Monday, September 30, 2019
Gates of Fire Book Report
Gates Of Fire Book Report Title: Gates Of Fire LCpl Yaccarine A. Jared Author: Steven Pressfield Publisher: Turtleback Books Published: 1999 This book is about the Spartans warrior culture and how it ties into the Marine Corps values, and the present day warrior culture of our Marine Corps. My opinion on this book is that it is a great and interesting read that captures the attention of the reader and ties in ideally to our Marine Corps values. It depicts perfectly on what it is to be a warrior whether it is past, present, or future.I think that every Marine should read this book or at least look into the history of the Spartans and their dedication to their way of life and culture of war fighting. I strongly believe the book should remain on the Commandants reading list. Introduction: My book report is on ââ¬Å"Gates of Fireâ⬠by Steven Pressfield. He was a prior Marine leaving the Marine Corps in 1966, he was inspired to write this book based of the resemblance he saw with th e Marines he served with and the ones he met presently and the warrior culture of the Spartans.His book has been taught in multiple places of military significance including the Marine Corps Basic School at Quantico, and it is added to the curriculum of the Naval War College. The book itself is about the legendary battle of Thermopylae and the three hundred Spartans who fought that battle knowing that the outcome was certain death. When reading the book you can clearly tell the levels of Honor, Courage, and Commitment these men had, and how they were willing to sacrifice everything for their homeland.After reading this book readers will clearly see how the author found the link between the Spartans, and the Marine Corps. Body: The book starts off describing the very basics of the Spartan culture, what makes them Spartans, how they are made, and the trials they had to face to earn their place amongst the other Spartans. When Spartans are born from the day of birth they are inspected, the ones who seem weak or unfit are killed to preserve the warrior culture. From a early age the children are taken away from their parents and put through a series of trials, one of which is to kill a slave.At a young age the children are already forced to kill, steal, and survive in a merciless environment that in the future will give them the mental fortitude to be amongst the greatest warriors known to history. At the age of eighteen they are thrown into the wilderness to fend for themselves, with nothing but will they must do this, and if they can make it back to their society they will be official Spartans. The main character of the book King Leonidas is the one who ultimately decides to take his warriors to the Gates of Fire to delay the Persian army of King Xerxes as long as possible.He selects three hundred of his finest Spartans and departs knowing very well that they will not return. This is where the Spartan culture ties into that of the Marine Corps, King Leonidas and his men had the courage to go face overwhelming odds knowing that the chances of survival were slim if even there. Given opportunities of surrender or retreat the Spartans denied them choosing rather to die and give Sparta as much time as possible then to save their own lives.This can relate to the present Marine Corps in many ways, it is well known that the Marine Corps fights and wins battles, and that we do not surrender we win or we die that is what is expected of us. Just as the Spartans did in ancient Greece we have upheld those basics of a warrior culture even when others have not, and that sets us apart from other services, because we live by those values. Sometime during the battle King Xerxes seeing the prowess of the Spartans, and their ability for war sought to make a truce with King Leonidas.Promising wealth, and success Xerxes attempted to bribe Leonidas to join him telling him he could have it all if he would simply kneel before him. Leonidas quickly refused the offer , of power and told Xerxes that they will continue to fight. Outraged by this Xerxes sent wave after wave of his men into the Spartan formation. Leonidas had honor in his actions, doing the right thing, overlooking personal gain, and staying faithful to Sparta and his men. With the Marine Corps value of honor, we as Marines also do these things.With espirit de corps, and a unswerving loyalty to our country we have always been looked upon to do the right thing even when others will not. Even our motto Semper Fidelis is our promise to upkeep that honor. In the end of the book the Spartans end up being surrounded, their flanks taken and completely out numbered Xerxes asks Leonidas one last time if he will kneel. In one last act of defiance Leonidas and his men make a final stand and a attempt on Xerxes life fully well knowing that there was no escaping a certain death.Their commitment to their cause was unwavering believing fully in what they fought for they were committed to the point of willfully giving up their lives for their cause and they did so with pride. This one final act ties into how the Marine Corps is very much like the Spartans of old as the showed that final value that is used by our own warrior culture daily. Marines signing a contract many of them giving up four years if not more of their life fully committed to something they believe in. With many others giving up their lives for a cause that they truly believe in.Conclusion: Overall I think this book was great, it showed a clear link on our warrior culture, and the warrior culture of the Spartans. It showed that our Corps values are the values of a warrior culture and it was shown through one of the most infamous warrior cultures in history. It not only was a entertaining read but it taught valuable lessons, and gave a understanding of what it means to be a warrior and what is expected of warriors, and like the Spartans the Marine Corps using those values as a base will allow our actions to ec ho through out eternity. Signature: X___________________________________
Sunday, September 29, 2019
Information Security Fundamentals Essay
Answer the following questions. Use complete sentences. 1. How does a false positive alarm differ from a false negative one? From a security perspective, which is least desirable? A false positive attack is where the system IDPS was alarmed but no attack ever occurred. The false negative is where an actual attack occurs and the IDPS isnââ¬â¢t alarmed at all. The least desirable would definitely be the false negative, if an attack does occur and the IDPS doesnââ¬â¢t even alarm well whatââ¬â¢s the point in even having it if it isnââ¬â¢t going to alarm. 2. What is a honeypot? How is it different from a honeynet? A honeypot is a decoy system that will lure potential hackers away from the networks critical systems. A honeynet is where the system subnet is constantly changing and it lures attackers away by redirecting the the subsystems that are rich in information. 3. What capabilities should a wireless security toolkit include? Definitely should be able sniff incoming packets, scan the wireless hosts, and be able to view the level of privacy. Keeping an eye on vulnerability is a must because wireless networks can be a little easier to breach especially if the right security measures are not implemented. 4. A key feature of hybrid IDPS systems is event correlation. After researching event correlation online, define the following terms as they are used in this process: compression, suppression, and generalization. Compression is when it will take several occurrences and will examine it multiple duplicates. Suppression is where the IDPS will just alert you if something major has happened instead of it just triggering off something simple it will still let you know that something triggered it. Associates alarms with higher leveled events, can be useful when corresponding with multiple failed ports. 5. ZoneAlarm is a PC-based firewall and IDPS tool. Visit the product manufacturer at www.zonelabs.com, and find the product specification for theà IDPS features of ZoneAlarm. Which of the ZoneAlarm products offer these features? 6. Using the Internet, search for commercial IDPS systems. What classification systems and descriptions are used, and how can these be used to compare the features and components of each IDPS? Create a comparison spreadsheet identifying the classification systems you find. 7. Use the Internet to find vendors of thumbprint and iris scanning tools. Which of these tools is more economical? Which of these is least intrusive? 8. There are several online passphrase generators available. Locate at least two of them on the Internet, and try them out. What did you observe?
Saturday, September 28, 2019
Literature review Essay
Youthfulness has always been an attraction, a perception of vibrancy and dynamism in every stage of a manââ¬â¢s life. This so-called ââ¬Å"Fountain of Youthâ⬠in each individual is reflected in his or her lifestyle; their disposition towards other people in the society; their interaction in their working environment, most especially the quality of the output of their work; and their perception of life ââ¬â that age does not hamper one to continue being young. Dossey (2002:12-16) For this group of youthful old individuals, what is vital is the quality of life and not the quantity of life. It is not whether they have lived long enough, but it is whether they have lived in attainment of their goals and aspirations, with contentment and happiness. This is what really matters at the end of the day. Dossey (2002:12-16) With all these debate over the significance of ââ¬Å"extendingâ⬠this particular stage in life, science and technology played a crucial role in addressing these matters. Experiments have been conducted on the possibility of extending the life span of people with the intake of certain medicines or even through surgery. In this attempt to reach immortality, biological breakthrough in cell division and regeneration are being processed in order to ascertain the supply for this demand. Science and technology have paved way to the peopleââ¬â¢s mindset that indeed, the possibility of a longer and more youthful life can be available. Dossey (2002:12-16) From this vantage point, the emergence of biomedicine has blossomed and has demonstrated the various ways in which it can influence the social aspect of an individual, aside from the physical well-being of the person. Bios have always been regarded as the most effective and at the same time, the most cost-efficient amongst all types of remedy or medication. Before we proceed with the technical aspects of Bios in medicine or in cosmetics, it is important that the definition of Biologicals are also given proper attention in this paper. What is Biologicals? Biologicals or what we call the Biotechnology-derived products that require tedious work in preparation and simplification of the raw materials in order to ensure the quality-control is above or within the approved standards as legislated. Tsang (2003:367-370) As per attached herein, you can see the various product types of biologicals: Source: Tsang (2003:367-370) Given the sensitivity of the issue, it is necessary that Biotechnology-derived products are governed by a strong legislative body to maintain the standards that will enable the products to remain safe to the end-users, to us, humans. It was then defined that these products are products which contain a biological substance, the substance possessing the following: that it is extracted from or sourced from a biological substance, and that there is a need for that substance to undergo several tests to ascertain the measures of safety and reliability of the product; that it is not hazardous to health. Requirements have been set by the authorities-in-charge so that liabilities against the general public are minimized. At the same time, these regulatory compliances will also serve as educating tools for the end-users that they are aware of the products they purchase. This is most especially true when the health, such is the appearance, is at risk. An example of biologicals that are prevalent in this day and age is the use of Bio-cosmetics. Bio-cosmetics In order to meet the objective of the paper which is to give enlightenment on the status of the bio-cosmetic industry, it is necessary that we are all in equal footing in the definitions of the terms being used in this paper. Bio-cosmetics is primarily made of two different components incorporated to produce another element or component. In this case, we have ââ¬Å"bioâ⬠and, we also have ââ¬Å"cosmeticsâ⬠. Bio, from the Greek combining form: bios, which means ââ¬Å"lifeâ⬠. Meanwhile, cosmetics pertain to the use for beautifying, cleansing or protecting, especially of the skin, nails, hair, or other parts of the human body, or of other species required for exhibition. Webster (2006:450) Furthermore, ââ¬Å"bioâ⬠is a composition of natural elements ââ¬â raw materials that are unadulterated and constitutes the purest ingredients of Mother Nature. It is in these virgin materials that the most complicated and highly-processed and most sought-after medicines are derived from. One need not go far, as these are simply in our lush environment that we can acquire these Biologicals. Such form is the Bio-Cosmetics. From the word itself, these are cosmetics that utilize the most biologicals. Cosmetics have come a long way from its origins in the early ancient period. Grolier (2005: 188). Cosmetics, mainly used for changing and enhancing the appearance of the face, skin and/or hair of the human being, is also being used as an adjunct to religious rituals, wherein men and women in the ancient days adorn themselves with accessories and cosmetics. From the many archaeological studies of the early days, it was found that men and women knew of how to prepare pigments and blend them with greasy substances, which are then considered as cosmetics. Analysis of these prehistoric pigments has revealed that as many as 17 colors have been used for these purposes. The most commonly used were a white made from white lead, chalk or gypsum; a black from charcoal or manganese ores; and red, orange and yellow. During the ancient world, the Sumerians, Babylonians, Hebrews and Egyptians employed similar preparations of cosmetics for similar purposes as follows: ceremonial, medicinal and ornamental. The Ancient Middle Eastern civilizations lavished mostly on the eyes, in part as a form of protection. Grolier (2005: 188). Henna was used to dye the hair and the fingernails, the palms of the hand and the soles of the feet. Scents and unguents are restricted at first in the rituals of mummification. In Egypt, rouges, whitening powders, abrasives for cleaning the teeth, bath oils and lipsticks were used daily by both sexes from the upper classes. Almond, olive, sesame oils, thyme and oregano, frankincense and myrrh, saffron, rosewater, and chypre formed the foundation of basic concoctions that we re eventually used throughout the world. A few more examples of how cosmetics sprung in various countries are discussed herein: In India, cosmetics were significant in Indian women in fulfilling their duty to always appear alluring to their lover or mate, such as is specified under the Kama Sutra. Women then were advised to learn the arts of tattooing. Cosmetics also served as an emblem in determining the caste or class rank in the society. Up till now, many Indian women still use cosmetics in the ancient way: eyelids are tinted with an antimony-based dye, the faces and arms are stained yellow with saffron powder, and the soles of the feet are reddened with henna. Grolier (2005: 188). In Greece and Rome, the classical Greek only permitted the use of few cosmetics, although they made use of imported raw materials. Greek women however, dye their hair regularly during times of mourning, and they sometimes lightened it with pomade or colored powders. Meanwhile, the Romans scorned cosmetics as effete. However, during the time of the empire, cosmetics began to be desirable in defining symbols of status and wealth. It should be noted however, that most of these popular cosmetics were, in fact, poisonous, especially the white lead commonly used as face powder. Grolier (2005: 188). In Medieval Europe, cosmetics were for a time restricted to the males of certain courts and to high-born ladies and courtesans. The contemporary criteria for facial makeup in the Western world is perhaps a continuation of medieval beauty, which is required that a womanââ¬â¢s skin be as white as the lily, and that her cheeks as red as the rose. Preparations for achieving this ideal were available to the rich; commoners had to make do with the wheat-flour powder and beet-juice rouge. To cap this history notes of the birth of cosmetics, France emerged as the leader in developing the art of makeup, and both men and women of rank used face powder, hair powder of saffron or flower pollen, and skin lotions. On the other hand, the Italians, particularly the Venetians, had become the major producers and purveyors of cosmetic preparations. Venetian ceruse, a skin whitener, was considered superior to all others and was in great demand, despite the knowledge that the white lead it contained could ruin the complexion and cause baldness, and if used in the long run, even death. Grolier (2005: 188-191). The peak of cosmetic use was reached in 18th century Europe, especially in England and France, where both sexes attempted to reach an almost totally artificial appearance. In England, this was the age of macaroni, the young fop whose clothing, powdered wig, rouge, and red lips, were supposedly inspired by Italian fashion. By the 1880ââ¬â¢s, advances in technology ââ¬â especially in printing ââ¬â and the advent of advertising opened way for a new era in cosmetic history: the age of testimonial advertisements. Respectable and beautiful women began to appear in print ads enabling and encouraging more women to use cosmetics. Grolier (2005: 188-191).
Friday, September 27, 2019
Alone on the sea Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words
Alone on the sea - Essay Example As more and more data are collected, retrieved and stored on these social media sites and internet, the concerns for its privacy and repurposing has been increased immensely. This superfluous information and data needs intelligent and sophisticated data base management systems, making this sensitive information prone to the advertising agencies etc. Advertising agencies lure these social media networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace, Twitter, Skype, Whatsapp etc to sell this personal sensitive data for marketing and advertising prospects. Highly customized, targeted and dedicated advertising campaigns have been designed by the advertisers managed by their back end running systems to reach their target markets. Highly targeted and specified advertising campaigns endanger the personals of individuals threatening the prospects of privacy violation. The goal of these advertising campaigns is unified that is to make their way to their target prospects that causes privacy violations. An advertising system has been established linking the middle users and the advertisers supported by the social media and internet so that they can display their ads and market their offerings. Moreover many of the internet tracking companies is also inclined towards gaining access to the private data of individuals through Facebook apps. The p oor infrastructure and least sophisticated systems of social media sites also cause privacy violations. As with the increased susceptibility of private data of internet users most of the renowned and gigantic social media sites have strengthened their privacy controls facilitating the users to gain trust in their platforms and services. For instance, Facebook, Instagram, Skype etc frequently make changes in their privacy control systems and proposing tight restrictive options in privacy setting for their users. Moreover they give options
Thursday, September 26, 2019
British Avante Garde Films Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words
British Avante Garde Films - Essay Example In spite of their seeming records for a status in a new anti-realist genre (including crime films and science fiction film), most of them were placed in the sunset world of lukewarm black and white B-movies. Such censures ultimately could stir the scholars and experts a bit and in recent times there is a sturdy growth in publications on British cinema although compared to the American scene the subject is still suffers from a relative lack of material. The tidy and wide contours the Hollywood cinema attained during the fifties and sixties and profited from the growth of film studies in the seventies. This is yet to be imitated in British cinema. Among the many revealing dealing of British film history Sarah Street's book British National Cinema (published in 1997). Street shows that "there is no such thing as a typical British film" (198). She , in this book has made a much more fascinating study by explaining the range in British movie making while revealing its evident historical trends - a study that could really snub those critics who always jeer at British cinema for not being "particularly interesting or worthy of study" (199). Here, she has traced the growth of the British Film industry, from the Lumiere brothers' first viewing in London in 1896, the manipulative power of Hollywood and the harsh financial disasters that affected British films. Sarah Street uses the ideas of 'official' and 'unofficial' cinema showing how British cinema has been both 'respectable' and 'disreputable' and eventually making us reveal why British cinema has constantly been treated indifferently by the authority and administration. Comparing Britain and Hollywood, Sarah asks what was the real historical and social function of the British 'star system'."British films" are always films that have been produced in England rather than Scotland, Wales and Ireland, or to be even more exact films made in London and its outer suburbs. Another interesting point here is the way "British Cinema" clutches "British-ness", the historical, cultural, social and psychological factors, traditions and values that most frequently linked with the British identity involving the duty to rebuild the British cinematic image implying the national identity. British film industry had the same starts and novelties as its foils in Europe and America and that all through its history it was both part of a larger cinematic society and it had to deal with same challenges as other national film industries. The British cinema has a history as lengthy as the history of cinema itself. There are also directors i n British cinema that can gloriously be entitled as "the inventor of cinema", the most remarkable among them being William Friese-Greene (1855 -1921), a portrait photographer turned film director, who, just like his French and American matching parts, was working for the creation of the cinematographic tools and is referred by many as the initiator in motion photography. He was a creator who conducted tests with moving image devices at the beginning of cinema that, after his death, was claimed
Economic Analysis Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words
Economic Analysis - Research Paper Example of iPad in India, among the various variant of countertrade the company may need to employ the switch trading which refers to the practice where one company sells its products to another company on the condition that it buys other products from another country (Levy, 2009). This is favorable as the Apple Company could hire an iphone application developer from Indian i.e. hire iPad App developer Company. India investment on research and development grew from 0.8% GNP in 2007 to 0.96 in 2010. This has had an impact on the overall improvement in the research sector. The ipad may need to employ buyback which comes about when a company builds a plant in a different country or offers other services like training and provides equipments to that other country and agrees to take a portion of the plantââ¬â¢s yield as a partial payment for the contract (Kelly, 1988). Since independence, India has relied on foreign aid to finance some of its economic developments though it has been trying to be as self reliant as possible. Going back to history, the World Bank in 1958 organized the Aid-to-India syndicate which comprised of the World Bank and thirteen other countries i.e. Australia, Canada, Germany, Italy, France, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and United States, Belgium, Britain and Denmark (Phull, 2007). Conjointly, the European nations have contributed a significant amount of aid to India. In the late 1950ââ¬â¢s and 1960ââ¬â¢s India received aids from the United States which accounted for 8 percent of all financial aids to India (Phull, 2007). India has a large population size, and the labor force comprises of two extremes from a large number of illiterate workers to a sizeable number of literate workers with professionalism in science, engineering and capable of working anywhere (Mazumda, 2008). Over the last two decades, the number of people in labor force grew by approximately 50 percent, and the unemployment rate has reduced from 8.3 percent to 6 percent from 1983
Wednesday, September 25, 2019
Club IT's Information Management Needs Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words
Club IT's Information Management Needs - Essay Example To make it clear and execute effectively I visited the website of Club IT to get more information. It helped me to comprehend the basic structure of the informational technology resources available to them and to implement strategies that can attract more clients. With this in mind, I recollected the five strategies that companies use to achieve competitive advantage in their industries. They are, Cost Leadership strategy-produce products and services at the lower cost in the industry Differentiation strategy-It offers different products, services or products features Innovation strategy- introduce new products and services, put new features in existing products and service and develop new ways to produce them Operational effectiveness strategy: improved the manner in which internal business process is executed so that a firm performs similar activities. Customer-orientation strategy: It is to follow the basic principle of focusing on customers and be at the best.( Rainer & Turban, p . 52) After reviewing the place and its needs I have decided that the best strategy for competitive advantage for Club IT is to use the Customer-Orientation Strategy. The Club ITââ¬â¢s Mission is "We, Ruben and Lisa, offer you live music, DJ's, dance space and refreshments that suit your lifestyle. You are our friends, and we seek to build a community that meets regularly at Club IT" (ââ¬Å"About Club Itâ⬠, n.d.).This reflects that the club wants to provide friendly environment. The entertainment that they get from the live music and the dance space allows them to be a part of Club IT for a longer period of time. The primary clientele that I have come across is young aged to mid age like 20ââ¬â¢s and 30ââ¬â¢s.They are jubilant at the fun-filled place and mostly are music lovers with high spirits. It helped me to focus on this section and to enhance the IT resources that are available. The Club ITââ¬â¢s information include intranet resources and it can be well utili zed to the advantage of the clients. It can be managed by a Club In charge or a Manager who is well versed with the computer usage. I suggested that the software can be upgraded to upload the photos of the clients, e-mail address and so forth. It would be a good practice to enter the clientsââ¬â¢ name and basic information at the entrance so that we can have track on the number of people visit daily and to give special preference to regular customers. This helps the management to avoid any discrepancy caused by under-aged drinkers. The best part would be to have track of the regular customer record and show them the gratitude and allow them to enter the place without any normal proceedings. They can have suggestions box in the website to get feedback once they visit the place. They can use around 2 to 4 computers as the place is small. The files have to be updated in an accurate manner. This type of software is a lifesaver for clubs, there is not much maintenance needed. The Cust omer-Orientation Strategy would be the right one to follow as its inclination is towards making the customer happy. The foremost step is to make the existing clients happy and to do so we can use the information that they provided and give them the details of the coverage of events through e-newsletters. The database that the club follows must have the information of the clients like the email
Tuesday, September 24, 2019
Human Resource Management and workforce Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words
Human Resource Management and workforce - Essay Example The other roles played by the department was to recruit manpower (ensure sufficient numbers of people are available for production,) Training the staff to improve productivity and, ensuring the safety and health of the employees. Still the preliminary focus was to ensure the implementation of Scientific Management techniques and the major work that used to get done routinely was - time-motion studies, fatigue studies, job analysis, developing job specifications, designing compensation program and occasional welfare programs. Typical welfare programs addressed the "other" needs of the employees like wash rooms, vacation, lunchrooms, housing, hygiene etc. 3. The initial stage of personnel management was the creation of Welfare Officers, predominantly women, as a reaction towards the hazardous conditions prevalent in the production floors at that time (it is pertinent to re-collect the economies used to revolve around manufacturing and mining in those days,) which was a heavily paternalistic role of the employers towards the women employees. 4. With the unionization of the work-place, formation of unions at work, greatly contributed to the development of "Labour Managers" at work place aimed at managing the industrial relationships. As the wars changed the industrial relations scenario and strikes were declared illegal, the importance of Industrial Relationships grew by leaps and bounds. 4. As the realization of the importance of Human Relations Approach increased and the fact that human productivity is also influenced by various factors like organization setting, motivation, work place conditions, and finally the need to align business goals with the employees needs. Instead of looking at business goals and employee needs being in direct conflict with each other but being mutual and compatible is the foundation on which the modern HRM is based on. The major factors that influenced the movement from the Personnel Relations to HRM is the movement from collectivism to individualism, as also the radical legislative changes that were undertaken in those times primary one being the banning of sympathetic work striking. Essentially both the principles are fundamentally aimed at improving the employee productivity and thereby boosting the top-lines (then - which meant direct impact on bottom lines) and better value delivery to the stake holders (now.) The difference is that
Monday, September 23, 2019
3G technology features and their impact on the business world Term Paper
3G technology features and their impact on the business world - Term Paper Example This paper discusses various features of 3G technology that are generally present in all products and explores the impact of 3G technology on business in the contemporary age. Features of 3G technology: The two key features of 3G technology that most consumers look forward to are data transfer rate and data security. They and many other features of 3G technology are discussed below: Using such devices as cell phones, consumers are able to access the Internet, listen music, watch movies and make calls 24/7. In order to frequently download large files from Internet, consumers want to have high data transfer speed, which is a facility that many latest cell phones offer. The security features of 3G technology secure the data and confidential information in the wireless communication system. Most forms of 3G technology like videoconferencing are compatible with a whole range of internet browsers and platforms. Old concerns of checking the compatibility of the product with the internet bro wsers have been obviated with the use of 3G technology. Videoconferencing can be equally efficiently conducted on a PC, platforms of Linux computing and a MAC. Likewise, people can participate in a videoconferencing session from all types of web browsers including Chome, Firfox and Internet Explorer. Similar is the case with online conversation through cell phones using skype.
Sunday, September 22, 2019
The revolutionary war Essay Example for Free
The revolutionary war Essay The Revolutionary War created the pathway to what we are now. We became independent and it gave us freedom from Britains King. The war led us to the new life we wanted without control of outside countries. But without the encouragement of writers to help us in our time of need, things still would not have been that easy. Some of the great writers that influenced others to make history happen would be Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and Patrick Henry. These men wrote articles that encouraged others to stand up for what they believed in, and they wrote remarkable speeches that helped us become who we are. They had the courage to write their thoughts into writing that inspired many to fight for what they believed in. Without the help of literature within the period of our time, maybe things wouldve gone differently. The winter of 1776 was a dreadful time for George Washington and his troops. They had little food, inadequate shelter, and many were deserting (Berstein 161). Into this horrible situation came Thomas Paine. In England, he had moved, without success, through several occupations. He then began to write essays supporting Americas fight for independence, shortly after his arrival in 1774. In December of 1776, he started to write a series of articles entitled The Crisis. His words inspired many soldiers to enlist in the army and encouraged them to continue fighting. After the publication of his articles, the first anti-slavery movement, The American Antislavery Society, was found (Katz 1). His beliefs of universal order, in human perfectibility, and in the power of reason, guided him throughout his life to express himself and persuade others to fight for what they believed in. Yet Paine, a fuzzy historical figure of the 1700s, is remembered mostly for one or two sparkling patriotic quotes These are the times that try mens souls and little else (Katz 1). The Crisis gave enough courage to the Americans that when they attacked Britain at Trenton they succeeded. His articles encouraged soldiers to continue fighting Britain and made them realize that the more they want Freedom, the more theyll have to fight. The victory at the battle of Trenton marked a turning point in the war. Thomas Jefferson was a powerful advocate of liberty who was born in 1743 in Albermarle County, Virginia. He studied at the College of William and Mary,à and then read law. In 1772 he married Martha Wayles Skelton. Freckled and sandy-haired, rather tall and awkward, Jefferson was eloquent as a correspondent, but he was no public speaker. In the Virginia House of Burgesses and the Continental Congress, he contributed his pen rather than his voice to the patriot cause. As the silent member of the Congress, Jefferson, at 33, drafted the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson put little that was new into the famous document. On the same day that Independence was declared, Mr. Jefferson was appointed one of a committee of three to devise an appropriate Coat of Arms for the republic of the United States of America (Rayner 8). Part of the declaration ideas had already been much discussed in America. They had previously been popular in England; John Locke had used them in his book On Civil Government, a defense of the English Revolution of 1688. The Declaration is a statement of the American theory of government. Three basic ideas were involved: (1) God had made all men equal and had given them the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (instead of Lockes pursuit of property); (2) the main business of government was to protect these rights; (3) if a government tried to withhold these rights, the people were free to revolt and to set up a new government. These three ideas formed the groundwork for the state governments that were established after the Declaration was adopted. The declaration came to be on July 4, 1776, when the members of the Continental Congress assembled at the State House in Philadelphia to take up a matter of vital importance. Two days earlier the Congress had voted to declare the colonies to be free and independent states. Now they were considering how to announce that fact to the world. By the end of the day, the final wording had been determined and the Congress voted unanimously to adopt one of historys greatest documents, which was the Declaration of Independence. The stirring phrases of the Declaration inspired the patriots to defeat the British, thus guaranteeing independence (Rayner 8). Since that time the Declaration has been a source of pride and strength for every generation of Americans. The American political leader Patrick Henry was one of the most celebrated orators of the American Revolution (Logan 6). He was born on May 29, 1736, in Hanover County, Virginia. Henry failed as both a storekeeper and a farmerà before being admitted to the Virginia bar in 1760 (Logan 6). However, he won fame in 1763 after his impassioned pleading in the Parsons Cause, a case in which he defended the right of the colony to fix the price of the tobacco in which the clergy were paid, despite a contrary ruling from London. Many feel he began the revolutionary movement in the South. Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death! an infamous statement by Henry that had led others to stand up for what they believed in. He boldly stated how the people should not let the king push them around and people agreed. His speech encouraged others to make a statement against the king to rebel and they got their respect. The Revolutionary War, which was greatly won, involved many literary works that had big impacts. Thomas Paines The Crisis encouraged many citizens to fight for what they believed in and this led to the victory of the Battle of Trenton. This document was much likely related to Patrick Henrys attempt to encourage others to rebel against Britains regulations with tobacco. Thomas Jefferson also had created a literary work that affected our nation deeply. The Declaration of Independence is still used today as a way of living as it was back then, when it was also used to inspire the soldiers at the time of war. So as you can see, literature did have an impact on our history, and without it maybe things would have happened differently. The influence of the literature during the Revolution helped create what we are now.
Saturday, September 21, 2019
An Analysis Of Cultural Heritage Tourism Tourism Essay
An Analysis Of Cultural Heritage Tourism Tourism Essay Heritage is property of the world. It has important evidences of past incidents and changes and it is the necessity to conserve it without political involvement and racial discrimination (UNESCO, 2004). So far Graham et al. (2000, p40) suggested Heritage is tremendously concerned in the construction and legitimating of collective constructs of uniqueness, such as group, gender, religion, civilization and nationalism. When we talk about the relation of heritage into tourism industry, at first, holy cities such as Rome are acknowledged as a highly multifunctional and even multi heritage place, as a result, the heritage attractions positively become the feature of Italy for tourist. To manifest the implication of heritage is consequently the key point of managing a heritage sites. As cultural heritage tourism is mostly depending on the history, the event in the past has abundant evidence that how the past travels had been changing the entire pages of each century and affected our past life. Much of it is also passed on form age to age occasionally in the form in which it actually happen but more often as myth or fable. In whichever form it is of prime importance to a tourism professional, particularly in the circumstances such as the one obtaining in India with wealthy cultural heritage having continuity form the ancient (IGNOU, 2002). The process of finding will continue to the future because no one predict that how many real stories have buried in the earth or still has not being found. But somehow scholars has been able to find the real incident of past with the help of evidences of literature which still present all over the world as well as the role of science and researchers. An archaeology department of each country is encouraging the researchers to fin d out about our past. These particular reasons also encouraged to the selection of the dissertation topic, so at first this will focus on past history and development of Ajanta and Ellora caves and then it will look at the past record of tourist information and the with the help of available secondary data from Books, Journal articles, news papers past surveys and the information available from the internet, respective governments and non government agencies such as UNESCO, ICOMOS, IUCN, GHF, etc. Introduction: Cultural heritage conservation is always a centre of discussion in the form of developing economy of various nations. Cultural heritage tourism product is becoming a prime source for develop and developing countries. Countries like India where every tourist gets glimpses of diverse culture in his/her entire journey. India is primarily a cultural destination in international tourism in these are the features of India marketed as tourism product in international as well as domestic circuit. Domestic tourism competition already has begun in India from past decades every states government has been developing their strategies with the help of international organization to improve the tourism. In result due to sudden changes the competition can be seen among service providers as from hawkers to a large scale stakeholders. In scenario market everyones mind has been diverting toward the heritage sites in India, thus its creating trafficking of tourists as well as service providers. So it is affecting the quality of services and facilities. So it shows a different picture of hospitality and tourism industry in India. Visitors/ tourists these are the main driver of tourism industries. Firstly, the different demands and requirement of individual is affecting on tourism industry in India such as tailor made tours and the class of tourist. Also the issues and understanding of heritage tourism by people it may be visitors/tourists or local communities are different. There are two types of tourists are who has interested to visit a cultural sites around the world and the second one who Most of the peoples travel interest is to watch heritage sites around the world and some leisure activity thus it boosting the economy of respective destination. The most important part of tourism is a cultural as well as natural heritage property. So it always remains prime attraction to most of the people to come and enjoy their holidays. This dissertation will focus on the every aspects of cultural heritage tourism industry such as supply, demand, conservation management, interpretation, authenticity and politics of cultural heritage site. The primary data can receive with the help of some questionnaire to understand the real nature and find out what can do more to achieve the overall development at Ajanta and Ellora Caves at Aurangabad. To understand the World cultural heritage site here the UNESCO considers that as a monuments, architectural works, works of monumental sculpture and painting, elements or structures of an archaeological nature, inscriptions, cave dwellings and combinations of features, which are of outstanding universal value from the point of view of history, art or science; groups of buildings: groups of separate or connected buildings which, because of their architecture, their homogeneity or their place in the landscape, are of exceptional universal importance from the point of view of history, art or science; sites: works of man or the combined works of nature and man, and areas including archaeological sites which are of excellent universal value from the historical, aesthetic, ethnological or anthropological point of view. In contrast it is suggested that World Heritage Sites should not only be exemplary situations for the pursuit of research but also be closely identified with the creation and maintenance of different kinds of knowledge (Darvill, T., 2007). People always willing to learn new things or exchange the knowledge between each other, it is nothing but to become aware about our surroundings and changing of trends in scenario market. Here, In the Krakow Charter (2000), a monument is defined as a clearly determined entity, the bearer of values, which represent a support to memory. In it, memory recognises the aspects that are relevant to human performance and feelings, associated with the historic time-line (Vecco, M 2010). Economic In the Times of India there was an article about heritage tourism and in that the Atul Sethi has mentioned that Heritage can become a serious economic driver for India, if the country is able to get its act together. If we take an example as future 2025, so the picture of the heritage site will give different view as no beggars or touts in particular area like Maluti temple, a world heritage site in Jharkhand India. So tourist can enjoy the holistic experience of the temples and can savour the living legacy of the region. The heritage tourism in India is attracting hordes of international and domestic tourist and top of the line contributors to the countrys foreign exchange and GDP. The global heritage fund organizations 2010 report says that developing countries like India can tap a $ 100 billion a year opportunity by 2025, if they make sincere attempt to preserve and responsibly develop their heritage sites. Literature Review: Introduction: This chapter will investigate the perception of cultural heritage tourism and visitor management as well as development of tourism at site by reviewing several concerned literatures. The review will start with the overview of cultural heritage tourism including the concept of Culture, heritage, cultural heritage tourism and cave architecture from different World Heritage Sites to understand the their current scenario of cultural heritage tourism management. The review will be followed by the discussion on visitor impacts, their experience and management. Also it will focus on the intermediaries of cultural heritage tourism. Cultural heritage tourism: Cultural Tourism is the subset of tourism that is defined as travel directed toward experiencing the traditional and contemporary culture, arts, and special character of a place. This includes the performing, visual and literary arts, language, museums, heritage, crafts, architecture, design, film and broadcasting. The primary benefit of cultural tourism is economic impact. There are plenty of statistics that talk about the fact that travellers who participate in cultural activities spend more money and stay longer than leisure travellers. A good cultural tourism plan shapes and defines a communitys image, both to itself and to the outside world Cultural tourism and cultural heritage management work as equivalent activities in most places with really little conversation between the two (Mckercher and Du Cros, 2002). As it shows common interest between the cultural and cultural heritage is the management, conservation, and preservation of the cultural and heritage properties. So the results of this many lost opportunities to provide value to visitor experiences even though managing rare and weak resources in a social context, environmentally and ethically responsible and sustainable manner. Sometimes this loss results in some (and scholars stress some) unprincipled tourism operator exploring local culture and heritage assets for their own personal gain (Mckercher and Du Cros, 2002). Hall and Zeppel (1990a:87 in Timothy and Boyd, 2003) stated that relation between cultural and heritage tourism is: Cultural heritage is experiential tourism based on being involved in and stimulated by the performing arts and festivals. Heritage tourism, whether in the form of visiting preferred landscapes, historic sites, buildings or monuments is also experiential tourism in the sense of seeking an encounter with nature or feeling part of the history of a place. Most researchers believe that heritage is linked to the past which symbolizes some sort of gift to be passed down to current as well as future generations, both in terms of cultural traditions and physical objects (Hardy, 1988 cited in Timothy and Boyd 2003). But in contrast many authors have pointed out that what elements of past a society need to maintain (Fladmark 1998; Graham et al., 2000; Hall and McArthur 1998 in Timothy and Boyd 2003). As there are many incidents all cannot link to the cultural aspects. This makes selective sort of heritage it assumes some aspect of value, that which is of personal value is labelled as personal or family heritage, whereas those values dictated by nations or communities become our heritage (Hall and McArthur 1998 cited in Timothy and Boyd 2003). Hall and Zappel (1990) observed differently that the connections between cultural and heritage tourism, stating that Cultural tourism is experiential tourism based on being involved in and stimulated by the performing arts, visual arts and festivals. Heritage tourism whether in the form of visiting preferred landscapes, historic sites, building or monuments, is also experiential tourism in the sense of seeking an encounter with nature or feeling part of the history of a place. However the most internationally accepted definition of heritage was defined by UNESCO that Heritage is our legacy from the past, what we live with today, and what we pass on to the future generations (UNESCO 2008a, p.5). Furthermore Timothy and Boyd (2003) stated that heritage can be divided into tangible immovable resources (e.g. national park, sanctuaries, monuments, buildings), tangible movable resources (e.g. objects in museums) and intangible resources including values, customs, ceremonies, lifestyles and experiences such as cultural events, currently UNESCO focusing on folk dances of south India as a cultural heritage( ). It defines that heritage tourism as an immersion in the natural history human heritage, arts, philosophy and institutions of another region or country (Timothy and Boyd 2003). The importance of Heritage The importance of heritage and reasons for preserving heritage can be described into four aspects which are social, economical, scientific and political (Hall and McArthur 1993a). In social significance, heritage refers to personal and collective identity people and society have which can lead to create a sense of belonging. The sense of belonging and social conscience is a driver to consider preservation in the first place. In terms of economic importance, heritage is preserved because of its value for tourism and recreation. As being a large scale business, heritage tourism can generate incomes for the sites either from visitor spending or sponsorship from various stakeholders (Hall and McArthur 1993a). Further mainly Heritage have scientific and educational importance since heritage attractions especially natural heritage sites such as national parks may have rare habitat and endangered species which will be useful for scientific researches as well as the monuments and wonders of the worlds creates more opportunities to the scientist and researchers to find out the exact meaning of the past it may be by digging by the archaeological department of each country or the scientific analysis of wall paintings at various world heritage sites (Hall and McArthur 1993a). In terms of political importance, Hall and McArthur (1993a, p. 9) state that the importance and demonstration of heritage may serve political ends as the conservation and interpretation of certain heritage attractions may serve to underline a particular version of history or to promote existing political values. Current tourist demand: According to (Pavliv, 2009) up gradation in the standard of living is become a main cause of rises in fluctuation of tourists spending for example the income generating from the modern tourism commodities. Modern tourists behaviour is the main factor in current tourism industry. As currently many of travel operations that could be from demand side or supply side are in boom because ease of accessing Information through internet. So the importance of information technology in the current industry is the main factor while considering the supply and demand of tourism industry. Also it can be assumed that the personal needs of the modern tourism have more influence compare to old masses of tourism. The current tourism mostly depended on economic mass and production to consume mass, standardized and rigidly packaged holidays. The new tourists are dictating the pace and direction of industry changes (Poon, 1993 in Pavlic, 2009). New tourists behaviour is the most important factor in the modern tourism development. Consequently, here the intention of the research is to find out the main factors and consequences of tourism demand changes. The researcher wants to find out if there is the universal type of tourist for the universal tourism supply or there are different types that require different marketing approach for example the e-tourism method to attract the tourists. Also the goals of the paper are to research the main causes of changes in modern tourism. The stated phenomenon has exerted a great influence onto the behavioural changes, as well as on the change in structure of the existing needs of tourist demand compare with the previous period. While the old mass tourism, apparently identical tourists were forced by the economic and mass production to consume mass, standardized and rigidly packaged holidays of every group of people and individual, new tourist consider the changes in this industry are and it affecting on their individual decision (Poon, 1993 cited in Pavlic, 2009). For ex: tour packages. Vellas Becherel (1997 in Pavlic, 2009) the modern tourist can be classified in various factors and in that three main factors which particularly in demand of travel of tourist firstly, demographic and communal changes. These factors mainly control by traditional and existing outbound market respectively these are two main markets in this industry so as far as concern it has enormous influence on the individual tourist as well as on international tourism. Secondly, leisure time and duration of holidays is greater than before as. Segmentation of holidays and market segmentation. Chapter 3 A case study of Ajanta and Ellora caves The consideration of architectural heritage had been a matter of national concern only at most the laws regarding protection of historic building in Europe date back to that period of their national borders. There are numerous cultural groups live in each country, but their scope never went beyond the boundaries. The cultural internationalism was a result of the First World War, with the formation of the confederation of Nations, and most of all of the Second World War, with the formation of the United Nations Organization and the establishment of the UNECO (ICOMOS, 2010). The chapter provides a literature review of cultural heritage tourism in India, Particularly at Ajanta and Ellora Caves World Heritage sites inscribed in 1983 by UNESCO at Aurangabad, India. These caves are great example of cave architecture from the 2nd to 6th century. It is mainly demonstrate the Buddhist, Jain and Hindu religion cultures. So, these studies will focuses on the religious diversity of cultures in India as well as it involve the importance of heritage visitors management at those sites. And then it will compare with other world heritage sites. As what can do more to maintain/sustain the balance between demand and supply side of heritage tourism industry in India. Increasing tourists and the conservation of heritage sites these are the main issues now days. So, as subsidizing product of tourism industry what are the main significance and characteristics of cultural heritage tourism and its importance around the world and in India particularly at Ajanta and Ellora caves . According to the UNESCO, the Ajanta Caves are the masterwork of the Archaeological rock cut caves. The first Buddhist cave monuments at Ajanta date from the 2nd and 1st centuries B.C. During the Gupta dynasty period (5th and 6th centuries A.D.), highly abundantly decorated caves were added to the original group. The paintings and sculptures of Ajanta, considered as a stunning success of Buddhist religious art, have had a considerable artistic influence. As it mentioned above the Ajanta caves depict the role of the Buddhist community, intellectual and religious halls, schools for self development based on the teaching of Vipassana. In theà Buddhistà tradition which means insightà into the nature of reality. Vipassana is one of worlds most ancient techniques of meditation; it is a practice of self-transformation through self-observation andà introspection. In English, vipassanaà is often referred to simply as insight meditation. The caves also was a reception centres in the India of the Gupta and their immediate successors. The caves are located 100à km north-east of Ellora, 104à km from Aurangabad, Maharashtra India and 52à km from Jalgaon Railway Station. They are cut into the volcanic lava of the Deccan in the forest ravines of the Sahyadri Hills and are set in beautiful sylvan surroundings. The most important part is these magnificent caves containing carvings that depict the life of Buddha, and their carvings and sculptures are considered to be the beginning of classical Indian art. And this is main reason why tourist and researchers attract to those sites. The description of the caves is, the total number of caves are 30 but one is unfinished caves so the 29 caves were excavated beginning around 200 BC, but they were abandoned in AD 650 in favour of Ellora. In that five of the caves were temples and 24 were monasteries, thought to have been occupied by some 200 monks and artisans. After 7th century to 18th century there was no any supportive record has found, it may be because of increased forest surrounding of the site and that it was forgotten until their rediscovery by a British tiger-hunting party in 1819. The Ajanta site consists of 29 caves cut into the side of a cliff which rises above a wander in the Waghora River. Today the caves are reached by a road which runs along a terrace mid-way up the cliff; however each cave was once linked by a stairway to the edge of the water. This is a Buddhist community, comprises five sanctuaries or Chaitya-grihasà (caves number 9, 10, 19, 26 and 29) and monastic complexà sangharamasà or viharas. A first group of caves was formed in the 2nd century BC: the Chaitya-grihas open into the rock wall by doorways surmounted by a horse-shoe shaped bay. The ground plan is a basilical one: piers separate the principal nave from the side walkway which joins in the apsis to permit the ritual circumambulation behind the (commemorative monument). This rupestral architecture scrupulously reproduces the forms and elements visible in wooden constructions. A second group of caves was created at a later date, the 5th and 6th centuries AD, during the Gupta and post-Gupta periods. These caves were excavated during the supremacy of the Vakatakas and Guptas. According to inscriptions, Varahadeva, the minister of the Vakataka king, Harishena (c. AD 475-500), dedicated Cave 16 to the Buddhist sangha while Cave 17 was the gift of the prince, a feudatory. An inscription records that the Buddha image in Cave 4 was the gift of some Abhayanandi who hailed from Mathura. The earlier architectural formulas were re-employed but treated in an infinitely richer and more ample manner. The decoration attained, at this time, an unequalled splendour: the statuary is numerous (it was already permissible to represent Buddha as a human; these representations are found both on the facades and in the interior). Finally, the wall painting, profuse and sensitive, constitutes, no doubt, the most striking artistic achievement of Ajanta. Under the impulse of the Gupta dynasty, Indian art in effect reached its apogee. The Ajanta Caves are generally decorated with painted or sculpted figures of supple form and classic balance with which the name of the dynasty has remained synonymous. The refined lightness of the decoration, the balance of the compositions, the marvellous beauty of the feminine figures place the paintings of Ajanta among the major achievements of the Gupta and post-Gupta style and confer on them the ranking of a masterpiece of universal pictorial art. Here needs to understand the history of India as how the past events has changed its culture first major civilisation Indus River valley was found early five thousand years back. The twin cities of Mohenjodaro and Harappa World heritage site UNESCO now in Pakistan were ruled by priests and held the fundamentals of Hinduism. These civilisations are known to possess a sophisticated way of life, a highly developed sense of aesthetics, an astounding knowledge of town planning and an unreadable script language. The Indus culture at one point of time extended nearly a million square kilometres across the Indus river valley. It existed at the same time as the ancient civilizations of Egypt and Sumer but far outlasted them. Surviving for nearly a thousand years the Indus valley civilisation fell to tectonic upheavals in about 1700 BC, which caused a series of floods.à The Aryans came around 1500 BC, and that was the reason to the collapsing Indus Valley culture. At the dawn of Vedic ages the Aryans came in from the North and spread through large parts of India bringing with them their culture and religious beliefs. Pleased In 567 B.C. Siddhartha Gautama was born. After asceticism andà meditation, Siddhartha Gautama discovered the Buddhistà Middle Way-a path of moderation away from the extremes of self-indulgence andà self-mortification. Siddhartha Gautama attained enlightenment sitting under aà Pipalà tree, now known as theà Bodhi treeà inà Bodh Gaya, (A name of place) India Gautama, from then on, was known asà The Perfectly Self-Awakened One,à theà Samyaksambuddha. There are lots of paintings and sculptures Vipassana. During this time lived Mahavira, who founded the Jain Religion. The Indian subcontinent is full of caves and monuments devoted to these religions and are worth a visit.à After two hundred years, in the 4th century B.C., Emperor Ashoka, one of the greatest King of Indian histories, led the Mauryan Empire to take over almost all of what is now modern India. This great leader embraced Buddhism and built the group of monuments at Sanchi (a UNESCO world heritage site). The Ashoka pillar (four lions are seated back to back on single cut rock pillar) at Sarnath has been adopted by India as its national emblem and theà Dharma Chakraà on the Ashoka Pillar adorns the National Flag. They were followed by the Guptas in the north, while in the south part of India quite a few different Hindu empires, the Cholas, the Pandyas and the Cheras spread and grew, did business with Europe and other parts of Asia till the end of the 1100s. Christianity came in India at about the same time from Europe. Legend has it that St. Thomas the Apostle arrived in India in 52 A.D. Even earlier than that people of the Jewish religion arrived on Indias shores. In about the 7th century A.D. a group of Zoroastrians, or Parsees, landed in Gujarat and became a part of the large mix of religions in India today, each of which adds its important and distinctive flavour. In the 15th century Guru Nanak laid the foundation of the Sikh religion in Punjab. In 1192, Mohammed of Ghori, a ruler from Afghanistan, came into India and captured several places in the north including Delhi. When he went home he left one of his generals in charge who became the first Sultan of Delhi. During this time Islam, was introduced into a major part of Northern India. It can be mentioned that even before that, just after the period of the prophet, Islam was brought to the western coast of India by Arab traders and flourished in what is now Kerala. The Dehli Sultanate gradually took control of more and more of North India over the next 200 years, till Timur, who was called Timur the Lame or Tamberlane came from Turkey in 1398 to attack India. He and his army stole all the valuables that they could carry and left again, Soon the Mughals, who were from Iran, came in and took control of the north. In the meantime south, in 1336, the Hindu Vijayanagar empire was set up and became very strong. The Europeans Portuguese, French, Dutch, Danish and British started arriving in the early 1600s. The above people held territories in India and made a good friends as well as enemies among Indias rulers as they got more and more involved, with the Indian politics, however the British who eventually controlled most of India and finally made it one of their colonies. Two hundred years later, in the 4th century B.C., Emperor Ashoka, one of the greatest King of Indian histories, led the Mauryan Empire to take over almost all of what is now modern India. This great leader embraced Buddhism and built the group of monuments at Sanchi (a UNESCO world heritage site). The Ashoka pillar at Sarnath has been adopted by India as its national emblem and theà Dharma Chakraà on the Ashoka Pillar adorns the National Flag. They were followed by the Guptas in the north, while in the south part of India several different Hindu empires, the Cholas, the Pandyas and the Cheras spread and grew, trading with Europe and other parts of Asia till the end of the 1100s. Christianity entered India at about the same time from Europe. Legend has it that St. Thomas the Apostle arrived in India in 52 A.D. Even earlier than that people of the Jewish religion arrived on Indias shores. In approximately the 7th century A.D. a group of Zoroastrians, or Parsees, landed in Gujarat and became a part of the large mix of religions in India today, each of which adds its important and distinctive flavour. In the 15th century Guru Nanak laid the foundation of the Sikh religion in Punjab. To Top In 1192, Mohammed of Ghori, a ruler from Afghanistan, came into India and captured several places in the north including Delhi. When he went home he left one of his generals in charge who became the first Sultan of Delhi. During this time Islam, was introduced into a major part of Northern India. It may be mentioned that even before that, just after the period of the prophet, Islam was brought to the western coast of India by Arab traders and flourished in what is now Kerala. The Dehli Sultanate gradually took control of more and more of North India over the next 200 years, till Timur, who was called Timur the Lame or Tamberlane came from Turkey in 1398 to attack India. He and his army stole all the valuables that they could carry and left again, and after that the Delhi Sultanate was never so strong again. Soon the Mughals, who were from Iran, came in and took control of the north. In the meantime south, in 1336, the Hindu Vijayanagar empire was set up and became very strong. The Europeans Portuguese, French, Dutch, Danish and British started arriving in the early 1600s. All of them held territories in India and made friends and enemies among Indias rulers as they got more and more involved, with the Indian politics, but it was the British who eventually controlled most of India and finally made it one of their colonies. India got its independence from Britain in 1947 after a long struggle led mostly by Mahatma Gandhi. In the process of becoming independent, India became two countries instead of one. In the years since independence India has made huge progress and coped with great problems, and has developed its industry and its agriculture, and has maintained a system of government which makes it the largest democracy in the world. India got its independence from Britain in 1947. Since independence India has made huge evolution and muddle through with great problems, and has maintained a system of government which makes it the largest democracy in the world. Every community and nation try to protect, conserve and develop heritage as an asset, particularly to make them important tourist sites by developing better infrastructure and facilities, which offer a rich cultural experience to tourists and ensure cultural and natural heritage of the destination to be preserved and conserved. To extend INTACHs mandate beyond conservation, the Heritage Tourism Division was set up in December 2005. A cogent system of sustenance of heritage sites was evolved in the activities of the Division. This would allow people to have access to and understand heritage sites in complete detail. The Heritage Tourism Divisions primary work is to synergize heritage with tourism. The Division works for development of sustainable tourism connected with heritage as an asset. A development of tourist facilities is in harmony with the local eco-system and heritage architecture, and regulates sensitivity of design in architectural style of construction of any new tourist facilities. The aim of developing tourism is to conserve and utilize buildings to sustain their maintenance. Heritage Tourism development aspects are: Community Development of tourist receiving destination Socio-economic Growth of the receiving community Preservation and Conservation of cultural and natural heritage sites Income Generation
Friday, September 20, 2019
The Natural Language Processing In Siri
The Natural Language Processing In Siri Natural language is the tool to represent Information. It is the ability for the users to communicate with any system or device in a conversational manner without any conversational hindrances. Natural Language Processing in Siri The above topic constitutes the working of Siri. This topic now being covered is how Siri can able to process sentences and convert them into meaningful texts. Natural Language Processing has become more advanced to understand human voice and convert them into text and manipulating those texts and giving us useful answers. Apple has introduced Dictation in Siri, a Speech to text feature. It process natural language, contextual and conversational and works with built in apps on Siri like calendars, contacts address etc. Function of the application Siri The application Siri requires a speech input. Using Automatic Speech Recognition System it translates our voice to text. This system analyses an individuals voice and fine tunes the voice to get more accurate result in the form of commands and questions1. The voice recognition does not just try to understand voice and translates to text but it tries to understand who the speaker or the person is. This will then try to learn the persons speech and Siri trains according to it. Next, the texts are sent to servers on the Apple Siri cloud and these words uses the Natural Language processing store to execute a series of understanding language models of the text. Uses POS tagging(Part of Speech), noun phrase chunking, dependency and parsing to parse text to form a meaningful sentences. Using various models like Boolean, vector and language changes a lot more and giving a meaning to the text. These meanings are taken from the lexical group of corpus documents finding the probability of the n ext words sequences. The higher the probability of the words the more chances the words get joined till the sentences gets structured. These parsed texts use the question and intent analysis to analyze the parsed text. For eg. Call my mother. It has to first store in its local memory who is your mother. When it is stored, the next time it will know who you are mentioning about it. Another example if you ask Siri to Schedule a meeting. Siri has to use pragmatic approach to understand what exactly the user is trying to describe. From the word Schedule it has to find out the whether the schedule is related to time table or a calendar. But still Siri can understand with one piece of word. It has to analyze the next piece of sentences to match a meaning. But since a Siri has a database for understanding this small information, it can actually make out that the calendar needs to be opened and ask the users to input the words and time of the meeting. If the answer cant be found or cant dir ectly answer it, Apple Siri then uses the data mash up technology combining two or more third party web services to get information out of the questions asked by the user. These third party mash up like Open Table, Wolfram Alpha perform actions, operations and question and answering. These answers are produced back into natural language processed text from a given question. And then uses the TTS technology to transform the Natural Language processed text to synthesized speech. Speech Recognition to Natural Language Processing Apple Siri uses speech synthesizer to process the voice to be sent to a server to transcribe the words spoken into parsed text. The sound spoken is encoded into compact digital form that preserves its information. The signal from the connected phone is relayed wireless through a nearby Cell tower then to the ISP which is then communicated to a server in the cloud which is been loaded with a variety of speech models to understand the language. The Speech is also verified local on the Apple Siri Devices if it can manage what the user is spoken in small measure otherwise recognizer which is installed locally communicates it to the server recognizer to evaluate the speech. The Server is then compared with a speech against a statistical model to estimate the sounds spoken and the order in which it was spoken. Techniques in Natural Language processing They are no of techniques used for constructing a good natural sentence such as statistical modeling, lexical and grammatical parsing, machine learning. These technologies deconstruct words, sentences, paragraphs and entire documents expressed in human language and map them to a semantic structure. 3 If you ask a question to Siri what is the time in New Delhi, India? This information is simplified by mapping out spoken words to correct spellings. Once the text is correctly categorized, it will extract information from various sources semantically. In this case, we have two elements to be retrieved, the time and the location as New Delhi. Siri must know what it is relates to. For example, 100 Degree of Celsius, the application must understand that at 100 Degrees it is hot. So there is a requirement for a Domain Knowledge. Definition of Techniques of Natural Language processing working with Apple Siri Language models are assigned a probability to sequence of words. It captures the properties of the language and predicts the next words in the sequence. If the Language model is used in information retrieval, it takes information from documents and takes the probability of higher number of words used for the next sentences. 6. Since apple Siri is a closed propriety, we assume these language models are used to constructs these words. They probably might use different methods to form sentences when asked to Siri. Some of the definitions of the certain techniques could have been used in Siri to process natural language are just given below Statistical modeling This algorithm are models which corrects words and sentences. It resolves difficulties of ambiguous data which are processed with realistic grammar. 4 Semantic Searching -It uses entity extraction which takes nouns, places and people and maps all these into a single concept. Parsing It is the process of analyzing a text made of sequence of tokens to determine grammatical structure to construct the words in a grammatical form.5 Auto Categorization It auto categorize thousands and thousands of words and then sort out of the works according to the words spoken and very quickly. Machine Translation This concept automatically tries to translate one text from one form to another. It has to know grammar, semantics and facts about the real world in order to make accurate translation. Sentiment Analysis It checks the tone of an article whether it is positive, negative or neutral. It extracts the subjects of the information. Question Answering We have Wolfram Alpha and Ask.com to answer questions for you. These are computational intelligences API web services giving useful answers back to the user when asked the questions
Thursday, September 19, 2019
Licence To Kill :: essays research papers
1.à à à à à The three qualities that I felt James Bond most possessed throughout the story were determination, bravery, and intelligence. In the next several paragraphs I will explain how incidents in the story revealed each quality portrayed by James Bond. Determination à à à à à In the beginning of the story a drug lord named, Frans Sanchez, severely injures James Bondââ¬â¢s partner, Felix Leiter, and kills his wife Della Leiter after escaping an attempted arrest by Felix. After this incident Bond becomes determined to capture Sanchez, bring his drug empire down, and avenge what he had done to his partner and close friend Felix Leiter. Bond shows such strong determination that he disobeys his chief, ââ¬Å"Mâ⬠, and the secret service branch of London in order to continue his mission with Sanchez. Bond was ordered by ââ¬Å"Mâ⬠to drop the case and head to Istanbul where he would be briefed on his next mission. However, Bond told his chief that he was not done with his mission and that if he was not allowed to continue with it he would have to resign from the secret service. Determined to bring Sanchez down and avenge all the pain which his friend inflected he eventually gave in his resignation and became a free agent. Intelligence à à à à à James Bond shows intelligence throughout the entire story. From his surprising attack tactics, to how he tricks villains and enemies into doing exactly what he wants. Bond was the type of man that was usually in control of the situation. There comes a point in the story where Bond must figure a way out to turn two major druglords against each other, William Krest and Frans Sanchez, in order for him to gain the trust of Sanchez so he can learn more about his drug organization and what he was about. He devises a plan that convinces Sanchez that Krest was stealing millions of dollars from him and that he was going to meet with the Chinese to plan an assassination in his name. Eventually Bond thinks of a way to set Krest up so that Sanchez believes him. The plan was so well though out that it surprised me how intelligent Bond actually was. He was in complete control of everything that happened and he eventually gained the trust of Sanchez and was granted permission to go to his secret drug plant in Isthmus city. Bravery à à à à à There are many times throughout the story where James Bond shows bravery and
Wednesday, September 18, 2019
Ray Bradbury :: essays research papers
Ray Bradbury Ray Bradbury has been considered one of Americaââ¬â¢s greatest science-fiction writerââ¬â¢s. His work often satires human nature and shows his readerââ¬â¢s the flaws found deep within the individual. Not only is Bradbury a novelist, but he is also a , short-story writer, essayist, playwright, screenwriter, and poet Bradbury was born in Waukegan, Illinois on August 22, 1920, the third son of Leonard Spaulding Bradbury and Esther Marie Moberg Bradbury. In 1926 Ray Bradbury's family moved from Waukegan, Illinois to Tucson, Arizona, only to return to Waukegan again in May 1927. By 1931 (the dawn of the Great Depression) he began writing his own stories on butcher paper. In 1932, after his father was laid off his job as a telephone lineman, the Bradbury family again moved to Tucson and again returned to Waukegan the following year. In 1934 the Bradbury family moved to Los Angeles, California. Bradbury graduated from a Los Angeles High School in 1938. His formal education ended there, but he furthered it by himself. He went to the library by night and by day at he worked at his typewriter. He sold newspapers on Los Angeles street corners from 1938 to 1942. Bradbury's first story publication was "Hollerbochen's Dilemma," printed in 1938 in Imagination!, an amateur fan magazine. In 1939, Bradbury published four issues of Futuria Fantasia, his own fan magazine, contributing much of the published material himself. Bradbury's first paid publication was "Pendulum" in 1941 to Super Science Stories. In 1942 Bradbury wrote "The Lake," a short story later added to a collection of short stories called The October Country. This was the story in which Bradbury discovered his distinctive writing style. By 1943 he had given up his job selling newspapers and began writing full-time, contributing numerous short stories to periodicals. In 1945 his short story "The Big Black and White Game" was selected for Best American Short Stories. In 1947 Bradbury married Marguerite McClure, and that same year he gathered much of his best material and published them as , his first short story collection. His reputation as a leading writer of science fiction was established with the publication of in 1950 (published in England under the title The Silver Locusts), which describes the first attempts of Earth people to conquer and colonize Mars, the constant thwarting of their efforts by the gentle, telepathic Martians, the eventual colonization, and finally the effect on the Martian settlers of a massive nuclear war on Earth. As much a work of social criticism as of science fiction, The Martian Chronicles reflects some of the prevailing anxieties of America in the early
Tuesday, September 17, 2019
Effects of Gender on Communication Essay
Gender communication gap has long been a problem and source of misunderstanding between men and women. Common situations showed that the more talking of women greatly affect their communication with the opposite sex and expressing themselves create miscommunication and other problems rather than understanding among themselves. In Deborah Tannenââ¬â¢s You Just Donââ¬â¢t Understand: Woman and Men in Conversation however it was made to contrast the typical stereotype that women talk to much than men. It also that does not follow that talking more means saying more with sense. Women may be expressing themselves more but their talking is regarded as speaking in private nature and oftentimes downplayed in terms of significance when compared to men talking publicly. Factors such as the place and the nature of communication also contribute to the turn-out of the whole process between men and women. Tannen reconciled the difference between gender in private and public communication and supported this with the terms ââ¬Å"Rapport-Talk and Report-Talk. â⬠The gender difference in private speaking was showed in a way that a woman is talkative compared to a man who is of few words. This is where the language of rapport takes place wherein women regard every conversation with a personal touch and connection. Although this situation is very evident in the home set-up, the utilization of private communication by women can be extended to other venues where they feel comfortable and at home at all times. Private speaking by a woman may be characterized by discussion of any topic under the sun and it could be either under her official or personal function or could be both. Private communication focuses on the ability of women to express themselves more specially with men whom they are intimate with because talking with the opposite sex is so relaxing that women tend to continue with their flow of thoughts thinking that their men-partners willingly and interestingly understand and accept whatever they are saying. In private communication, women talk to men not only for information, exchange of ideas and opinion but also to establish a closer interaction and have a stronger relationship with their men. This is where consequences start because the more women talk in a private speaking set-up, the more men feel that the communication must end. In turn, women are offended when men start to become indifferent, inattentive and openly disagree. Complaints start to come in when women, with all their heart out and mind speaking sees nothing in exchange of their expression. Communication differences are indicated in cartoons where women openly and again, do much of the talking and complaining. Women in private communication feel that when they speak, men must reciprocate or share with them the same level of expression. For women, to have a rapport is to have a two-way communication where both gender exercise their parts and not just the other one doing much of the talking while the other just listen or worse, not bother at all and just want the talkative women to shut up. However, men caught in private communication oftentimes tend to just leave the flow of communication with the speaking of the women whom they see as the ones with a lot to say specially when the nature of the communication becomes personal. And when women start not only to talk much but to complain more, men resent the pressure and incline to insist that women are just demanding to much from them by wanting to be the center of communication and by presenting herself to be the more affected party. With this scenario, consequences grow because as the women are incline to personalize the conversation, men prefer to detach themselves from the process and unconsciously hurt the feelings and downplay the thoughts of the other gender. And even in the complaining part, women express more of their dissatisfaction than men and this result into misunderstanding. Enter now the blaming of each party because men and women will have to stress their own points and in doing so create more unsettled differences. Tannenââ¬â¢s perspective is true in the sense that gender dictates the flow and communication process in private speaking and when differences set in, the process and the people involved are greatly affected. I also agree with her idea that each gender has its own way of talking and if these different manners met and clash in a private communication set-up where the women do much of the talking, not only the women suffer the consequences but both. Although men and women have the same purpose of expressing themselves in a way acceptable to both of them, consequences and differences are inevitable and can only get worse if the different style of talking is foremost to be considered. While the private communication is the conventional way of speaking between men and women, this scenario is different in a public communication set-up. In this scenario, the gender switch roles as the men do more of the talking while the women fell silent. While men are mute in home scenarios and women tend to dominate the conversations in a private communication, men now start and want to be at the center of the conversation. The change in the setting of the conversation plays a big part in the turn-around of gender roles. Since women dominate the home-style private communication, men now overshadow them when they start to speak more publicly such as in meetings, conferences, official gatherings ââ¬â all done outside the boundaries of home. Men now speak more freely and with authority and women take a back seat by merely listening and there may even come a time that they will just have to agree with men and be content with their reverse roles. Having a particular subject matter to discuss and not just the personalize topics that men and women talk inside their homes is one factor that affect the communication process in a public speaking set-up. In a public engagement, men as resource persons speak more of what they know with authority and they are now the ones dominating the floor. And just like in the private communication, communication differences occur in a public speaking set-up. A significant consequence is that women are perceive to be uninterested and less knowledgeable when men do much of the talking on a particular topic and they are just at the back seat. Tannenââ¬â¢s term of ââ¬Å"Report-Talkâ⬠is very evident in a public communication wherein men play the big role to get attention. Unlike in private communication where women talk much to build stronger connection and relationship with men, public communication reverses this process. However, it may not be agreeable and acceptable that men do the talking in public because they know more and women cannot perform the role. This communication difference result in mislabeling of men as the more knowledgeable in public speaking and that women will just have to be silent. For all we know, women may just have to establish their own credibility and authority to be able to speak and talk more publicly. Establishing their thoughts and making sure of the things that they may say could be what women take first into consideration before engaging in public communication. A contradiction to Tannenââ¬â¢s gender hypothesis in public communication where men were perceived to be better in talking more publicly is evident in a Newsweek news story on US Presidential candidate, former First Lady and now Senator Hillary Clinton. The news story showed how Clinton is getting strength and taking advantage of the presidential race not because of her being the wife of former President Clinton but because of how she can speak well and more of her thoughts publicly. It is evident that Clinton did not limit her speaking ability within the boundaries of her home and with authority, she was able to stress her points and advancement by utilizing on a particular topic such as health care for the Americans. â⬠¦ The New York senator has amassed strong support among crucial groups including female, older, less-educated and lower-income Democrats significant because women and older voters in particular have dominated these primaries and caucuses in the past. (Fram and Tompson, Newsweek) The same news story also showed how a woman can earn support and respect from men not just because of speaking her personal thoughts in a private speaking set-up but because of her willingness to express publicly her causes. Clinton was perceived as a woman who cannot just address domestic concerns but also issues such as Iraq and heath care thus gaining her the much needed support. A journal also claimed that men and women are so different that they comprise strikingly different ââ¬Å"speech communities. â⬠This is because of the fact that they are typically socialized in discrete speech communities. â⬠¦ Numerous studies and reviews of research demonstrate that distinct gender cultures exist and that they differ systematically in some important respects. (Wood, 2000, p. 207) With the issues presented, it may now be clear that gender differences on private and public speakings have great effects on communication in such a way that men and women on the onset have their own and contradicting ways of talking making understanding and complementation of each other thoughts difficult. Notwithstanding the willingness and ability of both gender to comprehend each other, there will still be conflicting issues, concerns, expressions and thoughts to be settled. Efforts to settle gender differences on communication may be a long way to go but it is not impossible to achieve.
Monday, September 16, 2019
Game theory Essay
Game theory is a broad field of study that involves examining ways in which strategic decisions are derived. The study is applied in areas where strategic interactions among rational players produce outcomes with respect to the preferences of those players (Fudenberg & Tirole 1991). Game theory is a branch of applied mathematics that is mostly used in the social sciences situations like, economics, psychology, political science, and philosophy. The theory is also used in other fields like, biology, engineering, political science, international relations and computer science. Game theory can be classified as; non-cooperative (or strategic) games and co-operative (or coalitional) games (Fernandez & Bierman 1998). Non-cooperative games are involved with how intelligent individuals interact with one another in an effort to achieve their own goals. Co-operative games are where players co-operate in their moves (strategies) to achieve the desired common goals. ââ¬ËStrategic-formââ¬â¢ or ââ¬Ënormal formââ¬â¢ games and ââ¬Ëextensive formââ¬â¢ games. ââ¬ËStrategic formââ¬â¢ games are games where actions by players are taken simultaneously and order of the play is irrelevant to the gameââ¬â¢s outcome. ââ¬ËExtensive formââ¬â¢ games are games where actions are taken by the players in a sequence and order of play is relevant to a gameââ¬â¢s outcome. They are usually presented in a tree diagram. Symmetric and Asymmetric games; Asymmetric games are where the payoffs for playing a particular move depend only on the other playerââ¬â¢s strategies. Symmetric game is where identities of the players can be changed without changing the payoff to the strategies. Zero-sum games and non-zero sum games; Zero-sum games are where the total benefits to all players add up to zero (Camerer 2003). In non-zero sum games, the total benefits do not necessarily adds up to zero. Discrete and continuous games; discrete games have finite number of players, moves, events and outcomes. Continuous games have infinite numbers. The basic elements of game theory are; an agent (an entity with preferences/options), game (All situations in which at least one agent can only act to maximize his utility through anticipating responses to his actions by one or more other agents), utility (amount of benefits/welfare an agent derives from occurrence of an event), payoff (an ordinal utility number assigned to a player at event of a certain outcome), outcome (an assignment of a set of payoffs, one to each player in the game), strategy (playerââ¬â¢s plan on which action to take to achieved his/her desired payoff) and trees and matrices (ways of representing games that is based on order of play) (Fernandez & Bierman 1998). Game theory is based on the following assumptions: Players in a game are able to make their own preferences i. e. they are free agents. Players are economically rational and they can, assess outcomes, calculate paths to outcomes and choose actions that they think will yield their preferred outcomes. Agentsââ¬â¢ purpose is to maximize their utility. Game outcome depends on the actions taken by the players (Camerer 2003). Game theory has been used to explain in different fields to explain varied phenomena. In economics, game theory has been employed to explain business behaviors and economic conditions. Economic theories have embraced game theory in explaining and exhibiting certain economic behaviors. Economists have used other related theories in trying to understand rational interaction of strategic economic decisions that are made by people. These theories are closely linked to game theory and they include, decision theory, general equilibrium theory and mechanism design theory. Decision theory is a game theory of a single player against nature that focuses on preferences and the formation of beliefs (Fernandez & Bierman 1998). The theory is used to demonstrate how best to acquire information before making a decision. Equilibrium theory is a branch of game theory that deals with trade and production and mostly with where there are relatively large number of individual consumers and producers (Fudenberg & Tirole 1991). It is widely used in the macroeconomic analysis of broad based economic policies like monetary and fiscal policies, stock markets analysis, interest and exchange rates studies. Mechanism design theory is built on game theory but have special focus on the consequences of different types of rules (strategies). Example of a game theory is price game used by companies in a duopolistic market to increase their market share. In a duopoly market, two firms control the market and they use factors like prices, quality products and services, promotions, branding and promotion to compete over the market share (Samuelson 2008). When market share of one company increases, the other companyââ¬â¢s share decreases. Firms in sectors that sells homogeneous products (e. g. energy sector), uses pricing strategy to win increase their market share. Taking example of two oil companies in a duopolistic market in current oil price surge, the companies are faced with problem of adjusting their prices upwards since this will adversely affect the demand of their oil products and thus reduce their revenues. Increase in crude oil prices has been experienced in the world, and oil and petroleum companies have to increase their retail prices upwards to realize earnings from their venture. Companies also have objective of increasing the volume of their sales, by increasing the market share of their products. Since petroleum companies trades homogeneous products, the main marketing tool to increase their market share is price. For two companies in a duopoly market, if one company increases its prices, and other maintains or even reduces, the former loses market share to the latter. Both companies face the following possibilities from their moves; reduction of market share of their products and hence their future revenues and profit or reduction in their profit margin or loss and hence shrink of their financial performance and growth in the future. Therefore each of the firms is faced with dilemma of which move to take in this situation of sharp increase in their raw materials. The two firms have the following strategic problem; to ensure profitability of their companies amid high cost of their sales, and pressure to maintain their prices at competitive price over their rivals in order to increase demand of their products. These are conflicting goals that management of each company must resolve by making strategic price decisions. Pricing strategies for the two firms are either to increase the price that would results to increase in revenue and retain its market share, reduce price which results to increase in market share of its products or maintain the price (Ibid 2008). Each company want to maximize its utility in the pricing moves i. e. to select a move that will see its market share maintained or increased and also ensure profitability of the company. Each strategy that the companies may take have implications on the other i. e. move by one firm affects the other firm. Example, in case of one firm decreasing its prices, this will affects negatively market share of the other as the demand of the former companyââ¬â¢s product increases. Therefore, each company is expected to take choice that will result to its favor. Since the two firms are competing for success in their business, there is no cooperation expected while making this very important pricing choice. However, both firm being the only supplier in the market, they can cooperate and set their price mutually in a way that will ensure that no company will lose out to the other. Such arrangements are common in oligopolistic markets, where producers when faced by price pressure mutually agree to set their prices at the same level that will maintain the market share levels. In this game, each player (company) prefers to increase its market share over the other over maintaining the current market share. Therefore, they are taking conflicting moves to win over the other. The information about the available strategic choices is available to both firms. Both firms also know the current market share of their products and prices of the rival group. Each company has information about the strengths of the other company and knows how much they can support low prices in the price wars. They also know that the cost of crude oil has increased in the world market and that price was the tool to increase their revenues and growth. The only information both companies do not have is which choice their rival make and when. Companies will not make price changes at the same time; therefore the company that will make price changes after the other will have advantage over the other as it has prior information that is very important in making the pricing decisions. This game is an extensive game and the moves are in a sequence order. Therefore, timing of their moves is very important as it will give the second company advantage to make a well informed move. Using a hypothetical case, we take example of one company making first move and then the other follows. Using the game tool we can get the possible outcomes and solutions in an economic situation like ours. The payoffs assigned to each possible result indicate situations where a company can benefit (high payoffs) or lose out to the other competing company (low payoffs). Using a hypothetical example of oil companies BP Inc and Shell Plc as companies that operates in a monopolistic market, we can examine outcomes of pricing moves made by the two companies. The game can be used to give solutions to the price problem in a tight monopolisic market. The pricing game is based on the following assumptions: both BP Inc and Shell Plc are rational entities and in their moves their objectives are to increase their market share. Both firms make a sequential move on pricing that take extensive form (Fudenberg & Tirole 1991). Shell Plc makes their decision after the BP Inc makes their pricing move. There is perfect market information symmetry (all company has all market information). Other factors that affect influence market share of the companies are constant. Strategies employed are price increment, price reduction or maintaining the price level. Payoffs (utility functions) for the moves are assigned as: Company that increases its market share over the other gets 5, company that losses its market share to the other gets -5. The payoffs represent the companies gain or loss in market share. The range for payoff is from -5 to 5, with both the lowest and the highest value representing the highest gain and the highest loss. The medium values represent an outcome of moderate change in the market share of the companies. The game can be represented in a tree diagram as follows: BP Inc P^ Pv Pà ¦ Shell P^ Pv Pà ¦ P^ Pv Pà ¦ P^ Pv Pà ¦ (0, 0) (-5, 5) (-2, 4) (5, -5) (3, 3) (4, 2) (4, 0) (2, 4) (2, 2) If BP Inc increases its prices ( P^) due to increased world crude oil prices, and shell Plc increases (P^) too the outcome will be (0, 0) i. e. their market share would not change but their sales may reduce due to decreased demand. If Shell Plc reduces (Pv) the prices after BP Inc has increased its prices, the pay offs are (-5, 5) i. e. BP Inc will loss its market share at a rate that is same as one Shell Plc will increase its market share. In the scenario that BP Inc will raise its prices and Shell maintains its prices (Pà ¦), the payoffs are (-2, 4) i. e. market share for BP will reduce (Pv) but at low rate compared to Shell increment rate will be. On the other hand, if BP Inc reduces its prices first and then Shell raises its prices, the outcome will be (5, -5) i. e. market share for BP will increase at a rate thatââ¬â¢s same as the one Shell Plc will lose its share. If both firms reduces their prices, the payoff is going to be (3, 3) i. e. their market share will not change but their sales will be better (higher revenue than if prices are higher). However, if BP reduces its prices but Shell maintains its price, the pay off will be (4, 2) i. e. BPââ¬â¢s market share will increase comparatively higher than Shellââ¬â¢s. In the last scenario, in case BP maintains its price level but Shell Plc increases its price the outcome payoff will be (4, 0) i. e. BPââ¬â¢s share will increase over Shellââ¬â¢s at relatively higher rate. But if BP maintains its prices and Shell reduces its prices, the pay off will be (2, 4) i. e. Shell Plc will increase its market share at a higher rate than BP Inc. In the last possible scenario, if both BP and Shell maintains their prices, the payoff will be (2, 2) i. e. there is not going to be changes in the market share, though both firms will have higher sales than if they raise their prices. The game theory provides the solution that the second (shell) should take a move to reduce its price, if BP increases as it will greatly increase its market share. Also it can get increased market share and profit if it maintains its prices, after BP increases its prices. To the company that makes the first move, the best solution is to maintain the price level as it will have higher payoffs without risking the move by the Shell. These options are the only one that will increase their market share and profitable growth. The price game theory can be used to understand economic changes in duopolistic markets. The game can be used in making strategic pricing and marketing decisions. The approach is important to economic theorists in describing the economic rationale that relates to commodity prices, demand and supply dynamics (Guala 2005). Despite the usefulness of game theory, there are some challenges to this theory. The assumptions on which the theory is based sometimes do not hold (Fernandez & Bierman 1998). Game theorist assumption that players always act in a way to directly maximize their utility sometimes is violated by human behaviors i. e. in practice, human behavior often deviates from this model. This is because of the following factors that need to be considered; irrationality, new models of deliberation, and different motives (). In real life some people tend to respond irrationally in a situation where they are ideally expected to respond rationally. Also different people are motivated by different things and thus tend to respond differently in the same situation. To this end some theorists take game theory as tool for suggesting how people should respond but not as a tool to predict human behaviors and that game theory is used to explain strategic reasoning rather than strategic behaviors. Other limitations of the theory are based on the assumptions that prices changes are the only factors that will affect the demand of the oil products and consequently the market share. In real life there are rational factors that affect the market share of a product or a company. Quality of products and services, brand strength, promotions and other marketing strategies influences the demand of a product and its market share. Companies may also be motivated by other factors other than increasing market share when making pricing decisions. The theory also does not assign specific values to specify to what percentage a company gain or lose the market share. Since itââ¬â¢s an economic analysis it should give outcomes that can be easily understood and that make economic sense. However, the theory is very important in giving the general description of how individuals are expected to respond given a certain economic conditions. In the economic field the theory has been instrumental in explaining behaviors of firms and individualsââ¬â¢ producers and consumers. The theory is also very important in understanding how strategic decisions relate. Reference: Camerer, C. (2003). Behavioral Game Theory: Experiments in Strategic Interaction. Princeton: Princeton University Press Fernandez, L F. ; Bierman, H S. (1998), Game Theory with Economic Applications, Addison-Wesley Fudenberg, D. , and Tirole, J. (1991). Game Theory. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press Guala, F. (2005). The Methodology of Experimental Economics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Samuelson, L. (2005). Economic Theory and Experimental Economics. Journal of Economic Literature 43:65-107.
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