Conference paper Research Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Conference - Research Paper Example The discussion of this paper focuses on the different cultural perspectives and how this influences the personal and social interactions of the students and scientists’ perceptions. Personal interaction is the manner in which individuals interact with each other in a group or a community through communication. The language of people to a great extend determines how an individual interact with each other. There is high power vested on personal relations, with communication playing a vital role in unifying the members of a particular group (Eby & Allen, 2012). Communication plays an important role in ensuring a smooth running of events in a group or community. Language as a form of communication unites the people speaking the common language. Differences in communication and language could be a source of conflict. It is believed that language classifies people into different social and is responsible for people’s ethnicity and social grouping. Social interaction is the way in which two or more people who are mutually oriented interact with each other through acts, actions, or practices (Argyle, 2007). The behaviour of these people affects each of the parties’ subjective experiences or intentions. Parties involved in this form of relationship should be aware of one another and put each other into consideration. Such a relationship requires the parties to behave towards each other, portraying the mutual consent of the existence and presence of the other person. Trust is essential to the success of the social interaction, and secret spying on the other party without their consent is likely to bring issues into the relationship. The behaviour of the parties influences the success of social interaction. According to Nganga & â€Å"University of Wyoming† (2006), people need to be aware of their cultural influences as they relate to one another in the society. Students of different backgrounds and cultures sharing the same learning facilities need to

Is Osama Bin Laden Killing Legal Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Is Osama Bin Laden Killing Legal - Assignment Example According to international humanitarian law, the killing of Laden seems justifiable as there was armed conflict involved. In addition, as the law indicates, there was intense conflict and the actor was an organized group. Thus, it becomes evident that the killing of Laden is legal according to humanitarian law. Now, when the human rights law is considered, it is pointed out that one can be targeted as far as that person directly participates in hostilities. Thus, planning terrorist attacks from hideout can be considered as direct involvement in terror. However, a look into the international law as evident from the UN Charter reveals that America violated the international law by entering the Pakistan soil without the permission or authorization of the UN Security Council, and even without the knowledge of Pakistan officials. Though Pakistan declared that their sovereignty had not been violated by the US operation, it is evident that it is the embarrassment of being caught red-handed with their malicious motives that made Pakistan respond that way. In fact, Article 2 of the UN Charter declare that all member nations should refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations. In addition, America violates international law in the fact that it did not seek the permission of UN Security Council. To illustrate, Article 39, Chapter VII of the UN Charter states that the Security Council shall determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression and shall make recommendations, or decide what measures shall be taken in accordance with Articles 41 and 42 to maintain or restore international peace and security.

Poverty and the Welfare State

Poverty and the Welfare State Poverty and the Welfare State. Question 1 Describe critically Murrays analysis of the underclass. How does the population in the USA characterized by his use of this term differ from that in Britain. Question 2 In an essay of no more than 1000 words, outline and critically evaluate the view that the Welfare State tends to create more poverty than it has the ability to solve. your essay must include examples of state policies as well as consider the different ideologies of welfare in Britain Question 1. Murrays articles in the Times magazine in 1989 which outlined his thesis concerning the emergence of an underclass in the UK similar to the one he had already identified in the US has been one of the more controversial texts in social policy recently (Murray, 1989, 1990). Murrays central thesis is that the welfare state through the provision of benefits to unmarried mothers and the cessation of those benefits should these women marry has the effect of removing fatherhood and the influence thereof a father figure from the lives of these children (Murray, 1989). They in turn become dependent upon welfare and so a class of people is formed outside of the norms of wage earning society dependent wholly on the state for support (Murray, 1989). Before we discuss some of the criticisms of this view it is worth noting the peculiarities and differences between Murrays thesis as it relates to the US and the UK. In the first instance Murrays work in the UK is much less racialised than his identification of the population in the US (Murray, 1984). In the case of the US Murrays thesis and identification of the population comprising the majority of the underclass has been that it is a Black population. Murray then identified single black mothers as forming the core of the underclass. While this was a feature certainly still of his analysis of the British underclass it was not as strikingly so as his British version however the later versions of his thesis on the UK underclass also took on these racial overtones, (Murray, 1994). Murray can be criticized on any number of grounds but perhaps some of the most devastating criticisms can be found when we consider research which is actually undertaken on those who constitute the underclass rather than abstract theorizing about the underclass which denotes much of the vague definitions of what the underclass is meant to be (Alcock 1997). In this regard recent work by Edwards and Duncan (1997) for example has demonstrated the degree to which the stereotypes of the composition of the underclass do not match the realities of the lives involved. In their study of single women with children and their uptake of paid work they found that black single mothers living in positively regarded underclass areas (inner city areas of London for example) were more likely to seek work and to regard working themselves as being beneficial for their children (Edwards and Duncan, 1997:33). This was in contrast to single mothers from less predominantly underclass areas that held traditio nal views about rearing their children. These views emphasised the importance of caring for their children through being at home with them rather than outside the home in employment. Consequently the members of this group were much less likely to have work or to seek work or see work as a good. Thus the image of black single mothers creating an underclass through their rejection of a work ethic would seem to be unfounded. Thus even in this small instance fatal flaws in Murrays thesis can be identified, ultimately it can be said that the very vagueness of the definitions of what constitutes the underclass in the literature can it be argued be seen to be reflective of the fact that an identifiable object such as the underclass is impossible to define and serves merely as a critique of welfare arrangements and a moral attack on the nature of those who are marginalized by society. Question 2. With the collapse of communist states across the world in the 1980s a major perceived competitor to the market economy was removed with some like Fukuyama proclaiming it to be the end of history and the triumphant victory of liberalism (Fukuyama, 1992). In the UK as in other European countries of course the welfare state has mediated against the evils of capitalism as set out by Beveridge for some time, serving as Marxists had argued as a bribe of the working class and ensuring the legitimization and continuation of the welfare state (Mishra, 1990). It is not surprising then with all the past attacks on the nature of the welfare state to note that with the end of history there has come a renewed assault on the welfare state in the UK. Criticisms of the welfare state have come from both the left and the right but also crucially from the middle way of social democratic viewpoints. Almost consistent research has demonstrated the failure of the welfare state in reducing relative levels of poverty; in fact the UK today has a divide between rich and poor which is increasing quicker than at any other time in the history of the welfare state (Hills and Stewart, 2005). Thus it has become an almost consistent feature of debate that the welfare state has failed but the reasons given for this failure are completely oppositional. The two most prominent sources of these reasons have been neo-liberalists and social democratic parties. For neo-liberalists the evils of the welfare state far outweigh the evils of the free market so in discussing the view that the welfare state creates poverty it is worth recounting their views on the failings of the welfare state. At the core of many of the arguments thus against the welfare state are notions of desert. Desert is seen as a principle of morals and thus the failings of the welfare state in this respect is a moral failure which in turn leads to the moral turpitude of those the welfare state attempts to help (Lavalette and Pratt, 1997). This moral attack on the poor and the perceived institutions which has lead to their poverty is of course nothing new (Thane, 1992). Since the Poor Law state welfare arrangements have been criticized for the creation of a mentality which is seen to encourage indolence and decrease motivation towards self-sufficiency. The reliance on welfare thus leads to unwillingness to seek work. This in turn has the effect of leading to increased taxation to support those unwilling to work. This then in turn leads to increased difficulties for employers in terms of paying higher salaries to counter higher taxation and so on into a vicious cycle of dependency (Hayek, 1990). Such a trend it is argues lay at the heart of the Oil Crises and the subsequent retrenchment of the welfare state in the UK and elsewhere. Thus for the neo-liberal critique it is the totality of the welfare state which not only fails in reducing poverty but also serves to in fact create more. It does this both in a structural sense by hindering the effective operation of the market but also by creating in those who are recipients of welfare a mentality which causes them to retreat from the fundamental basics of economic life in seeking employment. Thus for neo-liberals measures such as Income Maintenance support schemes serve to create a duality of factors leading to the increase of poverty. Reform of the welfare state for neo-liberalists must be done so that only the bare minimum of services are required for those who are truly in need, such as the young, aged or infirm, (Fitzpatrick, 2001). Amidst these criticisms the welfare state in the UK has undergone revisions also from its social collectivist roots. This may be surprising but we can view this a response to critiques of the welfare state from both left and right and hence theyre emerged consequently an articulation of a Third Way, (Giddens, 1994). This Third Way was to be a radical re-conceptualisation of the basis and functions of the welfare state. As such then it can be seen that New Labour in particular has followed in the footsteps of Thatcher towards reforming the welfare state. But how effective have these reforms been and what is their basis? Perhaps the most potent of these transformations has been in a shift away from the universalism of the early welfare state to a new selectivitist philosophy. Selectivism entails the targeting of benefits through such measures as means-testing and other income threshold schemes so as that ideally those that need it the most benefit from the specified arrangement (Lowe, 2005). If anything their effect on the poorest has been marginal as these people are already in receipt of benefits and the introduction of means tests has had little impacts. Instead a stealth reform of the welfare state has occurred and those who were on the margins, previously covered by the benefit are now excluded on the basis of their income being over thresholds, even if this is just marginal, (Esping-Anderson, 2002). Thus we can argue that this selectivist based reform of the welfare state has worsened life for many by removing the safety net for all that existed previously under a universalist system. What this means in other words is that the Third Way of Labour has in actuality enhanced and widened the gaps between rich and poor and made the effects of poverty worse their reforms in favour of making the welfare state more effective. The pace and scale of the gap and its widening between rich and poor can be considered in this light. Indeed this notion of effectiveness found in much of social policy discourse can often be seen as simply cost-cutting exercises. The effects of which are leading to a situation where it is arguable that we have now seen neo-liberalism by the back door with major consequences for UK policy treatment of both poverty itself and those living in poverty. References Alcock, P. (1997); Understanding Poverty, Palgrave, Basingstoke UK Edwards, R. and Duncan S. (1997); Supporting the Family: Lone Mothers, Paid Work and the Underclass Debate; Critical Social Policy, Vol.7 No. 4 Esping-Anderson, G. (2002); Why We Need a New Welfare State, Oxford University Press, Oxford UK Fitzpatrick, T. (2001); Welfare Theory: An Introduction, Palgrave, Basingstoke UK Fukuyama, F. (1992); The End of History and the Last Man, Penguin, New York US Giddens, A. (1994); Beyond Left and Right: The Future of Radical Politics, Stanford University Press, California US Hayek, F.A.V. (1990); Economic Freedom, Blackwell, Oxford UK Hills, J. and Stewart, K. (2005); A More Equal Society, Policy Press, Bristol UK Lavalette, M. and Pratt, A. (1997); Social Policy: A Theoretical and Conceptual Introduction, Sage, London UK Lowe, R. (2005); The Welfare State in Britain since 1945, Palgrave, Basingstoke UK Mishra, R. (1990); The Welfare State in Capitalist Society, Harvester Wheatsheaf, New York US Murray, C. (1984); Losing Ground: American Social Policy 1950-1980, Basic Books, New York Murray, C. (1989); Underclass; Sunday Times Magazine, 26th November Murray, C. (1990), The Emerging British Underclass, IEA, London UK Murray, C. (1994); Underclass: The Crisis Deepens; The Sunday Times, 29th May Thane, P. (1982); The Foundations of the Welfare State, Longman, London UK

red scare :: essays research papers

The war was over. The last cry of help had been heard and peace was supposedly coming to the United States. But everyone was wrong. An ideological war which prompted mass paranoia known as the Red Scare had spread through the US. It began in 1919 and ended in 1921. Red Scare was the label given to the actions of legislation, the race riots, and the hatred and persecution of "subversives" and conscientious objectors during that period of time. At the heart of the Red Scare was the conscription law of May 18, 1917, which was put during World War I in order for the armed forces to be able to conscript more Americans. This caused many problems in the recollection of soldiers for the war. For one to claim that status, one had to be a member of a "well-recognized" religious organization which forbade their members to participation in war. As a result of such unyielding legislation, 20,000 conscientious objectors were inducted into the armed forces. Out of these 20,000, 16,000 changed their minds when they reached military camps, 1300 went to non-combat units, 1200 gained furloughs to do farm work, and 100 of these, 450 went to prison. However, these numbers are small in comparison with the 170,000 draft dodgers and 2,810,296 men who were inducted into the armed forces. Objectors were targeted in the Red Scare after the war. They were condemned as cowards, pro-German socialists, also they were also accused of spreading propaganda throughout the United States. Many organizations stood up for the rights of the objectors. One was the National Civil Liberties Bureau, which would later be renamed the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU gained a reputation for helping people with liberal cases who were too poor to pay for their own representation in court. After the real war ended in 1918, the ideological war, turned against conscientious objectors and other radical minorities such as Wobblies, who were members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), and also Socialists. It was thought that the Wobblies and the Socialists were trying to overthrow the United States government. Wobblies, were persecuted against for speaking out against the capitalist system. Most of what they said, was only to attract attention, but it was taken seriously by the government. From the very beginning of the Red Scare, the Wobblies attacked by the government, because they were a symbol of radicalism.

Hydraulic Jack

————————————————- Hydraulic jack Hydraulic jacks are typically used for shop work, rather than as an emergency jack to be carried with the vehicle. Use of jacks not designed for a specific vehicle requires more than the usual care in selecting ground conditions, the jacking point on the vehicle, and to ensure stability when the jack is extended. Hydraulic jacks are often used to liftelevators  in low and medium rise buildings. A hydraulic jack uses a fluid, which is incompressible, that is forced into a cylinder by a pump plunger.Oil is used since it is self lubricating and stable. When the plunger pulls back, it draws oil out of the reservoir through a suction check valve into the pump chamber. When the plunger moves forward, it pushes the oil through a discharge check valve into the cylinder. The suction valve ball is within the chamber and opens with each draw of the p lunger. The discharge valve ball is outside the chamber and opens when the oil is pushed into the cylinder. At this point the suction ball within the chamber is forced shut and oil pressure builds in the cylinder.In a  bottle jack  the piston is vertical and directly supports a bearing pad that contacts the object being lifted. With a single action piston the lift is somewhat less than twice the collapsed height of the jack, making it suitable only for vehicles with a relatively high clearance. For lifting structures such as houses the hydraulic interconnection of multiple vertical jacks through valves enables the even distribution of forces while enabling close control of the lift.In a  floor jack  (aka ‘trolley jack') a horizontal piston pushes on the short end of a  bellcrank, with the long arm providing the vertical motion to a lifting pad, kept horizontal with a horizontal linkage. Floor jacks usually include castors and wheels, allowing compensation for the arc taken by the lifting pad. This mechanism provide a low profile when collapsed, for easy maneuvering underneath the vehicle, while allowing considerable extension.

Flashbulb Memory

Flashbulb memory is a distinctive and vivid memory. They are also long lasting, accurate and detailed. These memories are from personal circumstances surrounding a person’s discovery of shocking events. People remember these memories with clear details of the emotions they were feeling, the place where they were, and what they were doing when they first heard the news. These memories are so vivid that people can even remember irrelevant details, such as, weather or what they were wearing. Even though a flashbulb memory could be from previous years early, people can remember these memories like they just happened yesterday.Although, people remember what events happened on these certain days they can’t remember what they did the day before or possibly the day after. The aspect that makes these memories a lifelong memory is the emotion behind the memory. The emotion felt at the time of the event is what turns the memory from a regular memory in to a flashbulb memory. Emoti onal reactions stimulate the release of hormones that have been shown to enhance the formation of long term memories (Saundra K. Ciccarelli, 2009) In addition, people remember emotional trauma better than they remember every day events.The initial shock or stress caused by these extreme events can cause people’s memory to be misread. It has been suggested by a newsletter titled, Memory Disorder Project (2006), that a person has to require participation of the amygdala to actually have had a flashbulb memory. Amygdala is a brain structure involved in emotional memory, and possibly other brain systems which regulates mood and alertness. Amygdala also can regulate the encoding, storage and retrieval of episodic memory. The amygdala may be vital to the retrieval of memories from emotional public events.There have been horrible events that have been perfect examples to research people’s flashbulb memories. In past decades, events such as assignations of John F. Kennedy, Mar tin Luther King Jr. , and the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger have been used to research flashbulb memories. In more current events, people’s memories of the 9/11 attacks have been studied to find out more information about flashbulb memories. An individual can have flashbulb memories of their personal life experiences too. Examples of these would possibly be the death of a family member, or just the opposite, the birth of a family member.A couple personal flashbulb memories I have are the memories of my son being born, and the moment my sister was diagnosed with a life changing brain malformation. I remember exactly what I was feeling, and even what I was wearing during the instant these events occurred. The psychologist, Colegrove started writing in 1899 described how middle-aged people remembered exactly what they were doing thirty-five years ago, when Abraham Lincoln was shot. In the late 1970’s two people Brown and Kulik, started doing research on flashb ulb memories.Their theories seemed to support the idea of adrenaline effects on memory. In the 1970’s the classic example of â€Å"Where were you when you heard about Kennedy being shot. †. Brown and Kulik introduced the term flashbulb memory, along with the first model of the process in developing flashbulb accounts. They suggested a flashbulb memory cannot occur without a high level of surprise or emotional arousal. The four models they proposed was the photographic model, comprehensive model, emotional-integrative model, and the importance driven emotional reactions model.Even further studies of flashbulb memories led people to look in to their accuracy of the actual events. A psychologist named Neisser argued that flashbulb memories are not as accurate as people think they are. He suggested that flashbulb memories are really like â€Å"life markers†. When a significant event occurs, it becomes part of your life history. â€Å"We know our world is changed fr om that moment on, but that doesn’t mean they are accurate. † (Flashbulb Memory). There have been disagreements debating whether flashbulb memories are accurate enough to be categorized in their own group.One reason over this disagreement is because flashbulb memories fade away over time, which is also how regular memories work. Another reason, flashbulb memories are doubted is that they can be very unstable. Flashbulbs can seem extremely vivid because the memories are often retold over and over again. They are not remembered as vividly without constantly thinking about it. â€Å"Accuracy reduces during the first three months and levels at about twelve months. †(Wikipedia, 2010). Flashbulb memories are sometimes classified as a type of autobiography memory.Autobiography memory is memory used in our everyday life. A memory goes through the first stage, encoding. At this stage, a set of mental operations that people perform on sensory information to convert that in formation into a form that is usable in the brain’s storage systems. The next step is storage, where a person’s brain holds on to information for an amount of time. Finally, the last memory process is retrieving. This step can be difficult, as well as impossible. During retrieval, memories can be distorted.Flashbulb memories can still be distorted like all other memories, but they seem to be more vivid in our minds. Normal everyday memories are entered in to our sensory memory. We perceive information with our senses. Then, information goes from sensory memory to short term memory. This transfer occurs because of selective attention, which is the ability to focus on only one stimulus from among all sensory input. Information then is processed in to long term memory. These are long lasting memories that can be stored for a long period of time until memory is retrieved.This transfer can only occur through elaborative rehearsal (Saundra K. Ciccarelli, 2009). Three items t hat are thought to have significant affects on flashbulb memories are consequentiality, distinctiveness of an event, and personal involvement and proximity. Consequentiality is the main characteristic for determining flashbulb memories. The consequence of an event is a particular variable in the making and keeping of flashbulb memory. Two models of flashbulb memories state that the consequence of an event determines the intensity of emotional reactions.Distinctiveness of an event has been considered to be a large contribution to the efficiency of flashbulb memories. Flashbulbs memories have been identified as unique and distinctive from everyday memories. It has been documented that people actually involved in the event are going to remember the event better over time. People who had no direct experience will not have a precise flashbulb memory of the event the way people who were involved or in close proximity (Wikipedia, 2010) Even through the controversy of how accurate flashbulb memories are, or how they work, no one can deny the mystery of them.A person in their own curiosity has to wonder how they remember so many details of the day of a impacting event on their life ten years ago, but they can’t remember what they ate the for breakfast yesterday morning. Flashbulb memory is an appropriate name for the phenomena because these memories can be like clear flashes of what really happened during the time when a person heard this information and felt the emotions at that time. Those emotions stimulating the amygdala makes the memory last longer.Through research of people’s reactions and memories of catastrophic public events, we as a society have learned more details about flashbulb memories. Even though, the research started over a century ago, there are many other unclear topics of flashbulb memories. Such as, exactly what types of memory a flashbulb memory is, how it is retrieved, and how is it different from regular everyday memories. As long as memories have consequentiality, distinctiveness, proximity, or involvement, it will be a long lasting memory. Until proved otherwise these memories will be known as flashbulb memories.