Tuesday, January 28, 2020

Robert Frost And Nature Themes

Robert Frost And Nature Themes Robert Frost was one of the few leading poets of the 20th-century and won the Pulitzer Prize four times. Frost was a poet from rural New England, but his poems could be related to any part of the world. After college Robert Frost moved to England and published a few poems while there. He closely observed rural life and in his poetry endowed it with universal, even metaphysical, meaning, using colloquial language, familiar rhythms, and common symbols to express both its pastoral ideals and its dark complexities (Britannica Concise Encyclopedia 1). Nature is an everyday detail that people infrequently take time to appreciate and sometimes take it for granted; its what makes the world beautiful. In several of Robert Frosts poems like The Road Not Taken, Fire and Ice, and Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening they reflect nature, he recognizes the beauty and disaster of it. In the poem The Road Not Taken nature comes into play when Robert Frost introduces to the reader to a traveler that comes to a sudden halt at the site of a crossroad in yellow woods. The traveler of Robert Frosts The Road Not Taken is left to think about which path to travel on. Robert P. Ellis states On more than one occasion the poet claimed that this poem was about his friend Edward Thomas, a man inclined to indecisiveness out of a strong-and, as Frost thought, amusing-habit of dwelling on the irrevocability of decisions. After cautiously looking at of both routes, the traveler comes to the conclusion that both paths present a more interesting venture ahead. The traveler tells the reader that the woods are yellow which mean it could possibly be autumn. And looked down one as far as I could/To where it bent in the undergrowth (lines 4-5), this could mean the wood are thick and the road disappears in the undergrowth. The undergrowth would represent the travelers future that is uncle ar by which road he takes. Of the two means of travel, the traveler states that the passing there/Had worn them really about the same (lines 9-10) and both that morning equally lay/ In leaves no step had trodden black (11-12). There is a contradiction that one path is less worn than the other. These lines show us that the leaves have just fallen, and they cover which path was more or less traveled the day before. This line points out that there are times when you cant decide which decision is better. Without a clear solution to the problem, the character is left to think of any future consequences that could occur based on a decision of taken. As a result, the character comes to terms that the final destination is based only by chance and choice, but there are some regrets out the certain rode taken. Frosts work shows the general uncertainty of supposing a different result if another road was taken. The title suggests this feeling of doubt, where the road not taken is mentioned with greater standard than the actual course of travel. Missing the chance to travel both/ And be one traveler (2-3), one path must function as the chosen way and the other the other way, both with no indication of which is the better to travel. As a result, once the picked road is traveled, the other way holds a lingering reminder of what may have been lost just by chance. After a predictable self-evaluation of the travelers life, trying to figure out if he took full advantage of the available opportunities perceived as a frightening challenge for there will always be an ambiguity lingering around the other path. The traveler uneasily comes to terms with reality, and eventually determines the pointlessness on matters of the imagination. So, with a sigh (16), the traveler states that he took advantage of t he opportunities as they were given to him. Taking the chosen path has made all the difference (20). The decision determined the travelers overall course in life to the result that the other road couldve pointed the speaker to go in the complete opposite direction of his destination. This was the first Robert Frost poem I have ever read. The first time I read it I could easily relate to it. I do believe that this is one poem where anyone that reads it will be able to relate to it. I have been met with numerous decisions in like that are life changing. From which college I wanted to go to, to what major I want to study, and to fall or not to fall to peer pressure. All together, I enjoyed reading this poem. I like how Robert Frost compares a fork in the road to everyday life decisions we make. In the poem Fire and Ice Robert Frost compares two elements of nature fire and ice. Fire and Ice is straightforward in its message that emotions become destructive when they are too extreme, destructive enough even to end the world (Explanation of: Fire and Ice by Robert Frost). In the first two lines Some say the world will end in fire/Some say in ice (Lines1-2) the poem he presents the option to end of the world by fire or ice. He then talks about fire in the next two lines and compares fire to desire From what Ive tasted of desire/ I hold with those who favor fire (3-4). The comparison states that Frost sees desire as something that takes over and brings devastation. In the next stanza Frost then compares ice to hate. This comparison relates to the reader a view of hate as something that causes people to be unyielding, lifeless and cold. Ice also has the tendency to take in things and cause them to crack and break. The final line of the poem asserts that these two vicious forces a re evenly great. Fire consumes and destroys quickly, leaving ashes. In The overview Explanation of: Fire and Ice by Robert Frost it talk about how two opposites like fire and ice or passion and hatred can easily be linked together. While ice or hatred, destroys much slower. It causes objects to become so lifeless that they crack from the pressure created. Frost imagines that the end of the world could be caused by people becoming too strict, lifeless, and set in their way of life and beliefs that the world breaks apart into pieces. Stopping by Woods is a much stranger poem than may appear at first. From the opening lines, we know that the story is being told from the speakers point of view (Whose woods these are I think I know), but we may never bother to consider whom the man is addressing.(Monte). Robert Frosts love of nature is expressed through out the poem with the setting. His perfect description of the woods brings clear images to the readers head. The woods are lovely, dark and deep (line 13) the way Frost describes the wood would make the reader seem like they were there. The feel of Robert Frosts Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening is set by the only other sounds the sweep / of easy wind and downy flake (11-12). The first line in the poem talks about the woods. In the poem Frost says that the narrator enjoyed sitting and watching the snow and that he is also a nature lover. In the second stanza Frost refers back to the woods. The depth and darkness of the woods make the woods gloomier. The snow elimi nates the limits and boundaries of things and of his own being is, the function here of some secret desire toward destruction. The setting of the poem is in the woods. John T. Ogilvie explains the peace of the woods by stating The artfulness of Stopping by Woods consists in the way the two worlds are established and balanced. The poet is aware that the woods by which he is stopping belong to someone in the village; they are owned by the world of men. The traveler sees something in the woods that attracts him making the woods a special place. It appears that speaker has connected the woods with his paradise. The tranquility, dimness, and silence are what make it paradise. The traveler knows that he is not able stay put in this paradise, But I have promises to keep/And miles to go before I sleep (14-15).The traveler doesnt want to leave the peaceful woods, but he has made other promises that he must keep. Frost repeats the last two lines and miles to go before I sleep (15-16), this co uld stress the importance of this promise that was made, and to give the traveler a reason to leave. Further, Frost repeated the last two lines of the poem partially as a matter of form: What it [the repetend or repeated lines] does is save me from a third line promising another stanza . . . . I considered for a moment four of a kind in the last stanza but that would have made five including the third in the stanza before it. I considered for a moment winding up with a three line stanza. The repetend was the only logical way to end such a poem. (Hochman) Nature has its own way of relaxing the mind and body. Frost may have believed the same. Frosts use of colorful imagery helps other readers appreciate the serenity of nature. Stopping by Woods is an excellent poem uses symbolism and setting perfectly. I enjoyed this poem and I also like the meaning. This poem is telling you to stop and smell the roses and enjoys life. During winter is a time when most people are lone in solitude. Being isolated can be miserable, but it could all so be a time to collect thoughts without any annoyance of the outside world coming down on you. Nature is something that can bring about personal reflection in anyone. In many of Robert Frosts poems he tends to reflect on nature, and he recognizes the beauty and disaster of it.Robert Frost is an amazing poet. His ideas and the way he uses nature are perfect and are valued by many. Frost uses nature to put across his views as well as to make his poetry more interesting than it already is. His poems make it easy to imagine the setting in your mind through the detail he provides.

Monday, January 20, 2020

Computers and The Increase of Labor and Wage Inequality in The 1980’s :: History Technology Essays

Computers and The Increase of Labor and Wage Inequality in The 1980’s Although computer technology dates back to at least the 1940’s, microprocessors were first introduced on a wide scale in manufacturing in the 1970’s. It has been noted that mainframe computers started to be used in business in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s. Computers have seemed to grow more rapidly ever since the Apple II was born in 1977 and the IBM PC in 1981. PC (personal computers) spread rapidly in the 80’s and 90’s and have been upgrading ever since. It has been said that during this increase in popularity and use of computers the labor inequality and wage difference has been increasing as well. Throughout this paper we will discuss reasons why computers are to blame and why computers have had nothing to do with economic increase of skilled educated workers and a decrease in need for unskilled and uneducated workers. Increase in the growth rate of the demand of more skilled workers due to the pace of the technological work from 1970 to the present has been one of the arguments against computers causing inequality. From the 1970’s the pace of work has been faster, the work load has been greater because demand has gone up, and many jobs have become more difficult to learn. There are no longer mills where education and much knowledge was needed to get the job done. Work has gotten much more involved and complex. The employment of high school drop outs have fallen from 64.4% in 1940 to 9.8% in 1996, and the employment of college graduates have risen from 9.3% to 41.6%. Although computers have been around that whole time there is no way they caused a 54.6% decrease in the employment of high school drop outs. It has also been said that there has been an expansion slowdown from what the country was used to in the beginning half of this century from the 1970’s, so this has allowed companies to pay one educated worker rather than paying two of three uneducated workers that did the same job. Over the years unions have also began to disappear causing some of those unskilled workers how were once protected by contracts to a given union to become no longer demanded. Many of those unskilled workers who escaped being unneeded have noticed a dramatic pay decrease. Many people might think, â€Å"What are you talking about, in the 1940’s they were making like five to ten dollars a day.

Sunday, January 12, 2020

Another Accolade for Charter Arms Corp by Mike Royko

Laurence Bourgeois A00161609 March 12th, 2013 Analysis Essay In his essay â€Å"Another Accolade for Charter Arms Corp. â€Å", Mike Royko focuses not on John Lennon’s death, but on the type of gun that was used to kill him. He argues that the model of a gun makes a great deal of difference when killing someone. By ignoring the shooting of the celebrity, Royko uses irony to show how idiotic the debate on the gun is. He commences his essay by asking the readers â€Å"what difference does it make what kind of gun was used  ? and answers by saying that it indeed makes a great deal of difference. At this point, we know the author’s rhetorical strategy will consist on focusing on anything but the death of the famous musician. As mentionned before, Royko uses a lot of irony in his essay as a way of showing the readers how ludicrous the gun debate really is. Per example, in the beginning of his essay, Royko says  : â€Å"And when people become emotional about guns, as many do when somebody famous is killed, they tend to lump all guns together.They don’t show proper respect for an excellent gun, such as the Charter . 38. † By saying that this type of gun deserves respect, despite what it did to the famous superstar, the author is clearly trying to show no empathy for Lennon as a form of rhetorical strategy. Later on, he proceeds by saying  : â€Å"Now the Charter Arms Corp. has the unique distinction of having two famous people shot by one of their products, I wonder if they have considered using it in their advertising. Here, he takes his irony to another level by assuming the death of a celebrity should be something the company should be proud of and that advertising it would lead the customers to purchase the weapon. Using irony for this type of subject was a brilliant idea, but in this essay, Royko uses too much of it. Secondly, Mike Royko uses the model of the gun as an argument of his irony. He also constantly talks about the importance of the quality of the weapon.Per example, he mentions the incident that happened on network TV, where a reporter from CBS says that the gun used to shoot George C. Wallace was a â€Å"cheap handgun† and goes on by explaining how this was quite an insult for Charter Arms Corp. The author also talks about the fact that both shooters, Bremer and Wallace used the same gun to wound their victim and that the weapon did a good job. In another sample of his irony, Royko adresses Charter Arms Corp by saying  : â€Å"Once again, your product really did the job, gents. â€Å"To conclude, Mike Royko’s essay is initially an ironic piece of work written to make the readers realize that the main focus of a tragedy should be the victim, not minor details such as the weapon used to harm the person. In my opinion, this essay is a fine piece of work, but the author emphasizes too much on irony in a way that it shadows what the essay is actually about. Work Cited Royko, Mi ke. â€Å"Another Accolade for Charter Arms Corp. † The Broadview Anthology. 2nd ed. Ed. Laura Buzzard, Peterborough  : Broadview, 2011. 221-4.

Saturday, January 4, 2020

Alexander Fleming The History of Penicillin

From the Greek—anti, meaning against and bios, meaning life, an antibiotic is a chemical substance produced by one organism that is destructive to another. The word antibiotic comes from antibiosis, a term coined in 1889 by a pupil of  Louis Pasteurs  named Paul Vuillemin to who used it to define a process by which life could be used to destroy life. Antibiotics are natural substances that are released by bacteria and fungi into their environment, as a means of inhibiting other organisms. You can think of it as is chemical warfare on a microscopic scale. Sir Alexander Fleming Penicillin is one of the earliest discovered and most widely used antibiotic agents. While Sir Alexander Fleming is credited with its discovery, it was French medical student Ernest Duchesne who first took note of the bacteria in 1896. Flemings more famous observations would not be made until more than two decades later. Fleming, a trained bacteriologist, was working St. Marys Hospital in London when in 1928, he observed a plate culture of Staphylococcus that had been contaminated by a blue-green mold. On closer inspection, he noted that the colonies of bacteria adjacent to the mold were being dissolved. Curious, Fleming decided to grow the mold in pure culture, from which he was able to see that colonies of the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus were being destroyed by the mold Penicillium notatum, proving, in principle at least, the existence of an antibacterial agent. Fleming named the substance penicillin and published his findings in 1929, noting that his discovery might someday have therapeutic value if it could be produced in quantity, however, it would be years before Flemings findings would be put into practical, widespread use. British Research Continues In 1930, Dr. Cecil George Paine, a  pathologist  at the  Royal Infirmary  in  Sheffield, began experimenting with penicillin for the treatment of infant patients suffering neonatal infections (and later with adults suffering eye infections). After an inauspicious start, he successfully cured his first patient on November 25, 1930, however with only a mild success rate, Dr. Paines efforts with penicillin were limited to a handful of patients. In 1939, led by Australian scientist  Howard Florey, the work of a team of penicillin researchers at Oxford University’s Sir William Dunn School of Pathology that included Ernst Boris Chain,  Edward Abraham,  Arthur Duncan Gardner,  Norman Heatley,  Margaret Jennings, J. Orr-Ewing, and G. Sanders was beginning to show great promise.  By the following year, the team was able to demonstrate penicillins ability to kill infectious bacteria in mice. By 1940, theyd come up with a method for mass-producing penicillin but unfortunately, the output failed to meet expectations. In 1941, the team began a clinical trial with their first human patient, a policeman named  Albert Alexander who was suffering from a severe facial infection. Initially, Alexander’s condition improved but when supplies of penicillin ran out he succumbed to the infection. While subsequent patients were treated successfully, synthesizing the drug in sufficient quantity remained a stumbling block. Key Research Shifts to the United States With the increasing demands of World War II putting a huge drain on Great Britains industrial and governmental resources, the British scientists did not have the means to continue clinical trials on humans at Oxford. Dr. Florey and his colleagues turned to the United States for help and were quickly referred to the Northern Regional Laboratory in Peoria, Illinois, where American scientists were already working on fermentation methods to increase the growth rate of fungal cultures. On July 9, 1941, Dr. Florey and Dr. Norman Heatley came to the United States bearing a vital package containing a small amount of penicillin to begin work. By pumping air into deep vats containing corn steep liquor (a non-alcoholic by-product of the wet milling process) combined with other key ingredients, researchers were able to induce faster penicillin growth than with any previous methods. Ironically, after a worldwide search, it was a modified strain of penicillin that came from a moldy cantaloupe in a Peoria market produced the largest amount of penicillin when grown in submerged deep-vat conditions. By November 26, 1941, Andrew J. Moyer, Peoria Labs expert on the nutrition of molds, had succeeded, with the assistance of Dr. Heatley, in a tenfold increase in the yield of penicillin. After clinical trials were performed in 1943, penicillin was shown to be the most effective antibacterial agent to date. Mass Production the Legacy of Penicillin Meanwhile, simultaneous research being conducted a Pfizer Labs in Brooklyn, New York, helmed by Jasper H. Kane, led to a more practical fermentation  method for the mass production of pharmaceutical-grade penicillin. By the time Allied forces hit the beaches on D-Day on June 6, 1944, there was an ample supply of the drug to treat the numerous casualties. Another benefit to mass production was the decrease in cost. Penicillin prices fell from a prohibitively expensive rate in 1940 to $20 per dose in July 1943 to $0.55 per dose by 1946. The 1945 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine was awarded jointly to Sir Alexander Fleming, Ernst Boris Chain, and Sir Howard Walter Florey for the discovery of penicillin and its curative effect in various infectious diseases. Dr. Andrew J. Moyer from the Peoria Lab was inducted into the Inventors Hall of Fame and both the British and Peoria Laboratories were designated as International Historic Chemical Landmarks. On May 25, 1948, Dr. Moyer was granted a patent for a method of the mass production of penicillin. A Timeline of Antibiotics Ancient History—The ancient Egyptians, Chinese, and indigenous tribes of Central America all used various forms of mold to treat infected wounds.Late 1800s–The search for antibiotics begins in the late 1800s with the growing acceptance of the  germ theory of disease that linked bacteria and other microbes to the causation of a variety of ailments.1871—The surgeon  Joseph  Lister  begins research into a phenomenon indicating that urine contaminated with mold inhibited the growth of bacteria.1890s—German doctors Rudolf Emmerich and Oscar Low are the first to make an effective medication from microbes. While their drug, known as pyocyanase, was the first antibiotic to be used in hospitals, it did not have an effective cure rate.1928—Sir Alexander Fleming  observes that colonies of the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus could be destroyed by the mold Penicillium  notatum, demonstrating the principle of antibiotics.1935—Prontosil, the fir st sulfa drug, is discovered in 1935 by German chemist Gerhard Domagk.1942—Howard Florey and Ernst Chain invent a viable manufacturing process for  Penicillin G Procaine, which can now be sold as a drug.1943—Using microbes culled from soil bacteria, American  microbiologist  Selman Waksman invents streptomycin, the first of a new class of drugs called aminoglycosides that could be used to treat tuberculosis and other infections, however, the side effects of early-stage drugs often outweigh their curative value.1945—Using advanced X-ray crystallography, Oxford University scientist Dr. Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin defines the molecular layout of penicillin, confirming its structure as previously hypothesized and leading to enhanced development of other antibiotics and biomolecular substances, including vitamin B12.1947—Four years after mass production of penicillin begins, resistant microbes appear, including Staphylococcus aureus. Usually harmless in hum ans, if allowed to flourish unchecked, Staphylococcus aureus produces toxins that result in illnesses including pneumonia or toxic shock syndrome.1955—Lloyd Conover receives a patent for Tetracyclin. It soon becomes the most prescribed broad-spectrum antibiotic in the United States.1957—Nystatin, used to cure many disfiguring and disabling fungal infections, is patented.1981—SmithKline Beecham patents a semisynthetic antibiotic called Amoxicillin or amoxicillin/clavulanate potassium. The antibiotic debuts in 1998 under the tradenames of Amoxicillin, Amoxil, and Trimox.