Building Design Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Building Design - Essay Example Rondeau et al. suggests this formula for computing payback period as: (2006, p. 145). For example, an individual decides to purchase a condominium unit in Central London as an investment for  £245,000. He further invests around  £25,000 to furnish the unit and make it easily leasable. Thus his total investment is  £270,000. He then is able to rent it out for  £1,900 while spending about  £100 in maintenance, thus is able to generate a net profit of  £1,800 a month. Using the above formula, it will take a 12  ½ years for the owner to recover the condominium’s purchase price through the net profit of the lease. Rate of return is a financial measure of the profitability of an investment or a project. It is â€Å"what you get, minus what you started out with, expressed as a percentage of what you started with† (Getlner, et al., 2007, p. 176). Using the above example in the payback period concept, let us examine the rate of return of the condominium unit investment as several periods of time. At 12  ½ years, the owner would have made  £270,000 of rental profits, equal to the initial investment on the unit. Therefore, the rate of return on the 12.5th year would have been 0%. However if he waited 2  ½ more years to assess his investment, he would realize a 20% rate of return or  £54,000. There are two types of returns, one that is time-based, called periodic returns and one that is dollar-weighted (or in this case, pounds-weighted) called internal rate of return (Getlner, et al., 2007, p. 174). Internal rate of return, commonly referred to as IRR is applicable to real estate investments because it can compute investment performance over long periods of time which is the usual case in owning a property. One need not know the yearly value of the asset, the important information is the value of the capital investment at

Video Game Violence Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Video Game Violence - Research Paper Example On the other hand, some video games may have potential benefits to children. The games’ realistic and stimulating character has made it extremely acceptable and trendy to the younger generation. Statistics show that almost 80% of American children, ages 7 to 17 years old, play an average of 8 hours daily. While some games available in the market are suitably wholesome, beneficial and educational for children; some games, particularly those with ultra violent content could be destructive and inappropriate. The intensification of electronic play together with the escalating incidences of youth crimes has led to massive government and police investigations and legislative schemes worldwide (â€Å"School Age: Video Game Addiction†). Majority of conducted studies have been centered on the negative correlation between electronic games and aggressive behavior among the youth; and assessment of strategies aimed at reduction of risks to minors. However, minimal studies have been carried out to prove some probabilities of constructive influences on children’s development (Salonius-Pasternak and Gelfond 6). Despite numerous researches on the impact of violent electronic games on children, there appears to be as much perplexity as ever. Why do video games increase violence and aggression among the youth? How do these games affect children’s behavior? Why do those children already exposed to violence in society choose games of aggression? We may or may not find convincing answers to link video games with violent behavior. Psychoanalysts, educators, scientists, computer technologists, parents and even commoners may give different opinions and through them, we will be able to understand the reasons behind their arguments. This article will analyze the different viewpoints of different observers. Potential benefits and negative impacts will be presented, as well as this author’s personal analysis on the issue: Evidences of exhibited aggressiv e behavior in children and the growing incidence of crimes committed by young gamers are linked with over-exposure to video games; however, the probabilities of video games’ positive influences should not be ignored. Evidences of exhibited aggressive behavior in children and the growing incidence of crimes committed by young gamers are linked with over-exposure to video games; however, the probabilities of video games’ positive influences should not be ignored. In the seventies, modernization and technological innovations introduced electronic game play to society, particularly targeting the interest of the younger generation. Since then, video game play became a major part of children’s daily activities. In the 1980s, classrooms were equipped with computers and later, computers were recognized as providers of knowledge. Studies showed that educational software and games can undeniably have numerous beneficial effects on children’s academic performance (K ent). The beneficial effects electronic play has on children should not be discounted. Video games are educators. The interactive nature of this electronic media can be highly motivational; children become enthusiastically connected; they learn through repetition; and are rewarded for skillful

The Blind Side Essay Example for Free

The Blind Side Essay Belonging is a sense of enlightenment felt when an individual gains an understanding of themselves in relation to others and society. Once the characters belong to their family and to themselves, belonging to society and the rest of the world becomes easy. â€Å"Looking for Alibrandi† by Marlina Marchetta and the film â€Å"The Blind Side† directed by John Lee Hancock, both show how each character gains an understanding of themselves and their family therefore leading to them to belong to society. Throughout the novel, Josie’s perceptions of herself and Nonna’s relationship undergo a significant transformation. Initially, Josie does not feel she belongs to her Nonna because of the limitations she places on her. It is only at the end of the novel that Josie learns the true heart-ache and suffering her Nonna went through for her mother. Marchetta uses the intimate feel of a diary to relate to the story of the three women bound by strong ties of family. It shows how each of the women belongs to each other and it also shows the barriers to their relationships. Linear Structure gives the book a strong sense of continuity and ensures a steady pace of the story line. At the beginning of the novel Josie says â€Å"She drives me crazy. Sometimes I have to grit my teeth sometimes to control myself†, showing that she does not feel she belongs to her Nonna. Towards the end she states â€Å"I cried because I was loved by two of the strongest women I would ever meet in my lifetime†. The discovery that she does truly belong to her Nonna encourages Josie to be her own person and to live her life emancipated from any rigid stereotypes that are barriers to belonging. Once she belongs to her Nonna, she then realises she belongs to herself, making belonging to society easier. Cultural identity is a very strong factor in Josie’s life. At first it is a barrier to her belonging to society and she rails against it as being old-fashioned and sexist. She realises towards the end of the book that her culture has made her who she is and what she is capable of becoming. Throughout the novel her references to her culture are often sarcastic or mocking. Josie asserts light heartedly that without the Italian tendency for being chatty and loud â€Å"Telecom would go broke†. Marchetta uses humour to show how Josie speaks with the voice of today’s youth and she speaks of issues that are contemporary and with which readers can relate to. Initially, at school especially, she feels victimised by her race and doesn’t belong. She is bitter and resentful to those not like her and often resorts to physical abuse in response to ‘wog’ insults. â€Å"Simply because like religion, culture is nailed into you so deep you can’t escape it†. This conveys that even though sometimes Josie wishes she wasn’t Italian that makes her who she is. After she learns to accept that towards the end of the novel, she starts to belong to herself and to her culture and then making it easier to belong to her school. At first Josie does not feel as if she belongs to her family, however she comes to a realisation that her culture isn’t a barrier to her belonging; she can then belong to herself and to society. Just like Josie, Michael Oher realises that his race isn’t a barrier to belonging to his family, he belongs to himself and he becomes accepted in society.

Speaker identification and verification over short distance telephone l

SPEAKER IDENTIFICATION AND VERIFICATION OVER SHORT DISTANCE TELEPHONE LINES USING ARTIFICIAL NEURAL NETWORKS Ganesh K Venayagamoorthy, Narend Sunderpersadh, and Theophilus N Andrew gkumar@ieee.org sundern@telkom.co.za theo@wpo.mlsultan.ac.za Electronic Engineering Department, M L Sultan Technikon, P O Box 1334, Durban, South Africa. ABSTRACT Crime and corruption have become rampant today in our society and countless money is lost each year due to white collar crime, fraud, and embezzlement. This paper presents a technique of an ongoing work to combat white-collar crime in telephone transactions by identifying and verifying speakers using Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs). Results are presented to show the potential of this technique. 1. INTRODUCTION Several countries today are facing rampant crime and corruption. Countless money is lost each year due to white collar crime, fraud, and embezzlement. In today’s complex economic times, businesses and individuals are both falling victims to these devastating crimes. Employees embezzle funds or steal goods from their employers, then disappear or hide behind legal issues. Individuals can easily become helpless victims of identity theft, stock schemes and other scams that rob them of their money White collar crime occurs in the gray area where the criminal law ends and civil law begins. Victims of white collar crimes are faced with navigating a daunting legal maze in order to effect some sort of resolution or recovery. Law enforcement is often too focused on combating â€Å"street crime† or does not have the expertise to investigate and prosecute sophisticated fraudulent acts. Even if criminal prosecution is pursued, a criminal conviction does not mean that the victims of fraud are able to recover their losses. They have to rely on th criminal courts awarding restitution after the conviction and by then the perpetrator has disposed of or hidde most of the assets available for recovery. From the civil law perspective, resolution and recovery can just be a difficult as pursuing criminal prosecution. Perpetrators of white collar crime are often difficult to locate and served with civil process. Once the perpetrators have been located and served, proof must be provided that the fraudulent act occurred and recovery/damages are needed. This usually takes a lengthy legal fight, which often can cost the victim more money than t... ...phone speech†, IEEE Signal Processing Letters, vol. 2 no. 3 March 1995, pp. 46 - 48. [2] J.M.Naik, L.P.Netsch, G.R.Doddington, â€Å"Speaker verification over long distance telephone lines†, Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing (ICASSP), 23-26 May 1989, pp. 524 - 527. [3] A.L.Mcilraith, H.C.Card, â€Å"Birdsong Recognition Using Backpropagation and Multivariate Statistics†, Proceedings of IEEE Trans on Signal Processing, vol. 45, no. 11, November 1997. [4] G.K.Venayagamoorthy, V.Moonasar, K.Sandrasegaran, â€Å"Voice Recognition Using Neural Networks†, Proceedings of IEEE South African Symposium on Communications and Signal Processing (COMSIG 98), 7-8 September 1998, pp. 29 - 32. [5] V.Moonasar, G.K.Venayagamoorthy, â€Å"Speaker identification using a combination of different parameters as feature inputs to an artificial neural network classifier†, accepted for publication in the Proceedings of IEEE Africon 99 conference, Cape Town, 29 September – 2 October 99. [6] H.Demuth, M.Beale, MATLAB Neural Network Toolbox User’s Guide, The Maths Works Inc., 1996. [7] T.Kohonen, Self-organizing and associate memory Spring Verlag, Berlin, third edition, 1989.

Psychology and Sensation Seeker

Take a look at the material on sensation seeking on page 286 (Ch. 11). Do you consider yourself a sensation seeker? Why or why not? What are the advantages and disadvantages of your level of sensation seeking? I am not a sensation seeker because I prefer peace and happiness. I am the type of person that likes to see the same people and have a routine to follow which I feel comfortable in. The advantages of my level of sensation seeking are that I am more likely to find peace and happiness compared to someone who has a higher level of sensation seeking.The disadvantages might be people calling me boring and not having as much fun as I should be having. How would you rate your own achievement motivation? Why? In what ways is this an advantage to you? In what ways is it a disadvantage? I would rate my own achievement motivation very high. I say this because I fit all of the descriptions mentioned in the book and I enjoy excelling in the things I do. When I have an easy task in front of me I find it boring but when I have a difficult task I tend to feel worried because I might do poorly.This is an advantage because I know it pushes me to do better in all of the things I do in my life. It is a disadvantage because my self-esteem can be lowered when I don’t do well on something and it might also affect those around me. What did you learn about yourself from reading about the trait theories of personality? I learned that I have the following traits: Openness, Conscientiousness and Agreeableness. I am opened to new ideas, self-disciplined, sociable, talkative and affectionate.I am a weird mix because I am opened to new ideas but I tend to like routines and being comfortable with my surroundings. At the same time I am sociable, talkative and affectionate which is kind of weird. To better explain I am a junior accountant at a commercial real estate company who sits in a cubicle all day but I am very outgoing and talkative like a salesperson. I always get complimen ts from people for being so outgoing while being an accountant which is a weird thing. What did you learn about yourself from reading the other theories of personality? List and explain at least three things. ) I now know I am aware of my actions which is something I never really thought about before. I also learned that I am a person who enjoys doing things for the thrill that comes from doing things instead of doing things for the outcome. I also learned that I am self-disciplined which is something I never paid attention to before either. These are great things I learned about myself from reading the theories of personality which I would of never thought of before.How will you use this material on personality to improve your relationships (personal and/or professional)? I will use this information in order to better understand myself and other in both my personal and professional life. I know no two people are alike and now I can manage to speak to them and treat them based on th eir personality so they feel comfortable. I will also use this material to better understand myself and my way of thinking in order to excel at the things I do.

Cultural Imperialism And The United States - 1475 Words

During my time in Guatemala, I believe that the social issues I came in the most contact with were hegemony and cultural imperialism, or in other words, the influence the United States has over Guatemala. No matter where I was, whether it be the streets of the small town of San Miguel or the larger, more developed city of Guatemala City, I could not help but notice how much of an impact the United States has. Throughout the course of a month we learned a lot about the root causes of poverty- America as a hegemon- through both readings and discussion. The footprint the U.S. has left in Guatemala was apparent not only while reading and learning about the history of Latin America, but while visiting the country itself. In addition, we had the†¦show more content†¦As you walk or drive through Guatemala, you are sure to see countless billboards, much like in the U.S. Being from the U.S., this seems completely normal. The signs even looked very similar. When I took a closer look a t the signs, I noticed why they looked so similar. There were American models on the signs. In particular, I noticed a blonde-haired woman on the front of a billboard advertising shampoo. I also noticed American women on billboards advertising jeans and beer. When looking into bars I saw calendars with American women as well. It was impossible not to notice the influence that the U.S. had not only on methods of advertising, but also on the images used. In addition to noticing the U.S. hegemon while on the streets of Guatemala, I also noticed it while living with the people. While staying with host families, we were given the opportunity to take in an entirely different culture- or so we thought. Even though living amongst Guatemalans was a very new experience, it was also very evident that the U.S. had impacted the traditional Guatemalan way of life. The first thing that I noticed while living with my host family was the way they dressed. My host parents wore what can be considered as â€Å"traditional† clothing. They had not let any outside influence impact their decision in clothing. However, my host siblings we not mirroring their parents. My host siblings ranged from fourteen years old to about thirty years old. They wore much more casualShow MoreRelatedThe World War II And The Middle East1332 Words   |  6 Pages20th centuries, imperialism served a mode of global exploration and expansion of economic, political and religious influence. Glory was at stake; the opportunity to expound upon their influence on the balance of power galvanized most of Europe to explore and colonize Central Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. In the period of European imperialism, imperialism served as conveyer of status and power in world affairs; the more imperialist territory, a more powerful nation state. 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How I Learned to Drive Summary of Play by Paula Vogel

In How I Learned to Drive, a woman nicknamed Lil Bit recalls memories of emotional manipulation and sexual molestation, all of which are tied together with driving lessons. When Uncle Peck volunteers to teach his niece how to drive, he uses the private time as an opportunity to take advantage of the girl. Much of the story is told in reverse, starting with the protagonist in her teen years and echoing back to the first occurrence of molestation (when she is only eleven years old). The Good As the chair of Yales Playwriting Department, Paula Vogel hopes that each of her students will embrace originality. In an interview on YouTube, Vogel seeks playwrights who are fearless and want to experiment, who want to make sure that they never write the same play twice. She leads by example; Vogels work lives up to the same expectations. Compare How I Learned to Drive with her AIDS tragicomedy The Baltimore Waltz, and youll understand how her plot-lines and style vary from one play to the next. Some of the many strengths of How I Learned to Drive  include: Humor and wit steer the play away from over-bearing life lessons.A mock-Greek chorus allows for a multitude of interesting characters.Its never boring: the non-linear style jumps from one year to the next. The Not-So-Good Because the play strives not to preach in the style of an ABC After School Special, theres a sense of (intentional) moral ambiguity spread throughout the play. Near the end of this drama, Lil Bit wonders aloud, Who did it to you, Uncle Peck? How old were you? Were you eleven? The implication is that the child molester was himself a victim, and while that may be a common thread among real-life predators, it doesnt explain the level of sympathy that is offered to a creep like Peck. Check out the end of her monologue when Lil Bit compares her Uncle to the Flying Dutchman: And I see Uncle Peck in my mind, in his Chevy 56, a spirit driving up and down the back roads of Carolina - looking for a young girl who, of her own free will, will love him. Release him. The details mentioned above are all psychologically realistic elements, all of which make for great discussion in the classroom or the theater lobby. However, there is a scene in the middle of the play, a lengthy monologue delivered by Uncle Peck, which depicts him fishing with a young boy and luring him into a tree house to take advantage of the poor kid. Basically, Uncle Peck is a pathetic, repulsive serial-molester with a coating of nice guy/car enthusiast. The character Lil Bit is not his only victim, a fact to be mindful of if the reader leans towards pity for the antagonist. The Playwrights Goals According to a PBS interview, playwright Paula Vogel felt dissatisfied looking at the movie-of-the-week approach, and decided to create How I Learned to Drive as an homage to Nabokovs Lolita, focusing on the female perspective instead of the male point-of-view. The result is a play that depicts a pedophile as a very flawed, yet very human character. The audience may be disgusted by his actions, but Vogel, in the same interview, feels that its a mistake to demonize the people who hurt us, and thats how I wanted to approach the play. The result is a drama that combines humor, pathos, psychology and raw emotions. Is Uncle Peck Really a Slime Ball? Yes. He definitely is. However, he is not as invidious or as violent as the antagonists from movies such as The Lovely Bones or Joyce Carol Oatss story, Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? In each of those narratives, the villains are predatory, seeking to victimize and then eliminate the victim. In contrast, Uncle Peck actually hopes to develop a normal long-term romantic relationship with his niece. During several incidents throughout the play, Peck continues to tell her I wont do anything until you want me to. These intimate albeit disturbing moments generate feelings of trust and control within Lil Bit, when in truth her uncle is instilling a cycle of abnormal, self-destructive behavior that will affect the protagonist well into adulthood. During the scenes in which Lil Bit discusses her present-day life as an adult woman, she indicates that she has become dependent on alcohol, and on at least one occasion she has seduced a teenage boy, perhaps to have the same sort of control and influence her uncle once possessed over her. Uncle Peck is not the only loathsome character in the play. Lil Bits family members, including her mother, are oblivious to the warning signs of a sexual predator. The grandfather is openly misogynistic. Worst of all, Uncle Pecks wife (Lil Bits aunt) knows of her husbands incestuous relationship, but she does nothing to stop him. You have probably heard of the phrase, It takes a village to raise a child. Well, in the case of How I Learned to Drive, it takes a village to destroy a childs innocence.