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Most Recent Articles
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- Displacing Institutions And Civic Engagement
Since the introduction of traditional institutional forms of communication, like the press and telephony, people have been engaged in numerous discussions regarding their role in the process, their power to alter or affect technological innovations, their reactions to adopt or reject the latest manifestations. Academic debates and endless public discussions resulted in a situation where no right or wrong answer prevailed. All were possible, everything was applicable. As historians emphasize, most people seemed reluctant to accept newer forms of communications as they were trying to sustain a certain way of living, secure their position in society and most importantly, maintain a clear focus between the old and the new needs that evolved. Thus, the outcome of any suggested displacement became one of the central focus points in cultural studies, politics and other sciences, since the disintermediation was able to blur the ground upon which an action could be decided and a conclusion reached.
One of the most important institutions that has been threatened to be displaced, if not in its entirety, in at least some of its functions, was that of the family. Traditionally, the institution of the family is responsible for the overall socialization of a person, as it constitutes the first small community in which an individual evolves and learns to interact with other community members. Over the past century, due to economic, political and social changes, the traditional family unit has altered the way it interacts in relation to its members and with the rest of the society. Unfortunately, especially in Western societies, the role of the family has been altered and individualism is promoted as the basic principle having the primary role in a person's life. The institution of the family has lost its original appeal and power. This realization does not come as a shock, as it is directly related with the increasing divorce numbers or the lower numbers of civic engagement among other reasons that led to the diminished social capital. Parents and children reconstructed their relationships and directed their focus away from traditional family values. As an individual is taught from an early age that economic success and tangible rewards shall better serve him/her in the future, in comparison to healthy individual relationships, one tends to become less interested in creating a family, get involved in volunteer work, embrace humanitarianism or strive for social welfare. In today's fierce competitive environment, the focus of a person is directed towards a satisfactory monetary compensation during his/her professional career that is based on previous educational choices and academic performances. - Reading The Signs Of The Times
Several decades ago, Mohandas K. Gandhi warned against what he called the seven social sins: politics without principle, wealth without work, commerce without morality, pleasure without conscience, education without character, science without humanity, and worship without sacrifice.
Gandhi's social sins point to the crucial relationship between our ethics and our public life. That relationship has proven in the 21st Century to be the main subject in scholarly debates and the primary focus of constant questioning regarding the future course of human interaction, in relation to the latest technological advancements. In the vast global marketplace, people have to redefine themselves according to their needs and classify their wants/desires along a streamline of corporate offers. Incorporating ethos, dignity and self-awareness in this new technological era has become more than a challenge for today's consumers. At the same time, corporate actors begin to steadily realize that their survival depends heavily on recognizing this battlefield and to act proactively so as to come up with innovative flexible channels to service their targets. Redefining these new competent and knowledge markets has become for firms a must that needs to be carefully planned before attempting to indulge consumer minds. - Michelle Wie Is The Real Deal
Golfer Michelle Wie has gained worldwide attention for her attempts to compete in the men's PGA Tour, about how she has come so close (one stroke short of qualifying for the 2004 PGA Tour Sony Open) yet never quite made the cut. .But let's not forget that she also deserves our attention for her outstanding golf prowess and for her remarkable accomplishments to date. She may not yet have what it takes to compete with the big boys, but Michelle Wie is the real deal.
Witness the amazing records that the 16-year-old prodigy has set in such a short time: youngest player ever to qualify for an adult USGA-sanctioned tournament -age 10 years, 9 months, 24 days (2000 Women's U.S. Amateur Public Links); youngest player ever to qualify for an LPGA tournament - age 12 (2002 LPGA Takefuji Classic); The youngest winner (male or female) of an adult USGA-sanctioned tournament - age 13 (2003 Women's U.S. Amateur Public Links); youngest player to make a cut in an LPGA tournament and major - age 13 (2003 Nabisco Championship); youngest player to play in a PGA Tour event - age 14 (2004 Sony Open);lowest round by a female in a PGA Tour event (also the first female to score a sub-70 round in PGA Tour history) - 68 (2004 & 2006 Sony Open)l youngest player to play in Curtis Cup history - age 14 (2004); youngest female to make a cut in any professional male tour event - age 16 (2006 SK Telecom Open); first female medalist in a men's US Open qualifying tournament - age 16 (2006 US Open Local Qualifying at Turtle Bay Hawaii). - Building Groups Into Teams
People working on teams such as quality circles, project groups, or autonomous production teals accomplish the majority of an organization's work. However, some groups work like a dream team, appearing to accomplish miracles, while others generate nightmares. What makes the difference? The answer lies in appropriate group membership, structures, processes and training. If group members with appropriate skills and attitudes are trained to understand their own and other' role requirements, they can develop to collaborate without dysfunctional conflicts to achieve common objectives. However, firms have several paradoxes to manage.
One is that the cohesiveness that groups develop, when members value their association with one another and their common goals can promote enhanced satisfaction and extra synergy, but it can also reinforce resistance to change and underachievement if members need to relinquish behaviors that are accepted as group norms. - Do Mass Media Influence The Political Behavior Of Citizens
Outside of the academic environment, a harsh and seemingly ever-growing debate has appeared, concerning how mass media distorts the political agenda. Few would argue with the notion that the institutions of the mass media are important to contemporary politics. In the transition to liberal democratic politics in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe the media was a key battleground. In the West, elections increasingly focus around television, with the emphasis on spin and marketing. Democratic politics places emphasis on the mass media as a site for democratic demand and the formation of "public opinion". The media are seen to empower citizens, and subject government to restraint and redress. Yet the media are not just neutral observers but are political actors themselves. The interaction of mass communication and political actors — politicians, interest groups, strategists, and others who play important roles — in the political process is apparent. Under this framework, the American political arena can be characterized as a dynamic environment in which communication, particularly journalism in all its forms, substantially influences and is influenced by it.
According to the theory of democracy, people rule. The pluralism of different political parties provides the people with "alternatives," and if and when one party loses their confidence, they can support another. The democratic principle of "government of the people, by the people, and for the people" would be nice if it were all so simple. But in a medium-to-large modern state things are not quite like that. Today, several elements contribute to the shaping of the public's political discourse, including the goals and success of public relations and advertising strategies used by politically engaged individuals and the rising influence of new media technologies such as the Internet. - The Vast Potential Of Human Cloning
Think of a world where infertile, childless couples can go to a medical clinic, purchase cell replacements for malfunctioning cells in the reproductive system and, thus, bear kids; a world where people afflicted with degenerative diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's Disease can replace their damaged cells and be cured again; a world where the crippled can get the much-needed cells to revive their spinal chord and walk again.
Those amazing medical and scientific feats are only the tip of the iceberg when the potential of human cloning is concerned. Developed to its extreme, human cloning can make disease and sickness, maybe even physical suffering altogether, a thing of the past. - Two Views Of Social Responsibility
Government regulation and public awareness are external forces that have increased the social responsibility of business. But business decisions are made within the company. Two contrasting philosophies, or models, define the range of management attitudes toward social responsibility; the economic and the socioeconomic model.
According to the traditional concept of business, a firm exists to produce quality goods and services, earn a reasonable profit and provide jobs. In line with this concept, the economic model of social responsibility holds that society will benefit more when business is left alone to produce and market profitable products that society needs. To the manager who adopts this traditional attitude, social responsibility is someone else's job. After all, stockholders invest in a corporation to earn a return on their investment, not because the firm is socially responsible and the firm is legally obligated to act in the economic interest of its stockholders. - Setis Online Quest For Extra Terrestrials
Space. The great beyond. Are we alone in the galaxy? Researchers at the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence, or SETI, have pondered the question for years. Drawing on high-powered radio telescopes, SETI has been scanning the stars for years, searching for answers to the questions that our existence poses. While the search has relied upon private funding and dedicated researchers for years and years, they've created an opportunity to help the search from the courtesy of your own home.
A program was created by the researchers to help coordinate data analysis, which they dubbed SETI@home. The program is a client which can be downloaded from the website http://setiathome.berkeley.edu and it allows armchair scientists a chance at discovering rogue signals from alien galaxies. Self-governing, the program downloads chunks of data that were picked up by SETI's telescopes and analyzes it for any possible anomalies. Launched in May of 1999, the program has seen much success as a means for processing large chunks of data. Functioning like a virtual supercomputer, the processing power used on a day-to-day basis for scanning the skies is enormous. Over 5.2 million people have participated in the program worldwide, contributing over two million years of computing time collectively. As of April 17th of 2006, the processing power of the computers linked to SETI@home rests at around 250 Teraflops. By comparison, the strongest supercomputer in the world, Blue Gene, can process 280 Teraflops, slightly more than the SETI network. There are plenty of dedicated individuals giving their computer's processing power to the site. - A Social Group With Substance
If you're new to a town, or looking to change your life by bringing new people into it, there's a website that can really help your struggle. Located at http://www.meetin.org, MettIn is a website that provides ample opportunity for social exchanges completely free of charge. Completely staffed by volunteers, there are separate MeetIn pages for a host of cities across the USA and abroad. Members can communicate with each other, post events, and RSVP for events that they plan on attending. Every bit of the site is composed by those who choose to be actively social in the group, and it truly achieves its goals of providing a great place for people to get to know each other and have a good time.
Without the pressures of some of the ‘singles' sites out there, members in MeetIn come from all walks of life, from those who are looking for love to those that are just looking to have a good time experiencing some of the funnest activities their home town has to offer. The age range of the participants on the site varies widely and you're quite likely to find someone that you can really relate to if you dedicate even a minute amount of time to attending the site's events. On the site, you can find multiple events listed with several activities being planned per week by the site's most dedicated volunteers. You can forge lifelong friendships and create memories that you'll cherish for the rest of your days simply by attending some of the events and seeing exactly what life has to offer. Also, you'll find yourself talking to people from different walks of life that you would never normally have the opportunity to encounter. - Basic Human Societies
The word "society" refers to a group of people who occupy a certain territory and possess a distinct culture, characteristics and institutions. Oftentimes, societies are also held together by a system of shared beliefs or common goals.
There are four types of human societies based on means of subsistence. These are the hunter-gatherer societies, nomadic pastoral societies, horticulturalist or simple farming societies and intensive agricultural societies (civilizations). Some classifications also list industrial and post-industrial societies, although this may fall under agricultural societies. - Wearing A Red Ribbon
On February 7, 1985 at 2:00 p.m. the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent Enrique (Kiki) Camarena was attacked by five men while opening his truck doors intending to drive and meet his wife for lunch. The beige Volkswagen were he was forced in disappeared that warm winter afternoon in the streets of Guadalajara, Mexico. One month later, Camarena's body was found savagely and grotesquely murdered.
When Camarena joined the US DEA, after having served as a Marine and becoming a police officer, his mother tried to convince him to resign, but he was determined to make a difference. In 1974, he was transferred to Guadalajara, Mexico, the center at the time of the drug trafficking empire and working as an undercover agent was investigating a major drug cartel believed to include officers in the Mexican army, the police and the government. A firm believer of the notion that even one person can make a difference in this world, Camarena, at the age of 37, sacrificed his life to prevent drugs from entering the United States schools and streets. - Astronomy
The stars have always been a fascinating subject. Perhaps that's one reason why astronomy is so popular these days.
In essence, Astronomy isn't just about studying stars, as most people think. It's actually a study of celestial objects, which includes not only stars but also planets, comets and entire galaxies. In fact, Astronomy also studies different phenomena that come from outside of the earth's atmosphere, such as auroras and cosmic background radiation. - Weird Weather News
We are half-way through this warm weather month of August and the heat has become something of a burden and a hassle for many of us. Good thing the weather can be a source of amusement too sometimes. There were two reports last week about the weather that just made me smile. I’m re-telling them here in an effort to provide you with something to smile (or smirk) about this summer.
The first report, which originated from Moscow in Russia, recounted how Alyona Gabitova, a Russian woman from the town of Uljanovsk, was suing local weather forecasters for making a wrong prediction about the weather that ultimately ruined her holiday trip.
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