Bel Canto Opera Essay - 2271 Words

Opera in the Romantic Period was a time when opera changed drastically, especially in the country of Italy. The recognition of singers as being important, almost irreplaceable, in the art of â€Å"bel canto† opera changed the idea of a vocalist in opera forever. A singer’s voice was prized and Italian composers, like Rossini, Donizetti, and Bellini wrote operas and works to showcase the voice, it’s color, range and agility. These Italian composers were moving away from the normal style of composition of the time, and the composer Rossini, who set the stage for many other followers. Many of the operas written during this time are still performed today and are highly acclaimed. For the most part, before Italy became a main player, France†¦show more content†¦No longer was the orchestra the main component to listen to when attending an opera. Librettists and composers worked extremely close to get the right feel for arias and other pieces in the stor y. Bel Canto was a form of singing that was pretty much defined by three Italian composers: Rossini, Donizetti, and Bellini. These three composers had huge success in Italy and their operas are still being performed to this day. These captivating operas like Il barbiere di Sivilglia, Lucia di lammermoor, and Norma are three of the most popular and challenging operas that singers can be involved in. These three composers really set the stage for the rise of Italian opera. Rossini is probably the most popular composer of this era. His works are many and are extremely popular. Rossini was born in Pesaro in 1792 and on December15th, 1815 when he was only twenty-three years old, he signed a contract to write an opera for a theater in Rome (Weaver, 11). His childhood friend, Gertrude Righetti Giorgi, premiered as Rosina in Rossin’s Il barbiere di Siviglia, on opening night for the Nobile Teatro di Torre Argentina (Weaver, 19). Il barbiere di Siviglia went on to become one of the more famous operas of Rossini’s. This opera went through many struggles, however, because of the similar storyShow MoreRelatedThe Bel Canto Opera Performance1155 Words   |  5 PagesWhen students study to sing Italian bel canto opera, it’s better to use the work which performed by people who is original singer to imitate and practice. However, there are still a series of problems will happen for non-Italian students when they are study singing the opera, for example Semiramide. Bel raggio lusinghier. Even according to the video soundtrack to imitate, the overall effect artistic and performances is not satisfactory. The problems are pronunciation hesitation, slurred speech, unknownRead MoreA Theme of the Opera in Bel Canto by Ann Patchett645 Words   |  3 PagesBel Canto by Ann Patchett The theme of the novel draws its most core intensities from the art of opera. 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As a coloratura soprano, Sumi Jo is a true diva of the highest order. Nature has been bountiful to her by endowing her with a fabulous voice and memory. Admired for the astonishing emotional expression, authenticity, and warmth of her coloratura voiceRead MoreMonteverdi Musical Works Essay1045 Words   |  5 Pagesproponent of the so-called Stile moderno (modern style) is unquestioned, as is his pre-eminence in the development of the new form of opera that sprang from the combination of music and speech in the art of Italian monody. Operas In 1607, Monteverdi established himself as a composer of major works with his opera LOrfeo, which is considered to be the first great opera. LOrfeo is based on the legend of Orpheus, the musician who sought to bring his beloved Eurydice back from the Underworld by theRead MoreItalian Music1489 Words   |  6 PagesHe said as much as he loves to play instruments and sing, he is aware that he does not have an opera voice, which would allow him to sing authentic Italian music. Classical Italian music is considered to be Opera. Opera was born in Italy in 1600 during the Italian Renaissance and by the late 16th century. Now, when thinking about Classical Italian music, I think of one of the most famous Italian opera composers, Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901). Verdis works are most noted for their emotional intensityRead MoreThe History Of Western Music1381 Words   |  6 PagesAs new instruments were incorporated into orchestras and compositions became increasingly more instrumental interpl ay had an increasing new role in the new baroque music. Claudio Monteverdi was a pioneer in the field of music at this time. His new operas contained many instances on interplay and sudden contrasts in feeling. As the seventeenth century progressed base parts in music became increasingly more important as the new basso continuo, idea formed. In the basso continuo soprano and alto voicesRead MoreEssay on Jean-Baptiste Lully1787 Words   |  8 Pagescomà ©dies-ballets. He didn’t thing the French language was appropriate for large works but was good for ballets. Perrin, a French composer, introduced opera around this time and Lully thought it was absurd. However, when Perrin’s â€Å"Promone† succeeded, Lully changed his mind. Perrin ended up in prison over a money dispute and Lully bought the opera patent from him. This gave him complete control of French operatic performances. Then in 1673 Molià ¨re died and the King granted the patent for the RoyalRead MoreThe Italian Born Community in Australia1282 Words   |  5 Pagesand drink wine with their meals, but always with moderation. Words such as pasta, risotto, minestrone, pizza, salami, prosciutto, gelato, espresso, cappuccino, caffe-latte etc, have entered the Australian vocabulary as have words such as opera, concerto, bel canto and the numerous musical terms such as allegro, lento, forte, fortissimo, piano, pianissimo, adagio etc. Food and music are essential components of a nation’s life and culture. ATTITUDES TO CARE Traditionally, the family is

European journal of law economics Free Essays

1 Introduction Liability rules are important tool of environmental risks management in Canada, United States and Europe. The major legislations are CERCLA (Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act) adopted by the American Congress in 1980 and the Directive of the European Parliament and the Council on Environmental Liability with regard to the Prevention and remedying of environmental Damages which came into force in April 2004. A *E. We will write a custom essay sample on European journal of law economics or any similar topic only for you Order Now J.L. E. 78 liability rule induces correct incentive for risk prevention only if information is symmetric and the potential injurer has sufficient wealth to cover his liability. Indeed, it is well known from the previous literature that when the injurer’s wealth is not sufficient to pay liability judgments ex post (the injurer is said to be judgment-proof) this leads to underprovision of care ex ante (Summers 1983; Shavell 1986). In the case of environmental risks, on the one hand, perfect control of firm’s actions in prevention is not possible, and on the other hand, the wealth of the polluter may be small relative to the clean-up costs and victims’ compensation. There are many policies to alleviate the judgment-proof problem. The first one is to extend liability to the parties who have a contractual relationship with the risky firm, the case under CERCLA which imposes extended liability to lenders. The economic analysis of the extended liability has given raise to mitigated results. Pitchford (1995) considers a one-period moral hazard model with two states of nature (accident or not). Since the loan fee fixed by the lender included his expected liability costs, the more the lender is liable, the more he charges the firm in the no-accident state. Then, the state of the nature â€Å"no-accident† becomes unfavourable for the firm and the full liability of the lender2 leads to a suboptimal level of effort whereas partial lender’s liability allows achieving the optimal level of prevention. In a two-period model, Boyer and Laffont (1997) show that partial liability of lender is optimal. Consequently, these authors conclude that the s ociety has to make a tradeoff between prevention and compensation. In an alternative setting in which environmental damages are stochastic and prevention cost is a monetary investment that needs external funding, Dionne and Spaeter (2003) show that lender extended liability has a positive effect on the firm’s prevention level if and only if an increase in the face value of the debt implies an increase in prevention investment. Moreover, Balkenborg (2001) and Lewis and Sappington (2001) show that the benefits of extending liability to lenders depend on the observability of the firm’s prevention level by the lender, the bargaining power of each party and the nature of environmental damages. Finally, Hutchison and Van’t Veld (2005) consider a model with both observable damage-reducing activities and non-observable probability-reducing measures and show that introducing extended liability to lender induces judgement-proof firms with high gross profits to take social ly optimal levels of care, those with intermediate gross profits to take suboptimal level of care and drives those with low gross profits out of business. Financial responsibility is another remedy for the judgment-proof problem. Under a regime of financial responsibility, the firm is required to demonstrate that the cost of the harm she can cause is covered. The most common instrument of financial responsibility is the insurance contract. But as it is well known, the compulsory liability insurance induces the efficient level of prevention only when the insurer is able to observe the prevention level performed by the firm (Shavell 1986; Jost 1996; Polborn 1998). Following the analysis of Jost (1996), Feess and*E.J.L. E. 79 Hege (2000, 2003) consider a model with monitoring-based incentives and show that the mandatory liability coverage for total harm leads to an allocation that is closed to the first-best. In this paper, we investigate how the socially optimal allocation can be implemented through ex ante financial responsibility and ex post strict liability rule. We do not restrict our analysis to insurance contract but on contrary analyze financial guarantee contract. Indeed, in the Directive of the European Parliament and the Council on environmental liability there is a focus on a future legislation that imposes financial responsibility on the polluting firms. Then we analyze the consequences of financial responsibility on the incitation to prevention in a context of asymmetric information and show that the first-best allocation may be attainable. This follows from the fact that the level of damages provides a signal of the firm’s prevention level (Lewis and Sappington 1999) and can be used to design an optimal contract. But contrary to Lewis and Sappington (1999), in our setting, prevention measures do not only involve a disutility for the firm but also reduce the funds ava ilable for compensation and clean-up (Beard 1990; Lipowsky-Posey 1993; Dionne and Spaeter 2003; Dari-Mattiaci and De Geest 2005). We consider a firm which activity yields a non-random gross profit and generates random environmental damages. The firm can improve the distribution of damages by an investment in prevention at the beginning of the period and safety measures during the production process. At the end of the period, only the damages and the resources of the firm net of the prevention cost are observable. Moreover, it is assumed that the firm’s wealth is lower than the highest amount of damages its activity can generate. We establish a necessary and sufficient condition for the implementation of the socially optimal allocation in spite of moral hazard when the firm is mandated to cover the highest amount of damages its activity can generate. We also demonstrate that the set of contracts that implement the socially optimal level of prevention includes a particular contract of the form â€Å"reward or maximal penalty† which is closed to a finite risk product referred to as spread loss treaty . The rest of the paper is organized as follows. The following section presents the firm’s optimal choice in the absence of the financial responsibility regime. Section 3 investigates the impact of financial responsibility on the firm’s prevention level. Finally, Section 4 concludes. 2 The optimal choice of the firm without financial responsibility Consider a risk-neutral firm which activity generates a fixed profit P and creates a possibility of environmental damages ## ]0, L[. The firm can improve the distribution of damages by an investment in prevention at the beginning of the period and safety measures during the production process; these two measures are represented by a single prevention variable denoted e. However, the reduction of risk generates a cost c(e) when the firm chooses a level of prevention e. Moreover we assume that before engaging in its activity, the firm has initial wealth (equity) Rwhich can be partially used to cover the cost induced by prevention measures. Let f(##/e) and F(##/e) be respectively the density and the distribution function of the damages; the following is assumed: *E.J.L. E. 80 Assumption 1 ##e, f(##/e) 0, decreases with ##.3 This means that the observation of a lower level of damage is relatively more likely if a higher level of prevention has been adopted. This assumption implies the first order stochastic dominance: ## ]0, L[,Fe (##/e) 0. Moreover, Fe (0/e) = Fe (L/e) = 0. Assumption 2 ## ]0, L[, Fee (##/e) 0. This distribution function is strictly concave in e. 4 Assumption 3 ce (e) 0 and cee(e) 0. The prevention cost is strictly convex in e. Assumption 4 If the amount of damages is very high, the firm’s assets may be insufficient for compensation; then the firm will be pushed into bankruptcy. Assume that the discount rate is null so that the firm’s net value without investment in prevention noted ## equals R + P.Formally, this liability assumption can be written as L ##. What about the optimal level of prevention from the firm’s point of viewThe intuition suggests that a firm facing limited liability will underinvest in prevention. But, as stated by the following lemma this is not always true. Lemma 1 A judgment-proof firm does not always choose a suboptimal prevention level. Proof: See the â€Å"Appendix†. The social welfare criterion is assumed to be the minimization of the total cost which is the sum of the expected damages and the prevention cost. We assume that the regulator observes the prevention level. At the social optimum, the expected marginal benefit of prevention equals the expected marginal cost. The objective of the firm is to maximize its net revenue which equals to the sum of its profit and equity minus the expected liability payments (compensation and clean-up costs). The firm can only pay up to her assets. Hence the private expected marginal benefit is lower than the social one because of the partial internalization of environmental damages by the firm. Moreover, the private expected marginal cost of prevention is lower than the social one because the funds invested in prevention are not available for compensation and clean-up. At the private optimal level of prevention, the private expected marginal benefit of prevention equals the private expected marginal cost. Consequently, the optimal private level of prevention may be lower or higher than the socially optimal one, depending on which effect dominates. However, the judgment-proofness of the firm may result in a partial remediation of damages. One can think about compulsory liability insurance which covers the highest amount of damages as a solution to this problem. But it is well known from economics literature that when care is non-observable, a full insurance leads to underprovision of care by the insured. In the following section we demonstrate that under a guarantee structure, incentives work well even if it is *E.J.L. E. 81 impossible to observe the care by the polluter. The reason is that under the guarantee the polluter receives a return on investment in prevention. Moreover, this scheme provides the full coverage of damages: prevention and compensation are both satisfied. 3 Financial responsibility This section is devoted to the economic analysis of a hybrid regime of ex ante regulation through financial responsibility requirement and ex post strict liability. More precisely, in our setting the financial responsibility takes the form of a guarantee provided by another party that has deep pockets. Then the hybrid regime can be viewed as a regime of vicarious liability in which the guarantor and the firm are joint liable. As we know, in this setting, the victims generally choose to collect from the guarantor because the later has deep-pockets. Then, in what follows, we will assume that the firm and its guarantor are jointly liable and that it is the guarantor who has to compensate for the damages generated by the firm.5,6 The analysis is based on the principal-agent paradigm. In this framework, the firm is the limited liability risk neutral agent and the guarantor is the risk neutral principal. The prevention level performed by the firm and consequently the cost of such a measure are not observable by the principal. Moreover, the amount of damages and the net resources of the firm at the end of the period are observable. The timing of the model is as follows. First, the guarantor and the firm sign a contract which stipulates the state-contingent-payments (transfers) that the firm has to make to his guarantor. Secondly, the firm performs a level of prevention and bears the associated cost which is unobservable by the guarantor. Then, the profit is realized and the damages occur and finally the transfer is made to the guarantor. Moreover, it is assumed that the guarantor has all the bargaining power and his objective is to design a scheme of transfers that maximizes his profit. However, the guarantor ha s to take into account some constraints. The first one is the participation constraint of the firm which reflects the fact that the financial guarantee must yield expected revenue at least equals to what the firm would have obtained without contracting (condition 1). The second one is the firm’s limited liability constraint (condition 2). The third constraint reflects the fact that the transfer is bounded below in such a way that the firm could be rewarded (condition 3).7 The last condition is the incentive compatibility constraint which reflects the optimal behaviour of the firm in choosing the prevention level (condition 4).8 *E.J.L. E. 82 Formally, if we denote t(##) the transfer made by the firm when the amount of damages equals ##, the guarantor’s problem (P1) can be written as: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE subject to TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE The existence of schemes of transfers that solve the problem above is not guaranteed. Then it is essential to characterize the conditions under which the problem (P1) admits a solution for a given utility u (expected firm revenue) and a given prevention level e. We can establish the following result: Proposition 2 The problem (P1) admits a solution, i.e. the levels of utility u and prevention e can be implemented if and only if: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE Proof: See the â€Å"Appendix†. The intuition underlying the proposition 2 is the following. For a given level of prevention e it is not possible to find a scheme of transfers that gives a level of utility u if the marginal cost of such a measure is greater than the marginal benefit. Let us remark that the marginal benefit of prevention is reflected by the reduction of the expected transfers that the firm has to pay to her guarantor. We have demonstrated (see the â€Å"Appendix†) that there is a scheme %23t(##) that gives the maximum marginal benefit of prevention, which equals [## – c(e) – B]Fe (##). If this upper limit of the marginal benefit of prevention is lower than the marginal cost of prevention for a given e, then any scheme of transfers cannot implement the prevention level e. From the analysis above we can derive the following result: Proposition 3 The social optimum (u, e*) can be implemented with the financial responsibility if and only if: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE *E.J.L. E. 83 Proof: See the â€Å"Appendix† The left-hand-side term of the condition (5) represents the rate of change of the marginal benefit of prevention at the point e* with a transfers scheme %23t(##), whereas the right-hand-side represents the rate of change of the marginal cost of prevention at the same point. Consequently if there is a level of damage ## such that the rate of change of the marginal benefit is at least equal to the rate of change of the marginal cost of prevention then the social optimum can be implemented. The last step of the analysis is devoted to the characterization of a scheme of transfers that implements the first-best level of prevention. We can establish the following proposition: Proposition 4 The set of transfers that implement the socially optimal level of prevention contains a scheme of the following form: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE Proof: See the â€Å"Appendix† The scheme of transfers 23t(##) is such that if at the end of the period, the actual damage is lower than the target level ##, then the firm is rewarded by receiving the bonus payment B, so her net revenue at the end of the period equals ## Conversely if the actual damage is greater than the target level ##, then the payment made by the firm to the guarantor equals ## – c(e*) and the firm net revenue at the end is null. This form of contract can be approached to a spread loss treaty. It is an alternative risk transfer (ART) solution, more precisely a finite risk product. By this contract, the financial responsibility of the firm is transferred to her guarantor (that can be a bank or an insurer).9,10 At the beginning of the contract, the firm pays either annual or single premium into a so-called experience account. Furthermore, the two parties contractually agree on an investment return. The funds are used to compensation and the rest is returned to the client. But if the claims payments exceed the funds available, the client has to pay the remainder. In this paper, we consider a one-period model. Consequently, the model can be viewed as if we have aggregated the periods of the spread loss treaty. Moreover, if the realized damages are low, the funds into the experience account are sufficient for compensation whereas in the bad states of nature (high realized damages), the funds *E.J.L. E. 84 are not sufficient. Hence, because of its limited liability, the firm cannot pay back the claims payments of the guarantor. Then, the guarantor takes this fact into account by penalizing the firm in the intermediate states of nature [those such that the amount of damages is between the target level ## and ## – c(e*)]. Consequently, the reward is used as an incentive device. 4 Concluding remarks A potentially judgment-proof firm may not internalize the social cost of its activity and then may have insufficient incentives to choose the socially optimal level of prevention. Whereas most of papers studied the incentive effect of extending liability to the lenders of the injurer-firm, this paper on contrary considers another remedy to the problems generated by the judgment-proofness. I demonstrate that a full financial responsibility (operation licence subject to the demonstration of a financial guarantee which covers the highest remediation cost) is compatible with the socially optimal level of prevention and establish a necessary and sufficient condition under which this is realized. Furthermore, I have shown that when the socially optimal outcome is attainable, a contract of the form â€Å"reward or maximum penalty† is included in the set of first-best solutions. Such a contract rewards the firm when the actual damages are lower than a target level because the guarantor infers that the firm took an adequate prevention level. Conversely, if the amount of the damages exceeds the target level, then the firm is maximally punished. This particular contract can be approach to an alternative risk transfer product referred to as spread loss treaty. Consequently, the alternative risk transfer solutions seem suited not only for the hedging of environmental risks, but also for incentive purpose. Finally, recall that the Directive of the European Parliament and the Council on Environmental Liability has a special focus on a future legislation which imposes financial responsibility on the polluting firms. It is necessary that before the promulgation of such legislation, European authorities help insurance and banking sectors to develop the market for environmental guarantees. Acknowledgments I am very grateful to an anonymous referee and to the editor for helpful remarks on a previous version of the paper. I would like to thank Jean-Marc Bourgeon, Georges Dionne, Marie-Cecile Fagart, Mahamadou Fall, Claude Fluet, Bruno Jullien, Anne Lavigne, Remi Moreau, Pierre Picard, Sandrine Spaeter, Jean-Marc Tallon and Daniel Zajdenweber. The paper also benefited from the comments of session participants of the 2005 SCSE congress in Charlevoix, 2005 AFSE congress in Paris and seminar participants at HEC Montreal, Universite d’Orleans, Universite de Sherbrooke and Universite du Quebec a Montreal. Financial support by CREF-HEC and the hospitality of the Canada Research Chair in risk management are acknowledged. Appendix Proof of lemma 1 The social optimum e* is the solution of the following problem: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE *E.J.L. E. 85 The associated first-order condition is given by: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE The firm’s problem can be written as: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE The left-hand-side term of Eq. 6 (7) represents the social (private) expected marginal cost of prevention and the right-hand-side represents the social (private) expected marginal benefit. From the comparison of (6) and (7) eP can be lower or higher than e*. Proof of proposition 2 Part 1: u ## [u,## – c(e) – B] Every level of utility u is given by the following expression: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE Taking into account this expression, the objective function of the guarantor becomes: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE Moreover, (2) and (3) imply: ## – c(e) ? ## t(##)f(##/e)d## ? B; thus 0?u ? ## – c(e) – B Consequently, the existence of a transfers scheme verifying (1), (2) and (3) implies that the utility of the firm is bounded: u ## [u,## – c(e) – B]. Note that the principal’s objective function depends only on the expected transfer (by u). Therefore, all solutions that verify the agent’s incentive constraint and that have the *E.J.L. E. 86 same expectation are equivalent from the principal’s point of view. However, the existence of such solutions is not guaranteed. Indeed, if the problem does not admit a solution, then it is not possible to implement a given level of prevention e for a given level of utility u. Part 2: [## – c(e) – B]Fe (##/e) ? ce(e) Let us assume that u ## [u,## – c(e) – B], then the next step consists to establish conditions under which the incentive constraint (4) is satisfied. Let ## = {t(##)/B ? t(##) ? ## – c(e)##}, be the set of admissible transfers. Let us define:G[t(-)] = ## t(##)fe(##/e)d##; m = min ## t(##)fe(##/e)d## and M = max ##t(##)fe(##/e)d##. We can establish that m is strictly negative and M strictly positive.11 Thus the function G [t(.)] is bounded in the set of admissible transfers. Then the validity of the incentive constraint depends on the value taken by m as follows. Lemma 2 the incentive constraint is satisfied for a given e and u if and only if: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE Lemma 3 the scheme of transfers %23t(##) which minimizes the function G [t(-)] = ## t(##)fe(##/e)d## has the following form 12: TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE The second part of proposition 2 follows from lemmas 2 and 3. Proof of proposition 3 From proposition 2, we can derive that when the guarantor’s problem (P1) admits at least one solution, it is equivalent to the following problem (P1bis): TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE TABULAR OR GRAPHIC MATERIAL SET FORTH AT THIS POINT IS NOT DISPLAYABLE Conditions (9) and (10) imply proposition 3. *E.J.L. E. 87 Proof of proposition 4 From the proposition 3 we know that the socially optimal prevention level can be achieved if Fe(##/e*)/F(##/e*) ? ce(e*)/u. Moreover, we can demonstrate that the function Fe(##/e*)/F(##/e*) is not increasing in ##.13 Consequently, if Fe(##/e*)/F(##/e*) ? ce(e*)/u, there is a level of damages ## ## such that Fe(##/e*)/F(##/e*) = ce(e*)/u. References Balkenborg, D. (2001). How liable should a lender beThe case of judgment-proof firms and environmental risk: Comment. American Economic Review, 91, 731-738. Beard, R. (1990). Bankruptcy and care choice. RAND Journal of Economics, 21, 626-634. Boyer, M., Laffont, J.-J. (1997). Environmental risks and bank liability. European Economic Review, 41, 1427-1459. Dari-Mattiacci, G., De Geest, G. (2005). Judgment Proofness under four different precaution technologies. Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics, 161(1), 38-56. Dionne, G., Spaeter, S. (2003). Environmental risk and extended liability: The case of green technologies. Journal of Public Economics, 87(5-6), 1025-1060. Feess, E., Hege, U. (2000). Environmental harm and financial responsibility. Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance, Issues and Practice, 25(2), 220-234. Feess, E., Hege, U. (2003). Safety monitoring, capital structure and financial responsibility. International Review of Law and Economics, 23,323-339. Hutchison, E., Van’t Veld, K. (2005). Extended liability for environmental accidents: What you see is what you get. Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 49, 157-173. Jost, P. (1996). Limited liability and the requirement to purchase insurance. International Review of Law and Economics, 16, 259-276. Lewis, T., Sappington, D. (1999). Using decoupling and deep pockets to mitigate judgment-proof problems. International Review of Law and Economics, 19, 275-293. Lewis, T., Sappington, D. (2001). How liable should a lender beThe case of judgment-proof firms and environmental risk: Comment.American Economic Review, 91, 724-730. Lipowsky-Posey, L. (1993). Limited liability and incentives when firms can inflict damages greater than worth. International Review of Law and Economics, 13, 325-330. Pitchford, R. (1995). How liable should a lender beThe case of judgment-proof firms and environmental risk. American Economic Review, 85,1171-1186. Polborn, M. (1998). Mandatory insurance and the judgment proof problem. International Review of Law and Economics, 18, 141-146. Ringleb, A. H., Wiggins, S. N. (1990). Liability and large-scale long-term hazards. Journal of Political Economy, 98, 574-595. Rogerson, W. (1985). The first-order approach to principal-agent problems. Econometrica, 53, 1357-1367. Shavell, S. (1986). The judgment proof problem. International Review of Law and Economics, 6, 45-58. Summers, J. S. (1983). The case of disappearing defendant: An economic analysis. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 132, 145-185. IRDES, 10 rue Vauvenargues, 75018 Paris, France e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] E.J.L. E. 2010, 30(2), 77-87 How to cite European journal of law economics, Essay examples

Cloning Endangered Species Essay Example For Students

Cloning Endangered Species Essay Cloning is the production of duplicate copies of genetic materials, cells, or entire multi-cellular living materials. For years cloning had only been a fantasy, but with new scientific research cloning can be very successful. Because there are so many advantages in areas like agriculture, medicine, and biological research in producing genetically identical organisms, artificial cloning has become the focus of attention with scientists today. At last there is hope of saving endangered species. We might be able to witness the cloning of now nearly extinct condors, tigers, rhinoceroses, and so many other living marvels. That was a quote from Jose F. Jaramillo; a man who has written many essays on the hope of Cloning Endangered Species Essay. There are so many animals that are nearly extinct which could benefit greatly by cloning. Cloning endangered species would take a lot of time and it would be and extremely difficult process. Just look at the sheep that got cloned, Dolly. It took 276 tries to clone Dolly. So at the moment the success rate of cloning endangered animals is very low. But it is very possible to do. The history of cloning goes back to 1938 when a German scientist suggested removing the nucleus, which contains the genes, from an egg cell and replacing it with the nucleus from another cell, but back then the tools and technology to do such a task didnt exist. Then, in 1952, scientists took the nucleus out of the cell of a frog embryo and put it into a denucleated frog cell, but the egg didnt develop. In 1970, another scientist tried to do the same thing. But this time the eggs hatched and went into tadpole mode. But the tadpoles always died. Finally in 1984, scientists reported the successful cloning of a sheep. Cells from an early post-fertilization stage of development were taken out and put into a denucleated egg of a second sheep. The second sheep gave birth to a healthy lamb with cells having the genes from the original. In 1994 calf clones were produced. In 1996 scientists in Scotland cloned a sheep named Dolly. Cloning has never been tried on endangered species before. But since cloning has been done on other mammals it is very possible that it can be done on endangered species. It seems that congressional efforts to make cloning illegal are accelerating. Also, congress may go beyond cloning, they may try to stop research on important new infertility therapies. Many people are saying that cloning endangered species just isnt ethical, while others are saying that it must be done before they go extinct. Currently nothing but debating the efforts of cloning is going on. Currently scientists are trying to find possible ways to clone human beings, but protesters are getting in the way bringing up the ethics of it all, one anonymous citizen stated, It just is not ethical. Why should we be cloning human beings while at the same time too many are being produced every day naturally A bill was written by Sampson G. Smith to encourage the cloning of cloning of endangered species. It basically says that cloning can only be operated by qualified scientists and approved companies and we will be able to clone endangered species before they go extinct. Some endangered species that are being killed are elephants for its ivory, the sharks for their and whales for their oils, the leopard for its fur, and the rhinoceroses for their horns. Many species all over the world are becoming endangered and very close to becoming extinct. Cloning is needed to save these animals from extinction. Extinct animals would be very hard to clone. A female cant normally give birth to an animal of a different species, but it is not yet clear whether a female of a closely related species could give birth to a clone of a different species. Genes can mutate, or suddenly change, as a result of exposure to normal background radiation or certain chemicals or other influences. And some mutations may be lethal. Who know what could happen when you have a clone with mutations. .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb , .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .postImageUrl , .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb , .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb:hover , .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb:visited , .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb:active { border:0!important; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb:active , .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .u6915163ff2c383adc21674855162c3fb:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: Male and female observation: t Essay A big issue of concern when cloning is what this clone may bring in the world. They could be bringing new diseases into this world that .

Why Some Student Cheat Essays - Misconduct, Cheating, Morality

Why Some Student Cheat Why Some Students Cheat Nowadays, there are many popular ways for students to cheat in exams. Some students take their notes into the examination rooms. Some students ask their friends the answers by whispering while taking the exams. And some students just try to copy the answers of students who sit in front of them without caring how similar to giraffes they are. It is interesting to focus on the question that why some students still keep cheating in exams even though they know that the punishments of university are getting so tougher and tougher that every single semester many students have to drop their education. There are three main reasons why some students cheat in exams; being afraid of failure, having no ability, and wanting to take risks. Being afraid of failure is the most important reason for some students to cheat in exams. Some students think that if they fail the exams, they will have a lot of the following problems. For example, their parents will complain them about bad grades, their friends will look down and laugh at them, and they guess that the light of their educational futures will be darker too. They will get stressed if they cannot do the exams as well as they hope. And those factors will lead them to cheat in exams. In short, some students are afraid that they will have many problems if they fail the exams, so they start to cheat. Having no ability to do exams is the next reason that causes some students cheating. There are a few cases for this reason. Some students do not have their own self-confidences. Some students cannot do the exams because they are too difficult. And some students unreasonably judge themselves that they are not smart enough to pass the exams. Instead of studying hard, paying attention to classes, reviewing lessons, and doing exercises, they try to cheat in exams. In fine, some students do not try hard enough to pass the exams and it is terrible that their solution is cheating. The final reason why some students cheat the exams is because they want to take risks. It sounds unbelievable and crazy but it truly happens. Some students just want to show-off to their friends. To show their abilities is looked like fun activity for teenagers. Without thinking thoroughly, they try to show their dishonest tricks in the examination rooms. These students probably think that cheating the exams is challenging and makes them cooler. Besides, they will get incredibly good grades if they succeed their cheating plans too. Therefore, to dare the punishments, some students cheat in exams for their pleasures. In conclusion, there are many reasons for students to cheat in exams, being afraid of failure, having no ability, and wanting to take risks, including the reasons which I did not state. And until today, we still cannot guarantee that there are ways to help students stop cheating. However, to those who are thinking to cheat the exams, you should think about the punishments. No matter what your reason is. Does it worth for being caught and got punished from both university and society? You all know the answer. Although you are not smart enough to have excellent grades, you should be proud of yourself that you try to get good grades by your own abilities, not cheating.

Current Ethical issue essays

Current Ethical issue essays The newspaper article read, Iraq prisoner abuse detailed. At least one Iraqi prisoner died after interrogation, some were threatened with attack dogs and others were kept naked in tiny cells without running water or ventilation, according to an account written by military police sergeant who supervised a group o U.S. soldiers charged in a growing scandal over prisoner abuse in Iraq. The account of Staff Sgt. Ivan Chip Frederick portrayed a prison that spun out of control last fall as thousands of captured Iraqis poured into razor-wire confines (Honolulu Advertiser, Sunday May 2, 2004). The Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of war, 75 U.N.T.S. 135, entered into force October 21, 1950. Article 13 states, Prisoners of war must at all times be humanely treated. Any unlawful act or omission by the Detaining Power causing death or seriously endangering the health of a prisoner of war in its custody is prohibited, and will be regarded as a serious breach of the present Convention. In particular, no prisoner of war may be subjected to physical mutilation or to medical or scientific experiments of any kind, which are not justified by the medical, dental, or hospital treatment of the prisoner concerned and carried out in his interest. Likewise, prisoners of war must at all times be protected, particularly against acts of violence or intimidation, and against insults and public curiosity. Measures of reprisal against prisoners of war are prohibited (University of Minnesota Human Rights Library, May 4, 2004). What would cause a military police sergeant in the United States Armed Forces to make such an obvious breach of the Geneva Convention? I think many Americans are quick to judge, without taking all the facts into account, or for that matter ever being in a wartime situation, such as Ivan Frederick. The article in the Honolulu Advertiser stated, In some cases, as few as a dozen U.S. ...

A Dirty Job Chapter 6

He’d worked up a furious appetite because breakfast was running late today. The Emperor had slept on a bench by the Maritime Museum, and during the night his arthritic knee had snaked out of his wool overcoat into the damp cold, making the walk to North Beach and the Italian bakery that gave them free day-old a slow and painful ordeal. The Emperor groaned and sat down on an empty milk crate. He was a great rolling bear of a man, his shoulders broad but a little broken from carrying the weight of the city. A white tangle of hair and beard wreathed his face like a storm cloud. As far as he could remember, he and the troops had patrolled the city streets forever, but upon further consideration, it might have just been since Wednesday. He wasn’t entirely sure. The Emperor decided to make a proclamation to the troops about the importance of compassion in the face of the rising tide of heinous fuckery and political weaselocity in the nearby kingdom of the United States. (He found his audience was most attentive to his proclamations when the meat-laced focaccia were still nuzzled in the larder of his overcoat pockets, and presently a pepperoni and Parmesan reposed fragrant in the woolly depths, so the royal hounds were rapt.) But just as he cleared his throat to begin, a cargo van came screeching around the corner, went up on two wheels as it plowed through a row of garbage cans, and slid to a stop not fifty feet away. The driver’s-side door flew open and a thin man in a suit leapt out, carrying a cane and a woman’s fur coat, and made a beeline for the back door of Asher’s. But before he got two steps the man fell to the concrete as if hit from behind, then rolled on his back and began flailing at the air with the cane an d the coat. The Emperor, who knew most everyone, recognized Charlie Asher. Bummer erupted into a fit of yapping, but the more levelheaded Lazarus growled once and took off toward Charlie. â€Å"Lazarus!† the Emperor shouted, but the retriever charged on, followed now by his bug-eyed brother in arms. Charlie was back on his feet and swinging the cane as if he was fencing with some phantom, using the coat like a shield. Living on the street, the Emperor had seen a lot of people battling with unseen demons, but Charlie Asher was apparently scoring some hits. The cane was making a thwacking noise against what appeared to be thin air – but no, there was something there, a shadow of some sort? The Emperor climbed to his feet and limped into the fray, but before he got two steps Lazarus had leapt and appeared to be attacking Charlie, but he soared over the shopkeeper and snapped at a spot above his head – then hung there, his jaws sunk into the substantial neck of thin air. Charlie took advantage of the distraction, stepped back, and swung the cane above the levitating golden retriever. There was a smack, and Lazarus let go, but now Bummer launched himself at the invisible foe. He missed whatever was there, and ended up performing a doggy swish shot into a garbage can. Charlie made for the steel door of Asher’s again, but found it locked, and as he reached for his keys, something caught him from behind. â€Å"Let go, fuckface,† the shade screeched. The fur coat Charlie was holding appeared to be swept out of his hand and was pulled straight up, over the four-story building and out of sight. Charlie turned and held the cane at ready, but whatever had been there seemed to be gone now. â€Å"Aren’t you just supposed to sit above the door and nevermore and be poetic and stuff?!† he shouted at the sky. Then, for good measure, added, â€Å"You evil fuck!† Lazarus barked, then whined. A sharp and metallic yapping rose from Bummer’s garbage can. â€Å"Well, you don’t see that every day,† said the Emperor as he limped up to Charlie. â€Å"You could see that?† â€Å"Well, no, not really. Merely a shadow, but I could see that something was there. There was something there, wasn’t there, Charlie?† Charlie nodded, trying to catch his breath. â€Å"It will be back. It followed me across the city.† He dug into his pocket for his keys. â€Å"You guys should duck into the store with me, Your Majesty.† Of course Charlie knew the Emperor. Every San Franciscan knew the Emperor. The Emperor smiled. â€Å"That’s very kind of you, but we will be perfectly safe. For now I need to free my charge from his galvanized prison.† The big man tipped the garbage can and Bummer emerged snorting and tossing his head as if ready to tear the ass out of any man or beast foolhardy enough to cross him (and he would have, as long as they were knee-high or shorter). Charlie was still having trouble with the key. He knew he should have had the lock replaced, but it worked, if you finessed it a little, so he’d never made it a priority. Who the hell thought you’d ever have to get in quick to escape a giant bird? Then he heard a screech and turned to see not one, but two huge ravens coming over the roof and diving into the alley. The dogs arfed a frantic barking salvo at the avian intruders and Charlie put so much body English into wiggling the key in the lock that he felt an atrophied dancing muscle tear in his hip. â€Å"They’re back. Cover me.† Charlie threw the cane to the Emperor and braced himself for the impact, but as soon as the cane touched the old man’s hand the birds were gone. You could almost hear the pop of the air replacing the space they had taken up. The dogs caught themselves in mid-ruff; Bummer whimpered. â€Å"What?† the Emperor said. â€Å"What?† â€Å"They’re gone.† The Emperor looked at the sky. â€Å"You’re sure?† â€Å"For now.† â€Å"I saw two shadows. Really saw them this time,† the Emperor said. â€Å"Yes, there were two this time.† â€Å"What are they?† â€Å"I have no idea, but when you took the cane they – well, they disappeared. You really saw them?† â€Å"I’m sure of it. Like smoke with a purpose.† Finally the key turned in the lock and the door to Asher’s back room swung open. â€Å"You should come in. Rest. I’ll order something to eat.† â€Å"No, no, the men and I must be on our rounds. I’ve decided to make a proclamation this morning and we need to see the printer. You’ll be needing this.† The Emperor presented the cane to Charlie like he was turning over a sword of the realm. Charlie started to take it, then thought better of it. â€Å"Your Majesty, I think you’d better keep that. It looks as if you might be able to use it.† Charlie nodded toward the Emperor’s creaky knee. The Emperor held the cane steady. â€Å"I am not a worshiper of the material, you know?† â€Å"I understand that.† â€Å"I am a firm believer that desire is the source of most of human suffering, you’re aware, and no culprit is more heinous than desire for material gain.† â€Å"I run my business based on those very principles. Still, I insist you keep the cane – as a favor to me, if you would?† Charlie found himself affecting the Emperor’s formal speech patterns, as if somehow he had been transported to a royal court where a nobleman was distinguished by bread crumbs in his beard and the royal guard were not above licking their balls. â€Å"Well, as a favor, I will accept. It is a fine piece of craftsmanship.† â€Å"But more importantly, it will permit you to make your rounds in good time.† The Emperor now betrayed the desire in his heart as he let fly a wide grin and hugged the cane to his chest. â€Å"It is fine, indeed. Charlie, I must confess something to you, but I ask you to grant me the credulity due a man who has just shared witness, with a friend, of two giant, raven-shaped shades.† â€Å"Of course.† Charlie smiled, when even a moment before he would have thought his smile lost somewhere in the months past. â€Å"I hope you won’t think me base, but the second I touched this, I felt as if I had been waiting for it my whole life.† Then, for no reason that he could think of, Charlie said, â€Å"I know.† A few minutes before, inside the store, Lily had been brooding. It wasn’t her general brood, the reaction to a world where everyone was stupid and life was meaningless and the mere act of living was futile, especially if your mother forgot to get coffee at the store. This one was a more specific brood, that had started out when she arrived at work and Ray had pointed out that it was her turn to wear the vacuuming tiara, and insisted that if she wore the tiara, she actually vacuum the store. (In fact, she liked wearing the rhinestone tiara that Charlie, in a move of blatant bourgeois sneakiness, had designated be worn by whoever did the vacuuming and sweeping each day, and no other time. It was the vacuuming and sweeping she objected to. She felt manipulated, used, and generally taken advantage of, and not in the fun way.) But today, after she’d put the tiara and the vacuum away and had finally gotten a couple of cups of coffee in her system, the brooding had gone on, bu ilding to full-scale angst, when it began to dawn on her that she was going to have to figure out this college-career thing, because despite what The Great Big Book of Death said, she had not been chosen as a dark minion of destruction. Fuck! She stood in the back room looking at all the items that Charlie had piled there the day before: shoes, lamps, umbrellas, porcelain figures, toys, a couple of books, and an old black-and-white television and a painting of a clown on black velvet. â€Å"He said this stuff was glowing?† she asked Ray, who stood in the doorway to the store. â€Å"Yes. He made me check it all with my Geiger counter.† â€Å"Ray, why the fuck do you have a Geiger counter?† â€Å"Lily, why do you have a nose stud shaped like a bat?† Lily ignored the question and picked up the ceramic frog from the night before, which now had a note taped to it that read DO NOT SELL OR DISPLAY in Charlie’s meticulous block-letter printing. â€Å"This was one of the things? This?† â€Å"That was the first one he freaked out about,† said Ray matter-of-factly. â€Å"The truant officer tried to buy it. That started it all.† Lily was shaken. She backed over to Charlie’s desk and sat in the squeaky oak swivel chair. â€Å"Do you see anything glowing or pulsating, Ray? Have you ever?† Ray shook his head. â€Å"He’s under a lot of stress, losing Rachel and taking care of the baby. I think maybe he needs to get some help. I know after I had to leave the force – † Ray paused. There was a commotion going on out in the alley, dogs barking and people shouting, then someone was working a key in the lock of the back door. A second later, Charlie came in, a little breathless, his clothes smudged here and there with grime, one sleeve of his jacket torn and bloodstained. â€Å"Asher,† Lily said. â€Å"You’re hurt.† She quickly vacated his chair while Ray took Charlie by the shoulders and sat him down. â€Å"I’m fine,† Charlie said. â€Å"No big deal.† â€Å"I’ll get the first-aid kit,† Ray said. â€Å"Get that jacket off of him, Lily.† â€Å"I’m fine,† Charlie said. â€Å"Quit talking about me like I’m not here.† â€Å"He’s delirious,† Lily said, trying to pry Charlie out of his jacket. â€Å"Do you have any painkillers, Ray?† â€Å"I don’t need painkillers,† Charlie said. â€Å"Shut up, Asher, they’re not for you,† Lily said, automatically, then she considered the book, Ray’s story, the notes on all the items in the back room, and she shuddered. It appeared that Charlie Asher might not be the hapless geek she always thought him to be. â€Å"Sorry, boss. Let us help you.† Ray came back from the front with a small plastic first-aid kit. He peeled back Charlie’s sleeve and began to clean the wounds with gauze and peroxide. â€Å"What happened?† â€Å"Nothing,† Charlie said. â€Å"I slipped and fell in some gravel.† â€Å"The wound’s pretty clean – no gravel in it. That must have been some fall.† â€Å"Long story.† Charlie sighed. â€Å"Ouch!† â€Å"What was all the noise in the alley?† Lily asked, needing badly to go smoke, but unable to pull herself away. She just couldn’t imagine that Charlie Asher was the one. How could it be him? He was so, so, unworthy. He didn’t understand the dark underbelly of life the way she did. Yet he was the one seeing the glowing objects. He was it. She was crestfallen. â€Å"Just the Emperor’s dogs after a seagull in the Dumpster. No big deal. I fell off a porch in Pacific Heights.† â€Å"The estate,† Ray said. â€Å"How’d that go?† â€Å"Not well. The husband was grief-stricken and had a heart attack while I was there.† â€Å"You’re kidding.† â€Å"No, he just sort of became overwhelmed thinking about his wife and collapsed. I gave him CPR until the EMTs came and took him off to the hospital.† â€Å"So,† Lily said, â€Å"did you get the – uh – did you get anything special?† â€Å"What?† Charlie’s eyes went wide. â€Å"What do you mean, special? There was nothing special.† â€Å"Chill, boss, I just meant will we get the grandma’s clothes?† He’s it, Lily thought. The fucker. Charlie shook his head. â€Å"I don’t know, it’s so strange. The whole thing is so strange.† He shuddered when he said it. â€Å"Strange how?† Lily said. â€Å"Strange in a cool and dark way, or strange because you’re Asher and you’re out of it most of the time?† â€Å"Lily!† Ray snapped. â€Å"Go out front. Dust something.† â€Å"You’re not the boss of me, Ray. I’m just showing my concern.† â€Å"It’s okay, Ray.† Charlie looked like he was considering how, exactly, to define strange, and not coming up with anything that was working. Finally he said, â€Å"Well, for one thing, this woman’s estate is way out of our league. The husband said he called me because we were the first secondhand store in the phone book, but he doesn’t seem like the kind of man to do something like that.† â€Å"That’s not that strange,† Lily said. Just confess, she thought. â€Å"You said that he was grief-stricken,† Ray said, dabbing antibiotic ointment on Charlie’s cuts. â€Å"Maybe he’s doing things differently.† â€Å"Yes, and he was angry at his wife, too, for the way she died.† â€Å"How?† Lily asked. â€Å"She ate silica gel,† Charlie said. Lily looked at Ray for an explanation, because silica gel sounded techno-geeky, which was Ray’s particular field of geekdom. Ray said, â€Å"It’s the antidesiccant that they pack with electronics and other things that are sensitive to humidity.† â€Å"The ‘Do Not Eat’ stuff?!† Lily said. â€Å"Oh my God, that’s so stupid. Everyone knows you don’t eat the ‘Do Not Eat’ stuff.† Charlie said, â€Å"Mr. Mainheart was pretty broken up.† â€Å"Well, I guess so,† Lily said. â€Å"He married a complete fucktard.† Charlie cringed. â€Å"Lily, that’s not appropriate.† Lily shrugged and rolled her eyes. She hated it when Charlie dropped into Dad mode. â€Å"Okay, okay. I’m going outside to smoke.† â€Å"No!† Charlie jumped out of the chair and put himself between Lily and the back door. â€Å"Out front. From now on if you have to smoke you go out front.† â€Å"But you said that I look like a child hooker when I smoke out front.† â€Å"I’ve reassessed. You’ve matured.† Lily closed one eye to see if she could better glimpse into his soul and thus figure out his true agenda. She smoothed over her black vinyl skirt, which made a tortured, squeaking noise at the touch. â€Å"You’re trying to say I have a big butt, aren’t you?† â€Å"I absolutely am saying no such thing,† Charlie insisted. â€Å"I am simply saying that your presence in front of the store is an asset and will probably attract business from the tourists on the cable car.† â€Å"Oh. Okay.† Lily snatched her box of cloves off the desk and headed out past the counter and outside to brood, grieve really, because as much as she had hoped, she was not Death. The book was Charlie’s. That evening Charlie was watching the store, wondering why he had lied to his employees, when he saw a flash of red passing by the front window. A second later, a strikingly pale redhead came through the door. She was wearing a short, black cocktail dress and black fuck-me pumps. She strode up the aisle like she was auditioning for a music video. Her hair cascaded in long curls around her shoulders and down her back like a great auburn veil. Her eyes were emerald green, and when she saw him looking, she smiled, and stopped, some ten feet away. Charlie felt an almost painful jolt that seemed to emanate from somewhere in the area of his groin, and after a second he recognized it as an autonomic lust response. He hadn’t felt anything like that since Rachel had passed, and he felt vaguely ashamed. She was examining him, looking him over like you would examine a used car. He was sure he must be blushing. â€Å"Hi,† Charlie said. â€Å"Can I help you?† The redhead smiled again, just a little, and reached into a small black bag that he hadn’t noticed she’d been carrying. â€Å"I found this,† she said, holding up a silver cigarette case. Something Charlie didn’t see very often anymore, even in the secondhand business. It was glowing, pulsating like the objects in the back room. â€Å"I was in the neighborhood and something made me think that this belonged here.† She moved to the counter opposite Charlie and set the cigarette case down in front of him. Charlie could barely move. He stared at her, not even conscious that to avoid her eyes he was staring at her cleavage, and she appeared to be looking around his head and shoulders as if following the path of insects that were buzzing around him. â€Å"Touch me,† she said. â€Å"Huh?† He looked up, saw she was serious. She held out her hand; her nails were manicured and painted the same deep red as her lipstick. He took her hand. As soon as she touched him she pulled away. â€Å"You’re warm.† â€Å"Thanks.† In that moment he realized that she wasn’t. Her fingers had been ice-cold. â€Å"Then you’re not one of us?† He tried to think of what â€Å"us† might be? Irish? Low blood pressure? Nymphomaniac? Why did he even think that? â€Å"Us? What do you mean, ‘us’?† She backed away a step. â€Å"No. You don’t just take the weak and the sick, do you? You take anyone.† â€Å"Take? What do you mean, ‘take’?† â€Å"You don’t even know, do you?† â€Å"Know what?† Charlie was getting very nervous. As a Beta Male, he found it difficult enough to function under the attention of a beautiful woman, but she was just plain spooky. â€Å"Wait. Can you see this thing glowing?† He held out the cigarette case. â€Å"No glow. It just felt like it belonged here,† she said. â€Å"What’s your name?† â€Å"Charlie Asher. This is Asher’s.† â€Å"Well, Charlie, you seem like a nice guy, and I don’t know exactly what you are, and it doesn’t seem like you know. You don’t, do you?† â€Å"I’ve been going through some changes,† Charlie said, wondering why he felt compelled to share this at all. The redhead nodded, as if confirming something to herself. â€Å"Okay. I know what it’s like to, uh, to find yourself thrown into a situation where forces beyond your control are changing you into someone, something you don’t have an owner’s manual for. I understand what it is to not know. But someone, somewhere, does know. Someone can tell you what’s going on.† â€Å"What are you talking about?† But he knew what she was talking about. What he didn’t know was how she could possibly know. â€Å"You make people die, don’t you, Charlie?† She said it like she had worked up the courage to tell him that he had some spinach in his teeth. More of a service to him than an accusation. â€Å"How do you – ?† How did she – â€Å"Because it’s what I do. Not like you, but it’s what I do. Find them, Charlie. Backtrack and find whoever was there when your world changed.† Charlie looked at her, then at the cigarette case, then at the redhead again, who was no longer smiling, but was stepping backward toward the door. Trying to stay in touch with normal, he focused on the cigarette case and said, â€Å"I suppose I can do an appraisal – â€Å" He heard the bell over the door jingle, and when he looked up she was gone. He didn’t see her moving by the windows on either side of the door; she was just gone. He ran to the front of the store and out the door onto the sidewalk. The Mason Street cable car was just topping the hill up by California Street and he could hear the bell, there was a thin fog coming up from the Bay that threw colorful halos around the neon signs of the other businesses, but there was no striking redhead on the street. He went to the corner and looked down Vallejo, but again no redhead, just the Emperor, sitting against the building with his dogs. â€Å"Good evening, Charlie.† â€Å"Your Majesty, did you see a redhead go by here just now?† â€Å"Oh yes. Spoke to her. I’m not sure you have a chance there, Charlie, I believe she’s spoken for. And she did warn me to stay away from you.† â€Å"Why? Did she say why?† â€Å"She said that you were Death.† â€Å"I am?† Charlie said. â€Å"Am I?† His breath caught in his throat as the day played back in his head. â€Å"What if I am?† â€Å"You know, son,† the Emperor said, â€Å"I am not an expert in dealing with the fairer sex, but you might want to save that bit of information until the third date or so, after they’ve gotten to know you a little.† A Dirty Job Chapter 6 He’d worked up a furious appetite because breakfast was running late today. The Emperor had slept on a bench by the Maritime Museum, and during the night his arthritic knee had snaked out of his wool overcoat into the damp cold, making the walk to North Beach and the Italian bakery that gave them free day-old a slow and painful ordeal. The Emperor groaned and sat down on an empty milk crate. He was a great rolling bear of a man, his shoulders broad but a little broken from carrying the weight of the city. A white tangle of hair and beard wreathed his face like a storm cloud. As far as he could remember, he and the troops had patrolled the city streets forever, but upon further consideration, it might have just been since Wednesday. He wasn’t entirely sure. The Emperor decided to make a proclamation to the troops about the importance of compassion in the face of the rising tide of heinous fuckery and political weaselocity in the nearby kingdom of the United States. (He found his audience was most attentive to his proclamations when the meat-laced focaccia were still nuzzled in the larder of his overcoat pockets, and presently a pepperoni and Parmesan reposed fragrant in the woolly depths, so the royal hounds were rapt.) But just as he cleared his throat to begin, a cargo van came screeching around the corner, went up on two wheels as it plowed through a row of garbage cans, and slid to a stop not fifty feet away. The driver’s-side door flew open and a thin man in a suit leapt out, carrying a cane and a woman’s fur coat, and made a beeline for the back door of Asher’s. But before he got two steps the man fell to the concrete as if hit from behind, then rolled on his back and began flailing at the air with the cane an d the coat. The Emperor, who knew most everyone, recognized Charlie Asher. Bummer erupted into a fit of yapping, but the more levelheaded Lazarus growled once and took off toward Charlie. â€Å"Lazarus!† the Emperor shouted, but the retriever charged on, followed now by his bug-eyed brother in arms. Charlie was back on his feet and swinging the cane as if he was fencing with some phantom, using the coat like a shield. Living on the street, the Emperor had seen a lot of people battling with unseen demons, but Charlie Asher was apparently scoring some hits. The cane was making a thwacking noise against what appeared to be thin air – but no, there was something there, a shadow of some sort? The Emperor climbed to his feet and limped into the fray, but before he got two steps Lazarus had leapt and appeared to be attacking Charlie, but he soared over the shopkeeper and snapped at a spot above his head – then hung there, his jaws sunk into the substantial neck of thin air. Charlie took advantage of the distraction, stepped back, and swung the cane above the levitating golden retriever. There was a smack, and Lazarus let go, but now Bummer launched himself at the invisible foe. He missed whatever was there, and ended up performing a doggy swish shot into a garbage can. Charlie made for the steel door of Asher’s again, but found it locked, and as he reached for his keys, something caught him from behind. â€Å"Let go, fuckface,† the shade screeched. The fur coat Charlie was holding appeared to be swept out of his hand and was pulled straight up, over the four-story building and out of sight. Charlie turned and held the cane at ready, but whatever had been there seemed to be gone now. â€Å"Aren’t you just supposed to sit above the door and nevermore and be poetic and stuff?!† he shouted at the sky. Then, for good measure, added, â€Å"You evil fuck!† Lazarus barked, then whined. A sharp and metallic yapping rose from Bummer’s garbage can. â€Å"Well, you don’t see that every day,† said the Emperor as he limped up to Charlie. â€Å"You could see that?† â€Å"Well, no, not really. Merely a shadow, but I could see that something was there. There was something there, wasn’t there, Charlie?† Charlie nodded, trying to catch his breath. â€Å"It will be back. It followed me across the city.† He dug into his pocket for his keys. â€Å"You guys should duck into the store with me, Your Majesty.† Of course Charlie knew the Emperor. Every San Franciscan knew the Emperor. The Emperor smiled. â€Å"That’s very kind of you, but we will be perfectly safe. For now I need to free my charge from his galvanized prison.† The big man tipped the garbage can and Bummer emerged snorting and tossing his head as if ready to tear the ass out of any man or beast foolhardy enough to cross him (and he would have, as long as they were knee-high or shorter). Charlie was still having trouble with the key. He knew he should have had the lock replaced, but it worked, if you finessed it a little, so he’d never made it a priority. Who the hell thought you’d ever have to get in quick to escape a giant bird? Then he heard a screech and turned to see not one, but two huge ravens coming over the roof and diving into the alley. The dogs arfed a frantic barking salvo at the avian intruders and Charlie put so much body English into wiggling the key in the lock that he felt an atrophied dancing muscle tear in his hip. â€Å"They’re back. Cover me.† Charlie threw the cane to the Emperor and braced himself for the impact, but as soon as the cane touched the old man’s hand the birds were gone. You could almost hear the pop of the air replacing the space they had taken up. The dogs caught themselves in mid-ruff; Bummer whimpered. â€Å"What?† the Emperor said. â€Å"What?† â€Å"They’re gone.† The Emperor looked at the sky. â€Å"You’re sure?† â€Å"For now.† â€Å"I saw two shadows. Really saw them this time,† the Emperor said. â€Å"Yes, there were two this time.† â€Å"What are they?† â€Å"I have no idea, but when you took the cane they – well, they disappeared. You really saw them?† â€Å"I’m sure of it. Like smoke with a purpose.† Finally the key turned in the lock and the door to Asher’s back room swung open. â€Å"You should come in. Rest. I’ll order something to eat.† â€Å"No, no, the men and I must be on our rounds. I’ve decided to make a proclamation this morning and we need to see the printer. You’ll be needing this.† The Emperor presented the cane to Charlie like he was turning over a sword of the realm. Charlie started to take it, then thought better of it. â€Å"Your Majesty, I think you’d better keep that. It looks as if you might be able to use it.† Charlie nodded toward the Emperor’s creaky knee. The Emperor held the cane steady. â€Å"I am not a worshiper of the material, you know?† â€Å"I understand that.† â€Å"I am a firm believer that desire is the source of most of human suffering, you’re aware, and no culprit is more heinous than desire for material gain.† â€Å"I run my business based on those very principles. Still, I insist you keep the cane – as a favor to me, if you would?† Charlie found himself affecting the Emperor’s formal speech patterns, as if somehow he had been transported to a royal court where a nobleman was distinguished by bread crumbs in his beard and the royal guard were not above licking their balls. â€Å"Well, as a favor, I will accept. It is a fine piece of craftsmanship.† â€Å"But more importantly, it will permit you to make your rounds in good time.† The Emperor now betrayed the desire in his heart as he let fly a wide grin and hugged the cane to his chest. â€Å"It is fine, indeed. Charlie, I must confess something to you, but I ask you to grant me the credulity due a man who has just shared witness, with a friend, of two giant, raven-shaped shades.† â€Å"Of course.† Charlie smiled, when even a moment before he would have thought his smile lost somewhere in the months past. â€Å"I hope you won’t think me base, but the second I touched this, I felt as if I had been waiting for it my whole life.† Then, for no reason that he could think of, Charlie said, â€Å"I know.† A few minutes before, inside the store, Lily had been brooding. It wasn’t her general brood, the reaction to a world where everyone was stupid and life was meaningless and the mere act of living was futile, especially if your mother forgot to get coffee at the store. This one was a more specific brood, that had started out when she arrived at work and Ray had pointed out that it was her turn to wear the vacuuming tiara, and insisted that if she wore the tiara, she actually vacuum the store. (In fact, she liked wearing the rhinestone tiara that Charlie, in a move of blatant bourgeois sneakiness, had designated be worn by whoever did the vacuuming and sweeping each day, and no other time. It was the vacuuming and sweeping she objected to. She felt manipulated, used, and generally taken advantage of, and not in the fun way.) But today, after she’d put the tiara and the vacuum away and had finally gotten a couple of cups of coffee in her system, the brooding had gone on, bu ilding to full-scale angst, when it began to dawn on her that she was going to have to figure out this college-career thing, because despite what The Great Big Book of Death said, she had not been chosen as a dark minion of destruction. Fuck! She stood in the back room looking at all the items that Charlie had piled there the day before: shoes, lamps, umbrellas, porcelain figures, toys, a couple of books, and an old black-and-white television and a painting of a clown on black velvet. â€Å"He said this stuff was glowing?† she asked Ray, who stood in the doorway to the store. â€Å"Yes. He made me check it all with my Geiger counter.† â€Å"Ray, why the fuck do you have a Geiger counter?† â€Å"Lily, why do you have a nose stud shaped like a bat?† Lily ignored the question and picked up the ceramic frog from the night before, which now had a note taped to it that read DO NOT SELL OR DISPLAY in Charlie’s meticulous block-letter printing. â€Å"This was one of the things? This?† â€Å"That was the first one he freaked out about,† said Ray matter-of-factly. â€Å"The truant officer tried to buy it. That started it all.† Lily was shaken. She backed over to Charlie’s desk and sat in the squeaky oak swivel chair. â€Å"Do you see anything glowing or pulsating, Ray? Have you ever?† Ray shook his head. â€Å"He’s under a lot of stress, losing Rachel and taking care of the baby. I think maybe he needs to get some help. I know after I had to leave the force – † Ray paused. There was a commotion going on out in the alley, dogs barking and people shouting, then someone was working a key in the lock of the back door. A second later, Charlie came in, a little breathless, his clothes smudged here and there with grime, one sleeve of his jacket torn and bloodstained. â€Å"Asher,† Lily said. â€Å"You’re hurt.† She quickly vacated his chair while Ray took Charlie by the shoulders and sat him down. â€Å"I’m fine,† Charlie said. â€Å"No big deal.† â€Å"I’ll get the first-aid kit,† Ray said. â€Å"Get that jacket off of him, Lily.† â€Å"I’m fine,† Charlie said. â€Å"Quit talking about me like I’m not here.† â€Å"He’s delirious,† Lily said, trying to pry Charlie out of his jacket. â€Å"Do you have any painkillers, Ray?† â€Å"I don’t need painkillers,† Charlie said. â€Å"Shut up, Asher, they’re not for you,† Lily said, automatically, then she considered the book, Ray’s story, the notes on all the items in the back room, and she shuddered. It appeared that Charlie Asher might not be the hapless geek she always thought him to be. â€Å"Sorry, boss. Let us help you.† Ray came back from the front with a small plastic first-aid kit. He peeled back Charlie’s sleeve and began to clean the wounds with gauze and peroxide. â€Å"What happened?† â€Å"Nothing,† Charlie said. â€Å"I slipped and fell in some gravel.† â€Å"The wound’s pretty clean – no gravel in it. That must have been some fall.† â€Å"Long story.† Charlie sighed. â€Å"Ouch!† â€Å"What was all the noise in the alley?† Lily asked, needing badly to go smoke, but unable to pull herself away. She just couldn’t imagine that Charlie Asher was the one. How could it be him? He was so, so, unworthy. He didn’t understand the dark underbelly of life the way she did. Yet he was the one seeing the glowing objects. He was it. She was crestfallen. â€Å"Just the Emperor’s dogs after a seagull in the Dumpster. No big deal. I fell off a porch in Pacific Heights.† â€Å"The estate,† Ray said. â€Å"How’d that go?† â€Å"Not well. The husband was grief-stricken and had a heart attack while I was there.† â€Å"You’re kidding.† â€Å"No, he just sort of became overwhelmed thinking about his wife and collapsed. I gave him CPR until the EMTs came and took him off to the hospital.† â€Å"So,† Lily said, â€Å"did you get the – uh – did you get anything special?† â€Å"What?† Charlie’s eyes went wide. â€Å"What do you mean, special? There was nothing special.† â€Å"Chill, boss, I just meant will we get the grandma’s clothes?† He’s it, Lily thought. The fucker. Charlie shook his head. â€Å"I don’t know, it’s so strange. The whole thing is so strange.† He shuddered when he said it. â€Å"Strange how?† Lily said. â€Å"Strange in a cool and dark way, or strange because you’re Asher and you’re out of it most of the time?† â€Å"Lily!† Ray snapped. â€Å"Go out front. Dust something.† â€Å"You’re not the boss of me, Ray. I’m just showing my concern.† â€Å"It’s okay, Ray.† Charlie looked like he was considering how, exactly, to define strange, and not coming up with anything that was working. Finally he said, â€Å"Well, for one thing, this woman’s estate is way out of our league. The husband said he called me because we were the first secondhand store in the phone book, but he doesn’t seem like the kind of man to do something like that.† â€Å"That’s not that strange,† Lily said. Just confess, she thought. â€Å"You said that he was grief-stricken,† Ray said, dabbing antibiotic ointment on Charlie’s cuts. â€Å"Maybe he’s doing things differently.† â€Å"Yes, and he was angry at his wife, too, for the way she died.† â€Å"How?† Lily asked. â€Å"She ate silica gel,† Charlie said. Lily looked at Ray for an explanation, because silica gel sounded techno-geeky, which was Ray’s particular field of geekdom. Ray said, â€Å"It’s the antidesiccant that they pack with electronics and other things that are sensitive to humidity.† â€Å"The ‘Do Not Eat’ stuff?!† Lily said. â€Å"Oh my God, that’s so stupid. Everyone knows you don’t eat the ‘Do Not Eat’ stuff.† Charlie said, â€Å"Mr. Mainheart was pretty broken up.† â€Å"Well, I guess so,† Lily said. â€Å"He married a complete fucktard.† Charlie cringed. â€Å"Lily, that’s not appropriate.† Lily shrugged and rolled her eyes. She hated it when Charlie dropped into Dad mode. â€Å"Okay, okay. I’m going outside to smoke.† â€Å"No!† Charlie jumped out of the chair and put himself between Lily and the back door. â€Å"Out front. From now on if you have to smoke you go out front.† â€Å"But you said that I look like a child hooker when I smoke out front.† â€Å"I’ve reassessed. You’ve matured.† Lily closed one eye to see if she could better glimpse into his soul and thus figure out his true agenda. She smoothed over her black vinyl skirt, which made a tortured, squeaking noise at the touch. â€Å"You’re trying to say I have a big butt, aren’t you?† â€Å"I absolutely am saying no such thing,† Charlie insisted. â€Å"I am simply saying that your presence in front of the store is an asset and will probably attract business from the tourists on the cable car.† â€Å"Oh. Okay.† Lily snatched her box of cloves off the desk and headed out past the counter and outside to brood, grieve really, because as much as she had hoped, she was not Death. The book was Charlie’s. That evening Charlie was watching the store, wondering why he had lied to his employees, when he saw a flash of red passing by the front window. A second later, a strikingly pale redhead came through the door. She was wearing a short, black cocktail dress and black fuck-me pumps. She strode up the aisle like she was auditioning for a music video. Her hair cascaded in long curls around her shoulders and down her back like a great auburn veil. Her eyes were emerald green, and when she saw him looking, she smiled, and stopped, some ten feet away. Charlie felt an almost painful jolt that seemed to emanate from somewhere in the area of his groin, and after a second he recognized it as an autonomic lust response. He hadn’t felt anything like that since Rachel had passed, and he felt vaguely ashamed. She was examining him, looking him over like you would examine a used car. He was sure he must be blushing. â€Å"Hi,† Charlie said. â€Å"Can I help you?† The redhead smiled again, just a little, and reached into a small black bag that he hadn’t noticed she’d been carrying. â€Å"I found this,† she said, holding up a silver cigarette case. Something Charlie didn’t see very often anymore, even in the secondhand business. It was glowing, pulsating like the objects in the back room. â€Å"I was in the neighborhood and something made me think that this belonged here.† She moved to the counter opposite Charlie and set the cigarette case down in front of him. Charlie could barely move. He stared at her, not even conscious that to avoid her eyes he was staring at her cleavage, and she appeared to be looking around his head and shoulders as if following the path of insects that were buzzing around him. â€Å"Touch me,† she said. â€Å"Huh?† He looked up, saw she was serious. She held out her hand; her nails were manicured and painted the same deep red as her lipstick. He took her hand. As soon as she touched him she pulled away. â€Å"You’re warm.† â€Å"Thanks.† In that moment he realized that she wasn’t. Her fingers had been ice-cold. â€Å"Then you’re not one of us?† He tried to think of what â€Å"us† might be? Irish? Low blood pressure? Nymphomaniac? Why did he even think that? â€Å"Us? What do you mean, ‘us’?† She backed away a step. â€Å"No. You don’t just take the weak and the sick, do you? You take anyone.† â€Å"Take? What do you mean, ‘take’?† â€Å"You don’t even know, do you?† â€Å"Know what?† Charlie was getting very nervous. As a Beta Male, he found it difficult enough to function under the attention of a beautiful woman, but she was just plain spooky. â€Å"Wait. Can you see this thing glowing?† He held out the cigarette case. â€Å"No glow. It just felt like it belonged here,† she said. â€Å"What’s your name?† â€Å"Charlie Asher. This is Asher’s.† â€Å"Well, Charlie, you seem like a nice guy, and I don’t know exactly what you are, and it doesn’t seem like you know. You don’t, do you?† â€Å"I’ve been going through some changes,† Charlie said, wondering why he felt compelled to share this at all. The redhead nodded, as if confirming something to herself. â€Å"Okay. I know what it’s like to, uh, to find yourself thrown into a situation where forces beyond your control are changing you into someone, something you don’t have an owner’s manual for. I understand what it is to not know. But someone, somewhere, does know. Someone can tell you what’s going on.† â€Å"What are you talking about?† But he knew what she was talking about. What he didn’t know was how she could possibly know. â€Å"You make people die, don’t you, Charlie?† She said it like she had worked up the courage to tell him that he had some spinach in his teeth. More of a service to him than an accusation. â€Å"How do you – ?† How did she – â€Å"Because it’s what I do. Not like you, but it’s what I do. Find them, Charlie. Backtrack and find whoever was there when your world changed.† Charlie looked at her, then at the cigarette case, then at the redhead again, who was no longer smiling, but was stepping backward toward the door. Trying to stay in touch with normal, he focused on the cigarette case and said, â€Å"I suppose I can do an appraisal – â€Å" He heard the bell over the door jingle, and when he looked up she was gone. He didn’t see her moving by the windows on either side of the door; she was just gone. He ran to the front of the store and out the door onto the sidewalk. The Mason Street cable car was just topping the hill up by California Street and he could hear the bell, there was a thin fog coming up from the Bay that threw colorful halos around the neon signs of the other businesses, but there was no striking redhead on the street. He went to the corner and looked down Vallejo, but again no redhead, just the Emperor, sitting against the building with his dogs. â€Å"Good evening, Charlie.† â€Å"Your Majesty, did you see a redhead go by here just now?† â€Å"Oh yes. Spoke to her. I’m not sure you have a chance there, Charlie, I believe she’s spoken for. And she did warn me to stay away from you.† â€Å"Why? Did she say why?† â€Å"She said that you were Death.† â€Å"I am?† Charlie said. â€Å"Am I?† His breath caught in his throat as the day played back in his head. â€Å"What if I am?† â€Å"You know, son,† the Emperor said, â€Å"I am not an expert in dealing with the fairer sex, but you might want to save that bit of information until the third date or so, after they’ve gotten to know you a little.†

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Are you ready for the Big Data - Coursework Example The competitor company had used this ability to carry out myriad of experiments in the real world giving it a competitive advantage. The main point the authors put across is that big data collection is the game changer in the 21st century corporate world. Big data has the potential to revolutionalize the management practices. The authors pose a challenge to the companies to decide whether they are ready to exploit the potential of big data and to manage the threats it could pose effectively. The rest of the article explores the important ways in which big data could transform the competition in the corporate world, alter the corporate ecosystems and improve innovation. One of the major elements of organization development is effective communication across all organizational sectors and also extending to external stakeholders such as the suppliers. This article lays emphasis on the importance of sharing data across the different lines of business such as finance, management, productio n and sales and marketing. It further calls for integration of the organizations data system with suppliers, data systems in order to accrue benefits such as instant stock replenishment and real-time price adjustment. It argues that the tendency of many companies to accumulate huge volumes of data in their silos and other forms of information hoarding impedes timely exploitation of this data. This is not in line with essentials for organization development. Organizations need to open these data enclaves and integrate data from various systems.

Solution Exercise Essay Example for Free

Solution Exercise Essay AM by submitting on blackboard Guideline This homework is an â€Å"individual† data mining experiment. Plagiary is definitely not allowed. If any classmate or other person helps you on doing this homework, you need to specify who and which portion you got help from. You credit will be given to the helper (it is fair, right). The helper should also mention who get your assistant on this homework. Zero point will be given if your homework is found to be the same with others without any mention. You are required to use computer language (C, C++, or Java) or computer software (matlab or Weka) to do the data mining experiment and analysis. Other software or language is allowed based on the approval of the instructor. You need to specify which software or program you are using for this homework. If you use other person’s program or any program downloaded from internet, you need to address where you get it, and who is the author. If you decide to write your own program, please submit your source code. Extra credit will be given if you write your own program on any portion of this homework. No matter which kind of method you choose for this homework, you need to be careful on adjusting the parameter, if there is. Please do an experiment on how to obtain the better parameters and write down you analysis on this homework. You need to submit your homework written by MS Word through blackboard system. The homework should not longer than 10-page limit (source code should put in the appendix). No late homework is allowed! I. Congressional Voting Records (50%) http://archive.ics.uci.edu/ml/datasets/Congressional+Voting+Records Go to the UCI Machine Learning Repository to download the â€Å"Congressional Voting Records Data Set† or download house-votes-84.csv file from blackboard. Then, chose at least two different classification methods (decision tree, rule-based, Bayesian, ANN, SVM, Ensemble) to predict party affiliation (democrat or republican). You can use any kind of statistical software (such as mintab) or Excel to show the data exploration. Please PLOT it! How do you handle the missing values? The reasons of choosing classification methods Classification method implementation or software usage Specify how you do the experiment? Which software package you are using? Or, you write your own program? Also, you need to specify all the parameters you are using for the chosen methods, and explain how you make the adjustment. Result of 10-fold cross validation for each method Show your best result! Model comparison II. Wisconsin Diagnostic Breast Cancer (WDBC) (50%) http://archive.ics.uci.edu/ml/datasets/Breast+Cancer+Wisconsin+(Diagnostic) Go to the UCI Machine Learning Repository to download â€Å"Wisconsin Diagnostic Breast Cancer (WDBC)† dataset or download wdbc-data.csv file from blackboard. Please make sure you download wdbc.data not wpbc.data. Then, chose at least two different classification methods (decision tree, rule-based, Bayesian, ANN, SVM, Ensemble) to predict diagnostic result (malignant or benign). You homework should contains following sections. 1. Data exploration You can use any kind of statistical software (such as mintab) or Excel to show the data exploration. Please PLOT it! 2. The reasons of choosing classification methods 3. Apply one dimension reduction technique on the dataset 4. Classification method implementation or software usage Specify how you do the experiment? Which software package you are using? Or, you write your own program? Also, you need to specify all the parameters you are using for the chosen methods, and explain how you make the adjustment. 5. Result of 10-fold cross validation for each method Show your best result! 6. Model Comparison III. Extra credit (20%) Review some classification papers (at least one paper for each dataset) which use these two dataset for their experiment. Compare your result with them. Summarize what you found.