Financial Accounting Theory Essay

The article â€Å"GM to Take Charge of $20. 8-Billion† here reproduced from The Globe and Mail (February 2, 1993) describes the potential impact of SFAS 106, â€Å"Accounting for Postretirement Benefits Other Than Pensions,† on General Motors and Ford. For example, it appears that General Motors will be required to record a liability of $20. 8 billion, reducing its shareholders’ equity from $27. 8 billion to $7 billion, about a 75% reduction. Describe and explain how you would expect the efficient securities market to react to this information. SFAS 106, Accounting for Postretirement Benefits Other Than Pensions: â€Å"This Statement establishes accounting standards for employers’ accounting for postretirement benefits other than pensions. It will significantly change the prevalent current practice of accounting for postretirement benefits on a pay-as-you-go (cash) basis by requiring accrual, during the years that the employee renders the necessary service, of the expected cost of providing those benefits to an employee and the employee’s beneficiaries and covered dependents. In exchange for the current services provided by the employee, the employer promises to provide, in addition to current wages and other benefits, health and other welfare benefits after the employee retires. It follows from that view that postretirement benefits are not gratuities but are part of an employee’s compensation for services rendered. This Statement relies on a basic premise of generally accepted accounting principles that accrual accounting provides more relevant and useful information than does cash basis accounting. Accrual accounting goes beyond cash transactions and attempts to recognize the financial effects of noncash transactions and events as they occur. Recognition and measurement of the accrued obligation to provide postretirement benefits will provide users of financial statements with the opportunity to assess the financial consequences of employers’ compensation decisions. In applying accrual accounting to postretirement benefits, this Statement adopts three fundamental aspects of pension accounting: delayed recognition of certain events, reporting net cost, and offsetting liabilities and related assets. (FASB, 2012) I would expect the efficient securities market to find this practice acceptable. â€Å"Accrual-based accounting is more effective than cash-based accounting. A few arguments to support this theory are: certain cash receipts and disbursements are â€Å"lumpy,† within operating cash flows receipts and payments can be lumpy, accrual-based accounting is a better predictor of a company’s long-term financial performance. Also all formal statements need to be set up using accrual-based accounting, and publicly traded companies need to use accrual-based accounting to conform to GAAP standards (Keener, 2012). 2. Chapter 4: Problem 12 (Imax) a. To what extent can revenue growth substitute for net income as a predictor of future earning power? Explain. Use efficient securities market concepts in your answer, and consider the requirement under GAAP for immediate writeoff of research and startup costs. â€Å"Both revenue growth and net income are useful in determining the financial strength of a company, but they are not interchangeable. Net income describes how efficient a company is with its spending and operating costs and how effect ively it has been controlling total costs. Revenue, on the other hand, only indicates how effective a company is at generating sales and does not take into consideration operating efficiencies which could have a dramatic impact on net income (Investopedia, 2012). † â€Å"Start-up costs are defined as â€Å"those unusual one-time costs incurred in putting a new plant into operation, opening a new sales outlet, initiating a new process in an existing plant, or otherwise commencing some new operation (FASB, 2012). † †Costs of start-up activities, including organization costs, should be expensed as incurred (FASB, 2012). â€Å"Definition of ‘Revenue Recognition’ An accounting principle under generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) that determines the specific conditions under which income becomes realized as revenue. Generally, revenue is recognized only when a specific critical event has occurred and the amount of revenue is measurable. ‘Revenue Recognition’ explained For mo st businesses, income is recognized as revenue whenever the company delivers or performs its product or service and receives payment for it. However, there are several situations in which exceptions may apply. For example, if a company’s business has a very high rate of product returns, revenue should only be recognized after the return period expires. Companies can sometimes play around with revenue recognition to make their financial figures look better. For example, if XYZ Corp. wants to hide the fact that it is having a bad year in sales, it may choose to recognize income that has not yet been collected as revenue in order to boost its sales revenue for the year (Investopedia, 2012). † b. Use the concept of relevance to defend the revenue recognition policies outlined above. Relevant financial statements give information to investors about the firm’s future economic prospects (Scott, 2009). † c. Use the concept of reliability to criticize the revenue recognition policies outlined above. â€Å"To be reliable, information must have representational faithfulness and it must be verifiable and neutral (Scott, 2009). † d. To the extent that investors are awar e of the possible use of revenue recognition policies that overstate revenues (even though, for a specific firm, they may not know the extent to which that firm is using such policies), what is the effect on the operation of the capital market? Explain. â€Å"Investors have prior beliefs about a firm’s future performance. These prior beliefs will be based on all available information. If net income is high, or higher than expected, this may be good news. If so, investors would revise upward their beliefs about future performance. Other investors, who perhaps had overly high expectations for what current net income should be, might interpret the same net income number as bad news. Investors who have revised their beliefs about future performance upward will be inclined to buy the firm’s shares at their current market price, and vice versa for those who have revised their beliefs downward. We would expect to observe the volume of shares traded to increase when the firm reports its net income. Furthermore, this volume should be greater the greater are the differences in investors’ prior beliefs and in their interpretations of the current financial information (Scott, 2009). †

Navratri Significance and Celebration

As the world’s largest democracy rushes head long into the future; India is still known for its rich culture rooted in its past. For every Indian, celebrating festivals is not merely following rituals but; marks prosperity. With changing seasons, festivals of India depict this change. Navratri, a hindu festival who’s name itself has change (ratri). ‘Nav’ means nine and ‘Rartri’ means night; this festival is celebrated worshiping, nine forms of Goddess Durga for nine nights. Beginning on the first day of the bright fortnight of the Hindu month Ashwin, roughly corresponding to dates in the Gregorian calendar in September/October.This also usually coincides with the end of the rainy season. It is celebrated two times a year and like every hindu festival Navratri also derives its significance form myths corresponding to its origin. It is said that; Sati (also known as Uma) married Lord Shiva against the wishes of her father, King Daksha Prajapati. In revenge, Daksha organized a huge yagna and invited all the gods and deities except his new son-in-law. Sati decided to attend the yagna despite Lord Shiva's attempt to persuade her not to. The King ignored his daughter's presence and publically abused Lord Shiva.Unable to bear her father’s insults, Sati committed suicide by jumping into the yagna fire. However, she was reborn and again won Lord Shiva as her groom and peace was restored. It is believed that since then Uma comes every year with her four children Ganesh, Kartik, Saraswati and Laxmi and two of her best friends or ‘sakhis' called Jaya and Bijaya, to visit her parent's home during Navratri. Another well known myth is that, demon Mahishasur, after being given a boon by the fire god Agni that he wouldn't be killed by weapons bearing masculine names, caused grave destruction and terror.The gods sought the help of Lord Shiva, who advised the invocation of the goddess Shakti. With the gods' prayers, a divine lu ster sprang from the heart of Lord Shiva and the bodies of all the gods and formed the goddess Adhya Shakti. The gods gave her ornaments, arms and a lion as a vehicle. She fought with the evil Mahishasur for nine long days and nights, and at last, resulted in the beheading of Mahisa on the tenth. The nine nights came to be known as Navratri, while the tenth day was called Vijaya Dashami, the tenth day that brought the triumph of good over the evil.These legends and story are part of the history that surrounds the festival of Navratri and are going to be around as long as the festival continues. First three days of navratri; Goddess Durga are worshiped; Kumari the girl child, Parvati the young woman and Kali, the mature woman signifying the power of the woman which is worthy of respect. To overcome ego, lust, anger; the animal instincts acquired out of triumph we need spiritual wealth. For the purpose a person approaches goddess Laxmi.The fourth, fifth and sixth day of Navratri are d edicated to the worship of Laxmi – the goddess of prosperity and peace. Gathering wealth man doesn’t attain true knowledge. Seeking the urge to learn the seventh day is dedicated to worshipping Saraswati, the goddess of art and knowledge. A ‘yagna' is performed on the eight day. This comprises of a sacrifice honoring goddess Durga as well as bids her farewell. The sacrifice or offering is made out of clarified butter (ghee), rice pudding known as kheer and sesame seeds. On the ninth day Kanya pujan or girl child worship is performed.These Nine girls symbolize nine forms of the goddess and are offered with new cloths and delicacies as homage to the mother Durga. After the nine nights the tenth is celebration of Vijaya Dashmi when Durga killed the demon Mahishasur. This day coincides with another hindu festival Dushhera when lord Ram killed Ravana and made peace in the land of Lanka. Both occasions mark the triumph of good over evil. Singing and dancing people cele brate each one with spirit of botherhood. The diversified land of India continues to unfold a new definition of celebration crossing every state.Garba and Dandiya from the west, crackers and fireworks in the north to traditional dances of the northeast; It is these festivals that celebrate civilizations. The idea may be subjective but it truly is. Their ethinic nature links us to our roots; religion we belong. A child here grows up in a potential superpower and yet knows what it is to belong to an ancient civilization. Festivals not only bring prosperity and joy but have preserved our rich culture and heritage for the generations to come. -Nitin Ghuliani

Case About Anthony Tan

Concise Summary of Case – Anthony Tan was one of the most wanted men as he was allegedly charged for murder of Bosnian refugee and Rebels bikie, Edin â€Å"Boz† Smajovic. After 2 years building an export business in Vietnam, he read a media report from NSW, describing him as one of the state’s most wanted men. He was unaware for 2 years of the police hunt for him. He immediately got on the phone, first his lawyer, then to an airline. He was more than willing to return to Australia to fight his allegations.In the end he was arrested and charged for the murder and held on remand in prison for over a year. When he granted bail in August, his trial was to start that same week. Both Anthony Tan and co-accused Nathan Keith Reddy and taken to court. Once the case reached the Supreme Court, the case was dismissed even before the trial had started. This was because, it was understood that the case failed partly due to an alleged confession from a prosecution witness. Juri sdictions of all courts involved –The two courts involved in this case were the Central Local Court and the Supreme Court. The jurisdictions for the local court include the majority of criminal, summary prosecutions in NSW and with civil matters up to $100,000. It also conducts committal proceedings to determine whether or not indictable offences are to be committed to the District and Supreme Court. Meanwhile the jurisdictions for the Supreme Court has unlimited civil jurisdictions and handles claims of more than $750,000. It also deals with the most serious criminal matters, including murder and treason.The initial court for this case (Central Local Court) had refused bail, but when it reached the Supreme Court, the case was dismissed even before the trail had even started. Area of law – The Anthony Tan case was a public, criminal case, as Anthony allegedly broke the criminal law, which is part of the public law (also known as the Common law). The standard of proof i s the amount of evidence which a plaintiff or prosecuting attorney, in a criminal case, must be presented in a trial in order to win.As for a civil case the standard of proof is generally that the plaintiff must prove this case by majority (51%) of the evidence. The standard of proof for this case was it was beyond reasonable doubt. The standard of proof needed for a criminal case is that there must be no reasonable doubt that the defendant committed the crime in order to convict the defendant. The standard of proof in this criminal case, which resulted in the freedom of Mr. Tan, was an alleged confession from a prosecution witness, which led to the case to fail.Was a jury used? Why or why not? – A jury is usually used in the Supreme Court, but the Supreme Court judge had dismissed the case on technical terms, therefore a jury was not needed. It was an interesting case due to the fact that Tan was innocent yet held in jail for more than 1 year. This had a major impact on Anth ony Tan’s life, reputation and his future. For a case that would of continued in the Supreme Court, a jury would have been selected, but due to the fact that the case was dismissed, a jury was not needed.Is a jury effective? – A jury is a group of citizens (usually of 12) who hears the testimony in legal disputes and determines what they believe is the truth. The word jury is derived from the French word jurer, which means, â€Å"to swear an oath. † The jury has generally been successful because their peers judge the accused and the public plays a role in the criminal justice system, as they make the community feel as though they have a voice in situations that concern society at large.The jury is there to represent a cross-section of society and they provide a range of perceptions. Also the responsibility for the verdict is spread across 12 jurors and the system acts as a safety net against corrupt and oppressive conduct by state and/or police force. The jury i s also carefully selected to avoid bias, prejudice, racist, sexist or any other form of discrimination, which can influence the verdict. Also the defense council can remove a juror, if they feel uncomfortable with them being in the jury.

Lotteries Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Lotteries - Research Paper Example In the United States, total annual lottery sales have grown into the billions of dollars. Lotteries also provide an excellent opportunity to use elementary financial mathematics, as well as some probability, in a context familiar to students. Most students do not have major financial decisions to make, so the principles of financial mathematics may seem far removed from their lives. However, most of them are familiar with the lottery and the topic readily engages them. The application of these mathematical concepts in the lottery is discussed in this paper. In several USA states and Canada Provinces, the 6/49 lottery operates as an average lottery. To win the lottery grand prize the contestant needs to select all six numbers exactly as drawn in the weekly or monthly contest. This will be used as the model system for the computations in this paper. Starting with a bag of 49 differently-numbered lottery balls, there is clearly a 1 in 49 chance of predicting the number of the first ball selected from the bag. Accordingly, there are 49 different ways of choosing that first number. When the draw comes to the second number, there are now only 48 balls left in the bag (because the balls already drawn are not returned to the bag), so there is now a 1 in 48 chance of predicting this number. Thus, each of the 49 ways of choosing the first number has 48 different ways of choosing the second. ... This continues until the sixth number has been drawn, giving the final calculation, 49 48 47 46 45 44, which can also be written as : . The order of the 6 numbers is not significant. That is, if a ticket has the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, it wins as long as all the numbers 1 through 6 are drawn, no matter what order they come out in. Accordingly, there are 6 5 4 3 2 1 = 6! or 720 ways they could be drawn. Dividing 10,068,347,520 by 720 gives 13,983,816. This can also be written as: . This function is called the combination function, denoted as COMBIN(n, k) in some spreadsheet. Taken as a class, the number of possible combinations for a given lottery can be referred to as the "number space" (n). "Coverage" is the percentage of a lottery's number space that is in play for a given drawing (k). Mathematical concepts can also be applied in making strategies in picking a number. Frequency analysis is a popular strategy that is used. It involves keeping track of the individual numbers that are drawn over a period of time. You might compare it to handicapping a racehorse; rating his past performance to determine what his chances of winning are in the future. The figure below shows how many times each of the numbers has come up in the main National Lottery draw. Here we look at whether the observed distribution of the number of times each of the 49 numbers has come up fits with what would be expected with a truly random draw. Figure 1. Number of occurrences of 1 to 49 in 1240 lottery draws (UK National Lottery, 1997). Numbers that appear often in a certain game are called hot numbers. Some players will play these hot numbers exclusively on the assumption that since they have appeared often in the past, they should appear again in the future.

Gambling Casinos Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Gambling Casinos - Research Paper Example The city attracted more and more people looking for work, and jobs were plentiful. It became a place where divorce could be obtained very quickly, which added to the lure of the economy. It also became a major tourist attraction of people interested in watching the construction progress of a massive dam. It was a way for the city to raise tax revenue. The first casino/resort to be built was the El Rancho in 1941, which started a booming industry that replaced mining and farming as the number one industry by 1950. Looking at Las Vegas today, it is still a thriving economic marvel. Residents are lured by the No State Income Taxes, increasingly newer homes, great climate year round, easy access to highways and good roads, great public schools, and state-of-the-art hospitals. The allure of a good job market, hiking and water sports, and just the prospect of a better life bring approximately 5,000 new people a month. It also loses 1,000 people a month, however, these numbers are based on vacationers. The growth of the city has been from legalized gambling and casinos. Gambling, wagering and betting bring in millions of dollars to Las Vegas and it’s one of the major reasons people migrate there. Other major Casinos are in New Jersey, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania. New Jersey was the second state to legalize casino gambling in 1978. This move helped to revitalize the resort area known as Atlantic City, and it was a success. Gambling has always been a subjective issue in the United States. Supporters argue that it increases revenues to the state and local economies in addition to promoting jobs and recreational benefits. History shows that the economic benefits greatly outweigh the detrimental side of casino gambling People who are opposed to casino gambling cite higher crime rates, gambling addiction and moral issues. Other less mentioned arguments are erosion of work ethics and traffic congestion. Some of these points can be measured in dollars lost in the for m of more police, increased legal and prison costs, the cost of social services for compulsive gambling, lost job production, and costs for traffic control. However, the damage that is done to persons and families cannot be measured. According to Terry Rephann with the Allegany College of Maryland casino gaming is more popular among older and more affluent people. Using Minnesota as an example, gamblers are drawn mostly from within the state to the Indian Casinos. The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988 made if possible for the Native American Tribes to negotiate Class III gaming compacts within their own states. They are allowed to operate full-scale casinos. Thus, in the last decade it has become a viable means of stimulating the economy, lowering unemployment and increasing tax revenues to local and state governments. Among other benefits, it has allowed Native Americans to greatly improve the quality of their lives. It has improved their schools, housing, jobs and income. Casin os attract tourism, increase business to other businesses in the area as well as lift the tax burden on the residents of the community. In economically depressed areas, casinos are seen as a sure way to draw tourists and create new jobs. Native Americans also have misgivings about the social ills that come with gambling. Chris Pearson, who is a member of the Mashantucket Pequot tribe says, â€Å"Native Americans are very spiritual people, and we don’

LSweek 9 m 9 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

LSweek 9 m 9 - Essay Example It should also be noted that all aspects of development, whether social or economic, need to be measured in terms of sustainability. These efforts, however, if met by companies and or corporate bodies should be rewarded. However, historical experiences show that such rewards have rarely occurred. If this has to be done, measurement and strategic management is an inevitable requirement. Major changes in political will and economic policy need to be put in place to control use of resources in a manner that does not comply with the principles of sustainability. Such measures can include legislations, positive rewards to complying companies just to mention a few. In a research conducted in Japan by Michael Angelo and Cortez, in 2011 at the Asia Pacific University to establish how challenges related to social and environmental performance affect financial performance, any environmental innovation geared towards sustainability impacted positively on market performance. In addition, an incr ease in the short-term liabilities was attributed to the investment placed on environmental innovation in terms of cost of maintenance corporate social responsibility cost. Similarly, while markets’ concern about environmental conservation takes precedence in economic measures, social expenses is not their major concern as they presumably take this as a government responsibility. It is important that as we work towards economic stability, leaders should be able to Measure Company’s performance in more systematic ways. These way organizations will play an important role towards a competitive and suitable society. Based on the above-mentioned fact, most leaders today have adopted the strategy through reduction of the company’s socio-environmental impacts in the world as well as drawing limits to risks posed on the environment such as global warming. This is done through enhanced ecological management practices, sustainable use of the available resources and care f or the natural resources. An emerging trend is where executives and top management officials are beginning to exhibit transparent operations with regards to finances and accountability in a manner that go beyond use of ancient performance measures. This behavior is as a result of increasing compulsion for companies to take responsibility for the non-financial effects. On the other hand, the general ideas of sustainability are geared towards the enhancement of valuable features with an intention of reaching them out to the upcoming generations. Two theories have been adapted to explain the meaning of this statement; preservation and development version and resilience. The second theory is that of enhancing and maintaining natural and human capital. The adaptation based theory views sustainability as an adaptation route whose approach closely links system theories and complexity theories on self-maintenance. The view relates the internal systems of an organization to external interact ions exhibited by the environment. It is worthy to note that as the organization tries to

Globalization and International Relations Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Globalization and International Relations - Essay Example As a result of globalization, nations could improve their political as well technological relations globally. This paper will analyze globalization and its impacts on international relations. The concept of global economy came into existence with the emergence of globalization. This process notably assisted different segments of the international market. Globalization has significantly contributed to the creation of a global market and a global system of production. Capital marketers also enjoy the benefits of globalization as it has contributed to the integration of financial systems. This concept aided financial organizations like International Monetary Fund to disseminate â€Å"a particular view of the state’s role within the international economy† (Robinson, 2006). In addition, globalization enhanced the development of telecommunications media which in turn fastened the spread of global mass culture. And the key production factors such as capital and labor became globally mobile. Globalization eliminated international trade barriers and thus promoted international relations once this concept weakened the ability of nations to control transnational operations and economic activities. Companies transplanted their production facilities to other countries where costs are comparatively lower. Before the emergence of globalization, developing and underdeveloped countries had little access to developed markets and improved technology. However, since globalization, the global economic environment has undergone tremendous changes. According to Devetak and Hughes (2008, p. 34), globalization connects nations through a global network, and it assists a nation to get access to foreign markets and customers. Since the nations got ranges of benefits from globalization, governments adopted a liberal approach towards international trade.

The Hisory of Investigations Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

The Hisory of Investigations - Research Paper Example This research tells that historical aspect of investigations is widely studied in cultural, social, political, and economic concepts. The recent decades have seen vast numbers of researchers and scholars develop interest and enthusiasm to the study of how investigations are conducted, as well as the rationales for these processes. This includes investigation activities primarily owing to the drastic pace of industrialization, the arising security needs in all phenomenon, the improvements in the technological knowledge, and rampant changes that have taken preeminence in all realms among others. Investigations have been conducted since the beginning of the middle age as a result of knowledge requirements by the early man, who made many historical discoveries. The carrying out of investigations acts as a vital instrument in the provision of a road to essential information discoveries in accordance with its requirements. Moreover, the impacts of investigations conduction include vital in formation retrievement, the realization of various problems that are taken as matters of concern by particular people and at particular periods or seasons as well as providing a rationale for implementing change within various sectors. The context of investigation is quite wide owing to it application in all realms regardless of the kind of operations that are dealt with. Appropriate investigation procedures are those that employ ample methodologies and approaches with an intention of promoting effectiveness and efficiency measures in addition to providing the desired findings.... It is also crucial to provide a presentation of the investigation process conduction by the subjects entrusted with such roles. This will also study factors that influence the need for investigations, its development, and limitations, in addition to the strengths and weaknesses of a public defendant’s office. An overview of the context of investigations The process of studying phenomena in details to enhance comprehension of its course of action entails investigations. The investigation that is conducted in any study field entails efforts of a team, individual searches, or classes of professional groups in certain fields. A wide array of specific studies and subjects are applied in distinct phenomena in order to develop better comprehension of the original requirements. The completion of any kind of investigation entails the interplay of the factors driving to such a study need, the importance of the investigation being conducted, the involved investigators, as well as the sco pe into which the investigations are conducted. The methodologies and processes of conducting the investigations also play a major part in the investigation activities. In addition, evidence of study by investigators include the skin cells or body fluids that are biological like, course dynamics and fingerprints in the study of crimes and other required areas (Husserl and Moran xxix). Investigations require the application of proper formats with the intention of capturing real details in the required field. Different investigators apply distinct investigatory procedures and methodologies in a bid to promote efficiency and effective measures. There are different phenomena in the

Kiki Smith research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3750 words

Kiki Smith - Research Paper Example It is unfortunate, hence, to find that craft materials and craft techniques are traditionally for the most part forbidden in the world of art. They are dismissed as merely utilitarian objects and have no aesthetic significance. Famed American born contemporary feminist artist Kiki Smith, however, has rewritten the rulebook. Smith’s steady rise as a star in the contemporary art scene is marvelous if not entirely surprising. Her critical success was achieved while employing the use of unconventional craft-oriented materials. Through the use of these materials, she is able to successfully depict the intimate, physical, and psychological perspectives of the human body for her audience. This break from tradition in the use of craft materials is only an aspect of the deviations of Smith’s arts. ... Both of Smith parents are creative people. Her father, Tony Smith was an artist, the celebrated postwar abstract, minimalist sculptor and architect. Her mother, on the other hand, was an opera singer. Smith, hence, was exposed to a highly creative and artistic environment, considering the fact that both of her parents were artists. Particularly, she experienced steady exposure to the creative process from her father. His work has influenced the young Kiki in her artistic style. Tony Smith also maintained a vibrant household who played host to notable contemporary artists such as Jackson Pollack, Mark Rothko, and other gifted artists at the time.3 As a child, Smith would help her father make cardboard three-dimensional representations of what would later be known by the world as his geometrical sculptures. In 1967, his works in this area landed him in the cover of Times magazine. Smith’s father would always try his best to encourage her interest in art. For example, he would se t up a box of cylinders and cones to practice her drawing skills. Another important aspect in Smith’s family that would leave an indelible mark on her as an artist is her religious upbringing. Her family was devoutly Catholic and she herself acknowledges her affinity with her religious denomination later in her adult life. Certainly, this variable would manifest in many of Smith’s artwork later on. In an interview with a magazine, she explained: Some people get free. Some people say that you don’t have to be, but I’m stuck with it. I’ve always been spiritual. That’s always been the most important part of my life, thinking about God or Gods.4 In her childhood, Smith already new that she was not interested in drawing what she saw but, rather, she was more interested in drawing

Create an appropriate Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Create an appropriate - Essay Example The term evidence refers to the act of proving that ones thinking or reasoning is not only correct but also sensible. It involves showing. therefore, in the context of one claiming to be knowing something, he or she should be able to provide adequate evidence about it what he or she claims to be knowing or else the claim that he or she has will only be looked upon has an statement with lack of fact in it or an opinion since that will only be considered as telling those involve what we think about (Ruggiero 1998). There are different kinds of evidence which include personal experience, which exist on our minds; the formal observation which involves detached observation whereby the observer does not participate but keeps a distance from the study and participant observation whereby the observer is directly involved and research review which is done one the already undertaken research by reviewers who summarize everything and compare their findings. There is great relationship between e vidence and opinion. An opinion is just but a mere statement from any persons point of view and therefore, in any case, for an opinion to be accepted and looked upon has correct, practical and worth being adopted, an evidence has to be provide to support that statement. Hence, a statement without evidence is an opinion but a statement with evidence is not an opinion. For example , if a father tells his son that he was a top achiever in academics during his time has a student, the child wont be satisfied with his fathers statement unless his father show him is academics reports showing his excellence (Ruggiero 1998). In this case, the father is giving a statement which remains to be an opinion in which the child may either agree with it or not but in the case of the providing evidence, which will be the report of his academic achievements, the child with the will automatically accept and acknowledge the fact and will he will definitely work hard to be like his father. Therefore, evid ence and opinion are closely related in terms of establishing the reality, acceptability and the truth. Opinion is therefore of greater value in terms of laying a platform for the provision of the evidence and finally at justifying that one knows (Ruggiero 1998). With regard to knowing, evidence plays a very critical and important role towards justify the fact a person knows some. One is said to know only after providing evidence which could be through the act of explaining what he or she says that he or she knows, through demonstrating, through replicating an acting and so on and all this are what are equated to the term evidence. For instance, when one claims to be knowing the spelling of the word embarrass he as to support his statement by giving an evidence which is the correct spelling of that very word without failure. Evidence provision is at times problematic due to the fact that opinions are not based on anything substantial and there are also different types of evidence wi n which in the case of presentation the receiver may not be aware of all of them which may cause a dispute. Therefore, in the presentation of the evidence, the presenter is required to be well

Satyagraha in a Secular World Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Satyagraha in a Secular World - Essay Example In comparing this set of beliefs with Christianity, we find that they do not have much in common. Christianity has one God and no meditation practices or physical exercises to support our mind or brain functionality. Christianity's only bold set of ethics would be the Ten Commandments. Christians believe in the Soul outlives the body in Heaven (or perhaps in Hell), but have no belief in rebirth of the soul into a new body as Hindus do. As well as the origin of Satyagraha we must also understand its meaning. Directly translated, Satyagraha means "Insistence on truth, and the force derivable from such insistence."(Dilks, Hansen, and Parfitt) Gandhi created Satyagraha to develop a nonviolent resistance to help India (or any country or person) peacefully enforce their will upon their opponent, which at the time was Britain and their colonial rule over India. Gandhi insisted on self-suffering for Satyagraha to work. He calls this "Truth-Force", which basically means that to enforce something upon someone it is more effective to do so through self-suffering, rather than through the suffering of the opponent. Satyagraha believes that there is some truth in everything, even our enemies, and it takes all of the individual portions of truth to make up the total truth. When we burden our enemies with suffering, pain, or sacrafice, their truth becomes inaccessible to us and we have no way to obtain the bigger truths. Gandhi c laims that the opponent must also be deterred from taking the wrong action by showing him patience and sympathy. As I understand it, the easiest, and most primitive, way to interpret the principle of Satyagraha is as follows: Gandhi is showing the same principle of one brother nagging (poking, pinching, name calling) at another. If one brother is constantly nagging another and the brother being nagged continually gets upset, the brother doing the nagging will always continue on to entertain himself with his other brother upsetting himself. When the brother being nagged shows no reaction, and does not get upset or disrupt the cause, he is accepting self suffering and the nagging stops very quickly. Because India is mainly of Hindu belief, and was previously occupied and ruled by Britain, India became the perfect place for the principle of Satyagraha to evolve. Gandhi was the spiritual leader of an oppressed people living in an occupied land. The loss of their territory, heritage, and national identity created a need for a strong principle that could unite the country. Gandhi and his principles would not have as much of an impact in the Americas or in Europe as it did in India because there was no great desperation for independence. The Americans and Europeans had been afforded the basic rights of expression and thought, and had the right to self-determination. The U.S. was no longer under British rule, although in the 1770's it did have to win independence for the 13 colonies. Europe was under the threat to be ruled by Germany, but was at war, and had not completely come under the rule of them. I do not believe Satyagraha could win a war. However, it is a useful political tool that can unite a population behind a compassionate cause. It was an effective movement to

Tv Food Essay Example for Free

Tv Food Essay Have you ever sat in front of the TV devouring tons of snacks and not even paid attention to how much you had already eaten? That is why this essay sparked my attention! I constantly find myself in front of the TV craving snacks and chomping away, not even thinking about how much I am eating. Dolly Mittal, Richard J. Stevenson, Megan J. Oaten, and Laurie A. Miller conducted an experiment to find out if our memory is a factor for what we’ve already eaten. One amnesiac patient HM started this idea when he sat down to eat a second meal immediately after consuming the first because he had forgotten he already had eaten. This experiment is trying to show that snacking while watching TV, in opposition to snacking while not watching TV, can lead us to eat more later on. They want to prove it is because the TV affects our memory of how much we snacked earlier. In experiment one they take thirty-two female women that are not dieting and not diabetic with a BMI between 18 and 25 and let them spend 20 minutes eating as much snack food as they want. They are given chocolate balls, pringles, coca cola, and orange juice. Half of these ladies did it watching a 20 minute TV episode and the other half did it sitting quietly. Afterwards the remains were taken and measured; both groups consumed around the same amount of snacks. Around one hour later they sat the ladies down to eat lunch which would include: sandwiches, biscuits, crackers and dip. They found the result they were looking for when the women who had watched TV earlier while snacking ate more of this meal than the ladies who had earlier snacked without the TV. The result was finale when the TV group also couldn’t remember how much they had snacked on during the time they watched the TV. In experiment two the experiment was very similar to experiment one except that they wanted to see if the type of TV show would affect anything. This time they had the ladies watch different types of shows- funny, sad, and boring. The results were very similar to the first experiment and they learned that the type of TV show made no difference to the food they consumed. It was confirmed that when normal weight non-dieting females snack while watching TV, they later consume more food on a TV free meal than participants who snacked without TV. Also, participants who watched TV while snacking were less accurate in remembering the amount of snack food they had consumed. Something that I thought was interesting about this experiment is that it doesn’t work on men. In the journal it is mentioned that men take a different approach to this and try to eat as much food as possible, yet in the beginning the amnesiac patient HM that Hebben reported was a male. I didn’t like that the women fasted before they came to do the experiment. It is not a real life situation. Most of the time when I’m snacking in front of the TV I might have already eaten before that or I am just about to eat. Also If I knew that this experiment was all about food – I do not know if I would have eaten what I normally do. I might have been embarrassed and not given correct information. There is no way to make this experiment work 100% but that is how it is with most experiments. They conclude †Our data suggest that TV probably exerts some as yet unspecified effect on participants’ ability to recall earlier bouts of food consumption, leading to over consumption on a later TV free test meal. As TV viewing is associated with eating in so many different ways and as over consumption of food is a major problem in most industrialized nations, it would seem important to study exactly how this occurs. â€Å" Obesity is a HUGE problem in our country and I think that this could possibly have something to do with it. Even small children are watching TV now with a bag of chips in one hand and a soda in the other. Our nation is constantly getting fatter. Now when I sit in front of the TV I will think about what I’m eating and apply what I know to help me consume the right amount of food.

Internet of Things Paradigm

Internet of Things Paradigm Introduction According to 2016 statistical forecast, there are almost 4.77 billion number of mobile phone users in globally and it is expected to pass the five billion by 2019. [1] The main attribute of this significant increasing trend is due to increasing popularity of smartphones. In 2012, about a quarter of all mobile users were smartphone users and this will be doubled by 2018 which mean there are be more than 2.6 million smartphone users. Of these smartphone users more than quarter are using Samsung and Apple smartphone. Until 2016, there are 2.2 million and 2 million of apps in google app store and apple store respectively. Such explosive growth of apps gives potential benefit to developer and also companies. There are about $88.3 billion revenue for mobile application market. Prominent exponents of the IT industry estimated that the IoT paradigm will generate $1.7 trillion in value added to the global economy in 2019. By 2020 the Internet of Things device will more than double the size of the smartphone, PC, tablet, connected car, and the wearable market combined. Technologies and services belonging to the Internet of Things have generated global revenues in $4.8 trillion in 2012 and will reach $8.9 trillion by 2020, growing at a compound annual rate (CAGR) of 7.9%. From this impressive market growth, malicious attacks also have been increased dramatically. According to Kaspersky Security Network(KSN) data report, there has been more than 171,895,830 malicious attacks from online resources among word wide. In second quarter of 2016, they have detected 3,626,458 malicious installation packages which is 1.7 times more than first quarter of 2016. Type of these attacks are broad such as RiskTool, AdWare, Trojan-SMS, Trojan-Dropper, Trojan, Trojan-Ransom,Trojan-Spy,Trojan-Banker,Trojan-Downloader,Backdoor, etc.. http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/internet-things-much-exposed-cyber-threats/#gref Unfortunately, the rapid diffusion of the Internet of Things paradigm is not accompanied by a rapid improvement of efficient security solutions for those smart objects, while the criminal ecosystem is exploring the technology as new attack vectors. Technological solutions belonging to the Internet of Things are forcefully entering our daily life. Lets think, for example, of wearable devices or the SmartTV. The greatest problem for the development of the paradigm is the low perception of the cyber threats and the possible impact on privacy. Cybercrime is aware of the difficulties faced by the IT community to define a shared strategy to mitigate cyber threats, and for this reason, it is plausible that the number of cyber attacks against smart devices will rapidly increase. As long there is money to be made criminals will continue to take advantage of opportunities to pick our pockets. While the battle with cybercriminals can seem daunting, its a fight we can win. We only need to break one link in their chain to stop them dead in their tracks. Some tips to success: Deploy patches quickly Eliminate unnecessary applications Run as a non-privileged user Increase employee awareness Recognize our weak points Reducing the threat surface Currently, both major app store companies, Google and Apple, takes different position to approach spam app detection. One takes an active and the other with passive approach. There is strong request of malware detection from global Background (Previous Study) The paper Early Detection of Spam Mobile Apps was published by dr. Surangs. S with his colleagues at the 2015 International World Wide Web conferences. In this conference, he has been emphasised importance of early detection of malware and also introduced a unique idea of how to detect spam apps. Every market operates with their policies to deleted application from their store and this is done thru continuous human intervention. They want to find reason and pattern from the apps deleted and identified spam apps. The diagram simply illustrates how they approach the early spam detection using manual labelling. Data Preparation New dataset was prepared from previous study [53]. The 94,782 apps of initial seed were curated from the list of apps obtained from more than 10,000 smartphone users. Around 5 months, researcher has been collected metadata from Goole Play Store about application name, application description, and application category for all the apps and discarded non-English description app from the metadata. Sampling and Labelling Process One of important process of their research was manual labelling which was the first methodology proposed and this allows to identify the reason behind their removal. Manual labelling was proceeded around 1.5 month with 3 reviewers at NICTA. Each reviewer labelled by heuristic checkpoint points and majority reason of voting were denoted as following Graph3. They identified 9 key reasons with heuristic checkpoints. These full list checkpoints can be find out from their technical report. (http://qurinet.ucdavis.edu/pubs/conf/www15.pdf)[] In this report, we only list checkpoints of the reason as spam. Graph3. Labelled spam data with checkpoint reason. Checkpoint S1-Does the app description describe the app function clearly and concisely? 100 word bigrams and trigrams were manually conducted from previous studies which describe app functionality. There is high probability of spam apps not having clear description. Therefore, 100 words of bigrams and trigrams were compared with each description and counted frequency of occurrence. Checkpoint S2-Does the app description contain too much details, incoherent text, or unrelated text? literary style, known as Stylometry, was used to map checkpoint2. In study, 16 features were listed in table 2. Table 2. Features associated with Checkpoint 2 Feature 1 Total number of characters in the description 2 Total number of words in the description 3 Total number of sentences in the description 4 Average word length 5 Average sentence length 6 Percentage of upper case characters 7 Percentage of punctuations 8 Percentage of numeric characters 9 Percentage of common English words 10 Percentage of personal pronouns 11 Percentage of emotional words 12 Percentage of misspelled word 13 Percentage of words with alphabet and numeric characters 14 Automatic readability index(AR) 15 Flesch readability score(FR) For the characterization, feature selection of greedy method [ ] was used with max depth 10 of decision tree classification. The performance was optimized by asymmetric F-Measure [55] They found that Feature number 2, 3, 8, 9, and 10 were most discriminativeand spam apps tend to have less wordy app description compare to non-spam apps. About 30% spam app had less than 100 words description. Checkpoint SÂ ­3 Does the app description contain a noticeable repetition of words or key words? They used vocabulary richness to deduce spam apps. Vocabulary Richness(VR) = Researcher expected low VR for spam apps according to repetition of keywords. However, result was opposite to expectation. Surprisingly VR close to 1 was likely to be spam apps and none of non-spam app had high VR result. [ ] This might be due to terse style of app description among spam apps. Checkpoint S4 Does the app description contain unrelated keywords or references? Common spamming technique is adding unrelated keyword to increase search result of app that topic of keyword can vary significantly. New strategy was proposed for these limitations which is counting the mentioning of popular applications name from apps description. In previous research name of top-100 apps were used for counting number of mentioning. Only 20% spam apps have mentioned the popular apps more than once in their description. Whereas, 40 to 60 % of non-spam had mention more than once. They found that many of top-apps have social media interface and fan pages to keep connection with users. Therefore, theses can be one of identifier to discriminate spam of non-spam apps. Checkpoint S5 Does the app description contain excessive references to other applications from the same developer? Number of times a developers other app names appear. Only 10 spam apps were considered as this checkpoint because the description contained links to the application rather than the app names. Checkpoint S6 Does the developer have multiple apps with approximately the same description? For this checkpoint, 3 features were considered: The total number of other apps developed by same developer. The total number of apps that written in English description to measure description similarity. Have description Cosine similarity(s) of over 60%, 70%, 80%, and 90% from the same developer. Pre-process was required to calculate the cosine similarity: [ ] Firstly, converting the words in lower case and removing punctuation symbols. Then calibrate each document with word frequency vector. Cosine similarity equation: http://blog.christianperone.com/2013/09/machine-learning-cosine-similarity-for-vector-space-models-part-iii/ They observed that the most discriminative of the similarity between app descriptions. Only 10% 15% of the non-spam had 60% of description similarity between 5 other apps that developed by same developer. On the other hand, more than 27% of the spam apps had 60% of description similarity result. This evidence indicates the tendency of the spam apps multiple cone with similar app descriptions. Checkpoint S7 Does the app identifier (applied) make sense and have some relevance to the functionality of the application or does it appear to be auto generated? Application identifier(appid) is unique identifier in Google Play Store, name followed by the Java package naming convention. Example, for the facebook , appid is com.facebook.katana. For 10% of the spam apps the average word length is higher than 10 and it was so only for 2%-3% of the non-spam apps. None of the non-spam apps had more than 20% of non-letter bigram appear in the appid, whereas 5% of spam apps had. Training and Result From 1500 of random sampling data 551 apps (36.73%) were suspicious as spam. [ ] Methods Automation We used Checkpoint S1 and S2 for data management due to its comparability and highest number of agreement from reviewers. Due to limitation of accessibility for collect description reason only 100 sample was used for the testing. We have automated checkpoint S1 and S2 according to following algorithm. Collected data were used log transformation to modify. This can be valuable both for making patterns in the data more interpretable and for helping to meet the assumptions of inferential statistics. To make a code most time consuming part was description collection which takes more than two weeks to find and store. The raw data directed the description link for appID. However, many of them where not founded due to old version or no more available. So we searched all this info manually from the web and founded description was saved as a file which named as appID. (Diagram.) This allowed us to recall the description more efficiently in automation code. S1 was automated by identified 100 word-bigrams and word-trigrams that are describing a functionality of applications. Because there is high probability of spam app doesnt have these words in their description, we have counted number of occurrence in each application. Full list of these bigrams and trigrams found in Table 1. Table 1. Bigrams and trigrams using the description of top apps play games are available is the game app for android you can get notified to find learn how get your is used to your phone to search way to core functionality a simple match your is a smartphone available for app for to play key features stay in touch this app is available that allows to enjoy take care of you have to you to can you beat buy your is effortless its easy to use try to allows you keeps you action game take advantage tap the take a picture save your makes it easy follow what is the free is a global brings together choose from is a free discover more play as on the go more information learn more turns on is an app face the challenges game from in your pocket your device on your phone make your life with android it helps delivers the offers essential is a tool full of features for android lets you is a simple it gives support for need your help enables your game of how to play at your fingertips to discover brings you to learn this game play with it brings navigation app makes mobile is a fun your answer drives you strategy game is an easy game on your way app which on android application which train your game which helps you make your S2 was second highest number of agreement from three reviewers in previous study. Among 551 identified spam apps, 144 apps were confirmed by S2, 63 from 3 reviewers and 81 from 2 reviewer agreed. We knew that from pre-research result, total number of words in the description, Percentages of numeric characters, Percentage of non-alphabet characters, and Percentage of common English words will give most distinctive feature. Therefore, we automated total number of words in the description and Percentage of common English words using C++. Algorithm 1. Counting the total number of bi/tri-grams in the description From literature [], they used 16 features of to find the information from checkpointS2. This characterization was done with wrapper method using decision tree classifier and they have found 30% of spam apps were have less than 100 words in their description and only 15% of most popular apps have less than 100 words. We extracted simple but key point from their result which was number of words in description and the percentage of common English words. This was developed in C++ as followed. Algorithm 2. Counting the total number of words in the description int count_Words(std::string input_text){ int number_of_words =1; for(int i =0; i if(input_text[i] == ) number_of_words++; return number_of_words; } } Percentage of common English words has not done properly due to difficulty of standard selection. However, here is code that we will develop in future study. Algorithm 3. Calculate the Percentage of common English words(CEW) in the description Int count_CEW(std::string input_text){ Int number_of_words=1; For(int i while(!CEW.eof(){ if(strcmp(input_text[i],CEW){ number_of_words++; } else{ getline(readFile, CEW); } } return number_of_words; } Int percentage(int c_words, int words){ return (c_words/words)*100 } Normalizaton We had variables between [ min, max] for S1 and S2. Because of high skewness of database, normalization was strongly required. Database normalization is the process of organizing data into tables in such a way that the results of using the database are always unambiguous and as intended. Such normalization is intrinsic to relational database theory. Using Excel, we had normalized data as following diagram. Thru normalization, we could have result of transformed data between 0 and 1. The range of 0 and 1 was important for later process in LVQ. Diagram. Excel spread sheet of automated data(left) and normalized data (right) After transformation we wanted to test data to show how LVQ algorithm works with modified attributes. Therefore, we sampled only 100 data from modified data set. Even the result was not significant, it was important to test. Because, after this step, we can add more attributes in future study and possible to adjust the calibration. We have randomly sampled 50 entities from each top rank 100 and from pre-identified spam data. Top 100 ranked apps was assumed and high likely identify as non-spam apps. Diagram. Initial Results We used the statistical package python to perform Learning Vector Quantification. LVQ is prototype-bases supervised classification algorithm which belongs to the field of Artificial Neural Networks. It can have implemented for multi-class classification problem and algorithm can modify during training process. The information processing objective of the algorithm is to prepare a set of codebook (or prototype) vectors in the domain of the observed input data samples and to use these vectors to classify unseen examples. An initially random pool of vectors was prepared which are then exposed to training samples. A winner-take-all strategy was employed where one or more of the most similar vectors to a given input pattern are selected and adjusted to be closer to the input vector, and in some cases, further away from the winner for runners up. The repetition of this process results in the distribution of codebook vectors in the input space which approximate the underlying distribution of samples from the test dataset Our experiments are done using only the for the manufactured products due to data size. We performed 10-fold cross validation on the data. It gives us the average value of 56%, which was quite high compare to previous study considering that only two attributes are used to distribute spam, non-spam. LVQ program was done by 3 steps; [ ] Euclidean Distance Best Matching Unit Training Codebook Vectors 1. Euclidean Distance. Distance between two rows in a dataset was required which generate multi-dimensions for the dataset. The formula for calculating the distance between dataset Where the difference between two datasets was taken, and squared, and summed for p variables def euclidean_distance(row1, row2): distance = 0.0 for i in range(len(row1)-1): distance += (row1[i] row2[i])**2 return sqrt(distance) 2. Best Matching Unit Once all the data was converted using Euclidean Distance, these new piece of data should sorted by their distance. def get_best_matching_unit(codebooks, test_row): distances = list() for codebook in codebooks: dist = euclidean_distance(codebook, test_row) distances.append((codebook, dist)) distances.sort(key=lambda tup: tup[1]) return distances [0][0] 3. Training Codebook Vectors Patterns were constructed from random feature in the training dataset def random_codebook(train): n_records = len(train) n_features = len(train [0]) codebook = [train[randrange(n_records)][i] for i in range(n_features)] return codebook Future work During writing process, I found that data collection from Google Play Store can be automated using Java client. This will induce number of dataset and possible to improve accuracy with high time saving. Because number of attributes and number of random sampling, result of the research is appropriate to call as significant result. However, basic framework was developed to improve accuracy. Acknowledgement In the last summer, I did some research reading work under the supervision of Associate Professor Julian Jang-Jaccard. Ive got really great support from Julian and INMS. Thanks to the financial support I received from INMS that I can fully focused on my academic research and benefited a great deal from this amazing opportunity. The following is a general report of my summer research: In the beginning of summer, I studied the paper A Detailed Analysis of the KDD CUP 99 Data Set by M. Trvallaee et. al. This gave basic idea of how to handle machine learning techniques. Approach of KNN and LVQ Main project was followed from a paper Why My App Got Deleted Detection of Spam Mobile Apps by Suranga Senevirane et. al. I have tried my best to keep report simple yet technically correct. I hope I succeed in my attempt. Reference Appendix Modified Data Number of Words in thousands bigram/tr-gram Identified as spam(b)/not(g) 0.084 0 b 0.18 0 b 0.121 0 b 0.009 1 b 0.241 0 b 0.452 0 b 0.105 1 b 0.198 0 b 0.692 1 b 0.258 1 b 0.256 1 b 0.225 0 b 0.052 0 b 0.052 0 b 0.021 0 b 0.188 1 b 0.188 1 b 0.092 1 b 0.098 0 b 0.188 1 b 0.161 1 b 0.107 0 b 0.375 0 b 0.195 0 b 0.112 0 b 0.11 1 g 0.149 1 g 0.368 1 g 0.22 1 g 0.121 1 g 0.163 1 g 0.072 1 g 0.098 1 g 0.312 1 g 0.282 1 g 0.229 1 g 0.256 1 g 0.298 0 g 0.092 0 g 0.189 0 g 0.134 1 g 0.157 1 g 0.253 1 g 0.12 1 g 0.34 1 g 0.57 1 g 0.34 1 g 0.346 1 g 0.126 1 g 0.241 1 g 0.162 1 g 0.084 0 g 0.159 0 g 0.253 1 g 0.231 1 g

Strategic Management At Honda

Strategic Management At Honda With over 182,000 employees, Â ¥ 10,011, 241 million in annual revenues in 2009 coupled with upwards of $ 1370.1 million$ and 1896.4 in operating profits for the FY 2008 and 2009 respectively, Japans Honda is easily the industrys biggest manufactures of motor cycles, besides being a among the leading automobile producers. Operating across the globe, Honda is involved in the development, manufacturing as well as marketing and distribution of motor cars, motor cycles and a range other power products (Honda Ltd, 2010). It was founded in 1946, by Soichiro Honda and subsequently incorporated two years later, followed by years of success and growth as a motor cycle maker. Away from its core business, the companys 105 affiliates and 396 subsidiaries across the world provide financial services to thousands of its clients. It operates a four tier business model which includes the financial services division, motorcycle, automobile as well as power products (Honda Ltd, 2010). Besides multi wagons, Honda also produces a range of passenger cars, SUVs, mini vans, passenger cars, mini vehicles as well as sports coupes among others. Hondas flagship car and motor cycle models include the Accord, Civic, Legend, Insight, Acura CSX and Acura RL, CR-V, Cross Road, ASIMO Robots as well as the scooters among many others. The company recorded sales of over 10,114,000 units mainly in Japan, North America and Europe, representing an 8.5% rise over the previous years figures. Its sales have been on the rise despite through the global economic down turn that hit its American competitors, and largely driven by Toyotas PR woes over alleged flaws in the breaking system in its flagship Prius model. This success is largely attributable to the company strategic preparedness. Case in point, in 2002, it launched a hybrid car model to tap into the ever growing environmentally conscious clientele, besides launching the Environmental Learning Center (based in Texas), while in 2004, the company entered into a strategic partnership with GE, that led into the development and production of a trail blazing light jet engine, suited for business jets. Sethi and Swanson (1984), commencing in the year 2000, the company has embarked on an ambitious program to set up production plants in the emerging car and motor cycle markets, notably China, Argentina, Russia and the motor bike hot spot, Vietnam. The company prides itself with the twin principles of respect individuals and the Three Joys Principle i.e. buying, selling as well creating. These values reflect the company does wish to build on each persons unique abilities and its endeavor to ensure that everyone who comes by purchasing the products or by other means should have a great/joyous experience. Honda ensures this by relentlessly, lead in the creation of value, innovation, new products at accessible prices. RECONCILIATION OF DICHOTOMIES Honda ltds strategic innovation is founded on a process of dichotomies reconciliation which include both learning and planning, positioning on the market vs. internal resources development and lastly, core competencies related to the product against the core capabilities related to the processes. These three dichotomies do representing divergent strategies etc that drive Honda as a company since its establishment and through years of exemplary growth and expansion. De Wit Meyer (2010), assert that a critical look at Hondas strategies points especially its successful entry and dominance of new markets raises questions as to whether, Hondas strategy and subsequent decision making is solidly based on a meticulous, analytical and rational planning or whether its strategies are a direct result of the some decisions/ strategies reached at by the company, which evolved or became modified due to the environmental influences of the industry in which the company operates. PLANNING v. LEARNING While designing its strategies, the company has consistently followed a rational approach based on a critical analysis of the market and the industry environment. This strategy hinges on and it suited for a seasoned industry player such as Honda, since it seeks to built on, and exploit the companys immense experience in the automotive industry (Johnson et al., 2005). As a strategy, this is an important bottom up strategy that uses the already gained knowledge to optimize the companys needs. Planning takes into consideration both the companys resources as well as the environmental factors, as such will most likely utilize the companys set objectives within the constraints. Hondas largely seen as having successfully employed the planning strategy while entering into new markets notably while launching into the US motor cycle industry. Its recent strategic alliances with GE as well as its design and launch of innovative new products and expansion of manufacturing plants, in the ultimate attainment of huge scale economies and extremely law costs represent examples of internal planning. Planning is largely apparent from an outsiders point of view. However, interviews with the companys top management reveal a far different picture that suggests at best a company that is far from an overly rational, academic planning seeking to impose its corporate values and policies on the market and the industry, but rather a company, with a management structure that is at all times willing to learn. It is evident and widely accepted by many observers that Hondas strategies have evolved, without a clear plan or analysis of the industry. Case in point, the huge success attained by the companys 50 cc Supercab surprised everyone including the companys management. Mintzberg et al. (1998) observe that though the companys strategy may have looked analytical and well thought out, the management did blunder severally up until the market gave them the correct formula. Rational planning on its own is hardly, suited to many organizations and is in fact removed from the day to day running of a business as compared to learning, which permits management to continually develop and adjust their policies and strategies as they are implemented, in the light of new experience (De Wit Meyer, 2010). Hondas development of hybrid vehicles and energy efficient models e.g. the Honda Civic Sedan, in the wake of Toyotas success in the same field represent examples of learning from the environment. Honda has as well launched joint ventures in RD with other companies. Using both strategies gives the company an advantage, not least because it only allows the formulation of strategies that best meet both the internal resources as well as the environmental factors prevailing in the industry. POSITIONING VERSUS DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES Hondas positioning helps its brand to be associated with a given market segment. It is an equally helpful guide to the companys other strategies, particularly the marketing strategy, not least because it does clarify the essence of the brand and the helps the consumers to better identify the goals that the product seeks to meet in a unique way. In positioning a product or brand, managers must make decisions, seeking to appeal a given segment of the population, while at once risking losing the other(s). Honda has placed its various products on the basis of benefit, target, distribution as well as prices. The company offers competitive prices owing to its scale and technology advantages, which in turn permits it to achieve better client franchises. This strategy does however; affect the prestige of the brand, besides reducing the profit margins. Target, distribution and benefit positioning, that has seen the introduction of green models to serve the needs of green conscious clients, co upled by Hondas expansion into India, China and Vietnam, which was entirely meant at catering for emerging middle class in those countries. As against, development of internal resources, Hondas product positioning allows it to use fewer resources but still reach the target markets. It however, has enormous resources in capital, management, cutting production technology as well as manpower, which have driven the companys expansion across the globe. More investment in RD is, and has been possible, leading to greater innovation. While other smaller industry players struggle with limited resources constraining their RD as well as expansion, bigger companies like Honda, Toyota and GM can attain a better edge in the industry. Hondas has been able to pursue both strategies owing to the availability of niche products that it has successfully positioned e.g. motor bikes in Vietnam (over 400,000 units in annual sales), coupled by its huge availability of resources which allows it rope for RD, diversification and expansion. This does not entirely hold though, Honda spends just a fifth of GM expenditure on RD and launches fewer mode ls than the latter, yet it products/models are more successful than GMs. CORE COMPETENCIES VERSUS CORE CAPABILITIES Competencies are as a result of coordination of multiple production skills as well as a complex coordination of numerous technologies. They give a company access to newer markets; provide high barriers for competitors to enter the market, besides contributing considerably to the benefits of the end product(s). Hondas core competencies as regards products are the driving force behind the development of the numerous, innovative end user products. Hamel Prahalad regard Hondas product competencies as a brilliant example of how a small company can break into, and establish itself in a mature, stable market. In 2010 alone, Honda has set up a solar H2 station (Los Angeles), introduced the versatile iGX and GX engine series for general purposes. The company has as well produced lithium-ion based batteries intended for the new range of hybrid motor vehicles, alongside an ELC to spear head its green agenda. Honda is famed for its ability to recycle technologies in all its range of products, affording it RD efficiency. There are elements of core capabilities associated with its processes, but perhaps far lacking behind Toyota and many other industry players. These include efficient distribution channels, cost effective production processes. It trains dealers, determines shop floor plans and has strict operating procedures among others. Core product competencies in the automobile industry are far superior to the process capabilities and Hondas success is an outstanding testimony to this fact. MANAGEMENT STYLES Japanese and Hondas management styles do differ from the American style in at least six distinct aspects. These include differences in the interdepartmental relationships, communication patterns, and supervisory styles, mechanisms for control as well as existence of, or lack of a paternalistic orientation. According to Hofstede (2004), these differences largely stem from the inherent cultural differences between the two countries, which in turn influence the respective corporate cultures. Lifelong Tenure Most of the companies in Japan do provide lifelong jobs to their employees, with greater emphasis being laid on not age, but also seniority. Promotions are thus much more difficult, just as there is greater job security for the workers. Many organizations effectively hire employees for the, and are interested in the long term objectives as against Americas corporate worlds obsession with short term goals. Case in point, Hondas top management i.e. Satoshi Aoki (Chairman), Takanobu Ito, Koichi Kondo and Atsuyoshi Hyogo joined the company in 1968, 1978, 2000 and 1972 respectively, during which time they have risen through the ranks to reach the top management. On the contrary, the western corporate world is characterized by short term contracts for both managers and workers, charged with meeting short term objectives. Teams v. Individuals In contrast with the Western model where managers are responsible for decision making and subsequently accountable for the decisions reached, the Japanese system recognizes the importance of individual expertise, but the performance of the entire team is more emphasized than an individuals. In the western corporate world (Germany and American), certain employees have the star statuses e.g. in Germany, the engineers play central roles to the success of motor companies. Some elements of convergence exist though. Long apprenticeships and cadres (seniorities in Japan) do exist both in Germany, France as well as the Netherlands. Employees attain positions, promotions etc. through years of internships, apprenticeships or memberships to given classes-attained through education and or experience. Decision Making While most western corporations are characterized by top down decision making, the Japanese style of management is largely characterized by collective decision making by individual teams. Hondas decision making is characterized by the Ringi system, where decisions are passed based on a consensus of all the employees in a department or even the entire organization. This management style is identical to that practiced in Holland, except that the latter is anchored on existing contracts or class differences of among the employees. Communication As against the largely bureaucratic communication, hierarchical channels characterizing western corporations, which is largely effective and efficient, the Japanese channels of communication compromise in large part of face-to-face communication. These comprise everything from provision of information regarding assignment of tasks, responsibilities, organizational goals and the development and rechanneling of feedbacks. Implicit Mechanism of Control Honda ltd is concerned with building of its relationships with it biggest assets, the employees. Inspired by its philosophy Respect for the Individual, the company always seeks to develop collaborative relationships with each and every employee, where all mechanisms of control and supervision are largely informal. Supervisors work alongside other employees, who are involved, the decision making, which in turn renders decision making, execution of decisions and reception of feedback a lot more expedient. On the contrary, Hondas competitors run on a rigid, formal control mechanism. This sets goals, measurable, complete with targets that must be met by departments, franchises and individual employees, while the Japanese system is anchored on the management philosophies that all employees as well as managers identify with. Departmental Relationships Pascale Athos (1981), states that attainment of the goals set for a department etc requires inputs not just from the concerned departments, but perhaps most importantly, close collaboration with other departments in the company or even other organizations. Formal (necessary) relationships largely accomplish these goals (characteristic of the western model), while the Japanese style has an extra dimension; voluntary collaboration which is far more productive and results in greater knowledge sharing. Paternalistic Orientation Honda and many other Japanese companies are concerned by the holistic needs of every employee, including the concern for the well being of their families (Culpan, 2009). This imposes a social support role on the managers, a feature which is largely absent in the western world, safe for a limited number of family organizations. CORPORATE GOVERNANCE AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY With car markets in the developed world already saturated, most car companys are looking abroad in the emerging markets notably China, India and Brazil. A recent study by TNS shows that car buyers rate car makers more according to their CSR than those consumer in the first world, thus companies that perform better in this sphere stand a far greater chance of winning the hearts and minds of the new middle class is guaranteed success. In 2005, Honda was ranked the UKs best car company based on its social responsibility initiatives, by the foremost research company on automotives, TNS Automotive. It performs equally well in the US, Indonesia, Italy and Spain among other countries alongside BMW, Shell, Malaysias Petronas, Michelin and Germanys Porsche (Nissan Corp., 2010). Honda spent over 2.3% of its annual revenues in 2009, on its CSR commitments, with the environment taking the lions share of the budget. The company has undertaken numerous actions in an attempt to meet the challenges posed by global warming and climate change. With the reputation of the automobile industry and fossil fuels already damaged, due to its huge carbon footprints, and the growing fears among the public of air pollution, it is only reasonable that companies act in accordance to the wishes of the consumers. Honda has initiated the LCA system, which identifies and sets targets for the required actions. The company develops energy efficient models, adheres by the 3Rs (in design) and noise reduction etc. Hondas corporate governance is a typical Japanese style bottom down structure, characterized by collective decision making and a collective sense of belonging among to the company that in turn reflects on the companys performance (Honda Ltd, 2010). Any companys corporate governance does determine the direction that it assumes, which ultimately reflects on its financial performance. Nissans corporate philosophy, governance as well CSR activities are not different from Hondas. It seeks to bring enrichment of the peoples lives and the environment in which they operate. It has made CSR an important part of its corporate management policies. It has devised its green purchasing guidelines, coupled with Nissan-Renault Suppliers Guidelines, which ensure that the companys entire supply chain is green and serves the purposes of the policies set by its top management. Through its charitable arm, Chryslers management makes annual donations to needy communities, projects and causes (Chrysler, 2010). In 2009, the company advanced upwards of $100000 to Good Harvest geared at combating hunger. The companys CSR initiatives are not as extensive as both Nissan and Hondas partly because the company caters for the luxury market segments that are in the main concerned about the quality and luxury as against a companys CSR etc. CONCLUSIONS Honda is largely touted by observers and varied literatures in strategic management. Its strategies have largely been used either rightly or wrongly to back up a number of conceptual dichotomies, with contracting positions i.e. learning v. analytical planning, core capabilities v competencies etc. Most of these assumptions, and evidences have however, proven erroneous owing to empirical mistakes that result into the over emphasis of the companies strengths, while its mistakes go largely unnoticed. Further, strategies and explanations are expressed in form of reductionist, single-sided theories that largely fail to portray the actual strategic orientation of Honda. Hondas thrives on reconciling dichotomies. Thus many observers in the west have largely missed out in studying, learning from and understanding Honda. Rohlen (1974), it is evident that capabilities as well as competencies can possibly complement one another, forming into one theory. The latter does focus on the production expertise and technologies while the capabilities serving to improve the whole chain of value. Capabilities are far more visible and easily appreciated by the clients than are product competencies. Hondas ability to meet high targets and post tremendous growth rates is largely due to its tendency to set stretched targets, which brings into direct competition with the biggest players in the automotive industry. In order to compete, it uses its resource base to compete by either providing niche products or undercutting competitors on basis of cost advantages, attained through scale economies. This ability to leverage her resources offers the key to its success, as against the widely fabled Japanese management styles. This style is widely different from and more appealing that the western style corporate management is only suitable for the Japanese and Asian environments. There are aspects in both management styles that could beneficially be, and have largely been adopted by either side to the great advantage of the corporations, but not the complete management packages as they will be utter failures in the other ones environment (Schein, 1981). Finally, this report has demonstrated the importance of corporate governance, policy and CSR is important in the ever changing consumer tastes as well as preferences, and most importantly, increasing consumer awareness. RECOMMENDATIONS Increased spending and expansion of Hondas and other automotive companies in CSR, environmental protection and production of innovative environmentally friendly models should continue as the only way counter changing consumer needs as well as the changing times. The Western and Japanese styles of corporate management should be blended to suit both the practical and strategic objectives of each organization. Reconciliation of strategies is crucial for success and helps companies reap the benefits of divergent strategies, thus companies must seek common grounds between strategies rather than opting for only one.

How Concentration and Temperature Affects the Rate of Reaction Essays

How Concentration and Temperature Affects the Rate of Reaction between Magnesium Ribbon and Hydrochloric Acid. WHAT I AM INVESTIGATING I am going to investigate how concentration and temperature affects the rate of reaction between magnesium ribbon and hydrochloric acid. MY PREDICTION The thing which I expect to happen is the more acid added to water the faster the reaction will happen. Also the hotter the solution the quicker the reaction will happen. THEORY TO BACK UP PREDICTION This will happen because when the temperature increases it will give the particles energy which will make the particles move quicker causing more particles to â€Å"collide† this will make the reaction quicker. I predict that these factors might have an effect on the results 1. Temperature- how hot or cold 2. Concentration- how much acid, how little 3. surface area- how big or small 4. Time- how fast, how slow 5. Catalyst- will speed up the reaction but won’t get used up. 6. mass of magnesium- how much magnesium The idea that I am going to investigate is how the increase of temperature will affect the speed of reaction. Planning The equipment I will need is:  · Goggles for eye protection  · Beaker to put acid and water in  · Stop clock for measuring the time  · Magnesium strips to put in the solution the magnesium strip will be 3cm  · Acid to mix with the water  · Water to mix with the acid  · Measuring cylinder to make the experim...

Farewell to Manzanar Essay -- essays papers

Farewell to Manzanar Beginning in March of 1942, in the midst of World War II, over 100,000 Japanese-Americans were forcefully removed from their homes and ordered to relocate to several of what the United States has euphemistically labeled â€Å"internment camps.† In Farewell to Manzanar, Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston describes in frightening detail her family’s experience of confinement for three and a half years during the war. In efforts to cope with the mortification and dehumanization and the boredom they were facing, the Wakatsukis and other Japanese-Americans participated in a wide range of activities. The children, before a structured school system was organized, generally played sports or made trouble; some adults worked for extremely meager wages, while others refused and had hobbies, and others involved themselves in more self-destructive activities. The smaller children that were confined with their families seemed to be generally unaware of the hardships they were facing. Many enjoyed individuality and separation from their parents since they didn’t have to keep as close of an eye on the children. In the book, Jeanne notices that it was almost impossible to continue sitting her entire family at dinnertime, and this unfortunate change occurred in many other families as well. For the first year of their confinement, before there was a semi-structured school system, children did just about everything they could think of to pass the time. As anyone would expect... Farewell to Manzanar Essay -- essays papers Farewell to Manzanar Beginning in March of 1942, in the midst of World War II, over 100,000 Japanese-Americans were forcefully removed from their homes and ordered to relocate to several of what the United States has euphemistically labeled â€Å"internment camps.† In Farewell to Manzanar, Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston describes in frightening detail her family’s experience of confinement for three and a half years during the war. In efforts to cope with the mortification and dehumanization and the boredom they were facing, the Wakatsukis and other Japanese-Americans participated in a wide range of activities. The children, before a structured school system was organized, generally played sports or made trouble; some adults worked for extremely meager wages, while others refused and had hobbies, and others involved themselves in more self-destructive activities. The smaller children that were confined with their families seemed to be generally unaware of the hardships they were facing. Many enjoyed individuality and separation from their parents since they didn’t have to keep as close of an eye on the children. In the book, Jeanne notices that it was almost impossible to continue sitting her entire family at dinnertime, and this unfortunate change occurred in many other families as well. For the first year of their confinement, before there was a semi-structured school system, children did just about everything they could think of to pass the time. As anyone would expect...

Plagiarism †Impact of Internet Essay

The advent of technology and internet in the last decade has opened up several avenues for unlimited information access. This along with the increasing academic pressures has led students to resort to plagiarism at an alarming rate (Elliot, 2004). The problem of plagiarism in the academic context can no longer be ignored as it is hampering the creativity and intellectual capacities of students. Overall, there has been a growing concern and an increase in awareness to find ways to counteract plagiarism. Thesis Problem Statement It has been said that internet hinders the creativity of students and encourages intellectual laziness. This paper intends to explore the negative effects of internet on the creative thinking abilities of the students and find some ways to counteract it. Internet and Plagiarism While the concept of plagiarism is not new, it is certainly more widespread now than before. Plagiarism basically means copying someone else’s work and claiming it as own without giving due credit to the original author (Jones, 2007). With the advent of technological era, information is easily accessible and the temptation to pass off someone else’s work as one’s own is high. There is no limit to the amount or type of information that is available on internet covering every subject imaginable. While this kind of information accessibility is advantageous in several ways and facilitates learning in some scenarios, it also leads to several problems with plagiarism especially in the academic context. Due to the availability and ease of access of the information without any restrictions, the effort to plagiarise is much less compared to earlier days when students had to go through a laborious process to get access to the relevant resources in order to copy. In this co ntext, the impact of internet on cheating can be considered extremely high and is known as digital or cyber plagiarism. Impact of internet According to the NEC Research Institute, there are more than 1.4 billion pages on the Internet with 25 new pages being added every second (Dyrli, 2000). Due to this huge database of information, it is very easy to find papers and information related to the academic subjects This has led to a rapid increase in the percentage of cheating both intentional and unintended by students. According to a study conducted by the Centre for Academic Integrity of Duke University, plagiarism due to internet has increased fourfold in the last 6 years (Vencat, 2006). Several other studies have substantiated this claim of rising incidents of plagiarism and the blurring of moral lines among students. Reasons and Effects of Plagiarism Before delving deep into the effects of plagiarism and ways to prevent it, it is important to understand the reasons for it. While the availability of information is certainly a forerunner, there are several other reasons which lead to it as well, the main one being the academic pressure to which students are subjected and the emphasis on good grades in today’s competitive world (Elliot, 2004). However, since the focus of this paper is digital plagiarism, the main reasons why internet encourages plagiarism are stated below: 1. Access to unlimited information through websites and search engines. 2. The ease with which content can be copy-pasted as compared to the earlier traditional methods of copying the material by hand. 3. Difficulty in detecting plagiarism due to the sheer amount of information against which a particular essay or paper needs to be compared. 4. Lack of standards and criteria making it difficult to pin down a work as exact plagiarism. Due to all the reasons mentioned above and many others, the incidents of cheating are steadily on the rise since the last decade. While a lone instance of plagiarism is negligible, massive increases such as these indicate a self-destructive trend among the student community and are becoming a cause of worry (Lathrop & Foss, 2000). Cheating students not only hamper their own intellectual growth, they also make it that much more difficult for honest students to get their due. Students may gain admission to courses which they do not deserve by using the grades obtained through wrongful means and this creates a permanent impact on the future of the society. This impact becomes especially dangerous if a cheating student decides to get into fields such as medicine, law etc. Also, if a particular student who plagiarises regularly receives good grades, it might compel others to do the same and hence the problem will continue to spread. Considering all these factors, it has become imperative for the academic community to take a strong stand against plagiarism. Avoiding Plagiarism The anti-plagiarism industry has been gaining more and more prominence in the last few years and educational institutions have started enforcing very strict guidelines to ensure that students do not cheat. Most of the institutions mete out severe punishments to offenders. Having said that, the subject of academic integrity is a debatable topic and since all the information available on internet is considered public, it is difficult to define intellectual property in a precise manner. Creating awareness is the first step towards preventing plagiarism and most institutions are taking steps to ensure awareness among students. There are also several resources available on the internet which give information about what constitutes plagiarism and what does not. Teachers are resorting to the use of plagiarism detection softwares to catch offenders. As mentioned before, there are several reasons which ultimately culminate in plagiarism. Apart from the ones mentioned in the previous section, there are also several internal factors which lead students to cheat. Procrastination, poor planning and time management, peer pressure, lack of subject knowledge etc are some of the contributing factors (Elliot, 2004). Sometimes, students are genuinely not aware of the intricacies of citing works and thereby make mistakes which constitute accidental or unintentional plagiarism. However, the fact that the plagiarism was unintentional does not make it acceptable and is still considered wrong. To avoid plagiarism, it is important to tackle the root of the issue. While the institute and teachers can play an important role in creating awareness and challenging assignments which encourage creative thinking, at the end of the day, the moral responsibility lies with the students and it is up to them to understand the consequences of cheating and make an effort consciously to avoid it (Martin, 1984). There are several ways in which students can contribute towards reducing such cases. It is important to create self-awareness by studying all the plagiarism related policies and literature provided by the university and also to understand the consequences of not following the rules as most of the universities subscribe to anti-plagiarism softwares lately. Along with policies, it is also important for students to understand the ethics behind the policies. There are several writing formats and referencing styles followed by universities which provide guidelines on giving credit to the original source and students should familiarize themselves with the ones accepted by their own institutes (Kirszner & Mandell, 2004). It is a good idea to ask for help whenever there is any confusion about citing. Also, it is of utmost importance for students to develop good time management skills and plan their coursework in a proper manner as lack of time is one of the main factors for cheating. A good internal schedule with enough time allocated for understanding the subject matter can go a long way in preventing the temptation to cheat. By gaining a good understanding of the subject matter, it is possible to analyse what has been written on the subject by others and extract the relevant data from it rather than blind copying. Last but not the least, it is extremely important to cite all the information which has been borrowed from other sources (Neville, 2007). Developing Creative Thinking During his days as the editor of the Forbes magazine, Malcolm Forbes once said that â€Å"Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one†. This quote aptly describes the actual intent behind the design of academic subjects and the related coursework. It has been said that the ability to think and react logically is critical for a person’s personal as well as professional success. While the internet or any other literary resource might provide the information and the facts relevant to a coursework, they do not serve the actual purpose of a course. Most of the times, the aim of a coursework, be it an essay or a dissertation is to test the subject knowledge and critical thinking abilities of the student. Mere copy pasting does not in any way, reflect the thinking abilities of a student. The internet can be a powerful source of data and information as long as the student learns to process the data and understand the information independently.   Th e information available can be used more productively if the students relate it to the task at hand and build upon it. There are several ways to develop critical thinking abilities though it is not possible to simply learn them. Every assignment can be broken down into logical chunks which encourage thinking and analysing on the students’ part. Students can also participate in class room discussions to the maximum possible extent to understand various viewpoints and relate them to one’s own views. Participating in discussions and taking notes at appropriate places ensures that the original authors are always credited for their work. This also encourages asking questions and raising doubts as and when they arise thereby helping the students understand the subject better. Understanding the subject ensures that students do not blindly accept the facts presented by someone else without questioning the logic behind it or without asking for evidence (Martin, 1984).