What is menopause?

Menopause is a biological condition in women and, in simplest terms, defines the life period after the last menstrual period. It is typically defined as the period starting an year (12 months) after the last menstrual period and continues for the rest of the life. Menopause means that women can no longer get pregnant, although they will still be healthy and sexually active. Menopause means that women will no longer have to worry about using protection during intercourse. The age at which a women undergoes menopause is not fixed and varies from case to case. However, the women in U.S. generally experiences menopause at the age of 51 years. Some of the symptoms of menopause may include (and these could vary from woman to woman), hot flashes, inability to get good night's sleep, night sweats and irritability.

Hope this helps. 

What character development occurs in The Wizard of Oz?

In the beginning of the Wizard of Oz, Dorothy is a farm girl from Kansas who has mostly led her life fairly sheltered. Though unafraid and bold, she doesn't like being in a new strange land and at first she just wants to go home, but along the way as she meets and speaks with people and makes friends (the good witch, the lion, the tin man, the scarecrow) she grows to appreciate her journey and learn from her new friends. She learns the value of the people in her life, including her family back home.

The tinman, lacking a heart, believes he is incapable of love. After a serials of tribulations with Dorothy and their new friends, and their subsequent bonding, the tinman realizes he was capable of love all along even if he doesn't have a physical heart.

The scarecrow lacks a brain and wants one so he can be smart. However, throughout their journey he learns from experience, and grows into an intelligent creature without one.

The cowardly lion lacks courage. He goes to the wizard to get courage, but along the way experiences adventure and thrill with his friends and proves that he does have courage after all.

Appreciate, through genetic crosses, that science is linked to nature.

It would be hard to imagine a more accurate analogy.  The mechanisms that occur in nature in and of themselves involve science in one of it's purest forms, genetics.  A species must be able to reproduce to ensure it's lineage, otherwise extinction is inevitable.  Genetic crossings is one mechanism in place to observe the bond between science and nature.  From Mendel's observations of purebred characteristics and experimentation of crossing those characteristics we see a small, controlled scientific experimentation of what occurs naturally on a grander scale.  All the examples of traits we observe in nature are the results of the breeding of this trait versus that trait.  The final count is off the charts, in terms of total trait accountability.  There is an old saying, "Don't fool with Mother Nature."  Another way of interpreting that old saying would be Mother Nature has been doing what she has been doing for a very long time.  Some traits that were produced were good for the organisms that inherited them, while others were not.  The ones that were not were summarily dismissed from the great progression of life.

In the time of Corneille's CINNA, incidental music was often performed between the acts of plays. If there are just 5 movements of incidental...

Generally speaking, incidental music would have been played before each act. Therefore, the five separate movements of incidental music would have been played before the five acts of Corneille's puppet-play Cinna: one movement before the first act, one before the second act, one before the third act, one before the fourth act, and the fifth movement before the fifth act.

Given that Corneille's Cinna is in 5 acts, the performance would likely have started with Harrison's first movement.  Herein Harrison set a "mood" for the entirety of the play and set up the introduction of motivations, as illustrated by Harrison's first movement dynamical notes, which start with "medium fast, medium soft" and move to "grow louder" then jump to "suddenly soft."

This procedure of playing music before each act is still used today. The second, third, fourth and fifth movements build organically out of the first in such a way that the first gives a foretaste of what the other movements of the incidental music will hold while the listener is given a hint as to the various moods of the entirety of the piece.

Is Jane a reliable narrator or not in Pride and Prejudice?

This is an interesting question because in Austen's Pride and Prejudice, Jane is the heroine of the romantic subplot and Elizabeth's elder, more beautiful, more kindly dispositioned sister (universally portrayed in film versions incorrectly). Elizabeth, of course, is the flawed heroine who winds up seeing herself and Mr. Darcy through new eyes, through a new perspective (not to mention seeing wicked Mr. Wickham through new eyes as well). The narrator of the story is a third person narrator that resides outside the relationships and events of the story but that has full knowledge of them and relates them to the reader. Since there is no "Jane" who is a narrator, neither Jane Austen nor Jane Bennet, and since there is only an unnamed third person narrator, your question must be aiming at something different from "narrator." (With an author like Jane Austen, it is tempting to think of the third person narrator as "who" since we all hear Austen's voice in the narration, but, technically, third person narrators are generally spoken of as "that" and generally dealt with as though not having personalities.)

One thing Jane Austen is most noted for is the present, proximal, intrusive narratorial voice she develops in all her stories. What is meant by a present, proximal, intrusive narrator is that the third person narrator is not distanced from the action and characters: the narrator is not reporting from a distant, uninvolved perspective on what occurs in the characters' minds, feelings and relationships and in the action. In the narratorial mode Austen develops, the narrator is present with the characters as things occur; the narrator is in close proximity to characters as they think, feel and participate; the narrator interjects comments and evaluations pertaining to characters' thoughts, feelings, actions, relationships. Austen most often intrudes with comments and evaluations that are wrapped in that famous and delightfully engaging irony of hers (though she carefully never descends into hurtful sarcasm).

Now, if you're not actually asking about a "narrator"--because there is no narrator called "Jane"--you must be asking about this present, proximal, intrusive narrator created by the writer, Jane Austen, that intrudes into the narrative with comments and evaluations. Your question, then, may be rewritten as: "Does Jane Austen develop a reliable present, proximal, intrusive third person narrator or not?" The three options for answering this are:

1. Yes, and the narratorial comments, evaluations and irony can be trusted as drawing a correct representation of the characters and their social order and as giving correct ironic insight into their lives, minds, feelings, motives, interactions and cultural constraints.


2. No, and the narratorial comments, evaluations and irony give a distorted view, an idiosyncratic view of the lives, society and culture being represented: the view given is Jane Austen's view and no others would describe the lives, society or culture (if they had the talent or ability to) in the same way Austen does.


3. A little of each, sometimes the narratorial intrusions and irony are trustworthy but other times they are not because Austen lets her own idiosyncratic perceptions get the better of her depiction of the characters she is developing though it is our own perceptions that will arbitrarily select which are reliable and which aren't.

Fortunately, we are not left to our own devices for deciding whether Austen's narratorial mode results in a reliable narrator who is trustworthy or not because notable people of her day made comments as to the reliability of Austen's narratorial comments, evaluations and ironic insights. Perhaps the most notable was Sir Walter Scott who said of Jane Austen in his review of Emma that she has a talent for:

copying from nature as she [nature] really exists in the common walks of life, and presenting to the reader, instead of the splendid scenes of an imaginary world, a correct and striking representation of that which is daily taking place around him [the reader]. 

This confirmation (one among several from Austen's era) of the reliable trustworthiness of Austen's intrusive narrator can confirm our own assessment of Jane Austen's narrator as reliable and trustworthy: we can trust that the present, proximal, ironic commentary is not idiosyncratically biased or ... prejudiced ... but that the narratorial vision and perception is reliable and as clear as that which Elizabeth and Darcy each learned to attain, indeed perhaps it is right to say not "as clear as" but more clear than.  

What is an example of chemical weathering?

Chemical weathering is the breakdown of rocks by chemical reactions. Chemical weathering involves changes in the chemical composition of the existing rock to form new rock. Some examples of chemical weathering are hydrolysis, oxidation, carbonation, dissolution, etc.

Limestone dissolves by action of acidic water and causes weathering of statues, grave stones, etc. Dissolution of limestone also forms pathways for acidic water, which may result in sink holes. Another example of chemical weathering is rusting of iron objects. In this oxidation process, ferrous ion gets converted to ferric ion (ferric oxide). Hydrolysis of feldspar converts it to clay, such as potassium feldspar converting over to kaolinite and quartz. 

The amount of chemical weathering is a function of available surface area, temperature, climate, chemical composition of the rock, etc. 

Hope this helps. 

Why does Lyddie not sign the petition in Lyddie?

The petition that your question references is a petition to improve working conditions in the factories.  While the girls are paid to work in the factories, they are worked extremely hard in conditions that are not always safe for the girls.  These difficult working conditions often result in injuries to the factory girls.  

While Lyddie might agree with the petition in concept, she doesn't sign the petition for two reasons. Fear and selfishness.  

Her fear is a legitimate fear.  Girls that have signed the petition are blacklisted from the factories.  That means that they are fired, and other factory owners will refuse to hire them.  Signing the petition basically guarantees job loss and loss of income.  Throughout the novel, Lyddie is motivated to be financially independent and pay off her family's debt.  She simply cannot bear the thought of being fired.  

Selfishly, Lyddie doesn't sign the petition, because as more and more girls get blacklisted, Lyddie gets more and more work.  That increased work load translates to increased income for Lyddie.  

Define a memo and describe the elements that constitute it.

Short for “memorandum,” a memo is a means of written communication among a closed group of participants in a project of some sort. Usually used in a business context (but also in academic or other contexts) it has a “To” line, in which the names or titles, along with addresses, of the intended members of the group are addressed; a “From” line, which identifies the sender of the communication (name or title); a ”Subject” line, which names the project or item for discussion; and a “body,” in which a speech-act is performed (a request, a reminder, an utterance of fact or news, etc. , along with information about a date of a meeting, or some such organizational detail), followed by some sort of social closing (“Thanks in advance,” “I’ll be available to explain,” Don’t forget to…,” etc.). The main function of a memo is to keep members of a production team equally informed of progress on a project.

How can I write about "Rip Van Winkle" from three different perspectives: historical, formalist, and gender?

It's interesting to think about writing about "Rip Van Winkle" from these three critical perspectives. The historical perspective is important, as the story shows the social and political shift that occurred in a short period as the eastern seaboard moved from being a set of British colonies to its own nation. A historical approach would provide the reader with more background on the Revolution and the kind of changes it introduced into American life. 

The gender approach would note that the story is told from Rip Van Winkle's male perspective and would question the stereotyping of Dame Van Winkle as a shrew and a nag. What might life look like if you were Dame Van Winkle, depending for financial support on a man who doesn't work much? Is she left to handle everything, from the children to how to make ends meet while her husband loiters around the Inn, talking "about nothing?" Is her anger and "nagging" justified?

A formal approach could look at the language of the text, perhaps with a focus on the imagery (description using the five senses) that Irving uses to create the tone of the story and highlight the contrast between the sleepy time before the war and the bustling energy unleashed in the new Republic. One way to do this would be to focus on the language used to describe the Inn versus the language used to describe the Union Hotel. Unlike historical criticism, formal criticism focused on what is "in" the text. 

In Fahrenheit 451, what lesson does Guy Montag learn and how did he struggle with it?

Montag's question that he so desperately wants answered has two parts. First, because he feels as if his life is empty, he wants to know what exactly is missing from it. Second, he wants to know if books have the answer to fill his life with the missing part--whatever that might be. Montag first struggles with these questions when he meets Clarisse, a free-thinking teenager, who asks him if he is happy. When he can't honestly answer that he is, he wonders if the books contain the secret to happiness. What pushes Montag over the edge from wondering about books to actively seeking them out, and illegally reading them, is when a lady burns herself up for her books. He almost goes crazy with wonder trying to figure out why someone would die over books. Eventually, he remembers a former English professor he once spoke to and calls him for help to discover the secrets in books.

When Montag meets with Faber, he tells him of his concerns about feeling as though something is missing from his life. Faber tells him the following:

"No, no, it's not books at all you're looking for! . . . Books were only one type of receptacle where we stored a lot of things we were afraid we might forget. There is nothing magical in them at all. The magic is only in what books say, how they stitched the patches of the universe together into one garment for us. . . The things you are looking for, Montag, are in the world, but the only way the average chap will ever see ninety-nine per cent of them is in a book" (82-83 & 86).

Faber is completely correct because once Montag escapes the city and makes it to the natural world, it is then that he discovers what he was missing. He sees stars and leaves, feels the cool water and air around him, and his senses snap him back into remembering a life he had completely forgotten--his childhood on a farm. By living in the city with all of its distractions and hedonistic ways, Montag had forgotten about nature and how to use his five senses. These senses connect him to the natural world around him, which also connect him to living an authentic life--not a distracted one. 

"He stood breathing, and the more he breathed the land in, the more he was filled up with all the details of the land. He was not empty. There was more than enough here to fill him. There would always be more than enough" (144).

Therefore, Montag learns that the emptiness he feels in his life can be filled by experiencing the natural world, not necessarily by reading books. It takes him the course of the book to struggle with these questions, though. Fortunately, he had Faber to help guide him through the process and he was able to escape the city in order to discover the real world. 

Why is the photosynthetic reaction kept unbalanced?

To perform the process of photosynthesis, a plant requires the energy provided by sunlight to be able to carry out this cellular work. The organic molecules and oxygen they generate can be used by eukaryotes as fuel for the process of cellular respiration. Prokaryotes can also use glucose as fuel during fermentation. 

The set of chemical reactions performed by living things is called metabolism. The reaction of photosynthesis is an anabolic pathway where energy must be used by the organism in order to make complex molecules from simple less complicated ones. 

Energy is required by living organisms for all metabolic processes to continue because energy allows an organism to do cellular work. If the amount of energy was balanced, no amount of work could occur.  Energy can exist in many forms and can be transformed from one form to another.

Organisms are not closed systems and matter as well as energy is transferred between a living thing and its environment. For photosynthetic organisms, light energy enters the leaf by absorption and carbon dioxide enters through pores called stomates in the leaf. Water is transported up to the leaves via conducting tubes called xylem within veins. With these reactants, photosynthesis will then produce sugar, oxygen and water. The sugar is a stored energy reserve that can be used as a fuel for cellular process. Some energy exits the plant as heat. 

The energy transfer from light to heat within a plant illustrates that plants don't produce energy however, they can transform light to chemical energy and heat. 

In terms of photosynthesis, if the organism and its environment were at equilibrium, it would indicate that the system could do no work. However, when photosynthesis occurs, the organism will absorb energy from its environment which is an endergonic reaction. Sunlight is required to drive this process--photosynthesis needs an investment of energy to proceed. To convert carbon dioxide and water to sugar, +686 kcal/mol of energy is needed. This represents change in free energy (G) which is required to power the process of photosynthesis. A cell at equilibrium has a change of free energy of zero and is unable to do any cellular work--it would be dead.

In terms of photosynthesis, the sun provides a source of free energy each day to carry out this endergonic process. The chemical energy stored in the bonds of glucose  can be used as a fuel by living organisms to allow them to continue to carry out important cellular work and as long as there is a supply of fuel, the cell will not be at an equilibrium so they can continue to remain alive and perform necessary life functions.

In what ways does Ethan Frome qualify as a tragedy?

According to the Oxford Dictionary, in literature, a tragedy is "a play dealing with tragic events and having an unhappy ending, especially one concerning the downfall of the main character."

As the life of Ethan Frome unfolds, through the musings of the narrator, one comes to understand that Ethan's life truly illustrates that definition.

His youth was spent caring for his injured father and aging mother. Rather than pursuing his own pathway in life, he is saddled with the family farm. Though he does marry, his wife has her own ailments and she requires much assistance. That assistance comes from Ethan and the wife's female cousin, Mattie. Ethan and Mattie are caught in the web of unrequited love. Their only hope is that, upon their eventual death, they will finally be together.

When the sickly wife sets forth a plan to separate Ethan and Mattie, they plot to end their lives and hasten their time together in eternity. Tragically, their plans go awry.

The tragic story of Ethan Frome, which started with his father's injury, ends with Ethan and Mattie's own injuries.  They ARE to be together for eternity, under the constant care of Ethan's, now recovered, wife.

How would you summarize Woods Runner by Gary Paulsen?

Gary Paulsen is best known for his 1987 Newberry Honor-winning novel Hatchet. Woods Runner, young adult historical fiction published in 2010, continues Paulsen’s trademark subject matter—themes of nature and a young boy trying to survive.

Woods Runner takes place in 1776, in an isolated area of Pennsylvania. Thirteen-year-old Samuel has grown up amid nature and develops better survival skills than those of his parents, Olin and Abigail, who were raised in cities. The conflict of the story begins when Samuel discovers his family’s cabin has been burned, killing several settlers. Through his tracking skills, Samuel determines that his parents are still alive but have been taken captive. Later, it comes to light that British soldiers with help from Iroquois Indians were responsible for the attack. Thus, Samuel begins his journey to New York with the goal of rescuing his parents.

Samuel is joined by Annie Clark, a young girl he rescues after her parents are killed by mercenaries. They meet allies along the way, including Abner McDougal, a Scottish spy against the British. Samuel manages to rescue his parents through an escape across the Hudson River. However, Paulsen introduces another conflict as Samuel and family journey back home. The suspense reaches a climax when Samuel faces a group of British soldiers in the woods and narrowly escapes with the help of rebel soldiers.

This story follows a classic hero’s journey structure, and young readers may respond to the empowering message of a teen who, rather than needing to be rescued, becomes the rescuer.

How is Pahom's land to be marked by the Bashkirs in Leo Tolstoy's "How Much Land Does a Man need?"

In Chapter 6 of Leo Tolstoy's short story "How Much Land Does a Man Need?," Pahom is told by the Chief of the Bashkirs that he can purchase for one thousand roubles as much land as he can mark on foot in one day if he successfully returns to his exact starting point before sundown. Pahom feels concerned that the land he claims won't be properly marked and asks how that will be arranged. The Chief then explains how they will mark the starting point and how Pahom will mark out his perimeter using a spade.

More specifically, the Chief explains that they will start at any point Pahom wishes, and the Chief will remain with his tribe at that point all day long. He further explains that Pahom will need to carry a spade with him and mark whatever points of the perimeter he feels are necessary. Furthermore, Pahom will dig a hole at each turning point in the perimeter; then, he will "pile up the turf" on that spot to make the spot clearly visible. After all of Pahom's land is claimed, the Bashkirs will plow the land "from hole to hole" to clearly stake out the land.

As we see by the end of the story, Pahom successfully marks his perimeter but tries to walk more distance than he is physically capable of walking for the sake of greedily claiming more land. As a consequence, he dies by the time he returns to the starting point.

Compare ways in which evil is presented in Macbeth and Great Expectations?

In both works, evil is presented as a willingness to destroy other lives to fulfill one's own agenda. In Great Expectations, Miss Havisham, bitter and angry at having been left at the altar, and unable or unwilling to recover from that trauma, wreaks revenge by turning her ward Estella into a cold-hearted woman, and by teaching her to break Pip's heart as Miss Havisham's was once broken. In Macbeth, Lord and Lady Macbeth are willing to murder others, including a king who has been good to them, as well as children, to advance their own agenda. All of these characters are evil because they wilfully crush their own compassion and empathy towards others, becoming indifferent to the people they destroy. As Pip realizes at the end of the novel:

It would have been cruel of Miss Havisham, horribly cruel, to practice on the susceptibility of a poor boy, and to torture me through all these years with a vain hope and an idle pursuit, if she had reflected on the gravity of what she did. But I think she did not. I think that in the endurance of her own trial, she forgot mine, Estella ...

Another similarity between the two works lies in their portrayal of an evil woman. Both Miss Havisham and Lady Macbeth defy stereotypes of women as nurturing, maternal, kindhearted and gentle. Lady Macbeth goes out of her way to try to crush any compassionate impulse in her soul. "Unsex me here ... fill me [with] direst cruelty," she says, aware that her "feminine" instincts could interfere with her ambitions. She encourages Macbeth when he hesitates to kill Duncan, saying she would dash her own baby's brains out if she had promised to do so.

Miss Havisham, likewise, is hardly a kindly older woman. From the start, she wants Pip to be scorned and rejected. Pip later sees her as "diseased," just as Lady Macbeth will later understand herself as stained. In both works, evil is portrayed as a soul sickness, a deformation of the normal.

Both women also play on social expectations about women as dispensers of hospitality to deceive their victims. For a long time, Pip lacks the ability to see that a seemingly hospitable upper-class woman would hurt him. He's confused that Lady Havisham invites him over and allows him to spend time in her house, mistaking it for kindness.  Likewise, Duncan is lured into trust by Lady Macbeth's flattering and kind words, never suspecting his host and hostess are plotting to murder him. 

When an object is between a converging lens and the focal point of the lens, the three rays appear to diverge. Why is the lens still considered to...

Hello!

A converging lens is called converging because any beam of light becomes less divergent (or more convergent) after going through that lens then it was before.

When an object is beyond the focal plane of a lens, a diverging beam of its rays becomes convergent. When an object is at the focal plane, divergent beam becomes parallel, also less divergent. And in the situation you mentioned a beam remains divergent but less divergent than the initial beam.

The possibility of a lens to compress a beam of light is called optical power. And yes, this power is finite for any given lens.

As an analogy, when some light goes through a sheet of paper, it (light) dims but remains visible. And we may say that a sheet weakens any beam, although complete darkness isn't achieved.

What are the post modernistic characters in the text?

Great question! Although there are no specific post-modernistic characters in the short story, I think I understand what you mean. Much of the dialogue in Night-Sea Journey actually relates to the theories held by some very famous post-modernist philosophers.

For example, the protagonist, a spermatozoon, admits that his faith in a common Maker is ambivalent at best.

I have supposed that we have ever after all a common Maker, Whose nature and motives we may not know, but Who engendered us in some mysterious wise and launched us forth toward some end known but to Him... I have been able to entertain such notions, very popular in certain quarters, it is because our night-sea journey partakes of their absurdity.

His mention of 'absurdity' is significant. Albert Camus and Soren Kierkegaard are the preeminent philosophers of absurdist theology. Kierkegaard's The Sickness Unto Death and Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus highlight the meaningless of the universe and man's implicit helplessness in the grand scheme of things. Later, you can see our protagonist lending his voice in sympathy to the absurdist labors of Sisyphus:

The thoughtful swimmer's choices, then, they say, are two: give over thrashing and go under for good, or embrace the absurdity; affirm in and for itself the night-sea journey; swim on with neither motive nor destination, for the sake of swimming...

Which is to say, Someone Else's destiny, since ours, so far as I can see, is merely to perish, one way or another, soon or late.

Indeed, if I have yet to join the hosts of the suicides, it is because (fatigue apart) I find it no meaningfuller to drown myself than to go on swimming.

Both Camus and Kierkegaard did not regard suicide as a valid response to absurdism. They believed that the act of suicide was in itself, a meaningless strategy. You can see this in the fourth quote above. The two philosophers however, differed in how one should respond to a meaningless existence. Kierkegaard supported belief and acceptance in what he considered an unproven power above our own (many call this a belief in God or Providence or Intelligent Creation), while Camus believed that resigned acceptance to the absurd condition of mankind was the better response. He advocated the necessity of the human spirit to transcend the absurdist existence by thriving despite the circumstances.

The protagonist also laments other philosophies which try to explain his plight and the plight of millions of his fellow spermatozoa.

A poor irony: that I, who find abhorrent and tautological the doctrine of survival of the fittest... But the doctrine is false as well as repellent: Chance drowns the worthy with the unworthy, bears up the unfit with the fit by whatever definition, and makes the night-sea journey essentially haphazard as well as murderous and unjustified.

His anguish and frustration mirrors that of Friedrich Nietzsche, who some call an early post-modernist, a man who criticized the Darwinian evolutionary concept of the survival of the fittest.

Very likely I have lost my senses. The carnage at our setting out; our decimation by whirlpool, poisoned cataract, sea-convulsion; the panic stampedes, mutinies, slaughters, mass suicides; the mounting evidence that none will survive the journey- add to these anguish and fatigue; it were a miracle if sanity stayed afloat. 

Nietzsche calls this confusion and despair the ultimate cost of relinquishing faith in God or traditional morality. Suddenly, the principle reason for existence has been discarded, and the search must commence for new principles to sustain the validity of life.

For Nietzsche, biological evolution is the correct explanation for organic history, but it results in a disastrous picture of reality.

In fact, Nietzsche held that Darwinian evolution led to a collapse of all traditional values, because both objective meaning and spiritual purpose for humankind had vanished from interpretations of reality (and consequently, there can be no fixed or certain morality).

Sources: Rebellion, Loneliness, and Night-Sea Journey

Nietzsche, Darwin & Time: From Scientific Evolution to Metaphysical Speculation

Hope this helps!

In Chapter 20 of To Kill a Mockingbird, what do Scout and Dill learn about Dolphus Raymond?

Dolphus Raymond is the notorious town drunk who staggers through Maycomb clutching a bottle in a paper bag. He has a black mistress and several mixed children, which is why the racist community of Maycomb views him with contempt. In Chapter 20, Dill and Scout find out that he is not actually a drunk, and the bottle in the paper bag is simply Coca-Cola. Dolphus explains his reasoning as to why he pretends to be drunk.

In Chapter 19, Jem makes Scout take Dill out of the courtroom because he starts to cry after hearing Mr. Gilmer question Tom Robinson disrespectfully. Dill explains to Scout that he didn't like the way Mr. Gilmer was talking down to Tom and says that it makes him sick. Outside the courthouse, Dolphus Raymond hears Dill crying and tells him that he has something to settle his stomach. Scout is reluctant to follow Dill, and as Dill sips out of the infamous brown-bag, he smiles and tells her it's only Coca-Cola. Scout is puzzled and asks Dolphus why he pretends he's drunk all the time. Dolphus smiles and explains to Scout that people in Maycomb don't like the way he lives, so he pretends to be drunk because it "helps folks latch onto a reason." (Lee 268) Dolphus tells Scout that the people of Maycomb could never understand why he chooses to live the way he does. When Scout asks why Dolphus would entrust them with his secret, he tells them they are children and can understand it. He explains how they haven't seen enough of Maycomb to understand the extensive amount of prejudice throughout the county. Dolphus tells Scout and Dill that the older they get, the more they will witness white people discriminate against black people. Eventually, the racial inequality will become so commonplace that it won't even bother them anymore.

What are the likes/dislikes of Rudyard Kipling's poem "If", and would you recommend it to others?

“If” is a wonderful poem written by Rudyard Kipling.  The reason I like the poem is because it is good advice that will travel through generations of people.  It is not just for today, but for yesterday and tomorrow.  You will be able to tell your own children this advice.  If a young man were to follow this advice, he would become a remarkable man.  Many students have problems with the poem because it is too general.  They have a difficult time applying the advice.  If specific examples were given, they would comprehend the ideas better.  The problem with that is that it would time date the poem.  It would limit its comprehension to a specific situation. Kipling says,

“If you can make one heap of all your winnings/ And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss/ And lose, and start again at your beginnings/ And never breath a word about your loss.”  (Stanza three)

  It is meant to be general information that can be applied to numerous situations.  I would strongly recommend this poem to others, and, in fact, I taught it to my students. 

In "The Most Dangerous Game," where does Rainsford finally meet Zaroff?

In Richard Connel's short story "The Most Dangerous Game" a big game hunter named Sanger Rainsford accidentally falls off a yacht heading for South America and swims to a nearby island. On the island he discovers a "palatial chateau" in the middle of the jungle. There he meets General Zaroff for the first time. Zaroff is a Cossack who fled Russia after the civil war. It turns out that, because he has grown bored with hunting animals, Zaroff now hunts men.

When Rainsford refuses to hunt with Zaroff, the general provides Rainsford with a three day head start, a pair of moccasins and a hunting knife. Then Zaroff sets out to hunt Rainsford. Although Rainsford wounds Zaroff and kills the general's servant and best dog, he eventually has to jump into the ocean to escape.

After eluding the general, Rainsford swims across a cove to Zaroff's chateau and hides in the bedroom. Rainsford confronts the general and they duel. The final lines of the story reveal that Rainsford has won:

He had never slept in a better bed, Rainsford decided. 

`(x + 1)/(x^3(x^2 + 1)^2)` Write the partial fraction decomposition of the rational expression. Check your result algebraically.

You need to decompose the fraction in simple irreducible fractions, such that:

`(x+1)/(x^3(x^2+1)^2)  = A/x + B/(x^2) + C/(x^3) + (Dx+E)/(x^2+1) + (Fx+G)/((x^2+1)^2)`

You need to bring to the same denominator all fractions, such that:

`x+1= A(x^2(x^2+1)^2) + Bx(x^2+1)^2 + C(x^2+1)^2 + (Dx+E)x^3*(x^2+1) + (Fx+G)*x^3`

`x+1= Ax^2(x^4 + 2x^2 + 1) + Bx(x^4 + 2x^2 + 1) + C(x^4 + 2x^2 + 1) + (Dx^4+Ex^3)*(x^2+1) + Fx^4 + Gx^3`

`x+1= Ax^6+ + 2Ax^4 + Ax^2 +Bx^5 + 2Bx^3 + Bx+ Cx^4 + 2Cx^2 +C + Dx^6 + Dx^4 + Ex^5 + Ex^3 + Fx^4 + Gx^3`

You need to group the terms having the same power of x:

`x+1=x^6(A+D) + x^5(B+E) + x^4(2A+C+D+F) + x^3(2B+E+G) + x^2(A+2C) + x(B) + C`

Comparing the expressions both sides yields:

`A+D = 0`

`B+E = 0`

`2A+C+D+F = 0 => F = 1`

`2B+E+G = 0 => G = -1`

`A+2C = 0 => A = -2 => D = 2`

`B= 1 => E = -1`

`C = 1`

Hence, the partial fraction decomposition of the improper rational expression is `(x+1)/(x^3(x^2+1)^2) = -2/x + 1/(x^2) + 1/(x^3) + (2x-1)/(x^2+1) + (x-1)/((x^2+1)^2)`

Question: Do you think, if he had really wanted to run away, he could have? If your answer is yes, why didn't he run away?

Your question is an opinion question which means that there is no right or wrong answer; therefore, you should figure out your own thoughts when you compile your own essay.  This being said, I think that Misha could have run away at any time.  The reason why he doesn't is that what he clings to most is identity, and all of the characters he stays with give him something in regards to that identity.

The actual proof behind my opinion is that Misha does run away whenever he wants or needs to (in and out of the Warsaw ghetto).  This is at the point of the story where Misha is helping Janina and her family as they are "relocated" to this dreadful place.  Of course, there are other times where Misha can (and often does) run away as well.  Even before he is given his identity as "Misha" he is often running from people he steals from.  In fact, he is doing so in the very opening scene of the book.  I guess one could even say that he "runs" from Uri and the boys (and that safety) to move with Janina into the ghetto, following the first identity of friendship he's ever known.

In conclusion, it is safe to say that, yes, Misha could have run away (and often does), but values both identity and friendship more than the danger that he often doesn't know that he is in because of his innocence.

In "The Sniper" what effect does war have on the sniper?

Liam O'Flahery's anti-war short story "The Sniper" is about a Republican sniper alone on a rooftop during the Irish Civil War. O'Flaherty writes from a detached point of view which provides only the physical facts of the story. The text never reveals the emotional feelings of the sniper, even in the shocking surprise ending. All the reader knows is the sniper gives a "smile" and a "cry of joy" when he is successfully kills.

The sniper is described as being "thin and ascetic." He is a "fanatic" who is battle hardened. He seems to kill easily and without hesitation. The reader must assume that he has killed often and, during the course of the story, shoots a woman and an armored car commander before matching wits with the opposing Free-State sniper on the opposite roof. 

He tricks his enemy by pretending he has been killed. He drops his rifle from the roof to bring his opponent out from cover. When the Free-State sniper reveals himself, the Republican sniper kills him with his revolver. The body falls to the street below and when examined, the Republican sniper sees that it is his brother. 

From the text, it is impossible to know if the sniper changes his attitude toward the war, even after killing his brother. The only word that reveals his nature is when O'Flaherty calls him a "fanatic." A fanatic is someone totally devoted to one cause. The sniper is obviously fighting for what he thinks is right. He kills his enemy indiscriminately and no remorse is shown. We don't know the details of why he and his brother were fighting on different sides and we can't know how the sniper reacts to seeing his dead brother on the Dublin street. All that can be said for sure is that war is a terrible thing which makes soldiers do things they would otherwise never dream of doing.

How does globalization affect language?

Globalization has had an effect on unifying and propagating certain languages, while causing the extinction of others. Globalization is the process by which the world has become more united. We all share the internet, media, goods and services, whereas in the past, more things were created locally; culture and identity were kept closer to home. It was not as easy to hop on a plane and go across the world within a few hours. Stories were told from elder to youngster. 

In modern society languages have started to die out. Those languages that were once unique to small areas become less important, while languages used by majority of people are valued more. Everyone must learn the languages of the biggest countries, the biggest consumers and small localized languages spoken by few people have a harder time continuing. Young people would rather learn languages that will enhance their chances at a better life. Tradition is less valued and the progression of making money and cosmopolitan lifestyles are propagated through media.

Where are the efferent arterioles located?

The efferent arterioles are found in the renal system, which contains the kidneys, and is part of the urinary system. The role of the kidneys is to filter blood and extract urine and waste. From the kidneys, the urine goes to the bladder where it is ultimately excreted from the body. The kidneys are important because they remove waste from the blood, they secrete various hormones, and they keep the blood well balanced in terms of electrolytes and sodium. The role of the efferent arterioles is to take blood away from the glomerulus, which is a bundle of capillaries attached to the kidneys. In conjunction with the afferent arterioles, which supply blood to the glomerulus, the efferent arterioles are responsible for constricting and dilating in order to control the blood flow to the kidneys. 

Why is the HIV virus considered a retrovirus?

The HIV virus is one of the most debilitating and deadly virus's known to man. Its ability to compromise the important CD4+t cells in the human immune system leads to the onset of aids as once enough CD4+ t cells die. This leaves the body vulnerable to many infections, which ultimately lead to the infected persons death. HIV is spread through sexual or blood contact. It is known as a retrovirus because of the way it places its DNA into healthy CD4+ t cells. The HIV virus is in the form of RNA when it enters the cell. It then must convert its RNA into DNA so that the infected cell can use its own machinery to generate more HIV virus. Specifically, HIV uses an enzyme known as a reverse transcriptase for this process. The use of this enzyme is what leads HIV to be classified as a retrovirus, as reverse transcriptase takes the HIV RNA and converts it to DNA that is then placed directly into the cells original DNA. This leads to the creation of more viruses, spreading the infection. Hope this helps!    

`int (dx)/(sqrt(1 - x^2)sin^(-1)(x))` Evaluate the indefinite integral.

You need to evaluate the indefinite integral, using the following substitution, such that:

`sin^(-1) x = t => dx/(sqrt(1 - x^2)) = dt`

Replacing t for x yields:

`int dx/((sin^(-1) x)sqrt(1 - x^2)) = int (dt)/t`

`int (dt)/t = ln|t| + c`

Replacing back` sin^(-1) x ` for t yields:

`int dx/((sin^(-1) x)sqrt(1 - x^2)) = ln|sin^(-1) x| + c`

Hence, evaluating the indefinite integral, using the substitution `sin^(-1) x = t` , yields `int dx/((sin^(-1) x)sqrt(1 - x^2)) = ln|sin^(-1) x| + c.`

`int (ln x)^2 dx` Evaluate the integral

`int (ln x)^2dx`

To evaluate, apply integration by parts `int udv= uv - vdu` .

So let

`u = (lnx)^2`

and

`dv = dx`

Then, differentiate u and integrate dv.

`du = 2lnx * 1/x dx = (2lnx)/x dx`

and

`v = intdx = x`

Plug-in them to the formula. So the integral becomes:

`int (ln x)^2dx`

`= (lnx)^2 *x - int x * (2lnx)/x dx`

`= x(lnx)^2 -2int lnx dx`

To take integral of ln x, apply integration by parts again.

So let 

`u_2 = ln x `

and

`dv_2 = dx`

Then, differentiate u and integrate dv.

`du_2 = 1/x dx`

and

`v_2= int dx = x`

So the integral becomes:

`=x(lnx)^2 - 2( lnx * x - int x * 1/x dx)`

`= x(lnx)^2 - 2(xlnx - int dx)`

`=x(lnx)^2 - 2(xlnx - x)`

`=x(lnx)^2 - 2xlnx + 2x`

Therefore, `int (lnx)^2dx = x(lnx)^2 - 2xlnx + 2x` .

`3x - 2y + z = -15, -x + y + 2z = -10, x - y - 4z = 14` Use matricies to solve the system of equations. Use Gaussian elimination with...

`3x-2y+z=-15`

`-x+y+2z=-10`

`x-y-4z=14` 

`A=[[3,-2,1],[-1,1,2],[1,-1,-4]]`

`b=[[-15],[-10],[14]]`

`[A|b]=[[3,-2,1,-15],[-1,1,2,-10],[1,-1,-4,14]]`

Multiply 2nd Row by 3 and add Row 1

`[[3,-2,1,-15],[0,1,7,-45],[1,-1,-4,14]]`

Multiply 3rd Row by 3 and subtract it from Row 1

`[[3,-2,1,-15],[0,1,7,-45],[0,1,13,-57]]`

Subtract Row 2 from Row 3

`[[3,-2,1,-15],[0,1,7,-45],[0,0,6,-12]]`

Now the equations can be written as,

`3x-2y+z=-15`     ----equation 1

`y+7z=-45`          ------ equation 2

`6z=-12`                 ------ equation 3

From equation 3,

`z=-12/6=-2`

Now substitute back z in equation 2,

`y+7(-2)=-45`

`y-14=-45`

`y=-45+14`

`y=-31`

Substitute back the value of y and z in equation 1,

`3x-2(-31)+(-2)=-15`

`3x+62-2=-15`

`3x=-15-60`

`3x=-75`

`x=-75/3`

`x=-25`

So the solution is x=-25, y=-31 and z=-2``

` `

Would you expect the salinity of the ocean to be higher or lower near the mouth of a river where it has recently rained?

The salinity of the of the water located near a rainy region of the mouth of a river would be expected to be lower than the rest of the ocean.

 Salinity is a measurement of all the salts in a solution. Salinity is usually measured in parts per thousands, which can be abbreviated as ppt. On average, the salinity of an ocean is about 35 parts per thousand. This means that there is about 35 grams of salt in every 1,000 grams (or 1 kilogram) of ocean water. The average salinity of a river is, on average, about 0.5 parts per thousand. This means that there is about 0.5 grams of salt in every 1,000 grams (or 1 kilogram) of river water. However, if it had recently rained near the mouth of the river, then the salt concentration would have been diluted to an even lower value.

Why is Macbeth a good leader?

Macbeth is portrayed as a good leader in the beginning of the play. The sergeant in Act I, Scene 2 recounts how Macbeth and his comrade Banquo defeated the rebel Macdonwald, showing remarkable courage in so doing. When King Duncan hears that Macbeth killed Macdonwald, he describes him as a "valiant cousin" and a "worthy gentleman." Macbeth is brave and apparently loyal at this point in the play, both of which would be traits expected of a good leader and a worthy thane in Macbeth's society. Over time, Macbeth becomes corrupted by his lust for power. He murders his king and later has Banquo and Macduff's family assassinated. By usurping the crown of Scotland, Macbeth goes against everything that a good leader and noble should be. While ruler of Scotland, he is a bloody tyrant, and in the end, his death frees the kingdom from his leadership, which is anything but good.

What do you think the writer means by describing the children's play as "the business of the day?"

In the story, the author describes the children's play as 'the business of the children's day.' There are two underlying assumptions here. First, the business of children is to play; through play, children engage in the business of learning, exploring, and exercising. Many psychologists have classified the art of play as the true business of children. Sigmund Freud hypothesized that children play to act out their frustrations and to design a different, far more pleasurable construct to that engendered by a previously traumatic paradigm. He considered play therapeutic for children, and it certainly is true in Ravi's case.

Sources:

Roots of early childhood education.

Psychologists on child's play.

Ravi sees the shed as a sort of saving grace. There, in the dark recesses of the sinister shadows, he was to prove his capability and his relevance to the society of his peers. Instead, the shed only prolongs his humiliating defeat and further illuminates his consistent helplessness at being marginalized. By the time he pitifully cries to his peers that his small achievement is worthy of recognition, Ravi's composure is in ruins.

“I won, I won, I won,” he bawled, shaking his head so that the big tears flew. “Raghu didn’t find me. I won, I won——”

In the story, the children's play in Desai's tale also illuminates the major theme of the story, which is that reality often intrudes on fantasy. Ravi spends so much time dreaming up satisfying victories that he ultimately forgets the last step to claiming those victories. Also, in reality, children's concerns are often overlooked by adults, older children, and other peers. The story ends with Ravi contemplating his own insignificance in the big scheme of things. At some point in our lives, all of us come to realize our own fallibility and helplessness, just as Ravi does. Child's play in Anita Desai's story highlights how the child in all of us needs to recognize alienation as the human experience and take steps to achieve our own self-actualization despite this challenge.

`x + 2y - 3z = -28, 4y + 2z = 0, -x + y - z = -5` Use matricies to solve the system of equations. Use Gaussian elimination with...

`x+2y-3z=-28`

`4y+2z=0`

`-x+y-z=-5`

The equations in the matrix form can be written as,

`[[1,2,-3,-28],[0,4,2,0],[-1,1,-1,-5]]`

Add Row 1 and Row 3

`[[1,2,-3,-28],[0,4,2,0],[0,3,-4,-33]]`

Multiply Row 2 by 2 and Add it to Row 3 

`[[1,2,-3,-28],[0,4,2,0],[0,11,0,-33]]`

Now the equations can be written as,

`x+2y-3z=-28`     ----- equation 1

`4y+2z=0`            ------ equation 2

`11y=-33`               ----- equation 3

From equation 3,

`y=-33/11=-3`

Substitute back y in equation 2,

`4(-3)+2z=0`

`-12+2z=0`

`2z=12`

`z=12/2=6`

substitute back y and z in equation 1,

`x+2(-3)-3(6)=-28`

`x-6-18=-28`

`x=-28+18+6`

`x=-4`

So the solutions are x=-4, y=-3, z=6

Why does Malcolm hesitate to accept Macduff's offer of assistance?

In Act Four, Scene 3, Macduff travels to England to get military support and convince Malcolm to return to Scotland with him. However, Malcolm is not sure that Macduff has pure intentions and does not fully trust him. Malcolm has every right to be cautious considering his father was murdered by someone who was trusted. Malcolm thinks that Macduff may be attempting to gain Macbeth's favor by getting him to return to Scotland. Despite the fact that Macduff insists that he is not a traitor and is loyal to Malcolm, Malcolm continues to test Macduff's loyalty by lying to him. Malcolm lies by saying that he has so many vices that the people of Scotland will think that Macbeth is as pure as snow compared to him. Malcolm also claims that he has insatiable lust and greed that will ruin his country. After hearing this, Macduff expresses his agony and reveals his honest emotions. Macduff's passionate outburst proves to Malcolm that he is a loyal, trustworthy man. Malcolm then agrees to follow and trust Macduff. 

Why is potential difference the same in a parallel combination?

The work done by the electric field to move a unit of electrical charge between two points in a circuit represents the potential difference between these points.

This relationship is expressed in the following equation:

ΔV = W/q

On the other hand we have, that the electric field is a conservative field; This means that the work carried out by the field, between two points, does not depend on the path followed by the electric charge between these points.

When connecting several components between two points in a circuit (parallel connection), the electric charge moves through several paths between these two points but the work performed by the field, or the potential difference between the points, is the same for all paths. So in this type of connection, the potential difference is the same for all components.

What significant comparisons are made between Daisy and Jordan in chapter one of The Great Gatsby ?

The description of the two girls is conveyed by the narrator, Nick Carraway, who is Daisy's cousin. He was invited to spend the evening at the Carraway house in East Egg.

Nick's descriptions of Daisy and Jordan sketches a picture of similarity in the two. When he first sees them they are languidly lazing on a huge couch that looked like a balloon with the two buoyed upon it. The image is almost as one out of a children's storybook, something like a fairytale. Both girls are dressed in white and

their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house.

This image emphasises the almost surreal look painted by the two girls. It suggests a lightness, both literally and metaphorically, about them - they are like two fairies. It is ironic that Nick uses these descriptors since white also suggests innocence and purity, which was most definitely lacking in both girls, as one discovers later in the novel.

Nick's attention is initially focused on Jordan Baker, whom he describes as 'the younger of the two.' He did not know her and, in a slightly mocking tone, suggests that she has a somewhat snobbish air about her

'with her chin raised a little, as if she were balancing something on it which was quite likely to fall.' 

She came across as so superior that he felt he owed her an apology for disturbing them. She acted as if she hardly noticed him, probably to create an affectatious air of mystery around her and gave him an almost imperceptible nod. Daisy, on the other hand, acknowledged him better and made an attempt to rise, giving a silly little laugh which Nick found charming. Daisy made an attempt to appear 'conscientious', a quality she later in the novel proves to lack. 

Jordan Baker, in her slight acknowledgement of him, lost a bit of her composure and instantly tried to regain it by lifting her chin. Nick was impressed by the air of independence she projected. He almost apologised again. Nick describes Daisy's voice as alluring and sees her face as pretty but sad, although both her eyes and lips are bright. There was an exciting lilt to her voice which men would find attractive. In slight contrast, he sees Ms Baker's face as 'wan, charming and discontented.'

It is quite evident that Daisy's 'sad' and Jordan's 'discontented' face suggest a smidgeon of unhappiness, which both girls seem to want to mask. Their language is quite frivolous and generally inane. Nick does not provide a full physical description of Daisy but he seems to like what Jordan has to offer and enjoyed looking at her.

She was a slender, small-breasted girl, with an erect carriage, which she accentuated by throwing her body backward at the shoulders like a young cadet.

As already mentioned, Daisy and Jordan's conversation is littered with unimportant references and inane little remarks and suggestions. They, for instance, tell a story about 'the butler's nose' which Nick jokingly suggests he had travelled all the way to hear. Even Daisy's comparison of Nick to a rose suggests a forced sentimentality and romanticism which does not impress him at all. 

The two women are clearly bored and seem to pass the time just lazing about, drinking cocktails and expensive liquor and being served food at appropriate times. They are obviously careless and generally disinterested in more important affairs.

The one significant event which does seemingly affect both girls is when Tom is summoned for a telephone call. This little interlude dramatically changed the atmosphere and showed Jordan up as something of a gossip. She informed Nick that Tom was having an affair with a woman in New York. When the phone rang later, it caused an even greater disturbance. 

Nick noticed that Jordan Baker had been able to master 'a certain hardy skepticism' and Daisy later confided in him about the birth of her daughter and the fact that Tom had not been present. It is quite evident that both women had to find ways to deal with the little discomforts in their veritably fairy tale lives. Jordan adopted a somewhat supercilious air and a skeptical attitude whilst Daisy, in moments of distress, sought compassion by creating guilt in others as she does when she tells Nick about not attending her wedding.

The descriptions of the two women are used to convey the shallowness and essential emptiness of lives of privilege. Although Jordan, unlike, Daisy actually has a profession, she has adopted the values and practices of the idle rich.     

What gave Vera confidence to weave her story about the tragedy in "The Open Window"?

If the tragedy Vera intends to tell Framton Nuttel had actually happened, it would certainly have been known about and talked of all over the county. She has to establish that Framton is a complete stranger to the area; otherwise, he might wonder why he never heard anything about the incident. If Vera's aunt had been driven insane by the gruesome tragedy, that would also be the talk of the families for years. Vera first has to establish that Framton knows nothing of any consequence. She does this by asking him two leading questions:

 "Do you know many of the people round here?"

"Then you know practically nothing about my aunt?"

Framton's answers to these two questions give Vera the assurance she needs to go ahead with her story. His sister stayed at the rectory some four years ago, and the tragedy Vera describes supposedly occurred about three years ago. Framton's sister is presumably not very well informed herself. She would not have given her brother a letter of introduction to the Sappletons if she had heard Mrs. Sappleton was crazy. Framton's sister shows her own ignorance of the people in the area when she tells her brother:

"I shall just give you letters of introduction to all the people I know there. Some of them, as far as I can remember, were quite nice."

Saki invents the question-and-answer dialogue between Vera and her visitor in order to inform the reader that Framton is the perfect victim for Vera's prank.

What is the poem "A Poison Tree" mainly about?

Blake's "The Poison Tree" from his Songs of Experience is about how nursing anger and hate corrodes our souls. The poem begins by stating that: 

I was angry with my friend/I told my wrath/My wrath did end.

In other words, its best to make a "clean breast" of our feelings.

However, most of the poem shows the narrator nursing a bitter grudge against an enemy. It describes how this hate, unconfessed, grows like a plant and takes over the narrator's soul. He waters his grudge with his "tears" and suns his hate with his "smiles" of deception towards his enemy, pretending to like him.

The hate bears fruit, an apple. At this point, we should think of the Garden of Eden and the apple that the hate-filled Satan offered Adam and Eve.

The narrator has become Satan, his soul to turned to evil. He tempts his enemy with the "apple bright" and like Eve, the enemy falls for it. As the initial apple brought death to Adam and Eve (eventually), so the eating of this apple kills the narrator's foe. 

Miguel has just moved to a new school. It is the beginning of his senior year, and he doesn’t know anyone. He is worried about making friends and...

Let's answer this question as you suggested--by methodically considering the impact each term might have on Miguel's social abilities and happiness!

Locus of control refers to the degree a person believes that he or she can control the events which may affect him or her. Those with a strong internal locus of control think that they are responsible for what happens to them, while those with a strong external locus of control believe that external factors dictate the course of their lives. If Miguel has a strong internal locus of control, this will be positive, as he will feel empowered to make friends and become familiar with his new environment. If Miguel has a strong external locus of control, this will be negative, as Miguel will feel that he is at the whim of the perceptions of his peers.

Ingroup refers to the social group a person may psychologically identify him or herself with. An outgroup refers to the social group a person does not psychologically identify with. If Miguel finds himself as part of the "ingroup" at his new school (in other words, if he is able to locate those with a similar racial, cultural, religious, etc. background), this will be positive due to in-group favoritism (a preference for one's similarities with others). If Miguel finds himself as part of the "outgroup," this will be negative due to outgroup derogation (the perception of another's differences as threatening).

Stereotyping refers to a group of thoughts that are consciously generated about others as a consequence of expectations and beliefs about those who are different than us (those falling into the "outgroup"). If Miguel is in the ingroup at his new school and participates in the stereotyping of others, this will be negative in that it promotes ignorance. If Miguel is in the outgroup, this is also negative, as it means that he will be at risk of being stereotyped himself. 

Groupthink refers to the phenomenon in which a group conforms to an irrational thought or decision to avoid conflict and criticism. This is generally negative. Since Miguel is the new student at school, he poses a threat as an "outside influence" to already established social groups and, thus, may become the target of groupthink and efforts to reject him socially out of his peers' loyalty to their current groups. This may be especially problematic since Miguel is a new Senior, and the rest of the Seniors at his school have had four years to form their social groups. 

Mere-exposure effect explains an individual's preference for something out of familiarity. This is negative for Miguel. Miguel may have trouble fitting in and finding new friends because he has a preference established for the environment of his previous school and cannot adapt his tastes to his new one. Miguel also may face this phenomenon in his peers if they will not be as open to him due to their lack of familiarity with his presence. 

Fundamental attribution error refers to an individual's tendency to explain the behavior of someone else through their characteristics rather than external factors in the situation. This could be negative for Miguel if his nervousness about starting at a new school is incorrectly perceived as an unfavorable personality characteristic (unfriendly, hostile, etc.) rather than as an outcome dictated by his situation (being new). 

Sputnik I was launched into orbit around Earth in 1957. It had a perigee (the closest approach to Earth, measured from Earth’s center) of 6.81 x...

During its movement, the satellite is subjected to a centrifugal force, pointing towards the outside of the trayectory. In addition, is subjected to the force of Earth's gravity.

To keep the satellite in orbit, the speed must be such that, the centrifugal force it is equal and opposite to the force of gravity; so we can consider the following equality:

Fc = Fg

(m*v^2)/r = (G*M*m)/r^2

Where:

M,  is the mass of the earth.

m,  is the mass of the satellite.

r,  is the distance between the satellite and the earth

G,  is the gravitational constant.

v,  is the tangential velocity of satellite.

Solving, for the speed at perigee:

v^2 = (G*M)/r

v = sqrt (GM/r) = sqrt [(6.67*10-11)(5.97*10^24)/(6.81*10^6)]

v = 7.64*10^3 m/s  =  7.64 km/s

 So, at perigee the satellite must have a speed of 7.64 km/s

Why do Atticus and Aunt Alexandra not intend to go to the Halloween pageant?

Atticus and Aunt Alexandra each have their own reasons for not attending the Halloween pageant at the high school in Maycomb.  Scout had thought that both her father and her aunt would be attending.  After all, Scout had a role in the pageant.  Instead, Jem is the one who escorts her to the Halloween event at the high school.

Atticus had been serving in the state legislature in Montgomery, Alabama during the last week.  On the evening of the pageant, he has just arrived home.  He explains to Scout that he is not feeling up to attending the event.  

Aunt Alexandra explains to Scout that she is feeling too tired to attend because "she'd been decorating the stage all afternoon and was worn out" (To Kill a Mockingbird, Chapter 27).  She is planning to head up to bed earlier than normal that evening because she is so tired.  

Jem tells Scout that Miss Maudie will probably be there, which she is looking forward to.  This eases Scout's disappointment about Atticus and Aunt Alexandra not attending.

Why is the old man in "The Chaser" nameless?

The author probably had at least two reasons for not assigning a name to the old man. One was that the old man was engaged in an illegal business and probably preferred to remain anonymous. There are a lot of people doing business under false names or fictitious corporate names because they are engaged in illegal enterprises or are trying to evade paying taxes. Not every business is what it looks like on the outside. The old man is probably dealing in cash only and is thereby avoiding paying income tax, self-employment tax, and having a business license requiring annual renewal fees and local business taxes. He is keeping a very low profile. This adds to the dramatic effect of the story.

But there is another reason why John Collier didn't want to assign an name. Most authors find it a nuisance to make up names for characters and only do it when necessary. If there are a number of characters in a story or novel, then the author has to give them names. It is a hard job to think of appropriate names for characters, and not many authors were really good at it.

This brings up the question of why Collier gave the customer a name. For one thing, the old man is very cautious about the people he does business with. He would not accommodate Alan Austen at all, or tell him about his "chaser," if he didn't know who he was. Alan Austen could have been a cop. We see that Austen has to identify himself with a card. This would be a card given to him in confidence by a former client of the old man. The former client would have scribbled an introduction on the back of his own card.

An old man sat in the rocking-chair, reading a newspaper. Alan, without a word, handed him the card he had been given. "Sit down, Mr. Austen," said the old man very politely. "I am glad to make your acquaintance."

We see in a story such as "Hills Like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway that an author can get along without giving any of the characters names. The two main characters are of opposite sexes, so he can call one "the man" and the other "the girl." The woman who serves him is "the woman." We hear incidentally that the man is American and that he sometimes calls the girl "Jig," which doesn't tell us much except that they are pretty well acquainted.

I don't believe that John Collier had any other purpose for not giving the old man a name. It wouldn't help us to visualize him if we knew his name. We visualize him as an old man. If he did use a name, it probably wouldn't be his real name anyway.

What would be a good thesis statement for an essay on Dreaming in Cuban if you need to write about Lourdes and identity?

Lourdes has troubling memories from her time in Cuba. She sees her husband's family's ranch confiscated by the state. And she is raped by a soldier of the state. Therefore, she has a complete aversion to all things dealing with the state, communism, and the Cuban Revolution. Although she is raised in Cuba, these events and her conflicted relationship with her mother lead her to flee to America. She embraces American culture and opens two successful bakeries. She is proof that immigrants can find success and opportunity in America. In spite of all her hardships, she has acquired a version of the American Dream. But she has done so through her own hard work and perseverance. 

Lourdes has quite literally remade herself in America. Although she still is in touch with her Cuban roots (namely through Jorge, her father), she has formed a new identity, becoming more American than Cuban. Lourdes demonstrates that identity is not something essentially based upon where we come from. It is not determined by nationality, religious upbringing, or race. Lourdes demonstrates that identity is a fluxing notion, something that is more like a performance than something written in stone. It is malleable, it can be changed, and this is the result of the will to do so in addition to the influence of different cultures and beliefs. Lourdes goes from a communist, spiritual society to a capitalistic, entrepreneurial culture. She becomes American. Her mother, Celia, is Cuban through and through. Lourdes' daughter, Pilar, inevitably embraces her American and Cuban roots, thus showing again how identity is malleable and can be hybrid. With Lourdes and even more so with Pilar, we see that identity is a role which is not fixed to some essential notion of race, nationality, or even gender. Note that Lourdes is the more active, working member of her marriage. In these ways, in addition to her feminine roles, she takes on more typically masculine roles in the marriage. 

What is the setting of "The Californian's Tale" by Mark Twain?

“The Californian’s Tale” is located in what Mark Twain called “the Stanislau.” The Stanislau is a national forest located in central California. It is located east of San Francisco, north of Fresno, and south of Reno, Nevada. On the east it borders Yosemite National Park and on the south it borders the Sierra National Forest. Originally, the area was settled by the Mi-Wuk Indians, but with the discovery of gold in 1849, white men came into the territory. It is beautiful area of the country and, today, is a place people bike, camp, and enjoy their vacations. Mark Twain describes it in his story, “The Californian’s Tale” as,

“…..like Heaven on Earth.  It had bright green hills and deep forests where soft winds touched the trees.” (pg 1)

Modesto is the county seat of Stanislau County, and there is actually a city in Stanislau County named Twain Harte. This city was named after Mark Twain and Bret Harte, both authors who wrote tales located in that area of California.

How did the witches set the tone of the play in Macbeth?

Interestingly, Shakespeare introduces the audience to the witches before introducing Macbeth himself (or any of the other characters for that matter). They enter the scene accompanied by thunder and lightning, forbidding omens in their own right, and they describe a battle raging, a "hurly-burly" after which they will meet with Macbeth. The audience can guess from their presence and their words that they are up to no good, though there is no indication of exactly what they will attempt. As the scene ends, they depart, singing that "fair is foul" and "foul is fair." This song portends some of the foul deeds that Macbeth will undertake in order to secure and maintain his throne. Again, the audience is not exactly clear about what will happen, but they are alerted, as it were, that evil deeds may be afoot, that all may not be as it appears, and that the witches themselves may play a role in the proceedings.

Referring to the novel Fahrenheit 451... In the opening scene, why are the books compared to birds?

In the opening scene of Fahrenheit 451, Montag is in the process of burning a house full of books.  Montag notes that the burning books are “flapping pigeon-winged books [that] died on the porch and lawn of the house.  While the books went up in sparkling whirls and blew away on a wind turned dark with burning.”

To understand this metaphor, you need to picture what a pile of burning books would look like.  The pages are like the wings of a bird flapping in a burning pile.  Picture the pages of a book blowing in the wind and burning as if you opened the book’s spine and spread out the pages.  The ashes and burning pages take off to the sky like a flock of birds lifted off by the wind of the fire.  The remains of the books blow away with the wind much like birds would disappear into a dark sky.  Once the pages are burned, the books are just dead shells scattered around the house’s lawn. 

It is a powerful use of personification that Bradbury uses in the opening scene of the book.  He also describes the fire hose as a “python spitting its venomous kerosene upon the world.”  The literary device of personification gives these inanimate objects life, and therefore, makes the visual image more powerful by painting a picture of the scene for the reader.

In The Shakespeare Stealer by Gary Blackwood, why is Chris Beeston's reference to Leicester important?

The answer depends upon how deeply you want to go with your question.

Beeston's reference is a quick one, but is important because Beeston, who became a very famous and successful Elizabethan actor, was under the patronage of the Earl of Leicester. Any reference to Chris's literal "bread and butter" would have made him prick his ears, since Leicester's troupe was in competition with Shakespeare's King's Men. In the end, Beeston also worked for and managed Shakespeare's players as well, but competition and underhandedness between competing troupes was rampant--not to mention competition for currying the favor of the queen and her most noble courtiers, of whom the Earl of Leicester was one.

Next, it is interesting to note that later in his life, Beeston reveals himself as Simon de Montfort, son of the Earl of Leicester'. Not only is Leicester his patron, he is also his father.

Finally, note that the action surrounding Chris Beeston's reference takes place in Leicester, the only Hub between Stratford-Upon Avon, where Shakespeare was writing, and London, where the excitement, glamour and seediness of an actor's existence is fulfilled. The location represents a metaphorical turning point in the plot as Widget meets Bass and his destiny is driven forward. 

Explain the first prophecy in Macbeth.

In Act 1, Scene 3 the witches prophesize that Macbeth will be Thane of Cawdor and then the king. These are the first two prophecies. The exchange is quick:

W1: All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Glamis!

W2: All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor!

W3: All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter! (I.iii.51-53)

At the time of this prophecy, Macbeth is already the Thane of Glamis, so the first real prophecy is that he will become the Thane of Cawdor. This, however, is confusing to Macbeth because, as he says, "But how of Cawdor? The Thane of Cawdor lives / A prosperous gentleman, and to be king / Stands not within the prospect of belief, / No more than to be Cawdor" (I.iii.75-78). Yet, it is soon revealed that the Thane of Cawdor committed treason, ensuring that Macbeth becomes the Thane of Cawdor. This initial prophecy comes true, causing Macbeth to wonder how he will next become king. 

Why does the author make reference to the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon?

O. Henry is using the wildest hyperbole to describe how Della and Jim valued their family treasures: her beautiful long hair and his gold watch. The references to the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon come from the story in the Old Testament about how the fabulously wealthy Queen of Sheba came to visit the even more fabulously wealthy King Solomon in Israel. It is to be found in the Bible in 1 Kings 10. 

And she came to Jerusalem with a very great train, with camels that bore spices, and very much gold, and precious stones:

The Queen gave King Solomon 120 talents of gold. But he already had an income of 666 talents of gold per year, as stated in the Bible (King James Version):

Now the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year was six hundred threescore and six talents of gold.

A talent was an ancient unit of weight and value in Rome, Greece and the Middle East. One talent weighed approximately seventy-five pounds. So the Queen of Sheba was presenting King Solomon with about nine thousand pounds of gold. That is 144,000 ounces. The current value of gold is around $1300 per ounce.

It is, of course, ridiculous to suggest that King Solomon or the Queen of Sheba would have envied Della or Jim, two poor people who were just getting by on twenty dollars a week. But O. Henry seems to have been in a loquacious mood when he was writing "The Gift of the Magi." He also compares Jim and Della to the three kings, or magi, who brought expensive gifts to the baby Jesus where he was lying in a manger in a stable in Jerusalem. It seems appropriate, somehow, that O. Henry should be bringing in allusions to the Bible for this particular story, because it was all about Christmas and the spirit of Christmas. King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba also gave each other fabulous gifts.

It seems likely that O. Henry was writing this famous story in a rush to meet a deadline for the Christmas issue of a newspaper. Since the papers were full of advertisements for Christmas gifts, O. Henry might have been asked to write a story about the joys and blessings of giving gifts in order to encourage readers to do likewise. There are numerous possible morals to be drawn from "The Gift of the Magi," but one of them which may be overlooked is that we ought to be generous in our gift-giving at Christmastime, even if we have to max out our credit cards.

O. Henry was a notoriously heavy drinker. He was reputed to drink two quarts of whiskey a day, and he did some of his writing with a pencil in saloons. "The Gift of the Magi," though brilliant and probably O. Henry's most popular story, sounds as if it had been written hastily and not carefully proofread before he turned it in to his editor. In the early part of his story he repeats Della's problem four times, almost in the same words.

ONE DOLLAR AND eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies.

One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas. 

Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only $1.87 with which to buy Jim a present. 

Only $1.87 to buy a present for Jim. 

This certainly sounds as if O. Henry had already had a little too much Christmas cheer and also as if he was padding his story in order to fill a certain reserved amount of space in his paper. After drawing a far-fetched analogy between Jim and Della, on the one hand, and King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, or the other, he concludes his story with an equally far-fetched analogy between the Youngs and the three kings who brought presents of myrrh, incense and gold to Bethlehem. But there was nobody who could write quite like O. Henry.

Are space and time properties of our perception according to to Kant?

Kant's Critique of Pure Reason distinguishes the way we arrive at knowledge via a pair of binary distinctions. The first is the synthetic-analytic distinction. We know certain things analytically because they are contained in the very concept of the object being known, i.e. we know that cats are quadrupedal mammals because four-leggedness and being a mammal inhere in the definition of cats. However, we know the possible colors of cats' fur synthetically, because no particular fur color is inherent in the concept of "cat" -- we must look at cats to obtain this knowledge. Another distinction made by Kant is the a priori-a posteriori distinction. Things such as mathematical concepts are known prior to experience (a priori) and, in fact, experience has no bearing on them, while other things, such as the colors of cats are known from experience, or a posteriori. There is ordinarily a strong correlation between things we know a priori and analytically and those we know a posteriori and synthetically.

Space and time, however, are known a priori, in the sense that we know do not derive our knowledge of them from experience. However, space and time are not themselves known analytically but synthetically, and thus are what he calls synthetic a priori concepts, elements of our experience but prior to our experience. As all of our experiences are spatio-temporal (one could not imagine an object that wasn't extended in space and time as it would not be an object), Kant thus describes space and time as conditions of our experience. This isn't quite the same as space and time being properties of our perception, because we do not perceive space and time per se, but rather we structure our experiences in terms of space and time; for Kant, they are conceptual scaffolding shaping how we understand phenomena. 

How does the "The Tell-Tale Heart" prove that "actions speak louder than words"?

"The Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe is narrated in the first person. The nameless narrator is speaking to an unknown audience addressed only as "you," although as we read the story we can deduce that the nameless "you" may well be a police officer or a jury. He starts his speech by proclaiming that he is not insane:

TRUE! —nervous —very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses —not destroyed —not dulled them.

The rest of the story is a narrative in which the speaker tries to supply us with evidence that he is not insane. The more we learn of his thoughts and actions, however, the more we, as readers, draw precisely the opposite conclusion.

The narrator's decision to murder a man who has never harmed him is the first act that belies his claim of sanity. The second set of actions is his very careful stalking of an old man who really could put up no resistance. The narrator's baroque manner of devising a lamp that could illuminate only the eye of the old man but not the rest of him, under the delusion that the eye itself was evil, is additional evidence of his insanity.

The narrator claims that his dismembering the old man and hiding the body under the floorboards is evidence of sanity, but actually it is the reverse, as it connects him to the murder in the way that dumping the body in a river or burying it some distance away would not. Thus the narrator's actions disprove his words claiming that he is sane.

In "The Open Boat," how does hopelessness dominate the mood of the story?

"The Open Boat" by Stephen Crane, is a fictionalization of a real occurrence in his life.  Its portrayal of the sinking of a steamship and the survival of four men is overflowing with the emotions felt by the occupants of the 10' dinghy.

Hopelessness dominates the narrative due to the fact that the men are forced to realize that, despite their positions on Earth, they are helpless against an impartial Mother Nature.

For almost two days, the men are trapped by circumstances beyond their control.  Though their standings in life are diverse -  the injured steamship captain, an ambivalent writer/reporter, the portly ship's cook, and the robust oiler - they find themselves equally at the folly of nature.

Their circumstances lead them to be riled at one another.  Soon they realize the futility of those feelings and start to empathize with each other.  Finally, they realize their only hope is to be found in the indifference of nature.  That proves to be little hope, if any.

The final blow of the folly of pitting themselves against the earthy forces is when they finally swim to shore and it is the "fittest" of them that succumbs to the sea and drowns.

What does William Armstrong do to earn his nickname?

William Armstrong got his unusual nickname from his older brother who thought he looked like a doodlebug when he tried to crawl as a baby.  Doodle was born with birth defects that included a large head and a small body.  When his parents name him William Armstrong, Brother remarks that it is “a name [that] sounds good only on a tombstone,” foreshadowing the eventual death of Doodle.  When Doodle starts to crawl, Brother describes him and says,

When he crawled, he crawled backwards, as if he were in reverse and couldn’t change gears.  If you called him, he’d turn around as if he were going in the other direction, then he’d back right up to you to be picked up. Crawling backward made him look like a doodlebug.

A doodlebug is an insect indigenous to the region in which the story takes place. The doodlebug is found in Texas around the Gulf coast. Brother would have seen many doodlebugs in his time; and therefore, the description appears to be appropriate.

A footnote in the copy of my story mentions that a doodlebug is also a train that goes backwards and forwards. Again, this is a fitting description of what Doodle looks like when he crawls.   

So, William Armstrong earns the nickname, Doodle, simply because of his physical limitations.