Foundations of Mythology Short Answers Essay Example for Free

Foundations of Mythology Short Answers Essay How is the word myth used popularly? For example, what does the statement, â€Å"It’s a myth† mean? In contrast, how is the word myth used in the academic context? After considering the definition in your textbooks and course materials, write a definition in your own words. The statement â€Å"It’s a myth† to me means that it is not true or not fully true. There may be some truth but there is some false information added to the story. Myths- the rich rewards awaiting questioners willing to approach myths from numerous points of view are all open-ended fields of inquiry (Leonard and McClure, 2004). Myths are stories that are based on tradition. Some may have factual origins, while others are completely fictional. But myths are more than mere stories and they serve a more profound purpose in ancient and modern cultures (PBS, 2005). Myths have been around for a long time and they are stories and they have been told for a long time. Not all myths are true but there are cases that they do have some truth to them. There are myths that are throughout history and there is good and evil depending on the story that is being told. Why do myths from different cultures around the world address such similar or universal themes? Think about how myths explain the unknown and the tribulations of mankind. Many of the myths are passed down to all the different generations and they will keep going just like they always have. Some of the myths are the same as another but they are in with a different culture behind it because many people believe in different religions or just different beliefs. Myths explain the unknown and things that we do not even now happen at times. The subjects of myths reflect the universal concerns of mankind throughout history: birth, death, and the afterlife, the origin of man and the world, good and evil and the nature of man himself (PBS, 2005). The myths are made by people and they are then passed down for future generations to come so that they have an idea of what happened past years. With the different cultures there are many different religions and that is also a reason why there are so many different versions of the same myth, they are all just worded differently. What is the relationship between belief, knowledge, mythology, and religion? Where do mythology and religion intersect? Where do they diverge? Think about the function of myth and religion in helping human beings cope with change, suffering, loss, and death. A belief is something that we have been told and that we believe in, knowledge would be having the correct information for the truth. Mythology is the study of myths and can be a collection of myths, religion is what people believe in and it can be a collection of beliefs. Mythology and religion intersect because they both have beliefs and they have stories that are followed by Gods, heroes and so on. With the myths and religions it makes people cope with loss and death a little easier, not that either is ever a good thing but with the thought of seeing your loved one again someday when you go to heaven or to know that they are angels looking over us makes bad times such as these a little more bearable. Myths can be fun stories to believe in because of the meaning behind the stories, and learning about certain religions can be very interesting to where more and more people what to learn the differences that exist. How would you defend mythology’s relevance in contemporary culture? Think about familial and cultural traditions. Also, consider how mythology is used in the arts and in advertising to typify human experience. Mythology has had extensive influence on today and many years to come because there are many things that people research and want to know more about. Many people had to tell stories and talk about what they heard or what they were told because they did not have computers, printing and many other things that we have today. Many of the myths are told today that are interesting and still today makes people want to learn more which is exactly what myths are suppose to do, want to learn and believe in certain things. Today there are a lot of books paintings and many other inspirational things that makes everyone want to know what happened, along with all of us making our own myths today to pass down to future generations to come. The human experiences are great because just like a certain group of people that test the myths and find out if they are true or not but the whole time they are testing the myths they have fun doing so, along with teaching many of the myths that they are testing. References Leonard, S., McClure, M. (2004). Myth knowing: An introduction to world mythology. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill. (2005). PBS. What is a Myth? Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/mythsandheroes/myths_what.html.

The Importance of Feedback Essay Example for Free

The Importance of Feedback Essay Feedback is a response to an action. It is essentially an expression of the effect of a person’s behavior on other people. As such, it is a form of communication. In a business organization, feedback is a way of telling a worker how his or her action has affected a coworker, the work team where he or she belongs, the organization as a whole, or the clients of the organization. ((Heathfield, 2007) Perceived from the point of view of the initiator of the action, feedback could be an instrument of learning. It enables him or her to find out how his or her behavior has affected other people. It could then serve as a basis for future action. An individual who gracefully accepts a feedback develops a better self-awareness thereby affording him or her with an opportunity for improvement. (Center for Learning and Teaching, 2003) Feedback could either be constructive or destructive. Johns Hopkins Medicine (2002) maintains that when one consciously provides a constructive feedback, he or she gives it hoping to help a coworker but when a destructive feedback is purposely given, it is done so to willfully hurt the feelings of a coworker. However, giving a feedback, whether constructive or destructive, is not always done on purpose. A person providing the feedback could unconsciously give a destructive one if he or she does not know how to properly communicate a feedback. Hence, there is a need to know how to give a feedback objectively. Organizations approach the problem differently and educators teach the method in various ways. However, the general drift appears to be that first, the feedback should be given promptly. People often misunderstand a feedback when given late already. Then the feedback should be concerned with a specific action, not focused on the character of the person who did the action. Third, the person giving the feedback should exhibit an apparent sincerity and honesty to help. Then it has to be consistent. A certain kind of feedback should be given to everybody, not just to a targeted few. (Heathfield, 2007) References Center for Learning and Teaching. (2003). Principles for Constructive Feedback. Retrieved August 25, 2007, from http://www. clt. soton. ac. uk/Events/Workshops/OPS/feedback. htm Heathfield, S. M. (2007). How To Provide Feedback That Has an Impact. Retrieved August 25, 2007, from http://humanresources. about. com/cs/communication/ht/Feedbackimpact. htm Johns Hopkins Medicine. (2002). Lesson 7: Feedback Can Create Positive Changes. Retrieved August 25, 2007, from http://www. hopkinsmedicine. org/service/resources/lesson7. html.

Investigating the Accuracy of the Air-column Length

Investigating the Accuracy of the Air-column Length 1.0 Introduction (max 500 words) Sound is a vibration that transmits as a typically audible mechanical wave of displacement and pressure through a medium such as water or air (Wikipedia, 2015). A pressure disturbance that travels through a medium (particle to particle interaction) is called a sound wave. Particles become disturbed, causing one to exert a force to the adjacent particle; hence particles are disturbed from rest resulting in energy being transported through the medium (The Physics Classroom, 1996-2015). The displacement of a medium’s particles is parallel to the wave propagation direction, which characterises longitudinal wave (A.Russell D, 1998). Particles do not travel down the tube; they vibrate back and forth between their individual equilibrium. Due to the longitudinal waves, there are particles in the air that are compressed, whereas others are dispersed, which are called compression and rarefaction (Figure 1). The longitudinal wave does not have peaks, so the wavelength is usually measured using the distance between the compressions or the rarefactions. Figure 1 – Compression and rarefaction (Geeks Unite, 2013) The speed of sound is dependent on the temperature, which can be generated from, where v is the speed of sound and T is the temperature. However, in the experiment the velocity of sound waves is found by multiplying the wavelength and the known frequency of tuning forks. Wavelength is described as the length of one cycle of the wave. When a system is driven by the natural frequency, a resonance frequency occurs. However, the amount of wavelength sections can determine several natural frequencies through a column of air in a tube ( in Figure 2). When a tuning fork is held above the tube (Figure 2) while vibrating, if the tuning fork’s frequency aligns with the air column, air particles will be pushed by the tuning fork’s vibrations at a frequency which causes the vibration in the air column (Ping E, 2011). Figure 2 – Example of the experiment’s setup (NASA, 2010) Figure 3 – Resonance tube with closed and open end (NASA, 2010) Although compressions and rarefactions are in opposite directions, when they are reflected at the end of the closed tube (closed end is water) into the converse direction; propagation of waves are produced. The wavelength is calculated through the air column, because a tube’s shortest resonance length is a quarter of the wavelength (Figure 3). Resonance occurs at the greatest amplitude of the sound waves, hence, wavelength can be calculated as (Walding R et al, 2004). The fundamental frequency (first harmonic) has a node (when displacement of the amplitude is zero) at the closed end of the air column and an antinode at the open end (Figure 3 left) (The Physics Classroom, 1996-2015). By adjusting the tube, the third harmonic will appear next as one vibrational node and two vibrational antinodes form the frequency of the harmonic (Figure 3 right). Even though the wavelength and frequency can be multiplied to find the velocity of sound, they are not factors that will affect the velocity, which indicates the changes in wavelength only results in an inverse impact of the frequency (The Physics Classroom, 1996-2015). 4.0 Discussion 4.1 Analysis By investigating the accuracy of the air-column length using resonance tubes in water, it was clear that the results were achieved with relatively high accuracy when compared with the calculated air-column length when the room temperature was measured and assumed to be constant at; hence the velocity of sound was. It was discovered that the resonance tube’s diameter had an indirect relationship with the length of air-column, which an increase in tube’s diameter results in a decrease in the air-column length. From Table 1, the air-column lengths for each tube at all frequency declined from 0.161m, 0.231m and 0.329m to 0.134m, 0.203m and 0.301m respectively as the diameter of tubes increased from 0.0164m to 0.0865m (same trend in Table 2). As Graph 1 showed more explicitly through the decreasing linear trendlines at different frequencies, the indirect relationship between air-column length and tube diameter was justified. Moreover, the gradients of the trendlines were the end correction that appeared to be between, which approximately corresponded with equations of the theoretical data and the formula of wavelength (), but for this experiment using end correction of 0.4 could be invalid as each set of data may have its specific end correction, possibly causing inaccuracies. The measured data seemed to contain relatively high accuracy (overlapped with the theoretical data) in contrast with the theoretical data (Table 2) in Graph 1. Therefore, the end correction and hypothesis were justified. As frequency is inversely proportional to wavelength, Graph 2 illustrated the inverse relationship between frequency and air-column length where all air-column lengths declined as the frequency grew. While the values were close to 1, the data plotted did not perfectly fit the trendlines, which indicated that some errors were in the data (see 4.2 Evaluation). Due to tube B and C having similar diameters (0.038m and 0.039m), and only three decimal places were kept when calculating the air-column lengths, the trends were not presented distinctly as the other three tubes. If the results were kept in more decimal places, tube C would have a shorter air-column length than tube B at constant velocity of sound and frequency. Anomalies were expected and four were identified (highlighted in Table 7). Standard deviation was used to distinguish between the raw data. Results were seen as anomalies if they were not in the range of two standard deviations and average air-column length (). The highlighted data were believed to be one-off values as they appeared randomly, hence disregarded when calculating the average air-column length. The anomalies may have occurred due to parallax when interpreting the measurements from the measuring tape, which can be avoided in further experiments. Another reason may also be mistaking overtones as resonance or missing points of resonance, and particles (e.g. PVC pipe’s debris/scraps) Overall, the data collected were relatively reliable and expected in the hypothesis, thus, justified the inverse relationships between air-column length and tube, as well as frequency and air-column. Therefore, the data proved that wavelength was inversely proportional to frequency (The P hysics Classroom, 1996-2015). 4.2 Evaluation The experiment was completed in one day with consistency. However, errors were found between measured data and theoretical data. Table 3 showed the percentage error between measured and calculated (theoretical) air-column length. All percentage errors were less than 1% (varied from 0.004% to 0.612%). Hence, the errors were insignificant and the measured results contained relatively high accuracy with precision. Theoretically, the velocity of sound should be the same at across all tubes at all frequencies as the temperature was kept constant; however, the data varied between a range of and (Table 4). Percentage errors were negligible (all under 1% with highest value of 0.397%) which were calculated to compare with the theoretical velocity at () (Table 5). Propagation error of velocity of sound was also investigated by considering the error of apparatus, which was compared with the theoretical velocity. Since this error was less than, the error was considered to be insignificant that the measured data contained comparatively high accuracy; thus, justified the experiment as a valid experiment. Graph 3 presented the average velocity calculated, the velocities of five pipes differed from each other. Theoretically, an increasing trend in variance should present in Graph 3, but pipe B and C seems to have extremely large variances (errors), hence disregarded. Thus, increasing trend only applies to pipe A, C and E. Evidently, pipe A had the smallest variance, which implied high precision; hence, pipe A was considered to have the highest accuracy. Furthermore, random errors were made as the tuning fork may have been held incorrectly as hands were moving up and down to adjust the air-column, or pipes were not held completely perpendicular to the ground. The anomalies can be improved by using an electronic ruler to collect air-column lengths to avoid parallax. When finding the harmonics, overtones which relates to the third and fifth frequencies should be avoided. In addition, room temperature may be measured when collecting each trial’s data to calculate the speed of sound to ensure higher accuracy of the air-column length. Due to the experiment being conducted in the classroom with all other experiments conducting at the same time, surrounding noise might be another reason for anomalies occurring; hence the experiment should be completed in a quiet room to avoid resonance interference by other sounds. Furthermore, the experiment can be extended by using AFO (Audio Frequency Oscillator) that generates frequency (at certa in level) and a speaker instead of tuning forks to alternate the frequency and water level to determine the air-column length (Gadani D.H, 2011). Resonance is used in real life applications, usually for music instruments. Flutes can be estimated as cylindrical tubes with two open ends, whereas a clarinet has a closed end which the air is blown from one end and resonance occurs (Walding R et al, 2004). Clarinets usually have frequency range between 125Hz to 2000Hz (Brown S, 1996-2012) with 15mm inner diameter (Fox S, 2000). Since clarinet’s frequency could be around 200Hz, theoretical equation (at 256Hz from Graph 1) was manipulated (Graph 4) to determine the air-column length of the clarinet. The fundamental harmonic is predicted to occur at 33cm; however, at the third harmonic the result (99cm) almost matches with the real clarinet length of 94cm (Nave R, 2015). The length of clarinet must be an exact wavelength in order for the resonance to occur. Therefore, with a percentage error of 6.38% the prediction seems reasonable and appropriate, which justifies that the experiment can be extrapolated to real life application in the future. 5.0 Conclusion When the velocity of sound was kept constant at a certain temperature, the resonance tubes’ inner diameters were measured with known frequencies written on tuning forks, the wavelength was calculated, hence the air-column length could be determined (). It was found that the air-column length had an indirect relationship with the frequency when velocity of sound was kept constant and an inverse relationship with the tubes’ diameters while both velocity of sound and frequency were maintained the same. This supported the hypothesis that frequencies would have similar impacts on the air-column as the decrease in frequency would lead to an increase in air-column length when diameter was unchanged.

Victorian Maternity Essay -- Victorian Era

Victorian Maternity Working Class Maternity According to author Helena Wojtczak, â€Å"the average working class wife was either pregnant or breast-feeding from wedding day to menopause,† bearing approximately eight pregnancies, and ultimately raising approximately five children. This overflow of offspring was most likely linked to the fact that birth control literature was illegal at the time (Wojtczak). Wohl’s research of the difficulties in Victorian childbirth shows that a combination of a nutrient deficient diet, and a substantial deficiency of both height and weight prevalent in urban working class Victorian women very likely contributed to an exceedingly high number of premature births, and consequently, a high infant mortality rate. Also, working class women were expected to continue working throughout their entire pregnancy. Examples of this prejudice can be found in Victorian articles such as â€Å"The Rearing and Management of Children: Mother and Baby† in Cassells Household Guide. The article s tates that, â€Å"He who placed one woman in a position where labour and exertion are parts of her existence, gives her a stronger state of body than her more luxurious sisters. To one inured to toil from childhood, ordinary work is merely exercise, and, as such, necessary to keep up her physical powers, though extra work should be, of course, avoided as much as possible.† In reference to pregnancy outside of marriage, Wojtczak notes that it was notably common for a working class woman to become pregnant out of wedlock, and due to the social stigma involved, and the possibility of unemployment, these women often chose to conceal their pregnancy. Middle Class Maternity By the mid nineteenth century, Abrams states that Victorian middle cl... ...ther and Baby.† Cassells Household Guide, New and Revised Edition. C.1880s [no date]. Victorian London. Lee Jackson, Ed. Vol. I. Pg. 10. 8 November 2004 . Wohl, Anthony S. â€Å"Women and Victorian Public Health: Difficulties in Childbirth.† The Victorian Web: Literature, History and Culture in the Age of Victoria. George P. Landlow. 29 June 2002. National University at Singapore. 8 November 2004. . Wojtczak, Helena. â€Å"Pregnancy and Childbirth.† English Social History: Women of Nineteenth-Century Hastings and St.Leonards. An Illustrated Historical Miscellany. The Hastings Press. The Victorian Web: Literature, History, and Culture in the age of Victoria. George P. Landlow. National University at Singapore. 8 November 2004

Liyana Badr’s A Balcony over the Fakihani, Pillars of Salt, by Fadia Faqir, and A Woman of Five Seasons, by Leila Al-Atrash :: A Balcony over the Fakihani

Liyana Badr’s A Balcony over the Fakihani, Pillars of Salt, by Fadia Faqir, and A Woman of Five Seasons, by Leila Al-Atrash In Liyana Badr’s novella, A Balcony over the Fakihani, the main character, Su’ad, meets and falls in love with a man named Umar, who towards the book’s end is killed in battle. What occurs between the meeting and the death constitutes the author’s attempt to process the environment in which she grew up. Similarly, Pillars of Salt, by Fadia Faqir, and A Woman of Five Seasons, Leila Al-Atrash, focus on and investigate women’s lives in the Arab world. At the very least, three issues are at work in these books. One string explores the oppressions and the joys, the perversities and the passions of Arab women. Another theme is Arab men’s behaviors and attitudes toward women. The final topic, which encompasses the other two, is the idea of literary form; that is, the particular ways in which the authors represent their experiences through writing. Taken together, these novels, in both shape and content, explore what it means to be a woman in an Arab , a man’s, world. One early scene in A Balcony Over the Fakihani is emblematic of the novella as a whole, as well as of the novels of Faqir and Al-Atrash; it encapsulates the authors’ artistic approach to the handling of their lives, the hostilities they must endure, the roles of Arab men and women, and the different ways both act within their setting. To begin, Badr artfully sets the stage in an almost journalistic fashion, parodying a newspaper’s objective approach in the face of so much human tragedy: "May 1973—tank gun and machine gun fire on Shatila camp (Badr, 45). This crafty setup is part and parcel of the way in which the author handles her topic. Only through art can she comprehend and process these events. In this respect, "The sky was lit with green and red stars, and the thunder and lightening wasn’t real thunder and lightening, but bullets from machine guns and small arms." In the midst of such fighting, Su’ad noticed "a white hair in the middle of her head. I couldn’t believe a baby’s hair could turn white" (46). Her disbelief is compounded when Im Hamdi sees the white hair and "cried out and wailed." Su’ad, in turn, is overcome by emotion. The two women hug and cry.

Alfred Hitchcocks Ability to Scare :: Alfred Hitchcocks Film Analysis

Throughout the years, many directors have been making movies that seem to "scare the hell out of people". From thrilling to just suspenseful scenes, Alfred Hitchcock explores different techniques to ensure that he captures the audience's attention. The characters in Hitchcock's films play a very important role in creating the tensions and twists, causing that heart stopping moment where you just want to yell at the TV. He uses the characters like strategically placed chess pieces, knowing exactly when to make his move. Alfred Hitchcock was a very scared person in life, which ironically led him to be one of the greatest directors for thrillers and perhaps horrors. ?I?m not against the police, I?m just afraid of them? is a quote from Hitchcock that leads you to believe the characters in the movies he directed, were what he would be afraid of in real life. Alfred Hitchcock expresses his fear of the police in Psycho when a police officer finds Marion Crane sleeping in her car. The officer looks extremely intimidating and you start to think that maybe he is the psycho. This thought is soon juxtaposed when Marion is at the car yard and the same police officer who had spoken to her earlier, stops his car across the road, gets out and just stands there watching her. We later find out that he is not the psycho and Marion finds herself sheltered by the lonely and secluded Bates Hotel. Here we are introduced to Norman Bates, a shy, nervous but very friendly young man. You would never guess, and end up shocked when you realise that he is the psycho. The sounds and camera angles of this film are the key to the feeling of suspense. The sounds of the violin make up most of the soundtrack for Psycho. Although the soundtrack is very repetitive and slightly annoying, it gives you a sense of anticipation when it played throughout the movie. The screeching violins are always played when you least expect them to, catching you off guard. As said by Alfred Hitchcock, ?There is no terror in the bang, only the anticipation of it.? The camera angles also play an important role in this movie. When Lila, Marion?s sister, goes to find Mrs Bates and talk to her, it seems to take Lila forever just to reach the house, with the camera switching back and forth from her face, then to the door.

Cogent Argument

Name Professor’s Name Course Date Determination of a Cogent Argument Cogency is a term that is used to show coherency of the various premise that contributes to a conclusion that is derived from the individual statements (Audi 235). Cogency thus depends on the premises, if all the premises are true, then the conclusion will be probably construed to be true, the use of the word probably makes it open for any argument to be considered. Cogency is used in inductive argument where observations are used as an inference for proposing a general rule regarding a statement (Audi 237). Acceptability is the concurrence verdict that is reached after a careful evaluation of all the outstanding factors based on the premises of a statement (Audi 245). In the first premise, it is acceptable to say that the grades the student’s scores has no relation with their personal values but depicts their ability to grasp the contents of the syllabus. This is because in grading it is the exact resonance between what the student writes and what was taught, there is no any other factor outside this range that is integrated in classification. For instance, a drug addict student can score As while a Christian one scores Ds, these grades do not absolutely reflect the students personal values at all. The second premise is not acceptable is equally acceptable, whatever is taught in class is not constitutionally obliged to anyone in a legal perspective such that they have to believe the classroom opinions and facts. Whereas they have the capacity to retain the knowledge and use it to get better grades, there is no legal requirement that they have to believe in what they are taught. Understanding and believing are two different words that confer different meanings altogether, premise three is acceptable and is relevant to the concluding premise. All the three premises are true and augur well with the conclusion statement. Since all the premises are construed to be true, it becomes impossible not to believe the last premise. The fact that all the three premises are taken to be true, substantial grounds is established to believe the conclusion. Relevance is the relation of the various premises to the conclusion premise, it all the premises are true then it is said to be relevant to the conclusion (Audi 251). The conclusion in this case is dependent upon the individual premises, any opinion regarding the premises directly influences the outcome of the conclusion. With reference to the four premises given in this case there is relevancy in the premises, the three preceding premises are all true allowing them to be relevant to the conclusion. Grades do not reflects on the personal values of the students is the fact in the first premise, the second one asserts that there is no legal obligation to believe what is taught in class and the third one informs that the students who are familiar with the evolution story do not believe in it. Form the three premises a conclusion is the made regarding them that for those who understands the evolution story and do not believe in it should not be given lower grades. The relevancy in the premises can then be vividly observed. An adequate ground is the consistency of the individual premises in assertion of an overall judgment (Audi 265). Considering all the premises in the case, it is impossible to refute the conclusion based on the three premises above. All the premises are true and combine to give the conclusion that is given in the above case. In conclusion, the ARG conditions are used to critically evaluate premises and conclusions based on their coherency and consistency in determination of a conclusion. These bring about the term cogency which implies the resonance given by the various statements. The use of the ARG is useful in making deductive or inductive reasoning that is essential in the critical and creative thinking (Audi 285). Work cited Audi, Robert. Epistemology: A Contemporary Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge. New York NY: Taylor & Francis, 2010.