The Myth of Japanese Failure (NY Times January 9, 2012) Personal Statement

The Myth of Japanese Failure (NY Times January 9, 2012) - Personal Statement Example In many cases, the US has tried to tarnish the reputation of other countries in order to avoid intense competition from them. For instance, many negative articles have been written concerning the BRICS countries. This is despite the union making immense strides especially in the economic sector. This is because many think that such association will threaten the dominance of US in the global market and political sector. Therefore, the negative perception is mainly intended to reduce the trade between US and Japan in order to weaken its economy. Furthermore, the parameters used to measure the success of Japanese economy are not correct. As a result, a negative image is being painted about this country. I believe that benchmarking is the best measure of a country’s progress. This is because it is able to capture the changes that have occurred in the economic sector over a specified period of time. If such a parameter is used, the current image concerning Japan can change

Piaget’s Cognitive development theory Essay Example for Free

Piaget’s Cognitive development theory Essay Jean Piaget and his theory of the stages of cognitive development have made significant contributions to a wide cross-section of disciplines including educational psychology and applied developmental psychology. Though his original theory has undergone some amount of changes, the basic tenets are still applicable in understanding how humans develop progressively from birth to adulthood. Several theorists have criticized Piaget’s theory and have proposed alternative approaches to explaining human development. Other theorists have espoused Piaget’s theory with few modifications or additions to the original theory. Nevertheless his theory of cognitive development has had a tremendous impact on developmental psychology and will continue to represent a valid theory in helping to understand the nature and stages of human development. The field of applied developmental psychology has and will continue to benefit from the views put forward by Piaget. Biography of Jean Piaget Jean Piaget was born in Neuchatel, Switzerland on August 9, 1896 to what he described as a ‘tumultuous family environment. From an early age Piaget showed signs of having superior intelligence and acquired an interest in several fields of study including psychoanalytic theory, philosophy, mechanics and natural history. At the very young age of ten he published a study on mollusks (malacology). Several years later, in 1917 he published a philosophical novel. His intellectual and research accomplishments thereafter are numerous. In 1918, at only 21 years of age he obtained his doctoral degree in Biology from the University of Neuchatel continuing his study of mollusks in his thesis. His interest in philosophy and psychology led him to Zurich where he worked with mental patients while studying psychoanalytic theory. His interest in child developmental psychology began in Paris with his work in a laboratory at a grade school. Here he worked along with Alfred Binet, who headed the laboratory, in standardizing reasoning tests for Paris children. He became curious about the thought processes of children that influenced them producing either the correct or incorrect answers. Piaget published a number of articles discussing the research he conducted here. In 1921 Piaget was made director of studies at the Institut J. J. Rousseau in Geneva. In 1923 he married Valentine Chatenay with whom he had three children. He continued his study of child psychology and later published five books on the topic. His background in Biology had a significant amount of influence in his research (Slavin, 2000). These publications subsequently distinguished him in this field of study. His academic and administrative appointments saw him working at the University of Geneva, the Sorbonne, the Institut des Sciences de l’Education, and the Bureau International de l’Education. He is also noted to have founded and directed a center for philosophers and psychologists called the Centre d’Epistemologie Genetique. He worked along with several other researchers including Alina Szeminska, Barbel Inhelder, and Marcel Lambercier. Among the research topics that he conducted extensive studies on have been noted the notions of number, physical quantity, and space; manipulation of objects; and the development of perception. These areas collaboratively contributed to his theory of cognitive development. His platform of study was both at the professional and personal level. It is widely known that he conducted detailed observations of his three children Jacqueline, Lucienne and Laurent throughout their infant and language development years. His wife, herself a psychologist, also worked along with him during his observations, recording the behaviors of their children (Fischer Hencke, 1996). Piaget’s contributions to the field of developmental psychological are indeed considerable and have been widely acknowledged. He was awarded the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award in 1969 by the American Psychological Association for his contributions. At his death in Geneva on September 16, 1980, Piaget had written and published more than 40 books and over 100 articles or chapters dealing with the topic of child psychology. His earliest works include The Origins of Intelligence in Children (1936/1952), The Construction of Reality in the Child (1937/1954) and Play, Dreams, and Imitation in Childhood (1945/1951) (Fischer Hencke, 1996). To date his research is believed to have made the single most important contribution to developmental psychology (Slavin, 2000; Beilin, 1992) and to a large extent the field of cognitive development psychology was founded primarily on his work (Goswami, 2001, p. 259). Piaget’s theory of cognitive development Piaget sought to describe how development occurs from the moment of birth unto adulthood and the cognitive changes that occur as physical development takes place. Using his background in Biology and his knowledge of the way organisms behave relative to their environment, Piaget sought to explain how children think along these lines. Piaget’s position that children construct knowledge based on these processes was in antithesis to behaviorist orientation which suggested that behavior was molded exclusively by external environmental forces. Piaget’s theory was more constructivist in nature proposing that each child is actively involved in constructing his own reality. Construction of knowledge, Piaget argued, was facilitated via the interaction of the processes of adaptation, accommodation, assimilation and equilibration. Piaget commenced by proposing that children are born with a natural inclination to interact with and a need to understand their environment (Slavin, 2000). From the earliest stage children develop mental patterns that guide their behavior, what Piaget calls schemes. Schemes are used to â€Å"find out about and act in the world† (Slavin, 2000, p. 30). The goal of intellectual development, according to Piaget, was towards adaptation where existing schemes are adjusted in response to modifications in the environment. As new situations arise children either incorporate new objects or events into existing schemes through assimilation or they adjust existing schemes when new objects and events do not fit into those existing schemes in the process of accommodation. When unfamiliar situations arise a state of disequilibrium ensues and the processes of accommodation and assimilation facilitate the return to equilibrium where balance is restored between existing understanding and new experiences – the process of equilibration (Slavin, 2000). The dimensions of the theory Piaget believed that children passed through four different stages of development that are defined by different characteristic features from birth to adulthood. Piaget proposed that each child moves progressively through each of the stages of cognitive development as they mature physically. The four distinct stages of cognitive development that Piaget has specified are the sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational periods. He also gives an estimate as to the age at which each child will enter either stage. Wakefield (1996) points out, though, that â€Å"the age range for each stage is only an average† a child may enter a specific stage earlier or later than that estimated by Piaget. However, each child, Piaget argues, must pass through each of these stages of development in the specified order and no child can skip a particular stage. It must also be noted here that his theory is necessarily universal as it examines only how all children will progress and does not seek to analyze individual differences among children. The sensorimotor period represents a child zero (0) to two (2) years old. The main aspects of this stage Slavin (2000) summarizes as where â€Å"infants learn about their surroundings by using their senses and motor skills†. Piaget believes that each child is born with some built in mechanisms and tendencies and these he labels as reflexes. Because a newborn child has not yet developed a concept of his environment, his initial response to this environment up to one month old is instinctive. These reflexes, however, soon become the basis through which the child acquires new perspectives and behaviors (schemes) in an attempt to learn about and understand his environment. From birth to one month children begin to establish schemes as they commence the processing of interacting with and understanding their environment. Initially displaying behaviors by simple reflex children soon begin to modify these reflexes. From one to four months children attempt to reproduce recurring themes in their schemas. Children later begin to establish repetitive patterns in behavior and to associate different behaviors with different schemes. Examples include an infant crying when hungry and laughing when happy. The period two to four months Fischer and Silvern (1985) notes as when the child is developing the ability to intelligently adapt individual actions such as grasping a rattle (p. 634). Between four and eight months children are more object-oriented paying more attention to objects in their external environment, becoming more observant and less preoccupied with issues related to themselves such as hunger and sleep. Children begin to display more coordination in their schemes. From eight to 12 months children become aware of what they want and begin to construct their own schemas in order to achieve their goals. Behaviors are now more deliberate, carried out with a particular purpose in view. From 12 to 18 months children they are exploring new possibilities with objects in their environment. A child’s action at this stage is very experimental using trial and error to discover new schemas. From 18 to 24 months children begin to transition from this stage to the second preoperational stage. They are developing the ability to function using symbolic representations. Of course a child at the sensorimotor stage may not necessarily be able to fully understand every new thing that he perceives in his environment. Wakefield (1996) comments that, even though a child is unable to perform some amount of logical thinking at this stage, there is still some attempt to understand his environment through the use of his sense perceptions and motor skills. The preoperational stage is between ages two and seven years approximately. At this second stage children begin to be able to use symbols to represent things mentally by associating those new things with objects they are familiar with. While they are a little more developed cognitively than the earlier stage they still have a very narrow view of their environment. Within this stage, from age two to four years a child is relatively egocentric believing that everyone else sees things from their perspective. They also possess some amount of animism, believing that objects have characteristics similar to living things such as the ability to move. From age four to seven children further develop their reasoning capacities even though their thought processes are not completely logical. They have difficulty, however, with the concepts of centration and conservation. Slavin (2000) explains these concepts by illustrating that in this stage a child does not understand that the amount of milk in a tall glass is the same when it is poured into a shallower container nor are they able to realize that an object painted a different color is still the same object. The third stage of cognitive development is the concrete operational stage which covers children aged seven to eleven. At this stage children, while experiencing difficult thinking in abstract, are able to form concepts and solve problems. Of course they must be able to relate such operations to already familiar objects or situations in order for them to function properly. They are now able to understand and apply the principles of conservation and centration. Their reasoning is also considerably more logical and can show interrelations between different objects and classes of objects. They are still limited, however, in that they are unable to reason in abstract terms but need concrete circumstances and examples as guides. A child in the final formal operational stage, lasting from age eleven (11) to adulthood, is now able to reason in abstract and to conceptualize situations beyond what they can see and touch. They have now developed the capacity to perform reasoning about events, actions or objects that they cannot see or that are strictly hypothetical and they are also able to use deductive reasoning. They begin to devise plans to solve problems and test their hypothesis against a variety of options. Piaget’s stratification of cognitive development into different stages has considerable implications particularly for educational goals. Because children are able only after having moved through certain stages, to manipulate certain tasks and to be effective in certain cognitive activities, learning situations must be structured so that they match the developmental stages. Education must therefore be developmentally appropriate to the abilities of the child and attempts should be made to help children, as they progress from one stage to the next, to manipulate the operations inherent at each stage. Piaget’s view of cognitive development has been quite formidable and influential in helping researchers understand the processes at work at different stages and ages. There have, however, been several criticisms of the model. One of the major criticisms has focused on the presumed universality of the stages that Piaget describes. He supposes that every child, irrespective of situational context, will go through these stages at a prescribed time and that the principles are therefore applicable to all children everywhere. Some researchers have noted, however, that the rate and stage of development is not at all universal. The ages that Piaget initially suggested as delineating each stage are therefore thought of as rough estimates and children can enter and exit each stage either earlier or later than initially prescribed. Another concern that was raised with regards to Piaget’s theory was that it suggested that as the child progressed through the stages that the abilities at the lower stage no longer become useful or necessary. Piaget later clarified, however, that the concrete thinking and other abilities at the lower stage are not only essential before a child is able to progress to more complex thinking but they are also persistent over time and that a child never loses the lower abilities. He suggests that over time certain tasks become automatic, almost instinctive, but they are still essential even in the later stages of development. Further Piaget’s original theory had not considered the potential impact that the environment may have in impacting behavior. His initial argument much to anti-behaviorist and thus the power of environmental factors to shape behavior was almost ignored. Even though he accounted for these influences in his explanations of the process of adaptation and equilibration, he did not focus much on this aspect. Researchers have found that various social and environmental factors can have a considerable impact on a child’s development. They propose that a child can enter a stage earlier and progress through that stage much quicker than others based on the stimuli available in his environment. Similarly a child’s development may be significantly retarded if adequate stimuli are not provided in the environment. A child would therefore progress through stages later and at a slower pace. The behaviorist position that the environment matters is therefore not completely invalid and their view of the potential influence of the external environment in shaping behavior has some merit. Despite this failure to fully acknowledge and explain the relevance and impact of environmental factors in facilitating knowledge construction based on reality and even though the theory seems to emphasize universal stages of development, Fischer and Hencke (1996) believe that Piaget with his cognitive development theory is notably still the most influential researcher and theorist on developmental that the twentieth century has seen (Fischer Hencke, 1996, p. 09). Current research Several theorists have arisen in more recent times to expand on Piaget’s original theory, to propose modifications on the areas of weakness or to suggest a complete new approach to understanding cognitive development. Among those worthy of mention are Robbie Case, Kurt Fischer, Michael Shayer and Juan Pascual-Leone. Robbie Case is a neo-Piagetian who agrees with Piaget’s general position that children go through developmental stages. Case also agrees with Piaget that each stage is delineated based on age and is representative of the changing ways that children are able to mentally represent reality and how they process information in their brains. Case also supports that cognitive development occurs in four stages commencing from when a child is around one month old until the period of adulthood. Within each stage he also recognizes substages of development postulating, like Piaget that each successive stage is a continuation or a building on to the former (Sternberg, 1987, p. 08). Beginning in the mid-nineteen seventies Case began to propose alternative interpretations of the stage development theory. He has developed some characteristics in his new theory that are not in complete alignment with original Piagetian thought. His first area of departure is with relation to the way that information is processed in the brain throughout the stages.

Economic and Financial Integration in Emerging Markets

Economic and Financial Integration in Emerging Markets

tragoed Oedipus as the Ideal Tragic Hero of Oedipus the King (Oedipus

Oedipus as the Ideal Tragic Hero of Oedipus the King In the introduction to Sophocles' Oedipus the King, Sophocles defines a tragic hero as one who "[behaves] admirably as a man, [but who] is nevertheless tripped up by forces beyond his control and understanding..." (Sophocles 76).   In Oedipus the King, Oedipus is the tragic hero. The force that "trips up" the hero is fate, or, moira. It is Oedipus's actions that set the events into motion,   but it is ultimately his fate, and his attempted aversion to it, that brings about his downfall. This downfall, and elements such as plot, character, diction and spectacle (Aristotle 175), that cause Oedipus the King to be a tragedy. In order to describe Oedipus as a tragic hero, one must begin by describing a tragedy. A tragedy must consist of a variety of elements in order to truly fulfill its purpose. According to Aristotle, the most important element is plot (175). Without the events that unify all aspects, the story would not be held together. It is the actions of the tragic hero that lead to his downfall, and that define his characteristics and set into motion all other aspects of the work. In Oedipus the King, it is Oedipus's attempt to avoid his destiny, an overt act of hubris, that leads to his rise in power and ultimate fall. In this aspect, he completely fulfills the job of a tragic hero. Another aspect of a tragedy is character. These are the qualities that are imbued in each character in the story. There have to be admirable traits in the characters, or the readers would not care what happened to them. Some of these characteristics can include honor, bravery, and intelligence, as with Oedipus. If readers did not care, there would be no catharsis... ...hat it was his father whom he killed. He was also acting out of love for his parents when he tried to avoid his fate by leaving town. Due to these circumstances, it can be seen that Oedipus's punishment far exceeded the crime; but this is just one more reason   why he is a tragic hero. Bibliography Bloom, Harold, ed. Sophocles. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishers, 2003. 54-57. The Complete Plays of Sophocles. "Introduction." Ed. Moses Hadas. New York: Bantam Books, 1967. p.vii-xvi The Complete Plays of Sophocles. "Introduction to Oedipus the King." Ed. Moses Hadas. New York: Bantam Books, 1967. p.75-76 The Complete Plays of Sophocles. "Introduction." Ed. Moses Hadas. New York: Bantam Books, 1967. p.77-114 Aristotle. "Poetics". Aristotle's Theory of Poetry and Fine Art. Ed. Butcher, S.H. New York. Dover Publications, Inc. 1951.

Analysis of The Allegory of the Cave by Plato :: Philosophy Plato

An Analysis of "The Allegory of the Cave" by Plato The Allegory of the Cave is Plato's explanation of the education of the soul toward enlightenment. He sees it as what happens when someone is educated to the level of philosopher. He contends that they must "go back into the cave" or return to the everyday world of politics, greed and power struggles. The Allegory also attacks people who rely upon or are slaves to their senses. The chains that bind the prisoners are the senses. The fun of the allegory is to try to put all the details of the cave into your interpretation. In other words, what are the models the guards carry? the fire? the struggle out of the cave? the sunlight? the shadows on the cave wall? Socrates, in Book VII of The Republic, just after the allegory told us that the cave was our world and the fire was our sun. He said the path of the prisoner was our soul's ascent to knowledge or enlightenment. He equated our world of sight with the intellect's world of opinion. Both were at the bottom of the ladder of knowledge. O ur world of sight allows us to "see" things that are not real, such as parallel lines and perfect circles. He calls this higher understanding the world "abstract Reality" or the Intelligeble world. He equates this abstract reality with the knowledge that comes from reasoning and finally understanding. On the physical side, our world of sight, the stages of growth are first recognition of images (the shadows on the cave wall) then the recognition of objects (the models the guards carry) To understand abstract reality requires the understanding of mathematics and finally the forms or the Ideals of all things (the world outside the cave). But our understanding of the physical world is mirrored in our minds by our ways of thinking. First comes imagination (Socrates thought little of creativity), then our unfounded but real beliefs. Opinion gives way to knowledge through reasoning (learned though mathematics). Finally, the realization of the forms is mirrored by the level of Understandin g in the Ways of Thinking. The key to the struggle for knowledge is the reasoning skills acquired through mathematics as they are applied to understanding ourselves. The shadows on the cave wall change continually and are of little worth, but the reality out side the cave never changes and that makes it important.

A Game of Thrones Chapter Thirteen

Tyrion The north went on forever. Tyrion Lannister knew the maps as well as anyone, but a fortnight on the wild track that passed for the kingsroad up here had brought home the lesson that the map was one thing and the land quite another. They had left Winterfell on the same day as the king, amidst all the commotion of the royal departure, riding out to the sound of men shouting and horses snorting, to the rattle of wagons and the groaning of the queen's huge wheelhouse, as a light snow flurried about them. The kingsroad was just beyond the sprawl of castle and town. There the banners and the wagons and the columns of knights and freeriders turned south, taking the tumult with them, while Tyrion turned north with Benjen Stark and his nephew. It had grown colder after that, and far more quiet. West of the road were flint hills, grey and rugged, with tall watchtowers on their stony summits. To the east the land was lower, the ground flattening to a rolling plain that stretched away as far as the eye could see. Stone bridges spanned swift, narrow rivers, while small farms spread in rings around holdfasts walled in wood and stone. The road was well trafficked, and at night for their comfort there were rude inns to be found. Three days ride from Winterfell, however, the farmland gave way to dense wood, and the kingsroad grew lonely. The flint hills rose higher and wilder with each passing mile, until by the fifth day they had turned into mountains, cold blue-grey giants with jagged promontories and snow on their shoulders. When the wind blew from the north, long plumes of ice crystals flew from the high peaks like banners. With the mountains a wall to the west, the road veered north by northeast through the wood, a forest of oak and evergreen and black brier that seemed older and darker than any Tyrion had ever seen. â€Å"The wolfswood,† Benjen Stark called it, and indeed their nights came alive with the howls of distant packs, and some not so distant. Jon Snow's albino direwolf pricked up his ears at the nightly howling, but never raised his own voice in reply. There was something very unsettling about that animal, Tyrion thought. There were eight in the party by then, not counting the wolf. Tyrion traveled with two of his own men, as befit a Lannister. Benjen Stark had only his bastard nephew and some fresh mounts for the Night's Watch, but at the edge of the wolfswood they stayed a night behind the wooden walls of a forest holdfast, and there joined up with another of the black brothers, one Yoren. Yoren was stooped and sinister, his features hidden behind a beard as black as his clothing, but he seemed as tough as an old root and as hard as stone. With him were a pair of ragged peasant boys from the Fingers. â€Å"Rapers,† Yoren said with a cold look at his charges. Tyrion understood. Life on the Wall was said to be hard, but no doubt it was preferable to castration. Five men, three boys, a direwolf, twenty horses, and a cage of ravens given over to Benjen Stark by Maester Luwin. No doubt they made a curious fellowship for the kingsroad, or any road. Tyrion noticed Jon Snow watching Yoren and his sullen companions, with an odd cast to his face that looked uncomfortably like dismay. Yoren had a twisted shoulder and a sour smell, his hair and beard were matted and greasy and full of lice, his clothing old, patched, and seldom washed. His two young recruits smelled even worse, and seemed as stupid as they were cruel. No doubt the boy had made the mistake of thinking that the Night's Watch was made up of men like his uncle. If so, Yoren and his companions were a rude awakening. Tyrion felt sorry for the boy. He had chosen a hard life . . . or perhaps he should say that a hard life had been chosen for him. He had rather less sympathy for the uncle. Benjen Stark seemed to share his brother's distaste for Lannisters, and he had not been pleased when Tyrion had told him of his intentions. â€Å"I warn you, Lannister, you'll find no inns at the Wall,† he had said, looking down on him. â€Å"No doubt you'll find some place to put me,† Tyrion had replied. â€Å"As you might have noticed, I'm small.† One did not say no to the queen's brother, of course, so that had settled the matter, but Stark had not been happy. â€Å"You will not like the ride, I promise you that,† he'd said curtly, and since the moment they set out, he had done all he could to live up to that promise. By the end of the first week, Tyrion's thighs were raw from hard riding, his legs were cramping badly, and he was chilled to the bone. He did not complain. He was damned if he would give Benjen Stark that satisfaction. He took a small revenge in the matter of his riding fur, a tattered bearskin, old and musty-smelling. Stark had offered it to him in an excess of Night's Watch gallantry, no doubt expecting him to graciously decline. Tyrion had accepted with a smile. He had brought his warmest clothing with him when they rode out of Winterfell, and soon discovered that it was nowhere near warm enough. It was cold up here, and growing colder. The nights were well below freezing now, and when the wind blew it was like a knife cutting right through his warmest woolens. By now Stark was no doubt regretting his chivalrous impulse. Perhaps he had learned a lesson. The Lannisters never declined, graciously or otherwise. The Lannisters took what was offered. Farms and holdfasts grew scarcer and smaller as they pressed northward, ever deeper into the darkness of the wolfswood, until finally there were no more roofs to shelter under, and they were thrown back on their own resources. Tyrion was never much use in making a camp or breaking one. Too small, too hobbled, too in-the-way. So while Stark and Yoren and the other men erected rude shelters, tended the horses, and built a fire, it became his custom to take his fur and a wineskin and go off by himself to read. On the eighteenth night of their journey, the wine was a rare sweet amber from the Summer Isles that he had brought all the way north from Casterly Rock, and the book a rumination on the history and properties of dragons. With Lord Eddard Stark's permission, Tyrion had borrowed a few rare volumes from the Winterfell library and packed them for the ride north. He found a comfortable spot just beyond the noise of the camp, beside a swift-running stream with waters clear and cold as ice. A grotesquely ancient oak provided shelter from the biting wind. Tyrion curled up in his fur with his back against the trunk, took a sip of the wine, and began to read about the properties of dragonbone. Dragonbone is black because of its high iron content, the book told him. It is strong as steel, yet lighter and far more flexible, and of course utterly impervious to fire. Dragonbone bows are greatly prized by the Dothraki, and small wonder. An archer so armed can outrange any wooden bow. Tyrion had a morbid fascination with dragons. When he had first come to King's Landing for his sister's wedding to Robert Baratheon, he had made it a point to seek out the dragon skulls that had hung on the walls of Targaryen's throne room. King Robert had replaced them with banners and tapestries, but Tyrion had persisted until he found the skulls in the dank cellar where they had been stored. He had expected to find them impressive, perhaps even frightening. He had not thought to find them beautiful. Yet they were. As black as onyx, polished smooth, so the bone seemed to shimmer in the light of his torch. They liked the fire, he sensed. He'd thrust the torch into the mouth of one of the larger skulls and made the shadows leap and dance on the wall behind him. The teeth were long, curving knives of black diamond. The flame of the torch was nothing to them; they had bathed in the heat of far greater fires. When he had moved away, Tyrion could have sworn that the beast's empty eye sockets had watched him go. There were nineteen skulls. The oldest was more than three thousand years old; the youngest a mere century and a half. The most recent were also the smallest; a matched pair no bigger than mastiff's skulls, and oddly misshapen, all that remained of the last two hatchlings born on Dragonstone. They were the last of the Targaryen dragons, perhaps the last dragons anywhere, and they had not lived very long. From there the skulls ranged upward in size to the three great monsters of song and story, the dragons that Aegon Targaryen and his sisters had unleashed on the Seven Kingdoms of old. The singers had given them the names of gods: Balerion, Meraxes, Vhaghar. Tyrion had stood between their gaping jaws, wordless and awed. You could have ridden a horse down Vhaghar's gullet, although you would not have ridden it out again. Meraxes was even bigger. And the greatest of them, Balerion, the Black Dread, could have swallowed an aurochs whole, or even one of the hairy mammoths said to roam the cold wastes beyond the Port of Ibben. Tyrion stood in that dank cellar for a long time, staring at Balerion's huge, empty-eyed skull until his torch burned low, trying to grasp the size of the living animal, to imagine how it must have looked when it spread its great black wings and swept across the skies, breathing fire. His own remote ancestor, King Loren of the Rock, had tried to stand against the fire when he joined with King Mern of the Reach to oppose the Targaryen conquest. That was close on three hundred years ago, when the Seven Kingdoms were kingdoms, and not mere provinces of a greater realm. Between them, the Two Kings had six hundred banners flying, five thousand mounted knights, and ten times as many freeriders and men-at-arms. Aegon Dragonlord had perhaps a fifth that number, the chroniclers said, and most of those were conscripts from the ranks of the last king he had slain, their loyalties uncertain. The hosts met on the broad plains of the Reach, amidst golden fields of wheat ripe for harvest. When the Two Kings charged, the Targaryen army shivered and shattered and began to run. For a few moments, the chroniclers wrote, the conquest was at an end . . . but only for those few moments, before Aegon Targaryen and his sisters joined the battle. It was the only time that Vhaghar, Meraxes, and Balerion were all unleashed at once. The singers called it the Field of Fire. Near four thousand men had burned that day, among them King Mern of the Reach. King Loren had escaped, and lived long enough to surrender, pledge his fealty to the Targaryens, and beget a son, for which Tyrion was duly grateful. â€Å"Why do you read so much?† Tyrion looked up at the sound of the voice. Jon Snow was standing a few feet away, regarding him curiously. He closed the book on a finger and said, â€Å"Look at me and tell me what you see.† The boy looked at him suspiciously. â€Å"Is this some kind of trick? I see you. Tyrion Lannister.† Tyrion sighed. â€Å"You are remarkably polite for a bastard, Snow. What you see is a dwarf. You are what, twelve?† â€Å"Fourteen,† the boy said. â€Å"Fourteen, and you're taller than I will ever be. My legs are short and twisted, and I walk with difficulty. I require a special saddle to keep from falling off my horse. A saddle of my own design, you may be interested to know. It was either that or ride a pony. My arms are strong enough, but again, too short. I will never make a swordsman. Had I been born a peasant, they might have left me out to die, or sold me to some slaver's grotesquerie. Alas, I was born a Lannister of Casterly Rock, and the grotesqueries are all the poorer. Things are expected of me. My father was the Hand of the King for twenty years. My brother later killed that very same king, as it turns out, but life is full of these little ironies. My sister married the new king and my repulsive nephew will be king after him. I must do my part for the honor of my House, wouldn't you agree? Yet how? Well, my legs may be too small for my body, but my head is too large, although I prefer to think it is just large eno ugh for my mind. I have a realistic grasp of my own strengths and weaknesses. My mind is my weapon. My brother has his sword, King Robert has his warhammer, and I have my mind . . . and a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge.† Tyrion tapped the leather cover of the book. â€Å"That's why I read so much, Jon Snow.† The boy absorbed that all in silence. He had the Stark face if not the name: long, solemn, guarded, a face that gave nothing away. Whoever his mother had been, she had left little of herself in her son. â€Å"What are you reading about?† he asked. â€Å"Dragons,† Tyrion told him. â€Å"What good is that? There are no more dragons,† the boy said with the easy certainty of youth. â€Å"So they say,† Tyrion replied. â€Å"Sad, isn't it? When I was your age, used to dream of having a dragon of my own.† â€Å"You did?† the boy said suspiciously. Perhaps he thought Tyrion was making fun of him. â€Å"Oh, yes. Even a stunted, twisted, ugly little boy can look down over the world when he's seated on a dragon's back.† Tyrion pushed the bearskin aside and climbed to his feet. â€Å"I used to start fires in the bowels of Casterly Rock and stare at the flames for hours, pretending they were dragonfire. Sometimes I'd imagine my father burning. At other times, my sister.† Jon Snow was staring at him, a look equal parts horror and fascination. Tyrion guffawed. â€Å"Don't look at me that way, bastard. I know your secret. You've dreamt the same kind of dreams.† â€Å"No,† Jon Snow said, horrified. â€Å"I wouldn't . . . â€Å" â€Å"No? Never?† Tyrion raised an eyebrow. â€Å"Well, no doubt the Starks have been terribly good to you. I'm certain Lady Stark treats you as if you were one of her own. And your brother Robb, he's always been kind, and why not? He gets Winterfell and you get the Wall. And your father . . . he must have good reasons for packing you off to the Night's Watch . . . â€Å" â€Å"Stop it,† Jon Snow said, his face dark with anger. â€Å"The Night's Watch is a noble calling!† Tyrion laughed. â€Å"You're too smart to believe that. The Night's Watch is a midden heap for all the misfits of the realm. I've seen you looking at Yoren and his boys. Those are your new brothers, Jon Snow, how do you like them? Sullen peasants, debtors, poachers, rapers, thieves, and bastards like you all wind up on the Wall, watching for grumkins and snarks and all the other monsters your wet nurse warned you about. The good part is there are no grumkins or snarks, so it's scarcely dangerous work. The bad part is you freeze your balls off, but since you're not allowed to breed anyway, I don't suppose that matters.† â€Å"Stop it!† the boy screamed. He took a step forward, his hands coiling into fists, close to tears. Suddenly, absurdly, Tyrion felt guilty. He took a step forward, intending to give the boy a reassuring pat on the shoulder or mutter some word of apology. He never saw the wolf, where it was or how it came at him. One moment he was walking toward Snow and the next he was flat on his back on the hard rocky ground, the book spinning away from him as he fell, the breath going out of him at the sudden impact, his mouth full of dirt and blood and rotting leaves. As he tried to get up, his back spasmed painfully. He must have wrenched it in the fall. He ground his teeth in frustration, grabbed a root, and pulled himself back to a sitting position. â€Å"Help me,† he said to the boy, reaching up a hand. And suddenly the wolf was between them. He did not growl. The damned thing never made a sound. He only looked at him with those bright red eyes, and showed him his teeth, and that was more than enough. Tyrion sagged back to the ground with a grunt. â€Å"Don't help me, then. I'll sit right here until you leave.† Jon Snow stroked Ghost's thick white fur, smiling now. â€Å"Ask me nicely.† Tyrion Lannister felt the anger coiling inside him, and crushed it out with a will. It was not the first time in his life he had been humiliated, and it would not be the last. Perhaps he even deserved this. â€Å"I should be very grateful for your kind assistance, Jon,† he said mildly. â€Å"Down, Ghost,† the boy said. The direwolf sat on his haunches. Those red eyes never left Tyrion. Jon came around behind him, slid his hands under his arms, and lifted him easily to his feet. Then he picked up the book and handed it back. â€Å"Why did he attack me?† Tyrion asked with a sidelong glance at the direwolf. He wiped blood and dirt from his mouth with the back of his hand. â€Å"Maybe he thought you were a grumkin.† Tyrion glanced at him sharply. Then he laughed, a raw snort of amusement that came bursting out through his nose entirely without his permission. â€Å"Oh, gods,† he said, choking on his laughter and shaking his head, â€Å"I suppose I do rather look like a grumkin. What does he do to snarks?† â€Å"You don't want to know.† Jon picked up the wineskin and handed it to Tyrion. Tyrion pulled out the stopper, tilted his head, and squeezed a long stream into his mouth. The wine was cool fire as it trickled down his throat and warmed his belly. He held out the skin to Jon Snow. â€Å"Want some?† The boy took the skin and tried a cautious swallow. â€Å"It's true, isn't it?† he said when he was done. â€Å"What you said about the Night's Watch.† Tyrion nodded. Jon Snow set his mouth in a grim line. â€Å"If that's what it is, that's what it is.† Tyrion grinned at him. â€Å"That's good, bastard. Most men would rather deny a hard truth than face it.† â€Å"Most men,† the boy said. â€Å"But not you.† â€Å"No,† Tyrion admitted, â€Å"not me. I seldom even dream of dragons anymore. There are no dragons.† He scooped up the fallen bearskin. â€Å"Come, we had better return to camp before your uncle calls the banners.† The walk was short, but the ground was rough underfoot and his legs were cramping badly by the time they got back. Jon Snow offered a hand to help him over a thick tangle of roots, but Tyrion shook him off. He would make his own way, as he had all his life. Still, the camp was a welcome sight. The shelters had been thrown up against the tumbledown wall of a long-abandoned holdfast, a shield against the wind. The horses had been fed and a fire had been laid. Yoren sat on a stone, skinning a squirrel. The savory smell of stew filled Tyrion's nostrils. He dragged himself over to where his man Morrec was tending the stewpot. Wordlessly, Morrec handed him the ladle. Tyrion tasted and handed it back. â€Å"More pepper,† he said. Benjen Stark emerged from the shelter he shared with his nephew. â€Å"There you are. Jon, damn it, don't go off like that by yourself. I thought the Others had gotten you.† â€Å"It was the grumkins,† Tyrion told him, laughing. Jon Snow smiled. Stark shot a baffled look at Yoren. The old man grunted, shrugged, and went back to his bloody work. The squirrel gave some body to the stew, and they ate it with black bread and hard cheese that night around their fire. Tyrion shared around his skin of wine until even Yoren grew mellow. One by one the company drifted off to their shelters and to sleep, all but Jon Snow, who had drawn the night's first watch. Tyrion was the last to retire, as always. As he stepped into the shelter his men had built for him, he paused and looked back at Jon Snow. The boy stood near the fire, his face still and hard, looking deep into the flames. Tyrion Lannister smiled sadly and went to bed.

Google’s Strategy in 2010 Essay

What is Google’s business model? The answer is complex because it makes up of lots of different factors. The top 10 principles of Google’s corporate philosophy is what keeps them doing what they do best. (Gamble, 2010, pg. C-175). 1.Focus on the user and all else will follow. 2.It’s best to do one thing really, really well. 3.Fast is better than slow. 4.Democracy on the web works. 5.You don’t need to be at your desk to need an answer. 6.You can make money without doing evil. 7.There’s always more information out there. 8.The need for information crosses all borders. 9.You can be serious without a suit. 10.Great just isn’t good enough. Their mission statement is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. (www.google.com). These 10 principles have helped them achieve their goal within their mission statement. Google has kept it simple but efficient. These 10 principles have guided them from the beginning and it has work. They don’t need to fix something that is not broken. Examine the financial reports in the case to determine the company’s profitability, liquidity, leverage and activity ratios. Based on these ratios what is your assessment of the company’s performance? Justify your answer? Profitability ratios are measures of performance that indicate what the firm is earning on its sales or assets or equity. There are the operating profit margin, net profit margin, return on total assets, return on equity, and basic earning power ratios. (Mayo, 2007). Operating profit margin = Earnings before interest and taxes/Sales 8,381,189/23,650,563 = 35.4% Net profit margin = Earnings after interest and taxes/Sales 6,520,448/23,650,563 = 27.5% Return on total assets = Earnings after interest and taxes/Total assets 6,520,448/40,496,778 = 16.1% Return on equity = Earnings after interest and taxes/Equity 6,520,448/36,004,224 = 18.1% Basic earning power = earnings before interest and taxes/Total assets 8,381,189/40,496,778 = 20.6% Leverage ratios measure the firm’s use of debt financing. There are two ratios; debt/net worth ratio and debt ratio. (Mayo, 2007). Debt/net worth ratio = Debt/Equity 4,492,554/36,004,224 = 12.4% Debt ratio = Debt/Total assets 4,492,554/40,496,778 = 11.0% Activity ratios measure how rapidly the firm is turning its assets into cash. The two activity ratios are inventory turnover and receivables turnover. Google does not have any inventory so there is no inventory turnover. (Mayo, 2007). Receivables turnover = Annual sales/Accounts receivable 23,650,563/3,178,471 = 7.4% Liquidity ratios measure the ease of which assets may be converted into cash without loss. There are two liquidity ratios; quick and current ratio. (Mayo, 2007). Quick ratio = Current assets – Inventory/Current liabilities 29,166,958-0/2,747,467 = 10.6% Current ratio = Current assets/current liabilities 29,166,958/2,747,467 = 10.6% Since Google does not have any inventory, the quick ratio and current ratio is the same. This shows that Google does have more assets than current liabilities. Overall, Google is doing extremely well all over the board. Their debt ratio is low sitting at 11 percent. They paid their bills on time because their receivables turnover is sitting at 7 percent. Investors know that Google is a good company to buy stock into. Perform a SWOT analysis of Google. Strengths Number one search engine with established name Simple interface-user friendly Their interface has 88 different languages-Global usage Localized search results Infrastructure Weakness Contextual ads targeted by click fraud Can’t expand to offline products Opportunities Acquisitions of other business Increase online advertising Alliances/partnerships with other companies Launched their own operating system Google TV Threats Facebook Click fraud Yahoo, Microsoft, and Amazon Slow economy Describe Google’s value chain. What is the source of the company’s competitive advantage? Since Google does not have any â€Å"raw† materials to process into finished goods like a traditional company, their value chain is different. Ben Morrow (2009) their value chain is more nuanced. Google gathers all the web users it can (the raw material) by enticing them to use its stellar search product with highly relevant results delivered promptly. Then, through assorted â€Å"signs† (text advertisements) it directs these same web users in the form of traffic to its advertising partners who transform the traffic into â€Å"conversions† or sales on their sites (finished good). Their added value is that they know where to direct the users to their sites that they needed to go. The source of Google’s competitive advantage is learning by doing as stated by Hal R. Varian, Google’s chief economist (Lohr, 2008). Basically, they arelearning from their competitors. For example, with Microsoft antitrust problems, they are now making antitrust training is mandatory for Google managers (Lohr, 2008). Some of Google’s competitive advantages are their value, rarity, imitability, and substitutability. Value because it is part of their value chain. Rarity because their user interface is so simple and user friendly. Also, it is hard for competitors to imitate because of the large infrastructure requirements to serve the relevant pages quickly. Google has servers all over the world all synced up and all running on a very large quantity of RAM, fast computer memory. (Morrow, 2009). References Lohr, S. (July, 7, 2008). The New York Times. Google, Zen Master of the Market. Retrieved on April 11, 2012 from http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/07/technology/07google.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1. Mayo, H. (2007). Basic Finance: An Introduction to Financial Institutions, Investments & Management: 9 Edition. Thomson: United States. Morrow, B. (Feb. 22. 2009). Internal Analysis of Google Inc. Retrieved on April 11, 2012 from http://www.benmorrow.info/research/internal-analysis-of-google-inc/. Thomson A., Peteraf, M., Gamble, J., & Strickland, A.J. ( 2012). Crafting & Executing Strategy. McGraw-Hill.