Homework Should Be Abolished Essay Example for Free

Homework Should Be Abolished Essay It is a common emotion to students regarding the distaste of homework, but legions of teachers know better because they recognize the importance of homework in the success of students in school and outside of school. I completely disagree with the statement that homework should be abolished. School without homework is not an image I can fathom. There are many reasons why homework should not be abolished as it is greatly beneficial towards the student. Homework improves the stability of the student in school allowing them to spend their time wisely and not only focus on play. It allows the teacher to acknowledge the students weaknesses and in turn giving them an opportunity to improve and acquire new skills. Also, taking time each night to do homework is a chance for students to catch up on missed class and further reinforces the days lessons so it is permanently etched in the students mind where the information is stored and used when called upon. Several studies have proven that homework, in fact, does improve the stability of the student in school. This strengthens the statement that time spent completing homework is time well spent. Rather than giving students another hour of leisure time, doing homework entitles the student to an hour of enriched education. This can greatly benefit the student, as consistently finishing homework will reap great rewards such as a favorable test score or report card. Not only does homework accomplishment benefit the student, it also benefits the teacher as well. Teachers receive the opportunity to see at what stage the student is by assigning homework. Furthermore, the teacher can identify the weaknesses of the student so they can ameliorate their study habits in hopes of pulling their grades up. Many students chose not to say when they are experiencing difficulties and it is often up to the teacher to find out. Homework is not set out only to serve students, but it is also definitely aimed to help teachers gain insight on their students progress. Moreover, the meaning and goal of homework is profitable towards the students. It allows students who missed the days lesson to catch up with the rest of their classmates. Likewise, homework reinforces the new concepts taught that day and helps the student develop a deeper understanding of what they have learned. On the contrary, if teachers were to assign no homework daily, then the new ideas they have brought forth will fall on deaf ears and the students are the ones who lose out on the wondrous opportunity of learning something new. Are you ready to give up an opportunity where new notions are introduced and planted firmly within your mind? It is incredulous to suggest that homework should be abolished. Although many may hate the mention of homework, no one can deny the fact that homeworks benefits overshadow its cons. To put it succinctly, homework should not be abolished! It helps with time management and organization skills, allows teachers the opportunity to find their students weaknesses so that they can help them to improve and lastly, it helps to reinforce things taught in school and help to gain a better understanding of the new ideas and concepts taught, engraving it inside students memories forever.

Should The Internet Be Regulated Media Essay

Should The Internet Be Regulated Media Essay Internet censorship has become a hot topic to discuss at various levels in the government as well as within private entities and individuals. This is the taking control of what can be accessed viewed or published through the net (Zuchora, 5). It has been argued as to who should be mandated with the responsibility of internet control. This may be approved by the government or private organizations. There may be also self censorship by individuals and private organizations for their own advantage such as morals, religious and business reasons. However much has been said that the government should take control of the information sent and received through the internet. Some of the motives why the government is prepared to take control are to conform to society norms, control intimidation among people and also spread of fear among people in any country (Zuchora, 5). According to Obama, the US president he said, we are going to promote new and better tools of communication so as people can be empowered and be free to connect with other people in the society and thus with security. The government is going to support a free and also open internet so that people have needed information to help them in making decisions. It is also time to embrace the power of internet and its impact to our community. Internet has been known to improve peoples communication as well as reduce the distance barrier among two communicating people. It has been known to impact every aspect of our lives from the way we are taught in school to the way we get news and even how we find and maintain friends. Internet has led to the invention of internet based system. The internet based systems are literally used in most businesses now. They have improved efficiency and effectiveness especially in the delivery of goods and services (Bidgoli, 25). Internet also improved the storage of data, we no longer have to use files as a way of storing data. This reduced the manual filing systems which was slow and insecure. This ultimately reduced the service time especially in hospitals, banks and all service industries. Over time, there have been differing opinions on the topic internet censorship. Arguments have been made both for and against the need for the government to censor the information flowing through the internet. The degree of censorship varies from one country to the other. Some may have highly strict internet censorship such as the Arabic countries i.e. Iran. On the other hand, other countries may have extremely little internet censorship such as USA. However, the government should not limit the extent and magnitude of access to the internet in any country. This is because through the internet people have been benefiting from it such as getting news, advertising in case of businesses. There are numerous benefits associated with the use of internet in the community. This explains why I am against the issue of government censoring the internet (Zuchora, 7). A good illustration is the case of Iran, there was a plan by the Iranian to switch the internet in the county into a domestic netwo rk that was supposed to improve security. The officials in charge argued about improving deliberate cyber attacks, but the Iranians took it as an initiative to filter information online. One of the main obstacles experienced in the community when government censors the internet is the denial of the freedom of speech to the people. Internet use has increased over the last decade. The internet is believed to contain all types of information one may require. Fear of chaos should not be used as the bases to deny people (internet users) the right to express themselves and their feeling. Hence it should not be used for unwarranted censorship of the speech. The supporters of censorship argue that they are protecting the society from abuse such as sexual materials and hate being spread over the internet. However, there have been no well laid bases to determine what is bad to the people. People should be allowed to express their views on any topic in the community. Through the internet, business entities have been able to market their products both locally and internationally. Moreover, due to the changing world where by, news is being broadcasted through the internet for qui ck access by the people, censorship might deny the right of people to know and contribute to the national matters (Marsden, 164). The internet users should be left with consent to conclude what is right and wrong for them. With Internet censorship, freedom of speech through the internet continues to be threatened. The government therefore has no mandate or right to censor speech on the internet as it cannot force the adults to hear what is good for children. Freedom of expression is a vital component in any successful community. Internet has provided one of the most effective and visible ways that the ordinary people make their opinions heard. For example, when the US government was planning about Iraq war, it is the bloggers who questioned the action and not the renowned media. This gave chance for anti war opponents to organize. If the government was to regulate the internet, the American people for example would lose an important toll to exercise their freedom of expression (Bidgoli, 264). In addition to freedom of speech, internet responsibility should be left on the hands of the parent. One of the main talking points is how much the children should access thought the internet. However, government censorship would hinder the access of information to the adult. The parents should be the one in control of what the childrens access or send through the internet. This would help control what the kids can access. Control of internet usage by the kids should be left within the parents hands as well as school administration. The two people are the ones who are direct contact with the children, and it will be much effective for them to control what kids accesses on the internet. It will be much effective for parents to be responsible for the internet among their children than the government taking control (Caso, 46). Finally, control of internet usage denies privacy to the citizens. Through the censorship, government may use the internet to deny privacy. New technology tools are developed now and then and may be used by the government to deny human right as well as deny peoples privacy. When it comes to monitoring the information sent and received the government interferes with peoples privacy and may end up victimizing. People should be allowed to have their privacy to access what they want through the internet. Through the surveillance of the internet, the movement threatens free flow of information and hence violating peoples privacy. However, despite the right to access information to the people, censorship is also needed to reduce the rate of moral degradation of the children. As far as the parents are concerned, they might not be able to monitor their children all the time; hence they access wrong information from the internet. On the other hand, internet can be used to fuel crashes between communities or countries hence it should be monitored to what extent does people use the internet. A lot of malicious actions can be done through the net and despite the freedom to information control is needed for the wrong intentions of people. Conclusion From the above discussed points on the internet usage among people, it is clear that the government should cease from censoring what is sent and received by people through the internet. This is because the internet including other communication technologies has formed unprecedented ways and opportunities to share information between people. The internet has also been of great benefit through the opening of paths for pro-democracy groups, journalist and individuals in all parts of the world whereby they have been able to hold government accountable for their actions. While it is true some people misuse the internet by committing crimes, it should not be taken as the reason to regulate the entire medium. The already existing laws are adequate to preserve law and order in the communities. Much has been discussed the topic, and it leaves to the decision of the internet users to argue for or against the topic. However I take the stand that the government should not be involved in censoring the internet.

Lagrange Multipliers in Mathematics

Lagrange Multipliers in Mathematics Lagrange multipliers arise as a method for maximising (or minimising) a function that is subject to one or more constraints. It was invented by Lagrange as a method of solving problems, in particular a problem about the moons apparent motion relative to the earth. He wrote his work in a paper called Mechanique analitique (1788) (Bussotti, 2003) This appendix will only sketch the technique and is based upon information in an appendix of (Barnett, 2009). Suppose that we have a function which is constrained by . This problem could be solved by rearranging the function for x (or possibly y), and substituting this into . At which point we could then treat as a normal maximisation or minimisation problem to find the maxima and minima. One of the advantages of this method is that if there are several constraint functions we can deal with them all in the same manner rather than having to do lots or rearrangements. Considering only f as a function of two variables (and ignoring the constraints) we know that the points where the derivative vanish are: Now g can also be minimised and this will allow us to express the equation above in terms of the dxs Since these are linear functions we can add them to find another solution, and traditionally is used to get Which is 0 only when both We can generalise this easily to any number of variables and constraints as follows: We can then solve the various equations for the s. The process boils down to finding the extrema of this function:   Ã‚   As an example imagine that we have a fair 8 sided die. If the die were fair we would expect an average roll of . Let us imagine that in a large number of trials we keep getting an average of 6, we would start to suspect that the die was not fair. We can now estimate the relative probabilities of each outcome from the entropy since we know: We can use Lagranges method to solve this equation subject to the constraints that the total probability sums to one and the expected mean (in this case) is 6. The method tells us to minimise the function: Where the first part is the entropy and the other two parts are our constraints on the probability and the mean of the rolls. Differentiating this and setting it equal to 0 we get: Now if we do an integration we know that this value must be a constant function of since the derivative is 0, also since each of the terms in the summation is 0 we must also have a solution of the form: Or We know that the probabilities sum to 1 giving: Which can be put into (A2.1) to get Which doesnt look too much better (perhaps even worse!). We still have one final constraint to use which is the mean value: We can use (A2.2) and re-arrange this to find Which also doesnt seem to be an improvement until we realise this is just a polynomial in : If a root, exists we can then use it to find . I did not do it that way by hand, I used maple to find the solution   to the polynomial. (the script is below) I also calculated the probabilities for a fair dice as a comparison and test. fair dice mu = 4.5 unfair dice mu = 6 p1 0.125 p1 0.32364 p2 0.125 p2 0.04436 p3 0.125 p3 0.06079 p4 0.125 p4 0.08332 p5 0.125 p5 0.11419 p6 0.125 p6 0.15650 p7 0.125 p7 0.21450 p8 0.125 p8 0.29398 lambda = 0 lambda = -0.31521 Table A2. 1: comparison of probabilities for a fair and biased 8sided dice. The bias dice has a mean of 6. > > > > > > Equation also appears in the thermodynamics section. Because can be used to generate the probabilities of the source symbols I think that it would be possible to use this value to characterise the alphabet i.e. take a message from an unknown source and classify the language by finding the closest matching from a list (assuming that the alphabets are the same size). I havent done that but think that the same approach as the dice example above would work (the mean would be calculated from the message and we would need more sides!). When we have a totally random source, and in this case the probability of each character is the same. This is easily seen from (A2.2) as all the exponentials contribute a 1 and we are left with   Ã‚   Where m is the size of the alphabet all the symbols are equally probable in this case.

The State of Nature and its Implications for Civilization in Hobbes and

The State of Nature and its Implications for Civilization in Hobbes and Rousseau In his Leviathan Thomas Hobbes expresses a philosophy of civilization which is both practical and just and stems from a clear moral imperative. He begins with the assertion that in the state of nature man is condemned to live a life â€Å"solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.† It is in the interest of every man to rise above this â€Å"state of nature† and to give up certain rights so that the violent nature of the human animal can be subdued. Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s vision of the state of nature parallels that of Hobbes but for its more optimistic tone: â€Å"I assume that men reach a point where the obstacles to their preservation in a state of nature prove greater than the strength that each man has to preserve himself in that state.† In general, Rousseau’s words prove reasonably less severe than Hobbes’s. According to Hobbes the bestial rights that a man is forced to give up must also be given up by every other man if civilization is to quell the state of nature. This surrendering of rights then forms covenant of peace which mankind has agreed upon collectively to rise above the state of nature. Hobbes argues that it is human reason that has necessarily led men to embrace this covenant: â€Å"And Reason suggesteth convenient Articles of Peace, upon which men may be drawn to agreement . . . .† These Articles of Peace Hobbes calls â€Å"Laws of Nature† and argues that while they do not exist in a state of nature they are nonetheless natural laws which potentially exist there. â€Å"A Law of Nature (Lex Naturalis,) is a Precept, or generall Rule, found out by Reason, by which a man is forbidden to do, that, which is destructive of his life, or taketh away the means of preserving the same; and to omit, that, by which he thinketh it may be best preserved.† That is, a n atural law is a result of a reasoning which commands that each man protect his own life. With the state of nature as terrible as Hobbes describes it, it is reasonable for a man to wish to put an end to it, as he then has a greater chance of protecting his own life. Without certain agreements between individuals they interact in a manner in which they are all a constant threat to one another. Therefore Hobbes arrives at the first fundamental law of nature: â€Å"That every man, ought to endeavour Peace, as farre as he has hope of obtain... ...iety, both agree that their contemporary world is not a world of the human animal. Changes have occurred not only in the way humans are ordered, but in humans themselves as well. Their theories differ in their beliefs about these changes. Hobbes is able to recognize the current state of man as having transcended its most basic nature. Rousseau agrees with Hobbes but assumes even more of man. He believes that it is possible not only for humans to be at peace but also to be free. Just how far society has transcended the state of nature in today’s world is debatable, but one gets the feeling in reading these two authors that Hobbes underestimates human nature and Rousseau overestimates it. Perhaps the truth lies somewhere in the middle, for many societies today are barely able to achieve peace within their borders, while a handful can truly be said to have a liberated populace. It is certainly no coincidence, however, that Rousseau’s vision of society heralds liberty a s its highest ideal and that the most progressive states of today do likewise. Mankind’s ever evolving flight from the state of nature moves people to continually expect more from their society – as well as themselves.

All My Sons Essay -- All My Sons by Arthur Miller

Life is full of many hard decisions that people have to take, often on the spur of the moment. Some we get right others turn horribly wrong. Joe Keller, the tragic hero of Arthur Miller's play All My Sons, was no different. His whole life was dedicated to his family and their well being but all his plans were undone by one fatally flawed decision. The audience can relate to Joe and feel sympathy for him because he was a good man who did many great things for his family and in the end paid the ultimate price. Towards the end of the play, Joe's son Chris anguishes over the fatally flawed decision made by his father, thus eliciting the sympathy of the audience. However, this is not enough to detract from the audience relating to Joe as a basically good man, who has made the hard decisions for many years and ends up a tragic hero paying for his mistake with his life. Joe is a good man who has spent his whole life trying to live the American Dream. He has built a home and started up a business to take care of his family. He is a hardworking and considerate father to his sons, Chris and Larry and a caring and loving husband to his wife Kate. The audience knows this because early in the play, of Act 1, he says to Chris, "Because what the hell did I work for? That's only for you Chris, the whole shootin' match for you!"(Act 1, p15-16). The audience believes this because throughout the play they see no evidence of Joe indulging in any of the human weaknesses, which would squander his money. He is an easy-going man who is a good friend to everyone. The play is set in his backyard, which seems to be a perpetual open house to the neighbourhood. He is well-liked by people in his small town, as Ann says, "People like to do things for the... ...-one other young pilots. However, there are many in the audience who like Joe would think that Chris has had things too easy and is making much ado about nothing. It is Joe Keller for whom the audience feels the greater sympathy and respect because he was a great man, who made a fatally flawed decision, which continued to haunt him through life. He finally understood the meaning of life within family and the society in which we all live in and that is that you cannot make flawed decisions which impact others and get away with it. When Joe realises this, he is brave enough to pay the price for his mistake, and that is what makes Joe a hero in the audience's eyes. As the US folklorist & expert on mythology, Joseph Campbell, said, "A hero is someone who has given his or her life to something bigger than oneself ." There was nothing bigger for Joe than his family.

Waking Ned Devine

A utilitarian would say to do it because having that money would bring them more leisure, but a ethnologist would say that they must not commit fraud in order to get the money because that would be lying and according to the categorical imperative we should never lie. The second categorical imperative comes into play as well because it would be using a human as a means to an end rather than an end in itself (although with Ned being dead, one could have an argument that that doesn't come into play).Jackie makes the decision to lie because he has a dream and he believes that Ned has come to him and wants him to have the money. Cackle and Annie, as well as Jackie and Michaels friendship both fall under Aristotle category of friendship based on goodness. In both friendships, each person wants what Is best for the other person, and all things are shared with each other. Both Jackie and Nannies marriage and Jackie and Michaels friendship include benefiting from the other and pleasure from the other's company, but they have that important thing where each wants to help the other reach their tells.This is shown in the case of Jackie and Annie when Annie finds out Jackie and Michaels plan to get he money. She is upset because she doesn't want Jackie or Michael to go to Jail for fraud. She doesn't think that will be what is best for either of them. The amount of winnings matters to Annie because when she finds out how much money it actually is she realizes how much It can help themselves, and the whole town.I think that the moral significance of the act does change when Cackle Includes the whole town, because rather than being selfish and keeping It all, he Is helping the whole town and I do believe that is what Ned would have wanted. He Is attached to he town and would have been more than happy with what Jackie and Michael ended up doing with it. Although, if a ethnologist were to look at the situation, there's no way they would change their position, because lying is l ying, and that is wrong.This fits perfectly into the situation where Kant says you should tell the truth even when you want to lie, and only then are you truly free. The mean old women is a character that always seems to be looking for ways to get what she wants at the expense of others. She tries to get two loaves of bread for Alfa price, she tries to get her toaster back without paying for it, and finally she threatens Jackie, Michael, and Annie by saying that she will call the office of the lottery If she doesn't get more money.I think that the priest Is right to be worried of what will happen to the town with all that money because these people have lived simple lives for so long, that who knows what will happen when they come into money like this. It ends up looking like noticed that was an immediate change after they were sure of getting the money is when Fin promises Maggie to quit pig farming even though he claims to like it. If everyone stops their farming, what is going to happen to the village?Ultimately, yes, I think that Maggie does make the right decision when she chooses not to collect all the money for her son. When living in a tight knit community like that, everyone seems like family anyways. And like Jackie tells her, having a father is worth more than any amount of money, and if she were to claim the money for her son, Fin would have to continue pig farming and her son would still not have a father. As far a Aristotelian ethics goes, I think she climbed a bit on the hermeneutic circle and became a better person.

Worldwide Food Shortage

These new factors are related to economic systems, political issues, alternative energies and fuels or global warming and climate change. As we can read in an article by Lester Brown published in Scientific American Magazine, â€Å"one of the toughest things for people to do Is to anticipate sudden change. † (2009) This quote helps us understanding the crawls In countries affected by flooding or droughts. Other natural disasters hard to predict and having a substantial Impact on basic food production are earthquakes and tsunamis. These phenomenon's have the power to paralyze any agricultural activity among others.When these natural disasters affect countries with a poor economy, the situation is even worse as they do not have enough resources to recover and things are likely to become critical to the point where the population is affected by malnutrition and dies of hunger. Africa has been long known as the continent with the worst problems concerning food shortages In most of their countries, mainly due because of the hot temperatures causing severe uncontrollable droughts and water shortages. The situation in these countries has not only immediate implications on population, but also makes it very official for economies to develop.Unfortunately, because of the lack of food many diseases would easily spread and be difficult to overcome, since the countries are poor. To Illustrate the state of some African countries we will be citing a shocking affirmation published In an article by Marc Gunter, senior writer for Fortune Magazine: â€Å"The average American pet will consume more resources than the average African and have better medical care as well. † (2008) The same poor economical environment in countries of Central and South America had facilitated over the years, food shortages following either droughts or flooding.In 2001 for instance, a severe drought has compromised the crops across Central America. Countries like Honduras, Guatemala and E l Salvador have been seriously affected. (Taylor, 2002) These countries are predominately rural and produce grains and coffee for export. This is the other aspect of local food shortages: it can extend to affect other importing countries as well, forcing the increase in prices for some essential foods. As we could see so far in this analysis, droughts are not the only factors having the power to severely affect food production, but their opposite, flooding has the same vegetating erect. Entries all around ten world , In Europe, Salsa, Australia, ten Americas, they all have experienced food shortages due to flooding. A healthy production depends thus on balanced weather conditions. This might be however difficult to achieve, thinking that for centuries nature has been unpredictable, and it's getting worse due to global warming. An article published in Fortune Magazine presents the Pentagon's weather nightmare, global warming, as a surging problem, and predicts that a cooling in the N orthern Hemisphere will trigger longer and rasher winters in most European countries as well as in the United States.The same conditions will also cause according to the same source, severe droughts which will turn â€Å"farmland to dust bowls and forests to ashes. † (Strip,2004) Food shortages could arise from animal diseases, like the mad-cow disease, which caused a global meat shortage in 1996, and affected mainly the Great Britain, where people have died from consuming the meat coming from infected animals. Same situation has happened with chicken and pork later in the decade. A major issue nowadays is the price of oil.In a global economy heavily relying on amerce, import and export, the price of oil could have a significant impact on the cost of production. Some countries are seriously affected and decide to drop the production for essential foods, since its cost could become higher than the selling price. While some countries, usually developing countries, are strugglin g to survive on a low food supply, dealing with starvation and diseases, others might as well have an overage in production of basic food. We can analyze these countries' food overage from a humanitarian and ethical perspective, depending on what their decision is regarding the surplus.How many countries decide to distribute their overage to unprivileged nations, and how many simply dispose of the extra production? Great Britain for instance, estimates that more than 30% of their food is thrown away and thus UK might be the worst in the world for waste. The cost of the wasted food is estimated to be between 8 and 16 billion pounds a year. (Vidal, 2005) This is Just an example of how food is wasted in some countries or Just individually in certain households. In the context of long time food crisis around the world, this waste is highly unethical and shows low commitment to the global welfare.