Wednesday, July 31, 2019

Discuss how effective boot camps are for reducing future criminal behavior Essay

Discuss how effective boot camps are for reducing future criminal behavior. One type of intervention used to treat conduct disorder is the boot camp. The basic idea is that disruptive behaviors can be corrected by strict behavioral regulation and an emphasis on skills training (Weis & Toolis 2009). The intention of boot camps is to shock juveniles into complying and exhibiting more pro-social behaviors. Unfortunately, this method of rehabilitation is not based on empirical evidence nor supported by research (Garascia, 2005). Boot camps are controversial because they are not proven to be effective or appropriate for treating juvenile delinquents (Garascia, 2005). The general structure of boot camps is modeled after military basic training with strict scheduling, command from drill instructors, group discipline, little free time or privileges, and strenuous physical activity. Boot camps may be supplemented with academic and skills training programs (Garascia, 2005). Boot camps emerged in the early 1990s as an extension of adult correctional boot camps. While not as widespread now, as many as 50 juvenile boot camps operate in the United States (Weis & Toolis, 2009). Among the goals espoused for using boot camps as treatment are: reduce recidivism, reduce overcrowding, reduce costs, and rehabilitate youth (Weis & Toolis, 2009). Generally, recidivism rates from boot camp graduates are found to be similar to those who complete traditional residential correctional interventions. Boot camp programs may reduce overcrowding in detention centers and prisons since stays are shorter than traditional residential programs, allowing a quicker release into the community. While boot camps are less expensive than prisons or juvenile detention centers, they are more expensive than probation. If the offending juvenile is sentenced to boot camp instead of probation, then it is not cost effective. Weis, Crockett, and Vieth (2004) found that the average cost for boot camps per adolescent range from $6,241 to $14,021 depending on location, duration, and aftercare programs. In 1991, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) granted three organizations funds to create boot camps that had a military structure, used physical discipline, and provided aftercare services (Weis & Toolis, 2009). Boot camps evolved in three phases. The first generation of boot camps emphasized the military structure, extreme physical conditioning, and strict rules on the basis that shock and intimidation can correct disruptive behaviors. Juveniles were held  accountable for their crimes in hopes that it would deter them from future crime (Weis & Toolis, 2009). The second generation of boot camps focused on a balance between military structure and therapeutic programming such as schooling, job training, counseling, and daily living skills in order to increase self-control (Weis & Toolis, 2009). The third generation of boot camps placed less emphasis on military structure, following the belief that change occurs when the environment is one of respect and trust. Modeling and positive reinforcement were used as well as therapeutic and educational programming and intense aftercare programs (Weis & Toolis, 2009). Lastly, forced â€Å"treatment† has not worked. Even though youth given the diagnosis of conduct disorder are often criminalized, programs focusing on military-based, highly restrictive, coercive environments have failed to produce results to warrant their continued use. Rather than relying on these coercive tactics to â€Å"correct† these troubling behaviors, we must step back and reconsider the meaning and purpose of these behaviors- with close attention to the ecologies from which these youth emerge. If we focus equal resources at repairing (or preventing) the troubled worlds of these youth, compared to our investment in coercive, symptom-based strategies, we may likely achieve far greater results. References Garascia, J. A. (2005). The price we are willing to pay for punitive justice in the juvenile detention system: Mentally ill delinquents and their disproportionate share of the burden. Indiana Law Journal, 80, 489-515. Weis, R., Crockett, T. E., & Vieth, S. (2004). Using MMPI-A profiles to predict success in a military-style residential treatment program for adolescents with academic and conduct problems. Psychology in the Schools, 41(5), 563574. Weis, R., & Toolis, E. E. (2009). Evaluation of a voluntary military-style residential treatment program for youths with conduct problems: 6- and 36-month outcomes. Psychological Services, 6(2), 139-153.

Tuesday, July 30, 2019

Samuel P. Huntington’s essay on the Clash of Civilization Review

Samuel P. Huntington’s essay on the Clash of Civilizations can be summarized as a snapshot of the current state of political affairs of the world through the lens of western civilization. Throughout the paper the author had made numerous hypotheses that stated while nation states will remain a powerful and formidable force in the foreseeable future, it is the non-visible boundaries of civilizations that will shape the future of conflicts and forge allies as well as adversaries. The author has drawn from history in creating his assumption that current and future conflicts will be founded on the basis of civilizations as opposed to kingdoms and emperors.Huntington had stated that with the rise of governments â€Å"for the people† that â€Å"†¦the  wars of the peoples had begun† signaling a major change in why mankind has waged warfare. As such, populations of each respective culture will more than likely form alliances with populations from their own civiliz ations and forge enemies with those they have no common ground with. The author doesn’t take the time to explain the â€Å"why† this phenomena is occurring but chooses to merely gloss over any underlying reasons it may be happing and instead reiterate that it is in fact occurring.Many assumptions are made throughout the paper by evidence of a lack of adequate sources for many hypotheses which would leave the reader to assume that what is said is merely â€Å"common knowledge†. The author glazes over major historical events which had demonstrated peoples from different cultures and civilizations working together towards economic benefit such as the Silk Road.1Persuasion of the TheoristSamuel P. Huntington’s essay on the Clash of Civilizations is persuasive in historical anecdotes and real world current events. Most of Huntington’s essay need not say anything more then what is already repeated on major media outlets around the world. The essay states what has long been opposed by the far left; namely, that people choose to interact, trade and form alliances with â€Å"like peoples†. It then, shouldn’t come as a surprise that the author needs to say little in order to sway an audience to his hypothesis by simply relating real world events such as rising nationalism in Russia2, Greece3 and France.One only has to look at the Anglo sphere of alliances in areas of conflict in the Middle East to find that Huntington’s persuasive argument is a narrative of real world events4. Non-Western nations that hope to transition into modern nations form alliances with Western nations but such alliances only serve to further destroy the credibility of the elites within those non-western countries. The elites are viewed simply as â€Å"puppets† of foreign interest.The rise of extremist organizations such as Hezbollah that have successfully achieved legitimacy through the democratic process of their respective nation st ates further proves that the will of the people in non-western countries is not to be â€Å"let into the club† so to speak, but to form their indepedent civilizations identity while modernizing their economies and infrastructure. Huntington’s essay was able to be persuasive due to how it presented historical  information in light of real world events but failed to mention historical periods that saw massive growth in economic trade and cross pollination of civilizations such as the silk road 6, Incense Road7 or even the lesser known Tea Horse Road 8.Threats, Challenges, and OpportunitiesSamuel P. Huntington’s essay can alternatively be summed up as a threat brief and the challenges it bears provide little opportunity for western nations to exploit economic ventures in developing nations. However, Huntington’s essay does provide a ray of light by illuminating the opportunities Western nations have to form and cultivate defense, economic and intellectual relationships within their own civilizations9. Hunting has shown that civilizations that are similar generally avoid conflicts in national security and economic trade while the reverse seems to only exacerbate the two.This presents a unique opportunity for western nations to carefully examine who they consider as allies and coalition partners while also providing incentives for rethinking our security strategy of disarmament while simultaneously attempting to dissuade developing nations from increasing their arsenals. When one begins to look at current events and policies through the lens of civilizations it becomes apparent that many of our previous alliances with those different from us had been doomed from the start as evidence by the low participation rates of countries from East Asia who only sent token forces for operations in OIF and OEF.One could easily support Hunting’s warning of working together with unlike civilizations by simply looking at the debacle of the Sout h Korea armed forces in Afghanistan and its failure to support US operations while despite US forces that had shed blood on their soil in order in conflicts past10.Analysis of the Future Operational EnvironmentIn reviewing Samuel P. Huntington’s essay on the Clash of Civilizations it is painfully obvious that our previous alliances had been formed on convenience rather than an introspective look into who â€Å"we† as Americans are and how our supposed allies view our relationships. Do our current noticeable dearth of allies view themselves as western nations, are they simply trying to â€Å"join the club† or are they simply biding their time until  they can switch alliances to a group that resembles their civilization and values more than we do?It is my opinion based upon token efforts from allies during wartime, combined with an eager willingness to negotiate with terrorist and non-state actors that our current slew of â€Å"allies† are a bigger threat than some of our enemies. If present conflicts dictate what future areas of concern will be, we should form stronger alliances with like minded civilizations that have already proven their dedication to our shared values such as Poland11, Georgia and former East Bloc countries that have taken similar stances against terrorism by deeds and not words.Based upon the technological advantage and intellectual innovation I would argue that the â€Å"where† US forces might deploy is irrelevant compared to â€Å"who† we might deploy with. Potential enemies to western interest will remain non-western countries for the foreseeable future and despite Russia’s growing nationalism and desire to increase its military strength it will remain an economic defunct nation susceptible to the effects of brain drain12 and disenfranchisement of its middle class.The issues and concerns of redefining our allies along the thread of a common civilization will greatly increase the complexi ty of logistics in military operations due to our geographic locations as compared to those of our advesaries. For example, due to past examples of cowardice; such as negotiating with terrorist, if the US would remove South Korea as an ally it would have increased logistical challenges in dealing with North Korea and China should tensions continue to escalate.One would be safe to assume that South Korea would naturally befriend China, a country with a history and civilization similar to its own, which would rule out the possibility of using such a former â€Å"friend† as a logistic hub for staging operations. However such friends have only proven to be costly relationships in the long lung which seldom paid dividends for services rendered unto them in their time of need. The Western way of warfare has been one of discipline and the leveraging of technology in order to gain tactical superiority over our enemies.As such, we should look to cultivate advanced technologies with na tions that share our civilizations culture and use the inherent technological innovations of these cultures to develop weapons systems that will give us the necessary edge to engage and destroy our enemies. By doing  so, western civilization such as the United States of America would not have to get into bed with nation states of civilizations much different than our own whose motives remain unclear and questionable.

Monday, July 29, 2019

A Struggle Between Greed And Lack Of Wisdom In Esther Forbes Novel Johnny Tremain

A Struggle Between Greed And Lack Of Wisdom In Esther Forbes' Novel Johnny Tremain Universal Concepts:Johnny Tremain In the storyâ€Å"Johnny Tremain†,by Esther Forbes, the main character, Johnny Tremain, struggles with his arrogance and selfishness prior to the Revolutionary War. Several concepts, like pride, disillusionment, and loss, are introduced by events that the protagonist encounters such as his work as a silversmith,his crippled hand, and the loss of Rab.These concepts are further reinforced by the thoughts and actions of Johnny Tremain in response to events. Johnny Tremain displayed the concept of pride in the story when he was making a handle of a silver basin for John Hancock, a wealthy man from Boston. This was shown in the passage, â€Å"By Sunday noon, Johnny, following Mr. Revere’s advice and his curve, had got the model of the handle exactly right. He could tell with his eyes closed. It felt perfect.† After experiencing many failures, he prided his success in making the handle perfectly. Evidently, we see him seem to â€Å"soak† in the satisfaction of his achievement, further displaying the concept of pride in this passage. The concept of disillusionment was revealed when Johnny Tremain realizes that because of his crippled hand, he cannot pursue his dream of being a silversmith. The text states,†He got up, stood facing them stiffly, his bad hand jammed into his breeches pocket. ’I’m going out,’ he said thickly.† In this section, we can see the reality of the situation dawn on him and affect him mentally. From the disillusionment, we also see him turn away and avoid the comfort from others in the Lapham’s household. The idea of loss is shown in the novel when Johnny Tremain was informed of Rab’s death.Upon fully facing the truth that Rab was dead, he felt as if,†He had moved off into a strange lonely world where nothing could seem real not even Rab’s death.† This is significant to note because we can already see that losing Rab had affected Johnny Tremain emotionally and had given us a sense that he finds the experience almost surreal. And with its surreal feel, he also felt the loneliness with the death of Rab, showing the massive impact that losing Rab had. In the novel, Johnny Tremain’s actions are similar to certain events in my life. Upon being discouraged, Johnny Tremain turns away from the comfort of others. I recall many times when a family member or friend were discouraged, and when I attempt to comfort them, they quickly turn away. In conclusion, the concepts in the novel- pride, disillusionment, and loss- have been displayed through the thoughts and actions of Johnny Tremain.

Concert Review Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Concert Review - Assignment Example The melody of the recital can be described by a short but fast shifting motive. The composer uses about four notes that the shift rapidly from one set to another. At the introduction and throughout the piece the energy and vigor depicted in the melody gives the recital a jovial or celebratory atmosphere and mood. The vigor and strength that is depicted in the piece can be likened to the mood of a carnival or an active musical dance. The harmony of the recital is also varied between an interval and a chord. In the introduction of the piece, the general harmony is an interval sounding at most two notes at a time. In the later stages of the piece, it shifts to a chord but turns back the harmony back to the interval. At the intervals, there is an underlying melody that supports the harmony. In the subsequent groups of chords, the melody is not very clear, and the progression is achieved in the recital. The variation between the interval and chords in the piece creates musical motion in t he presentation. Musically it is expected that where the interval is supported by an underlying melody and thee audience perceives a level of stability, the harmony is referred to as consonance. However, in the case of a turbulent and unstable set of chords, the harmony is referred to as a dissonance. The texture of this presentation can be described as both thick and thin. First, the texture can be described as monophonic. The description of the texture is because the presentation is a solo recital that is not accompanied by any vocals.

Sunday, July 28, 2019

Descartes Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Descartes - Term Paper Example Essentially, the mind/body problem centers on trying to determine what constitutes 'real' experience. It is clear that the mind can fool the body into thinking it is experiencing something. Examples of this are found in the experiences of people with lost limbs or psychosomatic illness. However, the body can also fool the mind into experiencing something, such as in the case of false scents, misperceptions or vertigo. It is necessary to investigate the theories of Descartes any time one is researching dualism because it was Descartes who first suggested the body and mind could be divided and he who began to define the proper realms of the mind as compared to that of the body. The more these ideas are researched, though, the more they seem to fall apart. Dualism is the result of an attempt by Descartes to bring the discipline of mathematics with its basis on ‘real’ factual knowledge together with the more intangible concepts of thought. His attempt is characterized by a c ategorical rejection of anything that could not be externally proven. This method is now referred to as hyperbolic doubt. Regarding this method, Burnham and Fieser say â€Å"he refused to accept the authority of previous philosophers – but he also refused to accept the obviousness of his own senses. ... en applied to the school of philosophic thought because the formalist paradigm of the Socratic-Platonics denied any possibility of empirical knowledge. â€Å"On this view, sensory experience can inform us only about appearances, about how things seem. Authentic knowledge (episteme), however, must be of reality. The idea of empirical knowledge, that is, experiential knowledge, is thus intrinsically incoherent. The provenance of knowledge proper, that is, knowledge of the eternal and independent Forms, is reason alone. With regard to the world available to us through the senses, the world of appearances, we can aspire only to opinion (doxa)† (Rosenberg). According to the formalist paradigm, then, there is no means by which a mortal human being can access the epistemic knowledge Descartes sought simply because we do not have the appropriate capabilities required to understand what it is we are seeing/experiencing at this level. To accomplish the type of evidence he required, Desc artes applied four basic rules of logic to his process of discovery to use as guides and method. The first rule applied was that he could only accept truths that were 'clearly and distinctly' known to be true. The second rule employed was to reduce problems down to their most common elements. This enabled the philosopher to tackle them each as micro problems which could then contribute to solving the macro. The third rule was to proceed in logical order from the easiest solution to the most difficult so as to reduce the weight of issues being considered. The fourth and final rule was to take a broad view of each individual micro-problem in order to be sure nothing has been missed at the macro level. As Brians comments, â€Å"He calls into question everything that he thinks he has learned through his

Saturday, July 27, 2019

The main characteristics of Turkish banking system and its response to Dissertation

The main characteristics of Turkish banking system and its response to recent global financial crisis - Dissertation Example 62 Conclusion 64 Chapter Five 66 Conclusion 66 Table 1 68 Bibliography 71 Can Turkey’s Banking System Act as a Model To Buffer Global Financial Crises? Introduction With the burst of the US property bubble in 2008, mortgage defaults increased astronomically with irreparable harm to global banking sectors and financial institutions worldwide. A number of banks were hard hit by either non-performing loans or complicated financial assets arising under bad loans. As a consequence, actors in the market emerged as cautious which were further exacerbated by doubts about primary financial institutions’ solvency. ... Turkey also does not have an operating mortgage sector like the US has. Turkey’s Central Bank’s macroeconomic policies and measures taking by Turkey’s banks in response to the global financial crisis also contributed to the limited impact of the 2008 global financial crisis of 2008.4 This dissertation conducts a critical analysis of the main characteristics of the Turkish banking system and its response to the recent global financial crisis of 2008-2009. The main purpose is to determine whether or not, Turkey’s banking system represents a model for buffering the effects of global financial crises. This research is justified by the fact that the Turkish banking system faired relatively well during the recent global financial crisis of 2008-2009.5 At the same time, Turkey’s real economy suffered serious damages, thus making Turkey an interesting case study. Thus this dissertation seeks to determine whether or not capital restructuring of financial ins titutions which creates a hard cap against loans and mortgages suppresses economic stimulation elsewhere. Profits during the global financial crisis of the Turkish banking system were impressive compared to that of other countries including developed economies.6 While banks all over the world were collapsing, Turkey’s banks remained stable and registered profits.7 The Turkish banking system’s ability to withstand the 2008-2009 global financial crisis is generally attributed to its regulatory framework and risk protocols.8 The Turkish banking system has learned a lot with respect to responding to economic shocks and risk management following the financial crises of 2000-2001.9 As a result the Turkish banking system devised

Friday, July 26, 2019

Working Agreement Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Working Agreement - Case Study Example This also gives rise to psychological stress. The issues need to be addressed to ensure that the person comes out of her social and psychological stress which could also eventually break her down. Significant developmental History: The client has been addicted to crack cocaine for the past four years. It is possible for her to get out of it but it is yet to be done and the Child Protective Services have taken custody of the children and given them to their grandmother. The client needs to go through a parental program in order to get back in to the routine even if she were to come out of this issue. In the current situation, the person is subjected to psychological stresses that could make her behave emotionally. That possibly explains the reason for her to walk into the counseling room for getting the children back. Goals: The goal for the assessment will be to get the children back to the client. In order to achieve this goal, she would be interested in executing the rest of the work that might be required to cure her as well as bring in normalcy in her life. A secondary goal therefore, will be to get back into normal life with a job and with the family. If the therapy is successful, the client would have got back the children under her custody. There could be more complete life with the family than living by her in the care centers. All this would have changed if the counseling were to be successful. In order to achieve this goal, a series of session wise goals need to be fixed and executed. These are the desired outcomes of the sessions that are held and would ideally like to achieve the same. Prioritized Goals: The goals need to be properly prioritized in order to ensure that all the needed gains are obtained from the sessions. In order to realize her goal of getting the children back to her, it is needed first to get her sober before even asking for the custody of the kids. If the first priority is to get sober, then the second one will be to get her some work training so that she can earn for herself and for the family. Apart from this, she also has to have a parenting course done. All this could be the influence of the society on her behavior. Therefore, the third priority in her list will be to attend a six week parenting training course before she embarks on any other mission. Roles of other stake holders: The other stake holders in the process would be the clinician apart from the mother and the children of the client. While clinician has a guiding role, the role of the mother of the client and the children of the client is varied. The mother would support the children of

Thursday, July 25, 2019

Informal interview with immigrant from kenya Essay

Informal interview with immigrant from kenya - Essay Example When you came to USA, did you speak English? Response: The Americans and the people of my culture behave in quite different ways. For instance, in greetings, the people of my culture shake hands warmly and heartily; in American culture, however, although people shake hands in greetings, the shaking of the hands is not done in a warm and cheerful manner. Also, according to my culture, public expression of romantic feelings is discouraged; in fact, according to my culture, it sounds a bit odd to tell your lover publicly that you love her. For that reason therefore, dating in my culture is quite different from dating in the American culture- in my culture, rarely do the dating couple express their romantic feelings in public as is the case in American culture. Again, in socializing, the people of culture behave quite differently from the American people. This is because the people of my culture consider the community to be more important than the individual, for that reason, therefore, the people of my culture are quite united as a community, unlike the American people who are individualistic and who regard the individual to be more important than the community/society. Answer: There are two main situations in which I felt completely misunderstood when I arrived to America. In the first situation, on the first day of my arrival, I extended my hand in greetings to all the people I interacted with at the airport. To my surprise, many of the people I extended hands to in greetings looked at me suspiciously and they did not shake my hands; I really felt misunderstood by these people and ever since I wait for the people to first extend their hands in greetings before I extend my hand and shake them in greetings. In the second incident, on my second week in America, I held my friend’s hand, my compatriot Mr. Eric Odhiambo, as we were walking along the road; to our surprise, the people looked at us suspiciously. I later learnt that the people who looked at us

Wednesday, July 24, 2019

Total reward approach to compensation and timeline Research Paper

Total reward approach to compensation and timeline - Research Paper Example Further, compensating the employees’ efforts remains a basic and foundational concept in employees’ retention and motivation. To ensure a comprehensive and fool proof operation of these types of compensations that are besides the salaries, most companies have established systems that recognize what is to be rewarded and how the process is supposed to take place (Kowalewski, College, & Phillips, 2012). These programs are called total rewards programs and are meant to direct the organization on how the employees are to be rewarded to ensure efficient motivation and maximum retention of the employees. The rewards program encompasses all things and activities that the employer regards as motivating from the employees point of view and which are valuable to the general and specific welfare of the employees. Although they include both monetary and non-monetary commodities, the financial and related rewards are the most notable and the foundation of rewards system in an organization settings. Most companies recognize four categories of rewards (Burris, 2012). There are the membership and seniority-based rewards, work status-based, competency-based and performance based rewards. The established system dictates what type of reward is to apply in each employee’s case and how these rewards are to be executed. This paper is aimed at designing a total rewards system based on Coca-Cola Company’s system. By exploring in details the total rewards system of the company, this paper will provide an insight on the basic contained in a specific system. To arrive at this design, the paper will first look into the company and its main objectives, missions and vision and an analysis of the reward system. It is from this analysis that the design will be developed. The Coca-Cola Company is undoubtedly the world largest manufacturer of beverages and soft drinks. It has been ranked the world’s number one brand on several occasions. Since 1889,

Tuesday, July 23, 2019

Huckleberry Finn vs. Juggar Singh Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Huckleberry Finn vs. Juggar Singh - Essay Example None of them depict a political figure but rather they are just ordinary people with extraordinary skills. Both share some similarities, differences and impact in the overall plot of the novel in a distinctly, unique fashion. The theme around which â€Å"The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn† revolves is civil war between New England and the Old. It is set in Illinois during the pre-war times. Huck is a thirteen year old boy coming from a poor background and Widow Douglas and Miss Watson decide to civilize him. He is not only credulous but also susceptible, insightful, diligent, empathetic, evenhanded, rational, audacious, smart and blase all at once. The fact that he is superstitious is revealed in the very first chapter when he accidentally kills a spider and suddenly fears that this act will bring bad luck in his life (Twain 1977). Secondly, when he makes the mistake of spilling the salt at Widow’s place, he wants to throw it over his shoulder to ward off bad omen but he is stopped by the Widow herself. Later when he meets Jim, both share a series of superstition based on their experience and what they had heard. Huck is also gullible since he is so young. When he tries to flee the ladies’ attempt to civilize him, he meets Tom who offers him to become a part of his gang of robbers provided he goes back home. This also makes him adventurous since he is easily convinced that the gang of robbers will be an exciting company to be with. Despite of the lack of education, Huck is also shrewd and extremely rational (Twain 1977). This allows him to keep pace with Tom’s adventures. The intelligence of Huck is evident through his schemes of getting rid of his abusive father who had literally kept him locked in his place like a kidnapper. His master plan to escape is very grand and involves his own death. He makes the scene look like a murder and in his fathers’ absence, loads the canoe he finds floating in the river with supplies. He does not stop here. He kills a wild hog and plucks his own hair so that it looks like a crime scene where he was killed and dragged into the river. His industrious nature enables him to recognize the worth of any object he comes across such as a piece of driftwood in the river, and plans to sell and make money from it (Twain 1977). During his travel with Jim he continues to collect such items, hoping that one day he will possess a lot of money. Juggat Singh of â€Å"Train to Pakistan† is considered to be a local thief of the village Mano Majra located at the border of India and Pakistan in the novel. The story unfolds as the narrator recalls an incident that took place in the village which changes Juggat’s lifee forever. He is arrested by the police for murdering the village’s money lender Ram Lal. Ram Lal was actually murdered by Malli, a neighboring village’s dacoit. Juggat is in love with a Muslim girl named Nooran. Juggat’s bravery is revealed to t he people of village when he attempts to save the lives of many people including Nooran’s. The village, which was once a peaceful place, becomes a place of rebellion and hatred. Amidst the chaotic situation of the village which is faced with bloodshed after the arrival of the train full of mutilated dead bodies at the village, which is a combination of Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims, Juggat decides to prove his worth as a peace maker and not a

Problem of Stereotype Essay Example for Free

Problem of Stereotype Essay Stereotypes may lead ineffective communication when we communicate with strangers. Our stereotypes tend to be activated automatically when we categorize strangers and when we are not communicating mindfully (see von Hippel, Sekaquaptewa, Vargas, 1995). We, therefore, unconsciously try to confirm our expectations when we communicate with strangers. Our stereotypes constrain strangers’ patterns of communication and engender stereotype-confirming communication. In other words, stereotypes create self-fulfilling prophecies. We tend to see behavior that confirms our expectations even when it is absent. We ignore disconfirming evidence when communicating on automatic pilot. When we communicate on automatic pilot, we do not cognitively process all the information about others that is available to us (Johnston Macrae, 1994). Generally, the greater our cultural and linguistic knowledge, and the more our beliefs overlap with those of the strangers with whom we communicate, the less the likelihood there will be misunderstandings. To increase our accuracy in making prediction, we must try to understand which social identity is guiding strangers’ behavior in a particular situation. And to be effective in communication with strangers, we must keep our minds open and be mindful. Since stereotypes are a natural product of the communication process, they influence the way we process information. Stereotyping is the result of our tendency to overestimate the degree of association between group membership and psychological attributes. While there may be some association between group membership and psychological characteristics of members, it is much smaller than we assume when we communicate on automatic pilot. When we communicate on automatic pilot, we interpret incoming messages on the basis of the symbolic systems we learned as children. Besides, our processing of information is biased in the direction of maintaining the preexisting belief systems. We remember more favorable information about our ingroups and more unfavorable information about outgroups (Hewstone Giles, 1986). So we tend to process information that is consistent with our stereotypes and our stereotypes

Monday, July 22, 2019

The Person-Centred Therapy Essay Example for Free

The Person-Centred Therapy Essay For the purpose of this essay, I will be attempting to show an understanding of hypnosis, and describe the psychological and physical aspects of hypnosis. I will also be discussing the role of relaxation in hypnotherapy. I will be using information learned from my course hand outs, and from the year one book list. Hypnosis has been used by different cultures and religions around the globe for thousands of years, including the Australian Aborigines, North American Indians, the Hindu culture, the Chinese and even further back to the ancient Egyptians. In more modern times, hypnotism has been used as a form of entertainment, watched by â€Å"live show† audiences, and later on, TV shows, creating curiosity and fascination for many. It is this lighter area of hypnosis which has possibly contributed to the stigma which can surround hypnosis and hypnotherapy. The term â€Å"hypnosis† derives from the Greek word Hypnos, which means sleep, the words â€Å"hypnosis and â€Å"hypnotism† derive from the term â€Å"neuro-hypnotism† which means (nervous sleep). It is known that the Aborigines used a form of hypnosis to achieve their â€Å"Dream Time†, (altered state of consciousness and out of body experiences) which is still practiced to this day. The Chinese use a hypnotic like trance called â€Å"Oigong† (exorcise of vital energy) within their healing system. It is estimated that approximately five per cent of the population of China practice this type of hypnosis, making this the most common type of hypnosis practiced in the world. However, although practitioners of , â€Å"Oigong† believe it increases mental and physical energy, some Chinese mental health officials believe there to be some harmful side effects, and would like to see the practice banned. Given the huge diverse applications for which hypnosis is used, for example, religious practices, healing, and physical and mental energizing, it is clear to see that hypnosis within entertainment, â€Å"the stage hypnotist† has but a small role to play within a vast and complex discipline. Hypnosis is â€Å"a special psychological state with certain physiological attributes,  resembling sleep only superficially and marked by a functioning of the ind ividual at a level of awareness other than the ordinary conscious state†, not asleep, yet not awake. There are different theories suggesting that hypnosis is a â€Å"mental state† and another that hypnosis is linked to â€Å"imaginative role-enactment†. People under hypnosis are believed to have a heightened sense of focus and concentration, enabling them to concentrate intensely on a thought or a memory. It is at this point of focus and concentration when the person is able to change their thought process through suggestion. The level of concentration allows the person to block out all exterior noises, distractions and other thoughts. Hypnosis is achieved by using a hypnotist, using a procedure known as â€Å"hypnotic induction†. Hypnosis can also be self-induced, which can be achieved by â€Å"self-suggestion† or â€Å"auto-suggestion† Hypnotic induction uses a series of suggestions and instructions, which takes the person through a process of â€Å"Progressive Muscle Relaxation† or â€Å"PMR†. â€Å"PMR† should be delivered using a much slower than normal speaking speed. By slowing down the speaking speed, the recipient will feel more relaxed, and will be able to enjoy the process. There are four main types of brain wave, which lead to differing stages of relaxation. 1/Beta Waves, (15 to 40 cycles per second) This is considered to be the normal functioning level, during conversation. 2/Alpha Waves, (9 to 14 cycles per second) This is a slower rate than the beta, and would be experienced while relaxing after an activity, and is considered to be a state of creativity and relaxation. 3/Theta Waves, (4 to 8 cycles per second) These are experienced during meditative states and dreaming, and would be considered to be associated with calmness and serenity. 4/Delta Waves, (1 to 4 cycles per second) This is considered to be the slowest rate and would be experienced in our deepest subconscious. This would be experienced while in a detached state of awareness or sleep or while under very deep hypnosis. Franz Anton Mesmer (from which the term mesmerise was derived) was born in Germany in 1734, and was the Grandfather of Hypnosis. Although Mesmer studied law and medicine, he had a passion and a belief in alternative therapies and medicine. After a  lifetime of investigation and work, Mesmer died in 1815; however he left a legacy of intrigue and an army of followers and believers. One of these being the Marquis de Puysegur. De Puysegur joined a group called â€Å"The Society of Universal Harmony† originally run by Mesmer. After a succession of patients, De Puygesur found that the patients, while seemingly asleep, were able to talk and answer questions, while in the hypnotic state. De Puygesur believed that hypnosis was the result of a psychological force rather than a physical one, which was argued, debated but then accepted by followers. Dr James Braid from Manchester gave light to the term â€Å"hypnosis†. Braid was originally against mesmerising, but eventually gained an interest, and began his own study. Braid concluded that any cures were as a result of suggestion through hypnosis. Braid continued his study and developed a technique called â€Å"eye fixation†. The state which eye fixation resulted in was Braids idea of hypnosis. Dr John Elliotson was the first person to demonstrate the use of hypnosis during surgery. Elliotson cured a dumb epileptic patient if front of an audience of medics. Elliotson also used hypnosis in surgical procedures, however died in 1868 after much controversy. Sigmund Freud went on to support the idea of hypnosis, and would often give talks to the medical fraternity. Although Freud was not considered to be a great hypnotist, he continued to use hypnosis in his work, but by the mid 1890’s Freud had all but given up on hypnosis. Modern hypnosis began with the birth of Milton Erickson (1901), who pioneered his work in â€Å"indirect suggestion†. Erickson is considered by many to be the pioneer of modern hypnosis. After suffering with a series of terrible illnesses, Erickson dedicated his life to understanding the unconscious mind. Erickson believed that â€Å"the unconscious mind is always listening† and it did not appear to matter whether the patient was in a trance or not. Erickson believed that â€Å"suggestion† would have the desired effect on the mind, as long as it found some resonance at the unconscious level. As stated earlier, stage hypnosis plays a very small role within the field of hypnosis. There is a much greater importance for hypnosis, for example; hypnotherapy is now a widely accepted form of alternative treatment, and is accepted as such by professionals in the medical field. There are some conflicting and confusing perceptions of hypnosis. Many people believe that the hypnotist simply places a person into a form of hypnotic trance, where  the person has no control of their own actions and t hought’s; this however is not necessarily the case. John F Kihlstrom (Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania) stated â€Å"The hypnotist does not hypnotize the individual. Rather, the hypnotist serves as sort of a coach or tutor, whose job it is to help the individual become hypnotized†. The experience of hypnosis can vary greatly from one individual to another. Some people under the influence of hypnosis report a feeling of detachment and extreme relaxation. Others state that their actions occur outside of their conscious state of mind, and others may be able to feel conscious, and are able to hold a conversation while under hypnosis. There have been many experiments undertaken using people under hypnosis, which have given credence to the subject. In one such experiment by Ernest Hilgard, (American psychologist and professor (1904 to 2001) famous for his research on hypnosis, particularly within the field of pain control) an individual under hypnosis was instructed not to feel any pain in their arm. The individuals arm was then placed into iced water, while the individuals who were not under hypnosis had to remove their arms from the water within seconds, the hypnotized individuals were able to leave their arms in the iced water for several minutes without feeling any pain. There are many examples where, illnesses and medical conditions, both physical and emotional, have been cured or greatly reduced in severity, for example; Rheumatoid Arthritis, dementia, ADHD, pain relief during surgical procedures, and pain during child birth. There are known situations where individuals have undergone major surgical procedures, without any form of anaesthetic, and have experienced no pain or discomfort, such is the power of hypnosis. There is a common belief that some people simply cannot be hypnotised, however much research shows that many more people are hypnotizable than they believe. In studies and surveys, it has been shown that as little as ten per cent of all adults are considered either difficult or impossible to hypnotise. It also shows that children are more susceptible to hypnosis, and that people who are seen to be fantasists are also more responsive to hypnosis. To be successfully hypnotized, it is very important to enter with an open and clear mind, and to view hypnosis as a positive experience. In modern society, hypnosis is used very commonly as an alternative aid within areas such as; weight loss, the cessation of smoking, drug and alcohol addiction (reduction in use), fears and phobias. People who  may have a fear of flying or of spiders for example, have been known to be completely cured of their fear, allowing them to lead a more fulfilling and less stressful life. There also many myths with hypnosis, the obvious one being that the hypnotized individual does not remember anything of their hypnotic state once they are awake. Amnesia has been known to occur, however this is extremely rare. It is however known that hypnosis can affect an individual’s memory. â€Å"Posthypnotic amnesia† can lead to a person forgetting some of the things which occurred during hypnosis, however the effect is quite temporary, and limited in terms of information forgotten. It is also a myth that an individual can be hypnotized against their own will. A person must be willing and happy to participate in order to be hypnotized. This is the same for people who believe they have no control over their own actions while under hypnosis. It is not possible for a hypnotist to force or influence a person into behaving in a manner which goes against their own morals and standards. Hypnosis is able to assist in a person making positive changes, however it is not able to change physical strength or enhance athleticism. Hypnosis should be seen as an additional and supportive aid to other forms of medicines and therapies, rather than a stand-alone discipline. Conclusion/summary; Hypnosis continues to intrigue and be a cause of debate for professionals and individuals alike, however, what cannot be disputed is its place within entertainment, but more importantly, its relevance within the medical field and as an alternative therapy. Hypnotherapy is now a widely accepted form of alternative therapy, practised by surgeons, physicians and independent private therapists. Although hypnosis and hypnotherapy are not considered as a replacement for medical treatments or medications, they are seen as an extremely useful addition and enhancement to these. Hypnosis has proven to be a positive life changing experience for many people, where other methods, and in some cases medicines have failed. It is evidenced that individuals have greatly reduced their weight from life threatening obesity, and have been able to successfully cease using harmful substances such as alcohol, tobacco and other forms of drugs. The fundamentals of hypnosis and its basic principal’s remain unaltered for hundreds, possibly even thousands of  years, however research and investigations by many great psychologists, has allowed a much greater understanding of this important and at times vital discipline. From the ancient Egyptians to modern day man/woman, hypnosis continues be an extremely effective alternative, within the field of physical and mental health and emotional wellbeing, and has also allowed a greater understanding of the workings of the human subconscious. Bibliography Course hand-outs/notes Hypnosis:- A Brief History. Chrysalis Psychotherapeutic Counselling-Year 1-Module 1. 1-1 07/2010 SC. Page 6. Hypnosis:- A Brief History. Chrysalis Psychotherapeutic Counselling-Year 1-Module 1. 1-1 07/2010 SC. Page 10. Hypnosis:- A Brief History. Chrysalis Psychotherapeutic Counselling-Year 1-Module 1. 1-1 07/2010 SC. Page 7. Internet About.com. Psychology. What is hypnosis. Psychology.about.com/od/statesofconsciousness/a/hypnosis.htm?p=1 En.wikepedia.org/wiki/Milton_h._erickson

Sunday, July 21, 2019

How Does Diversity and Immigration Impact Innovation?

How Does Diversity and Immigration Impact Innovation? Anca Pop Nowadays, due to the increasingly competitive economic environment, and the constant danger of economic turn-downs, innovation has come into great prominence not only as an important source of competitive advantage, but also as a powerful driver of economic growth and prosperity. In this new context, attention has been drawn to the role that cultural diversity and immigration play in fostering innovation. Thus, the aim of this essay is to assess the impact of immigration on innovation. Furthermore, the question regarding whether or not a culturally diverse society represents an enabling environment for innovativeness shall be discussed. Nevertheless, a number of evidences and empirical data which support the linkage between cultural diversity, immigration and the innovation process shall be analysed. Statistical reports have shown that at the turn of the century â€Å"4.6% of world population was born in a different country from the one where it currently lived†. (Bratti and Conti, 2012:2). Given the size of this phenomenon, immigration has come into sharp focus on the global agenda, currently being at the centre of many economic and political debates and its economic consequences giving rise to a high level of research activity. Thus, it would be of highly importance to consider the contribution of increasingly cultural diversity in many societies to the innovation system especially when dealing with economic analysis and policy. However, in order to be able to analyse the effects of immigration and cultural diversity on innovation, firstly, the meaning of „innovation† as a concept along with its indicators should be tackled. Defining â€Å"innovation† could be rather a difficult task as it is a â€Å"multi-faceted phenomenon†, and a widely used concept in various ways and different contexts. (Venturini, 2005: 1) However, it could be generally agreed that †Innovation is different from pure invention. Innovation involves the successful implementation of a new product, service or process, which for most activities entails their commercial success.† (Gordon and McCann, 2005: 3). In addition to this, Ozgen, Nijkamp and Poot (2013: 3) state that innovation is achieved â€Å"by means of analytical knowledge† and argue that â€Å"The improvement of an existing product or the modification of an existing process or organizational arrangement can also be viewed as an innovation.† Regarding the measures of innovation, the most prominent ones are the number of patent applications and the Total Factor Productivity, used as proxies of technological growth and effective innovation s at both firm and country levels. Having now defined this process, leads the analysis further, to establishing how does immigration affect innovation. In recent years, research activities have demonstrated a rather positive correlation between migration and innovativeness, as â€Å"individuals coming from different countries usually have different, complementary skills with respect to natives, and the production of new ideas may be positively influenced by contacts and interchanges between culturally diverse individuals† (Bratti and Conti, 2012: 4). In addition to this, â€Å"migration brings youth to ageing countries, and allows ideas to circulate in millions of mobile minds. That is good both for those who arrive with suitcases and dreams and for those who should welcome them†. (The Economist, 2011) A rather more technical research on this matter is conducted by Ozgen, Nijkamp and Poot (2012) who study the impact of size, skills and diversity of immigration on the innovativeness of host regions using the number of patent applications per million inhabitants from 170 regions in Europe for the periods 1991-1995 and 2001-2005. According to this study, there are five mechanisms through which immigration may boost innovation: â€Å"the population size effect†; â€Å"the population density effect†; â€Å"the migrant share effect†; â€Å"the skill composition effect† and â€Å"the migrant diversity effect†. (Ozgen, Nijkamp and Poot, 2011:2). The first three mechanisms result from the fact that immigration increases the local aggregate demand. This boost in the aggregate demand could be met through an increase in the level and diversity of local production, which in the long run might need additional investment and thereby will encourage product and process innovation. Furthermore, local economy prosperity not only will generate firm growth but will also encourage additional start-up firms resulting into an innovation lift. Moreover, usually attracted to the large metropolitan areas with better job opportunities, migrants increase the urban population and thereby strengthen the forces of agglomeration which leads to greater innovation. (Ozgen, Nijkamp and Poot, 2011: 3). A more debated way through which the innovation system is enhanced by immigration refers to the skill composition effect on innovation. Given that the modern economy is in a constant quest for fresh ideas and better goods that would accelerate business growth, the global competition for highly-skilled migrants has gained magnitude. â€Å"Their role in innovation may seem obvious: the more clever people there are the more ideas are likely to flourish, especially if they can be commercialised.† (The Economist, 2009) Considerable empirical evidence for this is provided by Kerr who gathered data about the 8 million scientists who had acquired an American patent between 1975 and 2004. Hence, he found that the share of patents given to American-born scientists fell while the share of all patents awarded to immigrant scientists from China and India increased from 4.1% in the late 1970s to 13.9% between 2000 and 2004. (The Economist, 2009) Moreover, Kerr and William Lincoln (2008) ana lysed the way changes in the number of H-1B visa admissions reflected on patents in the years between 1995 and 2006. It is imperious to mention that H-1B visa is the United States work visa for skilled immigrants, which allows US companies to employ foreign workers in specialty occupations that require theoretical or technical expertise as well as the attainment of a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent as a minimum. Thus, they point out that â€Å"the estimates suggest that a 10% growth in the H-1B worker population is associated with a 2% increase in patenting† (Kerr and Lincoln, 2008: 20) Bosetti, Cattaneo and Verdolini (2013: 1) predict that skilled immigration has a significant positive contribution not only to the knowledge creation in host countries as â€Å"they add to the pool of skills in destination markets†, but also enhances natives ‘productivity as the interaction of diverse cultures and approaches in problem solving and brain storming situations might give birth to new, original ideas. In order to support these predictions, they have studied the effect of skilled migrants on the number of patents applied for through the Patent Cooperation Treaty and citations of scientific publications, as proxies of innovation in a panel of twenty European countries from 1995 to 2008. Thus, in accordance with their initial prediction, Bosetti, Cattaneo and Verdolini (2013:11) found out that â€Å"the variable measuring the stock of knowledge in a given country (stock of RD expenditure) exerts a positive and statistically significant effect on innovation. A 1 percent increase in the stock of RD expenditures is associated with a 0.6 percent and a 0.4 percent increase in patent application and citation, respectively†. In a similar vein, Hunt and Gauthier-Loiselle (2009) measure the likeness of skilled immigrants to enrich innovation and at what extent. They do so by evaluating the differences in patenting behaviour between immigrants and natives as well as the state-level determinants of patenting using a panel of data from 1940-2000 in the Unites States. The results show that a 1% increase in the college graduate immigrants implied 6.1% rise in patents per capita while 1% increase in the share of college natives raise patents per capita only by 3.5%. Furthermore, â€Å"1.3 percentage point increase in the share of the population composed of immigrant college graduates and the 0.7 percentage point increase in the share of post-college immigrants both increased patenting per capita by about 12% (..). The 0.45 percentage point increase in immigrant scientists and engineers increased patenting per capita by about 13%.† (Hunt and Gauthier-Loiselle, 2009:20). Hence they discover that one way ski lled immigrants could boost patenting per capita is by engaging in science and engineering as the knowledge and skills these occupations request are more easily transferable across countries. Skilled immigrants could also enrich patenting per capita, if an immigration policy regarding immigrants’ selection according to their abilities and knowledge levels was introduced. This would attract more science and engineering orientated migrants and would encourage less skilled migrants to acquire higher education and engage themselves more into the innovation process. (Hunt and Gauthier-Loiselle, 2009: 2). Nevertheless, due to migration and globalisation, diversity has become an increasingly outstanding feature of today’s world. This brings into discussion the fifth mechanism through which immigration can boost the innovation system, the migrant diversity effect, as an important link to innovation. A say on this matter had the European Commission (2008: 8), in their work regarding the diversity journey in search for talent, competitiveness and innovation: â€Å"as innovation processes depend on harnessing creativity, and while dynamic as well as supportive systems of management can elicit the best from staff, like-minded people will usually produce like-minded results. Diversity in the workforce can, however, help companies to break this mould and the cycle of limited unilateral thinking and, in so doing, set them free to discover new products, markets, and ways of doing or leading business†. Empirical evidence that confirms the positive linkage between cultural diversity and innovation is provided by Niebuhr (2006). She investigates the impact of a cultural diverse labour force in German regions on innovation, using a sample of 200 different nationalities. The results show cultural diversity to be beneficial to innovation: â€Å"Due to their different cultural backgrounds, it is likely that migrants and native workers have fairly diverse abilities and knowledge. Thus, there might be skill complementarities between foreign workers and native in addition to those among workers of different qualification levels.† (Niebuhr, 2006: 564). But are cultural diversity and immigration always beneficial to innovation? According to Bratti and Conti (2012: 4), cultural diversity might also cause difficulties in communication, especially when natives and immigrants do not speak the same language. This might reduce social capital and therefore act as an impediment to innovation and economic performance. In addition, Ozgen (2013: 92) finds as outcomes of cultural diversity, lower levels of trust and higher discrimination within firms, â€Å"non-transferability of skills† or â€Å"non-recognition of qualifications† which play as impediments in ideas exchange or the formation of new knowledge. Similarly, â€Å"co-ethnic networks can lead to spatial or occupational segregation and clustering of migrant groups, which may also impede the contribution of immigrants to firm innovation†. Moreover, a few other situations which lie on the negative side of immigration could be observed. That would be the case of areas experiencing higher inflows of low-skilled or low educated migrants: â€Å"unskilled immigration can have a negative effect by reducing social capital, creating communication problems among workers or pushing firms to lower their efforts to introduce product and process innovations†. (Bratti and Conti, 2012:16). In order to uphold this statement, Bratti and Conti (2012: 22) evaluate the effect of low-skilled immigrants in Italian provinces on patent applications, as a proxy for innovativeness. Thus, they find evidence that there is a significant negative effect not only of low-skilled migrants, but also an overall negative effect of large inflows of immigrants on innovation: â€Å"rising immigrants’ share by 1 p.p. produces a 0.064 percent reduction in patents’ applications per 1,000 inhabitants.† This negative effect is proved to be mostly driven by the characteristics of immigrants who â€Å"mainly appear as a source of low-skilled and cheap labour force, which is employed in traditional economic sectors† (Bratti and Conti, 2012:11). Although it focuses especially on Italy, Bratti and Conti’s study is not necessarily a particular case, as their findings are also consistent with the Lewis’ work (2011: 1031) who has proved that areas rich in low-skilled immigrants areas adopted less machinery, giving technological change a slower evolution and: â€Å"plants added technology more slowly between 1988 and 1993 where immigration induced the ratio of high school dropouts to graduates to grow more quickly†. Hence, the substantial immigration boom from the end of the last century had a negative impact of knowledge formation and actively led to a slow growth in the supply of skills in the United States: â€Å"only after the large wave of immigration in the 1980s did high-immigration ci ties become more unskilled than low immigration cities.† (Lewis, 2011: 1031). On the other hand, there are also claims that even low-skill immigrants can indirectly enhance productivity gains and innovation: â€Å"Even low-skill immigrants who start small businesses that stay small are important to the American economy. They provide low cost services and access to more goods. There are also second-order effects, for example someone who provides child or elder care cheaply provide an invaluable service. This allows natives to works outside of their home† (The Economist, 2010). Similarly, Peri (2009: 17) has found a positive linkage between productivity gains and immigration in the United States in the years between 1960 and 2006, although the most majority of the immigrants in his sample were low-skilled and engaged in menial work. He proves that the inflow of unskilled migrants resulted in a more efficient allocation of skills and education to jobs amongst natives, thereby leading to an increase in the total factor productivity. Additionally, the negati ve effects of cultural diversity and unskilled immigrants could be overcome by properly exploiting the competencies of skilled immigrants as well as by attracting more highly educated immigrants. This could be achieved by introducing favourable immigration policies for high-skilled immigrants, in order to foster innovation and economic growth. Furthermore, free language courses and job-related training programs could be provided for immigrants in order to reduce language barriers and allow them to develop or upgrade their skills. To conclude, on theoretical grounds, there are several ways in which immigration and cultural diversity can affect both positively and negatively the innovation system. Given such a mixture of positive and negative effects, the overall impact of immigration on innovation should be considered in terms of empirical evidences. In this sense, this essay has presented a number of different studies and approaches from European countries, but also from the United States. What is more, five mechanisms through which immigration can boost innovation have been analysed. As opposed to this, several negative effects of cultural diversity and immigration with regards to the innovation process have been considered along with several ways these drawbacks could be overcome. Thus, all things considered, it could be consented that migration and cultural diversity represent an opportunity as much as a challenge, but if managed carefully it would lead to positive outcomes such as innovation, technologica l change, increasing productivity gains and ultimately to economic growth. References Bosetti V., Cattaneo C. and Verdolini E. (2012) â€Å"Migration, Cultural Diversity and Innovation: A European Perspective†, FEEM Working Paper No. 69.2012. Online at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2162836 (Accessed 14 January 2014) Bratti M. and Conti C. (2012) â€Å"Immigration, Population Diversity and Innovation of Italian regions† Online at: www.ecostat.unical.it/rd2013/Papers/Bratti_Conti.pdf‎ (Accessed 12 January 2014) European Commission (2008) â€Å"Continuing The Diversity Journey: Business Practices, Perspectives And Benefits† European Union Publications Office, Luxembourg. Gordon I.R. and McCann P. (2005) â€Å"Clusters, Innovation and Regional Development: An Analysis of Current Theories and Evidence†, in Johansson B., Karlsson C. and Stough R., (eds.), â€Å"Entrepreneurship, Spatial Industrial Clusters and Inter-Firm Network†s , Edward Elgar, Cheltenham Hunt, J. and M. Gauthier-Loiselle (2008) â€Å"How Much Does Immigration Boost Innovation?† NBER Working Paper14312, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge Mass. Online at: http://ftp.iza.org/dp3921.pdf (Accessed 12 January 2014) Kerr W.R.andLincoln W. F. (2008)â€Å"TheSupplySideofInnovation:Hà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ 1BVisaReformsandU.S.EthnicInvention†JournalofLaborEconomics. Online at: http://www.nber.org/papers/w15768 (Accessed 13th January 2014) Lewis, E. (2011) â€Å"Immigration, skill mix, and capital skill complementarity†. The Quarterly Journal of Economics 126, 1029–1069. Online at: http://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/qjecon/v126y2011i2p1029-1069.html (Accessed 9 January 2014) Niebuhr A. (2006): â€Å"Migration and innovation: Does cultural diversity matter for regional RD activity?† IAB discussion paper, No. 2006,14. Online at: http://www.econstor.eu/handle/10419/31908 (Accessed 11 January 2014) Ozgen C. (2013) â€Å"Impacts of immigration and cultural diversity on innovation and economic growth† Online at: http://dare.ubvu.vu.nl/bitstream/handle/1871/47948/dissertation.pdf?sequence=1 (Accessed 13 January 2014) Ozgen, C., Nijkamp, P., Poot, J. (2011) Immigration and Innovation in European Regions IZA Discussion Papers 5676, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). Online at: http://ftp.iza.org/dp5676.pdf (Accessed 12 January 2014) Peri, G. (2009) â€Å"The Effect of Immigration on Productivity: Evidence from US States† NBER working paper September 2009. Online at: http://www.nber.org/papers/w15507 Accessed 14 January 2014 The Economist (17 September 2010) â€Å"Importing job growth† Online at: http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/09/economic_growth (Accessed 10 January 2014) The Economist (19 November 2011) â€Å"The magic of diasporas†. Online at: http://www.economist.com/node/21538742 (Accessed 10 January 2014) The Economist (5 March 2009) â€Å"Give me your scientists†¦Ã¢â‚¬ , Online at : http://www.economist.com/node/13234953 (Accessed10 January 2014) Venturini A. (2012) â€Å"Innovation and Migration† co-authored with F. Montobbio, C. Fassio, MPC Analytical Note, 2012/05. Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, San Domenico di Fiesole (FI): European University Institute, 2012. Pluripotent Stem Cells: Benefits, Properties and Uses Pluripotent Stem Cells: Benefits, Properties and Uses INTRODUCTION Pluripotent stem cells give rise to nearly all cells types of the body, like, muscle, nerve, heart, and blood. They hold huge promise for both research health care. The advance in human biology continues to generate interest among scientists, patients suffering from a wide range of diseases, including cancer, heart disease and diabetes, their families. Embryonic stem (ES) cells, is derived from inner cell mass of mammalian blastocysts they have the ability to grow for an indefinite period while maintaining pluripotency. These properties have led to hope that human Embryonic Stem cells might be useful to understand the disease mechanisms, to monitor effective and safe drugs, to treat patients of various diseases and injuries, such as juvenile diabetes and spinal cord injury. Cell culture is the one of the most important basic biomedical research. From many decades, many innumerable insights into both normal pathologic cellular processes have been gleaned by the study of human cells explanted in vitro. Primary human cells have a small life span in culture, there is a regulation of tissue formation, regeneration, and repair. Many human cell types have never closely been adapted for the expansion in vitro, and the lack of available models of normal pathologic tissue structure has render many new important questions in human growth and disease pathogenesis and it is hard to find. At present three types of methods have been reported to induce pluripotency artificially in mouse somatic cells. Embryonic stem like cells can also be recognized by long-term culture of bone marrow cells, and pluripotent stem cells can be generate adult germ cells, either by vitro culture of spermatogonial cells or by the parthenogenesis of unfertilized eggs. The capability to reprogram cells from the human blood will let the generation of patient-spec ific stem cells for the diseases. In this disease-causing somatic mutations are then restricted to the cells of the hematopoietic lineage. Depending on methods used, reprogramming of the adult cells to gain iPSCs may pose significant risk those could limit their use in humans. Many scientists around the world, announced the discovery of the method that could eliminate oncogenes after the induction of pluripotency, which will increase the potential use of iPSC in human disease. In April 2009, it was verified that generation of iPS cells is feasible without any genetic modification of the adult cell: a repetitive treatment of cells by means of certain proteins channelled into the cells viapoly-arginine anchorswas sufficient to induce pluripotency. Pluripotent stem cells are a unique scientific and medical source.The pluripotent stem cells are derived using non-Federal funds 8yat the beginning, embryos donated voluntarily by couples who are undergo fertility treatment in an vitro ferti lization clinic. Human embryonic stem cells isolated from more surplus embryos from in vitro fertilization clinics represent an immortal circulation of pluripotent cells that can theoretically generate any cell type inside the human body. PLURIPOTENT STEM CELLS PLURIPOTENT STEM CELLS are generated from adults cells where induced pluripotent stem cells is the part of pluripotent stem cells and it is also called as iPS cells or iPSC’s. Pluripotent stem cells give rise to nearly all of the cells types of body, like muscle, nerve, heart, and blood. Pluripotent stem cells are called master cells because they are able to make cells from all three body layers, so they can produce any cells or body needs to repair itself, it is called pluripotency. Pluripotent stem have promising future in the area of regenerative medicine because it it is different in effect on the cells of the body which are neurons, heart, pancreatic liver cells. It can help in the representation of single cell which can remain to lost the damage or diseased cells. IPSC they are similar to natural pluripotent stem cells, like embryonic stem cells in many ways, like the appearance of certain stem cell genes proteins,  chromatin methylation  patterns, doubling time,  embryoid body  formation,  teratoma  formation, viable  chimera  formation, and potency and differentiability. Pluripotent stem cells EMBRYONIC STEM CELLS Embryonic stem cells is the most important type of pluripotent cells. Embryonic stem cells(ES cells) arepluripotentstem cellsthat are derived from theinner cell massof ablastocyst an early-stage preimplantation  embryo. Humanembryos reach the  blastocyst  stage 4–5 days postfertilization, at which time they consist of 50–150 cells. From adult tissue iPSC has been derived. They cannot by pass the need of embryos but they can be matched in the patients which mean that pluripotent stem cells line will be present in the each individual. Without any risk of immune rejection autologous cells can be used for recognising the basic behaviour of disease present in the patients therapeutic transplants are not safe in iPSC technology. ESC that are appeared which have large domains of the genome that have a specific histone code, that are not found in more mature cells, which allows very fast inactivation or activation of gene expression. Embryonic stem cells arepluripotent th at are able todifferentiatein all derivatives of the three germ layers:ectoderm, endoderm, andmesoderm. It includes more than 220 cell types in the adult  body. Pluripotency distinguishes embryonic stem cells from  adult stem cells  found in  adults; while embryonic stem cells can produce all cell types in body, adult stem cells they are multipotent  and they can create only limited number of cell type. Human embryonic stem cell structure SOMATIC CELL NUCLEAR TRANSFER The somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) means, transferring the nucleus from a somatic cell, any cell of the body, to an other cell, in this case it’s an egg cell. This kind of pluripotent stem cell called ntES cell, which has only been made successfully in the inferior animals. To make ntES cells in the human patients, an egg donor, would be needed. The process of transferring a differentnucleusinto the egg â€Å"reprograms† it to a pluripotent condition, reactivating full set of genes for creating all the tissues of the body. PRODUCTION OF INDUCED PLURIPOTENT STEM CELLS iPSCs are introduced in a set of pluripotency associated genes or reprogramming factors in to a given cell kind. The original set of reprogramming factor are genes Oct4 (Pou5f1), Sox2, cMyc, and Klf4. It is a slow and unsufficient process which takes 1-2 weeks in mouse cells 3-4 weeks in human. It has efficiency of 0.01%- 0.1%. For improving the efficiency and time taken to get ipsc considerable changes have been done. In reprogramming factor, cell start to make colonies that look like pluripotent stem cells. Pluripotency is maintained by a combination of epigenetic, transcriptional and posttranscriptional mechanisms. PRODUCTION OF Ipsc CELLS GENERATION OF INDUCED PLURIPOTENT STEM cells. They divide culture donor cells. Transfect the stem cell-associated genes into cells by viral vectors. Harvest and culture the cells according to the Embryoic Stem cell culture by the use of mitotically in feeder cells. A small set of transfected cells become iPS cells generate ES-like colonies Generation of IPS cells Types of Pluripotent Stem Cells There are several types of pluripotent stem cells are Embryonic stem cells which are joined from the inner cell mass of blastocyst the embryos are produced from in vitro fertilisation, although this is important cause it eliminates the embryo, which could have been implanted for the formation of a baby. Embryonic germ cells which are obtained from the aborted foetuses and these pluripotent cells are copied from past cells. These past cells are those which can form sperm eggs. Embryonic carcinoma or the cancer cells which are cosset from tumour that sometimes are prevalent in a a foetus. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TOTIPOTENT,   PLURIPOTENT, AND MULTIPOTENT Totipotent cells can form all the kind of cell in a body, in addition the extraembryonic, or the placental cells. Embryonic cells, the 1st couple of cell divisions following fertilization are the only cells that are totipotent cells. Pluripotent cells can also give rise to all of the type of cells that make up the body. Embryonic stem cells are called pluripotent. Multipotent cells can expand into more than 1 cell type, but they are more limited than the pluripotent cells, adult stem cells cord blood stem cells are often considered as multipotent. BENEFITS OF PLURIPOTENT STEM CELLS Pluripotent stem cells give a renewable basis of healthy cells tissues to treat many type of diseases similar to heart disease and diabetes. People who are burn those patients who suffer from autoimmune diseases like Parkinsons can give advantage from the usage of pluripotent stem cells. Pluripotent stem cells have large potential for treatment of diseases, because they give rise to majority of cell types in human body,which include muscle, blood, heart nerve cells. The use for pluripotent stem cells include the generation of cells tissues that are use in transplantation. Drug study research next method that pluripotent stem cells are beneficial. Animals are mostly used to measure the safety and use of drugs. Those drugs which are secure and used in development for testing on animals. TURNING PLURIPOTENT CELL INTO TREATMENT Over time, many techniques are developed, pluripotent stem cells could any one of the day allow doctors to create form, rejection-proof transplant to patch a scarred heart, revitalize damaged nerves or reboot an immune system which is not able of fighting infection. Doctors have first obtained  pluripotent  stem cells that match the patient genetically through genetic  reprogramming,  nuclear transfer, or parthenogenesis. There are four critical steps: To grow  pluripotent  stem cells that create a large quantity of healthy cells. Restore faulty genes,this would be needed if the cells are carrying a genetic disorder, such as sickle cell anemia which turn the stem cells into a specific cell kind or a tissue.A genetically healthy line of  pluripotent  cells is recognized, they must be creating specialized kinds of cells and this process is called as differentiation. To transplant cells or tissue to the diseased or damaged organ or tissue,the cells will require to reach right part of the body, take hold and start to function. Scientists know how to deliver blood to the stem cells, but they still need to develop some effective delivery method for other cell types. Getting the pluripotent stem cell The cells can be made in one of several ways: Nuclear transfer— By using a patient’s skin cell and then transferring it into an egg (possibly the patient’s own, or of an egg donor). Genetic  reprogramming— By transforming a skin cell or blood cell or other cell from the patient to a  pluripotent  stem cell. Parthenogenesis— This is done by using unfertilized eggs. A woman may be able to give her own eggs to make stem cells that match her genetically, or draw on master banks of stem cells which are made from eggs. WHY ARE PLURIPOTENT STEM CELLS IMPORTANT? Pluripotent stem cells can be used to produce any cell or tissue the body might need to challenge a wide range of diseases, from diabetes to spinal cord injury, to childhood leukemia,or to heart disease. Pluripotent  stem cells can potentially be modified to provide a perfect genetic match for any patient. It means that the patient could get transplants of tissue and cells without matching tissue and tissue rejection problems. There is also no need to take powerful immune-suppressing drugs for the rest of their lives. Although there is time in achieving this, researchers have treated mouse models of human disease by using this strategy and hope that same can be done with human patients. Disease in a dish: Pluripotent stem cells create excellent laboratory models for studying how a disease unfolds, which further helps scientists to locate and track, very earliest disease-causing actions in cells. Immune deficiencies like type1 diabetes, muscular dystrophy, and myriad other disorders which are embedded in fetal development. In the lab, researchers monitor from where the first muscle cell comes from, or the first blood cell, and how this is different when the patient has a genetic disease. By the use of this information, doctors are able to correct the genetic defect before the disease advances. Applications: Pluripotent  stem cell has different characteristics that make it useful in different ways : Induced pluripotent cells(iPS cells) offer a unique chance to model many human disease and are already being used to make a lot of new discoveries about premature aging, disease,cancer, and more. They are made from a person’s own cells, they can be potentially manipulated to fix the defects that are causing disease and then used to create healthy cells for transplant that won’t be rejected by the immune system. Embryonic stem cells(ES cells) are standard for the biological theory of pluripotency. Scientists are continuosly working with Embryonic Stem cells to study more about a cell with pluripotency and discover safe better ways to create iPS cells. Each type of ES cell is important for different reasons: ES cells made from donating early embryos are unique tools for the understanding of earliest stages of human development specific tissues form, because they’re not modified to individual patients, their value is mainly in research. MEDICAL RESEARCH Disease modeling and drug development An attractive feature of the human iPS cells is their ability to derive them from adult patients for the study of cellular basis of human diseases. Since iPS cells have property of self-renewing and are pluripotent, they stand for a theoretically unlimited source of patient-derived cells which further can be turned into any kind of cell in the body. This is important because many other types of human cells which are derived from patients tend to stop rising after a few passages in laboratory culture. iPS have been generated for a broad variety of human genetic diseases, including common disorders such as Down syndrome and polycystic kidney disease. Organ synthesis A proof-of-concept by induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) to make human organ for the transplantation  was reported by researchers of Japan. Human ‘liver  buds’ (iPSC-LBs) were grown from a mixture of three different types of stem cells: Hepatocytes  (for liver function) coaxed from iPSCs Endothelial stem cells  (to form lining of  blood vessels) from  umbilical cord blood Mesenchymal stem cells  (to form  connective tissue). This new approach allows different cell types to self-organize into complex organ, mimicking the process in  fetal development. After growing in vitro for few days, the liver buds were transplanted into mice where the ‘liver’ quickly connected with host blood vessels and then continued to grow. Tissue repair Embryonic cord-blood cells were induced to pluripotent stem cells by the use of plasmid DNA. Using cell surface endothelial/pericytic markers  CD31  and  CD146, researchers have identified vascular progenitor, which is high-quality, multipotent vascular stem cells. After the iPS cells were directly injected into the  vitreous  of damaged  retina  of mice, the stem cells then engrafted into retina, grow repaired the  vascular vessels. Red blood cells In 2014,  type O  red blood cells  were synthesized at Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service from iPSC. The cells were induced to become a  mesoderm   then  blood cells   then red blood cells. The final step was making them eject their nuclei mature properly. Type O rbc’s can be transfused into all patients. Each pint of the blood contain about 2 trillion red blood cells, although some 107 million blood donations are collected globally each year. Human transfusions were not expected to begin until 2016.

Saturday, July 20, 2019

Slavery Fight For Freedom Essay -- Slavery Essays

Slavery Fight for Freedom During the course of the slave trade millions of Africans became involuntary immigrants to the New World. Some African captives resisted enslavement by fleeing from slave forts on the coast of West African. Others mutinied on board slave trading vessels, or cast themselves into the ocean, rather facing death than enslavement. In the New World there were those who ran away from their owners, ran away among the Indians, formed maroon societies, revolted, feigned sickness, or participated in work slow downs. Some sought and succeeded in gaining liberty through various legal means such as "good service" to their masters, self-purchase, or military service. Still others seemingly acquiesced and learned to survive in servitude. The European, American, and African slave traders engaged in the large amounts of trade in humans. The politicians and businessmen who supported them, did not intend to put into motion a chain of events that would motivate the captives and their descendants to fight for full citizenship in the United States of America. But they did. When Thomas Jefferson penned the words, "All men are created equal," he could not possibly have envisioned how literally his own slaves and others would take his words. African Americans repeatedly questioned how their owners could consider themselves â€Å"noble† in their own fight for independence from England while at the same time believing that it was wrong for slaves to do the same...

Communication in the work force :: essays research papers

A recent job that I have held was for the duration of the summer. I was a part-time employee working as summer help for Wegmans grocery store. The job included many tasks at hand where I worked in various departments throughout the store. This work experience has many similar attributes as that of the student â€Å"job.†   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  My first week of employment for summer help was very informational. The start out position is front end cashier. This is the typical last sales rep you will encounter before exiting the store after your purchase. We practiced our log in hours procedure, how to scan items, accept food stamps along with coupons and finally how to cash out a customer using a credit card, debit card or a personal check. When the first day of live action came, our trainer supervised over us we tendered the customers. At the end of the five and a half hour shift, I had cleaned out my register and handed it in to the accounting office. The following day at work my supervisor had told me that I had my till accounted for exactly. That sense of completion was motivation from there on out.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  I had eventually moved up in duties outside of the register. I began taking on responsibilities such as maintenance and working in the dairy department. These jobs would entitle me to stock various dairy products along with serving customers on a more personal level such as where to find an item. Also, I began sweeping the store along with removing the returned cans to the back of the store for storage and removal. These simple tasks allowed me to work at my own pace rather then take the next customer in line so it was a great confidence booster to work harder.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The preparation for these tasks in the short three months I had worked at Wegmans felt very similar to the responsibilities for having the student â€Å"job.† My growth as a student has come from many learning lessons through grade school. Yet being a twenty year old young adult attending college and balancing the social life, sports activities, family and schooling is a very difficult task. The key to success in all these aspects is in freshmen seminar class. This class was a teaching tool that allowed me to allocate time for various homework tasks along with balancing a fun social life and carrying a great grade point average.

Friday, July 19, 2019

Sharks :: essays research papers

Sharks "It’s tail swayed slowly from side to side, pushing the hunters body through the murky water. All signs of motion were non-existant, except for the rhythmic movement of the water over the five gill slits on either side of it’s head. Slowly gaining speed, the shady figures unmoving eyes fixed on it’s target, a lost harbor seal pup. As the distance between the predator and it’s prey grew closer, the jaws of the massive fish drew forward, exposing nearly eight rows of razor sharp teeth. Strings of it’s previous meal hung in rows from between it’s teeth. Sensing danger, the harbor seal frantically tried to find a place to seek refuge, but it was too late. The jaws of the shark closed around the seal with an astounding 14,000 pounds of pressure, cutting the seal in half. The Great White shark claims another victim.1" Any one who’s seen the famous movie series "Jaws" may look at the Great White Shark in a similar manner. Perhaps it’s the way that Hollywood uses a mix of fact and fiction in the series. This may have frightened many people into hating the Great White for it’s ferocity. It might have also been the size of the shark in the movie that’s kept thousands of people off the beaches and out of the water. Better yet, it could have been the overall storyline: A Great White shark with an eating disorder and a taste for human flesh. Perhaps that’s what is keeping vacationers from grabbing their trousers and snorkels. Over all, there have been 1026 attacks on humans by sharks in the last ten years. Only 294 of these attacks have been linked to Great White sharks. That’s roughly the number of people who drown each year in swimming accidents. Of these 294 attacks, less than eighteen percent were fatal. Out of the eighteen fatal incidents more than seventy percent was contributed to loss of blood. This means that the shark didn’t kill the victim. The shark bit the victim and then released them (also known as the taste test). The shark samples the victim by nibbling on an appendage or two often resulting in a severed artery or other major blood vessel. Therefore, the Great White should be considered a mantaster not a maneater. This intrigued scientists considering the size of the sharks brain. The Great Whites brain is about one half the size of a dogs. Over seventy percent of the brain is used for tracking prey. The other thirty percent is used for body functions. Studies show that the sharks main purpose is to eat.

Thursday, July 18, 2019

Economic Policies Of The Presidential Candidates Essay

The presidential election is coming just in the time when America is in desperate need to get out of many crises. Some of the apparent crises are the health reform crisis, the credit crisis and the political crisis generated by the war. Considering this background environmental condition, the coming election might be one of the most important events in the history of America and one that will decide the future of the country. In this paper however, I will focus on discussing the economic policies proposed by both presidential candidates. The discussion will focus on evaluating each of the candidates’ economic agenda and how they will affect the US economy in terms of growth (the supply side) and stability (the demand side). II. Thesis Statement Based on the news rails and publications regarding the economic agenda of the two candidates we can assess to a certain extent, the direction of each candidate. From my analysis, each of them has different approach on how to address the challenges faced by the nation. In the end of this paper I will provide a conclusion stating the different overall positions of both candidates and what benefits could come from each economic agenda. First however, I would make a thesis statement based on a quick glance over the available information in order to direct the course of this discussion. The thesis statement is: â€Å"Obama has an economic action plan that is aimed to affect the US economy in the form of improved living conditions for the middle class American workers in all aspects and thus generate economic stability, while McCain has an economic action plan that is aimed to affect US economy in the form of enhanced America’s competitiveness in businesses and thus create stronger macroeconomic growthâ€Å" III. Candidates on Economic Growth (the Supply Side) There are several perspectives of measuring the quality of a economic policy. In this paper, I am using two basic measurements of economic performance, which is economic growth and economic stability. Economic growth represents development of the supply side within the economy, which is represented by factors like productivity growth, capital accumulation and the supply of labor. Economic stability on the other hand, represents development of the demand side of the economy, which is represented by factors like inflation, demand for goods ands services, employment and price levels. Despite their nature of sometimes being a trade-off to each other, both are important economic indicators to ensure a prosper society. The lack of attention to any of those factors mentioned above will generate concerns and even protest from unsatisfied citizens of America. Thus, this paper is dedicated to evaluate the presidential candidates’ economic policies proposal within each and ever factors mentioned above. III. 1. John McCain on Economic Growth III. 1. 1 John McCain’s Agenda John McCain has confessed previously in one of his interviews that economy is not really his strong point. However, due to the presence of numerous professors as his economic advisors, it is not objective to judge the candidate from this statement alone. After a period of unclear statements regarding his economic agenda, John McCain has finally stepped-up confidently with a clear-cut economic agenda. His website reveals several sections consisting of actions under a title of ‘McCain Tax Cut Plan’. In the ‘Pro-growth Tax Policy’ section, McCain proposed the following actions: 1. Keep Tax Rates Low Under this action John McCain intends to fight the Democrats on their tax hike agenda and in the exact opposite of that plan, John McCain believes that there should be a reduction of taxes for the entrepreneurs of America. John McCain believes that small, medium and successful entrepreneurs are at the hearth of American innovation and therefore, should be protected by sound government policies. 2. Make It Harder to raise Taxes To support his commitment to maintain a low tax level, John McCain will strive to change the current legislation and suggested a new one, regulating that tax increases require at least 3/5 majority vote in Congress. 3. Cut Corporate Taxes Especially for corporations, John McCain suggested that a further tax reduction is important for US competitiveness. He believes that America was once a low-tax business environment, but later failed to keep pace as trade partners lower their rates. Thus, a tax deduction is appropriate to restore US competitiveness. 4. Rewards Savings, Investments and Risk-Taking John McCain believes that the reduction of tax will enable saving and further investment on innovation. Thus, it is imperative to maintain low taxes. 5. Allow First Year expensing of Equipment and Technology investment In order to boost investment in research and development, the government should allow corporations to expense their capital expenditures used for developing cutting edge technologies (‘John McCain’, 2008). III. 1. 2. Perceived Effects of the Agenda As elaborated, McCain’s economic agenda focused on his tax-cut plans. There are pros and cons regarding this action plan, especially regarding whether this tax cut plans will actually support economic growth. In theory, McCain’s agenda is in line with the general understanding on macro economic tendencies. Macroeconomic theories revealed that when taxes are low and entrepreneurship & innovation are supported by various legislations, there will be increased investment on business that will finally enhance the level of productivity of related businesses. This means that ‘in theory’, McCain has met the first criteria of economic growth, which is increased productivity. By lowering taxes on huge corporations, McCain will also allow these companies to enhance their capital accumulation process and generate business expansion faster than it would be otherwise. This means that ‘in theory’, McCain would have also met the ‘capital accumulation’ criteria. In terms of labor supply, McCain’s campaign website does not mention any effort of increasing the supply of labor for American industries. In his speeches and interviews on the other hand, the candidate has mentioned that his economic agenda will also include training programs for to increase the skills and capabilities of US labors and thus, enhanced their wages also. If these government training programs are truly a part of McCain’s action plan, than it the candidate had also ‘theoretically’ fulfilled the third factors, which is labor supply. Concerns however, are stated by economic observers. These observers stated that in the past 4 years, we have performed this strategy of providing entrepreneurs and corporations with supporting strategies, but the fact is, during the entire Bush’s administration, the amount of new jobs created is less than a year within the Clinton’s administration. Observers and writers also perceived that the corporate tax cut will enrich the already rich and done little for the middle class. This is quite in contrast to the current concerns throughout the United States toward increasing the quality of life for the middle class and the working class. Some perceived that this is only a clever strategy to get the support of powerful entrepreneurs in McCain’s campaign. Therefore, McCain’s idea of continuing this program (further protecting and supporting large corporations) does not impress most economic scholars and economic observers, but gain interest of the business sectors. Another concern is that McCain’s plan to increase labor supply is considered weak. This is due to the fact that American corporations are outsourcing their production activities overseas, due to the cheaper cost structure in foreign countries. Thus, supporting the large corporations with huge tax cuts will not guarantee that American labor will gain advantage over the growth generated by those tax cuts. Furthermore, with trainings that enhance American labor’s wage-rates, it will be less likely for American companies to use American labor in their production. These policies might have the potential of generating increased growth rates and innovation as promised, but even with the tax returns for workers families, the middle class will only gain a small portion, compare to the benefits gained by rich entrepreneurs.