Platos Allegory of the Cave Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Platos Allegory of the Cave - Essay Example The prisoners come up with a guessing game on what the images they see on the wall could be. The one who gets his guess right on what the next object to appear is gets praised by his fellow prisoners and is viewed as a master of nature, even though none of these things they guess have they seen or known.Plato finds a problem with this kind of knowledge where people believe in truth in things they have even not seen or experienced. Plato has his own view of how people should perceive and arrive at truth in their daily encounters in life. The first perception is: sensory perception. This entails the world as it appears, how we see it, feel it using our senses. The second kind of perception is spiritual perception. This comes about after we ignore the sensory perception and set out to seek deeper insight on the basic knowledge we have (Herman 2013). This previous perception happens to be Plato’s ideal philosophy of all time and the ideal kind of concept.Aristotle’s rhetori c can best be defined as the art of observing the necessary cause of persuasion in any given situation. According to Aristotle’s Rhetoric, he finds it okay for people to talk about things (ideal) they envision or have heard about as though they were actually in touch with them (Rorty, 1996). In his view this believe in the vision would bring them even closer to these ideal. Aristotle believed that human beings had the ability to look at how communications happen around them and deduce meaning and come up with convincing arguments.

International Economics, Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

International Economics, - Essay Example The success of RTA is mainly due to low trade barriers with all global partners. This means the most positive impact will be gained from free trade as researches show that least amount of tariff or no tariff is most advantageous for a regional trading agreement to become successful. Custom union, common market and economic union, all impose a certain amount of tariff on the goods. This greatly affects the amount of goods to be traded as an economist said: ‘the successful expansion of trade among the members of a regional trade agreement tends to be associated with increasing extra regional imports as a share of GDP and with the growth of world trade.’, and extra regional imports will only be increased if there will be no or minimal tariff. Economic unions and custom unions are only beneficial for international trade and can only produce positive results if implemented in conjunction especially in case of EU, and this what happened in 1990’s. Trade can only be flourished if the country undertakes international trade and involves in exchanging goods and services from different countries around the globe. International trade means starting trading of goods with foreign countries which means foreign exchange pouring in the country, leading to more GDP and resulting in more finance for the industries to make exportable goods. As exports will increase due to more exportable stock, trade will be flourished. International trade improves the relations between two or more countries. Improving relations means more chances of your own good to be sold in their markets, thus fostering trade (Nayan et al, 2010). International trade increases the productivity of a country; more production takes place leading to more people getting employed in the country, and therefore with more share in the GDP, there will be more growth in the world of trade.

Reasoned Action and Planned Behavior Theory

Reasoned Action and Planned Behavior Theory Buyer Behavior and Marketing Strategy The theory of reasoned action assumes that consumers consciously consider the consequences of the alternative behaviours under consideration and choose the one that leads to the most desirable consequences (PO: 8th edition: 2008) where intention is the key cognitive demonstration of a persons willingness to carry out the specific behavior and is the single best predictor of actual behaviour (PO: 8th edition: 2008) this means that any action that requires a certain amount of cognitive thinking and decision process requires a behavioral intention in order to complete the behavior. The Theory of reasoned action is not relevant for extremely simple or involuntary behaviours such as automatic eye blinking. Turning your head at the sound of the telephone, or sneezing (PO: 8th edition: 2008) The Theory of reasoned action is an adapted and broadened development of the multiattribute model by Fishbein. This is a useful guide for devising strategies to change consumers attitudes (PO: 8th edition: 2008) The theory also assumes that people tend to perform behaviors that are evaluated favourably and are popular with other people (PO: 8th edition: 2008) therefore external and environmental factors influences such as the social environment and personal variables such as values, goals, lifestyle patterns and psychological characteristics manipulate the consumers intention to engage in the behavior. If the behavior is seen or regarded unpopular among people in close proximity of that person then it is highly likely that the intention to perform the behavior will not occur. Behavioral intention (BI) is a proposition connecting self and future action (PO: 8th edition: 2008) and these are created through Choice and Decision process (PO: 8th edition: 2008) depending on consumers intention to engage in that behavior and the subjective norm regarding whether other people want the consumer to engage in that behavior. The strength of intentions of the consumer is very important aspect as this is combined with evaluations that highlight the consumers salient beliefs about the function consequences (PO: 8th edition: 2008). This combination creates the attitude towards the behavior or action where we can see the overall manifestation of evaluation of performing the behavior. For marketers the measurements of these beliefs are important and the same method is used to measure beliefs about product attributes. attitudes towards behaviors are likely to be strongly related to specific behavioral intentions (PO: 8th edition: 2008) Thus in continuation if behavioral intentions and actions become more specific towards an object then this strongly changes attitudes toward the salient beliefs and consequences of the behavior moreover forming different evaluations. This is important as marketers must be careful to determine whether they are concerned with consumers attitudes toward the object in general or some action regarding the object (PO: 8th edition: 2008) for the measurement of strengths and evaluations of salient beliefs about the consequences. For example it would not be odd to find that a consumer enjoys eating take away fish and chips occasionally, but they would have negative attitudes toward eating takeaway fish and chips everyday as this behavior would have negative consequences and would not be perceived as a favourable or popular among other people. The levels of specificity should be appropriate in relation to attitudes as more specific actions will see the need for different behaviours the measured intention should be specified at the same level as the observer (PO: 8th edition: 2008) other wise the relationship between measured behavioural intentions and observed behaviour will be weakened. This relates to appropriateness of specific behavior in specific situations, for example if a person wore jeans to the gymnasium for a work out, the observed behaviour by the social norm would think it is inappropriate.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Social Norm is another key element in the theory of reasoned action as this reflects consumers perceptions of what other people want them to do (PO: 8th edition: 2008). This of course is directly linked with behavioral intention and the individuals compliance to the expected social normative beliefs. Measured in probability of individuals motivation to conform to the subjective social norm, similar technique to how behavioral intention and belief strength is measured. If the subjective norm is higher then than intentional strength, then the behavior is evaluated under normative control rather than attitude linked control. In addition another hugely important factor is time, time is the major predictive accuracy of measured intentions, the longer the intervening time period, the more unanticipated circumstances (PO: 8th edition: 2008) consumer intentions and attitudes change over time and the longer it takes between measurement of intentions and observation of behavior the more likely other factors adjust the original intention so that it no longer corresponds to the observed behavior. Thus marketers must expect lower levels of predictive accuracy when intentions are measured long before the behavior occurs (PO: 8th edition: 2008) In 1985 the Fishbein model was modified once again with an additional variable of perceived control in the Theory of Planned Behaviour, this variable assumes that the consumer does not have complete voluntary control over some behaviors, if this is the case then we assume that the intentions are misleading which would create inaccuracies observed behavior. Addictions to smoking and alcohol would deter perceived control where he or she has little or not control, in comparison to someone walking into a supermarket and with out going through any cognitive or decision making processes picks up a Cadbury bar instead of a Mars bar. But do consumers really approach and purchase products in the same fashioned way by the theory outlined? The theory is required to be falsifiable, and looking at different perspectives of authors, critiques and methods of application in real time environments we can come to a better understanding of whether this theory is accurate or not Like any other theory posed in the past, the theory of reasoned action has been under criticism for the past 30 years, The theory of reasoned action identifies the types of cognitive and affective factors that underlie a consumers intention to perform a specific behavior, although intentions determine most voluntary behaviors, measures of consumers intentions may not be perfect indicators of the actual intentions that determine the behavior (PO: 8th edition: 2008) According to PO, the theory of reasoned action gives possible motives, triggers and possible cognitive and decision making processes that determines peoples behaviors through behavioural intentions, The intentions themselves are not solid indicators that people will actually perform those behaviors. According to David Trafimow in his Journal Theory of Reasoned Action: A case Study of Falsification in Psychology (2009; 19; 501) David Trafimow poses a question which is also posed by Miniard and Cohen (1981) that criticises two key components, what if behavioural beliefs normative beliefs are really different names for each other? and as a consequence Trafimow underlines that there is a conceptual problem with the theory of reasoned action. The suggested illustration of a behavior is eating a chocolate bar; the behavioral belief is my father will disagree with me if I eat a chocolate bar and the normative belief is my father thinks I should not eat a chocolate bar. This clearly suggests that there is a contradiction in the theory where it states that behavioral beliefs and normative beliefs have a clear distinction. As a result of this contradiction the theory is left rendered unfalsifiable (Trafimow: 2009; 19; 501) so if this distinction is considered incorrect then surely attitud e and subjective norms subject for question? In contrast to the theory of reasoned action researchers believe that attitude contains both affective and cognitive variables (Trafimow 2009; 19; 501), (Triandis 1980). Factor analysis is used on this assumption to test and determine the conception of attitude by many researchers; however Trafimow indicates that researchers limiting themselves to factor analysis paradigms would in no way seem to falsify the theory. Instead, Trafimow Sheeran (1998) include auxiliary assumptions to assume an associative hypothesis to test on participants associative pathways if beliefs that are more cognitive are likely to become associated with each other compared to beliefs that are more affective. The results substantiates the hypothesis, The participants in the study contiguously retrieved cognitive beliefs to each other and affective beliefs to each other; therefore it brings us to an essential assumption about the theory of reasoned action attitudes do not contain distinctive and affective comp onents (Trafimow Sheeran, 1998) As a result of this falsification it is this reason that the theory has directed the modification to apply distinction in the Ajzen and Fishbein model (2005). The application of theory of reasoned action in marketing environment research methods   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Trafimows method of auxiliary assumptions to falsify theories has shown us that the theory of reasoned action is used widely by many researchers and marketers nevertheless it is still not an unconditional technique. Personally, the theory is still an assumption and it does not accurately illustrate consumers approach to the purchase of products, as shown by Trafimows case study the theory is proving unfalsifiable and has critical conceptual problems that would need to be addressed before this theory could be used to show accurate results, but even then human psychology and behavior studies are still in the dark ages and achieving that is a accomplishment for the future generations.

Transfer of Personal Data to a Third Country :: Safe Harbor Agreement Human Rights Essays

Transfer of Personal Data to a Third Country I. Introduction 1.) An old issue, growing in importance Searching the web, one can see that privacy on the Internet is a big issue. Countless US or EU based human rights initiatives are fighting for the right to privacy. What is the reason for this? Although concerns about consumers' ability to protect their privacy have been in existence for decades, the Internet makes the issue more delicate: Businesses have access to a larger audience, which allows them to collect more data from more people. Furthermore, collection of more specific behavioural information is possible attaching cookies to a hard drive, reporting which websites someone enters.[1] In addition, data collection and storage having become much easier, faster and cheaper, cost concerns do not limit data-collection practices.[2] At the same time, the market for information about consumers and consumer behaviour is continuously growing, side by side with the expansion of e-commerce. 2.) Definition of the issue Privacy can be defined as "the right of the individual to be protected against intrusion into his personal life or affairs, or those of his family, by direct physical means or by publication of information."[3] This paper will focus purely on information privacy, also known as "data protection", which means the rules governing the collection and handling of personal data such as a person's name, address, phone number, family status, social security or other identification number or even medical, financial or government records. Data protection concerns the process of gathering, storing, analysis and distribution of personal data. Privacy issues can be divided into relations with the public sector and with the private sector.[4] In this paper, I will concentrate on the private sector, especially relevant because of the growing importance of e-commerce. 3.) Fundamentally different approaches in the US and the EU Europe and the US have very different approaches to data protection and privacy. In 250 years, nations on each side of the Atlantic have evolved their democracies into distinct forms of society and market economy. Differences in culture, policies and society are the consequence. a.) Government Interference vs. Self-Regulation As discussed in seminar one, there is an ongoing dispute regarding the approach in choosing an apt legal framework for the public and transnational sphere of cyberspace: Some scholars want governments to interfere as little as possible, others see the need for a unified legal framework. It seems that, concerning the privacy issue, the EU has chosen the latter option, by imposing a comprehensive, general law governing the collection, use and dissemination of data by public and private sector, whose enforcement is assured by an oversight body. The US tends to rely on sectoral laws, and on self-regulation for the

Critical Evaluation

The purpose in writing my critical evaluation essay is to do any analysis of a writer's point of view. In addition, it is to do an evaluation of the author's message. That is, what is the thesis or key idea the author was trying to get across. I will explore the writer's arguments that were offered to prove the focal idea and a summary of the author's solutions for action. It is my hope, with the critical evaluation, that l, along with the readers of my essay, will discover whether the author provided appropriate evidential support and the effectiveness of it.I also pop to provide some new insight and understanding to a topic that is so important to our history. This assignment allowed me to research a topic that is so important to our history. I was greatly intrigued that a group of atomic scientists who were responsible for creating such a meaner of destruction were pleading to halt the use of the atomic bomb against Japan. Not only through the course of my critical evaluation did I learn more about the events that led up to the bombing of Japan, I developed an understanding of the struggles between science, politics, and moral obligation and consequences.Moreover, to believe that if this plea could have been written in a different way, it could have affected the course of history. The difficulties I encountered during this writing assignment were ensuring I evaluated it in a logical manner, free from emotion due to the impact it had on our history. I attempted throughout the process, to perform research of the topic and make myself more knowledgeable of the events that led up to the petition and what took place after. I also had to ensure that while doing a critical evaluation off topic does not mean to be negative.But rather, it meaner being objective and well- informed. I enjoyed this assignment because it allowed me to revisit a topic in history that had such a huge impact. Although, I was aware of the author and who he was, I was not aware of the importa nce of this petition and how it could have changed the course of history. This assignment allowed me to evaluate an important part of history, pose and challenge questions about the topic, and see the strengths and weaknesses of a particular point of view.The article I chose is Leo Galliard's â€Å"Petition to the President†. As I stated previously, I chose this essay because of its huge impact on history, the struggle teen moral obligation and politics, and how the history course of events could have been altered had this article been written differently. Furthermore, with this article, it was easy for me to see the use of ethos versus pathos and the implications of the author's writing style.Michael Martinez Professor Shields ENGLE 102 Effectiveness in Writing 24 May 2013 In 1945, when it became public that the Truman administration planned on using atomic bombs against Japan, a group of scientists, many who had worked on the project, decided to protest. Led by Leo Sailor, a petition was written to the president or his fellow scientists to consider. It asked the President â€Å"to rule that the United States shall not, in the present phase of the war, resort to the use of atomic bombs† (Sailor, par. 1).Galliard's arguments expressed in the petition lacked the strength and persuasion needed to convince the President that the use of the atomic bomb against Japan was unjustifiable due to the lack of facts presented, the numerous fallacies found within the writing, and the failure to express the weight that their arguments held in the decision. In Leo Galliard's petition to the President, the author repeatedly utilizes the appeal f pathos, expressing the ideas in a way that invokes emotion and feelings from the audience, particularly the president. Galliard's states: Atomic power will provide the nations with new meaner of destruction.The atomic bombs at our disposal represent only the first step in this direction and there is almost no limit to th e destructive power which will become available in the course of this development. Thus a nation which sets the precedent of using these newly liberated forces of nature for purposes of destruction may have to bear the responsibility of peeing the door to an era of devastation on an unimaginable scale (Sailor, par. 5). Here, Sailor was trying to describe to the President that the results of using the atomic bomb would not only affect Japan, but ultimately the United States.Not only would the United States have to bear responsibility of having unleashed this atomic power, she would feel the effects of it when it would be used, inevitably, against other countries in the future. The author's overuse of pathos made his appeal less convincing and failed to convince President Truman that the use of atomic bombs against Japan was unwarranted. If Sailor had appealed to the President with the use of ethos, it would have made a more successful petition and proven his credibility as an expert. The lack of facts presented and the failure to express the weight that their arguments held weakened their petition. For example, as creators of the atomic bomb, they were aware of the specific catastrophic effects, including radiation poisoning. This is information that only the scientists knew and excluding it created a huge defect in their petition. A petition based on the scientist's logic and expertise would have proven far more effective. Excluding critical information that only the scientists knew should have been used as the main incentive to persuade the President.Not addressing the fact that it was them who created the atomic bomb and they knew of its enormous destruction capabilities, was a key point that should have been addressed. The petitioner's recurring use of pathos and pleas of emotion and moral obligation diverted the logical truths of their arguments. A factual representation of the have ultimately changed the course of history. Leo Sailor and his fellow co-sign ers did not prevent the bombings of Hiroshima ND Nagasaki, thus, proving that the arguments of the scientists failed to hold the strength needed to prevent the world's first nuclear catastrophe.The choice of words and main points could have been more powerful. A more dramatic impact might have changed the way history played out. If the scientists would have gone about the bombings in complete opposition rather than attempting to dictate policy, they might have been successful. Works Cited Sailor, Leo and Cosigners. â€Å"A Petition to the President of the United States. † Authenticator. Com. 2011. Web. 11 May 2012.

Employment and Falsification Job Candidates

ETHICAL ISSUES FACING EMPLOYERS AND JOB APPLICANTS Ruth Carter October 1, 2012 Some job applicants â€Å"pad† their application with false information, such as phony salaries and nonexistent jobs. Even some well-known political figures have been guilty of listing a job on their resume during a period of time in which such a job never existed. When applicants are eager or even desperate to find a job, such ethical dilemmas will rise to the forefront. FALSIFICATION What is falsification?Certainly, adding information that is not true would seem to indicate a clear intent on the part of the applicant to falsify information. But how do you judge whether or not leaving out pertinent information or information that would cast you in a bad light qualifies as intentional falsification? These are gray areas that are not always easy to define. Honors and Grades. Let’s take a look at a more specific example. What if your grade point average at graduation had been just slightly high er to qualify you for a degree designation of cum laude, magna cum laude, or even summa cum laude?Clearly, it would be falsification to claim one of these designations when that designation was not earned. However, there is an ethical way to place yourself in the best light without falsifying information. If you earned an outstanding grade point average in the courses for your given major, it is certainly acceptable to state your correct grade point average and specify that the average reflects grades only for courses related to your declared college major or minor. School Activities.Many applicants are willing to exaggerate or totally falsify their participation in school activities. In order to prove leadership ability, an applicant might be willing to say that he or she was president of a nonexistent club or perhaps organized some type of fictional fund-raising activity. Such deception is clearly falsification. Job Titles. Another area rampant with deception is the list of previo us job titles. In order to make a former job sound more impressive, a job contender might add a word or two to the title or perhaps rename the title altogether.REASONS FOR FALSIFICATION Job candidates lie for any number of reasons. Some of them see getting a job as some sort of game in which the rules really don’t matter. Others equate lying with cheating on an exam and rationalize the deception in some way. Many applicants have families to support and are willing to do anything to get the job. CONCLUSION It is clear that falsification is at hand more than ever, and it is equally clear that the value of ethics has been lost on some applicants.It is therefore up to the employer to figure out how best to test a potential employee’s integrity, to investigate an applicant’s history, and then to decide whether or not to hire this individual. The importance of ethical intentions in a future employee should never be underestimated. There is an old saying that honesty i s the best policy. Honesty is expected and required in the workplace, and great dividends await those who make an exemplary work ethic a top priority.