The Pretender Essays - The Pretender, Dream, Jackson Browne

The Pretender "The Pretender" by Jackson Browne tells a story of a man who has dreams of money and love. Pretenders dream of the "American Dream," money, and love, but do not possess these things. The Pretender in the song, typifies the middle-aged American. All want money and love, but few have them. "The Pretender" reveals a message of a man who had strong dreams, only to have them fade into the harsh reality of life. First, the Pretender dreams of possessing legal tender and living the American life. He dreams of living in a good house, and living a stable life. The quotation, "I'm going to rent myself a house in the shade of the freeway I'm going to pack my lunch in the morning and go to work each day And when evening rolls around I'll go on home and lay my body down," states that the man has a desire for a normal life. He wants a steady job, and a comfortable house. The Pretender also yearns for money, as stated "I'm going to be a happy idiot And struggle for legal tender Where the ads take aim and lay their claim To the heart and soul of the spender And believe in whatever may lie In those things that money can buy Thought true love could have been a contender," and he even thought money could by love. But in the end, the Pretender found out that money can't buy love. Second, the Pretender dreams of love, only to see his dreams fade. The quotation, "Ah the laughter of lovers As they run through the night Leaving nothing for the others But to choose off and fight And tear at the world with all their might While the ships bearing their dreams sail out of sight," perhaps describes the pretender's dreams. He dreams of love, and to have nothing disturb it, only to have his dream "sail out of sight." Third, the pretender, with all of his dreams, realizes the harsh reality of his life. The quotation, "Out into the cool of the evening Strolls the Pretender He knows that all his hopes and dreams end there," describes how he realizes how, though he has hopes and dreams, he will not likely attain them. Also, he realizes the monotony of his life, caused by a lack of love, as stated in the quotation, "And when the morning light comes in I'll get up and do it again Amen Say it again Amen." Clearly, the Pretender dreams of big things such as money, possessions, and love. Along the way, however, he loses his dreams and realizes how they only go so far. So, "Say a prayer for the Pretender Who started out so young and strong Only to surrender."Amen.

Lowering Drinking Age to 18 essays

Lowering Drinking Age to 18 essays In 1920 eighteenth amendment was passed which is generally referred to as prohibition. In essence it prohibited drinking or manufacturing alcoholic beverages. Supporters of prohibition thought that it would bring stop to social problems associated with alcohol consumption. Soon it became clear that prohibition was a failure, it achieved nothing, since drinking was still rampant. It created many other problems like the growth of organized crime, increased disrespect for law, unregulated and dangerous beverages, increased violence, the loss of tax revenue, corruption of law enforcement and other public officials, increases in binge drinking, and many other serious problems.. It was repealed in 1933. In 1984 MADD (Mothers Against Drinking and Driving) have succefully changed public opinion and raised the drinking age to 21. That is how we got here today. There are a lot of different opinions on what the drinking age should be however there are 2 radical opinions that push the legislators. The first is that there shouldnt be a drinking age. The other one is that alcohol as a whole should be outlawed. Those represent the radical left and right of the spectrum. The more common views are that drinking age should be lowered to 18 or it should stay at 21 and possibly raised. The conflict is the same old believe that remains rampant ever since prohibition. Alcohol is the cause of all the social problems. Which can be traced to ignorance, it is alcohol abuse not alcohol itself that cause a lot of social problems. Also another theme is added, young people are not mature, and therefore they cant be trusted with a substance such as alcohol. This brings in light another issue, as old as humans themselves. An aging population doesnt understand they young generation. To illustrate just how ancient is this problem let me quote a inscription found at grave of pharaoh that died in 3500 B.C. : You...

Services Sector Marketing Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Services Sector Marketing - Case Study Example Having a restaurant and running it is no big deal - people all across the world do that, but not many have succeeded the way that TGI Friday's has done. The business has done a remarkable job in developing its cutting edge over its competitors, doing what others haven't done, bringing up innovation and creativity, that attracts thousands of customers to its outlets all around the world, and has maintained itself and its status as the premier entertaining hang out place, with themed coverage, and instances that create a memorizing impact on the customer, pulling them to come over again and again. Customer attraction and retention is an important phenomenon when devising a marketing plan, and this is where TGI Friday's has been fairly successful in doing a remarkable job. The difference that it has created is what gives it a cutting edge. As mentioned in the company policy, amongst the critical components for the business is the ambience that it wants to create within its environment. And certainly, the business has been successful in the same. Critical incident is a derived form of critical incident technique, in which events and observations are gathered, and these observations formulate the critical incident. Critical incident techniques define process from the point of understanding and witnessing the 'incident' to the fact finding and collecting data from the participants and till the issue is resolved. TGI Friday's can identify what constitutes a critical incident by conducting research in its area or industry specific terms, and it would ultimately lead the business into identifying whether or not it has achieved customer satisfaction. For this purpose, on a general note, businesses hire consultants for rendering their services mainly to identify the variables. Researches reveal that the critical incident here, as also mentioned in the case, would be a busy time at the restaurant. Observing the various aspects related to a busy time and comparing the same to a non-busy time would yield meaningful outcome. Here, observation needs to be done by a neutral person who is neither very defending about the employees nor a very customer centric individual. The various aspects that need to be observed are mainly the delivery time, the professionalism of the servers, and manner of delivery, lag time and other several variables. These aspects should not just be observed but the participants i.e. the customers should also be asked questions about the same. A few observations during busy times, and a few during the non busy timings would definitely yield outcome that have comparative basis and thus can be compared to illustrate whether the business has achieved customer satisfaction or otherwise. Q3: Discuss the relative merits and demerits of 'blueprinting' and 'Servicescapes' as conceptual framework for analyzing the service encounter at TGI Friday's. Blueprinting is defined as a mechanism that portrays in a visual format the procedures and participants that are involved in producing a service, or in other words, it is a visual

Unit9 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 1

Unit9 - Essay Example The course met my expectations as I was set on learning about analysis of policies and the in-depth detail was provided. The progress so far has been overwhelming. I did not expect that at this point I would have made much progress and learnt the much I have but the truth is that am way ahead and am immensely impressed by this progress. Despite the overwhelming progress and the making of leeway in the course, I still wish most of the concepts about the public policies analysis could have been carried out in slower manner to give time to really understand them since they impact directly on our day to day lives. All in all, the much taught though shallow still was good. To those students undertaking this course next year, I would advise them to start early preparations of trying to understand (though not fully) the main concepts in the course. This is in order to enable them have many questions which in the end makes the course be detailed with as many real life examples as possible hence making the course much more relevant to them. More interactive time and open forums with the tutor where debates about the course topics would have arisen and therefore made the course less intense would have been appreciated. This is because interactive time provides an avenue and time to get up close with the course instructor and hence opening communication channels to the shy students who are not so comfortable in intense classroom lectures and do better in an open forum sort-of discussion. Reuters. â€Å"Consumer Spending Rises as Jobless Claims Hold Steady.† The New York Times, 30th August, 2012. Retrieved from:

Integrated risk management (financial risk management) Essay

Integrated risk management (financial risk management) - Essay Example World has evolved rapidly over the last few decades. The changes on our economic horizon are just a part of a global economic shift toward better more efficient and transparent systems. The term ‘better’ is a very generic term. This has been used basically to make a statement about diversity. The term ‘better’ changes its meaning every few years for everyone. For example a few years ago it was better to own an apartment in a high rise apartment building than an ordinary house. Today however the trend has changed once again. People prefer buying private houses rather than apartments; even the most expensive ones. This is because of a socio cultural shift in human evolution. This is just a very small example of the change that is present all around us. Another example if of the concept used mostly in International Business Management (IBM) called ‘International Product Life Cycle’. This concept basically assumes that a product exists in every phas e of its life cycle if we look at the world as a whole. A very relevant example would be of a Plasma LCD. These LCDs are in the growth stage of their life cycle in developed countries. In other developed countries however they might still be in the introductory stage. This is just an example of the complexity and diversity that is present in our business environment today. This complexity and diversity makes decision making very difficult. The risk factor therefore becomes even more prominent and damaging. When every decision might be right and wrong at the same time, how can you minimize risk? Moreover a global business environment is order of the day. This means that there are very few large and successful corporations which are not multinationals. Going beyond borders has therefore become a recipe for success. Recently a new phenomenon has emerged called outsourcing. This basically includes using human

Effect of Agency on Gambling Behaviour in Schizophrenia

Effect of Agency on Gambling Behaviour in Schizophrenia The Effect of Agency on Gambling Behaviour in Paranoid Schizophrenia Introduction Our sense of agency is a form of self-consciousness which allows us to distinguish between ourselves and other individuals; it makes us aware of which thoughts and actions are our own (Haggard Chambon; 2012). This construct can be measured through the use of the intentional binding task (Moore Obhi; 2012). When an individual preforms an action that is then followed by an effect such as an auditory tone, there is a perceived reduction in the length of the interval between the action and the effect. Since this only occurs for actions that are intentional, this phenomena is called intentional binding and has been suggested as a reliable measure of agency (Haggard, Clark Kalogeras; 2002). A disturbed sense of agency is symptomatic of schizophrenia, a long term psychotic disorder marked by severely impaired thinking and abnormal behaviour, including delusions and hallucinations (Andreasen Olsen; 1982). Sufferers of the disorder may either feel that external forces are controlling their actions or thoughts, or they may feel in control of events that in fact are not caused by their actions. Martin (2013) called this experiences of activity; patients form the grandiose delusion that they can control some external events by the sole means of their mind. The first intentional binding patient study (Haggard, Martin, Taylor-Clarke, Jeannerod, Franck, 2003) compared the magnitude of intentional binding in patients with schizophrenia to a healthy control group. They established that intentional binding was significantly more robust in patients compared to controls. Using the same task, a more recent study (Voss, Moore, Hauser, Gallinat, Heinz Haggard; 2010) found that the predictive component is either absent or faulty in schizophrenia, therefore a greater reliance on the external effect rather than the intended action leads to hyper-binding. The severity of positive symptoms, as in the paranoid schizophrenic subtype, was also found to correlate with impairments in action-effect predictions. Various studies have documented a high level of comorbid psychiatric disorders among individuals with gambling disorders, including Schizophrenia. Pathological gambling was first recognised by the APA as an impulse control disorder in 1980, and can be defined as the recurring behaviour of gambling on games of chance despite the resulting negative consequences, leading to the individual becoming incapable of controlling the time and money spent, even when losing. Research conducted by Desai Potenza (2009) investigated the co-occurrence between pathological gambling and schizophrenia. The researchers interviewed a sample of 337 patients diagnosed with schizophrenia. Using the DSM-4 criteria for pathological gambling, the researchers found that these patients may be at a particularly high risk; 19 percent were classified as either problem or pathological gamblers. Just under 10 percent met the diagnosis for pathological gambling, the most severe form of the disorder; recent studies hav e estimated the rate among the general population at less than one percent. Wegner and Wheatley (1999) suggested that the sense of agency also plays a role in phenomena such as superstition and gambling, in which individuals experience subjective control over uncontrollable entities; this is often know as illusion of control. Similar to delusions of activity in schizophrenics, various studies have shown that an irrational sense of personal control over the outcome, even in games of pure chance, is a possible factor in the maintenance of problem gambling. A study by Moore and Ohtsuka (1999) assessed the association between beliefs about illusion of control or internal locus of control and their relationship to gambling frequency in young people. The results indicated that irrational control beliefs were strongly associated with problem gambling; the illusion of internal control over gambling significantly predicted gambling frequency and problem gambling. Toneatto, Blitz-Miller, Calderwood, Dragonetti, Tsanos (1997) found that scoring highly on the South Oaks Gambling Screen (Lesieur Blume, 1987) was correlated considerably with exhibiting cognitive distortions during an interview, in which individuals expressed the belief that they are able to control the outcome of their gambling, along with an extravagant level of self-confidence. Heavy gamblers also made more active attempts to influence the outcome using gambling systems, rituals and superstitions. Sense of control over gambling appears to have cultural differences; Majamà ¤ki Pà ¶ysti (2012) found that Finnish gamblers stress their individual competence and will to take more risks than gamblers in France, even in games of chance, imagining a greater sense of control. Taken together, research suggests that Pathological Gamblers may experience a similar heightened sense of agency to Schizophrenics, in that they exhibit the illusionary idea that they are able to control outcomes which are not within their personal influence. Although the experience of agency between two disorders have not been directly compared, this could perhaps explain the high comorbidity between the two disorders. I therefore propose that a disturbed sense of agency will be present in both schizophrenics and pathological gamblers during a gambling task and may contribute to the development of gambling disorders. Methods In order to study the possible effect of agency on pathological gambling in schizophrenia, I intend to use as many participants as possible in order to obtain the largest, most generalizable sample; participants will be age and gender matched to eliminate extraneous variables. I will use the age range of 16-35, encompassing the peak ages of onset and acute psychosis whilst avoiding using minors for ethical reasons. I will be using a healthy control group, a group of pathological gamblers and a group of paranoid schizophrenics, as they present more positive symptoms than the other subtypes, which correlate with experience of activity delusions. In order to participate individuals must have a professional medical diagnosis for their disorder, as well as normal or corrected hearing and eyesight. Firstly, I would like to establish the level of individual sense of agency for each group during an intentional binding task. Following a voluntary or involuntary key press, participants will experience an interval followed by an auditory tone; they will then be asked to estimate the length of time between preforming the action and producing the effect in milliseconds. Research has shown that there is a perceived reduction in the length of the interval between the action and the effect where the participant believes that they produced the action voluntarily. Secondly, participants would complete a computer gambling task (Rachlin 1986) in order to simulate real life tendency to make a safer or riskier choice during a game of chance. This is a task in which they are asked to choose between two spinning wheels, where the pointer landing on a white coloured section would indicate a monetary win. On one wheel, a win is less likely but twice as substantial, on the second the win is less valuable but more consistent. In order to increase the ecological validity of the situation and hold the attention of the participant, they will have the opportunity to win the money collected during the task. This task will take place within a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner. This machine uses the Blood-oxygen-level dependent contrast (Huettel, Song McCarthy (2009) in order to detect changes in cerebral blood flow during the task, indicating neural activity in different brain regions. Results and Implications My predicted results would be that based on prior research the schizophrenic group will experience substantially more hyperbinding on the intentional binding task than the healthy controls; however I also hope to see the same with the pathological gamblers. Amongst that group, those who experienced the strongest feeling of agency would take the most risks during the task. I would expect to see similar, and greater, patterns of activation in the areas associated with agency, specifically self-agency, during the task in the fMRI machine for the PG and Schizophrenic groups. This would include the TPJ Precuneus, which has been implicated in a large number of studies during tasks relating to agency (Brass et al. 2009; Nahab et al. 2010; Schnell et al. 2007; Spengler et al. 2009; Yomogida et al. 2010) and has been suggested to contain a mechanism which allows us to determine mismatches in sensory feedback (Tsakiris et al. 2008) and attribution of external cause for events (Seidel et al. 20 10). A second area involved is likely to be the dMPFC, active during agency tasks due to its role similar role in predicting events. (Volz et al. 2003, 2004, 2005). Thirdly, I would also expect so see activation in the pre-SMA, which is involved in the development of intention to create voluntary movements(Picard and Strick 1996). Transcranial magnetic stimulation (tms) supressing neural activity of this area results in a decrease in intentional binding (moore 2010). Although increased blood flow will be present in these areas during all forms of agency experience, these areas have been found to be more strongly associated with external agency attributions; therefore it is possible that I will see more activation of these three regions in the healthy control group. This was suggested as the result of a met-analysis performed by Sperduti, Delaveau, Fossati Nadelfound (2011), recognising that the bilateral insular cortex, premotor and primary somatosensory cortex are only active during the production of voluntary movements (Ciccarelli et al. 2005; Francis et al. 2009; Tatsuya et al. 1999 and therefore experiences of self-agency. The bilateral insular cortex is of particular interest in this study as it has been noted in the impairment of attribution of self-agency in schizophrenic patients, and is correlated with positive symptoms. (Wylie and Tregellas 2010, Voss et al. 2010) Although the high level of comorbidity between Schizophrenia and Pathological Gambling is well documented, the effect of agency has not been studied directly in relation to the disorders, so results are difficult to predict. However, this area of study is worthwhile as it establishes the significance of screening patients with Schizophrenia for gambling disorders and helps to detect the aspects of the population that may place these patients at particular threat of developing pathological gambling. Patients who exhibit both these disorder have been found to respond less favourably to treatment, and may experience longer and more frequent durations in hospital, due to poor response and adherence to medication; this increases both the cost and encumbrance to society. Other negative consequences include increased aggression, alcoholism, depression, homelessness and likelihood of becoming a victim of crime. (Green, Drake, Brunette, Noordsy, 2007, Desai Potenza, 2009). The stress caused by gambling disorders, such as financial and relationship problems, may increase the risk of episodes of psychosis. (Borras Huguelet, 2007) Discovering reliable therapies for this group is of importance for future research because current research trials developing treatment for gambling addictions usually do not permit the inclusion of participant who have been diagnosed with a psychoticdisorder such as Schizophrenia; so far there has been no clinical studies of treatments for individuals with these co-occuring disorders. (Enrique Echeburà ºaa,b,*, Montserrat Gà ³mezc, Montserrat Freixac) 2011. Most significantly, this research could provide insight into the brain regions and theoretical processes involved in the maintenance of gambling disorders, in a population in which it is not only incredibly prevalent but also particularly harmful.

Allen Ginsberg :: essays research papers

Allen Ginsberg Allen Ginsberg was born in Newark, New Jersey on June 3, 1926. His father, Louis Ginsberg, was a published poet and a high school teacher. His mother, Naomi, was a radical Communist, paranoid, psychotic, and died in a mental institution in 1956. Ginsberg also had a brother who became a lawyer in Paterson, New Jersey. Ginsberg’s childhood was very complicated. Ginsberg’s mother only trusted him and thought that the rest of the family and the world was plotting against her. Ginsberg attended Columbia college to become a lawyer as his father had planned. However, Ginsberg’s new crowd at Columbia did not encourage him in his studies, and he got suspended from Columbia for various small offenses. He experimented with marijuana, and crused gay bars. Himself and his friends believed that they were working towards some kind of uncertain but great poetic vision, which he called the New Vision. But all of the joyful craziness with his friends it was symboliz ing the real craziness of his mother. Knowing that he was basically sane, Ginsberg embrassed a bizare lifestyle. This all changed as he entered a ‘straight’ phase after his arrest and imprisonment. Ginsberg started to date a woman named Helen Parker and began a job as a marketing researcher. However this ‘straight’ phase did not last long, as he met Carl Solomon in the waiting room of a psychiatric hospital. Ginsberg had many other occupations besides writing poetry. Such as a dishwasher, a welder, and an editor. He was the first Beat writer to gain popularity when he wrote his famous poem Howl. Ginsberg followed Howl with several other important new poems, such as sunflower sutra. Ginsberg had many influences on his writings. One major and very important influence was his mother. His mother was the main topic for the poem Kaddish, which describes his mother’s insanity and death. Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs also had an impact on Ginsbergâ⠂¬â„¢s writings. Ginsberg used Kerouac’s methods of spontaneous composition and expressing poems through music. Burrough’s introduced Ginsberg to the â€Å"druggy-gay-hipster† lifestyle. These three are said to be the founders of the beat generation. Ginsberg also borrowed Walt Whitman and William Blake’s ordinary and unrhymed style and made it his own. Another influence on his writing was the time period. The 1960’s were a period when people started to become aware of government doings. This led the people who disapproved to protest.