ShantanuT01/DACTYL-Pretraining huggingface dataset:
The Bible, as a historical source, is of great value since it contains the centuries-old experience of people and can reveal a lot. It has long been proven that those parts of it, where it speaks of Egypt and Babylon, were written by people who are well informed about the life of these monarchies. Discoveries are more convincing that these people were real representatives of the culture that dominated their time; this information is constantly being confirmed and clarified. The text of the Bible, consisting of several books, was compiled at different times; the oldest parts of the Bible were written no later than the XII-XI centuries BC. Many letters and documents in the Aramaic language found in these places during excavations are indisputable evidence of the closest Jewish-Egyptian relations at that time. Egyptian religious thinking reveals many contact points; an overlap between biblical and Egyptian literary and religious images is evident. What is more, the Egyptians’ unique culture, practices, and beliefs can be noted due to sacred primary sources. Cultural Features The events of the Old Testament are associated with several localities, namely the regions of the ancient Middle East. Historians note that the Nile is the dominant geographical feature of Egypt played an essential role in the history of Egypt and was reflected in the cultural worldview of the Egyptians. The fertile black soil of the valley was the source of life and vitality, while the lifeless sands of the desert reminded the ancient Egyptians of their mortality. The Egyptians treasured the great muddy river; the soil rich in black soil was called “the black land,” and such a picture of the world was reflected in the unique cultural fund of the people. (Arnold & Beyer, 2015) The culture of Egypt cannot be considered in isolation from religion since syncretism was the spiritual foundation of the people. Religion has been an integral factor in the development of Egyptian culture throughout its entire existence (Aling, 2020). They believed in the magical power of art and its mystical purpose. Therefore, they created a rational system of artistic expression, conveying the sacred meaning of the ritual of human burial. The uniqueness of culture was determined by the early emergence of class relations and the state and the relatively isolated geographical position of the Nile Valley. All this made it difficult for the ancient Egyptians to contact and, consequently, borrow the cultural achievements of other peoples. The decisive role of the Nile in the economy and the geographic features of the valley determined the specifics of the Egyptian worldview and religious cult, the entire system of spiritual values. Only by common labor, organized by the intense power of the Pharaoh, the Egyptians could create conditions for a normal life. Therefore, fear of the formidable forces of nature embodied in fierce deities, of the all-crushing power of the Pharaoh, their absolute greatness, and power permeated the entire worldview of the Egyptian in antiquity. Practices of the Egyptians Found in Bible The Bible also reflects the Egyptian views on the afterlife, in particular, the c
Abstract Royal Dutch Shell is one of the largest multinational corporations operating in the oil and gas industry of Nigeria. Shell focuses on developing the socially responsible operations in the country. However, the Niger Delta region is the zone of conflicts where the political, economic, and social situation is unstable. The absence of the government’s protection, corruption, and the public’s oppression cause significant challenges for Shell’s operations. Royal Dutch Shell p.l.c. is the largest multinational company in the world which operates in the oil and gas industry. The company was founded in 2005 as a result of the merger of the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company and Shell Transport and Trading Company ( Shell at a glance , 2014). Today, the company is headquartered in the Netherlands ( Royal Dutch Shell , 2014). Shell is presented globally, and it also operates in Nigeria over 60 years. The Challenges Facing the Companies’ Merger and Recommendations The merger of the UK-based Shell Transport and Trading Company and the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company was initiated in 2005. The new Anglo-Dutch group faced many challenges as a result of the merger, and these challenges can be divided into internal and external ones. Thus, the main challenging effect which influenced the corporate structure of the company was the focus on the single-board structure. The changes were rather challenging because of the necessity to replace the dual-board structure typical for Shell Transport and Trading Company (Cullen, 2011, p. 149). Moreover, the new group was also influenced by the unstable situation in the Nigerian society. The Niger Delta is the zone of the constant conflicts which are challenging for the business development because the government cannot provide the necessary protection for the public and enterprises (Cullen, 2011, p. 150). Furthermore, the operations made by the multinational company were not supported by the public because of its focus on the environmental damage and contributions to the social instability. While providing recommendations on overcoming the challenges, it is necessary to concentrate mostly on the external factors as the influential ones. The unstable situation in society, military conflicts, and violence are the basic problems to challenge the work of Shell enterprises. That is why, it is necessary to focus on the promotion of the human rights in the society and on the support of the company’s employees as the representatives of the Nigerian diverse society. The next step is the response to the public criticism in relation to the company’s inability to overcome the negative environmental effects and people’s poverty. It is important to pay the public’s attention to the company’s efforts and achievements in the field of realizing the sustainable and socially responsible business. What Has Made Shell’s Operations in Nigeria More at Risk and More Valuable Shell’s operation in Nigeria can be discussed as valuable in spite of all the
Introduction The following essay examines the purpose of accounting.The essay also discusses the four basic financial statements and how they are interrelated with each other and the importance of financial statements to managers, investors, creditors, and employees. Accounting entails the process of analyzing, recording, summarizing and reporting accounting information to parties that are involved (Weygandt, 2008, P.6). Purpose of Accounting The following are the main purposes of accounting; Financial accounting helps keep systematic record of all the financial activities of a business entity.Usually,business transactions are prepared and recorded in financial statements such as income statement, statements of financial position ,cash flow statement and change in owners equity. The International Accounting Standards requires that business transactions should be properly recorded in order to facilitate remembering of all business transactions in future. Human beings have limited memory and therefore, they can forget business transactions if they are not kept in a systematic manner (Baneriee, 2010, P.2). The other purpose of financial accounting is to provide information about the financial position, cash flows and performance of a business entity. The financial statements facilitated meeting this objective by providing information about the assets, liabilities ,equity, income and expenses, cash flows and other changes in equity of a business entity. This financial information as well as the information contained in an entity’s accompanying notes enables the users to evaluate the future cash flows of a business entity (Baneriee, 2010, P.2). Financial accounting plays an important role of communicating the financial results of a business entity to the users to enable them make decisions. Accounting is usually deemed as a business language because it communicates valuable information to various interested groups. Accounting plays an important role of communicating past and present performance of a business entity and this enables the users to determine whether business operations are carried out in effective and efficient manner (Baneriee, 2010, P.2). Accounting is also used as a tool of meeting legal requirements. Business are required to keep their accounts in an orderly manner facilitate such legal requirements such as tax assessment (Baneriee, 2010, P.2). Basic financial statements Financial statements entail the end products which are prepared from the adjusted trial balance. There are four basic financial statements namely; income statement, statement of financial position, cash flow statement and changes in owners equity. The income statement also known as profit and loss account is a financial statement that is used in reporting the operating performance of a business entity over an accounting period. The income statement summarizes the earnings and expenses of an entity over an accounting period. The income statement is thus a recapitulation of all the financial transactions of a business entity during an accounting period. It allows organizational leaders and other users of account inf
Introduction Information technology is a general term that refers to any hardware or software that is used directly in the production process. It alters the process of production, storage, communication or dissemination of information (Aksoy and DeNardis 8). Information technology has become a major component in the organization’s production process. Its impact on the production process cannot, therefore, be overlooked. Investing in Information Technology is expensive, and organizations need to be prepared to spend a lot of money. There have been arguments as to whether it is worth to invest heavily information technology. Concerns have been raised on the impact of information technology on organizational performance. Organizational performance is defined as the accumulated result of organizational activities (Daft and Marcic 9). This paper seeks to investigate the impact of information technology on the results of organizational processes or results of the organizational performance. Background Information technology enhances the communication process in an organization. This makes communication across the organization much more effective and accurate. As a result, high performance is achieved in an organization. Improving the communication process is a major step in ensuring that the organization makes accurate decisions. Another sector that has greatly changed as a result of information technology is the financial sector. The sector has experienced landmark changes such as automation of the financial systems. This ensures higher efficiency in the financial sector. The losses that are experienced as a result of using the manual system are also reduced. Information technology is also believed to have a major impact on the cost of production in an organization. It has resulted in a reduction of the number of employees in an organization. Introduction of machines and other software has made work easier. Therefore, organizations do not require a lot of people to do various tasks. For example, automation of the accounting system reduces the number of people who would be computing and recording entries. Reduction of manpower implies a reduction of the cost of production. Another way in which information technology has reduced the cost of production is making the process of production easier and more effective (Khosrowpour 21). The machines have also led to speeding up the process of production. As a result, an organization is able to save on time and money. Information technology is believed to have an impact on the systems of an organization. However, it is important to analyze its impact in the organizational performance that can be measured by analyzing changes in companies’ income or profit. This research paper seeks to establish whether there is any change of a company’s performance as a result of embracing new technology. Literature Review Information technology and organizational performance have been of great interest to different researchers. Ther
Modern readers are so mesmerized by Tennessee Williams’s romantic and mysterious personality and his unique talent to point precisely at human faults in his writings that not many know that the writer’s original name was Thomas Williams and in his “former” life that preceded the literary career he even worked for a shoe factory. Nowadays, “The Glass Menagerie”, so widely admired, is rarely compared to Williams’s own life, but in fact he purposefully splits his personality into two hypostases (Cluck, p.84) in order to show that the writing is a mature person’s account of his earlier life. The present paper focuses on the relationship between the play and the events from the author’s own life and addresses the technique of “personality dualism”, aimed at more sincere depiction of re-evaluation of the earlier years from the height of ten-year experience. Similarly to Tom the Character, Tennessee Williams worked for a warehouse for several years, which he always remembered as the most depressive period in his life (O’Connor, p.75). “An average student and social outcast in high school, Williams turned to the movies and writing for solace” (O’Connor, p.75). His sister Rose, the closest person in his life and the prototype of Laura in “The Glass Menagerie”, actually suffered from epilepsy and underwent a prefrontal lobotomy in the mid-1930s, which has a clearly negative outcome and left the girl institutionalized for the rest of her life. Laura, as one knows from the play, has pleurosis, a complicated medical condition, which consists in problems with breathing. Similarly to Rose, Laura is a shy, but excessively responsible girl: “Laura (rising). Mother, let me clear the table. Amanda. No, dear, go in front and study your typewriter chart” (Williams, p.6). Amanda, their mother, is similar by nature to Mrs.Williams given that both of them had quite a naïve nature and poorly fulfilled ambition, as both Tennessee’s mother and Mrs.Wingfield, in spite of their “noble” background and sociable nature, had “unworthy” husbands. The major means of knitting the plot closely to the author’s life is creating difference between Tom the Character and Tom the Narrator, as the former embodies young Tennessee Williams, whereas the latter is designed to act as a textual representation of 33-year-old writer. Tom’s dual role in “The Glass Menagerie” — as a personality whose recollections the play documents and as a character that performs according to those memories —highlights the play’s tension between independently presented truth and memory’s alteration of truth. Tom the Narrator often addresses the reader directly, trying to give a more distanced clarification and evalu
Turkana Boy’s growth rate comparing to those of chimpanzees and modern humans We can tell the rate at which Turkana Boy grew up by assessing the enamel in his teeth. Initial estimates put his age at 14, but enamel tests showed that he was only eight years old. If at eight years he was 5ft 3” tall, then he must have been growing very fast. Turkana boy’s growth rate is closer to that of chimpanzees than modern humans. Chimpanzees mature faster and by age seven they are sexually active. By his fast growth, Turkana boy would have reached adulthood much earlier than a modern human. A prolonged childhood is directly related to an increase in the size of the brain. Because the brains of modern humans are much bigger than those of their predecessors, they partly develop in the womb and partly outside. A long and slow childhood gives the human brain enough time to mature. This growth also happens in defined stage-infancy, childhood, teenage, adulthood, and old-age. The study of the cognitive abilities of Homo erectus Endocasts of the Homo erectus reveal the presence of the Broca’s area-a part of the brain that is linked to communication by speech. This evidence shows that the Homo erectus was capable of passing messages across to other group individuals by use of language. By examining the stone tools used by the Homo erectus , we are in a position to tell how versatile the Homo erectus was in terms of cognitive function. The bits and pieces found in the area where they used to shape the tools indicate that they had enough brain-power to recognize flaws in the material they were using. They shaped their axes in consideration of portability and use, further confirming that this species was able to think further ahead. This kind of intelligence confirms that the brain of the Homo erectus was much more adv
Introduction Various researches that have been carried out have shown that the presence of nutritional information has direct influence on food consumption choice. For instance the public awareness campaigns about nutritional disease have greatly impacted the consumer behavior. These campaigns are meant to enable the consumers to make the best choice of food and avoid such nutritional diseases as obesity. This is one of the factors that have caused the availability of nutritional information to increase in current world. According to United States Department of Agriculture (2005), the increasing cases of away-from-home food consumption have also increased the need for nutritional information in those food outlets and restaurants. In the United States, for instance, most of the states and localities claim that the fast food chain restaurants should provide the relevant nutritional information on all the foods they serve (Nutrition Labeling and Education Act, 1990). They claim that there should be a law requiring such information to be provided in the menus that are used by these restaurants. According to California Menu Labeling Bill (SB 1420) (2008), California took the lead in requiring fast food chain restaurants with over twenty outlets to include in their menus the information regarding calorie counts in their foods. Other state have gone further and requires more information regarding fat, carbohydrates, sodium and other such contents to be displayed in the restaurant menus. This was meant to enable the consumer to make informed choices about the kind of food they take (EU Food and Drink Confederation [CIAA], 2009). All this nutritional information has been noted to have significant influence on consumer food choice. Consumers use information to make choice on the right priorities, to allocate resource and to monitor progress. Knowledge encourages good decision making and responsible choices (Nayga & Roldolfo, 2000). Policies made by the government influence the consumer decision. These decisions are sometimes shaped by political and economic goals as well as social objectives (Sanders, 1993, Para 32). Part I of this paper is a literature review on the role of nutrition information in influencing consumer choice. At the end of the review an aim, set of objectives and a research question for a research project will be highlighted. Part II is an outline of the research. It will include research methodology, respondents of the research, how to access the respondents, difficulties likely to be encountere
Introduction It is the dream of every organization to attain success in all its undertakings. To achieve this, organizations have to realize that success stems from the people employed to work for it. If these people are not motivated, they lack the morale to work hard. It is the responsibility of senior managers to ensure that employee’s needs are met as they strive to meet the organization’s needs. It is normal for one to feel discouraged if his/her contributions are not recognized and rewarded appropriately. One cannot be able to achieve the goals of an organization if he feels that, he is being exploited. Motivation does not mean giving huge salaries but a simple word of mouth, for instance “well done”, can play a great deal. This paper looks at the benefits of employee motivation to an organization. How it helps in the production of quality results, achievement of goals, employee retention, and improvement performance. Production of Quality Results According to Pfeffer & Veiga (1999), motivated workers have ambition to produce quality results and emulate better ways of undertaking their duties. They feel part and parcel of the organization and all their efforts are aimed at making the organization better. By encouraging them, they feel valuable and ready to take any challenges that comes their way. They involve their soul and mind in searching for better strategies to address certain issues in an organization. Motivation also comes along with respect; if managers respect the employees working under them by giving them the freedom of speech and room to express new ideas they are encouraged to be creative. Failure to motivate employees may result in poor performance of a company. Retention of Employees Motivation is one of the strategies that an organization can use to retain employees. The process of selection and recruitment for job appointment is usually costly and an organization cannot afford to waste such funds simply because of failing to motivate its staff. More to this, training costs are usually very high because of the cost incurred and the reduction in production an organization experiences due to the appointment of unskilled staff. When employees are motivated, they feel obliged to work for an organization and may find it difficult to leave without valid reasons. On the other hand, when employees are not motivated they feel out of place and start looking
Introduction Aging is an extremely complicated process that affects an individual’s quality of life. Even today, there is no consensus regarding whether or not aging and becoming elderly immediately lead to cognitive decline, and there is much heterogeneity between seniors when it comes to the speed of decline (Yu et al., 2015). Studies of the dynamics of intelligence suggest that older adults (both men and women) have lower fluid intelligence compared to teenagers and adults, which may hinder decision-making in unexpected and new situations (Aichele, Rabbitt, & Ghisletta, 2015; Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2019). For example, because of the decline in fluid intelligence, it can be challenging for older adults to master totally new skills or succeed in activities that they have never tried before. As for another example, it is common for the elderly population to experience declines in working memory, which is why older adults may struggle with tasks that involve making connections between totally new and prior knowledge (Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2019). Main body Cognitive slowing is among the leading tendencies that influence intelligence and reasoning abilities in the three age groups. Cognitive processes slow down with age, which is manifested in changes related to the speed of information processing (Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2019). Prominent tendencies peculiar to young adults include the development of post-formal thought, the gradual decline of fluid intelligence, and an increase in crystallized intelligence (Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2019). The decline of fluid intelligence and the growth of crystallized intelligence continue when a person reaches middle age, and people in this age group already demonstrate reflective judgment (Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2019). In older adults, the characteristics of cognition give rise to the decline in conceptual reasoning and fluid intelligence, as well as the tendency to make less effective decisions (Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2019; Chiu et al., 2017). Conclusion Society’s reaction to intellectual activity, cognition, and reasoning in older adults seems to be based on stereotypes about the inevitable and rapid cognitive and physical decline that no one can escape or at least slowdown. However, Marian Diamond