Philosophical Theory Essay

Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) was a renowned French philosopher of twentieth century Europe. His highly unique political philosophy was merely influenced by the work of Marx and Hegel. From 1945 and onwards, his writings had dominated political themes which further recognized him as Europe’s best public intellectual of the century. One of his famous essays was â€Å"Anti-Semite and Jew† which had criticized French complicity in the Holocaust and defined oppression as an interpersonal recognition distortion (Sartre’s Political Philosophy; IEP). He co-founded â€Å"Les Temps Modernes†, a journal which published seminal essays on world affairs and political theory. It was only in 1950 when Sartre’s political inclination bent towards Marxism; he eventually released â€Å"Critique of Dialectic Reason, Vol. 1† in 1960, a systematic account which massively spoke of group struggle and history (Sartre’s Political Philosophy; IEP). Critique embodied Sartre’s earlier radical view and philosophy of existential freedom which had further led to his pioneering fusion of Marxism and Existentialism – an original political philosophy which touched the tension between historical forces and individual freedom. Marxism implied that societies can be better understood through struggle which existed between powerless and powerful groups. Existentialism viewed individuals as entities responsible for the numerous authorless social ills (Sartre’s Political Philosophy; IEP). It is in this respect that authenticity is considered a primary existential virtue; that is, it is a requirement for a person to critically examine one’s social situation prior to his or her acceptance of personal culpability with respect to the choices one made within that certain situation. In short, his new political philosophy embodied theories of both moral responsibility and individual agency. His well recognized work â€Å"Existentialism is a Humanism† although which was presented and shared a common argument of the categorical imperative of Kant, spoke largely of Marxism and Hegelianism. With respect to Marx and Hegel, Sartre developed his very own political view as reflected on his â€Å"Notebooks for an Ethics† (1982) (Sartre’s Political Philosophy; IEP). He agreed with Hegel who claimed that in order to win recognition, humans need to undergo a mutual struggle (Being and Nothingness). Initially, Sartre rejected the notion of transcending struggle by relations of mutual and reciprocal recognition; that is, all human relations according to Sartre, were by products of the master and slave relation. However, his idea on human relations was altered as he made the Notebooks. This may be summarized into four parts: (1) that there is a possibility for struggle to be transcended by both reciprocal and mutual recognition (2) that struggle is located in history and society rather than in onthology (3) that the struggle for recognition is a significant component in analyzing oppression as a form of domination and (4) that social solidarity was an ontological reality (dependent on recognition ties) rather than psychological projection which Hegel had claimed. Sartre’s theory of Existentialism had always accompanied Marxism. His description of social reality utilized Marx’s structural analysis which he further used to â€Å"rescue† Marxism’s categorization as â€Å"lazy dogmatism† (Sartre’s Political Philosophy; IEP). The combination of Existentialism and Marxism into a single unique theory criticized not only the economic class being a significant structural factor, but also human situation as dictated by gender, family, death and birth. An individual’s intention, he further claimed, can be sufficiently explained not by â€Å"objective interests† alone but through the combination of class analysis and personal history. Soren Kierkegaard Another renowned philosopher and Christian existentialist Soren Kierkegaard relied on the theory of Existentialism with respect to understanding human relations and individual particularity. Prior the release of his famous work â€Å"The Sickness unto Death†, Kierkegaard had claimed that there are forces at work in society and history which when projected, tend to focus on â€Å"sheer oneness† defined by singleness and particularity rather than by unity with others (Kierkegaard, Soren; 1989). The European society’s massive industrialization in the nineteenth century had led to the disruption of rurally-based societies and organic groupings with their respective identified function. Kierkegaard claimed that the age of rationalization had further drained the ethical content with respect to a well-defined group’s membership (intensive division of labor, multiple social roles and loss of corporate identity) and promoted â€Å"rational† reorganization (Kierkegaard, Soren; 1989). It was in this respect that he emphasized the world’s need of â€Å"absolute† particularity in oppose to universality. The notion of particularity, as Kierkegaard claimed, is precisely reflected in the principle of Christianity. Individuals find themselves in a lonely self emancipating situation, by which they are considered single human beings who stand before God. The more individual lose one’s social identity, the more â€Å"spiritual† and undifferentiated one becomes. Kierkegaard’s notion of the â€Å"true self† is one which conforms to the image of humanity as reflected by God through Christ (Kierkegaard, Soren; 1989). With respect to this principle, there are two theoretical dilemmas which other public intellectuals like Sartre may be facing: (1) in such a manner by which an individual stood before God, there is a possibility that the split between social and personal life is further accentuated (in oppose to Sartre’s dependence on both social and personal analysis); that is, the self and social life cannot be combined into one and (2) the situational status itself and that an individual identity for instance, cannot be placed over social and familial roles (which again contradicts Sartre’s notion of human situation as a by product of family, gender and other social structures). The Existentialist Thinker If it is in fact true to say that neither Kierkegaard nor Sartre agree with each other’s philosophy, why are they both considered existentialists any way? The very notion of Existentialism suggests that individual essence can only be realized after the â€Å"existence† of an individual had occurred and not the other way around; and that human beings cannot be understood in terms of science (Existentialism; 2010; Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). As per Sartre’s definition, Existentialism viewed individuals as entities who are responsible for a certain social situation. In respect to this, an individual’s authentic value (so to speak one’s personal originality) is considered as the theory’s existential virtue necessary to examine one’s individual situation within a given social phenomenon. Kierkegaard, like Sartre, recognized the value for individual authenticity. Instead of relying on universality, he emphasized on the importance of absolute particularity of individuals. Placing a high regard for individual particularity over a more collective and universal approach to human relations and the society, Sartre and Kierkegaard somehow shared a common ground with respect to political philosophy. Thus, the accuracy of such theory may be defined in subjective terms rather than objective. Kierkegaard and Sartre viewed individuals as the center of rationalization; that is, when an individual is born, he or she is authentic by nature, one who dictated rather than be dictated by social condition; however, individual existentialism can be deemed applicable not only towards understanding human action and intention along with other social structures (for instance familial and social roles) but also towards absolute particularity which rejected the very notion of social influence. References â€Å"Sartre’s Political Philosophy†; Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP): A Peer Reviewed Academic Resource. Kierkegaard, Soren (1989); â€Å"The Sickness unto Death†; Penguin Group. â€Å"Existentialism† (2010); Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Sartre, Jean-Paul (1993); â€Å"Essays in Existentialism†; Citadel Press

Henri Bergson

HENRI BERGSON History of Ideas 2012 To: Sir Asad Shahzad 10/21/2012 GROUP MEMBERS: * AMMARAH MASROOR-12779 * ASFIA AZIZ-12718 * SYEDA AREEBA TARIQ-13055 SUBMITTED TO: SIR ASAD SHAHZAD DATE: 21/OCT/2012 TOPIC| PAGE| Henri Bergson – Introduction| 2| Bergson’s Intuition| 3| Intuition: Definition, Explanation, A small practice that led to Intuition| 4| Example, Sinking into Intuition, Explanation| 5| Another Example, Explanation, Intuition as Philosophical Method| 6| Intuition as Philosophical Method| 7|Bergson’s Time and Free Will| 8| TABLE OF CONTENTS: Time and Free Will: Space| 9| Time| 10| Past and Present| 11| Free Will and Determinism| 12| Bergson’s Creative Evolution| 15| Meaning of Evolution| 16| Creative Evolution: Definition, Essence of Life, Elan Vital, Book| 18| Comparison between Darwin’s Theory of Mechanical Evolution and Bergson’s Theory of Creative Evolution| 19| Critics| 22| References| 23| HENRI BERGSON:Introduction: Henri Bergs on (1859–1941) was one of the most famous and influential French philosophers of the late 19th century-early 20th century. Bergson was born in Paris on October 18, 1859; he was the second of seven children of a Polish Father and English mother; both of his parents were Jewish. Bergson was a notably exceptional pupil throughout his childhood. Like his German contemporary, Edmund Husserl, Bergson's original training was in mathematics.Although his international fame reached cult-like heights during his lifetime, his influence decreased notably after the Second World War While such French thinkers as Merleau-Ponty, Sartre, and Levinas explicitly acknowledged his influence on their thought, it is generally agreed that it was Gilles Deleuze's 1966  Bergsonism  that marked the reawakening of interest in Bergson's work. Deleuze realized that Bergson's most enduring contribution to philosophical thinking is his concept of multiplicity. Bergson's concept of multiplicity attempts t o unify in a consistent way two contradictory features: heterogeneity and continuity.Many philosophers today thinks that this concept of multiplicity, despite its difficulty, is revolutionary. It is revolutionary because it opens the way to a reconception of community. (www. plato. stanford. edu) BERGSON’S INTUITION BY: SYEDA AREEBA TARIQ HENRI BERGSON: He wrote a book ‘THE CREATIVE MIND’ in 1946. This book is an introduction to metaphysics which consist of collection of essays and lectures concerning the nature of intuition, explaining how intuition can be used as a philosophical method. Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy in which the nature of being and world is taken into context.Whereas, two important questions are answered 1. what is there? And 2. what is it like? I would be explaining what intuition according to Bergson is and why it is called philosophical method. INTUITION: DEFINITION OF INTUITION: * An immediate cognition of object not inferred or d etermined by a previous cognition of the same object. * Untaught pure knowledge. EXPLANATION: Philosophical definition of intuition says that it is an immediate process of knowing of some object not by reasoning or analyzing the previous knowing of the same object.It is therefore, said to be pure or untaught knowledge that one acquires at an instant. ACCORDING TO BERGSON: According to Henry Bergson intuition is described as a method of ‘thinking in duration' which reflects the continuous flow of reality. A SMALL PRACTICE THAT LED TO INTUITION: Once he was rolling and unrolling thread and said that this represent man’s sense of mortality and the continual gain of new memory; a spectrum of a thousand shades with a current of feeling running through them, collecting and retaining them, to represent how all the moments are heterogeneous.The human has tendency to build new memories and retain them. He said that human memory has stored thousand of new things different from th e one formed and the one that will form every time if they go through the process of knowing. EXAMPLE: Example that he gave was of a piece of elastic which is contracted than drawn out to its limit and we can observe that there is a flow. The elastic produces a line which grows long and long presents that something is pure indivisible mobile unit. SINKING INTO INTUITION: He says that this is duration which can’t be divided.It is the qualitative not quantitative it has multiplicity yet unity and is mobile and continuously penetrating itself. He even says that duration can’t be represented by concept. One cannot experience the feeling if just a concept is there. One can’t grasp duration with concept. But duration is grasped only by intuition. By which one is transported into an object to grasp what is unique and ineffable (can’t describe in word) within it. Intuition is a complete philosophical method that involves placing oneself within the Duration, and e xpanding it into a continuous heterogeneity.EXAMPLE: Take an example a person has captured lots of picture of CBM from different angles and a poet has composed a poem over life here but one cannot replicate the feeling of being in CBM itself whereas the poem can never give the dimensional value of walking in CBM. EXPLANATION: Thus any concept given cannot grasp duration flow of real time but intuition can grasp duration. One can sink into the other object by having intuition an instant knowledge which is unique can’t be explained is gain by person which forms a new memory.Thus intuition is a direct perception and experience of the continuous flow of reality, without the use of any concepts the flow of time as real duration can be experienced only by intuition. ANOTHER EXAMPLE: He uses the example of an artist who makes a series of sketches of Notre Dame in Paris. â€Å"Now at the bottom of all the sketches made in Paris, the stranger will probably write ‘Paris’ by way of reminder. And as he has really seen Paris, he will be able, by descending from the original intuition of the whole, to place his sketches in it and thus arrange them in relation to one another.But there is no way of performing the opposite operation; even with an infinity of sketches as exact as you like, even with the word ‘Paris’ to indicate that they must bear close connection, it is impossible to travel back to an intuition one has not had, and gain the impression of Paris if one has never seen Paris (201). † EXPLANATION: Here he says that if an artist has sketched a model of a city which he has actually seen and drew him would have knowing of the place which he has transferred to his sketches. He is descending from original intuition in order to place his sketches in it.But if a person who has never seen Paris he cannot enjoy Paris sketches as much as the one who saw in actual would transport himself to the sketches and intuit it as an object. The p erson never seen Paris can never feel like walking into the place rather he would make a new intuition of his one within the duration. A person can form an immediate knowing of object different from the knowing of the same object before by actually being in duration through intuition. Why intuition is called as philosophical method-of transporting into object to grasp what is ineffableIntuition is a method through which one cast off or throws his habits of mind that tries to break duration and thus convert the duration into space. To know anything as whole it’s necessary to intuit rather breaking into bits of pieces. Experience can only come from intuition. We hear melody; we hear the whole, not a series of notes one after another. When we  analyze the melody, we may indeed break it into a number of notes, but we are then analyzing the notes, not the melody. The melody, to be known, must be grasped as a whole. In other words, it must be intuited. Thus, the method of intuiti on is at essence the task of metaphysics.Metaphysics is not a synthesis of knowledge, a sort of piecing together of the notes to form a melody, nor is it analysis, the breaking down of a melody into its component notes. Metaphysics is the  experience of melody. Thus concludes Bergson in his â€Å"Introduction to Metaphysics†: â€Å"Metaphysics has nothing in common with a generalization of experience, and yet it could e defined as the whole of experience (l’experience integral). † BERGSON’S TIME AND FREE WILL BY: ASFIA AZIZ TIME AND FREE WILL (1889) – HENRI BERGSON Henri Bergson in his book has explained various different ideas amongst which the most studied are of * Time and Space The Idea of Pure Duration * Free Will and Determinism I will explain each point in detail. This book has influences Sartre towards Philosophy. This book is also considered to be an anti-thesis to Immanuel Kant. Kant proposed that Freedom is something beyond the circle of time and space. Time and space is considered as ‘same’ to Kant i. e. being homogenous. Bergson on the contrary, differentiates time and space and gives forward the concept of duration, a state in which freedom is experienced. (www. stanford. edu) The explanations have been extracted from his book â€Å"Time and Free will- An essay on the immediate data of consciousness† SPACE:Henri Bergson defines space as being homogenous. It is the same and identical to everyone perceiving it. He says that multiplicity exists in space. Multiplicity is the psychic state of being multiple at the same time. It has a connection with the human mind and reason, because reason enables a person to understand the state of multiplicity. Bergson demonstrates two kinds of multiplicity: 1. Quantitative Multiplicity: When we count physically existing materials and we localize them in space, it is called quantitative multiplicity.No symbolic representation and mental images are formed to p erceive this kind of state, because things exist physically in front of our eyes. (Key Writings, Bergson, continuum, p53) Example, when we count the number of sheep in a flock of sheep, we save images of the previous sheep in our minds as our counting progresses. These images are involuntarily fixed by us at a point in space. 2. Qualitative Multiplicity: This is the analysis of the states of consciousness being multiple when we perceive intangible materials or qualities. Here, formation of mental images and symbolic representation is important.Example, when we hear a noise of footsteps, our minds form a mental image of somebody walking and each of the successive sounds of the steps are localized in space; we count our sensations by localizing them into space and this leads to the demonstration of qualitative multiplicity. (Key Writings, Bergson, continuum p53) By defining the existence of multiplicity in space, Henri Bergson then defines space as: â€Å"Space is what enables us to distinguish a number of identical and simultaneous sensations from one another; it is thus a principle of differentiation† Some people say that simultaneous sensations are never identical.To support this point, Henri Bergson states that when we talk about homogenous medium we are talking about the simultaneity of terms which are identical in quality but are distinct from each other. Henri proposes that the higher the intelligence in a human, the more clear the understanding of homogenous space will be. Men have the special faculty of conceiving space without quality and hence we say that the medium where men localize simultaneous sensations and objects are the same for everyone. (Key Writings, Henri Bergson, continuum, pg 57) TIME:Usually many philosophers take time and space to be the same. But Henri Bergson, differentiates between time and space. For him, there are two kinds of time: * Mathematical time: Mathematical time is the time which is used in sciences by scientists. It is homogenous time which is the same for everyone. This is the time which many philosophers consider as space, as it is homogenous. (ibid, p63) Example, the time in hours, minutes and seconds used to calculate speed of a moving body is mathematical time. It can also be called the clock time. * Real Time or Real Duration:According to Bergson, real time is the time that we experience and it is continuous and flowing. It is heterogeneous as it is the qualitative representation of time that differs from person to person. It is also called the state of real duration defined by Bergson as: â€Å"Pure duration is the form which the succession of our conscious states assumes when ego lets itself live, when it refrains from separating its present state from its former states† To understand this, Bergson said that real duration is the state of mind where our ego dominates.Ego is the self of a person and directs the person’s mind to amalgamate the past states with the present states in an organic whole. In this conscious state, all states of mind permeate into one another to form it as a whole. (ibid, p60) Example, when we hear successive rings of a bell, we perceive that sound to be in a continuous rhythm and do not distinguish each ting of the bell. This amalgamation and permeation of the successive rings of bell into one organic whole is what real duration is all about. Past and Present:When Bergson speaks of the past, he does not mean the past, but our present memory of the past. Present is the only moment in the whole history of the world. Past resides in the present and that also changes the aspirations for future. This permeation of former and present states demonstrates real duration. Example, a man has a best friend and he believes him to have all good characteristics. One day, if he sees his best friend lying to him, all his perceptions about the good characteristics would change.This shows that his present will change his past and future too. This is how real duration is experienced in real life. Quotations by Henri Bergson, â€Å"The present contains nothing more than the past, and what is found in the effect was already in the cause. † â€Å"The idea of future, pregnant with infinity of possibilities, is thus more fruitful than the future itself, and this is why we find more charm in hope than in possession, in dreams than in reality† FREE WILL AND DETERMINISM: Real Duration vindicates human freedom and disposes off the path of determinism.To understand this, we must first understand these two doctrines separately. Determinism: It is a doctrine that all human choices, events and actions have sufficient causes and are pre-determined by the states of mind. For a determinist, freedom of choice is an illusion. This illusion can be presented as, that if a person has to select one branch from a lot of branches; the branch that he selects is a choice that is fully predictable because somewhere at the back of his mind he has the idea of which branch to select. www. informationphilosopher. com) In response to this example, Bergson proposed the idea of free will and said that the above choice is a choice through the formation of a mental image localized in space, which is inadequate to symbolize a choice. Choice is a temporal act for Bergson as it is pertaining to the present and conscious state of mind. Free Will: It is a doctrine that the events and actions of human beings are expressed through personal choices and are not governed by other forces or states of mind.Henri Bergson proposes that through experiencing real duration we can be free. The freedom of choice is fully certified by direct experience says Bergson. He describes free will as, â€Å"A man is free when his act springs spontaneously from his total personality and it has evolved up to the moment of action. If this spontaneity is absent, his action will be stereotyped† When man experiences real duration, he gains possess ion of himself and once self possession is attained, the man acts freely and creatively.Freedom has a strong association with personality or character of an individual. Character and personality changes from different situations which in turn changes our self. To demonstrate this idea, Bergson uses the saying of an English writer Stuart Mill: â€Å"To be conscious of free will must mean to be conscious, before I have decided, that I am able to decide either way† Bergson and other defenders of free will would be of the opinion that, when we perform an action freely, some other action is ‘equally possible’ which we leave and make a choice willingly.When a determinist says that our motives determine our action, Bergson says that motives are conflicting. He says that common sense believes in free will, and motives are not a necessity for defining our actions (Time and Free Will, Bergson, p148). To prove that motives are conflicting, Henri Bergson presents the sayings of Stuart Mill as: â€Å"I could have abstained from murder if my aversion to the crime and my dread of its consequences had been weaker than the temptation which impelled me to commit it. † In response to this Henri Bergson said, His desire to do right and his aversion to doing wrong are strong enough to overcome†¦ any other desire or aversion which may conflict them†(TFW, p150) Through this, the only idea that Bergson intends to provide is that the motives of ‘desire’ and ‘aversion’ are conflicting. But when the man decides to select one of them, it demonstrates his free will and freedom of choice. BERGSON’S CREATIVE EVOLUTION BY: AMMARAH MASROOR Let us first start with the basic definition of evolution, MEANING OF EVOLUTION: A process of formation or growth, progressive change or development in the  inherited characteristics  of  biological  populations over successive  generations† Hence the term ‘Evolutio n’ means that certain characteristics or genes starts transforming in a population which then results in a complete transformation of that population’s characteristics which was once inherited by the preceding populations. So it is said that the growth or development which has been taking place as the generations passed has thus completed and now it can be said that this species has evolved.This process of evolution can take place in living organisms as well as in non-living organisms. Some general examples could be the evolution of the bottle of coke or the evolution of airplanes, what we once used to see in cartoons and documentaries and what we see now in reality and in which most of us have travelled is absolutely an evolution. The best example for the evolution in living organisms is the evolution of mankind, the theory that Darwin proposed and the idea that he gave that, ‘Man is the descendant of apes’ CREATIVE EVOLUTION: Henri Bergson proposed the i dea of evolution as ‘Creative Evolution’.He believed that human beings are primarily to be explained in terms of the evolutionary process and that the mechanical process of random selection is inadequate to explain what occurs. According to Bergson: â€Å"Creative evolution is a sort of inner drive which he calls as â€Å"elan vital†, translated as â€Å"life force† and this life force has a connection with the real time that carries the process of evolution perpetually onward. † In order to understand this definition of creative evolution first one needs to understand the two concepts that he highlights in here: Essence of Life:For Bergson the essence of life is duration, the real time – time that is continuously flowing through which we have direct inner experience and is connected with life itself, with the life force that is the elan vital because of which goes on the everlasting process of evolution. Elan Vital: Bergson gives an explanat ion to this terminology as â€Å"an original common impulse which explains the creation of all living species†. The word’s literal meanings are ‘vital force’, ’life force’ or ‘vital impulse’. A combination of both real time and life force causes the process of creative evolution to begin. BOOK – CREATIVE EVOLUTION:In order to further explain his work and concept about creative evolution Henri Bergson wrote a book in 1907 which provided an explanation against Darwin’s Theory of Mechanism. He was also awarded a Nobel Prize for this work of his. COMPARISION BETWEEN DARWIN’S THEORY OF MECHANICAL EVOLUTION AND BERGSON’S THEORY OF CREATIVE EVOLUTION: In order to understand that why Bergson’s Theory is known as Creative Evolution and Darwin’s Theory as Mechanical Evolution let us have a comparison between the two theories. This comparison includes the 4 main points of both the theories and all t he points of each theory are interrelated with each other.The first and the foremost comparison between the two theories are about the approaches they follow. Bergson’s creative evolution follows the teleological approach of traditional finalism that is everything that starts comes to its natural place which ultimately makes the genuine creative creation. Now here the teleological approach comes from the word teleology which means that things should be explained by the appeal to their goal, purpose or functions. For example if you throw a rock it would go to its natural place – the ground, due to the gravitational pull that exists.Teleological whereas can be explained for the existence or presence of biological trait, structure or behavior by appeal to its function. In comparison to this Darwin’s mechanical evolution follows the mechanistic approach which precludes the possibility of any real change or creativity as the products of evolution is given in advance, in the form of pre-existent possibilities. This explains that this process deprives evolution of any inventiveness or creativity because this process is treated as pure mechanism which simply adds existence to something that already had been in the form of possible.Hence there is no difference left between the real and possible. Although both the approaches, to some extent are same because they provide us with the notion that â€Å"Whole is given†. Therefore, neither mechanism nor strict finalism can give a satisfying account of changes in life. The second comparison is about the Tendency Theory. Here Bergson talks about the â€Å"complexification† of life, that is, the phenomenon of its evolution from the simple original vital impulse into different species, individuals, and organs.Here he explains two concepts, firstly he explains that after evolution has occurred species are then differentiated into plants, animals and humans. Then he further explains that life is complex and in order to simplify itself it organizes itself into two great opposite tendencies, namely, instinct and intelligence. Here he then explains the second concept that these tendencies further provides a distinction between humans and animals, that humans have both these tendencies whereas animals only have one that is instinct.This is the reason why Bergson calls this evolution of mankind as ‘Creative Evolution’. In comparison to this Darwin speaks of the ‘Natural Selection’ – the primary mechanism of change over time which includes 4 components * Variation * Inheritance * High rate of population growth * Differential survival and reproduction This is very obvious from the four of its points that he believes that the more the specie is adaptable to change, the variance and tendency to inherit and the more it increases its population through reproduction it has more chances of evolution.The third comparison is that Bergson believes at the pe ripheral of intelligence a fringe of instinct survives which helps us to understand the essence of life. This means that at the boundaries of intelligence a border of instinct is present. His concept is that instinct is the primary factor whereas intelligence is the secondary factor. Instinct comes in first and then the intelligence, this is why instinct came first in all living organisms but then some of the organisms further evolved.Hence because of this evolution they can then be differentiated as animals – with instinct whereas humans – with instinct and then with intelligence (after evolution). Comparing this with Darwin’s theory it can be said that he had no concept of the two tendencies hence focused on the concept of â€Å"Survival of the Fittest†. According to him there exists no such tendencies which helps us to lead our lives, instead there is this concept of â€Å"Survival of the Fittest† where only those species survives that are open to changes, open to use available resources and can fit in the present environment whereas others are there to die.An example could be of the movie Ice Age where all the animals in that movie do not further exist instead they have evolved (the mammoth have now evolved as elephants). The point of Bergson in this comparison can be concluded as there is a little bit of instinct surviving within each intelligent being, making it to coincide with the life force. This partial coincidence is what found ‘Intuition’. The fourth comparison in actual is not a comparison because it is just a one sided difference.Here Bergson puts forward his view and connects it with his previous point of tendencies, that combined result of instinct and intellect is â€Å"intuition†. Through intuition, an individual understands the difference between ‘order’ and ‘disorder’. Intuition means gut feeling, sometimes known as the 6th sense. Bergson says that our way of p erceiving and knowing this world when based on the need for living is then an obstacle. To this obstacle he gives the name ‘Idea of Disorder’. This idea consists of three notions: 1.Order: things happening according to our needs and wants 2. Disorder: simply the order we are not looking for. Although this order may be correct for others but for us it is not happening according to what we want. 3. Nothingness: things that exist in space but we do not consider them to be as existing because it had never been our need. To this point of Bergson there is no comparing point of Darwin because he never came to the point of intuition. His theory stopped at the notions of ‘Natural Selection’ and ‘Survival of the Fittest’. LETTER TO HAROLD HOFFDING:Henri Bergson in one of his letter to Harold Hoff ding which was published in his book key writings said that â€Å"someone who gets a complete grasp on the creative evolution would never then believe on the p rocess of mechanism because in that time is useless†. CRITICS: Although Bergson made his ideas attractive with analogies and poetic metaphors he did not support them with rational arguments. He left them to the readers to understand it themselves on their level of intuition. Furthermore, his critics complained that his ideas did not stand up very well to logical analysis.His defenders replied by saying that he possessed all these characteristics in common with the best creative writers, and that this was because he was offering insights rather than logical arguments. REFERENCES: * www. google. com * www. googleimages. com * www. stanfordencyclopediaofphilosophy. com (plato. stanford. edu) * www. dictionary. references. com * Key Writings – Henri Bergson (continuum) * Modern Philosophy by Bertrand Russell * History of Western Philosophers * 20th Century Philosophy

Barriers and facilitators in collaboration with consumers and carers Essay

Barriers and facilitators in collaboration with consumers and carers - Essay Example The reason for failure of comprehensive health care being administered was that there is a lacking of well-trained mental health care staff and certain infrastructure not being in place making it difficult to provide quality care (Sundararamann, 2009). The Journal of the American Medical Association, which features a study carried out by the Centre for Disease Control lists tobacco, poor nutrition, excess alcohol consumption and infections as the main predisposing factors that result in death. This implies that focus should be on administering health care primarily in the form of educating the public as opposed to focusing on heart diseases, cancer and stroke, as has been the case. America has the largest budget on health care making it perceivable as the best in health care administration; however, this is not the case as the budget goes to medical care instead where the best medical facilities in form of research centres and medical schools have been set up. It thus becomes imperat ive to create a distinction between medical care and health care where the former is characterized by use of new technologies and the latter is centred on administration of quality care. In America this is evidenced by the fact that it has a higher infant mortality rate compared to England and France and similarly a shorter life span compared to Japan (Schimpff, 2012). In dealing with this problem of non-comprehensive mental health care administration, a mulch disciplinary team has become the solution where medical specialists from various fields are assembled to design a system that will facilitate quality health care administration. This is because a mulch disciplinary approach has been proven to achieve the best results when solving complex social problems such as childhood obesity. It follows a system of design thinking, which is defined as a novel, empirical, human centred, investigative approach to innovation aimed at providing innovative solutions not just to social organizat ions but businesses as well. It involves bringing together psychologists, anthropologists and other specialists to work collaboratively to design a system that solves a social problem in terms of administration of quality care. In most cases, consumers are also included in the designing in order to ensure the solution arrived at is agreeable. Its popularity arises from the fact that various skills, mind-sets and processes that have been gathered due to experience and cannot be taught in schools, are combined (Innovation design thinking, n.d). Mental health care refers to a broad range of services that vary from marital or family counselling to more specialized treatments for illnesses such as bipolar. It also encompasses mental disorders alluded to certain age groups for instance Alzheimer’s in old people and Attention Deficit Disorder in children, along with postpartum depression in middle-aged people. When administering mental health care, the services would include counsel ling, prescribing medications, inpatient care and outpatient care. There has been a shift in attention to medical health care following incidences such as the Virginia Tech shooting, leading the Congress to set out to transform the mental health care system; more so, because there was an outcry by the public regarding its adequacy. In 2008, following the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act, health insurers that choose to cover

The Emergence Of The Discipline Of Psychology From Its Early Essay

The Emergence Of The Discipline Of Psychology From Its Early Philosophical And Natural Science Beginnings - Essay Example He and his colleagues focused serious interest on studying the mind through experimental introspection. Introspection is the detailed mental self-examination of feelings and thoughts as they occurred. The research involved meticulous observation of simple events under controlled conditions-one that could be measured as to quality, intensity, or duration-and recording of the responses to variations of those events. The emphasis on control and measurement in these investigations were what first established psychology as a scientific discipline. Wundt initiated the concept of stating mental events in relation to objectively knowable and measurable stimuli and reactions. William James of the same era also followed the psychological method of introspection in The Principles, in which he defines as "the looking into our own minds and reporting what we there discover." However, J.B. Watson questioned the soundness of those approaches, reasoning that if one introspection yield a different result with another wouldn't necessarily mean that one set of results is correct and the other is incorrect. He argued that it was impossible to prove or disprove the results obtained by that method. He suggested that studies be confined to what can be measured and observed by more than one person. With that, Behaviorism was formed.

Business environment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Business environment - Essay Example International trade is a significant representative of Gross Domestic Product in many countries. International trade has social, economic and political benefits and these have been realized in most industrialized countries in the recent times. Other factors that have contributed enormously to the development of the international trade are globalization, advanced transport systems around the world, emergence of multinational corporations and practice of outsourcing by many countries. In general, international trade is globalization and it is a branch of economics. When economics is incorporated into international trade, a larger branch called international economics is formed. Foreign Direct Investment has contributed greatly to international trade. This type of trade occurs when an investor acquires an asset from a country other than their own with intentions of managing the property. FDI has been categorized into three classes namely: Equity capital - this refers to the value which a multinational corporation has invested in shares of an enterprise in a foreign country. It includes both mergers and acquisitions and Greenfield investments made by the multinational company in a foreign country. Reinvested earnings- This represents the value of shares that Multinational corporations have invested in affiliate earnings as dividends. The retained profits by the affiliates are assumed by the multinational company to be reinvestment in the affiliate. This can represent up to 60 per cent of outward FDI in the United Kingdom. It is imperative for countries around the world to engage in bilateral FDI arrangements due to enormous growth in institutional, economic and legal interlinkages between countries. FDI has boosted economy all over the world. There is increment in the annual global flow of around $250 billion as experienced between 1985 and 1995. United

Introduction to Business Law Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 1

Introduction to Business Law - Essay Example While the historical methods of resolving the disputes e.g. civil litigation etc. are still very much intact and effective but their limitations have also been highlighted in modern age. This has given rise to the idea of finding alternate methods of dispute resolution or alternate dispute resolution (ADR). In this paper we will look at what is ‘Alternate Dispute Resolution’, what are its types, how it evolved and what is its effectiveness towards access to justice. We will also see if there are any challenges confronting alternate dispute resolution. When a dispute is resolved through non-conventional methods it is knows as alternate dispute resolution. It â€Å"can be defined as the resolution of disputes other than rendered by the judicial system†. (Rosa, Santa, 2009) There are many ways in which a dispute can be alternatively resolved but following are the most commonly used ones: When the parties to a dispute appoint a neutral referee to hear their dispute and make the decision it is knows as arbitration. The person working as the referee is known as the arbitrator. There can be one or more arbitrator in arbitration. Arbitration is mostly used when there is an arbitration clause in contract between two parties stating that in case of a dispute both parties would go to the arbitrator instead of going through the tradition legal forums. (Lew, Mistelis and Kroll, 2003) Mediation is a system to reach a consensus among conflicting parties. In mediation a mediator is appointed with the consent of all parties. The mediator tries to talk to concerned parties both in the presence of each other and alone as well. Mediation, as a process of reaching a decision, falls short of arbitration as the status of mediator is only to facilitate the dialogue between parties and not make a final decision regarding the dispute. (Stitt, Allan, 2004)

Life before new technology Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Life before new technology - Essay Example In addition, the calls were not of the best quality meaning that by using landlines, phone calls had a higher chance of being dropped as compared to today’s cell phones. This is because; the switching process between calls was a manual process, before the automation of the system. In addition, there was a higher likelihood of landline telephony infrastructure getting vandalized, making calling a nightmare. This is as opposed to today’s telephony services, where calls are reliable and can be made without worries of dropping or getting disconnected. In addition, the calling rates were sky high considering the number of telephone service providers. Call providers were few and limited to certain geographic regions meaning that one only had limited choice in getting provider and, as a result, was at their mercy. With the emergence of the cell phone, calls are cheaper as compared to before their presence, with more service providers, and thus more choice due to competition br inging calling right to a cheap bargain (Goyal, 2002). This is, in addition to text messaging that, eases communication substantially without calling or consuming much time. Before the mobile phone people had to be confined in a given area to make, or even, receive a call. This made it highly inconvenient for both or all parties involved as one could not make or receive calls at their own time and at any place they wished, which made it very difficult to communicate because communication was opportunistic gamble that one had to make. With the cell phone, calls can be made at any place, and one’s own convenient time. In addition, another issue was the intertwinement of business and personal issues, as calls at work were strictly business and could not involve personal issues as it led to unprofessional conduct. Due to lack of cell phones and the presence of landlines created professional images in accompanies and businesses. However, the presence of cell phones has come to bri dge the boundary between personal life and the work place. This is because; they create opportunities for integrating work and personal issues, as one has the same number for the two aspects (Wajcman et al, 2007). Communication, other than the use of landline phones to make calls, required one to write letters, telegrams, and telegraphs or even fax the information to other individuals. With this in mind, communication was a slow process taking up to weeks to reach the intended individual. This was especially so between friends who intended to keep in touch and relate with each other easily. The process of communication was tedious and inefficient considering that the letters did not always get to the intended individual at all, or in time. Social media, on the other hand, has eased communication by linking different people from a variety of divides and bringing them together (Mueller, 2011). In respect to this, information flows easily between interested parties and cuts on the requ ired to create and receive a response. Still, on flow of information, networking was a difficult thing to do as there was no single place to be in order to meet people with similar interests and goals, unless an individual met them by coincidence or created a local group of people who can easily meet if need be. However, social media has made that outdated by bringing numerous people and groups together. This is in order to share ideas and thoughts on different topics with increased ease. This is especially

Mathematics IB Internal Assessment Research Paper

Mathematics IB Internal Assessment - Research Paper Example The shipping services and product business takes place along the Qatar Bahrain Causeway which links Bahrain and Qatar. This is the longest marine causeway in the world. The country, Bahrain has a very basic economy. Only 1 percent of Bahrain is arable, hence, the country cannot produce sufficient food to sustain its ever increasing population. Therefore, the entire population majorly relies on imports. The major employers in this country are commerce, industry, and services. These fields take up 79 percent of workers, while 20 percent has been absorbed by the government. Farmers make up the remaining 1 percent of the population. The country has distinctive cost difference in shipping and products across the world due to its island nature and the existence of the Qatar Bahrain Causeway. However, it is important to note that most of these jobs are held by foreigners who make up 60 percent. This has made employment a continuous problem. The economy of Bahrain is largely based on the pro duction and processing of petroleum which makes up 60 percent of the exports. 30 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) also comes from the same. The well established and developed transport and communication is accountable for efficient shipping services and it being the center for finance and banking. Several multinational firms doing business in the area of Persian Gulf have their headquarters in Bahrain. The cost difference in shipping and products in Bahrain results from its fruitful commercial activities. Some of the country’s products shipped to other countries include vegetables and fruits, dairy products, poultry, fish, and shrimp which are sold along with handicrafts produced locally. On the other hand, Bahrain depends on tourism making up 9 percent of its gross domestic product and a great deal of international banking. The industries engaged in shipping services and products in Bahrain include the major industry, petroleum production, processing, and refining , offshore banking, aluminum smelting, tourism, and ship repairing. In addition, the products shipped to other countries include cement blocks, soft drinks, plastics, paper products, and asphalt. Although shipping and products across the world are somehow convenient to the major industries, shipping in Bahrain is efficient because of its location and availability of Qatar Bahrain Causeway which connects the island to the offshore main land such as Iran, Iraq among other countries. Some countries like China have made huge profits on their exports to other countries such as the United States. However, the imports and exports of Bahrain are approximately equal in value. Petroleum accounts for about 60 percent of the exports while aluminum makes around 7 percent. These exports are majorly shipped to Japan, South Korea, India, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. 40 percent of the country export is composed of crude oil processed within the country. However, Bahrain as well has im ports shipped into the country. The major imports of the country include transportation equipment, machinery, and food from Saudi Arabia, Japan, the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom. The cost difference in shipping and products in Bahrain is also accounted for by the nature of division of labor. As mentioned earlier, 79 percent of the workforce is in industry, services, and

Case study Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 1

Case study - Essay Example In 1993, Peter Solvik joined Cisco and made IT the central functionality of the company. He showed interest in starting many projects for the upgrading of IT in the company. He brought many changes and supported the company in adopting IT successfully. However, when Peter Solvik left the company and Boston joined as the new CEO, there were many problems revealed with the current IT adopted by the company (McAfee, McFarlan and Wagonfeld 4). ERP was introduced by Peter Solvik in the company and was installed for handling inventory and manufacturing functions but with the passage of time, other functions was also added to the ERP system due to which, problems were there (McAfee, McFarlan and Wagonfeld 3-4). Boston after becoming the CEO identified these problems and showed interest in three main projects, which were to upgrade the ERP, to develop enterprise reporting and business information solution and to develop a single database (McAfee, McFarlan and Wagonfeld 5). This paper will di scuss all the relevant details of the case in depth. IT Governance Styles at Different Levels Peter Solvik after joining Cisco changed the company’s consideration of IT as an overhead. He made sure that IT performed the role of central functionality of the company. According to his opinion, without using latest technology, the company was not able to progress. Under his governance, ERP system was implemented, which was to handle manufacturing and inventory tasks at the start. In his tenure, the company created its own internet and intranet, due to which not only the data transfer procedures were eased out but also many customers were added to the company’s profile due to which, the company was able to generate more revenue. Peter Solvik’s IT governance style was profitable and commendable for the company as it was due to this style that the company gained reputation and enhanced profits in the market. The organization was made an IT centralized organization (McA fee, McFarlan and Wagonfeld 3). At network/infrastructure level, internet and intranet were developed to control all network related functions such as sales, manufacturing and others. A website was developed with the name Cisco.com. At data level, intranet was used for data transferring while at application level, the ERP was developed to handle the manufacturing and inventory applications of the company. Problems with Cisco There were many problems with the company’s IT by 2001, which were discovered after Boston’s joining the company. Many customized tools were there to handle different functionalities for which, extra costs were paid. The investment for the customized tools was too much and information retrieval was problem. In addition, there was no central decision making for the IT functions as every department made its own decisions due to which, there were problems related to upgrading ERP system of the company as a whole. There was lack of centralized planning , which was again problematic for the company (McAfee, McFarlan and Wagonfeld 5). Many old custom interfaces were required to be put out of action in order to install a newer version of ERP, which will be problematic for the users of ERP. In addition, ERP was designed mainly to

Ethical issues Essay Example for Free

Ethical issues Essay Code of ethics for education defines the professional behavior of educator and serves as a guide to ensure there is ethical conduct. Professional standards commission came up with standards that give guidance as far as conducts that are general accepted in education profession. For this case, there is assurance of protection of safety, health and general welfare of teachers and students to ensure some degree of accountability within the education profession and defines unethical conduct justifying disciplinary action. Educators ought to uphold ethics such as moral sensitivity, moral judgment, moral motivation and moral character among others wile working. Ethical standards are set such as criminal acts, abuse of students, alcohol or drugs, misinterpretation, public fund and property mismanagement and improper remunerative conduct among others (Code of ethics for Educators, 1999) How is it then possible for a teacher, who has been trusted with the welfare of children, dare think, for a moment to have a sexual relationship with a student? Well, here is a case study in Leewicks High School in America. English teacher charged with having affair with student, February 1998 English teacher, Mary (not real name), 35 years old was charged with criminal sexual exploitation and having a sexual and romantic affair with a minor 16 year old boy. She admitted having sex with the boy. Suspicions were raised about the affaire when people saw them together cuddling and holding hands away from the school. Another teacher, Mrs.  Shael (not real name) also found a hand written note with the student’s initials on Mary’s desk. There was also a piece of paper with a list of things she wanted to do which included dinner out and â€Å"great sex! † Police said they seized letters in which Mary wrote. She was upset that the boy wanted to breakup the relationship. The boy told the police that the relationship started when he was 15 years old while baby sitting Mary’s son and taking care of her dogs and cats. They also exchanged gifts and letters, including wedding rings, police said. Mary was arrested at school and initially denied the allegations, saying the boy was fantasizing. Police said that she later confessed. Prosecutors noted that Mary initially made up a cancer story to save her marriage from breaking, and later on continued to use the same lie in order to be absent in her place of work and in an effort to keep the lover boy from terminating the relationship Mary was ordered on bail and could be sentenced to more than eight years. She was suspended with pay. She has separated with the husband; they had a 9 year old son. Mark (not real name), the principal of the school said the whole school felt betrayed. This became the topic of discussion among students and teachers in the school. Some students found it hard to believe the story as they described her as a very nice teacher who is always positive. † She was a very dear teacher to us† student commented. Some felt the act was disguising. The disciplinary action taken might lead Mary to be fired by the education managers. She is likely not to serve the eight years in jail because she can easily be released on bonds. Mary could alternatively have been asked to compensate the teen for sexually using him. The ministry of education could monitor the educator’s conduct and performance after an investigation is held. This action is to ensure that the prosecuted educator is abiding by laws and regulations of the sector. Professional certificate or license could be suspend or revocation. The action is usually taken the way it is outlined in educator’s code of ethics. Another alternative way of dealing with the case is not to allow the educator to be engaged in to play the role of volunteers. Or substitute teachers or any position during the time of her revocation, suspension or denial for the violation of the code of ethics. These solutions though acceptable, may complicate the situation because the students will loose the teacher and the education performance be affected. The sector will also have lost a human resource.

Knowledge-based organization

Knowledge-based organization Knowledge-based organization Introduction Most organisations in one way or another have embraced the notion that to operate effectively in todays economy, it is necessary to become a knowledge-based organization (Alvesson, 1993). But few truly understand what that means or how to carry out the changes required to bring it about. Perhaps the most common misunderstanding is the view that the more a companys products or services have knowledge at their core, the more the organization is, by definition, knowledge based. The knowledge-based society of the 21st century is characterized by knowledge generation as the primary source of wealth and social well-being. This economic development, facilitated by networked actions of a variety of global actors utilizing new information and communication technology (ICT) including Internet technologies, is fundamentally changing the rules of the game of performing in both private and public organisations. Accordingly, new concepts, frameworks, models and theories are required in order to increase our understanding of the principles of the creation and use of knowledge and information as a resource. This development both in theory and in practice is evident because, contrary to the traditional factors of production, knowledge and information are partly intangible in nature. It is therefore vital for organisations to provide a holistic view of contextual factors which have an impact on the creation, processing, storage, maintenance and use of information and know ledge as a resource. Moreover, organisations must know more about the means that affect processes related to knowledge and information. Knowledge-Based Organisation in Malaysia In the early 1980s, when the Japanese advances in the economy and began to make great impacts on the business state of affairs, knowledge work began to make headway to the workers levels. The Japanese enterprises show their way to knowledge work at the workers levels through such practices as QCC activities, 5S activities, Kaizen suggestion schemes and the like. These practices continue to contribute to improving productivity and competitiveness in production. By mid 1980s, Japan has overwhelmed other western companies and organisations with their low cost and high quality products by it techniques and quality tools. Malaysia as any other countries in the world is moving towards improving their information technology facilities and services. After achieving independence on 31 August 1957, Malaysia was basically a resource-based country and depending on the extraction of natural resources. The need to provide jobs for the local population then was one of the primary foci of the economic development plans. In order to compete with Japanese organisation success Malaysian government in the Malaysian Context of Industrial Development has emphasis learning in every national agenda. The Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) Malaysia launched the First Industrial Master Plan, 1986-1995 (IMP1) in 1986 with the main focus is to rationalize the industrial growth process and the growth of manufacturing industry. The Malaysian Prime Minister first mooted Vision 2020 in 1991 and it is Malaysia national vision for the countrys continuing development into a developed nation (Ahmad Sarji Abdul Hamid, 1993). Even with the success of the IMP, the Total Factor Productivity (TFP) growth recorded over the period 1992-1997 was below the expected level. The manufacturing-based industrialization strategy will only take the country into an industrial society and this will not be sufficient to achieve the post-industrial/advanced industrial society and a civil society as envisaged in the Vision 2020 (NITC, 1998). As Malaysia prepares to become a knowledge-based economy, new strategic focus calls for the nation to work towards the digital economy and a knowledge-based economy. The national response to this is the National IT Agenda (NITA) to direct the progress and the Multimedia Super Corridor (MDC, 1999) and its associated programs that aim to create the IT waves towards this new economy (NITC, 1998). Organisations will have to refocus their strategies to be globally competitive. The new competitive strategy will be knowledge-based, and organisations will have to be knowledge-focused. Even if production of tangible outputs is the core business, the competitive strategy will have to be knowledge-based. In other words, the competitiveness of an organisation will be its knowledge rather than is physical outputs. The proposition here is that managing and exploiting organisational knowledge or knowledge management is a strategic focus for organisation to achieve competitiveness, and the learning organisation is the outcome of this strategic process. Knowledge Management initiatives are developing in a wide variety of government sectors in varying countries around the world and this conference will provide and intergovernmental forum for the discussion of best practice in public sector knowledge management. A recent survey reveals that 73% of governments feel they have made mistakes in setting up their online systems and 56% say that the work has taken longer than expected. Nonetheless, 89% are not yet tired of implementing e-government. By placing individual services on-line, government departments could achieve cost savings of up to 25 percent. If departments collaborate to provide a one-stop shop for a handful of services-say, by creating a World Wide Web site where you apply for a drivers license, pay a traffic ticket, and make an appointment for an emission inspection-the figure raises to 45 percent. Getting departments to collaborate is the tricky part. What is Knowledge? Knowledge as we all know comes from a cycle that involves the transformation from data to information and to knowledge. Information if it is not interpreted accordingly will not be knowledge. Knowledge is an organised combination of data, assimilated with set of rules, procedures, and operations learnt through experience and practice and without meaning knowledge are just information or data (Bhatt, 2001). It is only through meaning that information finds life and becomes knowledge (Bhatt, 2000). McDermott describes six characteristics of knowledge that distinguish it from information (McDermott, 1999): 1. Knowledge is a human act. 2. Knowledge is the residue of thinking. 3. Knowledge is created in the present moment. 4. Knowledge belongs to communities. 5. Knowledge circulates through communities in many ways. 6. New knowledge is created at the boundaries of old. In today competitive environment, organisations are competing which each other to achieve a high competitive advantage. In this era information is now considered as the most important assets in organisation. Information comes from knowledge and knowledge comes from the mind and experience of an individuals. Davenport and Prusak (1998) have provided the following definition of knowledge: Knowledge is a fluid mix of framed experiences, values, contextual information, and expert insight that provides a framework for evaluation and incorporating new experiences and information. If originates and is applied in the minds of knower. In organisations, it is often becomes embedded not only in documents of repositories but also in organizational routines, processes, practice, and norms. Knowledge management emphasizes on the inter-personal communication over the mere capture and storage of knowledge. Organizational intellectual assets and capital are the most priority aspects of the knowledge management efforts. Knowledge is the important elements in a value-chain. This value chain includes data, information, knowledge, wisdom, and the conceptualisation of knowledge management as a process of refinement, leveraging data and information to the more valuable level. These value-added elements can help organisations in problem solving and decision-making to improve performance and increase innovations. Innovation is an ongoing process in which organisations create problems, define them, and then develop new knowledge for their solution (Beveren, 2002). Knowledge Management Knowledge management is an emerging trend. This is because organisations have started to realize the importance of knowledge in order to achieve competitive advantage. Recent years have seen an explosive increase of interest in knowledge management. As well as a massive outpouring of books and articles on KM, many organizations have embarked upon their own KM programmes. A recent KPMG survey (KPMG, 1998) of 100 leading UK firms found that a staggering 43% of respondents were undertaking some kind of KM initiative. For an organisation to survive they must be able to move one step further from their competitors and would be able to differentiate themselves between other. Creating and sustaining a competitive advantage a one way of achieving goals. To coupe with these rapidly changing environments, organisations needs to know what are their corporate knowledge assets and manage these assets to sustain competitive advantage. Knowledge belongs to the family of progressively increasing corporate assets, like management systems, brand identity, customer information and corporate reputation (Pascarella, 1997). Knowledge is a person, highly personal asset and represents the collective expertise and efforts of networks and alliances. Knowledge management has becoming the most critical aspect in organisation to achieve competitive advantage. Nonaka (1991) stated that in an economy where the only certainty is uncertainty, the one sure source of lasting competitive advantage is knowledge. According to McCampbell (1999), to have a successful knowledge management projects, knowledge management was at least partially responsible for a major transformation of one large consulting firm and the transformation was all-embracing in terms of a marked improvement in financial result for the firm while engaged in knowledge management practices. Knowledge Management is multi-disciplinary approach and has now becoming very powerful concept. It is rapidly growing practice used as strategic tool for organisation to produce efficient and productive product and services. This concept helps organisations to seek and maximize value by helping people innovate and acclimatize in the face of change. As the world is moving towards a global knowledge economy, proper management and practice of knowledge can transform services and product and put value into it. As global competition based on knowledge intensive products or services swiftly increase, it is little wonder that organisations are seeking ways to harness knowledge through business strategies and knowledge management tools and techniques (Vandermerwe, 1997). Many organisations are already thriving in our increasingly knowledge-intensive world, often referred to as the new or knowledge economy. These organisations are achieving success by focusing on how knowledge can be used to deliver value to the organisation and its stakeholders. Knowledge management helps people prepare for an environment of constantly shifting demographics, industries, economies, and customer needs by ensuring that people have the expertise and information they need in order to properly assess business problems and opportunities. Knowledge Management is a process that helps organisations to find, select, organize, disseminate, and transfer important information and expertise necessary for activities such as problem solving, dynamic learning, strategic learning and decision-making (Gupta, Iyer and Aronson, 2000). Knowledge management caters the critical issues of organizational adaptation, survival and competence in face of increasingly discontinuous environmental change. Essentially, it embodies organizational processes that seek synergistic combination of data and information processing capacity of information technologies, and the creative and innovative capacity of human beings (Malhotra, 1998). Tacit and Explicit Knowledge There are two types of knowledge. Knowledge that cannot be articulated is called tacit knowledge. In organisations, tacit knowledge is the personal knowledge used by members to perform their work and make sense of their worlds (Choo, 2000). Tacit knowledge is also as important as explicit knowledge. The only problem that occurs is that tacit knowledge is hard to be explained and communicate. As Michael Polanyi the chemist-turned-philosopher who coined the term, put it, We know more than we can tell. Polanyi used the example of being able to recognize a persons face but being only vaguely able to describe how that is done. Contrast to tacit knowledge, explicit knowledge is the knowledge that has been articulated, capture in the form of text, tables, diagrams, product specifications and so on (Cortada, 2000). Explicit knowledge is also knowledge that is expressed formally using a system of symbols and can therefore be easily communicated and diffuse (Choo, 2000). This type of knowledge is the most recognized and captured by organisations. Most organisations concentrate more on explicit knowledge because it is easy to understand and capture (Barlow, 2000). Both tacit and explicit knowledge are very important and critical to organizational information or knowledge management system development. It is just a matter of identify and captured it to make it as an valuable assets. TACIT EXPLICIT INDIVIDUAL DEPENDENT Personal Tacit Self-Motivated Creativity Know-How Know-What Know-Why INDIVIDUAL INDEPENDENT Cultural Tacit Organisational Tacit (e.g. Causal Ambiguity) Regulator Assets (Copyrights, Patents, Trademarks) There are three types of explicit knowledge resident in any organisation 1. Cognitive knowledge, 2. Advanced systems skills, and 3. Systems understanding. In Figure 1, Meso and Smith (2000) described cognitive knowledge, also termed know-what is the basic mastery of a discipline that professionals achieve through extensive training and certification (Quinn et al., 1996). Advanced skills or know-how refer to the ability to apply rules of a discipline to complex real-world problems (Quinn et al., 1996). Systems understanding, also termed know-why is the deep understanding of the web of cause-and-effect relationships underlying a discipline (Quinn et al., 1996; Nonaka, 1991). The creation of new knowledge comes from the ongoing innovations form learning organisations. Therefore, organizational learning occurs at the intersection of tacit and explicit knowledge during the interaction of the various employees, departments or teams in an organisation (Nonaka, 1991). Sustainable competitive advantage results from innovation. Innovation in turn results from the creation of new knowledge (Meso and Smith, 2000). Knowledge Creation It is process how organisation gathers internal and external information in one system. Knowledge creation refers to the ability of an organisation to develop novel and useful idea and solution (Marakas, 1999). Nonaka (1994) identifies four mechanisms for knowledge creation: 1. Socialisation whereby one individual shares tacit knowledge with other. Sharing of experiences through observation, imitation and practice; 2. Combination whereby one pieces of explicit knowledge is combined with other; 3. Externalisation whereby tacit knowledge is made explicit; and 4. Internalisation process of experiencing knowledge through an explicit source, where explicit knowledge is converted into tacit. Meanwhile Rovertson (2001) has identified four types of organisational knowledge: 1. Conscious, which is an individuals explicit knowledge; 2. Automatic, which is an individuals implicit knowledge; 3. Objectified, which is explicit, social knowledge, and 4. Collective, which is implicit, social knowledge. Knowledge Capture Knowledge can be captured inside and outside organisation. The captured knowledge then will be integrated within one system in organisation as a resource. The purpose of knowledge management is to integrate internal and external knowledge at all time in order to cope with environmental changes both within and outside the organisation, to solve existing problem as well as to innovate for business expansion. Beveren (2002) provides a model where information is acquired through the sensors and processed in the brain by using prior knowledge (see Figure 1). Where: Knowledge is the stock of conceptual tools and categories used by humans to create, collect and share information. During the processing of information, new knowledge can be acquired or created for future use, when more or new information is acquired and processed. Knowledge Dissemination Knowledge dissemination in corporate knowledge is involving with the activity to disseminate or distributes knowledge to members in organisation. Knowledge benefited to organisation if they can disseminate. Knowledge needs to distributed and shared if an organisation to leverage value from it (Bhatt, 2000). Beveren (2002) illustrates how knowledge is transformed into information within the brain to be communicated externally through language or demonstration (see Figure 2). Language in this model includes all forms of communication, such as written, verbal and body language. In this model, the prior knowledge contained in human brains is required for the creation of information, just as the creation of knowledge often requires the input of information through the sensors to the brain. The initial formation of prior knowledge has been a huge area of debate for many years and has been discussed from two opposed positions, the empiricists and the nativists. Organizational Learning 2.5.3 Knowledge Sharing The organisational creation of differential knowledge, at its central part, springs unpredictably and unknowingly from social interchanges between competent organisations. Thus the importance of organizational behaviour in adapting to change is self-evident. Unfortunately, our understanding of the processes of organizational change is quite limited. The basic facts of human cognition are that our brains have the capacity to establish an extremely large number of possible networks of connections, but only a small fraction of this potential can be realized. Indeed, the growth of knowledge and the possibility of innovation depend on the incompleteness of present connections (Loasby, 2000b). Knowledge sharing only takes place on a significant scale where organisations have organized themselves into communities of practice. These communities need to be integrated to the companys strategy and its organizational structure.The phenomenon of communities of practice is known under different names. The World Bank, for example, is leveraging global knowledge sharing to attain its goal of becoming a clearinghouse for expertise on sustainable development (Wah, 1999) and they are called thematic groups; in Hewlett Packard they are learning communities or learning networks; in Chevron they are called best practice teams, and in Xerox they are know as family groups (Denning, 2000). Many practitioners pf knowledge managementincreasingly see knowledge sharing as a better description of what they are about than knowledge management. Advantages of knowledge sharing as a term include its commonsense comprehensibility, along with a certain degree of inter-activity implicit in any sharing. Drawbacks of knowledge sharing include the possibility that even sharing is insufficiently interactive, and that it implies (falsely) that the existence of knowledge precedes the sharing process, thereby (wrongly) separating knowledge management from knowledge creation and innovation and research. Knowledge Exploitation Knowledge exploitation is one of the vital parts in corporate knowledge. Knowledge exploitation means making knowledge more active and relevant for the organisation in creating values. If an organisation did not find it easy to locate the right kind of knowledge, the organisation may find it difficult to sustain its competitive advantage (Ganesh 2001). There are certain indicators for an organisations ability to create, disseminate and apply knowledge. Demarest (1997) identified six key questions an organisation has to answer to participate in knowledge management effectively: 1. The culture, actions and beliefs of managers about the value, purpose and role of knowledge; 2. The creation, dissemination and use of knowledge within the organisation; 3. The kind of strategic and commercial benefits a organisation can expect by the use of effective knowledge management; 4. The maturity of knowledge systems in the organisations; 5. How a organisation organise for knowledge management; and 6. The role of information technology in the knowledge management program. Using Demarests model, McAdam (2000) in his research on A comparison of public and private sector perceptions and use of knowledge management found that in terms of knowledge construction, organisations recognised the need for both a scientific and a social construction of knowledge if the benefits of knowledge management were to be realised. Knowledge embodiment was found to be highly dependent on employee interchange, which must be recognised as a source of knowledge and key to the success of knowledge embodiment in organisations dissemination and use. Approaches to knowledge dissemination as part of a KM system were found to be mainly ad hoc. There was little systematic use of the more sophisticated methods available. The use/benefits of knowledge management within the organisations studied was based mainly on reduced costs, and improved quality and efficiency. Creating, managing and transferring knowledge is the top of agenda for a growing number of organisations in the Chase study. They believe knowledge management would improve performance and result such as improved decision making, increased responsiveness to customer, improved efficiency of people and processes, increased ability to innovate and improved products and services (Chase, 1997). Although organisations recognised the importance of creating, managing and transferring knowledge, the research findings also found that many of the organisations still have been unable to translate this competitive needs into strategies. Other conclusion from his study is that the best practice organisations are experiencing great difficulty in translating knowledge management theory into practice. Communities of Practice In todays organisations community of practice seems very important for employees to contribute and share their tacit and explicit knowledge for the organisation development. Community of practice can be define as a group of practitioners who share a common interest or passion in an area of competence and are willing to share the experiences of their practice. Community of practice can play an important role in leveraging knowledge in organisation. Gamble and Blackwell (2001) defined community of practice as collections of individuals bound by informal relationship who share a similar work role in a common context. They are groups that: 1. Come together voluntarily for a shared purpose; 2. Have members that identify themselves as part of the community; 3. Repeatedly engage in activities with other member s and communities; 4. Have interactions that last for an indeterminate period of time. An essential ingredient of knowledge sharing programs in large organisations is the community of practice. In undertaking knowledge sharing programs, most organisations have found sooner or later that the nurturing of knowledge-based communities of practice is a sine qua non to enabling significant knowledge sharing to take place. Such communities are typically based on the affinity created by common interests or experience, where practitioners face a common set of problems in a particular knowledge area, and have an interest in finding, or improving the effectiveness of, solutions to those problems (Denning, 2000). Launching and nurturing communities of practice for knowledge sharing programs can be accomplished in a variety of ways (Denning, 2000). 1. Endorsing informal communities that already exist. 2. Asking practitioners what issues they care about. 3. Instructing leaders to form communities. 4. Launching purely virtual communities. 5. Launching communities among the incorrigibles. Communities of practice can add value into organisations in several important ways: 1. Community of practice can help to drive strategy. 2. They can start new lines of business. 3. They can solve problems quickly. 4. They transfer best practice. 5. They develop professional skills. 6. They help companies recruit and retain talent. Organisational Culture Organizational culture is a critically important aspect for facilitating sharing, learning, and knowledge creation. It is not homogeneous and sometimes has subcultures (McDermontt and Odell, 2001). An open culture with incentives built around integrating individual skills and experiences into organizational knowledge will be more successful (Gupta, Iyer and Aronson, 2000). Goh (2002) argues that one cultural dimension critical to knowledge transfer is co-operation and collaboration. Recent research on co-operation in organisation may help increase organizational understanding of the dynamic knowledge transfer. Knowledge transfer requires the willingness of a group or individual to work with others and share knowledge to their mutual benefit. Without co-operations and collaboration culture knowledge transfer form individuals and groups will not be successful. Culture plays significant function in the success of knowledge management implementations. McDermontt and Odell (2001) used a definition of culture that helped to see its multiple levels (Figure3). Following Schein (1985), McDermontt and ODell defined culture as: The shared values, beliefs and practices of the people in the organisation. Culture is reflected in the visible aspects of the organisation, like its mission and espoused values. But culture exists on a deeper level as well, embedded in the way people act, what they expect of each other and how they make sense of each others actions. Finally, culture is rooted in the organisations core values and assumptions. Often these are not only unarticulated, but so taken-for granted that they are hard to articulate, invisible to organizational members. Because of these layers of culture, people can often act in ways inconsistent with the organisations articulated mission and values, but consistent with its underlying or core values. Following this definition, in an organisation with a knowledge sharing culture, people would share ideas and insights because they see it as natural, rather than something they are forced to do. They would expect it of each other and assume that sharing ideas is th e right thing to do. In order to achieve high level of collaborations and co-operations, there is a fundamental variable needed. It is a matter of trust. A high level of trust is therefore an essential condition for a willingness to cooperate. Trust belongs to the area of human factors in knowledge management. It is defined as expectations and acts that the members of the community direct to each other. In organisations trust supports and enables collaboration and knowledge sharing which are processes related to knowledge management. Collaboration and knowledge sharing are based on organizational culture and climate, which can either support or prevent them (Yoon, 2000). In order to overcome cultural barriers to sharing knowledge has more to do with how organisations design and implement their knowledge management effort than with changing the existing organizational culture (McDermontt and ODell, 2001). It involves balancing the visible and invisible dimensions of culture; visibly demonstrating the importance of sharing knowledge and building on the invisible core values. The companies we studied felt they are still learning how to do this effectively. McDermontt and ODell (2001) derive five critical aspects about aligning knowledge sharing with the organisation culture. 1. To create a knowledge sharing culture, make a visible connection between sharing knowledge and practical business goals, problems or results. 2. Match the overall style of your organisation rather than to directly copy the practices developed by other organisations. 3. Link sharing knowledge to widely held core values. By linking with core values of the organisation values, you make sharing knowledge consistent with peers expectations and managers considerations. 4. Human networks are one of the key vehicles for sharing knowledge. To build a sharing culture, enhance the networks that already exist. Enable them with tools, resources and legitimisation. 5. Recruit the support of people in your organisation who already share ideas and insights. Managers need to encourage and even pressure people to share their knowledge. Build sharing knowledge into routine performance appraisal. There must be a well-built culture of continuous improvement and learning, linked to problem seeking and problem solving and focused on specific values such as product quality and customer service. Employees are encouraged to gather relevant information and to use and share that information in problem solving and implementing innovative solutions and practices (Goh, 2002). Organisational Knowledge Structures Organisational knowledge structure is different than organisational culture and climate in at least two significant ways. The concept of knowledge structures deals with goals, cause-and-effect perspective, and other cognitive essentials. Furthermore knowledge structure is more clearly linked to an organisations plan for survival and more subject to change than an organisations culture, neither of which changes readily of provides specific strategies for action for an organisation (Lyles, 1992). In developing knowledge structures, there are three stages that individuals go through to reach agreement (Weick and Bougon, 1986): 1. Agreement on which concepts capture and abstract their joint experience; 2. Consensus on relations among these concepts, and; 3. Similarity of view on how these related concepts affects each party. Human resource is an important asset and within these resources lays the knowledge useful for organisations. In order to develop organizational knowledge the role of individual knowledge is very important. Organizational Change The organisations creation of differential knowledge, at its core, springs unpredictably and unknowingly from social interchanges between competent organisations. Thus the importance of organizational behaviour in a

The Dairy Science Department at Cal Poly :: Agriculture

The Dairy Science Department at Cal Poly The Eugene and Rachel Boone Dairy Science Complex at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo contains a fully-operational dairy and research facilities for students in the Dairy Science department. This complex is located on Mt. Bishop Road, past the Crops Unit and Veterinary Hospital, and sits in the scenic foothills of Bishop’s Peak. Cal Poly has one of the largest Dairy Science departments in the country and it is the only university on the west coast to offer a specific Dairy Science major. The first-rate facilities at Cal Poly allow students to learn about feeding, milking, calf raising, artificial insemination, and the management of dairies in the classroom and then practice what they have learned on the purebred Jerseys and Holsteins. The Dairy Cattle Instructional Unit was built in 1992 and is used for a wide range of instructional activities. The first floor of this unit contains two classrooms, a computer room, a nutrition and physiology laboratory, and a microbiology laboratory. Numerous plaques and awards from local cattle shows dot the white walls. Cal Poly has bred some of the top-rated cows in the nation for type and production and individual cows have won many awards for the rich content and amount of milk produced. Industrial-like stairs along one wall lead up to the second floor where visitors can view the milking process. Cows are milked at the milking parlor daily from 4 to 6 am and 4 to 6 pm. This immaculate parlor can milk 16 cows at one time and contains state of the art milking equipment including an energy-efficient pre-cooling system, which the milk passes through before being stored in two 3,000-gallon bulk tanks. The physiology laboratory is used for artificial insemination, feed a nalysis, and dairy biotechnology courses. Students perform experiments such as embryo manipulations and transfer techniques in this laboratory. Beyond the Instructional Unit are the barns where all the cows reside.

Analysis of the immigration problem :: essays research papers

Analysis of the Immigration Problem The world has gone through a revolution and it has changed a lot. We have cut the death rates around the world with modern medicine and new farming methods. For example, we sprayed to destroy mosquitoes in Sri Lanka in the 1950s. In one year, the average life of everyone in Sri Lanka was extended by eight years because the number of people dying from malaria suddenly declined. This was a great human achievement. But we cut the death rate without cutting the birth rate. Now population is soaring. There were about one billion people living in the world when the Statue of Liberty was built. There are 4.5 billion today. World population is growing at an enormous rate. The world is going to add a billion people in the next eleven years, that's 224,000 every day! Experts say there will be at least 1.65 billion more people living in the world in the next twenty years. We must understand what these numbers mean for the U.S. Let's look at the question of jobs. The International Labor organization projects a twenty-year increase of 600 to 700 million people who will be seeking jobs. Eighty-eight percent of the world's population growth takes place in the Third World. More than a billion people today are paid about 150 dollars a year, which is less than the average American earns in a week. And growing numbers of these poorly paid Third World citizens want to come to the United States. In the 1970s, all other countries that accept immigrants started controlling the number of people they would allow into their countries. The United States did not. This means that the huge numbers of immigrants who are turned down elsewhere will turn to the United States. The number of immigrants is staggering. The human suffering they represent is a nightmare. Latin America's population is now 390 million people. It will be 800 million in the year 2025. Mexico's population has tripled since the Second World War. One third of the population of Mexico is under ten years of age, as a result, in just ten years, Mexico's unemployment rate will increase 30 percent, as these children become young adults, in search of work. There were in 1990 an estimated four million illegal aliens in the United States, and about 55 percent of them were from Mexico. These people look to the United States.

The Internet. Essay -- Design and Technology

The Internet. The Development of the Internet The Internet had started as a research project that was funded by the US Military. There were only three computers that were linked up to this network at this time. After 1969 a total of four computers were linked to this network, but nowadays there are billions. To link onto the internet everybody had a dial up connection which was a connection through your telephone line, when you wanted to go onto the internet a analogue signal would have been sent to your telephone provider and you would have been billed by them according to what your pay package was. The disadvantage of this was that you couldn’t accept telephone calls that were being made to your phone numbers but now the latest technology allows telephone calls to be accepted regardless if you are on the internet and now a new digital signal is being used instead of the old analogue one. Before simple information was displayed on the internet for example reviews and news and membership clubs were common, but now anything can be found on the internet. The internet also has a long way to go before it is 100% safe in the future; internet developers are working on improving the search engines, privacy and the security of the internet. Spam Spam is the name given to unwanted e-mails. This could be things advertising new products, or get rich prize draws, credit schemes and pornography. Spam can cost businesses as much as a couple of million pounds to send out computers. Spam can be sent to home computers as well as business computers. Businesses try to filter Spam by using blockers but these attempts may fail, because Spam is sent out in its millions this can clog up the internet network causing computers to rum slow or even crash. E-mail E-mail is short for electronic mail. E-mail is not only for fun but plays a large part in effective communication between major businesses. Almost everybody connected on the internet has an e-mail account. Accounts are free and can be achieved by singing up with companies such as yahoo, AOL and hotmail. Due to e-mail accounts being free storage space is limited. If you wish to have more storage space to keep more e-mails then the providers of your account offer you the chance to purchase a bigger account at a small price which you normally have to pay each month. Depending on ... ... should only contain material that is relevant and suitable for them. Ø Any pages that are likely to offend people should have a warning on them e.g. racist pages. Ø Links should not connect people to inappropriate sites when they are unaware of it. Ø People should not send Spam Ø Adverts on the internet should be true and not just joking about Ø If it is a purchasing site any extra cost such as VAT should clearly be shown Ø The advertisers name should be shown clearly Ø Information on web sites should not encourage illegal acts Ø Private data can’t be shown without the person knowing about it. Conclusion Overall the internet is a fast way to obtain information from a lot of different sources it is a good time killer if you are bored as it has billions and billions of different websites to explore. The internet is also a good way of advertising and selling and equally purchasing items. Although there are many draw backs the internet has more advantages than disadvantages. The fact that there are billions of people connected to the internet opposed to four computers when it was first set up means that it must be a good place to visit.

1:45 British Time, 11th September 2001 Was When the Unthinkable Happened Essay

1:45 British time, 11th September 2001 was when the unthinkable happened. One of the tallest buildings in the world was hit by a passenger jet. The people on the streets of New York could only watch in shock, horror and disbelief as the low-flying aircraft headed straight for the northern tower of the world trade centre. The jet headed for roughly the 65th to 70th floor of the tower. In a split second, the jet disappeared into the side of the tower, exploding as it did so. Only ten minutes later, when television crews had been alerted to the scene by the first incident, another low-flying aircraft was spotted. Live on US television, the jet banked left and disappeared into the southern tower, exploding as the first one had. As I stated in the first sentence, this all happened at about a quarter to two in the afternoon. On arriving home from school, I still wasn’t aware of what had happened a couple of hours ago. I went down to the newsagents down the road to buy a magazine. I noticed that the shop assistants were paying very close attention to the radio, yet it still didn’t come to me that something was up. At around half past four I turned on the television and couldn’t believe what I saw. There were images of the disaster, being shown over and over again. It didn’t come to me immediately how serious the incident was. As I carried on watching, I began to understand more clearly the significance of the disaster. And seeing images of people coming out of the buildings with blood all over them made me wonder who on earth would want to do a thing like that. The slow motion replays of the crashes showed how the jets simply tore through the walls of the towers like cardboard, and exploding as they went through the walls. It was painful to watch, and sickening to think of all the people on board the plane and inside the buildings. These terrorist attacks had been extremely well planned. Both of the jets were on domestic flights, where the security is not as tight as international flights are. It would be easy, experts say, to take a knife on board. In addition to this, both the flights would have been 6 hours long had the disaster not happened, so there was a lot of fuel on board which would have aided the fire spreading down through the building. It really hit home to me how dreadful it must have been inside the buildings as television pictures showed numerous people jumping to their death from the towers. How desperate must the situation inside have been to jump from 80 floors up? I dread to think. Soon the situation worsened. I gasped with horror as pictures of one of the towers collapsing to the ground were broadcasted by the English stations. It was simply horrible to see, and the dust created was so thick that some of the pictures showed nothing because of the dust in front of the camera. A few minutes later the other tower disappeared from that famous New York skyline as well, and the terrorists had fully succeeded. The terrorists must have also been able to fly the aircrafts. Surly no American pilot (or any nationality pilot for that matter) would fly an aircraft into the Twin Towers, whether threatened with a knife or not. I can’t believe that American Airlines would be so careless, as the crime rate in America is extremely high anyway. Of course I am not saying that any normal American would want to fly a plane into a major building in their own country, but if there was a mentally disabled person who got on a plane with a knife you never know what they might do. If security on these flights had been tighter none of this would have happened, surly. The disbelief was still around for many days after the disaster actually happened, and fire fighters were still searching through the rubble, hoping to find a few survivors among the mess. A few days after the crashes, it was thought that the person responsible was Asuma Bin Laden. As time went on it became more and more certain that Bin Laden was responsible, and eventually the man himself admitted as much on Afghan television. He is now the most sought after person in the world, with George W. Bush offering a $25,000,000 reward for anyone who can tell the USA where Bin Laden is hidden. Even thought I’m not American, everytime I see Bin Laden on the news, anger builds up inside me. How could someone do what he did? He doesn’t look like someone who has killed thousands, but he has, and he’s possibly the most hated man in the world. Having been to New York, (and incidentally, opting to go up the Empire State Building rather than one of the Twin Towers, which I now slightly regret), I feel that I can relate more to what has happened than I would have been able to otherwise. The photos I have of the skyline of New York obviously include the Twin Towers, and I can imagine how wrong the skyline now looks. When I look back on the photos, it makes me wonder why those buildings, which fitted into the skyline so well, are nolonger there. Why did Bin Laden do this? In conclusion, my feelings now, compared to my feelings right after it happened haven’t really changed. Having found out who was responsible, I now know what direction to put my hate towards, and the initial shock has faded, gradually. But when September 11th is mentioned, I still spare a thought for the people in the buildings and on the aircrafts and their families. I dearly hope that nothing of this nature ever happens again. And to finish I think that it is worth asking the question: If God does exist, where on earth was he on September 11th?