Filipino Slang Words Essay

Throughout the generation, one can already make a separate dictionary for the great number of Filipino slang terms created. However one term can definitely catch one’s attention, which is exactly what the term’s meaning is. Have you ever been in a situation where a person has been called epal? What exactly is being epal? Urban Dictionary defines it as ‘a person who goes into a situation wherein his presence is not needed or in a place he does not belong’. The term epal has been derived from the word ‘pumapapel’ or ‘mapapel’ which means someone who intervenes with affairs of others or impedes with the concerns of a group with no relation to him with the intention of trying to become the center of attention. It can be inferred that it is an example of salitang kalye or balbal in Filipino language and has an unclear etymology. Although unclear is its roots, epal is similar to other Filipino slang terms and it is certain that there is a catalyst for these words to be created. Hence, it is not only about using epal as either an insult or a label because it is also an element of language variation. Relevantly, slang terms are codes or â€Å"mechanisms† that reflect social awareness or circumstances happening around an individual (Newsome, n.d.) The term can be traced to the culture of the Philippines. Knowing that it is part of our language and culture, it is ought to be elaborated for it allows the discovery of the pattern of formation of words like it and what it has to do with our identity. This one word could even identify the image of Filipino society in the micro-level. The term epal is a proof of the diversity of the Filipino language because of its connotation in the past and present, impact to society and contrasting themes with other similar terms in the Philippines. On account of being a mainstream negative label for someone, the attribute of epal has extended to the usage in the social and political dimension. There are hundreds of situations one can recognize someone as epal. In the social scene, media might use epal as an interesting element in a show. One can imagine a girl with her quickly beating heart, and blushing cheeks that seem like roses blossoming and sparkling eyes hidden and focused on the ground to avert the eyes directed toward her. In an inconspicuous location after school hours, she called this boy full of determination but now it was as though her courage was being drained from her. Presently, she is standing before the man of her dreams and is ready to confess her overflowing emotion. Both are anxious of their presence and what is about to happen. Beginning to explain, she spoke to the boy in a soft-spoken yet determined voice. As soon as she was about to confess her pure and deep love, the whole atmosphere is ruined and the mood is after a teacher appeared. The romance between the princess and the prince is destroyed by the dragon and to what they thought was going to be their happy ending, it ended painfully before it even began. An epal is a person who intervenes with people or thwarts plans. In a political scene, again one can imagine a person walking down the street, and he sees posters everywhere of incompetent politicians declaring their vow to the progress of this country. It was the same vow they made during the previous campaign period where they won, and currently their promises are insubstantial. Completely infuriated by this, he goes home and tries to ease his mind so he turned the television on to watch his favourite show. Giggles and tears were expressed; the person was concentrated veritably on the show for the storyline was reaching its climax. Then, the epal struck once more; a campaign advertisement showed the same shameless politician, who pretended to help the adults and children by giving them goods and smiles at a populated squatter area. At such a premature period, he was already campaigning and promoting his kupal side. An epal is one who schemes and gets as much opportunity as possible to get attention. To distinguish further, an epal is characterized as: first, he is treated like an outcast when he is forcing his way in to a group he does not belong or he is not welcome in. Second, a person who assigns himself with more work so he seems the good guy in the group but actually he receives pity and the work he assigned for himself is given to others so he is left with none. He is a cunning extra character in a movie trying to create his own script in the film, so he can get the credit for the success of the movie and get more attention. Boosting the ego through vexatious ways, it is what an epal does. As is any other term, there must have been a cause as to why slang words are formed. Though epal has a vague etymology, it has motivators for it to be integrated in the Filipino vocabulary. First, according to Zorc (1993), Filipinos establish the idea of a slang terminology â€Å"by borrowing from other languages, by giving new meanings to pre-existing words by coining or creating original forms, or by using numbers as a kind of â€Å"in-group codes† (as cited in Derivation of Slang Words, para. 1) The explanation for the existence of epal can be identified as coinage, or invented words completely or almost varying from the words they had been based on. It has reshaped the term through the process of metathesis and reduction. Metathesis or agglutination is simply the rearrangement of sounds and syllables in a word to produce new terms that may or may not have the same meaning as the original word (Derivation of Slang Words, n.d.). During the 1970s, the process of agglutination become popular and it might be the reason why we have epal (Tan, 2009). Reduction is the truncation or removal of a letter or a group of letters in a word. Example of these are Erap from the word pare (brother or friend), as well as yosi and siga (a brute) from sigarilyo (cigarette). Second, the likely cause of the creation of epal, similar to other salitang kalye at balbal, is being relative to the situation the term epal was formed. The result is a product that suits its social environment. Epal’s locus and period of time of creation has influenced and contextualized the term. Areas of the masa, or the middle and lower class Filipinos and further popularized by the media is the likely origin of epal. It is proven that slang terms are more likely to flourish in the scene of the masa but it is not absolute in all cases for even in college or in other various settings, people create their own slang, jargon and register. As a result, epal is evidence that our language is diversified and made more unique, through its regular usage rather than using foreign language. Epal has observantly contributed to our media and politics. In social context, media has made it famous because celebrities, hosts, and showbiz gossip people use it; it has become a staple label for people regardless whether they deserve it or not. Another effect would be that media has used epal characters frequently in comedy programs and use them for humor in romantic shows or rom-coms in short. They are portrayed as people who are annoying and uncontrollably butts in conversations, break up friendship among people, or someone who likes to brag and present himself to other uninterested people. He is a typical fool or clown. In political context, DSWD has used the term and launched its program after this. The â€Å"Anti-epal† campaign is against the â€Å"epals† in our community. These are politicians and political groups that ‘use the Conditional Cash Transfer Program, also known as PantawidPamilyang Pilipino Program, to threaten beneficiaries and take advantage of their roles in the forthcoming elections (Fernandez, 2013). The epals here have the same essence as the social context but has integrated it into their own conditions. Looking at these instances, epal is a slang term created by and for vendors, pedicab drivers or loiterers in the street. It can symbolize a cry for patriotism and change. These effects show that even a term like epal affects not only our language but also the people themselves. From the unique term epal, other terms have branched out from it such as kupal and kapalmuks. The variety of such creative words in Filipino slang vocabulary is too many to identify; its usage changing through periods of time and its trend fluctuating through succeeding generations. Epal, kupal and kapalmuks have been used interchangeably but in actuality they differ in: representation and degree. The word kupal originated from the language of Cebu. Similar as epal, kupal is also a master in the field of being an irksome pest but it specifically means an obnoxious person. Furthermore, it may be described as a person doing irresponsible actions and being ignorant of its consequences. The degree of the term kupal is greater than epal because it expresses a stronger feeling of frustration when one is called kupal. Hence, it can only be used as an insult. A person being kupal may not actually always be impudent, yet the person will always be considered repugnant. An instance could be whenever a person makes decisions without good discretion and this wrong judgement has caused grave results to him and others as well. First aspect of a kupal is that the person lies frequently and blatantly to get what he wants. The second aspect of a kupal is that the person recklessly does things and insensitively involves people with him. Ultimately, the primary difference between epal from kupal is the depth of both terms’ to denominate an individual’s acrimony to a person. Conversely, kapalmuks is pure shamelessness. It is the contraction of the Filipino phrase â€Å"kapal ng mukha† which exactly means being thick-faced or to be put simply have no sense of modesty in oneself. Both kapalmuk and epal are almost synonymous with each other. Both are vainglorious and egotistic, but epal tends to meddle with people’s businesses while a kapalmuk fixes himself in showing off for the praise. Kapalmuks is the state of shamelessness to the extreme degree, greater than an epal. An epal might self-promote through people, or social channels like giving himself most of the credit for a project that he had negligible collaboration with (Esguerra, 2011). Brazenly stepping into an affair and wanting to help very pretentiously, an epal gains popularity with his non-existent contributions and solutions. Randy David of Inquirer claimed this to be the â€Å"new narcissism† (De Veas Insigne, 2011) Contrariwise, a kapalmuk associate himself with people to seek attention rather he would spotlight himself. In a clearer manner, a kapalmuk is personified and can be seen here in the Philippines where walls of cities are turned into photo albums or scrapbooks by politicians. Everywhere, they put tarpaulins, posters, ads, infograph and other propaganda of politicians about themselves. The affected are just not facades, buildings or electric posts; license plate, permits, etc. are also marked by politicians’ faces. Although an epal can be intolerable, a kapalmuk can be disgraceful to himself and other people. Despite arguments claiming slang words in the language of Filipinos for instance epal, astig, damulag, bulalo, and jologs as detrimental to our culture for it makes our language a lowly, menial and ineffective medium in communication, slang terms are actually one characteristic of language which represents diversity at the same time solidarity. Coinages of Filipino terms prove that the language is ever evolving. It does not matter if it is barbaric or jargon but the important thing is that these words convey some aspect of truth in the world. The term epal then, represents the truth of having an exasperating character whether in real life or in a TV show. A person being epal is characterized as an outcast of in a group or a prideful extra in a movie. Similar as any slang word, it has its origin and during the trend of deriving slang in the 70s, epal took its form from the word ‘pumapapel’. Its effects to the Philippine community are that it is a recurring theme in the entertainment side and has been used to label people from the political arena. Epal may simply describe an attention seeking person but this is just a manifested purpose of the term. Its latent purpose might be to depict people in the country that are damaging this society. The significance of words in our language such as epal is not just to know a description for an enemy you have, it is much more complex than that. According to Gibbs (1994), Slang can be defined as â€Å"dynamic variety of language that is used to show solidarity and claimin-group membership† (as cited in Newsome, para. 2). It is in this light that we can deduce that when one culture creates slang it means that people are comfortable with the people they are mingling with and this strengthens the affiliation between a group either through race, language, belief, etc. Hence, it is right to say that bekimons, gay people in the Philippines, do not just cluster around their sexual orientation but also the language that they speak of. Lodge in his work â€Å"The Pragmatics of Slang† concisely explained it in his first of three features of language variation, that â€Å"a broad and increasing lexicon is essential in order to express the ‘nuances’ of human emotions and personal identity and experiences† We create these slang words because these words embody our troubles and our personality; the whole essence of us. Words mean nothing if these do not help define ideas and thoughts of the people. The word epal entails the idea of the generation when it was made and is being used. Thus, epal may, in the future, disappear in the following generations but the language of Filipinos will still be evolving. References: Arriola, B. So what’s epal (2012, September 03) Retrieved from Beltran, C. Beyond epal†¦it’s kapal (2012, September 12) Retrieved from http://www. De Guzman, L. In the know: ‘Epal’ (2011, November 04) Retrieved from De Veas Insigne, Y. (2011, November 17) Anti-epal bill is ok but how about the kapalmuks? Retrieved from http://www.yodisphere.com/2011/11/anti-epal-bill-is-ok-but-how-about.html DSWD to launch anti-epal campaign (2013, February 03) Retrieved from Epal : Pinoy Slang. (n.d.) Retrieved from Epal : Urban Dictionary (n.d) Retrieved from Esguerra, C. V. (2011, November 04) Sen. Santiago to shame vain politicians thru ‘anti-epal’ bill† Philippine Daily Inquirer. Retrieved from

Critique of Pure Reason Essay

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) is the central figure in modern philosophy. He synthesized early modern rationalism and empiricism, set the terms for much of nineteenth and twentieth century philosophy, and continues to exercise a significant influence today in metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, political philosophy, aesthetics, and other fields. The fundamental idea of Kant’s â€Å"critical philosophy† — especially in his three Critiques: the Critique of Pure Reason (1781, 1787), the Critique of Practical Reason (1788), and the Critique of the Power of Judgment (1790) — is human autonomy. He argues that the human understanding is the source of the general laws of nature that structure all our experience; and that human reason gives itself the moral law, which is our basis for belief in God, freedom, and immortality. Therefore, scientific knowledge, morality, and religious belief are mutually consistent and secure because they all rest on the same foundation of human autonomy, which is also the final end of nature according to the teleological worldview of reflecting judgment that Kant introduces to unify the theoretical and practical parts of his philosophical system. 1. Life and works Immanuel Kant was born April 22, 1724 in Konigsberg, near the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Today Konigsberg has been renamed Kaliningrad and is part of Russia. But during Kant’s lifetime Konigsberg was the capitol of East Prussia, and its dominant language was German. Though geographically remote from the rest of Prussia and other German cities, Konigsberg was then a major commercial center, an important military port, and a relatively cosmopolitan university town. [1] Kant was born into an artisan family of modest means. His father was a master harness maker, and his mother was the daughter of a harness maker, though she was better educated than most women of her social class. Kant’s family was never destitute, but his father’s trade was in decline during Kant’s youth and his parents at times had to rely on extended family for financial support. Kant’s parents were Pietist and he attended a Pietist school, the Collegium Fridericianum, from ages eight through fifteen. Pietism was an evangelical Lutheran movement that emphasized conversion, reliance on divine grace, the experience of religious emotions, and personal devotion involving regular Bible study, prayer, and introspection. Kant reacted strongly against the forced soul-searching to which he was subjected at the Collegium Fridericianum, in response to which he sought refuge in the Latin classics, which were central to the school’s curriculum. Later the mature Kant’s emphasis on reason and autonomy, rather than emotion and dependence on either authority or grace, may in part reflect his youthful reaction against Pietism. But although the young Kant loathed his Pietist schooling, he had deep respect and admiration for his parents, especially his mother, whose â€Å"genuine religiosity† he described as â€Å"not at all enthusiastic. † According to his biographer, Manfred Kuehn, Kant’s parents probably influenced him much less through their Pietism than through their artisan values of â€Å"hard work, honesty, cleanliness, and independence,† which they taught him by example. [2] Kant attended college at the University of Konigsberg, known as the Albertina, where his early interest in classics was quickly superseded by philosophy, which all first year students studied and which encompassed mathematics and physics as well as logic, metaphysics, ethics, and natural law. Kant’s philosophy professors exposed him to the approach of Christian Wolff (1679–1750), whose critical synthesis of the philosophy of G. W. Leibniz (1646–1716) was then very influential in German universities. But Kant was also exposed to a range of German and British critics of Wolff, and there were strong doses of Aristotelianism and Pietism represented in the philosophy faculty as well. Kant’s favorite teacher was Martin Knutzen (1713–1751), a Pietist who was heavily influenced by both Wolff and the English philosopher John Locke (1632–1704). Knutzen introduced Kant to the work of Isaac Newton (1642–1727), and his influence is visible in Kant’s first published work, Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces (1747), which was a critical attempt to mediate a dispute in natural philosophy between Leibnizians and Newtonians over the proper measurement of force. After college Kant spent six years as a private tutor to young children outside Konigsberg. By this time both of his parents had died and Kant’s finances were not yet secure enough for him to pursue an academic career. He finally returned to Konigsberg in 1754 and began teaching at the Albertina the following year. For the next four decades Kant taught philosophy there, until his retirement from teaching in 1796 at the age of seventy-two. Kant had a burst of publishing activity in the years after he returned from working as a private tutor. In 1754 and 1755 he published three scientific works — one of which, Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens (1755), was a major book in which, among other things, he developed what later became known as the nebular hypothesis about the formation of the solar system. Unfortunately, the printer went bankrupt and the book had little immediate impact. To secure qualifications for teaching at the university, Kant also wrote two Latin dissertations: the first, entitled Concise Outline of Some Reflections on Fire (1755), earned him the Magister degree; and the second, New Elucidation of the First Principles of Metaphysical Cognition (1755), entitled him to teach as an unsalaried lecturer. The following year he published another Latin work, The Employment in Natural Philosophy of Metaphysics Combined with Geometry, of Which Sample I Contains the Physical Monadology (1756), in hopes of succeeding Knutzen as associate professor of logic and metaphysics, though Kant failed to secure this position. Both the New Elucidation, which was Kant’s first work concerned mainly with metaphysics, and the Physical Monadology further develop the position on the interaction of finite substances that he first outlined in Living Forces. Both works depart from Leibniz-Wolffian views, though not radically. The New Elucidation in particular shows the influence of Christian August Crusius (1715–1775), a German critic of Wolff. [3] As an unsalaried lecturer at the Albertina Kant was paid directly by the students who attended his lectures, so he needed to teach an enormous amount and to attract many students in order to earn a living. Kant held this position from 1755 to 1770, during which period he would lecture an average of twenty hours per week on logic, metaphysics, and ethics, as well as mathematics, physics, and physical geography. In his lectures Kant used textbooks by Wolffian authors such as Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten (1714–1762) and Georg Friedrich Meier (1718–1777), but he followed them loosely and used them to structure his own reflections, which drew on a wide range of ideas of contemporary interest. These ideas often stemmed from British sentimentalist philosophers such as David Hume (1711–1776) and Francis Hutcheson (1694–1747), some of whose texts were translated into German in the mid-1750’s; and from the Swiss philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778), who published a flurry of works in the early 1760’s. From early in his career Kant was a popular and successful lecturer. He also quickly developed a local reputation as a promising young intellectual and cut a dashing figure in Konigsberg society. After several years of relative quiet, Kant unleashed another burst of publications in 1762–1764, including five philosophical works. The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures (1762) rehearses criticisms of Aristotelian logic that were developed by other German philosophers. The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God (1762–3) is a major book in which Kant drew on his earlier work in Universal History and New Elucidation to develop an original argument for God’s existence as a condition of the internal possibility of all things, while criticizing other arguments for God’s existence. The book attracted several positive and some negative reviews. In 1762 Kant also submitted an essay entitled Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality to a prize competition by the Prussian Royal Academy, though Kant’s submission took second prize to Moses Mendelssohn’s winning essay (and was published with it in 1764). Kant’s Prize Essay, as it is known, departs more significantly from Leibniz-Wolffian views than his earlier work and also contains his first extended discussion of moral philosophy in print. The Prize Essay draws on British sources to criticize German rationalism in two respects: first, drawing on Newton, Kant distinguishes between the methods of mathematics and philosophy; and second, drawing on Hutcheson, he claims that â€Å"an unanalysable feeling of the good† supplies the material content of our moral obligations, which cannot be demonstrated in a purely intellectual way from the formal principle of perfection alone (2:299). [4] These themes reappear in the Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy (1763), whose main thesis, however, is that the real opposition of conflicting forces, as in causal relations, is not reducible to the logical relation of contradiction, as Leibnizians held. In Negative Magnitudes Kant also argues that the morality of an action is a function of the internal forces that motivate one to act, rather than of the external (physical) actions or their consequences. Finally, Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime (1764) deals mainly with alleged differences in the tastes of men and women and of people from different cultures. After it was published, Kant filled his own interleaved copy of this book with (often unrelated) handwritten remarks, many of which reflect the deep influence of Rousseau on his thinking about moral philosophy in the mid-1760’s. These works helped to secure Kant a broader reputation in Germany, but for the most part they were not strikingly original. Like other German philosophers at the time, Kant’s early works are generally concerned with using insights from British empiricist authors to reform or broaden the German rationalist tradition without radically undermining its foundations. While some of his early works tend to emphasize rationalist ideas, others have a more empiricist emphasis. During this time Kant was striving to work out an independent position, but before the 1770’s his views remained fluid. In 1766 Kant published his first work concerned with the possibility of metaphysics, which later became a central topic of his mature philosophy. Dreams of a Spirit-Seer Elucidated by Dreams of Metaphysics, which he wrote soon after publishing a short Essay on Maladies of the Mind (1764), was occasioned by Kant’s fascination with the Swedish visionary Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772), who claimed to have insight into a spirit world that enabled him to make a series of apparently miraculous predictions. In this curious work Kant satirically compares Swedenborg’s spirit-visions to the belief of rationalist metaphysicians in an immaterial soul that survives death, and he concludes that philosophical knowledge of either is impossible because human reason is limited to experience. The skeptical tone of Dreams is tempered, however, by Kant’s suggestion that â€Å"moral faith† nevertheless supports belief in an immaterial and immortal soul, even if it is not possible to attain metaphysical knowledge in this domain (2:373). In 1770, at the age of forty-six, Kant was appointed to the chair in logic and metaphysics at the Albertina, after teaching for fifteen years as an unsalaried lecturer and working since 1766 as a sublibrarian to supplement his income. Kant was turned down for the same position in 1758. But later, as his reputation grew, he declined chairs in philosophy at Erlangen (1769) and Jena (1770) in hopes of obtaining one in Konigsberg. After Kant was finally promoted, he gradually extended his repertoire of lectures to include anthropology (Kant’s was the first such course in Germany and became very popular), rational theology, pedagogy, natural right, and even mineralogy and military fortifications. In order to inaugurate his new position, Kant also wrote one more Latin dissertation: Concerning the Form and Principles of the Sensible and Intelligible World (1770), which is known as the Inaugural Dissertation. The Inaugural Dissertation departs more radically from both Wolffian rationalism and British sentimentalism than Kant’s earlier work. Inspired by Crusius and the Swiss natural philosopher Johann Heinrich Lambert (1728–1777), Kant distinguishes between two fundamental powers of cognition, sensibility and understanding (intelligence), where the Leibniz-Wolffians regarded understanding (intellect) as the only fundamental power. Kant therefore rejects the rationalist view that sensibility is only a confused species of intellectual cognition, and he replaces this with his own view that sensibility is distinct from understanding and brings to perception its own subjective forms of space and time — a view that developed out of Kant’s earlier criticism of Leibniz’s relational view of space in Concerning the Ultimate Ground of the Differentiation of Directions in Space (1768). Moreover, as the title of the Inaugural Dissertation indicates, Kant argues that sensibility and understanding are directed at two different worlds: sensibility gives us access to the sensible world, while understanding enables us to grasp a distinct intelligible world. These two worlds are related in that what the understanding grasps in the intelligible world is the â€Å"paradigm† of â€Å"NOUMENAL PERFECTION,† which is â€Å"a common measure for all other things in so far as they are realities. † Considered theoretically, this intelligible paradigm of perfection is God; considered practically, it is â€Å"MORAL PERFECTION† (2:396). The Inaugural Dissertation thus develops a form of Platonism; and it rejects the view of British sentimentalists that moral judgments are based on feelings of pleasure or pain, since Kant now holds that moral judgments are based on pure understanding alone. After 1770 Kant never surrendered the views that sensibility and understanding are distinct powers of cognition, that space and time are subjective forms of human sensibility, and that moral judgments are based on pure understanding (or reason) alone. But his embrace of Platonism in the Inaugural Dissertation was short-lived. He soon denied that our understanding is capable of insight into an intelligible world, which cleared the path toward his mature position in the Critique of Pure Reason (1781), according to which the understanding (like sensibility) supplies forms that structure our experience of the sensible world, to which human knowledge is limited, while the intelligible (or noumenal) world is strictly unknowable to us. Kant spent a decade working on the Critique of Pure Reason and published nothing else of significance between 1770 and 1781. But its publication marked the beginning of another burst of activity that produced Kant’s most important and enduring works. Because early reviews of the Critique of Pure Reason were few and (in Kant’s judgment) uncomprehending, he tried to clarify its main points in the much shorter Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics That Will Be Able to Come Forward as a Science (1783). Among the major books that rapidly followed are the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785), Kant’s main work on the fundamental principle of morality; the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (1786), his main work on natural philosophy in what scholars call his critical period (1781–1798); the second and substantially revised edition of the Critique of Pure Reason (1787); the Critique of Practical Reason (1788), a fuller discussion of topics in moral philosophy that builds on (and in some ways revises) the Groundwork; and the Critique of the Power of Judgment (1790), which deals with aesthetics and teleology. Kant also published a number of important essays in this period, including Idea for a Universal History With a Cosmopolitan Aim (1784) and Conjectural Beginning of Human History (1786), his main contributions to the philosophy of history; An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment? (1784), which broaches some of the key ideas of his later political essays; and What Does it Mean to Orient Oneself in Thinking? (1786), Kant’s intervention in the pantheism controversy that raged in German intellectual circles after F. H. Jacobi (1743–1819) accused the recently deceased G. E. Lessing (1729–1781) of Spinozism. With these works Kant secured international fame and came to dominate German philosophy in the late 1780’s. But in 1790 he announced that the Critique of the Power of Judgment brought his critical enterprise to an end (5:170). By then K. L. Reinhold (1758–1823), whose Letters on the Kantian Philosophy (1786) popularized Kant’s moral and religious ideas, had been installed (in 1787) in a chair devoted to Kantian philosophy at Jena, which was more centrally located than Konigsberg and rapidly developing into the focal point of the next phase in German intellectual history. Reinhold soon began to criticize and move away from Kant’s views. In 1794 his chair at Jena passed to J. G. Fichte, who had visited the master in Konigsberg and whose first book, Attempt at a Critique of All Revelation (1792), was published anonymously and initially mistaken for a work by Kant himself. This catapulted Fichte to fame, but he too soon moved away from Kant and developed an original position quite at odds with Kant’s, which Kant finally repudiated publicly in 1799 (12:370–371). Yet while German philosophy moved on to assess and respond to Kant’s legacy, Kant himself continued publishing important works in the 1790’s. Among these are Religion Within the Boundaries of Mere Reason (1793), which drew a censure from the Prussian King when Kant published the book after its second essay was rejected by the censor; The Conflict of the Faculties (1798), a collection of essays inspired by Kant’s troubles with the censor and dealing with the relationship between the philosophical and theological faculties of the university; On the Common Saying: That May be Correct in Theory, But it is of No Use in Practice (1793), Toward Perpetual Peace (1795), and the Doctrine of Right, the first part of the Metaphysics of Morals (1797), Kant’s main works in political philosophy; the Doctrine of Virtue, the second part of the Metaphysics of Morals (1797), a catalogue of duties that Kant had been planning for more than thirty years; and Anthropology From a Pragmatic Point of View (1798), based on Kant’s anthropology lectures. Several other compilations of Kant’s lecture notes from other courses were published later, but these were not prepared by Kant himself. Kant retired from teaching in 1796. For nearly two decades he had lived a highly disciplined life focused primarily on completing his philosophical system, which began to take definite shape in his mind only in middle age. After retiring he came to believe that there was a gap in this system separating the metaphysical foundations of natural science from physics itself, and he set out to close this gap in a series of notes that postulate the existence of an ether or caloric matter. These notes, known as the Opus Postumum, remained unfinished and unpublished in Kant’s lifetime, and scholars disagree on their significance and relation to his earlier work. It is clear, however, that these late notes show unmistakable signs of Kant’s mental decline, which became tragically precipitous around 1800. Kant died February 12, 1804, just short of his eightieth birthday. 2. Kant’s project in the Critique of Pure Reason. The main topic of the Critique of Pure Reason is the possibility of metaphysics, understood in a specific way. Kant defines metaphysics in terms of â€Å"the cognitions after which reason might strive independently of all experience,† and his goal in the book is to reach a â€Å"decision about the possibility or impossibility of a metaphysics in general, and the determination of its sources, as well as its extent and boundaries, all, however, from principles† (Axii. See also Bxiv; and 4:255–257). Thus metaphysics for Kant concerns a priori knowledge, or knowledge whose justification does not depend on experience; and he associates a priori knowledge with reason. The project of the Critique is to examine whether, how, and to what extent human reason is capable of a priori knowledge. 2. 1 The crisis of the Enlightenment To understand the project of the Critique better, let us consider the historical and intellectual context in which it was written. [5] Kant wrote the Critique toward the end of the Enlightenment, which was then in a state of crisis. Hindsight enables us to see that the 1780’s was a transitional decade in which the cultural balance shifted decisively away from the Enlightenment toward Romanticism, but of course Kant did not have the benefit of such hindsight. The Enlightenment was a reaction to the rise and successes of modern science in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The spectacular achievement of Newton in particular engendered widespread confidence and optimism about the power of human reason to control nature and to improve human life. One effect of this new confidence in reason was that traditional authorities were increasingly questioned. For why should we need political or religious authorities to tell us how to live or what to believe, if each of us has the capacity to figure these things out for ourselves? Kant expresses this Enlightenment commitment to the sovereignty of reason in the Critique: Our age is the age of criticism, to which everything must submit. Religion through its holiness and legislation through its majesty commonly seek to exempt themselves from it. But in this way they excite a just suspicion against themselves, and cannot lay claim to that unfeigned respect that reason grants only to that which has been able to withstand its free and public examination (Axi). Enlightenment is about thinking for oneself rather than letting others think for you, according to What is Enlightenment? (8:35). In this essay, Kant also expresses the Enlightenment faith in the inevitability of progress. A few independent thinkers will gradually inspire a broader cultural movement, which ultimately will lead to greater freedom of action and governmental reform. A culture of enlightenment is â€Å"almost inevitable† if only there is â€Å"freedom to make public use of one’s reason in all matters† (8:36). The problem is that to some it seemed unclear whether progress would in fact ensue if reason enjoyed full sovereignty over traditional authorities; or whether unaided reasoning would instead lead straight to materialism, fatalism, atheism, skepticism (Bxxxiv), or even libertinism and authoritarianism (8:146). The Enlightenment commitment to the sovereignty of reason was tied to the expectation that it would not lead to any of these consequences but instead would support certain key beliefs that tradition had always sanctioned. Crucially, these included belief in God, the soul, freedom, and the compatibility of science with morality and religion. Although a few intellectuals rejected some or all of these beliefs, the general spirit of the Enlightenment was not so radical. The Enlightenment was about replacing traditional authorities with the authority of individual human reason, but it was not about overturning traditional moral and religious beliefs. Yet the original inspiration for the Enlightenment was the new physics, which was mechanistic. If nature is entirely governed by mechanistic, causal laws, then it may seem that there is no room for freedom, a soul, or anything but matter in motion. This threatened the traditional view that morality requires freedom. We must be free in order to choose what is right over what is wrong, because otherwise we cannot be held responsible. It also threatened the traditional religious belief in a soul that can survive death or be resurrected in an afterlife. So modern science, the pride of the Enlightenment, the source of its optimism about the powers of human reason, threatened to undermine traditional moral and religious beliefs that free rational thought was expected to support. This was the main intellectual crisis of the Enlightenment. The Critique of Pure Reason is Kant’s response to this crisis. Its main topic is metaphysics because, for Kant, metaphysics is the domain of reason – it is â€Å"the inventory of all we possess through pure reason, ordered systematically† (Axx) — and the authority of reason was in question. Kant’s main goal is to show that a critique of reason by reason itself, unaided and unrestrained by traditional authorities, establishes a secure and consistent basis for both Newtonian science and traditional morality and religion. In other words, free rational inquiry adequately supports all of these essential human interests and shows them to be mutually consistent. So reason deserves the sovereignty attributed to it by the Enlightenment. 2. 2 Kant’s Copernican revolution in philosophy To see how Kant attempts to achieve this goal in the Critique, it helps to reflect on his grounds for rejecting the Platonism of the Inaugural Dissertation. In a way the Inaugural Dissertation also tries to reconcile Newtonian science with traditional morality and religion, but its strategy is different from that of the Critique. According to the Inaugural Dissertation, Newtonian science is true of the sensible world, to which sensibility gives us access; and the understanding grasps principles of divine and moral perfection in a distinct intelligible world, which are paradigms for measuring everything in the sensible world. So on this view our knowledge of the intelligible world is a priori because it does not depend on sensibility, and this a priori knowledge furnishes principles for judging the sensible world because in some way the sensible world itself conforms to or imitates the intelligible world. Soon after writing the Inaugural Dissertation, however, Kant expressed doubts about this view. As he explained in a February 21, 1772 letter to his friend and former student, Marcus Herz: In my dissertation I was content to explain the nature of intellectual representations in a merely negative way, namely, to state that they were not modifications of the soul brought about by the object. However, I silently passed over the further question of how a representation that refers to an object without being in any way affected by it can be possible†¦. [B]y what means are these [intellectual representations] given to us, if not by the way in which they affect us? And if such intellectual representations depend on our inner activity, whence comes the agreement that they are supposed to have with objects — objects that are nevertheless not possibly produced thereby? †¦[A]s to how my understanding may form for itself concepts of things completely a priori, with which concepts the things must necessarily agree, and as to how my understanding may formulate real principles concerning the possibility of such concepts, with which principles experience must be in exact agreement and which nevertheless are independent of experience — this question, of how the faculty of understanding achieves this conformity with the things themselves, is still left in a state of obscurity. (10:130–131) Here Kant entertains doubts about how a priori knowledge of an intelligible world would be possible. The position of the Inaugural Dissertation is that the intelligible world is independent of the human understanding and of the sensible world, both of which (in different ways) conform to the intelligible world. But, leaving aside questions about what it means for the sensible world to conform to an intelligible world, how is it possible for the human understanding to conform to or grasp an intelligible world? If the intelligible world is independent of our understanding, then it seems that we could grasp it only if we are passively affected by it in some way. But for Kant sensibility is our passive or receptive capacity to be affected by objects that are independent of us (2:392, A51/B75). So the only way we could grasp an intelligible world that is independent of us is through sensibility, which means that our knowledge of it could not be a priori. The pure understanding alone could at best enable us to form representations of an intelligible world. But since these intellectual representations would entirely â€Å"depend on our inner activity,† as Kant says to Herz, we have no good reason to believe that they conform to an independent intelligible world. Such a priori intellectual representations could well be figments of the brain that do not correspond to anything independent of the human mind. In any case, it is completely mysterious how there might come to be a correspondence between purely intellectual representations and an independent intelligible world. Kant’s strategy in the Critique is similar to that of the Inaugural Dissertation in that both works attempt to reconcile modern science with traditional morality and religion by relegating them to distinct sensible and intelligible worlds, respectively. But the Critique gives a far more modest and yet revolutionary account of a priori knowledge. As Kant’s letter to Herz suggests, the main problem with his view in the Inaugural Dissertation is that it tries to explain the possibility of a priori knowledge about a world that is entirely independent of the human mind. This turned out to be a dead end, and Kant never again maintained that we can have a priori knowledge about an intelligible world precisely because such a world would be entirely independent of us. However, Kant’s revolutionary position in the Critique is that we can have a priori knowledge about the general structure of the sensible world because it is not entirely independent of the human mind. The sensible world, or the world of appearances, is constructed by the human mind from a combination of sensory matter that we receive passively and a priori forms that are supplied by our cognitive faculties. We can have a priori knowledge only about aspects of the sensible world that reflect the a priori forms supplied by our cognitive faculties. In Kant’s words, â€Å"we can cognize of things a priori only what we ourselves have put into them† (Bxviii). So according to the Critique, a priori knowledge is possible only if and to the extent that the sensible world itself depends on the way the human mind structures its experience. Kant characterizes this new constructivist view of experience in the Critique through an analogy with the revolution wrought by Copernicus in astronomy: Up to now it has been assumed that all our cognition must conform to the objects; but all attempts to find out something about them a priori through concepts that would extend our cognition have, on this presupposition, come to nothing. Hence let us once try whether we do not get farther with the problems of metaphysics by assuming that the objects must conform to our cognition, which would agree better with the requested possibility of an a priori cognition of them, which is to establish something about objects before they are given to us. This would be just like the first thoughts of Copernicus, who, when he did not make good progress in the explanation of the celestial motions if he assumed that the entire celestial host revolves around the observer, tried to see if he might not have greater success if he made the observer revolve and left the stars at rest. Now in metaphysics we can try in a similar way regarding the intuition of objects. If intuition has to conform to the constitution of the objects, then I do not see how we can know anything of them a priori; but if the object (as an object of the senses) conforms to the constitution of our faculty of intuition, then I can very well represent this possibility to myself. Yet because I cannot stop with these intuitions, if they are to become cognitions, but must refer them as representations to something as their object and determine this object through them, I can assume either that the concepts through which I bring about this determination also con.

Mass Media's Negative Impact on American Society Essay

Mass Media's Negative Impact on American Society - Essay Example A major role in the impeachment of President Clinton was played by the media of the country as well. But today, the unconcealed public anxiety, which concerns functioning, tasks, content of the media, sounds louder. Many prominent figures of our society, as well as many ordinary people, express dissatisfaction concerning an increasingly negative impact of mass media not only on journalism itself, but on society as a whole. This primarily concerns the quality of today’s American journalism within a moral and ethical point of view. Most of the public is deeply concerned also, that the media tries to teach us morality, â€Å"passing some inherited moral norms from generation to generation†. However, the very essence of this social heritage has been vigorously debated. In spite of the fact that in very few media reports and television broadcasts morality is perceptible and obvious, hints at some or other moral values are always present, especially on TV. At the same time th e media is flooded with scenes of violence in action and horror films and cartoons even, endless shootings, crime reports, aggressive music and games that, so some extend, popularize the criminal culture. In many cases the media does not consciously want to provoke violence in society – it just covers over a weak storyline of a picture or lack of really important news with scenes of violence, which surely attract attention of common people. Such scenes have a direct impact on subconsciousness, because they influence on the feelings rather than senses. The media forms in teenagers’ heads some stable mechanism, according to which they will act in this or that reality situation (Moy and... This essay stresses that sex in mass media is not limited to explicit images of copulation or nudity; it may include any model implying sexual behavior, interest or motivation. The most alarming in the behavioral effects of viewing erotic materials is that there is a traced direct connection between it and commission of sexual assaults. There were a lot of studies conducted, which considered the ratings of such crimes as rapes, exhibitionism, sexual abuse of minors, depending on changes in availability of sexually explicit materials. This report makes a conclusion that the last decades witnessed the rapid development of new communication technologies. E-mail, Internet, digital television, have become a part of our lives, often pushing to the sidelines the traditional media. Communication ceases to be one-way, there appear elements of interactivity. The question of the influence of the media appears in a new perspective. The amount of information available to each member of society increases many times; the process of news diffusion becomes swift and varied. At the same time the content quality of mass media lives much to be desired. It’s full to the brim with violence, advertising, false ideals and tons of shallow information a normal man will never need. Everyday impact of the media on society leads to creation of stereotypes, simplification of thinking and psychological patterns, as information is presented in ready-made form with a certain emotional coloring, which leaves no space for creative conceptua lization.

Infectious Disease Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Infectious Disease - Essay Example So if the transition happens they move into infectious group. Consequently infectious group is the one that spreads it back to susceptible for certain period of time, which is known as ‘infectious period’ after that period they are a considered to be immune for life if recovered. The following picture depicts a basic SIR model used analyzing an infectious disease Using notation from our SIR model there are some equations that can be formed in order to find answer to my IA question. When modelling SIR models it is very important to identify the independent and dependant variables. As in majority of the mathematical models time ‘t’ is going to be independent variable and it is going to be measured in days. More people are getting infected when there is a contact between infected people and susceptible. In our equations represents number of contacts infective person has each day. If we decided that I represents number of all infected people than represents number for all infected contacts per day. But infected people come in contact only with susceptible ones therefore we need to multiply (susceptible fraction of the population) we get: This expression looks like first differential equation, but in our equation of change in susceptible class is negative. It is negative because people from that class are getting removed into the infected class. In order to represent those equations as a derivation they should be expressed with relation to our dependant and independent variables. In order to represent the rate of change as a derivation every dependant variable such as S, I, R should be represented with relation to time. When talking about infectious disease such function of time as ‘next day’ can be represented as: S(t+t) – S(t). Applying those changes to our equations we get: Following the same principle as we used explaining ‘Equation 1’ next day increase in I can be represented by finding all the cases that can happen tomorrow

2 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 3

2 - Essay Example equal to capital and liabilities because when a person or an entity start their business, they inject the capital which can be in form of cash or other assets therefore at the beginning of the entity all there is are assets and capital. When the company expands it purchases goods or offers services which give rise to further assets and further liabilities as loans are acquired and credit is obtained out of that same capital. Some amount is also generated as profit for their business. Therefore, all the transactions of the entity take place through the same capital and the assets of the company must always equal their liabilities and capital. The statement of financial position gives the position of the company at a given moment of time where it provides the description of company’s assets, liabilities and equity from its establishment to that particular date, while the Income statement provides the details of all the income and expenditure activities during the year as at the date of balance sheet. In a nut shell, the financial position is the standing at that date while the Income statement is the movement during the period which is why the dates begin with ‘as at’ and ‘year ended’ respectively. The figure of net cash flow will mostly be different from that of net profit because the cash flows of the company are purely due to the monetary items such as sale, purchase, monetary income of dividend and interest, monetary expenses of salaries and rent etc. These expenses are purely of monetary nature while the net profits of the company not only involve these monetary items but also involve non cash items such as depreciation, fair value, amortization etc therefore normally cash and cash equivalents of the company are usually not equal to their net profit. Certain expenses are not affected by the cash flows of the company as it does not involve cash dealing on the time of the transaction. These expenses or income do not affect the cash flows because

American Politics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

American Politics - Essay Example Through executive branch, the President takes a role of chief partisan for a political party, and the representative of the rest of Americans citizens. Founders of the executive focused on realities involved in managing anticipations of modern presidency, which is becoming more significant and bureaucratic compared to the past. The executive branch has a vital role of monitoring the American political system. Moreover, the executive has undergone an evolution through a focus on core policymaking, thereby experiencing crucial bureaucratic extension; for instance, approximately one thousand seven hundred people constituted the institution of the presidency. On the other hand, the executive branch of the government specializes in making policies, through the help of political advisors. Therefore, the President acquires the ability to satisfy the needs of the citizens through the executive branch, thereby meeting public expectations. In addition, there are experts in the executives focus ing on national security, agriculture and mass communication. Various developments in the executive branch of the government have led to an increased power of the President in order to keep pace with increased public expectations. The executive has been functioning through basic Constitutional framework, which is developed by the government through share powers. Nonetheless, there are situations when the President fails to meet these expectations and this calls for efforts to be made through the executive to convince other political actors in other branches of the government; in this case, this nature of the executive has led to dependency of the President on action of other branches of the government. The President who is a significant element of the executive has sought assistance from numerous advisors and organization in the process of managing their duties. For instance, the vice President takes the significant role of offering advice to the President; in fact, this is stipulat ed in the Constitution. There are other parties playing the advisory role through closing personal ties with the President; for example, the former U.S President had a tendency of relying on his brother Robert, while George Bush relied on his father for advice (Bond 461). In the executive branch of the government, the presidency has taken a significant role as an organization which comprises numerous individuals. However, the significant element of presidency as an office entails vice President, cabinet and EOP; apparently, there are other people serving as executive branch, who strive in process of accessing President, though some are more frequent compared to others. Judicial Branch: Judiciary as a branch focuses on serving as an adjudicator in democratic political process; in fact, it is a more applicable way of political conflicts resolution. It focuses on ensuring that the government makes decisions that are dependable on core democratic ideology of political liberty, equity an d majority rule. Therefore, a magistrate as a division of the government emphasizes dealing with conflict resolutions, though this is not easy (Bond 550). There are situations where the judges focus on making the necessary effort to embrace and acknowledge legitimate desires of majority based on expression in the law. Moreover, the judiciary branch focuses on dealing with freedom and equity by fostering protection of liberties of minorities from being subjected to infringement.

Essay 1 Questions Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

1 Questions - Essay Example The text exhaustively addresses the most important aspects of the topic, the only gap is on how to eliminate the possible bureaucracies from the onset of the program implementation, and this is what I would add. 5. The text supports the claim since it has several relevant examples that prop up the claim sufficiently without any explicit shortfalls. The point that needs more substantiation is how prevent the plans from being dysfunctional 6. The inferences that can be drawn are that pay for performance is a good strategy but could cause substantive barriers to productivity within the organization, and they logically align with the evidence and alternative reasons as well reasonable. 11. The text demonstrates and identifiable genre-a business report and the special characteristics include; it is written in simple language, it is complete, it is concise, it states the objective in the opening statement and relatively accurate. 14. The organization of the text in whichever arrangements serves the same purpose since it addresses a singular issue that of pay performance and thus arrangement of the text has no striking prospective creation of a difference. 16. The author uses applies similes and the exact simile he uses, is â€Å"incent† and the metaphor â€Å"slam dunk† and these figurative language are considerably confusing and in their place it were prudent to use simple words. However, the author explains the context of the difficult words making the work better understandable. 17. At the beginning of the article, I am stuck and a little disinterested by the distracting complex figurative language used but deeper into the article, the author makes his ideas concise and captivating. 18. The allusions of the writer sufficiently build up the main idea of the article since he alludes to the standard practices affectively creating a factual picture in

Unique Messages of The Cruci-Fiction Project and The Three Crosses Essay - 3

Unique Messages of The Cruci-Fiction Project and The Three Crosses - Essay Example The two artworks send messages to the audiences. In the Rembrandt artwork, the government crucifies the criminals. Similarly, the Gome-Pena and Roberto Sifuentes artwork show the collaborators’ crucifixion is meant to protest the strict immigration and discrimination policies of the United States and the Los Angeles police department. The two artists, Chicano Guillermo Gome-Pena and Roberto Sifuentes, collaborated to produce a popular project, The Cruci-fiction Project, during 1994 (Dutta 210). The Golden Gate Bridge democratic artwork shows their disgust over the procedural hindrances of the Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS). There are differences between the two artworks. The Gome-Pena and Roberto Sifuentes artwork show the authors were not really crucified. The collaborators were only acting. No one was hurt by the crucifixion. On the other hand, the Rembrandt van Rijn artwork shows Jesus Christ and the two thieves were nailed to the cross. The three individuals died. Further, the art form used differs. In the Rembrandt, a masterpiece is done using the print or etching venue. The venue involves the use of metal plates. On the other hand, the Gome-Pena and Roberto Sifuentes artwork use real human beings. The collaborators are actors. They play the three-hour crucifixion to dramatize their protests. During April 1994 event, the collaborators’ costumes represented the undocumented bandits trying to enter the United States. Further, Roberto depicted the gang members who were trying to enter the United States. The April 1994 event questions why prevailing United States sentiments blame the immigrants for the United States’ rising criminal activities.  

Legislation on Stem Cell Research & Related Issues Essay

Legislation on Stem Cell Research & Related Issues - Essay Example The actual research on stem cells began after the 1950’s when a cure for leukemia and several immune-deficiency disorders were sought that were life-taking (UK Stem Cell Foundation 2011). Stem cell research produced a cure for leukemia through bone marrow transport from a sibling and within no time, people began to look forward at the same to develop a cure for several other disorders. People still consider stem cell research potentially providing a cure for several disorders including renal conditions (requiring renal transplantation, neuro-dengerative disorders, cardiac disorders, cancers, etc, wherein no cure for the same has been found till today using other forms of technology. In order to generate opportunities and cure for the disorder there needs to be greater funding from the Federal government in order to pioneer and support the development of such technology. In the past, stem cell research has also worked real-time cures for several disorders. For example, a person who had a gene resistant to the HIV virus, stem cell research helped the person to stop taking antiviral drugs. ... logy and that in sporadic cases, cures for several diseases have been obtained, there is no evidence to point out that stem cells can in fact proved a cure for diseases. These two points into consideration, the Bush Administration in 2001 decided to partially fund such research and slowly phase out the use of such technology. Stem cell research also involves harvesting body parts and for this reason the Congress sought a ban (Wertz, 2002). However, it should be noted that the Congress sought a ban only on that research that involved destruction of embryonic stem cells that had the potential to transform into living beings. Slowly with greater mileage and greater studies that proved that stem cells provided a cure for various disorders that were otherwise incurable, slowly stem cells research was sought as a necessity. In order to regulate the funding and projects under the stem cell banner, the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine was created in 2004; any organization that wanted sponsorship for stem cell research had to approach to the CIRM. With greater pressure on the Bush Administration on the policy of banning stem cell research, a partial reversal of the policy was taken by the Bush government. The Barack Obama Government which came to power in 2008 immediately signed an Executive Order that permitted stem cell on human embryos. A clarification was issued by the US Federal Government in 2011, which said that the funds could only be used for stem cell research and not on destruction of human embryos. Hence, research projects that wanted to use federal funds had to have a clear and constructive purpose for stem cell research and not mere destruction of human embryos that would otherwise be obtained from the leftover embryos from couples who undergo IVF

Kite Runner response text analyses Essay Example for Free

Kite Runner response text analyses Essay The Kite Runner tells us, through Rahkim Khan that, True redemption is when guilt leads to good again Rahkim Khan states. Throughout the course of The Kite Runner there are many characters that have committed sins and subsequently attempted to redeem themselves. The Kite Runner structured around main characters, Amir and Baba and their acts of betrayal. The impact of these acts continues to be felt throughout the novel manifesting itself in Amirs guilt ridden narrative. However, guilt is not enough. The need for redemption and atonement is what these characters seek. There is away to be good again the kite runner shows that this is along painful but ultimately positive journey. Amirs feelings of guilt spring from incidents of betrayal throughout his childhood. Since 1975 when Amir watched as Hassan was raped in an alleyway by Assef, I ran because I was coward. I was afraid of Assef and what he would do to me Amir feels guilty for his cowardice s but it was not fear that drove him away the real reason Amir ran was Baba. Amir was so envious of Baba and Hassans friendship that he thought Assef was right. Maybe Hassan was the price I had to pay the lamb I had to slay to win Baba. He was just a Hazara wasnt he? This event not only affected Hassan and Amirs friend ship but still made Amir highly jealous of Babas concern for Hassan, I havent seen much of Hassan in the last few days Baba said I couldnt help hating the way his brow furrowed with worry Amirs selfish personality handy caps his chance to be good again and redeem himself for the past. Amir places Hassan in the position to be framed and sets him up for theft of Amirs birthday presents, this incident clearly shows that Amir approaches atonement the wrong way. I lifted Hassans mattress and planted my new watch and a handful of afghani bills under it then I knocked on babas door and told what I hoped would be the last in a long line of shameful lies. Hassans loyalty leads to Ali and his departure to grant Amirs wish, I wanted Baba all to myself Amirs actions changed his and Babas life forever. Amir has stolen his fathers right to a best friend, his relationship with his hidden son and taken away Ali and Hassans job and security within their family. In many respects, Amirs adult personality is now the direct result of this childhood, feelings of guilt and betrayal. Amir attempts to redeem himself by planting money in Fahibs family house I did something I had done 26 years earlier: I planted a fistful of crumpled money under a mattress. He also tries to ally his feelings of guilt by taking Sohrab out of Afghanistan and back to America, the way he should have done with Hassan. In All Amirs efforts, he does become a better person once he is situated in America however he doesnt redeem himself for what he did as a child. Nothing will, It didnt make everything all right, it didnt make everything all right. Amir is not all to blame for his insecurity and lack of self-esteem, this personality is the result of Babas bad parenting. If I hadnt seen the doctor pull him out of my wife with my own eyes, Id never believe hes my son. Baba is not a supporting father towards Amir or Hassan. Throughout the book, Baba tries to redeem and atone himself for neglecting a secret child. He attempts to achieve this by raising Hassan equality to Amir however by doing this it disallows Baba to be close to Amir as feelings of guilt towards Hassan arise; hence taking the right to a loving family away from Amir and Hassan, for not speaking the truth. Babas betrayal is directed at Ali for sleeping with his wife. Theres only one sin and that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft Baba illustrates his deduction to atone for his actions using his wealth he builds and orphanage for illegitimate or orphaned children. Baba feeds the poor with his ceremonial lamb money. Baba also using his courage and urge to fight for what is right this is evident when he protects the afghani women in chapter ten from the Russian soldier, ill take a thousand of his bullets before I let this indecency take place. Babas decision to abandon home and his country are a evident sign of sacrifice to secure Amirs long-term welfare and happiness. His attempts of redemption and atonement to be good again result in his feelings of achievement the day that he dies. Tonight I am much too happy If The Kite Runner tells us anything it is that redemption is a life long task, through which a person seeks to become Good Again. A person needs to forgive themselves of their sins and absolve them of guilt in order to go on living their lives. Throughout the corse of The kite Runner, we learn that guilt is not enough. To be good again is more than the journey of redemption and atonement it is the destination.

The Writing Style Of Mark Twain English Literature Essay

The Writing Style Of Mark Twain English Literature Essay Mark Twain once said when asked how to write, Write what you know about. His work of Life on the Mississippi is a great representation of his advice to aspiring writers. It is written in true realistic style, providing the reader with many elements. Likewise, The Lost Phoebe is written in true naturalistic style, showing elements of mans struggle with society and himself. Both works are true to the form they are written in and have many stark contrasts in comparison. Twains writing style not only brings great descriptions of the world he presents to the reader, but he adds elements of humor to make his points. The focus of both works is on two poor characters. Twains character is fixated on the adventure and romanticism he believes that life on the Mississippi River will offer him. Twain incorporates truthful treatment of life surrounding his character. In describing the daily life in the town, he writes, Once a day cheap, gaudy packet arrived upward from St. Louis, and another downward from Keokuk. Before these events, the day was glorious with expectancy; after them, the day was a dead and empty thing. Twain continues to breathe life into his story by describing the town and some of its inhabitants, leaving the reader a well-shaped image of life in the town. In reading the text it seems that most people in the town trudge on in their daily lives and have lost hope or sight of what they once dreamed. They seemed to fall into a quasi-catatonic st ate in which their entertainment hinged on a steamboat berthing at the dock. Once gone, the town returned to regular humdrum. Even Twains character abandons most of his dreams: These ambitions faded out, each in its turn; but the ambition to be a steamboatman always remained. Dimmed hope, to be certain, but not gone, Twains character backs his ears and chases down what he considers the American Dream: freedom and adventure. Twain makes it clear throughout his work that even though one may have a love for something, and romanticize it to the point of exhaustion, doesnt mean it will be easy by any stretch of the imagination. Finding that he was treated poorly by those who didnt consider him one of them, Twain points out, Months afterward the hope within me struggled to a reluctant death, and I found myself without an ambition. Ashamed to return back home because of failure in chasing his dream, he makes an even more bold decision to travel to the Amazon. As the chapters unfold, Twain points out what life on the Mississippi is like and maybe not as romantic as once thought. I believe he was making a point that all dreams can be this way, so be prepared for what you ask for. After all his ambitions of life on the Mighty Mississippi, the prestige of friends and family envying his position as a steamboat pilot, Twains character can not even remember simple navigation lessons taught to him. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦my memory was never loaded with anything but blank cartridges. In the end, it appeared that Twains character simply wanted the status of being a glorious steamboatman without having to learn the true nature of it. Twain shows the follies of chasing dreams without true desire to learn, because by doing so, romanticism of the dream is replaced by the reality of it. Twain also points out how society reacts to those with aspiring dreams. Twains character was mostly rejected by those he was attempting to emulate. There was little help and forgiveness for him. He ties the se realistic elements together by inserting humor at optimal points. In stark contrast to using humor to make a point, The Lost Phoebe is a dark representation of man versus himself, nature, and society. It begins, depressingly, describing the poor conditions of the setting. There is not one bright element in the description of the house or land around it. Indeed, the only happy element is when Dresier writes, Old Henry Reifsneider and his wife Phoebe were a loving couple. Even with this happy element, Dresier even later takes a dump all over that, too, when he writes, Old Henry and his wife Phoebe were as fond of each other as it is possible for two old people to be who have nothing else in this life to be fond of. This work is concerned more with the description of how dismal the surrounding is rather than the true nature of Henry or his wife. Any good qualities either may have possessed are void and irrelevant in this naturalistic style of writing. Whatever Dresiers intent was in writing this work, it is clear that the circumstances involving the p eople Henry Reifsneider encounters, and nature, and even the nature of man, are the antagonists here. As for this reader, this piece of literature throws cold water on any ambition to marry for fear of losing my spouse and wandering around seeing apparitions of them until one day all hope is lost and his life is ended by falling off of a cliff. Every aspect of this work is dark and dismal. Reifsneider encounters the first antagonist with the death of Phoebe: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦in a fog of sorrow and uncertainty, followed her body to the nearest graveyard, an unattractive space with a few pines growing in it. The second encounter followed immediately thereafter with Reifsneider struggling against people suggesting he come to live with them. But he wanted to stay near his dead wife. Soon he found himself seeing apparitions of Phoebe that would eventually lead him to his own demise, but not before his struggles with people he encountered. Hes clean outn his head. That poor old fellers bee n livin down there till hes gone outen his mind. Ill have to notify the authorities. one man remarked as he observed Henry. Dreiser amplifies the Naturalism style in that impact of Henrys environment is clear, and is vividly motivated by this, in animalistic fashion, to find his wife. This story is a classic example of Naturalism style in that it is dark, lonely, and full of descriptors about a working-class environment. Arguably, the ending to this story could be construed as a happy one. Henry does find his wife through his own death, and was seemingly happy to leap. But from the first line to the last, this story is a dark tunnel that continually spirals downward. It is full of true Naturalism style and there is absolutely no real humor contained within. From the way the characters talk, to the way they are dressed, and how they interact is a snapshot of this dark theme Dresier attempts to convey. Both works provide great descriptions of the environment of which they are trying to convey aspects of their works. However, where Dresier chooses to gain some type of sympathy for his characters by describing the outward circumstances, Twain conveys his ideas by examining some real aspects of the character as well as the real life around him. Twain makes his points more subtle than those of Dresier, but both are equally true to their form of styles.

Patient Safety Incident (PSI) Essay -- Resident Care

Living in a care home often results in residents becoming less independent with respect to their ability to exercise their rights and responsibilities. Some care home routines restrain residents. For instance, care homes sometimes use cot-sides or cocoon beds, which are designed to reduce falls but are often ineffectual with demented residents, who tend to climb over the rails and fall from a great height. In addition, residents often develop problems such as pressure sores, incontinence, muscle wastage and worsened mental conditions due to the use of such beds. This paper describes the Patient Safety Incident (PSI) designed for Hollybrook (HB) care home, at which I work as a professional care worker. The first part of the paper explores the information systems in use at HB and it argues that Patient Safety Incident (PSI) is a result of adverse events that tend to be more organisational than clinical in their aetiology. From an organisational perspective, PSI records help one to understand the causes of errors relating to communication, teamwork and care process design, in a way that is different to that of clinical epidemiology. This part of the paper outlines the information required to sort and organise records in order to make it easier for staff to use them. These records list the contact details of residents, their Medical Administration Record (MAR) and accident/incident records. Designing the record around the database makes it easier for staff to sort out and identify, for example, all residents who are taking controlled medicat ions or whose risk assessment needs closer observation by internal staff. A database application will also help HB to reduce the overall burden of the traditional paper method and will e... ...nce an incident that may not be seen as such by staff working in the same environment but, if the staffs have frequently witness that the same incident occur; they may stop reporting the incident. However, database application system can save charting time which could be utilized to provide care to residents. Administration function like medical records, risk assessments, daily reports and coding requires documentations from the service users` electronic medical record database to enhance the EHR, which link the EHR data with databases containing standardized assessment information from external healthcare systems. If the database is not similar as to what other healthcare systems use, it is impossible to share information from EHR database with other clinical application systems. Works Cited 1. EBRAHIM,A (2011) NAMIBIAN EDUCATION CENTRE, NAMIBIA Patient Safety Incident (PSI) Essay -- Resident Care Living in a care home often results in residents becoming less independent with respect to their ability to exercise their rights and responsibilities. Some care home routines restrain residents. For instance, care homes sometimes use cot-sides or cocoon beds, which are designed to reduce falls but are often ineffectual with demented residents, who tend to climb over the rails and fall from a great height. In addition, residents often develop problems such as pressure sores, incontinence, muscle wastage and worsened mental conditions due to the use of such beds. This paper describes the Patient Safety Incident (PSI) designed for Hollybrook (HB) care home, at which I work as a professional care worker. The first part of the paper explores the information systems in use at HB and it argues that Patient Safety Incident (PSI) is a result of adverse events that tend to be more organisational than clinical in their aetiology. From an organisational perspective, PSI records help one to understand the causes of errors relating to communication, teamwork and care process design, in a way that is different to that of clinical epidemiology. This part of the paper outlines the information required to sort and organise records in order to make it easier for staff to use them. These records list the contact details of residents, their Medical Administration Record (MAR) and accident/incident records. Designing the record around the database makes it easier for staff to sort out and identify, for example, all residents who are taking controlled medicat ions or whose risk assessment needs closer observation by internal staff. A database application will also help HB to reduce the overall burden of the traditional paper method and will e... ...nce an incident that may not be seen as such by staff working in the same environment but, if the staffs have frequently witness that the same incident occur; they may stop reporting the incident. However, database application system can save charting time which could be utilized to provide care to residents. Administration function like medical records, risk assessments, daily reports and coding requires documentations from the service users` electronic medical record database to enhance the EHR, which link the EHR data with databases containing standardized assessment information from external healthcare systems. If the database is not similar as to what other healthcare systems use, it is impossible to share information from EHR database with other clinical application systems. Works Cited 1. EBRAHIM,A (2011) NAMIBIAN EDUCATION CENTRE, NAMIBIA

Analysis If Homeward Bound :: essays research papers

Homeward Bound Homeward Bound is a satiric play, which attacks the socially accepted standards of today’s society. This play is known as a comedy of manners; defined as light social satire. Homeward Bound also consists of amusing characters that the audience can relate to. This type of play appeals to mostly sophisticated audiences and actors because the play consists of clever use of language and brilliant conversation.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Elliot Hayes’ use of satire in Homeward Bound plays an important part in the telling of the story. His use of satire expresses how the characters feel about each other and their situations. There were many parts of the play that had satire in them. The scene where the mother is talking about her gay son and his partner is an example because it was a mockery of how “normal people'; handled the touchy subject of homosexuality. Another satiric scene is where Norris told her family about her affair, but the circumstances were that she had the affair with Nick’s gay partner and she was bearing his child. This is a very unusual example of satire because this sort of thing usually does not happen to a middle class society (or at least not that I have heard of). The family’s reaction to this newfound information is very humorous because they act almost opposite as to what is expected. Hayes is almost ridiculing the middle class’ mentality and their views on life. Hayes also satirizes when Bonnie reveals Donna’s little secret of her indecent behavior when she was a little child. This was totally unexpected and it revealed Donna’s character as being loose. Even though the characters did the opposite of what was expected and were quite amusing, the audience could relate to them because, before all the surprises were revealed the audience saw the characters as ordinary people. Once the “skeletons'; came out of the closet, the audience realized that euthanasia, homosexuality, alcoholism and affairs are problems that all levels of class face. This realization brings the audience closer to the characters and the circumstances presented on stage. This play appeals more to a sophisticated and mature audience because of the clever use of language and brilliant conversation. There was a lot of slang and colloquialism used. Usage of swears was interesting; it is a normal assumption to make that middle class families are not so crass. This was effective because it provided more realism by showing how people would talk in these serious and yet humorous situations.

Essay example --

Interdisciplinary Research Question What are the impacts of mainstreaming ESE students into a general education classroom? The problem most viewed with mainstreaming special education and general education students is that student’s individual needs are sometimes being overlooked. Justification of Interdisciplinary Approach In order to justify my interdisciplinary approach I will show how drawing from the relevant disciplines I have chosen offers different views and perspectives presenting diverse explanations to the problem. Relevant Disciplines Education – accommodations, modifications, training of instructors Sociology – socialization, acceptance, understanding, respect Psychology – self esteem, belonging Analysis of Problem with Evaluation of Insights The insights addressed are the preconceptions of instruction, socialization and behavior issues of mainstreaming ESE students. It is assumed that socialization and behavior can play a positive role with inclusion by offering students a chance to improve their socialization and behaviors skills while breaking down the social stigma of being different. However, this can also have a negative effect on students. By not presenting ESE students with the proper monitoring when socialization and behavior is involved can lead to embarrassment and alienation of peers. It is believed that inclusion can affect all students because instructional needs aren’t being met. With accommodations having to be put in place teachers are spending more time with ESE students and offering less challenging instruction to the general education students. Conflicts Between Disciplines The conflict is whether socialization and behavior play an intricate part in the educational needs of the ESE s... ...ght out, and if the decision is to mainstream the student then it should be decided whether the student will benefit from full or partial inclusion. If they are mainstreamed then they will need to be carefully monitored and ensure that all of their needs are met in order to be successful in the general education setting. The pros and cons of inclusion will need to be looked over repeatedly to be sure that the plan is working in the best interest of the student and does not affect the academic goals of either the special needs student or the general education student. As more and more students with special needs are placed into general education classrooms the general idea is that this is the best placement for them based on their needs. However, in order to make this successful the students, parents, and teachers involved will have to work hard and work together.

PLATE

The protein fraction from 70 percent saturation of recrystallised ammonium sulphate was found to have the maximum protein content (19.6 mg/g flower) and hence it was selected for further studies and is abbreviated as PAF in the present study. 4.2.1 Characterization of the selected PAF by Native PAGE and SDS PAGE The selected PAF was characterized by column chromatography. This showed a single peak and was further characterized in native PAGE and SDS page. The results are shown in Plate the SDS-PAGE analysis of the ammonium sulphate precipitated protein extract showed 15 different protein bands with good visibility in CBB R250 staining method (Figure). PLATE CHARACTER IZATION OF PFPa BY PAGE AND SDS PAGE A – Standard Protein Markers; B – PAGE; C– SDS PAGE Each fraction showed a number of major and minor bands indicating several proteins. Of the several bands obtained in 70 per cent saturation of ammonium sulphate, the major band alone was eluted. In order to find out the presence of subunits in this band, it was further subjected to SDS PAGE. The results showed one major protein indicating the absence of subunits. The molecular weight of this protein was found to be 99 KD when compared to the standard molecular markers. 4.3. Fifty percent effective dose of selected protein fraction of Plumeria alba The free radical scavenging capacity of PFC was tested by its ability to bleach the stable DPPH. The DPPH (2,2 diphenyl -1- picryl hydrazyl) radical scavenging activity was carried out using different concentrations of PFC (Figure). The radical scavenging activity was found to be dose dependent. Figure Percentage Free Radical Scavenging Activity of Selected protein fraction of Plumeria alba The protein fraction of Plumeria flower extract showed the dose dependent DPPH radical scavenging activity. From the graph, the 50 percent effective concentrations of these were found to be 28 Â µg and 35 Â µg and used in the further studies. Free radicals and their scavenging systems play important role in the healing of normal and delayed types of wounds. The dose response curve of DPPH radical scavenging activity 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 10010 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Ascorbic acid Plant sampleDPPH RadicalScavenging 9(%) of the extract and standards showed that at the highest concentration (0.5mg ml-1) the scavenging effect of the methanolic extract reached 9.3% (Afolayan et al., 2008). Shyuret al. (2005) also reported that the scavenging activity for free radicals of 1,1diphyryl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) has been widely used to evaluate the antioxidant activity of natural products from plants. The antioxidant activities of the leafy vegetables of India were measured in different systems of assays such as DPPH assay, super oxide radical scavenging assay, hydroxyl radical scavenging assay and lipid peroxidation assay and IC50 values were calculated (Dasgupta and De 2007). 4.4. Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization – Time of Flight Mass Spectra (MALDI-TOF MS) MALDI-TOF mass spectra were used for the analysis of peptide mass fingerprinting and MS/MS ion search identification of the in-gel trypsin digested protein fragments (Figure 5), selected peptide masses were submitted to Mascot (http://www.matrixscience.com) for SwissProt databases search. There was no conclusive match in peptide mass fingerprinting, since MS/MS ion search program was selected for further identification. The MS/MS ion search in the NCBIProt database revealed that, WRKY transcription factor WRKY24-like isoform X1 [Juglans regia] (Figure 6-7) with the protein score of 81 (Protein score is 10*Log(P), where P is the probability that the observed match is a random event. Protein scores greater than 80 are significant (p

Buzz Marketing

Buzz Marketing is a type of word-of-mouth marketing. Word-of-mouth marketing is when businesses, products, services, or events are promoted in written or oral form via happy customers who tell others about their positive experience. Word-of-mouth marketing is considered to be a more credible source of advertising because the recipient is hearing the information from someone who is not perceived to be out for a profit. Furthermore, the person making the recommendation has their reputation on the line for making the suggestion. Consumers are more likely to trust someone that they know and like than they are to trust media that has selfish interests. When specifically talking about buzz marketing, as opposed to the more broad word-of-mouth marketing, it is described as an interaction of consumers and customers (users) of a product, service, business, or event, that increases the strength of the marketing message. This can create excitement, anticipation, positive association, etc, which is called â€Å"buzz†. The buzz is both the marketing by the company and the reaction by the customers and potential customers. Some examples of successful buzz marketing campaigns would be the hype surrounding the Ford Fiesta cars, Harry Potter movies, Twilight movies, Dexter television series, Volkswagen’s new beattle cars, the Blair Witch Project movies, and the beanie babies bean stuffed animals. For the Ford Fiesta cars, Ford gave 100 consumers a Ford Fiesta car to drive for 6 months. They were asked to complete different missions every month including delivering Meals on Wheels, taking treats to the National Guard, wrestling alligators, going to elope, etc. The participants then started sharing their adventures on social media sites such as YouTube, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, Ustream, etc. This experiment was an enormous success. Ford got 6 and a half million views on YouTube and 50,000 information requests. Most of the requests came from non-Ford owners. Ford spent a very small amount of money on this campaign compared to how much a typical TV campaign would have cost. The beanie babies were another good buzz marketing campaign. People became crazed with collecting the stuffed animals because Ty Warner Inc. (the creator) created a false sense of scarcity. They purposely â€Å"retired† certain animals to make them valuable. They also would not sell them in large toy stores. They made people think that they were scarce and that they would be valuable into the future. Kids were going crazy making their parents buy them. Even many adults became beanie baby collectors. Ty didn’t even have to do traditional advertising. They were able to rely on word-of-mouth. They even tried to keep new animal releases secretive and wanted to not advertise so that people would think that they were â€Å"underground†. Ty Warner did such an incredible job of buzz marketing that he was able to make himself a billionaire just off of selling stuffed toys. Ty created an empire worth $6 billion dollars. He did this during the 1990’s. This was before social media had started. It is likely that if this was done today that social media would have helped him to make a lot more money. The Blair Witch Project movie ended up being very successful due to buzz marketing as well. People who went to see the movie thought that they were going to see a documentary about a true story. When moviegoers were viewing the movie they were genuinely scarred because they thought it was real. Obviously successful buzz marketing is much cheaper and more effective than traditional advertising. It can be done for as little as no money. But its effect can be massive. It can also backfire. It is impossible to know for sure how consumers will run with your initial buzz marketing idea. You can create a story and a buzz, but there is no way to know for sure that consumers will turn that into a positive buzz or that it won’t just fizzle out quickly. In order to attempt to create a buzz you need to start a compelling story. This story needs to have elements such as taboo, unusual, outrageous, salacious, interesting, secretive remarkable and/or hilarious. This story then needs to create a conversation. The conversation needs to engage consumers and make them keep the story alive. The bottom line in buzz marketing is that it can be very effective. A company with an unlimited advertising budget has the option of reaching every single consumer in America. But that only amounts to 300 million impressions. An impression does not necessarily lead to a sale. A successful buzz marketing campaign does much more than have impressions, it gets peoples’ interest. A sensational story makes a potentially boring product a compelling item that consumers want to buy. Buzz Marketing Buzz Marketing is a type of word-of-mouth marketing. Word-of-mouth marketing is when businesses, products, services, or events are promoted in written or oral form via happy customers who tell others about their positive experience. Word-of-mouth marketing is considered to be a more credible source of advertising because the recipient is hearing the information from someone who is not perceived to be out for a profit. Furthermore, the person making the recommendation has their reputation on the line for making the suggestion. Consumers are more likely to trust someone that they know and like than they are to trust media that has selfish interests. When specifically talking about buzz marketing, as opposed to the more broad word-of-mouth marketing, it is described as an interaction of consumers and customers (users) of a product, service, business, or event, that increases the strength of the marketing message. This can create excitement, anticipation, positive association, etc, which is called â€Å"buzz†. The buzz is both the marketing by the company and the reaction by the customers and potential customers. Some examples of successful buzz marketing campaigns would be the hype surrounding the Ford Fiesta cars, Harry Potter movies, Twilight movies, Dexter television series, Volkswagen’s new beattle cars, the Blair Witch Project movies, and the beanie babies bean stuffed animals. For the Ford Fiesta cars, Ford gave 100 consumers a Ford Fiesta car to drive for 6 months. They were asked to complete different missions every month including delivering Meals on Wheels, taking treats to the National Guard, wrestling alligators, going to elope, etc. The participants then started sharing their adventures on social media sites such as YouTube, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, Ustream, etc. This experiment was an enormous success. Ford got 6 and a half million views on YouTube and 50,000 information requests. Most of the requests came from non-Ford owners. Ford spent a very small amount of money on this campaign compared to how much a typical TV campaign would have cost. The beanie babies were another good buzz marketing campaign. People became crazed with collecting the stuffed animals because Ty Warner Inc. (the creator) created a false sense of scarcity. They purposely â€Å"retired† certain animals to make them valuable. They also would not sell them in large toy stores. They made people think that they were scarce and that they would be valuable into the future. Kids were going crazy making their parents buy them. Even many adults became beanie baby collectors. Ty didn’t even have to do traditional advertising. They were able to rely on word-of-mouth. They even tried to keep new animal releases secretive and wanted to not advertise so that people would think that they were â€Å"underground†. Ty Warner did such an incredible job of buzz marketing that he was able to make himself a billionaire just off of selling stuffed toys. Ty created an empire worth $6 billion dollars. He did this during the 1990’s. This was before social media had started. It is likely that if this was done today that social media would have helped him to make a lot more money. The Blair Witch Project movie ended up being very successful due to buzz marketing as well. People who went to see the movie thought that they were going to see a documentary about a true story. When moviegoers were viewing the movie they were genuinely scarred because they thought it was real. Obviously successful buzz marketing is much cheaper and more effective than traditional advertising. It can be done for as little as no money. But its effect can be massive. It can also backfire. It is impossible to know for sure how consumers will run with your initial buzz marketing idea. You can create a story and a buzz, but there is no way to know for sure that consumers will turn that into a positive buzz or that it won’t just fizzle out quickly. In order to attempt to create a buzz you need to start a compelling story. This story needs to have elements such as taboo, unusual, outrageous, salacious, interesting, secretive remarkable and/or hilarious. This story then needs to create a conversation. The conversation needs to engage consumers and make them keep the story alive. The bottom line in buzz marketing is that it can be very effective. A company with an unlimited advertising budget has the option of reaching every single consumer in America. But that only amounts to 300 million impressions. An impression does not necessarily lead to a sale. A successful buzz marketing campaign does much more than have impressions, it gets peoples’ interest. A sensational story makes a potentially boring product a compelling item that consumers want to buy.