner was used to analysis the data set and cluster food item. The whole process sequence shown in figure 3.figure 4, 5, 6 shows the final result. Figure 3 data analysis process Figure4 food Items clustered into 19 clusters Figure4 distribution of 8 Nutrients into clusters from (0-12) Figure4 distribution of 8 Nutrients into clusters from (13-18) 5.1 K-mean Evaluation a performance based on the number of clusters. This operation builds a derived index from the number of clusters by using the formula 1 (k / n) with k number of clusters and n covered examples. It is used for optimizing the coverage of a cluster result in respect to the number of clusters. By applying the K-mean model to this data set the Cluster number index = 0.997 witch indicate a good coverage. 6. Conclusion Data mining has been widely used in many health care fields. The Diabetes Diet Care was one of the health problems that data mining play role on it .this experiment are conducted based on USDA National Nutrient dataset. The results demonstrate that K-mean is very effective and it can successfully create food groups that will help in many recommendations systems.