Macbeth Essays (750 words) - Characters In Macbeth,

Macbeth MacBeth Everyone who is mortal has at least one flaw. Some are more serious than others. For example, some people have addictions to gambling, while other people can't remember to put the milk away after they use it. After a while though, a person's flaws come back to haunt them. The tragedy MacBeth is no exception to this. In it, many of the character's die. And the reason is that they have a flaw, that would eventually lead to their downfall. Not every character is deserving of his fate though. Some characters have a minor flaw, which shouldn't lead to their death. But other's have a major flaw, which is would eventually lead them to their death anyway. The first Thane of Cawdor, is killed by MacBeth for trying to lead a revolution against England. His fatal flaw was that he was according to Ross, a disloyal traitor. The thane of Cawdor was greedy, and wanted the throne of England for himself, and as a result was murdered. But his murder wasn't really disheartening, because the Thane of Cawdor, deserved his fate. He was leading a battle, in which many lost their lives, for the sake of greed, and deserved to die because of his flaw. Duncan was the King of England, and was murdered by MacBeth. He was murdered, because in order for MacBeth to fulfill his plan and become king, Duncan would have to die. Duncan's fatal flaw was that he was too trusting. For example, he thought that none of his friends could really be enemies. If Duncan was more careful about his safety at MacBeth's castle, he may have had a chance to survive. But Duncan's flaw, wasn't something so horrible that he should die. Most people need to trust each other more, and just because one person did, he shouldn't have to die. MacBeth's former best friend, Banquo was also killed by MacBeth. Banquo was killed, because he knew too much about the murder of Duncan. But that was not his fatal flaw. Banquo's fatal flaw was that although he knew that MacBeth killed Duncan, he really didn't do anything about it. There were many opportunities where Banquo could tell someone such as MacDuff what he thought about the murders. But Banquo didn't deserve death, just because he didn't act quickly in telling someone that MacBeth killed Duncan. Banquo knew that if he said anything, no one would believe him, and he would be executed. Lady MacBeth is MacBeth's wife. She is his coconspirator in killing Duncan. Although she helps MacBeth get the courage to commit the murder, she isn't willing to do it herself. She uses the excuse that Duncan looked too much like her father. Unlike MacBeth though, it is harder for Lady MacBeth to live with the fact that she helped cause the murder of the king. And in the end, it makes her so crazy that she commits suicide. Whether or not Lady MacBeth deserved her fate is a tricky question. Although she did encourage MacBeth to murder Duncan, she feels regret for her action. Also, she realized what she did was wrong. But in my opinion, she realized it a little too late, and Duncan was still dead so she did deserve her fate. MacBeth was the focus of the entire play, and that's why it was named after him. All of the problems start when he murder's Duncan. He commits the murder because of his fatal flaw, he is too ambitious. If he wasn't so ambitious and determined to be king, then he would never have killed Duncan. And if MacBeth didn't kill Duncan none of the other characters would die. MacBeth deserved his fate more than any other characters in the play. He did many things wrong. First he killed Duncan, then he killed Banquo. After that, MacBeth killed MacDuff's family. And worst of all, MacBeth disturbed the balance of nature. Also, MacBeth didn't feel any remorse until he was faced with death. If MacBeth just waited for his time, he would have been king, and have had a chance to enjoy it. Every character that died in MacBeth had one fatal flaw. The first Thane of Cawdor was a traitor. Duncan was too trusting. Banquo didn't do anything about the knowledge he had. Lady MacBeth helped plot the murder of Duncan. And MacBeth, destroyed the natural order and harmony of nature. But not all of the characters who died deserved to die because of

The Environment and Free-Range, Organic, and Local Meat

The Environment and Free-Range, Organic, and Local Meat Meat and other animal products are a serious environmental issue, leading the Atlantic chapter of the Sierra Club to call animal products, a Hummer on a plate. However, free-range, organic, or local meats are not the solution. Free-Range, Cage-Free, Pasture-Raised Meat, Eggs, and Dairy Factory farmers are not animal-hating sadists who confine the animals for fun. Factory farming started because scientists in the 1960s were looking for a way to meet the meat demands of an exploding human population. The only way the U.S. can feed animal products to hundreds of millions of people is to grow grain as an intense monoculture, turn that grain into animal feed, and then give that feed to intensively confined animals. There isn’t enough available land on earth to raise all livestock free-range or cage-free. The United Nations reports that livestock now use 30 percent of the earth’s entire land surface, mostly permanent pasture but also including 33 percent of the global arable land used to produce feed for livestock. Free-range, pasture-fed animals would require even more land on which to feed. They require even more food and water than factory farmed animals, because they are exercising more. To meet the increasing demand for grass-fed beef, South American rainforests are being cleared to produce more pasture for organic, grass-fed beef to be exported. Only 3 percent of the beef produced in the U.S. is grass-fed, and already, thousands of wild horses are displaced by this relatively small number of cattle. The U.S. alone has 94.5 million beef cattle. One farmer estimates that it takes 2.5 to 35 acres of pasture, depending on the quality of the pasture, to raise a grass-fed cow. Using the more conservative figure of 2.5 acres of pasture, this means we need approximately 250 million acres to create grazing pastures for every cow in the U.S. Thats over 390,000 square miles, which is more than 10 percent of all the land in the U.S. Organic Meat Raising animals organically does not reduce the amount of food or water required to produce meat, and the animals will produce just as much waste. Under the National Organic Program administered by the USDA, organic certification for animal products has certain minimum care requirements under 7 C.F.R. 205, such as access to the outdoors, shade, shelter, exercise areas, fresh air, and direct sunlight (7 C.F.R. 205.239). Manure must also be managed in a manner that does not contribute to contamination of crops, soil, or water by plant nutrients, heavy metals, or pathogenic organisms and optimizes recycling of nutrients (7. C.F.R. 205.203) Organic livestock must also be fed organically produced feed and cannot be given growth hormones (7 C.F.R. 205.237). While organic meat does offer some environmental and health benefits over factory farming in terms of residue, waste management, pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers, the livestock do not consume less resources or produce less manure. Animals raised organically are still slaughtered, and organic meat is just as wasteful, if not more wasteful, than factory farmed meat. Local Meat We hear that one way to be eco-friendly is to eat locally, to reduce the amount of resources required to deliver food to our table. Locavores strive to build their diet around food produced within a certain distance from their home. While eating locally might reduce your impact on the environment, the reduction is not as great as some might believe and other factors are more important. According to CNN, an Oxfam report titled, Fair Miles - Recharting the Food Miles Map, found that the way in which food is produced is more important than how far that food is transported. The amount of energy, fertilizer, and other resources used on the farm may have more environmental significance than the transportation of the final product. Food miles are not always a good yardstick. Buying from a small, local conventional farm may have a greater carbon footprint than buying from a large, organic farm thousands of miles away. Organic or not, the larger farm also has the economy of scale on its side. And as a 2008 article in The Guardian points out, buying fresh produce from halfway around the world has a lower carbon footprint than buying local apples out of season that have been in cold storage for ten months. In The Locavore Myth, James E. McWilliams writes: One analysis, by Rich Pirog of the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture, showed that transportation accounts for only 11% of foods carbon footprint. A fourth of the energy required to produce food is expended in the consumers kitchen. Still more energy is consumed per meal in a restaurant, since restaurants throw away most of their leftovers... The average American eats 273 pounds of meat a year. Give up red meat once a week and youll save as much energy as if the only food miles in your diet were the distance to the nearest truck farmer. If you want to make a statement, ride your bike to the farmers market. If you want to reduce greenhouse gases, become a vegetarian. While buying locally produced meat will reduce the amount of fuel needed to transport your food, it does not change the fact that animal agriculture requires an inordinate amount of resources and produces a great deal of waste and pollution. Tara Garnett of the Food Climate Research Network stated: There is only one way of being sure that you cut down on your carbon emissions when buying food: stop eating meat, milk, butter and cheese... These come from ruminants- sheep and cattle- that produce a great deal of harmful methane. In other words, it is not the source of the food that matters but the kind of food you eat. All things being equal, eating locally is better than eating food that has to be transported thousands of miles, but the environmental advantages of locavorism pale in comparison with those of going vegan. Lastly, one can choose to be an organic, vegan locavore to reap the environmental benefits of all three concepts. They are not mutually exclusive.

Venture Capital and Entrepreneurship Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 9000 words

Venture Capital and Entrepreneurship - Essay Example The company is not only selling clothes, it is marketing its products as lifestyle - the lifestyle that the rich deserves and the not so rich to aspire for. The company is the exclusive owner of the brand. The company aims to achieve a 1% share of the market it its first year, then 3% in its second year, and 5% in its third year. Its market is the whole American population but its target markets are upwardly mobile men and women aged 20 to 50 with income of more than $50,000 annually. The Cashmere Collection, Monaco is 100% owned by its parent company, The Zelective Group, and is looking for a venture capitalist to finance the company's operations in Hong Kong by investing $25 million. The online apparel retail industry is growing tremendously. Introducing The Cashmere Collection, Monaco into the Hong Kong through online selling will create huge value for its parent company. The Cashmere Collection is owned by the Zelective Group which is headquartered in Monaco - one of the world's remaining monarchies. According to the group's website, the location of the head office is very strategic as it is very close to some cities which are leading and pioneering in the world of fashion: Milan , Florence , Rome , Paris and London. Currently, Zel Currently, Zelective's business model is wholeselling clothes made from cashmere. Its mission as a wholesale is "to deliver high-end textile products at affordable prices." It sells ready-to-wear and made-to-order cashmere collections. The company's products are made from 100% cashmere which are sourced from the highlands of Inner Mongolia believed to be the origin of the best cashmere fiber in the world (Please see Figure 1 for some of the Cashmere Collections). It has 31 or so collections so far. Cashmere is a type of wool fiber harvested from Cashmere goats. The fiber is characterized to be very soft, with high napability and loft. Cashmere is noted to provide natural light-weight insulation without the bulk. Cashmere is often named drop by celebrities and celebrity stylists as one of their favorite fabrics (InStyle 2009, p. 156). Figure 1 The Cashmere Collection The products of the company are positioned not only as clothing items but fashion items. In Maslow's hierarchy of needs, the Cashmere Collection fulfills a person's safety needs - safety from cold, heat and the weather by providing insulation; and self-esteem needs by providing

Enterprise Resource Planning (SLP) Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Enterprise Resource Planning (SLP) - Coursework Example mo shows the SAP Crystal Reports and Sap Crystal Reports Server, and the uses both are put to by an IT department to set up reports for personnel across the company. The reports can be set up in a way that suits various people and departments, so it can run as often as needed, and it can be changed to a format such as e-mail or Adobe PDF format. The demo was OK, but the wording at the bottom of the screen was not always visible. A business using this program can achieve savings as the reports give up-to-date data as and when required. There is not a chance of losing their way with tracking resources, whether personnel or materials. As the report can be set up to show precise data at a certain time the financial implications are able to be forecast with a lot of certainty. It could be used by a private person who has a lot of materials, such as a DIY builder or a even a person with a hobby who has collected a lot, but is not sure what they have or what else needs to be collected. After some careful thought the third demo is in fact the 30-day trial version of SAP Crystal Reports. The reason being this is a chance to use the system itself and find out more about how it feels in actual use. The screen shot below in Fig. 1. shows the data in a report built using a simple Access database. This tool is great for keeping up to date with changes in a companies resources, something that can be difficult to track across a complex company, where it has to deal with staff, customers, materials and the processes between all these. If it is all on one system a manager can quickly find data and produce a report showing its status instead of trying to search databases, spreadsheets and other

Working Hours of Construction Employees in Hong Kong

Working Hours of Construction Employees in Hong Kong This study examines whether the local construction workers satisfied with the length of their working hours and whether there is necessary for the Government to constrain the working hours of the labours by imposing regulations or similar control measures. For your background of this study, this chapter outlined (1) background of this study; (2) the aim and objectives of this study; (3) methodology adopted and (4) overview of the study scope. Background Construction industry significantly contributes to Hong Kongs economic. The long working hours as the negative impression of the construction industry causes aging problems and lack of fresh blood in the industry. According to the Working Time Directive from Europe (Directive, 2003), weekly working hours of at least 48 hours or more should be regarded as long. Therefore, more than 48 hours could be regarded as long working hours which makes consistency among studies. Alongside with that there are voices that the workers in Hong Kong are currently required to work excessively long hours some suggested that the average workers have to work for a range of 60 to 70 hours per week. This is long if it is compared to the average working hours of labour in the U.S., the European countries, Japan or other developed countries. The nature of Hong Kong construction industry is using long working hours to cope with the tight construction schedules. Normally, the workers in the mentioned regions generally work less than 44 hours per week (OECD, 2004). In Hong Kong, the employers of the contractors are complaining that they currently suffer from labour shortage and problem of an aging labour force. Therefore, there are two significances of this study. First, the reduction in the length of the working hours shall help to make building construction a more attractive industry for young men and women and shortage and aging problems. The youth may be encouraged to join the building construction industry. Second, people may suffer from fatigue after repeatedly working for long hours, such fatigues may lead to personal and/or family problems, occupational diseases and safety hazards. Thus, the situation on labours working hours must be revealed and studied. Research Aim and Objectives This research aims investigate of there is a need for the Government to constrain the working hours of the local construction workers to a designated limit by imposing regulations or similar control measures. The study covers understandings of the weekly length of working hour of the labour and their satisfaction of the length. And it also investigates the reasons of the longer working hours compared to the counterparts in the other advanced countries, examines if there are alternative ways to implement building construction works without the need of the workers to work for more than 44 hours per week. It is expected that this study can make contributions to reveal these mentions if actions shall be taken by the legislators to control the maximum working hours of labour serving the building construction industry. The objectives of this study are as followed: To identify the situation of working hours faced by the local workers. To examine the possible impacts due to excessively long working hours of the workers in the building construction industry. To identify the concept of work life balance. To examine the leading international practice on controlling the maximum number of working hours of individual workers per week. To conduct a questionnaire survey to the workers in the building construction industry for the situation. To conduct interviews with site agents or project managers of the building general contractors for the situation. To conduct interviews with the leaders of the local labour unions for any improvements. To discuss the issues identified and make conclusions and necessary recommendations (for further studies). 1.4 Methodology The objectives of this study can be achieved through the following methods: Literature review on books, journals and websites were carried out to summarize exiting knowledge on related topics. Data collection was carried out by conducting a questionnaire survey to front-line workers in the industry. Data collection was carried out by interviewing project managers and leaders of the local labour unions in the industry. Data analysis was conducted by using SPSS16.0 for window. The reliability assessments, descriptive analysis, one-way ANOVA, Pearson correlation analysis and multiple regression analysis were conducted. 1.5 Scope of Study In order to achieve the objectives, this study is divided in the following main chapters: Chapter 1 Give a brief introduction of the backgrounds, aim and objectives, methodology and scope of this study. Chapter 2 Give an overview of construction industry in Hong Kong; Investigate the impacts of long working hours; Investigate the concept of work life balance; and Elaborate the concept of work life balance Chapter 3 Describe methodology adopted for this study. Chapter 4 Conduct analysis on the collected data by using statistics techniques; Discuss on the findings of study. Chapter 5 Give conclusions and recommendations; Give limitations of this study; Provide suggestions for further research. CHAPTER 2:  LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Overview of Construction Industry In Hong Kong, the construction industry plays an important role in the economy of Hong Kong. The Government announced in the 2011-2012 Budget that HK$58 billion would be spent on infrastructures, which is nearly HK$10 billion more than within 2010-2011. According to the Quarterly Report of Employment and Vacancies at Construction Sites, was published by the Census and Statistics Department, the industrys employees were accounted for 56,502 of the labour force in 2010. Also, the Government plans to invest continuously in infrastructure to promote growth, that the estimated capital works expenditure will exceed HK$60 billion for each of the next few years. In additional 600 thousands square meters land for commercial or business use will be available to enhance the self competitiveness among advanced countries. The Government expects there are 60,000 additional job vacancies will be created in this year. 2.1.1 Long Working Hours The long working hours should be divided by genders, for the male employees, long hours should be regarded as over 60 hours per week; for the female employees, it should be regarded as over 40 hours per week (Dex et al., 1995). In these recent years, Messenger (2004) had compared the working hours of employees in various countries, and found that the advanced countries like Japan, in which a high proportion of employees have to work 50 or more hours per week. According to the Working Time Directive (Directive, 2003), 48 hours per week was defined as long hours and which was used as the indicator in this study. As stated in The State of Work-Life Balance in Hong Kong 2010 survey conducted by Community Business, 48.7 hours was the average working hours to the employees in different industries. The Government announced in the 2010 Report on Annual Earnings and Hours Survey that there are more than 60% of employees in construction industry have to work more than 48 hours per week, and also the median weekly working hours increased 1.6% from 2009 to 2010. As stated in the overseas literatures review, the ideal length of working hours should be about 7 to 9 hours per day or 48 to 50 hours a week. 2.1.2 Factors for Long Working Hours The study (New Zealand Census, 2006) found that requirements of jobs, income, the culture of workplaces, and the job satisfactions provided motivate people work longer time. First, the requirements of the job include completion of the tasks appointed, even high workload and respond to the clients demands; Second, the need for more income should be driven by both maintaining basic needs of life and consuming luxury goods; Third, the culture of the construction site should be always under tight schedule, no matter due to inappropriate management or unexpected weather or accidents; Forth, the satisfaction of the workers should be intangible rewards of works (Lindy, 2009; Raphael and Itzhak, 2006; Weston et al. 2002). As the construction industry in Hong Kong is very competitive in the previous years, the number of projects is not enough for the workers due to the economic recession. Since the construction period of each contract is limited, contractors would like to compress the period of construction as possible for their own profit. Therefore, the workers have to complete their works as soon as possible to prevent delay of schedule and shorten the construction period by days. Otherwise, workers may not able to get further job opportunities. 2.2 Impacts for excessively long working hours There are many researches focus on the relationships between long working hours and fatigue, which could be associated with physical and psychological health of human. For this characteristic, Dex et al. (1995) believed that it brought both positive and negative impacts. At the positive side, the long hour working man could be regarded as a responsible, hardworking and motivated person to his/ her work, family and society. He/ she could earn more income to the family and be served as a role model. At the negative side, fatigue and stress come along with the deprivation of rest. Those feelings are not good for individual social network and family, and may damage to physical and mental health. Insufficient rest could also damage performance and cause safety problems, most accidents were due to unconsciousness (Lindy, 2009; Johanna and Joanne, 2003; Fox and Dwyer, 1999). 2.2.1 Fatigue Fatigue is not easy to be defined, which could be acute and cumulative. Konz (1998) believed that long daily work hours and long weekly work hours would make people being fatigue, especially if there is a lack of rest. Those effects of fatigue should be divided into direct and indirect outcomes, while the indirect outcome is in term of performance of work or health problems. His approach was to avoid overtime of work, that the working hour over 12 hours per day and 55 hours per week should be regarded as overtime. For the mechanisms which contributed to fatigue, Rogers et al. (1999) pointed that age, health status, quality and quantity of sleep, length of working hours, work experience, work motivation and home or family life should be used for measuring degree of fatigue. In the Asian countries liked as Japan and South Korea, researches showed that workers complained of physical and mental fatigue after excessively long working hours, such fatigue could not be escaped and be kept into the next day. The chronic fatigue brought harmful to cardiac health and decreases the cardiovascular functions (Park et al., 2001; Shimonitsu and Levi, 1992). There are evidences that the degree of fatigue is in positive relationship with the length of working time and negative relationship with the length of recovery time. 2.2.2 Physical Health A Japanese term Karoshi means people die from a syndrome of cardiovascular attacks liked strokes, myocardial infarction or acute cardiac failure after excessively overwork (Spurgeon et al., 1997). For a more biological explanation, Liu et al. (2002) conducted a research to investigate the relationship between heart diseases and length of working hours by comparing the workers who have to work more than 61 hours per week and who have to work less than 40 hours per week. The study reflected that overtime work increases blood pressure and heart rate, which induces cardiac symptoms such as chest pain. Presence of abnormal heart rate and blood pressure increases the risk of acute myocardial infarction (abbr.: AMI). Also, insufficient rest increases the rate of AMI; the risk of AMI should be induced by the combination of working hours and the quantity and quality of sleep. Besides heart diseases, Yasuda et al. (2001) pointed out that long hours working may damage the self immunity, chronic headache and irritable bowel problems might be induced by working overtime (CIPD ,2001). 2.2.3 Psychological Health In Hong Kong, the number of construction site workers in September 2010 was in total 56,503 people, in which published by the Census and Statistics Department, the ratio of male and female was approximately 12:1. The female site workers are minority in the construction industry. Shields (2000) noted that women who used to work longer hours are more likely to develop depression compared to their colleagues working normal hours. Depression could be a measure in considering stress, which the term Stress is difficult to be defined. Spark et al. (1997) concluded that there were outcome measures when defining stress. The outcome measures should include depression, anxiety, frustration, mood symptoms, poor sleep quality, role strain, irritability/ tension, problems with relationships and general mental stress amongst other things. All these diverse indicators are used to define stress in different bases. There is a small but significant correlation between psychological health symptoms and length of working hours, it should be contrast relationship. However, it was not easy to provide evidences to access the actual association with long working hours and poor mental health outcomes (Kodz et al., 2001). 2.2.4 Performance Most of the available evidences support that poor performance is related to longer working hours, but the relationship should be complicated and not conclusive. By measuring the performance effects, productivity outcomes and, speed and accuracy tests are the direct and indirect measurements respectively. A report showed that the productivity reduced for 2-4% whiles the length of working time increased by 10% (Shepard and Clifton, 2000). By conducting survey with management level, Worrall and Cooper (1999) showed that 68% of managers felt that there was an adverse effect on their productivity after working for long period of time. Kodz et al. (2001) pointed out a poll result that 62% of the managers believed that shorter working hours gives workers more incentive in production. Fatigue induced by long working hours could be regarded as a stressor, and excessive stressors will lead to decrease the performance of workers, suggested by Proctor et al. (1996). However, an appropriate level of stressors will increase arousal and enhance performance. Some researches tried to find the relationship between work performance and the weekly working days and the daily working hours, those researches had tested the employees by adjusting the different combination of working time. Shepard and Clifton (2000) noted that the length of workweek possibly affects the productivity through effects on individual motivation, effort and satisfaction, physical well-being, stress and fatigue, and absenteeism. The result showed that there are many variables in considering the correlation of working hours and performance. 2.2.5 Safety and Accident People after working for long hours would like to lose their attention and would to take risks, work-related accidents might then happen. Fatigue due to long working hours might cause man-made disasters. Wellens (2001) noted that Chernobyl or the Exxon Valdez oil spill were contributed by such fatigue. Besides the fatigue, losing attention while working might bring harms to the workers in certain working environments which are exposure to toxic chemical or hazards. Ong et al. (1982) said that the prevalence of hand injuries should be related to lack of training, supervision, inexperience and time of day. The time of day when is most likely to have accidents should be around the 8th to  ­9th hour at work (Hanecke et al., 1998). The Labour Department announced the number of accidents of the construction industry was 7.1% among the major economic activities, which about 2,755 accidents within 2009-2010. According to the statistics published by Labour Department, the top five types of accidents were (1) Injured whilst lifting or carrying, (2) Slip, trip or fall on same level, (3) Striking against or struck by moving object, (4) Striking against fixed or stationary object and (5) Contact with moving machinery or object being machined. The above types of accidents should be man-made, which could be prevented or avoided by great attention, good supervision and training. There are clearly showed that long working hours could be related to safety and accidents in particular working environments. 2.3 Work-life Balance Work-life balance (abbr.: WLB) has been being concerned in Hong Kong few years ago. As began at 2004, The University of Hong Kong (HKU) and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Asia carried out a survey on the topic of work-life balance among the local employees, which was a questionnaire based survey. In that research, there were some benchmarks related to the situation in Hong Kong, they were length of working hours, general reasons for working overtime, effects on health, availability of sick leaves and annual leaves, and loyalty to company of the employees. In 2006, Community Business started to conducted a similar survey called The State of Work-Life Balance in Hong Kong, which published annually. The local situation about WLB is reviewed by this survey per year. And the objectives of the surveys are different by each year, the newest report published in 2010 studying the role of flexible work arrangements in improving the WLB of employees and reviewing the previous results since 2006. 2.3.1 Definition Until present, the concept of work-life balance is not well defined, but all the definitions are related to the work hours. If the hours of day are not measured, the concept of work- life balance should be intangible. The different combination of working hours and non-working hours in a day could provide a clear picture on the balance. Some people say WLB concerns flexibility of schedules, while the others say it is a reduction in working hours (Kodz et al., 2001; Dow-Clarke, 2000; Major et al., 2001; Fox and Dwyer, 1999; Wallace, 1999; ODriscoll et al., 1992). Also, the term of work-life balance is not the one used to describe the same issues around the world. Different researchers gave different terms to the issue in their own studies. For example, ODriscoll et al. (1992) preferred the term inter-role conflict to describe the conflicts within an individuals roles; work-family conflict brought up by Major et al. (2001) and Fox and Dwyer (1999); work-to-nonwork conflict proposed by W allace (1999). Dow-Clarke (2002) defined WLB with respect to family life, income and the life cycle of her selected employees. The work hours in WLB represent as short as achieving or maintaining individuals desired balance between work and family life. The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) in UK have made some practices of WLB in 2001, which are flexi-time, staggered hours, time off in lieu, compressed working weeks, shift swapping, self-rostering, working from home and etc. However, most of the practices are not practical to the workers in construction industry, especially in this study. Flexible working hours have been proposed in Hong Kong for several years, but it is not very popular; the practice has been only supported by large business companies and the Government. To narrow down the literatures review of WLB, the effects of working long hours on WLB would be focused. 2.3.2 Effects of long working hours on Work-Life Balance There are so many long hours standards in the various researches, some interviewed the employees working for 42 hours per week and some recorded the employees working more than 50 hours per week (Galambos and Walters, 1992; Wallace, 1999). It is not easy to compare the effects on long works. This review would aim to the effects on WLB only. As it is hard to measure the impacts of work on home, Kodz et al. (2001) concluded that most of the researches took off attitudinal survey or case study approaches. The survey released by DTI and Management Today in 2002, showing that the UK employees would prefer shorter working hours rather than winning the lottery and most of the workers admitted the low accessibility of any flexible working practices. For the effects on family life, there are three associations due to working long hours, (1) Disruption to family activities, (2) Dissatisfaction with the involvement and the amount of time spent in child care, and (3) Dissatisfaction with the amount of time spent with couples (La Valle et al., 2002). For the effects on personal life, they are relevant to depression and anxiety, stress, work life and role strain (Dow-Clarke, 2000; Galambos and Walters, 1992). In addition, Wallace (1999) concluded that the work life of individuals was the invader to the family life. 2.3.3 Influence of Work-Life Balance Besides the negative effects of working long hours on WLB, there are some practices like compressed workweek schedule and flexi-time schedule would be positive for working performance, job satisfaction and satisfaction with work schedule (Baltes et al. 1999). As mentioned before, there are some practices for improving WLB, which are all related to the work hours. Flexible time schedule, staggered hours, compressed workweek, shift swapping, self-rostering, annual hours, job sharing, working from home, and etc (DTI, 2001). All of them are the mechanisms to enhance the employees attitudes to work. Invancevich (1974) carried out a work performance comparison between workers worked for compressed workweek and workers worked for normal schedule; and Baltes et al. (1999) evaluated the work performance of workers under flex-time and compressed workweek, both of the studies showed the positive outcomes in shorter workweek. The latter study reflected job satisfaction and satisfaction with work schedule too. Baltes et al. (1999) pointed that the positive effects of compressed workweek would not diminish over time, and there was no disruption to the productivity of absenteeism too. The State of Work-Life Balance in Hong Kong Survey (2010) showed the problems resulting from poor WLB, there were the responses from employees. About 60% of respondents felt fatigue level, sleepiness and extreme tiredness prolonged by the poor work-life balance. Third of them complained the loss of amount of time to spend with family. Over a quarter of employees believed that their work hours invaded to their social life and decreased their job productivity. The results should be approximately same as the Work Life Balance Survey of Hong Kong Working Population published by HKU in 2009. To make a conclusion, the poor work-life balance affects the time arrangement of the employees throughout a day, functions as a stressor to the workers and harms the health of the workers. 2.4 Hypotheses of Study Long working hours is recognized as an element in the local construction industry. The factors for long working hours of each individual are various, most of them could be classified as four dimensions, requirements of jobs, income, cultures of workplaces and work satisfaction provided (Lindy,2009; Raphael and Itzhak, 2006; Weston et al., 2002). Impacts due to long working hours have been discussed for many years, which could be personal, family and social related. At the positive side, the employee could be served as a hardworking, motivated person, who should be a role model in a family (Dex et al., 1995). At the negative side, the physical and psychological health, family life, social network and safety problems are being affected by the long working hours (Lindy, 2009; Johanna and Joanne, 2003; Fox and Dwyer, 1999). Work-life balance is an important concept in a living person, but it is just mentioned for years in Hong Kong. There are many practices used to improve the balance, to reduce the proportion of work hours within the whole life. Such as flexible time schedule, staggered hours, compressed workweek, shift swapping, self-rostering, annual hours, job sharing, working from home, and etc are the ways used over the world (DTI, 2001; Baltes et al., 1999; Invancevich, 1974). For the consequences due to unbalanced work-life, there are loss of the involvement in family activities and child care, the amount of time with couples and full of stress and anxiety (La Valle et al., 2002; Dow-Clarke, 2000; Wallace, 1999; Galambos and Walters, 1992). Hypothesis 1- As suggested by the previous literatures, long working hours really affect the employee by different dimensions (Fox and Dwyer, 1999; Galambos and Walters, 1992). The workers are driven to work for longer hours by their own motivations (Lindy, 2009; Raphael and Itzhak, 2006). Since the degree of satisfaction in working long hours is different by people, it hypothesizes that the attitudes towards motivations that can enhance workers satisfaction in long working hours. Hypothesis 2- As mentioned before, people with unbalanced work-life will diminish their time in participating activities other than works (La Valle et al., 2002; Wallace 1999; Baltes et al. 1999), and make the life not well developed and healthy. It hypothesizes that flexible work arrangement can help work-life balance in all aspects like personal life, family life and productivity of work. CHAPTER 3:  Methodology 3.1 Introduction In the previous chapter, the background of the work hour problems faced by the workers in the construction industry was reviewed. Besides, the problems induced by long working hours and influences of Work-Life Balance were introduced in the literature review. The objectives of this study are (1) to identify the drawbacks of working hours to the local workers; (2) to examine the possible impacts due to excessively long working hours of the workers in the building construction industry; (3) to identify the concept of work-life balance; (4) to examine the leading international practice on controlling the maximum number of working hours of individual workers per week. In order to achieve the research objectives, a questionnaire survey had been conducted to collect data from construction workers, and a questions set with cover letter for interviews was designed to collect opinions from the union leaders and project managers in building general contractor firms. This chapter outlines the design of questionnaires, questions design of the interviews, data collection method and method of analysis undertaken in the next chapter. 3.2 Questionnaire Design In order to achieve the research objectives, a 10 questions questionnaire was designed (see Appendix 1). Part I required the respondents to provide their basic information such as gender, age, experience in the construction industry and form of employment. Part II required the respondents to provide their normal daily working hours and weekly work days, overall working hours per week, normal daily rest time and evaluate the current length of working hours. Part III listed the possible reasons for overtime work arrangement from practical cases (see Table 3.1). The respondents were asked to tick the top five reasons faced and sort the chosen reasons with numbers (1=most common, 5=least common). Shortage of Labours There are not enough labours and too many works remained. Poor arrangement of materials and/ or equipments The arrangement of materials and/ or equipments is not satisfied to the construction processes on site. Poor site management Planning is not practical enough and/ or the schedules of work are not up-to-date or poor leadership of supervisor. Reworks needed There are construction mistakes due to unclear instructions, lack of supervisions, poor quality control, careless mistakes made by workers and/ or inappropriate installations. Equipments damaged Equipments are damaged and/ or mal-function under normal operations. Changes of design Temporary scheduling caused by changes of design, preparation and construction of work have to be revised. Period of Contract Period of contract is too short for normal construction process. Unexpected weather Construction processes could not be operated caused by poor or unexpected weather, and then there is a delay. Others There are reasons not mentioned but happen in practical construction site. 3.3 Data Collection The targeted respondents of the questionnaire are the front-line workers who work in construction site. Two pages questionnaire was sent to the contractor firms and distributed to the targeted respondents. And some of the collected questionnaires were interviewed by face-to-face. The targeted interviewees were the project managers or site agents who are working in building general contractor firms and the leaders of the local labour unions. The questions set was sent to the targeted interviewees, email reply and phone interviews were conducted. 3.4 Data Analysis Method In this research, the data analysis was carried out by SPSS 17.0 for windows, including Enjoyment à ¤Ã‚ ½Ã¢â‚¬ Ãƒ ¥Ã‚ ¥Ã‚ ½Ãƒ ¥Ã‚ °Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ

Kesa and Morito

Love or Lust In Akutagawa’s â€Å"Kesa and Morito†, the text suggests notable differences between love and lust. In regards to the underlined symbols of love and lust, the characters identified within the short story may portray the differences between the symbols. Wataru’s character may symbolize the meaning of true love, and will identify the correlation to that of purity and innocence. However, the characteristics of Kesa and Morito may symbolize lust, and the evil and selfishness associated with it. Love may create kind and giving acts, such as the text describes Wataru’s actions toward Kesa.On the other hand, lust may lead to destructive and irrational gestures that are described by Kesa and Morito’s defining actions. According to Morito, Wataru Saemon-no-jo made a valiant effort to win the heart of his wife Mesa. Wataru loves his wife Kesa, and his actions proved such fact. Kesa’s aunt Koromogawa further stated, Wataru â€Å"spared no pain or effort to win Kesa’s heart† (p. 436). He has a reputation of being a prosaic man. With that said, Wataru even took on the burden of learning poetry. Wataru expressed his love for Kesa through the noted examples.The true symbol of love within the text appears to acknowledge Wataru and his efforts to win over Kesa. Wataru has a profound love for his wife. Due to such love, the text implies that Kesa and Morito may have felt sympathetic toward him. In a few circumstances, Kesa and Morito actually consider Wataru’s feeling throughout their encounter. In the beginning of the story, Morito explains how his heart would hurt if he has to kill a man he does not hate. When Morito found out that Wataru and Kesa were married, he burned with jealousy. After the affair with Kesa, Morito mentioned that his jealousy faded away.He actually stated that he has no hatred or spite toward Wataru. In fact, Morito thought kindly of Wataru. One can understand how Morito could bec ome jealous, knowing that the woman of his desire married another. After all, Morito had an association with Kesa three years prior. Without the three year absence, their relationship may have been different. Thus, many reasons can account for Morito to dislike or have hatred toward Wataru. Although the text does not state the exact reason Morito thinks kindly of Wataru, the inference may lead one to suggest.Due to the honorable means Wataru won over the heart of Kesa, Morito could not maintain malice thoughts. Ultimately, Morito acknowledged Wataru’s innocent and pure love for Kesa. Such attribute most likely caused Morito to idolize his character. Lusting after the flesh can be just a mere thought. Once the thought becomes an action, significant ramifications may follow. According to Morito, during the three year separation from Kesa, he dreamed of an intimate encounter with her. He never admits to loving Kesa, therefore an inference may suggest the feeling of superficial d esires.The dream of intimacy can lead one to believe that lust is a factor. As mentioned in the earlier text, Morito once burned with jealousy over the union between Kesa and Wataru. After their affair, the jealousy faded. Such fact may lead one to believe that love could not appear as a factor. Several times after intimacy, Morito questions his own feeling for Kesa. â€Å"But do I really love Kesa†? (p. 437) Morito asks. He thought that he loved her before she married Wataru. After looking into his own heart, he realized several motives may have caused such thought. Morito struggles with the fact that he had not intimately engaged her years prior.Knowing that Morito had never experienced intimacy prior to their absence, his fleshly desire may have been the driving force. His proclaimed love for her may simply unveil nothing more than â€Å"sentimental embellishment of the motive that drove Adam to Eve† (p. 437). The text suggests that within their three year break in association, Morito appeared unsure of his love for Kesa. Morito felt tortured with the fact of not experiencing Kesa’s body. He describes the feeling as regretful. Upon the completion of the Watanabe Bridge, Morito finally connected with Kesa.Morito resorted to all sorts of means to reconnect with the woman of his desires. Once they met, the regrets immediately began to fade. Due to the fact that he broke his virginity, his fleshly desire may have dissipated. As the text progress, Morito describes the diminished beauty of Kesa. He describes his disappointment, because she did not appear how he envisioned her to be. Morito states, that she does not possess the â€Å"statuesque beauty that he had imagined for the past three years† (p. 438). At such time, Morito felt the need to maintain the course and accomplish his past lustful desires.After intercourse, Morito felt an empty feeling. He did not feel an attachment with Kesa. Morito describes how lust dominated him. The unexplainable lust turned into hatred. Like a blink of an eye, Morito despised Mesa. After describing the confusion he felt with the lust and hatred, Morito decided to kill Wataru. As mentioned in the earlier passage, Morito thought kindly of Wataru. However, due to the confusion of lust and hatred, Morito felt no other way to address such iniquities. The gesture of killing Wataru clearly implies an irrational thought process, and could not be explained by Morito.Upon interpreting Kesa’s motive to engage in adultery, it appears that lustful feelings factored in her decision. According to Kesa, she felt ashamed of her actions. She described that she would have to live in shame, and live life like a prostitute. â€Å"In this case I shall carry my regret beyond my grave,† (p. 440) Kesa stated. Uncertain if Morito would kill Wataru, Kesa refers to Morito as selfish. Kesa describes the feeling of hurt, based upon the perception of ugliness within her heart. According to the text, Kesa mentions how she gave her body to a man she did not love.Her lustful behavior appears to summarize her action as a, â€Å"delirious moment† (p. 440). In addition, Kesa refers to Morito as a â€Å"lascivious man who hates and despises me† (p. 440). Although Kesa made it clear that she can not reciprocate her husband’s love, she maintains a deceitful lust for Morito. Kesa made an omission that she had a shameful desire for Morito. Ultimately, Kesa cast blame on Morito for taking her body for, â€Å"his wicked lust† (p. 441). After rationalizing the deadly ending, Kesa ponders about her husband’s feeling, in the event he should find her dead.In the end, her statement was, â€Å"no I won’t think of him† (p. 441). The contrast between love and lust were noted throughout â€Å"Kesa and Morito†. The only person associated with the symbol of love appears pure, genuine, and honorable. Wataru possesses all of those attributes and characteristics. On the other hand, Kesa and Morito were the symbols of lust and fleshly desires. Due to the decision to act upon the lustful desires, the text outlined reactions to such actions. In conclusion, the symbols of lust define the actions of evil and irrational thought processing.

2.03 Cell Membranes and Homeostasis Essay

Objective(s): The reason for this experiment is to see how starch and iodine affect each other and how a plastic bag works similar to a membrane in certain situations. Introduction: I know prior to doing this experiment that iodine mixed with starch creates a dark color and that most objects, organic and inorganic, naturally experience isotonic reactions. Hypothesis: I think that the potato will absorb more starch than the sweet potato and they will both absorb relatively similar amounts of water. Procedure: Variables: Controlled- water and size of potatoes. Manipulated variables- potatoes growth based on contents of solution. Data: Data and Observations Bag ContentInitial color of water/iodine solution in the cupFinal color of the solution in the cup Starch and Water Dark blue, purple Blackish Blue WaterOrangeyOrange Analysis Questions Part 1 1.Restate your hypothesis and discuss if the observed results supported the hypothesis. -Based off what I observed, my hypothesis, stating that the potato will absorb more starch than the sweet potato, was correct. 2.Identify the control and variables in your experiment. -Variables: Controlled- water and size of potatoes. Manipulated variables- potatoes growth based on contents of solution. 3.Why do we observe the color of the solution before adding the sandwich bags to each cup? -To make sure that the solutions contain the necessary contents. 4.Based on your observations, is the sandwich bag permeable to starch? To iodine? -Iodine is permeable to the sandwich bag, while starch is not. 5.Look up the molecular structures of starch and iodine, and use those structures to explain your observations. -Starch is a more complex compound than iodine, making it easier for iodine to pass through objects. 6.If a balance was available, describe how you could use it in this experiment and what the purpose would be. -The balance could be used to also see the difference is the potatoes before and after the observation time. 7.Living organisms are made of cells. Those cells must receive nutrients and gases in order to undergo the metabolic processes that maintain homeostasis. In paragraph form, explain how you think the nutrients and gases enter the cell. Distinguish between the molecules that can enter by diffusion by simply moving across the membrane and those that must expend energy to cross the cell membrane. -Nutrients enter cells in to major ways, through active and passive transport. When a molecule uses diffusion or other processes that require no energy, they are using passive transport. An example molecule for this would be water or glucose. Other molecules, that need to use energy to enter a cell use active transport. Many molecules that use this are macromolecules, like proteins. Molecules use one of these two transports to enter a cell. 8.List three criteria cells use to select materials to enter or leave the cell. Then explain the role of each criterion in determining the type of transport a cell will use for different sized molecules. For instance, small molecules move across the membrane by diffusion, given they are moving with the concentration gradient. -Water can enter the cell in order to balance the amount inside to the amount of the environment. This is passive due to the fact that it happens without any external energy. -Some molecules can pass into the cell by facilitated diffusion. This is passive due to the nature of diffusion and because the solute is moving down its concentration gradient. – Sodium is moved out of an animal cell while potassium is moved into the cell by the sodium-potassium-pump. This is through active transport because it uses energy. Restate your hypothesis and discuss if the observed results supported the hypothesis. -Based off what I observed, my hypothesis, stating that the potato will absorb more starch than the sweet potato, was correct. 2.Use your observations to explain if each type of cell (potato, sweet potato/pear/apple) was isotonic, hypertonic, or hypotonic to each of the solutions. Explain what happened to each type of cell in response to the type of solution it was in. -Potato- it was hypertonic and gained water in the water solution. In the starch solution, it was hypotonic. -Sweet Potato- it was hypertonic in the water solution and went through plasmolysis in the starch solution. 3.Based on the observed volume changes, which of  the vegetables/fruits used in this experiment has a greater amount of sucrose in its cells? Explain your answer. -The Sweet Potato seemed to have an originally larger amount of sucrose in its cells. Conclusion: In conclusion, it seems like the hypothesis was relatively c orrect. From the data collected from the experiment, the two potato samples were subjected to different solutions. The potato was hypertonic to the distilled water and hypotonic to the starch solution. The sweet potato, on the other hand, was a little harder to determine, though it was obvious that it was hypertonic to the distilled water, it was hard to determine if it was hypo-,hyper-, or isotonic. Since it was hard, I did a little research and realized that what I was seeing was the sweet potato going through plasmolysis. This experiment was somewhat difficult due to the fact that I was observing periodically, but it seems like it was a success.