Archive for February, 2010
Your desk may reveal more to your co-workers and boss than you may think. In fact, a recent survey conducted on behalf of a desktop solutions line suggests there are three distinct organizational types in the typical office-”pilers,” “filers” and “tossers.” Chances are, the person who has heaps of piles on the desk sits next to you, the obsessive filer sits across from you and the person who throws everything away is down the hall.
“The fact that you can never find anything on a co-worker’s desk when you need it seems to suggest that everyone has their own system of organization,” said Sharon Mann, organizational expert and president of the 100,000-member I Hate Filing Club. “This recent study supports this belief as it divides workers into three organizational types: pilers, filers and tossers. With pilers comprising the largest segment of the workforce, developing PileSmart-a line catering directly to pilers’ needs-was simply the right solution.”
Using Mnemonics in Foreign Language Teaching and Learning
So how much vocabulary do you actually need to know before you can “get by” and actually converse in a foreign language? That depends on who you ask, as that tends to vary somewhat.
In his book, “Using Your Memory”, author Tony Buzan says that a mere 100 words comprise nearly 50% of the vocabulary used in every day conversational speech in most languages. Learning the equivalent of these words in a foreign language can help you to quickly develop essential vocabulary for everyday conversational use. But is this really enough?
Link Word Technique
Generally, you can function at the most basic level in a foreign language with a core vocabulary of around 1000 words according to Dr. Michael Gruneberg who formalized the “LinkWord” technique. He claims that, using this technique of linking a word in your own language to a word in the new language, you can acquire a core vocabulary in a foreign language in as little as 10 hours.
For many parents who have home schooled their children through the elementary years, continuing the process during high school may seem like a daunting task. After all, math and science become more advanced in the teen years, and you may not have been a genius when it came to those subjects when you were in high school. You may also be concerned about the social aspect of your child’s development, as this becomes even more important for teenagers.
But if your son or daughter has benefited greatly from the home school experience thus far, why put a stop to it? Especially with all the online resources available today, it’s definitely possible to give your teenager everything he/she needs to be successful at this stage of the game.
Sometimes it’s hard to imagine life before the internet. Believe it or not, the internet has just celebrated its 35th birthday. I suspect no one would have imagined the impact such an invention would have on our daily lives. And its potential increases with every day.
The internet provides us with up-to-date news, entertainment, forums, and a multitude of other topics where anything you can think of is literally at our fingertips. Newly popular is the concept of acquiring your education online. While more and more colleges and universities are offering some classes online, online degrees are becoming increasingly accepted and habitual. Anyone who wants to improve their skills, make a change in career, or simply further their understanding of their profession can obtain an online degree. It is especially convenient for people who work full time.
Where does starvation exist in the world today? What are some of the causes of world hunger? Are citizens of developed countries donating monetarily to the ongoing relief efforts? In this article I will address these questions with the hope that by creating an understanding of the current world hunger situation, morally conscious individuals will do their part in contributing to the eradication of this unseen suffering.
It is a well known fact that there is enough food in the world to feed every human being on earth. Sadly, malnutrition and hunger still afflict one out of every seven people in the world today. Or, from a slightly different statistical perspective, the current world population is 4,712,200,000. The number of malnourished is 797,900,000. Therefore 17% of the world population is currently malnourished or starving. No matter how you examine the issue, a current crisis is at hand. Why is this so?
The causes of starvation are complex, but there are some common threads that seem to be associated with this problem. First and foremost, starvation is caused by poverty. To address the problem of world hunger then the problem of global poverty must be addressed. Therefore, the question that we should examine is what are the causes of poverty. A thorough discussion on the causes of global poverty is outside the purview of this article. Entire textbooks have been written on the subject. For our discussion, it is suffice to say that one of the major causes of poverty is governments pursuing policies that inhibit self sufficiency.
Areas of starvation are also characterized by persistent problems in cultivating food from lack of seed, arable land, and tools. Those that can grow food, must deal with insects, drought, floods, and war, which can result in complete destruction of crops. Historically, areas of Africa have experienced periodic locusts infestations, which can completely destroy crops.
Other causes of world hunger are related to the globalize system of food production. The globalize system of food production and trade favors a reliance on export crops while discriminating against small-scale farmers and subsistence crops. Many third world countries export out to much food while concomitantly not keeping enough food to sustain their own people.
AIDS is a significant cause of hunger. In societies affected by AIDS, famine is more deadly and difficult to combat. Why is this so? AIDS attacks the most productive individuals within society. Fewer productive people within society means fewer individuals to work the jobs that involve food production. This is one contributor to the starvation currently taking place in Africa.
Weather plays a major role in terms of the prevalence of starvation. Areas of drought leads to non-useable land with subsequent famine. This is well known. But less well known is that floods can also lead to starvation. Crops can be flooded and therefore destroyed, which in essence produces the same result as drought. In both cases, weather can produce a complete lack of self sufficiency.
Military conflicts, both internal and between neighboring countries, can lead to starvation. These conflicts can result in destruction of crops. Government money is directed at funding the conflict at the expense of the starving people. Funds are diverted from social and economic development. Military conflicts can also result in the displacement of large groups of people, removing them from their farms and their way of life. People can end up in refugee camps, completely dependent on relief aid.
The causative factors of world hunger are numerous, and certain factors change from year to year, therefore at any given time, some areas may be more prone then others. The extent of drought, flood, internal conflicts, and war with neighboring countries can vary over time. Therefore, these factors incorporate a variable affect on the degree to which inhabitants of susceptible countries suffer from starvation.
A combination of these causative factors in a particular region is a formula for disaster. When this occurs, large scale starvation can take place. A case in point. The Horn of Africa has seen severe drought coupled with internal conflicts. This is leading to the development of a tragedy. In this region currently 11 million people are on the brink of starvation.
Historically, certain areas of the world have had a high prevalence of hunger and starvation. These areas are the central region of South America, large areas of East, Central, and Southern Africa, and regions of South Asia. As of 2006, the current hot spots, those areas which are suffering the greatest degree of starvation, are as follows:
Niger:This area in central Africa has been struggling to cope with the devastating impact of drought and locusts infestations.
Haiti:In this region extreme poverty has been further exacerbated by a political crisis, floods, tropical storms, and hurricanes.
Horn of Africa:An estimated 11 million people in the Horn of Africa “are on the brink of starvation” because of severe drought and war. Somalia, Kenya, Djibouti and Ethiopia need food aid, water, new livestock and seeds. This is a major hunger crisis in development.
Afghanistan:Poverty in Afghanistan, made worse by drought, has contributed greatly to their hunger problem.
Pakistan:The recent earthquake coupled with a severe winter have produced starvation conditions. Recently, mud slides have hampered relief efforts.
North Korea:Food insecurity caused by the countries economic problems, is compounded by unpredictable and severe weather conditions. To date, the North Korean government has failed in its duty to provide for it‘s starving people. The North Korean government has actually refused foreign aid.
Columbia:A 40 year civil conflict and the illegal drug trade have caused mass displacement and poverty.
Democratic Republic of Congo:3.4 million people have been internally displaced as a result of a continuing internal conflict.
Mali:They are struggling to cope with the devastating impact of a recent drought.
Southern Africa:Erratic weather, lack of seed and fertilizer, chronic poverty, and AIDS have been contributing factors to starvation.
These are the areas of the world which are currently suffering the highest levels of malnutrition and hunger. With this understanding of where relief efforts are needed, we must address the question of individual response. Are individuals of developed countries donating to relief efforts? Most morally conscious individuals donate to relief efforts when the problem is presented to them.
A major problem in the relief effort is the general population of developed countries not knowing about the current hunger crisis. News organizations, more specifically television news, are not giving enough attention to the global hunger situation. While an in depth discussion as to the reasons for this is outside the purview of this article, a few points can be made.
Evidently, the American TV news organizations, do not think world hunger is much of a story since starvation is a daily occurrence. I suspect, from the perspective of these news organizations, that 24,000 people per day dying from hunger is not a big enough news story. When 1,386 people died from hurricane Katrina, the news coverage was enormous. Five months after hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, TV news organizations were still squeezing all they could out of this story. Granted this was an obvious tragedy, but an even bigger tragedy, much bigger, is going on in Africa and the general public does not even know about it.
Evolution theory teaches that survival is for the fittest living organism.
What is life? What is fit? And what does it mean to survive?
Well, there are many definitions of course. A useful definition, in scientific perspective, is the one that allow us to analyze myriads things with fewest principles. So here they are.
A living organism is a class of objects that share 3 traits.
1. Reproduce. Living organism can make copies.2. Inherit. Living organism, in the process of reproducing, will inherit traits to the offspring.3. Mutate. Living organism, in the process of inheriting, will make small mistakes.
That seems like a reasonable definition. If we look most living things around us, like dogs, cats, pigs, birds, fido, virus, etc., they all share those traits.
However, based on those definitions, God is not alive, while computer virus, religious doctrines, ideologies, and ideas are alive.
I don’t think God will mind though. It’s just a definition.
The practical aspect is that we can use evolution theory to explain the sort of humans, cats, dogs, germs, doctrines, ideologies, and ideas that are common nowadays.
Different living organism performs those 3 traits differently. Those living organism that reproduces a lot becomes plenty. Those that reproduced a lot, become common.
That’s the basic of evolution theory.
For example, we see that peacocks tend to have long elaborated tails. From this, we can guess peacocks with long elaborate tail must have made more peachicks. Perhaps, peahen love peacocks with long elaborate tails. It’s true.
Suppose it were true. Then peacocks with longer tails will mate with more peahens. Those happy couples will then produce more peachicks.
Male peachicks will inherit long tails. Female peachicks will inherit preferences for long tail. So, peahens like peacocks with long tail.
It looks like a circular argument. It is. The truth is we don’t really know for sure, at least just from the reasoning, why peacocks have long tail.
However, we do know that traits that lead to gene pool survival through sexual selection tend to be positive feedback.
Those are traits that either enhance gene pool survival through regular means or signal capability to survive on the females. Samples of the former are Cheetah’s speed and men’s wealth. Samples of the latter are peacock’s tail and sport cars.
The more peacocks have longer tail, the more peacocks in the future, will have even longer tails. The more peahens in the future will get turned on by long tail even more.
Now, most males are poor. Does that mean women like the poor? Does being poor serve gene pool survival?
The answer to the first question is no. The answer to the second is, well, sort of due to various unnatural sex laws against consensual sex. It’s tricky.