ShantanuT01/DACTYL-Pretraining huggingface dataset:
Introduction It has been the norm to refer to an outspoken filmmaker whose work elicits emotions among movie critics as a controversial and polarizing figure. Sicko by Michael Moore is a film that reinforced the belief that Michael Moore remains a controversial figure driven by personal ego to influence critical policies. Critics however point out that the intense debate o this movie has been precipitated by the bottom-line topic it touches -health care in the United States. In the review, of the movie, I believe Moore is persuasive in that he accomplishes one important goal. This is successfully managing to convince the viewers that the United States policy makers have failed to institute revolutionary policies in health care that have been done by other nations. Having received a description of hard hitting documentarians, Moore has edited and spanned around the themes of this movie that makes it compulsively watchable. Persuasive Strategies One notable and largely effective attempt by Moore to effectively make use of persuasive strategies is the use of statistics. In Sicko , Moore has used hard data to effectively relay its central message and persuade the viewers that health policies in the United States are failing. The ideas projected by Moore in the film include the need for a redress in health care system and call for urgent adoption of effective health care systems in other nations such as Canada, Britain and France. The order and Strategies used by Moore to reach Audience To understand the effectiveness of the strategies and the order used by Moore to reach his audience, it would be appropriate to point out the main theme of the film and then proceed to critically analyze the tools used by Moore in presenting these strategies within this film. As has been stated, the main theme around Sicko revolves around the appalling state of the American health care system. One effective approach that Moore has used to reach its aud
Introduction Dreams are considered by psychologists as a way through which the human body overcomes both mental and physical challenges. The psychology of dreams in human beings is an aspect that has been studied for ages now since the onset of the 19 th century. Among key psychologists that have examined dreams in human beings are Sigmund Freud and Jung C.G. These two attribute the occurrence of traumatic events in dreams to past fears or previous traumatic exposures. The current study is based on the findings of a previous field study on two groups of children in Palestine. In this study, the concepts of dreams as presented by Sigmund and Jung and their application on Trauma and Dream content will be evaluated. The article by Valli et al. (2006), depicting a field study on children in Palestine is the basis of the current study. The original study was a case control study in which children presenting with past traumatic experiences were matched to those presenting without past traumatic experiences and their dream contents compared. The children used in this study were randomly drawn from two distinct regions in Palestine that is, the Gaza strip and Galilee. The main objective of this study was to test a number of hypotheses and predictions emerging from the Threat simulation theory (Punamaki et al., 2005). Among the obvious objectives was to examine the impact of exposure to military activities such as gun shots on the psychology on children. With reference to the threat simulation theory, it is postulated that experiences in real life should induce the response to the simulation of threats if the role of dreams is to simulate any threats (Revonsuo, 2000). Therefore for the children in the Gaza strip, their experiences in real life with various military activities should possibly have an influence on their dream contents. Hypotheses When comparing the contents of the dreams in the two groups of children, it is expected that:   * Dreams of previously traumatized children will more often point to threatening experiences as opposed to the dreams of children without any previous traumatic experiences. This is with regard to the fact that the dreams of traumatized children are stimulated by real threats which impact on their threat induction system.   * Since dreams are induced by real threats, it is thus expected that previously traumatized children will experience more dreams than their peers in the control group that is, children drawn from a rather peaceful setting.   * In traumatized children, the efficiency of threat simulation depends on the parties common to the dream or rather the dream self. This implies that unlike in non traumatized children, the items significant to a dream are more threatened in the dreams of previously traumatized children than in children from peaceful backgrounds.   * Unlike in children that do not have previous traumatic experiences, the threats common to the children with traumatic experience
Currently, I treat death as an irreversible process and a final stage in each person’s life. At some point, I realized that it was inevitable, and every human would ever face it. It would be insane to think that anyone can avoid demise. Imagine an immortal is already so tired of their very long and endless life that they want to die. It is the same as if someone doomed to death wants to live. Therefore, I try to maintain respect for this phenomenon and thereby try to enjoy every moment of life so as not to regret anything on my deathbed. This philosophical perspective helps me avoid unpredictable emotions or reactions. However, my views on demise have undergone significant shifts throughout the ages. Being a child, I remember having no understanding of it. My only concept of death was that a dead person or an animal could be brought back to life somehow. As I grew older, I developed sorrowful feelings when I heard about someone’s departure. I recollect thinking about death as something painful and cruel because it took people’s life (Santrock, 2019). It became an increasingly sensitive topic to me during my adolescence, and I always tried to avoid it. There were numerous cases when I heard about suicides of my peers, and I could not perceive why they did it. I contemplated the causes leading individuals to give up on living bright lives. Being an adult, my perception of death became more philosophic, and I started viewing it in terms of one of the life stages alongside birth, growing up, and others. This is how I finally shaped my standpoint on this mournful yet natural process.
Companies’ Background The two companies referred to in this study operate in the foods and beverages industry. In addition, the companies concentrate in the production of low calorie microwavable foods. Krafts Foods Inc. is a leading global manufacturer and marketer of beverages and packaged foods (MarketResearch.com, 2011). It has its headquarters in Northfield, Illinois, but also operates in the other continents. Low calorie microwavable products from the company fall under the convenient meals sector. For instance, cheese and Kraft Macaroni come in ready-to-heat pouches. Manute Foods Company is also a multinational foods company. It specializes in the manufacture and distribution of low calorie microwavable foods. Its operations are not as widespread as those of Krafts Foods Inc. However, its presence in the industry is significant. The organization operates from the state of Texas. Low Calories Microwavable Foods Market Structure and Companies Effectiveness Determination Plan Mankiw (2011) regards market structure as the number and types of competing firms operating in a given industry. Consumers across the US and the rest of the world are exhibiting increased preference for healthy and fat-free food products (MarketResearch.com, 2011). According to IMAP (2010), the global demand for convenience foods and increasing health consciousness are expected to facilitate continued growth in the low calorie microwavable foods sector. In addition, majority of the processed foods consumed in the world are packaged. Competition in the low-calories microwavable foods industry is intense. Krafts Foods Inc. competes with other global foods and beverages brands, not only in the low calorie microwavable foods sector. Some of the competitors include Tyson Foods (US), Danone (France), and JBS (Brazil). Others are Kellog Co. (US), ConAgra Foods (US), and HJ Heinz Co. (US) (IMAP, 2010; Rayburn, 2014; Jambrak, 2012). In spite of the stiff competition, profits in this sector are relatively high. For instance, Krafts Foods Inc. recorded $42.2 billion in revenues in 2008 from its global operations. Operating profits and net income stood at $4.9 billion and $2.9 billion respectively (IMAP, 2010). Krafts Foods Inc. market analysis above reveals that the low calories microwavable foods industry has a monopolistic competition market structure. The market is highly competitive, characterized by numerous o
In order to provide adequate definition of the term ‘deviance’, it is necessary to understand the nature of this phenomenon. There is an assumption that deviant individuals are minority groups whose moral norms and behaviors differ from the ones accepted in the society in general. At this point, the concept can refer to the individuals who violate norms and values that are typical of society. Such a perspective can also imply considering marginal groups whose religious and philosophical beliefs do not coincide with the ones upheld in the community. In fact, there is no unanimous opinion concerning what and who is deviant because social norms have been changing in the course of time. I agree with the idea that deviance is more associated with violation of social norms that are factually and generally accepted in society, including laws and morale. Therefore, people who oppose these norms can be considered deviant members of society. Society should not regard people as deviant by relying on personal subjective opinion only. For instance, some might believe that vegetarians belong to the deviant groups because they dietary habits differ much from those accepted among the majority of people. My personal understanding of deviance previously referred to the idea that deviant people originated from sub-cultural groups, including representatives of hippies who were popular in the 70s or hipsters, advanced adults and teenagers whose lifestyle is associated with liberal political views, independent music, and deviant fashion sensibility. Such an assumption seems to be justified once it relies solely on dictionary definition of deviance, according to which it is the group of people or a set of assumption that move beyond the accepted norms. However, my personal understanding is only one side of the medal, which might deviate from those introduced by the majority. The existence of contradictory definitions is explained by the absence of objectively accepted terms that are widely used in society. Therefore, older definitions fail to construct the concept of objectivity; rather, they were closer to subjective realm. The distinction between objective and subjective views on deviance should be created to define the salient characteristics of the phenomenon. In this respect, the objective views on deviance are confined to the availability of certain characteristics that are either different or similar to the accepted ones. In contrast, subjective opinion implies that there is no unanimous assumption concerning who and what is deviant in Canadian society unless someone establishes the criteria. Despite the presence of opposite angles of discussion, both views are necessary to grasp the width of the definition. In order to decide which side of debate is more reasonable, specific attention sh
The Covid-19 pandemic is a global health issue that has impacted health care systems as well as the economies of all countries. Local and international businesses are equally affected by governments’ measures to control the spread of the disease. National and international demand and supply chains have been disrupted. Multinational corporations (MNCs) have responded to the effect of the Covid-19 pandemic by adjusting their operations. This essay discusses the implications of Covid-19 on MNCs’ strategies and globalization. The common strategies used by MNCs are the vertical and horizontal expansion of markets. The approaches ensure that the companies have a significant share of the global market and maintain their competitiveness in the respective industries. The vertical expansion involves the enhancement of production processes in foreign nations. This strategy allows MNCs to take advantage of such factors as reduced cost of raw materials and labor, less stringent local business laws and regulations, as well as low capital investment requirements. These aspects help MNCs to have minimum production costs and maximum profits. The tactic is also applicable to sales, where MNCs decide to establish their sales units in the host countries rather than using local marketing agencies. The disruption of supply and demand in the market by Covid-19 hampered the full implementation of the vertical strategy. Covid-19 inhibited MNCs’ ability to exploit opportunities in the host countries. Cross-border and local regions’ shipment of raw materials and finished goods have been negatively impacted by the policy of limiting the movement to control the spread of Covid-19. Equally, closure of business and stay-at-home plans have lowered the demand due to reduced disposable income and consumers prioritizing more on saving than spending (United Nations Industrial Development Organization 19). Therefore, MNCs have been adjusting their functioning according to the market forces in different countries. The labor-intensive and operating companies in countries most affected by the virus have halted production due to a reduced supply of labor and raw materials (United Nations Industrial Development Organization 20). The organizations are also changing the way they were reaching their customers. They have capitalized on social media platforms such as Facebook for marketing their products and maintaining communication with their clients since Covid-19 regulations inhibit direct promotion. MNCs are changing the way they were operating before Covid-19 to prevent losses. The horizontal expansion strategy in production and sales focuses mainly on the local markets where the MNCs operate. The corporations start manufacturing units in host countries to cater to existing demand. They promote their goods the way they do in their home nation, including branding and packaging, to copycat international norms. The approach allows
Introduction Along with information and entertainment, persuasion is one of the main purposes of mass communications. It means that messages conveyed via mass media may be aimed at having people adopt different attitudes or change their current behaviors. Rational persuasion appeals to reasoning and provides arguments. However, there are other persuasion tools, and a major one is an emotional appeal. Bypassing reasoning, it affects a person’s emotional state, which is seen as a more profound and a stronger driving force for behaviors than rationality (Perloff, 2010). The analysis of emotional appeal requires a more substantial effort than the analysis of arguments because the emotional appeal is more subtle. It can be said that an argument is persuasive because it is coherent and presents factual data while estimating the persuasiveness of emotional appeal is more challenging because it requires certain psychological knowledge. An ad that employed emotional appeal was a 2008 poster by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) depicting a man who is mutating into a fish. The ad appeared as part of a global climate change awareness campaign. Upon reviewing this add, the persuasion tools employed in it can be examined from the psychological perspective. Ad Campaign Background In 2008, the narratives of environment protection and climate change were trending in the world, i.e. appearing in mass media with higher frequency and intensiveness, due to the United States presidential election campaign of Barack Obama, whose political platform included environmental issues as a significant part (Houser, 2016). As the public attention to the topics of climate change was growing globally, the WWF published an ad that eventually became well-known—the “Fishman” ad. It is a poster depicting a man in a teal blue shirt, and his head has mutated to resemble that of a fish (“WWF: Fish,” 2008). It is written on the poster, “Stop climate change before it changes you.” The ad was created by an advertising agency in Antwerp, Belgium, named Germaine; photo credits were given to a Belgian photographer Christophe Gilbert. According to a statement by the WWF, the goal of creating the poster was to attract the attention of people and have them examine the variety of climate change issues discussed by the Fund (“Climate Campaign,” 2009). Upon seeing the poster, a person was supposed to develop a strong emotional response and thus become more interested in looking up what the WWF has to propose in terms of reducing the negative effects of climate change. Particularly, the organization had a number of solutions to reduce CO2 emissions, and the theme of their campaign was that everyone could do it in their everyday life; otherwise, everyone would be adversely affected. Concerning public feedback to the ad, the WWF did not publish any data on the effectiveness, which could have been measured by counting the people who reacted to it, i.e. followed the ad and visited the Fund’s website to
A big idea is a concept or statement that is core to the study of mathematics. It connects various topics in the mathematics syllabus into one big idea. The concept of big ideas focuses on breaking down the mathematics curriculum into subsections that can be taught and learnt easily. The advantages can be assessed in two perspectives in terms of the importance to the student and teacher because the big ideas concept focuses on making learning and instructions easy and understandable ( Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2014). One of the major advantages that a student enjoys from this concept of learning mathematics is the connection between new and known ideas being learnt. At a higher level of learning, students learn about fractions which are just a continuation of the learning sections which started at pre-school (Charles, 2005). Big idea’s help students relate what was taught in the first year to the subsequent ones. This aspect has high importance because it makes learning fast for the student ( Knowing and Learning Mathematics, 2001). Secondly, the learner benefits from the big ideas focus by being provided with the opportunity to explore concepts thoroughly. Ontario Education (2006) stated that programs that are organised around big ideas provide cohesive learning opportunities that will allow students to explore mathematical concepts in depth. This allows students to embrace the conceptual foundations of mathematics. Apart from being an advantage to the learners, Charles (as cited by Siemon, Bleckly and Neal, 2012) claims that focusing on big ideas and the links between helps to deepen teacher knowledge and confidence for teaching maths. Another advantage of the big ideas to the teacher is categorization of topics. Categorization of topics is very useful as it will assist the teacher when teaching mathematics using connected ideologies. The related topics of study are taught in a connected way according to the concepts of big ideas (Van-de-Walle, Karp, & Bay-Williams, 2013). Big ideas can make selecting instructional decisions and identifying prior learning easier. Chosen Big Idea: Numbers Numbers are the baseline and determinants of the perspectives in mathematics. Being able to understand and work with numbers is essential in every aspect of everyday life. Understanding numbers means being able to estimate, measure, calculate mentally, to compute using different ways and use calculators when necessary. Furthermore, understanding numbers is important for students to be able to make sense of a problem as well as making sense of solutions (Booker, Bond, Sparrow and Swan, 2010). A great sense of numbers helps student’s make sense of the world around them. To simplify numbers, they can be classified into whole, counting or integers. The practise of counting identifies the tally of thing available at an instance. Primarily, the final number of a tally identifies the amount of items or things present. The items presented in a group are represented by a specific symbol and word. Each symbol is a representation of integers. There are many points between integers in a number line. The lowest integer
Various approaches are applied in the process of understanding the competitiveness of an industry and the relationship between products within it. One of the methods used is the product hierarchy approach, which allows a relationship between products and the needs they serve to be identified. The product hierarchy narrows down basic needs to specific items that address and satisfy those needs. The hierarchy has seven levels, which include the need family, product family, product class, product category, product line, product type, and brand. The economy of the United Arab Emirates is composed of robust industries that provide essential services and goods to the local and international markets. Some of the core sectors include health, entertainment, banking, automobile, and technology industries. To have a deeper understanding of the industries, a product hierarchy will be analyzed to assist in determining the competitiveness of the product segments and brands. Industry 1: The Health Industry The health industry in the UAE is a multibillion-dollar sector that serves the needs of good health in both local and international populations. Health is a need family that is served by different product families. In this case, the focus will be on the healthcare product family. The following flow chart shows the product hierarchy for the health industry in the United Arab Emirates: Figure 1: Product Hierarchy-Health Industry. As presented in the flow chart diagram above, the focus of the product hierarchy for the health industry is on the provision of health services in the United Arab Emirates. The health industry is categorized in the need family of health. Under the need family, the product family that is emphasized is health care, which constitutes the segment of the industry that focuses on providing products that address curative and preventive services to individuals (Shihab 249). The next level in the hierarchy is the product class, which is the Healthcare Equipment and Services category that is essential to meeting the health needs of patients and all interested parties. The product category in the hierarchy includes the hospitals that provide various services that are related to health care (Ahmed and Alfaki 85). They include the inpatient and outpatient services, which form the product line. The product type constitutes the diagnostic and general healthcare services that are provided in the various hospitals. Some of the most notable brands through which healthcare services are provided are the NMC Hospital, Burjeel Hospital, and the American Hospital. Competition in the Health Industry The UAE health industry is very competitive due to the high quality of healthcare services that the population demands. As one of the leading economies in the region, the country has invested heavily in the healthcare sector through elaborate policies and infrastructural