In all big democratic countries, parties are very important. But there are a few very small countries, such as the island of Jersey, where most politicians do not belong to any party and where parties do not matter much.
In some democracies, there are only two big political parties. For example, in the United States, there is the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. Some other parties exist but are very small and do not hold seats in Congress.
In other countries there are larger numbers of parties. In the German federal Parliament (or Bundestag), six parties have seats. In the United Kingdom, there are two big parties, one medium-sized party, and many small ones.
Page
A page can be different things:
Pet
A pet is a domesticated animal that lives with people, but is not forced to work and is not eaten, in most instances. In most cases, a pet is kept to entertain people or for companionship. Some pets such as dogs and cats are placed in an animal shelter if there is no one willing to take care of them. If no one adopts it or the pet is too old/sick, the pet may be euthanized.
Dogs, cats, fish, rodents, lagomorphs, ferrets, birds, certain reptiles and amphibians, and a wide variety of arthropods such as tarantulas and hermit crabs are the most common pets in North America. Horses, elephants, oxen, and donkeys are usually made to work, so they are not usually called pets. Some dogs also do work for people, and it was once common for some birds (like falcons and carrier pigeons) to work for humans.
Rodents are also very popular pets. The most common are guinea pigs, rabbits, hamsters (especially Syrian and dwarf hamsters), mice and rats.
Product
A product can mean a few things:
Program
The term Program can be used in many ways.
Platonic realism
Platonic realism is the theory of reality developed by Plato, and explained in his theory of Forms. Platonic realism states that the visible world of particular things is a shifting exhibition, like shadows cast on a wall by the activities of their corresponding universal Ideas or Forms. Whereas the visible world of particulars is unreal, the Forms occupy the unobservable yet true reality and are real.
Platonism is a similar, yet sometimes modified, view of reality.
Among the natural philosophers in ancient Greece, the problem of universals was the mystery of where particular things derive their traits that we perceive as universals—for instance "red" or "apple" or "good" or "woman" or "truth".
Plato explained that the particular things of the visible world are imperfect, transient copies of the universal Ideas that are the perfect, lasting Forms. Existing exist outside space and time, the Forms are the universals and act as templates from which particulars manifest.
In his "Metaphysics", Aristotle, a student of Plato, explained that Socrates and his own student Plato held it significant that the world is in flux, much as Heraclitus had commented, "You cannot step into the same river twice", a theme of the Eleatics, a group of pre-socratic philosophers.
Plato considered that only the mind could access the timeless reality of truths, the realm of the Forms casting the visible world. Plato's metaphorical allegory of the cave—whereby humans only know reality as shadows of the real things they see interacting on a wall—suggests the practical consequences of Platonic realism as to "natural philosophy" in its endeavor to explain the natural world and as to values in human society. (Value theory comprises ethics, aesthetics, and political philosophy.)
Plato had led the focused application of geometry, developed by Euclid, to explain the natural world. Yet by his view of nature, Plato regarded astronomy as similar to seeking a theoretical proof in geometry—abstract and not the real world—whereupon the mind's insights derived from a quest to hold other truths through the mind's probing of ethics and aesthetics would yield discovery of truths within the realm of Forms, outside space and time.
Aristotle, a student of Plato, answered the problem of universals differently. Aristotle explained that universals are concepts corresponding to traits borne and shared by the particular things themselves. Aristotle did not regard all reality as visible, as he recognized existence of souls, yet regarded souls as unobserved parts of the visible world, real in itself. Aristotelianism largely shaped the course of Western thought.
Aristotle developed a more or less full description and explanation of the natural world and developed logic—syllogistic logic—to derive conclusions of the relations among things. Aristotle's grounding in the visible world was a metaphysical approach that suggested what evolved by some 2 000 years later into empirical science.
Some mathematicians and physicists are Platonists, for instance Max Tegmark and Roger Penrose. Yet today's Platonists usually view entities within the visible world as real, and simply regard universal abstractions like numbers, sets, propositions, and geometry as corresponding to real and timeless entities that also exist, though "pure" Platonists regard only the Forms or their realm as real.
By way of string theory and the holographic principle, some physicists conjecture that Plato's allegory of the cave approximates the natural world's structure. Tegmark, who regards only the mathematical structure of the universe as real, has been called a "radical" Platonist.
Paradox
A paradox is a sentence in logic that cannot be true but also cannot be false. It is self-contradictory. Many famous problems of this kind exist.
A famous paradox is called the liar's paradox. It is the simple sentence "This sentence is a lie", or equivalently, "This statement is false."
If the sentence is true, then it is a lie as it says. But if it is a lie, it cannot be true. A lie cannot also be a truth. So the sentence being true makes it a lie.
On the other hand, if the sentence is a lie, then it is not as it says: it is true. But that is just what the sentence says, which makes the content of the sentence true. So the sentence being a lie makes it true.
This paradox is not just in English, but in any language. It is true of mathematics as well. Paradox can never be removed from any symbol system that makes claims about itself.
Another example is the statement that "there is no cabal". Only a cabal can know if there is no cabal, so this is either a guess, or, it is a cabal trying to pretend it does not exist.
Not all paradoxes are true logical paradoxes, since they can also be common-sense-defying statements that appear true. Some famous examples of this kind of paradox include:
A paradox can also arise in ethics. Assuming power over others may sometimes be required to protect them while diminishing their right to autonomy. This is defined as an , which means "a paradox arising in ethics". Similarly, an ethical dilemma may be resolved by re-framing of the problem to reveal the false contradiction.
Because a paradox forces one to think "out of the box" about possibilities other than true or false in logic, right or wrong in morality, it is often brought up for educational purposes. People who do not see a paradox where others do are likely to be too certain that they are right.
Potato
A potato is a vegetable, the "Solanum tuberosum". It is a small plant with large leaves. The part of the potato that people eat is a tuber that grows under the ground.
A potato contains a lot of starch and other carbohydrates. Potato usually has a light-brown or yellowish skin and is white or yellow inside. If the potato gets light on it, the tuber turns green and will be poisonous.
The potato is originally from the high and cool areas of the Andes mountains. It was grown as a food crop thousands of years ago. When Spanish conquistadores came to South America in the 1500s they took potatoes back to Europe.