The Dangers of Fossil Fuels

In recent decades, we have seen a remarkable advancement in science and technology. Owing to this, many wonder why the primary sources of consumer energy remain non-renewable fuels; petroleum (36%), coal (27%) and gas (23%) [International Energy Agency, 2013]. The issue with this is, â€Å"fossil fuels† which took millions of years to form are running out at an unprecedented rate, and there is no consensual view as to what will replace them. There are many reasons why the general population should be concerned about such an event affecting them.Firstly, wrought global development and population growth society has become overly dependent on energy from exogenous sources like fossil fuels. Secondly, the easier fuels to obtain have been mostly depleted hence companies are resorting to costly and hazardous extraction methods. Finally, the profitability of fossil fuel extraction is fast decreasing and this is inciting countries to use alternative sources such as hydro-electric. Sus tained global growth has left the world in a perilous position. In 1850 when the capacity of resources such as oil and coal were first predicted, they were deemed to sat for centuries.One factor these predictions failed to consider was sudden exponential population growth, a function of both technological advances and medical breakthroughs. Fossil fuels were the meaner by which this was made possible as their discovery led to more developed societies; incentives human growth. Today, the next wave of developing nations like China demand more fuel for their growing populations and are competing with high-development countries for a bigger portion of the rapidly shrinking resource. The migration from a forager society to an agricultural society was a key event in the context of energy.The people at this stage in history knew using all their energy hunting and gathering prevented them from doing activities they would otherwise want to do. Eventually, though communal agriculture, they le arnt to conserve their survival energy by forming a society wherein each member provided for one another. The discovery of the heat engine reinvigorated this idea. Work from human labor could be replaced with work from an exogenous source, in this instance fossil fuels. Today society continues exploit this idea to improve quality of life, mostly through transport and warmth.Services, manufacturing, minerals, food and clean water are further benefits of the constant flow of energy people receive. 90% of the energy consumed by the western world comes from non-human sources. (DRP T Morgan, 2013). Without the abundance of energy, the economic-based society humans know would cease to exist. There is scarcely enough energy in the form of fossil fuels for most to live easy and fulfilling lives, but the general populous should concede they deed to adapt sooner rather than later. The easy to obtain fuels like crude oil are depleting quickly.Consequently, companies reap millions of barrels of petrol, rendering these sources unprofitable. With fossil fuels not as abundant or easy to obtain as they used to be, desperate measures in the form of Franking and Deep Sea Drilling are being used. However, these methods are costly and put unnecessary stress on the environment. Governments don't feel obliged to intervene when the struggle for fuel is being eased. People wonder why governments are unconcerned that public funds are being spent n dangerous and costly extraction processes like franking and deep-sea drilling instead of investing it into finding a substitute.The reason is blatant: so citizens are kept happy. The world seems prosperous at this moment in history, but who knows how soon people will regret these senseless decisions. Much energy is needed to build and run the equipment, extraction devices and vehicles we need to obtain oil, natural gas and coal. Since the industrial revolution, ERROR (energy returned on energy invested) has been extremely high. For example, when oil was discovered companies got over 100 units of energy back for every 1 unit used during extraction (Charles Hall, 2010).This made extraction a profitable industry though as I noted previously, fuel reserves dried out and became harder to find. TAP Research (2013) found the global average ERROR last year had fallen to 15:1 . The effects of this trend have been seen everywhere, for instance rising petrol prices. In fifteen years, the cost of petroleum in New Zealand has tripled from 80 cents a litter to 220 cents a litter. Alternate fuels transport is presently so inconvenient that this trend seems destined to continue.The world may witness an energy cliff in the near future when the amount of energy consumed during extraction actually surpasses the amount the economy gets in return. Suddenly, renewable sources by default will become the favorable option, because they are economical enough to exploit. Future motorists will be forced to drive electric vehicles like the Ionians Leaf, even if according to specifications they cost $70 000, have a range of 100 kilometers and take n absurd 20 hours to charge on house current.Energy is one of the most important things in modern life; it fuels transport, businesses, schools, heats houses and gives us light. Without it people are confined to being hunter-gatherers. It is hard for one to conceive living like this, but this type of living may become standard if the energy surplus is wiped. Moving on from fossil fuels presents itself as a colossal challenge, one the next generation has to accept. In New Zealand, a high proportion of their energy consumed comes from hydro, ego- Herman and wind sources, so they could stand as the world leaders of a global renewable energy revolution.There is much potential for sources of clean energy like solar and wind power to outlast fossil fuels, and it would be great to see more money invested in these types of renewable energy sources. One hopes people will be informed in the f uture of the consequences of utilizing fossil fuels so they can make sensible decisions around their use. World governments can't ignore the issue forever, and every time someone speaks up makes it more likely for them to towards a brighter future.

Comparative Annual Report Essay

All listed companies must prepare and publish their annual report for each end of every financial year. Bursa Malaysia Berhad and Central Bank of Malaysia require business entities to submit annual report. Annual reports are intended to give shareholders and other interested people information about the company’s activities and financial performance. It is general documents that give shareholders an idea of the condition of the company as a whole. The Securities Commission makes public companies disclose certain information to the shareholders of the company. It will create a standardized method that investors can use to evaluate the potential of a company. The purpose of this project is to analyze the annual reports between two industries. For our project paper, we have focus on services and plantation industries and compared two annual reports for the year 2009 between. This comparison would describe about these two industries; what is the similarities disclosure and differences disclosure between services and plantation industries besides the implication of disclosure and presentation of financial reporting. The aims of comparative between two annual report is to strengthen and enhance the understandability on how these companies present the information in their annual report to internal and external users. All information should be honest and forthcoming. It is to emphasize on the particular industries, including background of the company. Besides that it has emphasize on applicable statutory requirements, corporate governance, and voluntary disclosure on corporate social responsibility and environment issues into these two different industries. Furthermore, analyzed the similarities and differentiation of statutory requirement applies by both companies. And find out whether these two companies have complied in corporate governance and discuss the application of corporate social responsibility and environmental issues.

Literature: Meaning of Life and Personal Relationship Essay

Describe your personal relationship to literature and to reading. Begin by considering the meaning of literature. What does the term literature mean to you? What makes something literary in your own mind? If literature means different things to different people, who defines what is and what is not literature? My personal relationship to literature and reading is a feeling of event as if you are living in the same thought process of the writer, or either you liReading is one of my hobbys. Its alwaqys important for me to know what I am reading about because its lets me voceriate what the author is trying to say. Next, reflect on your relationship to reading and literature. What kind of reading engages/interests you? What about that writing draws you in? Do you find meaning in reading certain writing? If so, describe the satisfaction you draw from this process. Also consider how you read. Do you, for example, take notes or mark text as you read, or do you simply absorb the material on a page? There are no right or wrong answers to your response. This discussion is an opportunity to reflect on what literature is to you, as well as to consider the many meanings that literature may have for others in the class. Discussion #2 Review the key literary terms and concepts presented throughout Chapters 1 and 2. (See the end of each chapter for a glossary of terms.) Choose at least four of these terms to discuss in your post. Then, find examples of these concepts in the readings from this week. Explain how these examples demonstrate each literary concept as well as the effect which the given technique or form has on a reading of the respective text.

Ports in the Storm Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Ports in the Storm - Essay Example This is a great opportunity that can really open up Portugal and its neighbouring countries. European markets will be the first beneficiaries of an improved Lisbon port. First, this is a great investment where European companies can drive their investments. After certain duration, Lisbon harbour will call companies to tender for services like offloading containers, uploading containers, and ship repairs. This will provide business to big and small companies improving on the European economy. Secondly, besides providing business to companies, employment opportunities will increase, as individuals will operate cranes and other machines. Thirdly, Improvements of Lisbon harbour will allow the bulkiest of the vessels to dock in it. According to Economist magazine, â€Å"The bulkiest vessels can carry 14,000 twenty-foot containers that would require a train 85 km if transported by rail† (The economist Newspaper, 2012). Big vessels enhance economies of scale since there is a considerable fall in the cost per container. Cost of industrial raw materials falls as the cost of transportation falls, this eventually causes low cost of products. Fourthly, big ships do not stop in many destinations of Europe. This means that Lisbon harbour will open up a faster means of transportation of bulk materials fastening up the process of production. In addition, consumers and businesses will receive complete products in good time. This will attract prime shippers looking for value, speed, and reliability. The first beneficiary of an improved Lisbon port is Portugal. This is because as the port expands, Portuguese industries will get cheap raw materials for their productions. Heavy metal industries and those that depend on bulky materials that come from Asia will benefit greatly. In addition, Southern part of Spain will grow because of this port. The growth will come about as goods from Lisbon port are transported via good

1.Since Country A has a higher GDP than Country B then this must mean Essay - 1

1.Since Country A has a higher GDP than Country B then this must mean the residents of Country A are better off in terms of economic welfare. Discuss - Essay Example Therefore, to understand how much the given statement can be justified, we need to understand the strength of GDP as a measure of welfare. For that, first we need to understand what exactly GDP is and what is captured through it. Then we have to consider the concept of welfare and see whether GDP is able to capture it or not. Finally, based on this understanding we shall be able to judge the validity of the statement. So in the following, first GDP shall be introduced as a concept. Then the concept of welfare shall be discussed. Finally GDP and welfare shall be related to examine how strongly GDP may reflect the welfare level of any country. Finally, the discussion will be concluded by commenting upon the validity of the statement based on the understanding developed in the previous sections. GDP or Gross Domestic product is the sum total of the market value of all final goods and services produced within the boundaries of any nation in a given year (McConnell & Brue, 2005). It aims to measure the national income of any economy. Only the market value of final goods and services are included and the market value of all goods used as intermediaries in the process of production are excluded in the measurement of national income to avoid the problem of double counting. Sometimes as an alternative, to avoid the double counting problem, to measure national income, the value added at each stage of production is calculated and added up. However, the objective remains to estimate the national income on an economy as adequately as possible. It is important to note that GDP can be expressed in two forms – nominal GDP and real GDP. Nominal GDP represents the money value of all final goods and services produced within an economy in any given year. Real GDP is the nominal GDP d ivided by the price level. Dividing real GDP by the population of the economy we get per capita real GDP. We shall in

Marketing Environment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Marketing Environment - Essay Example Marketing environment on the other hand can be viewed through analysis of factors and forces that influence and/or affects firm’s ability to build and maintain a long lasting relationship with its clients that later necessitate application of the marketing management strategies (Sheehan, 2011, 6). Marketing environment can be analysed in three broad categories to include micro environment analysis that calls for evaluation of factors and forces within the business and unearthing the ways in which they affect business’ ability to serve its clients (Luck & Chartered Institute of Marketing, 2010, 13). Instruments of evaluation in this kind of analysis include the company itself to include all its operational departments, firm’s suppliers, marketing intermediaries, publics and analysis of customer market. Macro environment analysis calls for evaluation of forces that are outside the firm’s direct involvement and influence which in the long run affects the micr o environment factors and thus affecting the firm’s operations. Instruments of evaluation in this analysis include demography, culture, natural calamities such as earthquakes, droughts and storms; analysis of the economy, politics and technology. Meso- environment analysis seek to evaluate the impacts of market intermediaries and their contribution to selling, promotions and distribution of goods and services in relation to the competitive aspect of the market and the firm’s competitive advantage. In this paper we shall evaluate the marketing environment of Walt Disney Holidays in relation to its market share/ leadership and the competitive advantage it possesses in the industry; evaluate importance of market research, market mix and service innovation for the firm, and later recommend marketing techniques to increase competitiveness and sustainability. Market Share Being in the tourism industry, analysis of pricing signals and measures to improve client satisfaction s uch as service innovations are prerequisite for market leadership. Service innovations such as â€Å"see dreams come true† whereby they have taken technology and consumer satisfaction to the next level necessitates their competitive advantage (Greenblatt, 2013, 11) over the other tour/ holiday firms by giving clients a new experience of living on ice as compared to other firms which may choose to let their clients experience the ice on visual aspects only. Their pricing signal evaluation; adoption of technology in majority of holiday segments and the coupon promotion strategies to various destination has enabled establish a significant market share in tourism industry. Micro environment analysis With outlets in Florida and a wide network of resorts in the United Kingdom, effective management of its internal departments such as finance, research and development, marketing and supplies, and the overall customer satisfaction segment will be essential to the sustainability of the ir operations (Fayolle & Kyro, 2008, 2). For instance the research and development section needs to come up with features of a product or service in the resorts segments that holistically attracts more customers by giving the firm competitive advantage over other holiday firms while the accounting department will approve the financial side of the marketing plan and budget on the customer satisfaction strategies. Suppliers and Supply analysis Supply of basis services in the resorts business is changing with time

What differences are there between the US and the UK in either the Essay

What differences are there between the US and the UK in either the politics of abortion or the politics of same sex relation what explains these differences - Essay Example States such as Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, Iowa, and Connecticut in United States do recognize that homosexuals have their civil rights to marry [1]. Labor Party government gives rights to homosexuals. There are only slight distinctions between marriages and same-sex couples in Britain. Plans are underway to eliminate those differences and fully accept same-sex marriage as legitimate marriages. Both UK and U.S started abortion in 1967 and 1973 respectively. Same-sex marriage recently has hit the headlines in the American politics. Britain has experienced some reactions to change laws on abortion and homosexuality in parliament and Conservative Party. United States and UK have well-defined dissimilarities in their politics of abortion and same-sex marriage. To start with, both United States and United Kingdom have abortion Acts that spells out the procedure of its application and the person to apply it. In Britain, the efforts to amend laws on abortion started back in 1967 when abortion Act was relaxed. These new amendments allowed abortion under proscribed conditions of health of fetus and mother. United States through a ruling by Supreme Court led to a change of law on abortion in January 1973. The new law stated clearly on where, who, and time limits of abortion. For the under-age, consent was required in order to allow abortion. The basic disparity in UK and U.S on laws of abortion is that it allows abortion is on request for the U.S but it is subject to location and moods of physician on the former. The United States Supreme court recognizes the rights of women to abort. They do it through very secretive manner because it values and respects personal privacy. On the contrary, British Abortion law does not provide privacy to women. It has restrictions and one has to give genuine reasons before getting a legal permission to abort. In U.S, there have been numerous incidents to stop abortion in

Personal Operative Theory Classroom Management Assignment

Personal Operative Theory Classroom Management - Assignment Example These beliefs are important to me because based on my personal experiences as a child and in teaching some children, children have tendencies of understanding things better through positive reinforcement. To make studying and learning an enjoyable experience it must be taught through empowering ways, and that disciplining must be carried in a caring, respectful, and fair manner (Spitzer, 2009). Â  2. On an educator’s standpoint, while it is still important for me that children learn the lessons effectively, I deem their learning of positive attitudes, having pro-social behavior, and accepting responsibility to be essential in their learning processes. I feel that imparting these behaviors in children are important because while they may forget the exact academic lessons that they learn, their behaviors will stay longer with them, and thus by helping them gain positive and productive behaviors as early as possible, this will help them grow up into well-adjusted and responsible adults in the future (Durlak, et al., 2011). As their guide, I deem myself to have primary responsibility within the classroom to reinforce positive behavior and detect and discipline negative or anti-social behaviors (with dignity and respect) at the earliest possible time, and as students I expect them to treat their classmates with respect through open-mindedness, to treat others as equals a nd not think that they are above others, and to be responsible with their studies (e.g. submit assignments on time). Â  3. I believe that respect is something that is learned through application and has a strong impact on an individual.

Real rapes and Real victims Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Real rapes and Real victims - Essay Example As this is not always the case, the police has made a differentiation between â€Å"real rape† and where the woman herself did not initially think of it as rape but was convinced by other people that it was. Based from the research done (Stewart, Dobbin & Gatowski, 1996), a woman is finally convinced by other people to report the rape by two reasons: Sadly, myths and pre-conceived notions of women have dominated the police’s perception of women claiming rape. Because of these ideas, the police have acted nonchalantly towards these women and have come up with their own criterion to judge who the â€Å"real victim† is. This person, police say, is a woman who did not bring upon the rape to herself. In other words, the â€Å"real victim† acted decently but still found herself a victim of rape. This is when the justice system deems it proper to â€Å"rescue† her. This reasoning may be attributed to a belief in the â€Å"Pedestal Myth†. The pedestal myth puts woman at the top level of the respect and virtue ladder. Under this notion, women are expected to be prim and proper. They are expected to be more honorable than men. They should not drink. They should not hang out and/or drink in bars, wear tempting clothes and the like. Women are expected to be more ladylike. This notion has caused the police to focus more on the credibility of the woman rather than the facts of the case in deciding whether to pursue a rape claim or not. They have created their own standard seemingly based on this pedestal myth and will only investigate a claim if they think the judge will deem the victim believable. This is a very vital point in finding justice for the rape victim. Inasmuch as they are the first group of people who will officially decide whether a crime of rape has been committed or not, the police’s impression of a rape victim is of utmost importance. Similarly, the character and credibility of the victim aid in fig uring out what

Skills required to provide clinical leadership in nursing mental Essay

Skills required to provide clinical leadership in nursing mental health - Essay Example The rest of the essay will broadly foray into these required skills. One of the most requisite skills for nursing officers is conviction and courage in handling financial decisions for their hospital or clinic. With healthcare insurance becoming unaffordable for an increasing number of Americans, people end up in hospital wards with insufficient finances. While running a hospital or a clinic has a business element to it, its first priority is to serve needy patients, especially the ones suffering from mental ailments. An ethically conscious leader will always keep this in mind and put the interests of the patient before that of the organization. While this may sound a touch idealistic and its implementation may seem unfeasible in a competitive healthcare industry, it is nevertheless an ideal worth persevering for. According to Shawn Ulreich, the chief Nursing Officer at Spectrum Health, â€Å"It is time to bridge the gap between nursing--and all of operations--and finance†¦Nursing leadership entails measures to tackle the massively flawed payme nt system. Other times, it is demonstrating that you sincerely care about patient care† (Fifer, 2007). Continuing in a similar vein, leaders in Nursing should reverse recent trends of high employment dissatisfaction among nurses and other support staff. Nurses across the country are not happy with the remuneration package handed to them and consequently shifting to jobs that pay more. Another reason cited for this state of affairs is the lack of mutual understanding between the business and nursing wings of the healthcare organizations. For example, according to a recent survey, â€Å"Approximately 38 percent of the respondents reported having left a CNO position--13 percent within two years before the survey and 25 percent within five years before the survey. When asked about the context of their departure, a high percentage reported leaving their

Article Critique Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Article Critique - Essay Example It is difficult to argue with the position Adler takes. Today’s media reports are filled with stories of children as both victims and authors of serious crimes. Both scenarios indicate that children are exposed to conduct that entirely adult in nature, with the result that the innocence of childhood is lost. Adler writes of the measures that parents and adults in general take to protect children from crime. These measures involve a stream of â€Å"hyper-vigilance† . (Adler) Fear of crimes against children are unrealistic given that there are diseases that claim the lives of children far more frequently than crimes. (Adler) This is perhaps the only point that Adler makes that invokes dissension. Fear of crime against children can never be underestimated. Children are vulnerable to crime and require adult protection and supervision. When a child is given free licence to traverse on his or her own, they are always potential victims. However, Adler is right in his observation that children have become hostages and imprisoned in their homes. There are parents who attach a leash to their children at the mall to guard against abductions. (Adler) Today’s adults have taken protection to the extreme. Children are cautioned to the point of exhaustion against the harm that can befall them. In one case, Adler notes that one family went beyond merely setting alarms in the cars and in their home. They have even fixed alarm systems on members of the family. (Adler) These kinds of measures cause undue fear and alarm for children and are entirely unnecessary. The best approach to guarding against the risk of harm is to ensure that small children are never left without adult supervision. There is no logical reason for raising the alarm with small children. Adult responsibility toward small children includes protecting them from

Brookliyn Bridge Essay Example for Free

Brookliyn Bridge Essay Arthur millers a view from the bridge is set in a slum side in red hook, which faces the bay on the seaward side of Brookliyn Bridge in New York. The background to the conflict is built around a working class couple (Eddie and Beatrice Carbone) and their niece (Catharine.) The small Family also had help from two of Beatrices cousins from Italy (Marco and Roldopho) to obtain the Conflict and perhaps push main character Eddie Carbone to the end of his tether. Marco and Roldopho had travelled from Europe of which, at this point of time had still been suffering from the political and financial effects of World War 2. Europe was very poor at this point of time because during the war the tax prices had risen to pay for military supplies, however Marco and Rodolfo travelled to America for a better chance to survive. Whilst Marcos aims where purely to support his wife and growing family in Italy, Roldopho had planed to buy a motorcycle to satisfy his shallow needs. Catherine, on the other hand, lives with Eddie and Beatrice because her mother died in a tragic event.. So Eddie has taken on a father figure in her life (even though he is not her biological father) and he treats her like his own child. But when we read more into the book we learn that eddies loves Catherine in more than a father and daughter way. So when Marco and Rodolfo turn up at their flat in the 1940s Catherine takes a liking to Rodolfo, so I feel that Eddie is building up with jealousy and gets more and more physically and sexually attracted to Catherine. So the fact that Eddie has become more and more physically and sexually attracted to Catherine the relationship between Eddie and Beatrice even though they are married is going down hill. I think this is because Eddie is thinking about Catherine most of the time or even all of the time. This means that there is a lot of tension between the two of them we can tell there is a lot of tension between them as when Beatrice decides to show Eddie affection Eddie sustains and is always too distracted by the thought of Catherine and Rodolfo. So Eddie creates a lot of tension by trying to control Catherines life. When the attraction between Catherine and Rodolfo gradually becomes a love relationship Eddie learns to know this and he then trys to end their relationship. But in trying to do this Eddies true feelings about Catherine start to appear in the play. Eddies dislikes Rodolfo as he is blonde, sings and makes dresses and eddies wants a man for Catherine but Rodolfo in eddies eyes is not a man. Eddie thinks that Rodolfo is not a man because he does not have a family to provide for and because he spends his first set of wages on a new jacket, meanwhile Marco is sending money back to italy/cill for his family. The money Marco sends to Italy Sicily gets some medicine for his son. This gives Eddie enough treason to not like Rodolfo so towards the end of the act Eddie goes to speak to alfieri nd this really shows the reader that Eddie is getting desperate to have his chances with Catherine and to be rid of Rodolfo. But Alfieri sees that Eddy has way too much love for Catherine and tells him to let her go thats my advise  you did your job now its her life wish her luck and let her go because theirs no law Eddie make up your mind to it the law is not interested in this. But Eddie cannot let her go and he cannot accept that he cannot control her anymore. But then Alfieri tries to reason with Eddie and calm him down but when Alfieri suggests that Eddie is in love with Catherine Eddie doesnt like his feelings being talked about so then alfieri asks Eddie she cant marry you can she? and Eddie replies whatre you on about? Marry me! I dont know what the hell you are talking about! The beginning of the play starts off with a little speech from Alfieri about the end before it even happens. This scene is quite important as it tells us a little about the play and what it is going to be about. The play is a tragedy as it starts off with a normal couple living with a niece and then one of the couples cousins comes to them for shelter from Italy. But one of the cousins falls in love with Catherine (the niece). So as the relationship between them get stronger the love from Eddie to Catherine gets stronger and Eddie wants more from the relationship that he cannot get. This builds up a load of tension between them, which eventually turns into a tragedy. Arthur miller creates moments of intense conflict in this act by making the characters use a lot of jealousy among them, which creates moments of intense conflict. Some of the moments of intense conflict is when Eddie challenges Rodolfo to a boxing match and ends up really punching him. (Maybe to take his anger out on him) and also when Marco challenges Eddie to a chair lift with one hand. Eddie cannot do this but when Marco succeeds in doing this the look in Marcos eyes are giving Eddie a little message. I think the message Marco is giving to Eddie is if you pick on my little brother you will have to pass me first! Maybe I am wrong but thats how his look seemed to me.

Comparison of Electroconvulsive Therapy and Antidepressants

Comparison of Electroconvulsive Therapy and Antidepressants Brief 101151 INTRODUCTION Depression is one of the more common forms of mental illness. It has been estimated that approximately 9.5% of the population will suffer with depression at any one time (Robins and Regier 1990) and that 17% of people will suffer with depression at some point in their life (Blazer et al 1994). Defining depression is not a straight forward task. This is due to the fact that it can range from normal unhappiness through persistent and pervasive ways of feeling and thinking to psychosis (Hale 1997). Having said this, a number of different features which can be associated with depression have been identified by Hale (1997): Persistent low mood Loss of interest and enjoyment Reduced energy and diminished activity Poor concentration and attention Low self esteem and low confidence Ideas of guilt and unworthiness Bleak pessimistic views of the future Ideas or acts of self harm or suicide Disturbed sleep Diminished appetite It is also possible to distinguish between three major types of depression. The first form of depression is Dysthymia which involves long-term chronic depressive symptoms which do not necessarily disable the individual. The second form is Bipolar Disorder which involves the patient experiencing periods of mania and depression through cycles of mood change. The third and final category concerns Major Depression. The symptoms involved with this mental illness combine to ensure that it is difficult for the patient to work, study or to enjoy activities as well as them having difficulties regarding eating and sleeping patterns. It is this third and most serious form of depression which will be the focus of the following discussion. TREATMENT OF SEVERE DEPRESSION A number of different approaches to the treatment of depression have been taken which are based on a range of theoretical perspectives. These include approaches such as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Psychoanalysis and those based on increasing exercise levels. However, perhaps the most common treatment for depression involves the use of antidepressant drugs (American Psychiatric Association 1993) These include medications such as Tricyclic (which is cheap and effective but does have side effects which limit compliance), Selective Serotonin Up-Take Inhibitors (which has fewer side effects but less effective for disturbed sleep) and Monoamine (which, in rare cases, can be fatal when mixed with certain foods) Although antidepressants can be effective, research has indicated that they may not be the optimal solution. For example, Thomas et al (1982) conducted a study involving 115 participants who were randomly allocated to receive either a combination of antidepressants or a placebo. T he medication was found to have a significant effect but non-compliance was identified as a significant problem. It has been estimated that non-compliance regarding antidepressant drugs is between 20 and 59% (Johnson 1973 and Thomas et al 1982). Further research has also reported that patients who are suffering with depression are still at a significant risk of relapse or recurring symptoms even when they have been adhering to their medication programme for a long period of time (Grunhaus et al 1990). It may also be the case that medication is not suitable for all forms of depression. For example, Hale (1997) suggested that antidepressants may not be effective for psychotic depression. Therefore, as a result of the potential drawbacks of non-compliance, relapse and not being effective for all forms of depression, efforts have been made to identify other approaches for the treatment of severe depression. One of the most controversial treatment approaches is Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT). It was first used in 1938 by Cerletti and Bini (Linington and Harris 1988). It involves sending an electrical current through the patient’s brain with the aim of stimulating the release of neurotransmitters which will ultimately improve the patient’s mood. ECT has obtained a somewhat negative reputation due to stories of bitten tongues and fractured bones and it is often seen as a form of punishment rather than treatment. However, reviews of its application have demonstrated that ECT does have significant benefits compared to simulated ECT, when all procedures are followed without an electrical current actually being given (The UK ECT Review Group 2003). Whenever one is making decisions regarding the use of any given treatments, one must consider the body of scientific evidence which has assessed the treatment’s efficacy and effectiveness. The following review will aim to consi der the research which has assessed the efficacy and effectiveness of ECT as a treatment for severe depression in order to determine its effectiveness with reference to the use of antidepressants. RESEARCH QUESTION Thus, the following review will aim to answer the question ‘Is ECT an effective treatment compared with antidepressants in cases of severe depression’. The methodology which was employed within this research will now be outlined. LITERATURE SEARCH A systematic review aims to integrate existing information from a comprehensive range of sources, utilising a scientific replicable approach, which gives a balanced view, hence minimising bias. It can also be stated that systematic reviews provide a means of integrating valid information from the research literature to provide a basis for rational decision making concerning the provision of healthcare. 2.1 SOURCES OF DATA The methodology employed within the research involved obtaining data from three key sources: Computerised searches, Manual searches, and the Internet. Each of these data sources will now be considered in more detail. 2.11 COMPUTERISED SEARCHES The methods used in this research will include a detailed computerised literature search. Multiple databases, both online and CD–Rom will be accessed to retrieve literature because they cite the majority of relevant texts. The computerised bibliographic databases are:- MEDLINE EMBASE CINAHL PSYCHINFO Biological Abstracts Cochrane SIGLE However because articles may not be correctly indexed within the computerised databases, other strategies will be applied in order to achieve a comprehensive search. 2.1.2 MANUAL SEARCHES A manual search will be performed to ensure that all relevant literature is accessed. The manual searches will include:- Books relevant to the topics from university libraries and web sites Inverse searching- by locating index terms of relevant journal articles and texts Systematically searching reference lists and bibliographies of relevant journal articles and texts 2.1.3 THE INTERNET The internet will provide a global perspective of the research topic and a searchable database of Internet files collected by a computer. Sites accessed will include:- Department of Health National Institute of Clinical Excellence English National Board of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Visiting Google British Medical Journal 2.2 IDENTIFICATION OF KEY WORDS A set of key words will be used within the literature search. Elements of the research question will be used to provide the search terms. Therefore, the words Electroconvulsive Therapy, Antidepressants, Depression, Effectiveness and Evaluation will all be used. 2.3 INCLUSION AND EXCLUSION CRITERIA To ensure that the more relevant research studies are identified, a set of inclusion and exclusion criteria will be utilised. In order to be included in this research the studies will need to relate to the evaluation of Electroconvulsive Therapy and relate to the treatment of depression. Furthermore, studies will be excluded if they are published before 1975 or if they are not available in English. DISCUSSION This review has identified literature which has focussed on assessing the effectiveness of ECT in comparison to antidepressants regarding the treatment of severe depression. In order to structure the discussion, the research will be analysed with reference to the benefits of ECT regarding relapse, patients who are drug-resistant and those with severe depression in particular. The potential drawbacks of ECT will then be briefly considered before overall conclusions are drawn regarding the research question. 3.1 RELAPSE Studies were located which highlighted the benefits of ECT regarding the reduction of relapse. For instance, Petrides et al (1994) reviewed the case histories of 33 patients who had been diagnosed with long term depression. A set of 21 patients were included in the study as a one year follow up report was available for analysis. Each of the participating patients had been taking antidepressants for a significant length of time but were still experiencing relapses of depression. After the delivery of ECT it was reported that the number of patients with depression who suffered relapses fell from a normal rate of 50% to 33% at the one year follow up. For the patients with delusional depression in particular, the relapse figure fell from a normal rate of 95% to 42%. Based on this research it would appear that ECT can be more effective than antidepressants in terms of reducing relapse rates. A more recent and relevant study was conducted by Gagne et al (2000) which also involved the retrospective reviewing of patients’ notes. Two groups of 29 matched participants were identified. The first group had only been taking antidepressants were as the second group had antidepressants along with ECT. At the two year follow up stage the relapse rates for those who had ECT was 52% compared to the 93% associated with those who only had medication. At the five year follow up stage, the relapse rate for the drug-only group had fallen slightly to 73% where as the ECT group had fallen dramatically to just 18%. The average survival rate of the ECT group was 6.9 years which was significantly longer than the 2.7 years for the drug-only group. Therefore the research considered in this section would lead one to conclude that ECT can be more effective than antidepressants alone in terms of reducing relapse rates. Having said this, it should be noted that these research projects involve d combining ECT with antidepressants rather than replacing them entirely. 3.2 MEDICATION RESISTANT PATIENTS Although antidepressants are effective for many patients with depression, there are some groups for whom it is less effective. Rabheru and Persad (1997) reviewed the literature which focused on assessing the effectiveness of ECT for patients who were found to be resistant to antidepressant medication. They found that the research evidence indicated that ECT could have significant benefits for medication resistant patients. These benefits were particularly relevant for elderly patients with depression. An important point to make here, however, was demonstrated by research conducted by Prudic et al (1996). They reported that the effectiveness of ECT may decline as the time for which the patient has suffered with severe depression increases. Therefore, the approach of using ECT when the patient has been found to be resistant to antidepressants may not be the optimal approach as the possible benefits of ECT may have been reduced. Therefore, this section has demonstrated that ECT could be beneficial for patients who have severe depression and have not been significantly helped by the use of antidepressants. However, it is important to note that the use of ECT may decline over time. 3.3 PATIENTS WITH SEVERE DEPRESSION Further research has indicated that ECT may well have particular benefits over antidepressants with regards to patients who have severe depression. Sobin et al (1996) conducted research to evaluate the effectiveness of ECT for patients with a range of levels of depression. They reported that 70% of the participants responded significantly as a result of the ECT and that significant improvements were made by those who had severe depression. Other research has also leant support for the assertion that ECT is particularly beneficial for patients with severe depressive symptoms, mood congruent delusions and those who are at prominent risk of committing suicide (Martin 1989, Schatzberg 1992, Persad 1990, Philibert et al 1995 and Fink et al 1996). It appears that the attributes of ECT are particularly suited to the treatment of people with severe depression. It may be that the more severe a person’s depressive symptoms are, the more drastic and severe the treatment approaches need t o be for them to be effective. CONCLUSIONS This review has considered research which has investigated whether ECT is effective in treating severe depression when compared to antidepressant drugs. Based on this research it can be concluded that ECT, when combined with antidepressants, does appear to significantly reduce patients’ relapse rates. It can also be said that the evidence supports the view that ECT can be effective for patients who have been found to be resistant to antidepressants. The third and final conclusion is that ECT appears to be particularly suited to patients with the more severe forms of depression. Having said this, some criticisms need to be acknowledged regarding this body of research. For instance, Rose et al (2003) highlighted three major drawbacks. Firstly 1 in 3 patients who are given ECT report persistent memory loss. Secondly, the research studies conducted by clinicians in this area report more positive results than those conducted by consumer agencies. This may be due to the selection of participants or the focus of the research questions. The third and final drawback outlined by Rose et al (2003) is that the studies which support ECT rarely assess the long term effects or cognitive functioning and the majority of them were conducted many years ago using small samples. The research is also limited because it mainly uses case studies (Thienhaus et al 1990), naturalistic studies (Aronson et al 1987) or retrospective reviews of patient notes (Stiebel 1995). Few randomly controlled trials were highlighted by this literature search. Such criticisms must be kept in mind when considering the effectiveness of ECT in comparison to antidepressants for treating severe depression. 5.0 IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE Guidelines produced by the National Institute of Clinical Excellence, based on a review of Department of Health and Cochrane database research, recommends that ECT be used for rapid and short term improvements for patients with severe depression or who are at significant risk of suicide (Tharyan and Adams 2003). However, as highlighted by the Royal College of Psychiatrists (2003) in their response to these guidelines, the use of ECT may have a wider scope than this approach would suggest and the guidelines may ensure that patients who may benefit from ECT are not given the treatment. Further research in this area will provide a basis upon which to test the appropriateness of these guidelines and the current use of ECT. It would appear that ECT can have significant benefits for patients with severe depression but that more efforts need to be made to tackle the negative impressions which may be associated with this treatment such that it can become a more accepted approach. The main im plication of this review for practice is that ECT appears to have a significant role to play in the treatment of severe depression but that it is likely to be alongside the use of antidepressants rather than instead of them. This strategy will enable the most comprehensive treatment programme to be delivered to the patients and ensure that their chances of a full recovery are maximised. REFERENCES American Psychiatric Association (1993). Practice guidelines for major depressive disorder in adults. American Journal of Psychiatry; 150(suppl): 4. Aronson TA, Shukla S, and Hoff A: (1987) Continuation therapy after ECT for delusional depression: a naturalistic study of prophylactic treatments and relapse. Convulsive Therapy; 3:251–259[Medline] Blazer DG, Kessler RC, McGonagle KA, and (1994) Swartz MS. The prevalence and distribution of major depression in a national community sample: the national comorbidity survey. American Journal of Psychiatry;151:979-6. Gagne, G. G., Furman, M. J., Carpenter, L. L. and Price, L. H. (2000) Efficacy of continuation ECT and antidepressant drugs compared to antidepressants alone in depressed patients. American Journal of Psychiatry, 157, 1960-1963 Grunhaus L, Pande AC, and Haskett RF (1990) Full and abbreviated courses of maintenance electroconvulsive therapy. Convulsive Therapy; 6:130–138 Johnson DAW. (1973) Treatment of depression in general practice. British Medical Journal; ii: 18-20. Linington, A. and Harris, B. (1988) Fifty years of electro-convulsive therapy. British Medical Journal, 297, 1354-1355 Martin BA (1989) Electroconvulsive therapy for depression in general psychiatric practice. Psychiatric Journal of the University of Ottawa; 14:413–417 National Institute for Clinical Excellence (2003). Guidance on the use of electroconvulsive therapy. London: NICE, 2003. www.nice.org.uk/pdf/59ectfullguidance.pdf (accessed 9 Jun 2003). Persad E: (1990) Electroconvulsive therapy in depression. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry; 35:175–182[Medline] Petrides G, Dhossche D, Fink M, and Francis A: (1994) Continuation ECT: relapse prevention in affective disorders. Convulsive Therapy; 10:189–194 Philibert RA, Richards L, Lynch CF, and Winokur G: (1995) Effect of ECT on mortality and clinical outcome in geriatric unipolar depression. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry; 56:390–394[Medline] Prudic J, Haskett RF, Mulsant B, Malone KM, Pettinati HM, Stephens S, et al. (1996) Resistance to antidepressant medication and short-term clinical response to ECT. American Journal of Psychiatry;153:985-92. Rabheru K, and Persad E: (1997) A review of continuation and maintenance electroconvulsive therapy. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry; 42:476–484 Robins LN, Regier DA (Eds) (1990). Psychiatric Disorders in America, The Epidemiologic Catchment Area Study,; New York: The Free Press. Rose D, Wykes T, Leese M, Bindman J, and Fleischmann P. (2003) Patients perspectives on electroconvulsive therapy: systematic review. British Medical Journal;326: 1363-5.[Abstract/Free FullText] Sackeim HA (1994) Continuation therapy following ECT: directions for future research. Psychopharmacology Bulletin; 30:501–521 Schatzberg AF: (1992) Recent developments in the acute somatic treatment of major depression. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry; 53(Mar suppl):20–25 Sobin C, Prudic J, Devanand DP, Nobler MS, and Sackeim HA. (1996) Who responds to electroconvulsive therapy? British Journal of Psychiatry;169:322-8. Stiebel VG: (1995) Maintenance electroconvulsive therapy for chronically mentally ill patients: a case series. Psychiatric Service; 46:265–268 Tharyan P, and Adams` `C`E (2003) Electroconvulsive therapy for schizophrenia. Cochrane Schizophrenia Group. Cochrane Database Systematic Review;(1): CD000076 The UK ECT Review Group (2003) . Electroconvulsive therapy: systematic review and meta-analysis of efficacy and safety in depressive disorders. Lancet;361: 799-808 Thienhaus OJ, Margletta S, and Bennett JA: (1990) A study of the clinical efficacy of maintenance ECT. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry; 51:141–144 Thompson J, Rankin H, Ashcroft GW, Yates CM, McQueen JK, and Cummings SW. (1982) The treatment of depression in general practice: a comparison of L-tryptophan, amitriptyline and a combination of L-tryptophan and amitriptyline with placebo. Psychological Medicine; 12: 741-751[Medline].

Current Technology And Future Trends Computer Science Essay

Current Technology And Future Trends Computer Science Essay Server virtualization is the masking of server resources including the number and identity of individual physical servers, processors, and operating systems from server users. The intention is to spare the user from having to understand and manage complicated details of server resources while increasing resource sharing and utilization and maintaining the capacity to expand later. Virtualization allows multiple operating system instances to run concurrently on a single computer; it is a means of separating hardware from a single operating system. Each â€Å"guest† OS is managed by a Virtual Machine Monitor (VMM), also known as a hypervisor which is computer software/hardware platform virtualization software that allows multiple operating systems to run on a host computer concurrently. Because the virtualization system sits between the guest and the hardware, it can control the guests use of CPU, memory, and storage, even allowing a guest OS to migrate from one machine to another. Virtualization is a modified solution between centralized and decentralized deployments. Instead of purchasing and maintaining an entire computer for one application, each application can be given its own operating system, and all those operating systems can reside on a single piece of hardware. This provides the benefits of decentralization, like security and stability, while making the most of a machines resources. Advantages of Virtualization Zero downtime maintenance Freedom from vendor-imposed upgrade cycles Instant provisioning Pooling hardware resource Virtual hardware supports legacy operating systems efficiently Dynamic resource sharing Security and fault isolation Business continuity, backups, and automated restoration Examples of Productivity Using Virtualization When to use Virtualization As virtualization disentangles the operating system from the hardware, a number of very useful new tools become available. Virtualization allows an operator to control a guest operating systems use of CPU, memory, storage, and other resources, so each guest receives only the resources that it needs. This distribution eliminates the danger of a single runaway process consuming all available memory or CPU. It also helps IT staff to satisfy service level requirements for specific applications. Since the guest is not bound to the hardware, it also becomes possible to dynamically move an operating system from one physical machine to another. As a particular guest OS begins to consume more resources during a peak period, operators can move the offending guest to another server with less demand. This kind of flexibility changes traditional notions of server provisioning and capacity planning. With virtualized deployments, it is possible to treat computing resources like CPU, memory, and sto rage as a hangar of resources and applications can easily relocate to receive the resources they need at that time. Components of Virtual Infrastructure Bare-metal hypervisors to enable full virtualization of each x86 computer. Virtual infrastructure services such as resource management and consolidated backup to optimize available resources among virtual machines Automation solutions that provide special capabilities to optimize a particular IT process such as provisioning or disaster recovery. Physical to Virtual Server Migration Any respectable virtualization solution will offer some kind of P2V (Physical to Virtual) migration tool. The P2V tool will take an existing physical server and make a virtual hard drive image of that server with the necessary modifications to the driver stack so that the server will boot up and run as a virtual server. The benefit of this is that you dont need to rebuild your servers and manually reconfigure them as a virtual server—you simply suck them in with the entire server configuration intact! So if you have a data center full of aging servers running on sub-GHz servers, these are the perfect candidates for P2V migration. You dont even need to worry about license acquisition costs because the licenses are already paid for. You could literally take a room with 128 sub-GHz legacy servers and put them into eight 1U dual-socket quad-core servers with dual-Gigabit Ethernet and two independent iSCSI storage arrays all connected via a Gigabit Ethernet switch. The annual hardware maintenance costs alone on the old server hardware would be enough to pay for all of the new hardware! Just imagine how clean your server room would look after such a migration. It would all fit inside of one rack and give you lots of room to grow. As an added bonus of virtualization, you get a disaster recovery plan because the virtualized images can be used to instantly recover all your servers. Ask yourself what would happen now if your legacy server died. Do you even remember how to rebuild and reconfigure all of your servers from scratch? (Im guessing youre cringing right about now.) With virtualization, you can recover that Active Directory and Exchange Server in less than an hour by rebuilding the virtual server from the P2V image. Software Automation Solutions for Virtualization These are the few platform virtualization and software providers in the market on which organizations rely upon.  »Ã‚ »VMWare  »Ã‚ »RightScale  »Ã‚ »eNomaly  »Ã‚ »Force.com  »Ã‚ »Gigaspaces  »Ã‚ »Citrix  »Ã‚ »Xen  »Ã‚ »Microsoft Virtualization  »Ã‚ »Sun VirtualBox  »Ã‚ »IBM PowerVM  »Ã‚ » Hewlett-Packard Integrity Virtual Machines (Integrity VM). Future Trends in field of Virtualization Virtualization has significant cost benefits for organizations: server consolidation can yield a saving of  £2 million over three years for an organization running 250 dual-core servers; and a power saving in the order of  £78,000 per 1,000 PCs per year can be realized by moving from a full desktop PCs infrastructure to a server-hosted desktop virtualization solution. The market for virtualization management solutions will be the most innovative and, potentially, lucrative in the near future. Financial analysts estimate the market for IT virtualization could be worth over $19 billion. As many as 16 million desktops could be virtualized by 2011. The virtualization infrastructure management (VIM) market is undoubtedly going to be the most lucrative aspect of IT virtualization in the longer term, and so is perhaps the most dynamic and active part of the virtualization scene References: Emerging trends and the evolving vendor landscape By Victoria Furness Introduction to server virtualization by George Ou www.microsoft.com

The Human Genome Project Essay -- Genetics Science Papers

The Human Genome Project The Human Genome Project is one of the most widely discussed topics in genetics today. The United States human genome project began in 1990, when the $3 billion dollar project to map 3 billion DNA base pairs was announced.(4) When the initial funding was provided, it was anticipated that the project would require 15 years to complete and the target date for completion was 2005.(8) Recent technological advances have shortened that time period, and it is now estimated that the program will be complete by 2003.(1) The program now has been expanded to an international effort involving research facilities in France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. There are also several private companies that are sequencing the genome also. The majority of the funding for the United States human genome project has come from the Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Biological and Environmental Research and the National Institute of Health (NIH). The objective of the project is t o create a DNA sequence library for a representative sample of the human genome. Such a reference library would prove to be priceless from a research standpoint, as well as an applied perspective. This library will aid in the identification of specific mutations which cause a distinct disorder or disease. If the normal base pair can be inserted in place of the abnormal one, gene therapy could become a reality. Along with this new technology comes several problems, both technical and ethical. The ethical issues play a major role in the use and possible implications of this technology. A special committee was formed to evaluate these ethical issues and to make recommendations regarding them. This committee was given the tit... ... http://www.ornl.gov/hgmis/publicat/hgn/v10n1/04bacend.html 5. U.S. Dept. of Energy. Human Genome News. "Five years of Progress in the Human Genome Project", Obtained from the WWW 09/07/99: 12/95: http://www.ornl.gov/TechResources/Human_Genome/publicat/hgn/v7n3/04progre.html 6. UNESCO. The Gene Letter. "UNESCO Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights, July 1997", Obtained from the WWW 09/07/99:07/99: http://www.geneletter.org/0398/UNESCO.htm 7. U.S. Dept. of Energy. Human Genome Project: "Ethical, Legal and Social Issues (ELSI) of the Human Genome Project", Obtained from the WWW 08/31/99: 08/31/99: http://www.ornl.gov/TechResources/HumanGenome/resource/elsi.html 8. U.S. Dept. of Energy. Human Genome News. "U.S. HGP on Fast Track for Early Completion", Obtained from the WWW 8/31/99:2/1/99: http://www.ornl.gov/hgmis/publicat/hgn/v10n1/01goals.html

The Life of Billy Pilgrim in Vonneguts Slaughterhouse-Five or The Chil

The Life of Billy Pilgrim in Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five or The Children's Crusade      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Marked by two world wars and the anxiety that accompanies humanity's knowledge of the ability to destroy itself, the Twentieth Century has produced literature that attempts to depict the plight of the modern man living in a modern waste land. If this sounds dismal and bleak, it is. And that is precisely why the dark humor of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. shines through our post-modern age. The devastating bombing of Dresden, Germany at the close of World War II is the subject of Vonnegut's most highly acclaimed work, Slaughterhouse-Five or The Children's Crusade: A Duty Dance with Death. Vonnegut's experience as an American POW in Dresden fuels the narrative that unconventionally defines his generation through the life and death of Billy Pilgrim. The survival of Billy Pilgrim at Dresden and his re-entry to the shell-shocked world reveal a modern day journey of the anti-hero. Vonnegut's unusual style and black satire provide a refreshing backdrop for a vehement anti-war theme and enhance his adept ability to depict the face of humanity complete with all of its beauty and blemishes. Likewise, Vonnegut adds his own philosophy concerning time, our place in it, and connection (or disconnection) to it and one other. Perhaps the most crucial step in understanding this intriguing work is to start with its title, which holds the key to Vonnegut's most prevailing theme.    Vonnegut addresses the writing of his work about the bombing of Dresden in the first chapter, detailing the stress he felt when faced with such a laborious task. The carnage of Dresden does not haunt those who were not there. The combined efforts of the A... ...dons the glimmer of hope that accompanies the fact that life has its moments of grandeur. He encourages the modern reader to escape the question "why me" and urges us to embrace a philosophy that consistently reminds us that even in the midst of the most cruel (and the most celebrated) events, humanity retains all of its virtue and vice. So it goes. Vonnegut allows us to laugh out loud, despite the tragedies of war and the anxiety of the post-modern world. His picture of the modern man is simultaneously dismal and hopeful. His unique style, satiric overview and astute ability to capture the multiple faces of mankind, properly place him in the realm of the most accomplished authors of the Twentieth Century.    Works Cited Vonnegut, Kurt Jr. Slaughterhouse-Five or The Children's Crusade: A duty Dance with Death. New York; Random House, 1969.   

“Ethics in Policing” Essay

In The Ethics of Policing, John Kleinig presents a broad discussion of the ethical issues that overwhelmed existing police organization and individual police officers. This debate is set surrounded by others that bring in the reader to basic approaches at present in support among moral philosophers (social contract, neo-Kantian and utilitarian–though thought of the recent efforts to widen virtue-oriented ethical theories is regrettably absent) and to many of the significant questions posed in the swiftly growing subfield of practiced ethics (such as whether professional ethics are constant with or in clash with so-called â€Å"ordinary† ethics). The discussions are consistently even-handed, broad and extraordinarily rich in detail. Kleinig sets out typologies of the kinds of force used by the police as well as variety of dishonesty in which they occasionally engage range of distort exercise, alternative actions for holding police responsible, and the like. He offers wide-ranging debate of the role and history of police codes of ethics, the changes made on the personal lives of police, and the challenges to police management facade by unionization and confirmatory action. In short, this book is much more than a directory of police ethical issues with reference for their solution–it is that, of course, but it is also an beginning to professional ethics in general, a articulate staging of important existing moral theories, a outline of the key legal decisions affecting police work, and a rich representation, both understanding and essential of the police officer’s world. Kleinig concentrates on his topic with a large idea of ethics, one that runs from meticulous problems (such as police judgment and use of force), through common problems (such as the ethics of misleading tactics and the nature of dishonesty), to deliberation of the effects of police work on police officers’ moral fiber (such as the regrettable inclination of police to distrust and hostility), all the way to organizational difficulty (such as those about the arrangement of answerability and the status of whistleblowers). Right through his rich and caring conversation, it seems as if the difficulty of ethical policing is just that of how the police can morally carry out the job they are assigning and putting into effect the laws they are furnished to implement. Kleinig considers that many of the ethical problems facing the police have their cause in (or are at least supported and assisted by) the trend of police to appreciate their own role as that of law enforcers or â€Å"crime-fighters. † This promotes over trust on the use of force, predominantly lethal force and enhances police officers’ sense of hostility from the society they are sworn to serve. Furthermore, this self-image makes police doubtful of, hostile to, and commonly unhelpful with police administrations inspired programs such as â€Å"community policing†Ã¢â‚¬â€œthat aim to redesign the police into a more comprehensible organization. Amusingly, the police self-image as â€Å"crime-fighters† continue in the face of practical studies showing that law enforcement per se, the engaging and catching of criminals, takes up only a small number of police officers’ work time. Much more time is in fact spent by the police doing things like crowd and traffic organizing, dispute resolution, dealing with medical tragedies, and the like. Consider Kleinig’s argument of police dishonesty. Kleinig takes up Lawrence Sherman’s view that allowing police to agree to a free cup of coffee at a diner starts the officer on a slippery slope toward more serious graft because, deliberating he has accepted a free cup of coffee makes it difficult for the officer to stand firm when a bartender who is in action after legal closing hours presents him a drink–and this in turn will make it harder to resist yet more serious attempts to bribe the officer to not enforce the law. Sherman then suggests that the only way to fight corruption is to get rid of the kinds of laws, first and foremost vice laws that provide the strongest lure to corruption of both police and criminals. In opposition to Sherman’s view, Kleinig believe sthat of Michael Feldberg, who argue that police can and do differentiates between minor gratuities and bribes. Kleinig consent. Kleinig takes corruption to be a topic of its motive (to misrepresent the carrying out of justice for personal or organizational gains) relatively than of particular manners. This is a nice difference that allows Kleinig to detach corrupt practices from other ethically problematic practices, such as taking gratuities–of which the free cup of coffee is an example. Quoting Feldberg, Kleinig writes that â€Å"what makes a gift a gratuity is the reason it is given; what makes it corruption is the reason it is taken† (Kleining, 1996, 178). Gratuities are given with the hope that they will encourage the police to frequent the organization that give them, and certainly, the police will often stop at the diner that gives them a free cup of coffee. Thus, Kleinig follows Feldberg in philosophy that recieving coffee is wrong because it will tend to draw police into the coffee-offering business and thus upset the democratic value of even-handed distribution of police protection. Kleinig takes up the question of entrapment by first allowing for the so-called subjective and objective advances to determining when it has occurred. On the subjective approach, entrapment has happened if the government has rooted the intention to commit the crime in the defendant’s mind. So implicit, the defence of entrapment is overcome if the government can show that the defendant already had (at least) the outlook to perform the type of crime of which he is now blamed. On the objective approach, anything the intention or disposition of the real defendant, entrapment has arised if the government’s contribution is of such a character that it would have made a usually law-abiding person to commit a crime. Kleinig condemns the subjective approach by indicating that the behaviour of a government cause that constitutes entrapment would not do so if it had been done by a classified citizen. Thus, the subjective approach fails to clarify why entrapment only relay to actions performed by government means. For this grounds, some turn to the objective approach with its stress on improper government action. However, as Kleinig skilfully shows, this approach experience from the problem of spelling out what the government must do to, so to converse, â€Å"create† a crime. It cannot be that the government agent was the sine qua non of the crime since that would rule out lawful police does not entice operations; nor can it be that the government agent simply made the crime easier since that would rule out even undisruptive acts of providing public information. The objective approach seems based on no more than essentially controversial intuitive judgments about when police action is excessive or objectionable. The reason is that this account is susceptible to the same opposition that Kleinig raised in opposition to the subjective approach–it fails to explain why entrapment only relates to actions carried out by a government agent. Certainly, the problem goes deeper because Kleinig’s account supposes that government action has a particular status. As Kleinig point to, the same actions done by a private citizen would not comprise entrapment. It follows that actions done by a government agent can dirty the evidentiary picture, while the same actions done by a private citizen would not. But, then, we still need to know why entrapment refers only to actions carried out by government agents. To answer this, Kleinig must give more power to the objectivist approach than he does. When it does more s Kleinig notes but fails to integrate into his account–the government â€Å"becomes a tester of virtue rather than a detector of crime† (Kleining, 1996, 161). Indeed, much practical crime fighting is wrong because it does not so much fight crimes as it fights criminals, taking them as if they were an unseen enemy who need to be drawn out into the unwrap and take steps. As with corruption, it seems to me that Kleinig has measured entrapment with active criminal justice practice taken as given and thus, by default, as not posing a confront to ethical policing. Kleinig suggests that as an alternative of law enforcers or crime-fighters, police ought to be consider and think of themselves–as â€Å"social peacekeepers,† only part of whose task is to put into effect the law, but whose larger task is to remove the obstruction to the even and pacific flow of social life. (Kleining, 1996, 27ff) Kleinig’s disagreement for significant the police role as social peacekeeping has three parts. The first part is the gratitude that, while social agreement theories lead to the idea of the police as just law enforcers, the information is that we have (as I have already noted) always likely the police to play a larger role, taking care of a large diversity of the barrier to quiet social life. The second part of the quarrel is that the idea of the police as peacekeepers, in totaling to equivalent to what police essentially do, reverberates adequately with practice, in exacting with the idea of the â€Å"king’s peace,† the organization of which might be thought of as the predecessor of modem criminal justice tradition. Kleinig thinks will flow from this preconceiving of the police role: a less confused, more helpful and pacifying relationship between the police and the society; a compact dependence on the use of force, particularly lethal force, to the point that force is sighted as only a last alternative among the many possessions accessible to the police for eliminating obstacles to social peace. The very fact that police are armed (and dressed in military-style uniforms) for law enforcement makes it just about overwhelming that they will be used for crowd and traffic control. Subsequently, if a small group of persons is to keep a large, volatile and potentially dodgy group in line, it will surely help if the small group is armed and in distinguishing dress. As for the other jobs allocated to the police, it must be distinguished that these jobs are not generally executed by the police for the community as a whole. Middle class and wealthier folks do not turn to the police for dispute resolution or help in medical emergencies. Ignored in this way, the poor call on the police when there is problem and reasonably so. The police are at all times there, they make house calls, and they do not charge. Practices that outcome from our negligent treatment of the poor should scarcely be lifted to normative position in the way that Kleinig in cause does by speaking of what â€Å"we† have allocated to the police. Only some have had the authority to assign the police these additional jobs, and even those influential few seem more to have deserted the jobs on the police than considerately to have assigned them. Most significantly, however, distinguishing the police as peacekeepers has the trend to cover over what is still the most important truth about the police, the very thing that calls for extraordinary good reason and for particular answerability, namely, that the police have the ability to order us around and to use aggression to back those orders up. For example, when Kleinig takes up the police arguments that they should be treated like proficiently and thus standardize themselves, Kleinig objects only on the position that â€Å"It is uncertain whether police can lay claim to such focused knowledge† not available to lay persons as renowned professions, such as medicine and law’ do. (Kleining, 1996, 40) Similarly, in explanation why police may correctly be focused to civilian review boards, Kleinig says that â€Å"the police provide a society service at a cost to the society† and thus ought to be answerable to the public they serve. (Kleining, 1996, 227) The police are precisely subject to remote review to a level that the local authority company is not, and the grounds are the particular authority and authority the police have and the suitably tense relation involving that power, essential as it is, and the free public it both defend and threatens. Conceivably, after all, the cops are right in opinion of themselves as law enforcers and crime fighters. Reading John Kleinig’s book is an extremely good way for anyone to learn just how uncomfortable that situation is. References Kleining, John (1996) The Ethics of Policing, New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Mgt 4045

Explain the rationale for the global harmonization of financial reporting and disclosure requirements. -Make the financial statement more comparable across the global market so investors can invest their capital in more efficient comparable. 2. Identify two groups that are exerting pressure for pursuing global harmonization. How do these two groups stand to benefit from harmonization? -Investors are concerned with the reliability and comparability of sinacial statement in countries other than theirs.They favor this because it will help lower cost of investing in countries aboard and enhance the effectiveness of investment decisions. Multinational companies want global harmonization because of the increase in international diversity of manufacturing and sales. The fact that all accounting practices are not compatible means that they devote more resources to prepare and consolidate there financial statements. 3. What are the main obstacles to global accounting harmonization? In your op inion, are these obstacles likely to be overcome in the near future? The main obstacles are due to economics and politics. I think it will be a very slow and hard process to invoke in the near future because of everyone sensitivity and pride of there own countries.The polices would have to come from a super national organization and combine principals of many different countries. 4. What is the role of each of the following supra-national organizations? a. International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) -Developed as a parent entity of the IASB, it is an independent standards setter that assumes accounting standards setting responsibilities from IASC. . International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) -Organizational accounting organization that represents accountants employed in public practices, and the primary activity is to serve public interests and to facilitate cooperation among members. c. International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) -Known as the international standard setters for securities market, it promote high standards of regulation for sounds markets, and establishes standard and effective surveillance of international securities to name a few objectives. d.Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) -â€Å"Rich mans club†, comprised of 30 countries that produce 2/3 of the worlds goods and services in were all countries are committed to a market economy and pluralistic democracy, that provided governments with a setting to discuss, develop, and perfect economic an d social policies. 5. The FASB has described their proposal to transition to IFRS as an â€Å"improve and adopt† approach. What are the two parts of this â€Å"improve and adopt† proposal? Why does the FASB support this approach? First, the â€Å"improve and adopt† plan will require a joint effort by FASB and IASB to develop and improve standards in the areas that will benefit financial statements users universally. Secondly, a gradual approach transition to IFRS will reduce the disruptions that might occur from an abrupt switch. -Third, this approach allows other infrastructures elements to improve and converge while IFRS and improved and mandated. Finally, this approach avoids the added cost and complexity of dealing with two accounting systems. 6.What is the current plan for joint projects between the FASB and IASB? What is your assessment of the reasonableness of this plan? -The current plan between the joint projects is on a modified strategy and a delayed timeline for several of their convergence project extended till the end of 2011. Even thought that are delayed it is said that it will not negatively impact the SEC’s timeline. I think it is a good idea to have a longer period of time to implement these joint projects because it gives the stakeholders more time to express there input. 7.The PWC article identifies eleven (11) joint projects currently underway (i. e. , financial instruments, revenue recognition, leases, etc. ). Select three of these joint projects to consider in depth. For the three projects you have selected: -Financial Instruments- The issues with the financial instruments used to cause an inconsistent way of reporting value, revenue and other forms of financial information’s that could misleading investors. The joint project it to bring off these financial instruments together to make it easier to understand.To bring convergence there is a need for multiple new a more useful approaches like, recognizing losses earlier and recognizing credit impairments when not thought to collect. -Revenue recognition- Revenue recognition currently recognizes revenue when the customer signs into an agreement and values the price of fulfillment as being a fixed value. The new joint project would require the recognition of a contract come after the contract is fulfilled and not be able to keep the value as fixed.Another important aspect of the proposal is to est ablish principles to promote comparability among similar contracts. -Leases- -Consolidation- Under the ne joint projects, many of the companies will still be able to consider certain investment companies under the U. S. GAAP are likely to continue to meet qualifications under the new definition, but some may not. The one major change will be defining if the company has control over the investment company and how that will be determined. a. Provide a brief overview of the issue. b. Explain why it is important. c.Describe what needs to be done to bring about convergence. 8. The authors of the last article, Paul Miller and Paul Bahnson, are not proponents of international uniformity of accounting standards. Identify three reasons they are against it (they provide more than three). Do you agree? -He believes that uniformity is not comparable, it kills innovation, and doesn’t believe IFRS is uniformed. I do agree with him in some aspects because uniformity across a global market, while a very noble goal, is almost impossible to achieve and could result in so many problems.

Parenting: GCSE Child Development Essay

This is an excellent essay that was wonderful to read and mark. It shows a good understanding of the varying needs of the child and discusses how conflict can arise. If the writer wanted to extend the essay, they could discuss some of the theories that look at how relationships develop and how conflict arises. ***** Marked by teacher Sam Morran 01/12/2012 The first 200 words of this essay†¦ Lil Maisky Year 11 Parenting: -Describe the ideal relationship between parents and children. -How do you appreciate your parents and how do they appreciate you? (400 words) Any ideal relationship is based on the appropriate balance in between the commitment and effort of both members concerned. However, the relationship between a parent and child is far more complicated as there is a large amount of responsibility involved. Also, the child is likely to resemble one or both of the parents to a certain extent, but not be as developed or experienced as the parent, thus adding a lot of competition and  argumentative aspects to the relationship. This can be more prominently observed when two members of the same sex are involved (mother and daughter†¦) As the age of the child increases, the responsibility of the parent decreases, most probably proportionally, and this has to be observed by the parent. One has to take into consideration that the child’s young years are all that he/she has experienced and that although it’s existence might only go back as far as a tiny fraction of the parents life, this cannot be understood by the child until

An Analysis Of ‘Hills Like White Elephants’ By Ernest Hemingway Essay

‘Hills like White Elephants’ is a very clever story written by a journalist, turned ambulance driver, turned military, turned prose and fiction writer.   Ernest Hemingway was popular for his novels and short stories, but before he entertained his passion for the art of storytelling, he worked for the Kansas City Star as a reporter; he was also an ambulance driver during World War I and enlisted in the Italian infantry. He took every opportunity to wield the pen, in fact, after the war; he worked for the Toronto Star.   Hemingway was more in love with the pen than with the musket as during the Spanish Civil War and the Second World War, he even worked as a news correspondent.   This brilliant writer produced exceptional pieces of literature that are cherished for their quality to this day such as ‘Death in the Afternoon’, ‘The Green Hills of Africa’, ‘A Farewell to Arms’, ‘For Whom the Bell Tolls’, and ‘The Old Man and the Sea’. Hemingway drew from his experiences in the motifs of his pieces which usually had masculine motifs like hunting, war, and other activities associated with the masculine gender.   For some strange reason, however, Hemingway committed suicide in 1961.   His works of short fiction were far better than his novels; however it is with his novels that he built a reputation for himself.   ‘Hills like White Elephants’ is one of his short stories that quite reflects the skill of Hemingway as a fictionist. ‘Hills like white Elephants’ is a piece of literature that demonstrates what is known to literaturists as literary control in tackling the main theme which is abortion.   It is a story that addresses a very sensitive issue with the use of allegory and a philosophical approach to fiction known as existentialism. The story ‘Hills like White Elephants’ is a relatively ‘short’ short story that is ridden with symbolism; for all its worth, it might have as well been a piece of poetry, if not for its obvious narrative style.   It is about two individuals, an unnamed American and Jig who have a discussion over some drinks at a train station in Spain. The matter of their discussion is vague at first, and becomes clear to be abortion later on.   The piece is a ‘silent’ commentary about the difference of views between males and females in general as well as the poignant reaction of both genders to news that may or may not change ones way of life.   In this particular story, Hemingway used the third person perspective to give the audience a sense of distance when reading the story.   By this, it means that the audience, instead of closely associating themselves with the characters in the story, would instead, identify themselves on a different level, thus, giving even the subject matter of the story a metaphorical feel, despite its being a tangible and quite material issue. This distinct level of identification in the story because of the narrative is a technique used by most writers to create a more general feel to the story; so that the audience, in reading the story, does not have to attach themselves to a particular detail and identify with that detail.   Noticeably so, this same quality of the story is also achieved by Hemingway’s use of direct, relatively short sentences for the conversation of the two characters.   This technique, again, gives the story a distinct indifferent feel. It allows the reader to explore the story on various levels instead of just zooming into one particular aspect of the story.   It also prevents the audience from succumbing to the temptation of making specific conclusions about the story early on; from the temptation of simply disregarding other details in the story and focusing on the main subject matter, which is abortion.   Even this particular issue is never mentioned in the piece, except in the form of symbols and indirect statements from the characters. This particular style of writing, where the writer skimps on words, and instead, attaches multi-level meanings to the text is known as literary control.   The main theme of abortion is addressed in this particular style, to begin with the title itself, â€Å"Hills like White Elephants†. (Hemingway, 1950)   The title, which is illustrated more in the first paragraph of the story which describes the setting, acquires a new level of interpretation from the passage, â€Å"The hills across the valley of the Ebro were long and white.† (Hemingway, 1950); and the girl continues to describe the barren landscape, â€Å"They look like white elephants†. (Hemingway, 1950) What this does in particular is it foreshadows the main theme of the story by presenting something decrepit or useless.   ‘White elephants’ are accepted to be symbols of huge structures that are not functional, and in the way this particular phrase is used to describe the hills in the story, it takes on a different meaning – that the hills, barren and dry, supposedly representations of abundance and fertility, are apparently ‘white’ or ineffectual on a superficial level. This particular style combines two opposing images, that of fertility in the hills, and emptiness, in the perception of Jig.   What this does is it confirms Jig’s pregnancy, but alludes to this pregnancy being empty, in the sense that she feels that her pregnancy is meaningless, if not to her, to her lover.   The tension in the conversation is given another push with the man’s remark about Jig’s description of the hills, â€Å"I’ve never seen one (white elephant)†. (Hemingway, 1950) Then Jig responds, â€Å"No, you wouldn’t have.† (Hemingway, 1950)   On   the level that has been discussed, this particular exchange in their conversation basically presents the man as being indifferent not only to the feelings of Jig but to the concept of emptiness and aloneness; that other than not being able to sense how Jig is feeling at the moment, he also is naturally and habitually indifferent, selfish, even. This early in the story, there is also an indication as to the personality of Jig being very dependent and attached to the man because of her requiring his approval first before she does anything; in having a drink, she asks, â€Å"What should we drink†¦Could we try it (Anis del Toro)?† (Hemingway, 1950); and when she is asked if she would take the drink with water, she asks (addressing the man), â€Å"I don’t know†¦Is it good with water?† (Hemingway, 1950) These statements from the girl show how valuable the man’s approval of her decisions is.   These show the weightiness of the man’s decisions even with matters concerning Jig.   This particular exchange also gives the audience an idea of how the tone will be when the main issue of abortion comes into play.   At this point, the girl also senses the indifference of the man and indicates this with the line, â€Å"Everything tastes like licorice.   Especially the things you’ve waited so long for, like absinthe.† (Hemingway, 1950) The girl here makes an indirect reference to their lifestyle – that nothing is new with them – and suddenly, when something new happens – she gets pregnant – the man refuses to accept the change.   In particular, this also gives a slight indication that the girl wants to continue the pregnancy when she implied that it is a change that she ‘waited so long for’ (Hemingway 1950)   This interpretation is further strengthened when the girl remarks, â€Å"That’s all we do, isn’t it – look at things and try new drinks?† (Hemingway, 1950) Another indication as to the lifestyle of this couple comes later in the story, with the author’s description of the bags at the station, â€Å"He did not say anything but looked at the bags against the wall of the station. There were labels on them from all the hotels where they had spent nights.† (Hemingway, 1950)   This description of the bags creates the imagery of the owners of the bags being people who are on a pleasure trip from one place to another.   Bags are also used here to represent the emotional or mental baggage that the man is carrying as a consequence of the pregnancy of Jig. When the man finally reveals in the story that he wants Jig to have an abortion, in the passage, â€Å"†It’s really an awfully simple operation, Jig, †¦ It’s not really an operation at all.† (Hemingway, 1950), the tension begins to rise, and more symbols emerge.   Of course, with this remark from the man, the girl becomes silent and does not react. However, her first line after this revelation is â€Å"Then what will we do afterward?† (Hemingway, 1950)   Basically, what this does is it amplifies the emptiness of the woman in relation to the abortion – her asking ‘what to do afterwards’ (Hemingway, 1950) shows that she does not see anything after the abortion; that everything after the abortion is covered in haze.   The man further refers to the pregnancy as something that has made them both unhappy (Hemingway, 1950), in response, the girl takes hold of two strings of beads from the bead curtain and says, â€Å"†And you think then we’ll be all right and be happy.†. (Hemingway, 1950) However, note that although the girl almost validates the statement of the man regarding the pregnancy, notice the action of holding the beads – while this can easily be passed off as an unconscious musing, it could also be symbolic for ‘prayer’.   Beads are derived from the old Middle English word ‘bede’ which means prayer.   The string of beads as described very much look like the ones in rosaries; hence, it could be interpreted that although the girl seems to agree with the man, she is praying or hoping against all hope that abortion was not the solution to their problem. The girl is at a loss for words at this point and refers back to the ‘white elephants’ in her earlier exchange with the man specifically pointing out his earlier reaction to this remark, â€Å"But if I do it, then it will be nice again if I say things are like white elephants, and you’ll like it?† (Hemingway, 1950)   Now, if the previous interpretation of ‘white elephants’ being emptiness is applied to this statement, it becomes quite sarcastic as opposed to the tone at which it is said – the girl here is submitting to the man and implying that she will be empty with the abortion, but will the man like her in this state, anyway?    The man responds, â€Å"I’ll love it. I love it now but I just can’t think about it.† (Hemingway, 1950)   Slowly, from their exchanges, a brute nature emerges from the man, insensitive, and indifferent.   Their conversation then continues on to indicate that the girl will be having the abortion but not because she wants it, but because this would make her man happy, also implying that her own happiness is not a matter of concern, because she has put the man’s happiness before her own; this she conveyed with the lines, â€Å"Then I’ll do it. Because I don’t care about me.† (Hemingway, 1950)   Here we can see that a resolution is not met between the two characters, only a submission, which, by the way, is against the will of the lady. The author alludes to the lady’s desire of having the child when he put in a description of the scenery at the other side of the station – which, in this story, represents a ‘crux’ or a point of decision.   The station here is symbolic of a turning point in both of the lives of the characters, and so, the author, earlier, describes that the hills are dry and barren, while at the other side of the station, â€Å"were fields of grain and trees along the banks of the Ebro. Far away, beyond the river, were mountains.†Ã‚   (Hemingway, 1950) All these images represent fertility, life, and renewal, and at this point also, when the lady sees this particular scenery, she experiences a change of heart and realizes that she should at least take another chance at convincing the man that the abortion will leave her empty, which should be the main issue between the two of them, if the man was sensitive enough.   This realization is clear in their rapid exchange of lines, â€Å"†I said we could have everything./We can have everything./No, we can’t./We can have the whole world./No, we can’t./We can go everywhere./No, we can’t. It isn’t ours any more./It’s ours./No, it isn’t. And once they take it away, you never get it back.† (Hemingway, 1950) In this exchange, it is evident how totally unrelated the man’s arguments are in relation to the girl’s.   Here, they don’t really ‘meet’ each other in terms of what they are talking about.   This ‘not meeting of minds’ has another indirect symbol in the ‘railroad tracks’ which are parallel and never meet.   Notice the last statement of the girl in the above exchange; in this particular line, she is referring to the child in her womb, while earlier on in the conversation, the man is actually referring to the material and carnal pleasures that they had both been enjoying. The man says that they can have all these, but the lady disagrees.   In the end, there is no closure in their argument and Hemingway leaves the audience hanging as to whether the girl decides to have the abortion or not.   What is known, however, is that in the end, the girl indicates that she is all right (Hemingway, 1950); considering her previous arguments, then it can be assumed that she will not be going for the abortion. While the story is fairly simple in its presentation, it tackles a very deep philosophy known as existentialism, appropriately so because the writer lived in an era when this philosophy was in force.   Despite the girl’s seeming submission to the man’s will in this story, she actually exercises her individual existence and choice; two very basic concepts of existentialism. From the text, it is evident how the lady struggles to assert her own individual set of beliefs, and how she, although in a very subtle way, dismisses the man’s arguments in favor of her own set of beliefs and her freedom to choose.   So, while we can easily say that for a superficial reader, the story is just an exchange of conversation between two people regarding an abortion, the symbols and the clever use of language comes into play to coax the reader to digest the story and interpret it a different level; at which level, the references to existentialism become clear. In closing, the story is indeed a hotbed of symbolism and a classic example of literary control.   It does not spoon-feed the audience nor takes all the thinking away from the reader.   It very discreetly, but very accurately infers various meanings into the text by way of   allegory, and profoundly presents the idea of existentialism simply by playing around with the conversation of two people, the introduction of a sensitive matter, and finally, the unspoken assertion of the lady of her individual nature and her own freedom. References Hemingway, E. (1950). Hills like White Elephants. Retrieved March 25, 2009, from http://www.gummyprint.com/blog/archives/hills-like-white-elephants-complete-story/