A New Wave of Competitors Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

A New Wave of Competitors - Case Study Example The company mainly targets the wealthy and high income customers that have an average income that is at least 12 percent higher than the rest of the population and currently Reed owns 14 percent of the market share. Reed Supermarkets has a reputation of around 80 years for its service as a supermarket chain. Reed is now known nationwide and is serving a huge population. This creates a competitive advantage for the company and places them at an upper position relative to its competitors. The layout of the stores of Reed Supermarkets is attractively planned. Attractive stores and good service allowed Reed to differentiate itself from other competitors in the industry. Among the factors the most distinguishing are long store hours and short time for checkout, adequate number of staff, elegant and creative serving-case displays, extensive customer service and runners carrying bags of the customers to their cars. Customers are not required to provide tips to the staff while leaving. The p laces in which the stores are located show high population growth and even in many of these places, the growth rate of population is above the average rate of growth in the rest of the country. This shows that there is high prospect for the company to increase store traffic. The store visibility is also enhanced since large number of customer would visit the store and they would act as word of mouth promoter. Weaknesses Reed offers high quality products to its customers, but, according to the perception of a considerably large segment of the target customer, prices charged by Reeds is high. Therefore only a selected slice of the market can buy products from its stores. There is no harmony among the management of the company about the appropriate strategy that must be implemented for increasing market share. Contradiction exists among managers about discounts, high-margin items, introduction of low price specials and double couponing. On this issue, they have not been able to choose the most apt solution from the different opinions provided by each of them. The company has drawn a line on its capital expenditure for at least the coming two years starting from 2011. Such freezing on capital expenditure would affect the operations and growth path of the company. In order to meet higher revenue objectives more stores have to be opened. However, stringent capital expenditure policy might hamper such ambitions and impair the growth of the business. Opportunities Political/Legal The supermarket industry in the USA faces the support of strong lobbying form farm groups, transporters, and food processors. This facilitates the supermarket by removing barriers to trade, maintaining symmetry in information sharing across the market and allowing smooth expansion. Economic The economy of the USA has the GDP of 15.94 trillion (according to 2012 estimate). It is a developed country and therefore has the ready ground for development of flourishing supermarkets. Columbus, being situated in the largest state in the United States of America therefore offers a good opportunity for growth to Reed. The average citizen in the state has a high purchasing power. Socio-cultural There is an increasing trend among the American consumers that they are gradually becoming more health conscious besides being price sensitive. The emerging trend

Recruitment and Staff Selection Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Recruitment and Staff Selection - Case Study Example The ideal hiring process will involve recruitment on the basis of merit only. Any kind of bias or prejudice on the basis of gender, race or ethnicity cannot be allowed to dilute a recruitment or selection process if an ideal hiring process is to be established. The problems in achieving an ideal hiring system occur because human beings are in charge of hiring. They have predispositions and they cannot remain objective at all times. This is a major impediment in achieving an ideal recruiting process. Hiring process should also be such that equal opportunities are given to everyone. Whether hiring process is internal or external in nature all applicants should be allowed to participate and they should be treated equally. An ideal hiring process also does not involve one man show. A group of employees or managers can be less bias then an individual manager because one man will not be allowed to take matters in his or her own hand and promote or hire anyone he or she wants. Equal opportunity should be the backbone of an ideal hiring process because only then it can serve the organization in the best possible way. Ideal hiring process also allows any applicant to question why his application for job was denied. This is a right that most employees are unaware of. They should be informed about the decision and the reasons for not selecting them should be disclosed. Only then Hiring process can be made crystal clear from dilutions of discrimination and personal favors. Recruitment process should also efficient. The process should not take a long time because organizations cannot waste a great amount of time on recruitment. Hiring process should be ethical, yes, but it should also be cost effective so that interests of all parties are served to the best. Costs should be kept in mind but this does not mean any compromise should be made on ethical standards. Many steps can be

Digital Signal Processing (DSP) and CDMA Advantages

Digital Signal Processing (DSP) and CDMA Advantages INTRODUCTION ANALOG AND DIGITAL SIGNALS The signal is initially generated is in the form of an analog electrical voltage or current, produced for example by a microphone or some other type of transducer. The output from the readout system of a CD (compact disc) player, the data is already in digital form. An analog signal must be converted into digital form before DSP techniques can be applied. An analog electrical voltage signal, for example, can be digitized using an electronic circuit called an analog-to-digital converter or ADC. This generates a digital output as a stream of binary numbers whose values represent the electrical voltage input to the device at each sampling instant. Digital signal processing (DSP)-digital representation of signals and the use of digital processors to analyze, modify, or extract information from signals. Many signals in DSP are derived from analogue signals which have been sampled at regular intervals and converted into digital form. The key advantages of DSP over analogue processing are Guaranteed accuracy (determined by the number of bits used) Perfect reproducibility No drift in performance due to temperature or age Takes advantage of advances in semiconductor technology Greater flexibility (can be reprogrammed without modifying hardware) Superior performance (linear phase response possible, and filtering algorithms can be made adaptive) Sometimes information may already be in digital form. There are however (still) some disadvantages Speed and cost (DSP design and hardware may be expensive, especially with high bandwidth signals) Finite word length problems (limited number of bits may cause degradation). Application areas of DSP are considerable: Image processing (pattern recognition, robotic vision, image enhancement, facsimile, satellite weather map, animation) Instrumentation and control (spectrum analysis, position and rate control, noise reduction, data compression) Speech and audio (speech recognition, speech synthesis, text to speech, digital audio, equalisation) Military (secure communication, radar processing, sonar processing, missile guidance) Telecommunications (echo cancellation, adaptive equalisation, spread spectrum, video conferencing, data communication) Biomedical (patient monitoring, scanners, EEG brain mappers, ECG analysis, X-ray storage and enhancement). INTRODUCTION TO CDMA Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) is a radically new concept in wireless communications. It has gained widespread international acceptance by cellular radio system operators as an upgrade that will dramatically increase both their system capacity and the service quality. It has likewise been chosen for deployment by the majority of the winners of the United States Personal Communications System spectrum auctions. It may seem, however, mysterious for those who arent familiar with it. CDMA is a form of spread-spectrum, a family of digital communication techniques that have been used in military applications for many years. The core principle of spread spectrum is the use of noise-like carrier waves, and, as the name implies, bandwidths much wider than that required for simple point-to-point communication at the same data rate. Originally there were two motivations: either to resist enemy efforts to jam the communications (anti-jam, or AJ), or to hide the fact that communication was even taking place, sometimes called low probability of intercept (LPI). It has a history that goes back to the early days of World War II. The use of CDMA for civilian mobile radio applications is novel. It was proposed theoretically in the late 1940s, but the practical application in the civilian marketplace did not take place until 40 years later. Commercial applications became possible because of two evolutionary developments. One was the availability of very low cost, high density digital integrated circuits, which reduce the size, weight, and cost of the subscriber stations to an acceptably low level. The other was the realization that optimal multiple access communication requires that all user stations regulate their transmitter powers to the lowest that will achieve adequate signal quality. CDMA changes the nature of the subscriber station from a predominately analog device to a predominately digital device. Old-fashioned radio receivers separate stations or channels by filtering in the frequency domain. CDMA receivers do not eliminate analog processing entirely, but they separate communication channels by means of a pseudorandom modulation that is applied and removed in the digital domain, not on the basis of frequency. Multiple users occupy the same frequency band. This universal frequency reuse is not fortuitous. On the contrary, it is crucial to the very high spectral efficiency that is the hallmark of CDMA. Other discussions in these pages show why this is true. CDMA is altering the face of cellular and PCS communication by: Dramatically improving the telephone traffic capacity Dramatically improving the voice quality and eliminating the audible effects of multipath fading Reducing the incidence of dropped calls due to handoff failures Providing reliable transport mechanism for data communications, such as facsimile and internet traffic Reducing the number of sites needed to support any given amount of traffic Simplifying site selection Reducing deployment and operating costs because fewer cell sites are needed Reducing average transmitted power Reducing interference to other electronic devices Reducing potential health risks Commercially introduced in 1995, CDMA quickly became one of the worlds fastest growing wireless technologies. In 1999, the International Telecommunications Union selected CDMA as the industry standard for new third-generation (3G) wireless systems. Many leading wireless carriers are now building or upgrading to 3G CDMA networks in order to provide more capacity for voice traffic, along with high-speed data capabilities. DS_CDMA Multiple access systems based on DS CDMA have achieved increasing significance for mobile communications applications. A promising concept is based on DS_CDMA applying MRC at the receiver. MRC takes advantage of the channel diversity to combat the multipath fading. However the capacity of a DS_CDMA system is limited by both multi-user interference and inter symbol interference ISI in high data rate applications. OFDM is applied to combat the frequency selectivity of the channel using a simple one tap equalizer Further more OFDM prevents the ISI and inter carrier interference ICI by inserting a guard interval between adjacent OFDM symbols OFDM is typically used for audio TV and HDTV transmission over terrestrial channels and achieves high spectral efficiency. The CMDA Technology overview FDMA In Frequency Division Multiple Access, the frequency band is divided in slots. Each user gets one frequency slot assigned that is used at will. It could be compared to AM or FM broadcasting radio where each station has a frequency assigned. FDMA demands good filtering. TDMA In Time Division Multiple Access, the frequency band is not partitioned but users are allowed to use it only in predefined intervals of time, one at a time. Thus, TDMA demands synchronization among the users. CDMA CDMA, for Code Division Multiple Access, is different from its traditional ways in which it does not allocate frequency or time in user slots but gives the right to use both to all users simultaneously. To do this, it uses a technique known as Spread Spectrum . In effect, each user is assigned a code,which spreads its signal bandwidth in such a way that only the same code can recover it at the receiver end. This method has the property that the unwanted signals with different codes get spread even more by the process, making them like noise to the receiver . Spread Spectrum Spread Spectrum is a mean of transmission where the data occupies a larger bandwidth than necessary. Bandwidth spreading is accomplished before the transmission through the use of a code, which is independent of the transmitted data. The same code is used to demodulate the data at the receiving end. The following figure illustrate the spreading done on the data signal x(t) by the spreading signal c(t) resulting in the message signal to be transmitted, m(t). Originally for military use to avoid jamming (interference created on purpose to make a communication channel unusable), spread spectrum modulation is now used in personal communication systems for its superior performance in an interference dominated environment . Definition of Spread Spectrum: A transmission technique in which a pseudo-noise code, independent of the information data, is employed as a modulation waveform to â€Å"spread† the signal energy over a bandwidth much greater than the signal information bandwidth. At the receiver the signal is â€Å"despread† using a synchronized replica of the pseudo-noise code. Basic Principle of Spread Spectrum System: The Principal types of Spread Spectrum are Direct Sequence (DS), and Frequency Hopping (FH). An over view of these systems is hereby given: Pseudo shift of the phase pseudo shift of the frequency Coherent demodulation noncoherent Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS) A pseudo-noise sequence pnt generated at the modulator, is used in conjunction with an M-ary PSK modulation to shift the phase of the PSK signal pseudo randomly, at the chipping rate Rc (=1/Tc) a rate that is integer multiple of the symbol rate Rs (=1/Ts). The transmitted bandwidth is determined by the chip rate and by the base band filtering. The implementation limits the maximum chip rate Rc (clock rate) and thus the maximum spreading. The PSK modulation scheme requires a coherent demodulation. PN code length that is much longer than a data symbol, so that a different chip pattern is associated with each symbol. Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum A Pseudo-noise sequence pnt generated at the modulator is used in conjuction with an M-ary FSK modulation to shift the carrier frequency of the FSK signal pseudurandomly, at the hopping rate Rh. The transmitted signal occupies a number of frequencies in time, each for a period of time Th (= 1/Rh), referred as dwell time. FHSS divides the available bandwidth into N channels and hops between these channels according to the PN sequence. At each frequency hop time the PN generator feeds the frequency synthesizer a frequency word FW (a sequence of n chips) which dictates one of 2n frequency position fhl . Transmitter and receiver follows the same frequency hop pattern. The transmitted bandwidth is determined by the lowest and highest hop position by the bandwidth per hop position (à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬  fch). For a given hop, instantaneous occupied bandwidth is the conventional M-FSK, which is typically much smaller than Wss. So the FHSS signal is a narrowband signal, all transmission power is concentrated on one channel. Averaged over many hops, the FH/M-FSK spectrum occupies the entire spread spectrum bandwidth. Because the bandwidth of an FHSS system only depends on the tuning range, it can be hopped over a much wider bandwidth than an DSSS system. Since the hops generally result in phase discontinuity (depending on the particular implementation) a noncoherent demodulation is done at receiver. With slow hopping there are multiple data symbol per hop and with fast hopping there are multiple hops per data symbol. 3.3 Basic principle of Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum For BPSK modulation the building blocks of a DSSS system are: Input: Binary data dt with symbol rate Rs = 1/Ts (=bitrate Rb for BPSK) Pseudo-noise code pnt with chip rate Rc = 1/Tc (an integer of Rs) Spreading: In the transmitter, the binary data dt (for BPSK, I and Q for QPSK) is ‘directly multiplied with the PN sequence pnt , which is independent of the binary data, to produce the transmitted baseband signal txb: txb = dt . pnt The effect of multiplication of dt with a PN sequence is to spread the baseband bandwidth Rs of dt to a baseband bandwidth of Rc. Despreading: The spread spectrum signal cannot be detected by a conventional narrowband receiver. In the receiver, the baseband signal rxb is multiplied with the PN sequence pnr . If pnr = pnt and synchronized to the PN sequence in the received data, than the recovered binary data is produced on dr. The effect of multiplication of the spread spectrum signal rxb with the PN sequence pnt used in the transmitter is to despread the bandwidth of rxb to Rs . If pnr ≠  pnt , than there is no dispreading action. The signal dr has a spread spectrum. A receiver not knowing the PN sequence of the transmitter can not reproduce the transmitted data. Performance in the presence of interference: To simplify the presence of interference, the spread spectrum system is considered for baseband BPSK communication (without filtering). The received signal rxb of the transmitted signal txb plus an additive inteferance i (noise, other users, jammer,†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦): rxb = t xb + i = dt . pnt + i To recover the original data dt the received signal rx0 is multiplied with a locally generated PN sequence pnr that is an exact replica of that used in the transmitter (that is pnr = pnt and synchronized) The multiplier output is therefore given by: dr = rxb . pnt = dt . pnt . pnt + i . pnt The data signal dt is multiplied twice by the PN sequence pnt , where as the unwanted inteferance i is multiplied only once. Due to the property of the PN sequence: pnt + pnt = +1 for all t The multiplier output becomes: dr = dt + i . pnt The data signal dr is reproduced at the multiplier output in the receiver, except for the inteferance represented by the additive term i . pnt . Multiplication of the inteferance by the locally generated PN sequence, means that the spreading code will affect the inteferance just as it did with the information bearing signal at the transmitter. Noise and inteferance, being uncorrelated with the PN sequence, becomes noise-like, increase in bandwidth and decrease in power density after the multiplier. After dispreading, the data component dt is narrow band (Rb) whereas the inteferance component is wideband (Rc). By applying the dr signal to a baseband (low-pass) filter with a band width just large enough to accommodate the recovery of the data signal, most of the inteferance component i is filtered out. The effect of inteferance is reduced by processing gain (Gp). Narrowband inteferance: The narrowband noise is spread by the multiplication with the PN sequence pnr of the receiver. The power density of the noise is reduced with respect to the despread data signal. Only 1/Gp of the original noise power is left in the information baseband (Rs). Spreading and dispreading enables a bandwidth trade for processing gain against narrow band interfering signals. Narrow band inteferance would disable conventional narrow band receivers. The essence behind the inteferance rejection capability of a spread spectrum system: the useful signal (data) gets multiplied twice by the PN sequence, but the inteferance signal get multiplied only once. Wideband interference: Multiplication of the received signal with the PN sequence of the receiver gets a selective despread of the data signal (smaller bandwidth, higher power density). The inteferance signal is uncorrelated with the PN sequence and is spread. Origin of wideband noise: Multiple Spread Spectrum user: multiple access mechanism. Gaussian Noise: There is no increase in SNR with spread spectrum: The large channel bandwidth (Rc instead of Rs) increase the received noise power with Gp: Ninfo = N0 . BWinfo à   Nss = N0 . BWss = Ninfo .Gp The spread spectrum signal has a lower power density than the directly transmitted signal. Code division multiple access (CDMA) is a methode of multiplexing (wireless) users distinct (orthogonal) codes. All users can transmit at the same time, and each is allocated the entire available frequency spectrum for transmission. CDMA is also known as Spread-Spectrum multiple access (SSMA). CDMA dose not require the bandwidth allocation of FDMA, nor the time synchronization of the individual users needed in TDMA. A CDMA user has full time and full bandwidth available, but the quality of the communication decreases with an increasing number of users (BER ). In CDMA each user: Has its own PN code Uses the same RF bandwidth Transmits simultaneously (asynchronous or synchronous) Correlation of the received baseband spread spectrum signal rxb with the PN sequence of user 1 only despreads the signal of user 1. The other user produces noise Nu for user 1. ACCESS SCHEMES For radio systems there are two resources, frequency and time. Division by frequency, so that each pair of communicators is allocated part of the spectrum for all of the time, results in Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA). Division by time, so that each pair of communicators is allocated all (or at least a large part) of the spectrum for part of the time results in Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA). In Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), every communicator will be allocated the entire spectrum all of the time. CDMA uses codes to identify connections. MULTIPATH AND RAKE RECEIVERS One of the main advantages of CDMA systems is the capability of using signals that arrive in the receivers with different time delays. This phenomenon is called multipath. FDMA and TDMA, which are narrow band systems, cannot discriminate between the multipath arrivals, and resort to equalization to mitigate the negative effects of multipath. Due to its wide bandwidth and rake receivers, CDMA uses the multipath signals and combines them to make an even stronger signal at the receivers. CDMA subscriber units use rake receivers. This is essentially a set of several receivers. One of the receivers (fingers) constantly searches for different multipaths and feeds the information to the other three fingers. Each finger then demodulates the signal corresponding to a strong multipath. The results are then combined together to make the signal stronger. Difference between TDMA vs CDMA. TDMA is Time Division Multiple Access, while CDMA is Code Division Multiple Access. Both technologies achieve the same goal of better utilization of the radio spectrum by allowing multiple users to share the same physical channel, but by using different methods and that is why the three of the four words in each acronym are identical. Both allow more than one person to carry out a conversation on the same frequency without causing interference. The two technologies differ in the way in which users share the common resource. In TDMA the channel is chopped up into sequential time slices. The data of each user is put on the channel in a round-robin fashion. In reality, only one user actually uses the channel at any given point of time, but he uses it only for short bursts. He then gives up the channel for a short duration to allow the other users to have their turn. This is similar to how a computer with just one processor runs multiple applications simultaneously. CDMA on the other hand allows everyone to transmit at the same time. With conventional methods of modulation techniques it would hav been simply not possible. What makes CDMA to allow all users to transmit simultaneously is a special type of digital modulation called Spread Spectrum. In this modulation technique users stream of bits is taken and splattered them across a very wide channel in a pseudo-random fashion. The pseudo part is very important here as at the receiver end the randomization must be undone in order to collect the bits together in a coherent order. For example consider a room full of couples, and each couple trying to carry on one-on-one conversations. In TDMA each couple takes their turn for talking and they keep their turns short by speaking only one sentence at a time. As there is always more one person speaking in the room at any given point of time, no one has to worry about being heard over the background din. In CDMA assume each couple talks simultaneously, but they all use different languages. The background din doesnt cause any real problem as none of the listeners understand any language other than that of the individual to whom they are listening. Voice Encoding At this point many people confuse two distinctly different issues involved in the transmission of digital audio. The first is the WAY in which the stream of bits is delivered from one end to the other. This part of the air interface is what makes one technology different from another. The second is the compression algorithm used to squeeze the audio into as small a stream of bits as possible. This latter component is known at the Voice Coder, or Vocoder for short. Another term commonly used is CODEC, which is a similar word to modem. It combines the terms COder and DECoder. Although each technology has chosen their own unique CODECs, there is no rule saying that one transmission method needs to use a specific CODEC. People often lump a technologys transmission method with its CODEC as though they were single entities. Voice encoding schemes differ slightly in their approach to the problem. Because of this, certain types of human voice work better with some CODECs than they do with others. The point to remember is that all PCS CODECs are compromises of some sort. Since human voices have such a fantastic range of pitch and tonal depth, one cannot expect any single compromise to handle each one equally well. This inability to cope with all types of voice at the same level does lead some people to choose one technology over another. All of the PCS technologies try to minimize battery consumption during calls by keeping the transmission of unnecessary data to a minimum. The phone decides whether or not you are presently speaking, or if the sound it hears is just background noise. If the phone determines that there is no intelligent data to transmit it blanks the audio and it reduces the transmitter duty cycle (in the case of TDMA) or the number of transmitted bits (in the case of CDMA). When the audio is blanked your caller would suddenly find themselves listening to dead air, and this may cause them to think the call has dropped. To avoid this psychological problem many service providers insert what is known as Comfort Noise during the blanked periods. Comfort Noise is synthesized white noise that tries to mimic the volume and structure of the real background noise. This fake background noise assures the caller that the connection is alive and well. However, in newer CODECs such as EVRC (used exclusively on CDMA systems) the background noise is generally suppressed even while the user is talking. This piece of magic makes it sound as though the cell phone user is not in a noisy environment at all. Under these conditions, Comfort Noise is neither necessary, nor desirable. DS-CDMA-INTRODUCTION While multiple access interference (MAI) by other users has been recognized as the capacity-limiting factor in direct sequence code-division multiple-access (DS-CDMA)-based cellular communication systems, multiuser approaches have largely alleviated the problem when the noise process is additive Gaussian. With the availability of multiuser detectors, inaccurate or inappropriate noise modelling assumptions seem to have become the issue again. Whereas multiuser detection has much to offer in the mobile- to-base station uplink, it does not at present appear to be feasible for the downlink due to the complexity involved and the lack of resistance against adjacent cell interference. Moreover, the few multiuser proposals for the downlink require the knowledge of all spreading codes, which is not possible in the tactical military environment, for instance. Enhanced single-user receivers equipped with adaptive filter banks deliver promising performance with reasonable complexity, especially in slowly varying channels. Thus, the performance of single-user detectors is still of interest, particularly in the presence of non-Gaussian noise. In both urban outdoor and indoor mobile radio environments, electromagnetic interference generated by man-made sources such as factories or power lines causes the noise to be of non-Gaussian nature. Large noise magnitudes are deemed very improbable by linear receivers, and consequently performance deterioration is experienced. It is therefore desirable to build systems that can maintain respectable functionality under a broad class of noise distributions, rather than strictly optimizing for the unrealistic Gaussian assumption. Such is the goal of robust detection and estimation theory, which aims to design systems that are suboptimal under nominal channel conditions (e.g., Gaussian channel) and yet do not face catastrophy when the noise distribution is not nominal (e.g., unlike linear schemes). Note that suboptimality here refers to very good performance that is slightly worse than that of the nominal-optimal detector/estimator. The direct sequence code division multiple access (DS-CDMA) technique has been favourably considered for application in digital mobile cellular networks due to its potential to provide higher system capacity over conventional multiple access techniques. Unlike FDMA and TDMA capacities which are mostly limited by the bandwidth, the capacity of a CDMA system is mainly restricted by its interference level. Any reduction in interference produces a direct and linear increase in system capacity. Multiple access interference (MAI) caused by non-zero cross-correlation between different spreading sequences is the major type of interference limiting the CDMA system capacity. Much work has been done to characterize MAI, and to analyze and evaluate the CDMA system performance in the presence of MAI. Since the cross-correlation properties of most sets of spreading codes are either too complex to analyze or very difficult to compute when different transmissions are not synchronized, a random seque nce model. In the case of moderate to large processing gains, Gaussian distribution with variable variance is a good approximation for the MAI distribution. One of the approaches to reduce MAI is to employ orthogonal spreading sequences, and try to synchronize the transmissions at the chip level (quasi-synchronization). However, this is generally difficult to achieve in multipoint-to-point systems, such as the reverse link (mobile-to-base) of a cellular system, due to a lack of synchronization of the various mobile terminals, and the variable transmission delays. In this paper, a multi-carrier DS-CDMA (MCDS-CDMA) scheme is employed to facilitate the synchronization process, and thus reduce MAI. SYSTEM MODEL A model of the MS-DS-CDMA system for the kth user of a CDMA system is shown in the figure 1. TRANMSITTER MODEL At the transmitter the user‘s data stream dk(t) is divided into M interleaved sub streams and spread by a spreading sequence ck(t) to a fraction 1/M of the entire transmission bandwidth W. The resultant chip sequences are then used to modulate M carrier. The carrier frequencies ωm,m=1,2,M are equally spaced by the chip rate so that they are mutually orthogonal over one channel symbol interval T. Let R be the information rate and Rc be the carrier control code rate then the channel symbol interval is BER PERFORMANCE: MC-DS-CDMA system performance measured by bit error rate through analysis and simulation. Analysis: The BER is analysed based on the following: Ortoganal spreading sequences with rectangular pulse shape are applied. ÃŽ ¶k,k=1†¦K are independent of random variables distributd in (-ÃŽ ¶D,ÃŽ ¶D) WHERE ÃŽ ¶D=ÃŽ µD+Ï‚D.Given W and ÃŽ ¶D,M is chosen so that ÃŽ ¶D It is assumed that the fading parameters of the desired user . It is perfectly estimated so that the coherent detection and optimum soft decision decoding could be carried out at the receiver to make the problem analytically tractable. The fading amplitudes as independent Rayleigh random variables with equal second moments. The model is MATLAB INTRODUCTION: Matlab is a commercial Matrix Laboratory package which operates as an interactive programming environment. It is a mainstay of the Mathematics Department software lineup and is also available for PCs and Macintoshes and may be found on the CIRCA VAXes. Matlab is well adapted to numerical experiments since the underlying algorithms for Matlabs builtin functions and supplied m-files are based on the standard libraries LINPACK and EISPACK. Matlab program and script files always have filenames ending with .m; the programming language is exceptionally straightforward since almost every data object is assumed to be an array. Graphical output is available to supplement numerical results. IMREAD Read image from graphics file. A = IMREAD(FILENAME,FMT) reads a grayscale or color image from the file specified by the string FILENAME. If the file is not in the current directory, or in a directory on the MATLAB path, specify the full pathname. The text string FMT specifies the format of the file by its standard file extension. For example, specify gif Digital Signal Processing (DSP) and CDMA Advantages Digital Signal Processing (DSP) and CDMA Advantages INTRODUCTION ANALOG AND DIGITAL SIGNALS The signal is initially generated is in the form of an analog electrical voltage or current, produced for example by a microphone or some other type of transducer. The output from the readout system of a CD (compact disc) player, the data is already in digital form. An analog signal must be converted into digital form before DSP techniques can be applied. An analog electrical voltage signal, for example, can be digitized using an electronic circuit called an analog-to-digital converter or ADC. This generates a digital output as a stream of binary numbers whose values represent the electrical voltage input to the device at each sampling instant. Digital signal processing (DSP)-digital representation of signals and the use of digital processors to analyze, modify, or extract information from signals. Many signals in DSP are derived from analogue signals which have been sampled at regular intervals and converted into digital form. The key advantages of DSP over analogue processing are Guaranteed accuracy (determined by the number of bits used) Perfect reproducibility No drift in performance due to temperature or age Takes advantage of advances in semiconductor technology Greater flexibility (can be reprogrammed without modifying hardware) Superior performance (linear phase response possible, and filtering algorithms can be made adaptive) Sometimes information may already be in digital form. There are however (still) some disadvantages Speed and cost (DSP design and hardware may be expensive, especially with high bandwidth signals) Finite word length problems (limited number of bits may cause degradation). Application areas of DSP are considerable: Image processing (pattern recognition, robotic vision, image enhancement, facsimile, satellite weather map, animation) Instrumentation and control (spectrum analysis, position and rate control, noise reduction, data compression) Speech and audio (speech recognition, speech synthesis, text to speech, digital audio, equalisation) Military (secure communication, radar processing, sonar processing, missile guidance) Telecommunications (echo cancellation, adaptive equalisation, spread spectrum, video conferencing, data communication) Biomedical (patient monitoring, scanners, EEG brain mappers, ECG analysis, X-ray storage and enhancement). INTRODUCTION TO CDMA Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) is a radically new concept in wireless communications. It has gained widespread international acceptance by cellular radio system operators as an upgrade that will dramatically increase both their system capacity and the service quality. It has likewise been chosen for deployment by the majority of the winners of the United States Personal Communications System spectrum auctions. It may seem, however, mysterious for those who arent familiar with it. CDMA is a form of spread-spectrum, a family of digital communication techniques that have been used in military applications for many years. The core principle of spread spectrum is the use of noise-like carrier waves, and, as the name implies, bandwidths much wider than that required for simple point-to-point communication at the same data rate. Originally there were two motivations: either to resist enemy efforts to jam the communications (anti-jam, or AJ), or to hide the fact that communication was even taking place, sometimes called low probability of intercept (LPI). It has a history that goes back to the early days of World War II. The use of CDMA for civilian mobile radio applications is novel. It was proposed theoretically in the late 1940s, but the practical application in the civilian marketplace did not take place until 40 years later. Commercial applications became possible because of two evolutionary developments. One was the availability of very low cost, high density digital integrated circuits, which reduce the size, weight, and cost of the subscriber stations to an acceptably low level. The other was the realization that optimal multiple access communication requires that all user stations regulate their transmitter powers to the lowest that will achieve adequate signal quality. CDMA changes the nature of the subscriber station from a predominately analog device to a predominately digital device. Old-fashioned radio receivers separate stations or channels by filtering in the frequency domain. CDMA receivers do not eliminate analog processing entirely, but they separate communication channels by means of a pseudorandom modulation that is applied and removed in the digital domain, not on the basis of frequency. Multiple users occupy the same frequency band. This universal frequency reuse is not fortuitous. On the contrary, it is crucial to the very high spectral efficiency that is the hallmark of CDMA. Other discussions in these pages show why this is true. CDMA is altering the face of cellular and PCS communication by: Dramatically improving the telephone traffic capacity Dramatically improving the voice quality and eliminating the audible effects of multipath fading Reducing the incidence of dropped calls due to handoff failures Providing reliable transport mechanism for data communications, such as facsimile and internet traffic Reducing the number of sites needed to support any given amount of traffic Simplifying site selection Reducing deployment and operating costs because fewer cell sites are needed Reducing average transmitted power Reducing interference to other electronic devices Reducing potential health risks Commercially introduced in 1995, CDMA quickly became one of the worlds fastest growing wireless technologies. In 1999, the International Telecommunications Union selected CDMA as the industry standard for new third-generation (3G) wireless systems. Many leading wireless carriers are now building or upgrading to 3G CDMA networks in order to provide more capacity for voice traffic, along with high-speed data capabilities. DS_CDMA Multiple access systems based on DS CDMA have achieved increasing significance for mobile communications applications. A promising concept is based on DS_CDMA applying MRC at the receiver. MRC takes advantage of the channel diversity to combat the multipath fading. However the capacity of a DS_CDMA system is limited by both multi-user interference and inter symbol interference ISI in high data rate applications. OFDM is applied to combat the frequency selectivity of the channel using a simple one tap equalizer Further more OFDM prevents the ISI and inter carrier interference ICI by inserting a guard interval between adjacent OFDM symbols OFDM is typically used for audio TV and HDTV transmission over terrestrial channels and achieves high spectral efficiency. The CMDA Technology overview FDMA In Frequency Division Multiple Access, the frequency band is divided in slots. Each user gets one frequency slot assigned that is used at will. It could be compared to AM or FM broadcasting radio where each station has a frequency assigned. FDMA demands good filtering. TDMA In Time Division Multiple Access, the frequency band is not partitioned but users are allowed to use it only in predefined intervals of time, one at a time. Thus, TDMA demands synchronization among the users. CDMA CDMA, for Code Division Multiple Access, is different from its traditional ways in which it does not allocate frequency or time in user slots but gives the right to use both to all users simultaneously. To do this, it uses a technique known as Spread Spectrum . In effect, each user is assigned a code,which spreads its signal bandwidth in such a way that only the same code can recover it at the receiver end. This method has the property that the unwanted signals with different codes get spread even more by the process, making them like noise to the receiver . Spread Spectrum Spread Spectrum is a mean of transmission where the data occupies a larger bandwidth than necessary. Bandwidth spreading is accomplished before the transmission through the use of a code, which is independent of the transmitted data. The same code is used to demodulate the data at the receiving end. The following figure illustrate the spreading done on the data signal x(t) by the spreading signal c(t) resulting in the message signal to be transmitted, m(t). Originally for military use to avoid jamming (interference created on purpose to make a communication channel unusable), spread spectrum modulation is now used in personal communication systems for its superior performance in an interference dominated environment . Definition of Spread Spectrum: A transmission technique in which a pseudo-noise code, independent of the information data, is employed as a modulation waveform to â€Å"spread† the signal energy over a bandwidth much greater than the signal information bandwidth. At the receiver the signal is â€Å"despread† using a synchronized replica of the pseudo-noise code. Basic Principle of Spread Spectrum System: The Principal types of Spread Spectrum are Direct Sequence (DS), and Frequency Hopping (FH). An over view of these systems is hereby given: Pseudo shift of the phase pseudo shift of the frequency Coherent demodulation noncoherent Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS) A pseudo-noise sequence pnt generated at the modulator, is used in conjunction with an M-ary PSK modulation to shift the phase of the PSK signal pseudo randomly, at the chipping rate Rc (=1/Tc) a rate that is integer multiple of the symbol rate Rs (=1/Ts). The transmitted bandwidth is determined by the chip rate and by the base band filtering. The implementation limits the maximum chip rate Rc (clock rate) and thus the maximum spreading. The PSK modulation scheme requires a coherent demodulation. PN code length that is much longer than a data symbol, so that a different chip pattern is associated with each symbol. Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum A Pseudo-noise sequence pnt generated at the modulator is used in conjuction with an M-ary FSK modulation to shift the carrier frequency of the FSK signal pseudurandomly, at the hopping rate Rh. The transmitted signal occupies a number of frequencies in time, each for a period of time Th (= 1/Rh), referred as dwell time. FHSS divides the available bandwidth into N channels and hops between these channels according to the PN sequence. At each frequency hop time the PN generator feeds the frequency synthesizer a frequency word FW (a sequence of n chips) which dictates one of 2n frequency position fhl . Transmitter and receiver follows the same frequency hop pattern. The transmitted bandwidth is determined by the lowest and highest hop position by the bandwidth per hop position (à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã¢â‚¬  fch). For a given hop, instantaneous occupied bandwidth is the conventional M-FSK, which is typically much smaller than Wss. So the FHSS signal is a narrowband signal, all transmission power is concentrated on one channel. Averaged over many hops, the FH/M-FSK spectrum occupies the entire spread spectrum bandwidth. Because the bandwidth of an FHSS system only depends on the tuning range, it can be hopped over a much wider bandwidth than an DSSS system. Since the hops generally result in phase discontinuity (depending on the particular implementation) a noncoherent demodulation is done at receiver. With slow hopping there are multiple data symbol per hop and with fast hopping there are multiple hops per data symbol. 3.3 Basic principle of Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum For BPSK modulation the building blocks of a DSSS system are: Input: Binary data dt with symbol rate Rs = 1/Ts (=bitrate Rb for BPSK) Pseudo-noise code pnt with chip rate Rc = 1/Tc (an integer of Rs) Spreading: In the transmitter, the binary data dt (for BPSK, I and Q for QPSK) is ‘directly multiplied with the PN sequence pnt , which is independent of the binary data, to produce the transmitted baseband signal txb: txb = dt . pnt The effect of multiplication of dt with a PN sequence is to spread the baseband bandwidth Rs of dt to a baseband bandwidth of Rc. Despreading: The spread spectrum signal cannot be detected by a conventional narrowband receiver. In the receiver, the baseband signal rxb is multiplied with the PN sequence pnr . If pnr = pnt and synchronized to the PN sequence in the received data, than the recovered binary data is produced on dr. The effect of multiplication of the spread spectrum signal rxb with the PN sequence pnt used in the transmitter is to despread the bandwidth of rxb to Rs . If pnr ≠  pnt , than there is no dispreading action. The signal dr has a spread spectrum. A receiver not knowing the PN sequence of the transmitter can not reproduce the transmitted data. Performance in the presence of interference: To simplify the presence of interference, the spread spectrum system is considered for baseband BPSK communication (without filtering). The received signal rxb of the transmitted signal txb plus an additive inteferance i (noise, other users, jammer,†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦): rxb = t xb + i = dt . pnt + i To recover the original data dt the received signal rx0 is multiplied with a locally generated PN sequence pnr that is an exact replica of that used in the transmitter (that is pnr = pnt and synchronized) The multiplier output is therefore given by: dr = rxb . pnt = dt . pnt . pnt + i . pnt The data signal dt is multiplied twice by the PN sequence pnt , where as the unwanted inteferance i is multiplied only once. Due to the property of the PN sequence: pnt + pnt = +1 for all t The multiplier output becomes: dr = dt + i . pnt The data signal dr is reproduced at the multiplier output in the receiver, except for the inteferance represented by the additive term i . pnt . Multiplication of the inteferance by the locally generated PN sequence, means that the spreading code will affect the inteferance just as it did with the information bearing signal at the transmitter. Noise and inteferance, being uncorrelated with the PN sequence, becomes noise-like, increase in bandwidth and decrease in power density after the multiplier. After dispreading, the data component dt is narrow band (Rb) whereas the inteferance component is wideband (Rc). By applying the dr signal to a baseband (low-pass) filter with a band width just large enough to accommodate the recovery of the data signal, most of the inteferance component i is filtered out. The effect of inteferance is reduced by processing gain (Gp). Narrowband inteferance: The narrowband noise is spread by the multiplication with the PN sequence pnr of the receiver. The power density of the noise is reduced with respect to the despread data signal. Only 1/Gp of the original noise power is left in the information baseband (Rs). Spreading and dispreading enables a bandwidth trade for processing gain against narrow band interfering signals. Narrow band inteferance would disable conventional narrow band receivers. The essence behind the inteferance rejection capability of a spread spectrum system: the useful signal (data) gets multiplied twice by the PN sequence, but the inteferance signal get multiplied only once. Wideband interference: Multiplication of the received signal with the PN sequence of the receiver gets a selective despread of the data signal (smaller bandwidth, higher power density). The inteferance signal is uncorrelated with the PN sequence and is spread. Origin of wideband noise: Multiple Spread Spectrum user: multiple access mechanism. Gaussian Noise: There is no increase in SNR with spread spectrum: The large channel bandwidth (Rc instead of Rs) increase the received noise power with Gp: Ninfo = N0 . BWinfo à   Nss = N0 . BWss = Ninfo .Gp The spread spectrum signal has a lower power density than the directly transmitted signal. Code division multiple access (CDMA) is a methode of multiplexing (wireless) users distinct (orthogonal) codes. All users can transmit at the same time, and each is allocated the entire available frequency spectrum for transmission. CDMA is also known as Spread-Spectrum multiple access (SSMA). CDMA dose not require the bandwidth allocation of FDMA, nor the time synchronization of the individual users needed in TDMA. A CDMA user has full time and full bandwidth available, but the quality of the communication decreases with an increasing number of users (BER ). In CDMA each user: Has its own PN code Uses the same RF bandwidth Transmits simultaneously (asynchronous or synchronous) Correlation of the received baseband spread spectrum signal rxb with the PN sequence of user 1 only despreads the signal of user 1. The other user produces noise Nu for user 1. ACCESS SCHEMES For radio systems there are two resources, frequency and time. Division by frequency, so that each pair of communicators is allocated part of the spectrum for all of the time, results in Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA). Division by time, so that each pair of communicators is allocated all (or at least a large part) of the spectrum for part of the time results in Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA). In Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), every communicator will be allocated the entire spectrum all of the time. CDMA uses codes to identify connections. MULTIPATH AND RAKE RECEIVERS One of the main advantages of CDMA systems is the capability of using signals that arrive in the receivers with different time delays. This phenomenon is called multipath. FDMA and TDMA, which are narrow band systems, cannot discriminate between the multipath arrivals, and resort to equalization to mitigate the negative effects of multipath. Due to its wide bandwidth and rake receivers, CDMA uses the multipath signals and combines them to make an even stronger signal at the receivers. CDMA subscriber units use rake receivers. This is essentially a set of several receivers. One of the receivers (fingers) constantly searches for different multipaths and feeds the information to the other three fingers. Each finger then demodulates the signal corresponding to a strong multipath. The results are then combined together to make the signal stronger. Difference between TDMA vs CDMA. TDMA is Time Division Multiple Access, while CDMA is Code Division Multiple Access. Both technologies achieve the same goal of better utilization of the radio spectrum by allowing multiple users to share the same physical channel, but by using different methods and that is why the three of the four words in each acronym are identical. Both allow more than one person to carry out a conversation on the same frequency without causing interference. The two technologies differ in the way in which users share the common resource. In TDMA the channel is chopped up into sequential time slices. The data of each user is put on the channel in a round-robin fashion. In reality, only one user actually uses the channel at any given point of time, but he uses it only for short bursts. He then gives up the channel for a short duration to allow the other users to have their turn. This is similar to how a computer with just one processor runs multiple applications simultaneously. CDMA on the other hand allows everyone to transmit at the same time. With conventional methods of modulation techniques it would hav been simply not possible. What makes CDMA to allow all users to transmit simultaneously is a special type of digital modulation called Spread Spectrum. In this modulation technique users stream of bits is taken and splattered them across a very wide channel in a pseudo-random fashion. The pseudo part is very important here as at the receiver end the randomization must be undone in order to collect the bits together in a coherent order. For example consider a room full of couples, and each couple trying to carry on one-on-one conversations. In TDMA each couple takes their turn for talking and they keep their turns short by speaking only one sentence at a time. As there is always more one person speaking in the room at any given point of time, no one has to worry about being heard over the background din. In CDMA assume each couple talks simultaneously, but they all use different languages. The background din doesnt cause any real problem as none of the listeners understand any language other than that of the individual to whom they are listening. Voice Encoding At this point many people confuse two distinctly different issues involved in the transmission of digital audio. The first is the WAY in which the stream of bits is delivered from one end to the other. This part of the air interface is what makes one technology different from another. The second is the compression algorithm used to squeeze the audio into as small a stream of bits as possible. This latter component is known at the Voice Coder, or Vocoder for short. Another term commonly used is CODEC, which is a similar word to modem. It combines the terms COder and DECoder. Although each technology has chosen their own unique CODECs, there is no rule saying that one transmission method needs to use a specific CODEC. People often lump a technologys transmission method with its CODEC as though they were single entities. Voice encoding schemes differ slightly in their approach to the problem. Because of this, certain types of human voice work better with some CODECs than they do with others. The point to remember is that all PCS CODECs are compromises of some sort. Since human voices have such a fantastic range of pitch and tonal depth, one cannot expect any single compromise to handle each one equally well. This inability to cope with all types of voice at the same level does lead some people to choose one technology over another. All of the PCS technologies try to minimize battery consumption during calls by keeping the transmission of unnecessary data to a minimum. The phone decides whether or not you are presently speaking, or if the sound it hears is just background noise. If the phone determines that there is no intelligent data to transmit it blanks the audio and it reduces the transmitter duty cycle (in the case of TDMA) or the number of transmitted bits (in the case of CDMA). When the audio is blanked your caller would suddenly find themselves listening to dead air, and this may cause them to think the call has dropped. To avoid this psychological problem many service providers insert what is known as Comfort Noise during the blanked periods. Comfort Noise is synthesized white noise that tries to mimic the volume and structure of the real background noise. This fake background noise assures the caller that the connection is alive and well. However, in newer CODECs such as EVRC (used exclusively on CDMA systems) the background noise is generally suppressed even while the user is talking. This piece of magic makes it sound as though the cell phone user is not in a noisy environment at all. Under these conditions, Comfort Noise is neither necessary, nor desirable. DS-CDMA-INTRODUCTION While multiple access interference (MAI) by other users has been recognized as the capacity-limiting factor in direct sequence code-division multiple-access (DS-CDMA)-based cellular communication systems, multiuser approaches have largely alleviated the problem when the noise process is additive Gaussian. With the availability of multiuser detectors, inaccurate or inappropriate noise modelling assumptions seem to have become the issue again. Whereas multiuser detection has much to offer in the mobile- to-base station uplink, it does not at present appear to be feasible for the downlink due to the complexity involved and the lack of resistance against adjacent cell interference. Moreover, the few multiuser proposals for the downlink require the knowledge of all spreading codes, which is not possible in the tactical military environment, for instance. Enhanced single-user receivers equipped with adaptive filter banks deliver promising performance with reasonable complexity, especially in slowly varying channels. Thus, the performance of single-user detectors is still of interest, particularly in the presence of non-Gaussian noise. In both urban outdoor and indoor mobile radio environments, electromagnetic interference generated by man-made sources such as factories or power lines causes the noise to be of non-Gaussian nature. Large noise magnitudes are deemed very improbable by linear receivers, and consequently performance deterioration is experienced. It is therefore desirable to build systems that can maintain respectable functionality under a broad class of noise distributions, rather than strictly optimizing for the unrealistic Gaussian assumption. Such is the goal of robust detection and estimation theory, which aims to design systems that are suboptimal under nominal channel conditions (e.g., Gaussian channel) and yet do not face catastrophy when the noise distribution is not nominal (e.g., unlike linear schemes). Note that suboptimality here refers to very good performance that is slightly worse than that of the nominal-optimal detector/estimator. The direct sequence code division multiple access (DS-CDMA) technique has been favourably considered for application in digital mobile cellular networks due to its potential to provide higher system capacity over conventional multiple access techniques. Unlike FDMA and TDMA capacities which are mostly limited by the bandwidth, the capacity of a CDMA system is mainly restricted by its interference level. Any reduction in interference produces a direct and linear increase in system capacity. Multiple access interference (MAI) caused by non-zero cross-correlation between different spreading sequences is the major type of interference limiting the CDMA system capacity. Much work has been done to characterize MAI, and to analyze and evaluate the CDMA system performance in the presence of MAI. Since the cross-correlation properties of most sets of spreading codes are either too complex to analyze or very difficult to compute when different transmissions are not synchronized, a random seque nce model. In the case of moderate to large processing gains, Gaussian distribution with variable variance is a good approximation for the MAI distribution. One of the approaches to reduce MAI is to employ orthogonal spreading sequences, and try to synchronize the transmissions at the chip level (quasi-synchronization). However, this is generally difficult to achieve in multipoint-to-point systems, such as the reverse link (mobile-to-base) of a cellular system, due to a lack of synchronization of the various mobile terminals, and the variable transmission delays. In this paper, a multi-carrier DS-CDMA (MCDS-CDMA) scheme is employed to facilitate the synchronization process, and thus reduce MAI. SYSTEM MODEL A model of the MS-DS-CDMA system for the kth user of a CDMA system is shown in the figure 1. TRANMSITTER MODEL At the transmitter the user‘s data stream dk(t) is divided into M interleaved sub streams and spread by a spreading sequence ck(t) to a fraction 1/M of the entire transmission bandwidth W. The resultant chip sequences are then used to modulate M carrier. The carrier frequencies ωm,m=1,2,M are equally spaced by the chip rate so that they are mutually orthogonal over one channel symbol interval T. Let R be the information rate and Rc be the carrier control code rate then the channel symbol interval is BER PERFORMANCE: MC-DS-CDMA system performance measured by bit error rate through analysis and simulation. Analysis: The BER is analysed based on the following: Ortoganal spreading sequences with rectangular pulse shape are applied. ÃŽ ¶k,k=1†¦K are independent of random variables distributd in (-ÃŽ ¶D,ÃŽ ¶D) WHERE ÃŽ ¶D=ÃŽ µD+Ï‚D.Given W and ÃŽ ¶D,M is chosen so that ÃŽ ¶D It is assumed that the fading parameters of the desired user . It is perfectly estimated so that the coherent detection and optimum soft decision decoding could be carried out at the receiver to make the problem analytically tractable. The fading amplitudes as independent Rayleigh random variables with equal second moments. The model is MATLAB INTRODUCTION: Matlab is a commercial Matrix Laboratory package which operates as an interactive programming environment. It is a mainstay of the Mathematics Department software lineup and is also available for PCs and Macintoshes and may be found on the CIRCA VAXes. Matlab is well adapted to numerical experiments since the underlying algorithms for Matlabs builtin functions and supplied m-files are based on the standard libraries LINPACK and EISPACK. Matlab program and script files always have filenames ending with .m; the programming language is exceptionally straightforward since almost every data object is assumed to be an array. Graphical output is available to supplement numerical results. IMREAD Read image from graphics file. A = IMREAD(FILENAME,FMT) reads a grayscale or color image from the file specified by the string FILENAME. If the file is not in the current directory, or in a directory on the MATLAB path, specify the full pathname. The text string FMT specifies the format of the file by its standard file extension. For example, specify gif

F. Scott Fitzgeralds The Great Gatsby :: essays research papers

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald I want to introduce you to, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The book is set in the â€Å"Roaring Twenties† as it takes place in the summer of 1922. It is the height of the jazz age as society is dissolves into the Great Depression. The protagonist is Jay Gatsby and narrated by Nick Carraway. The story is about jay’s love for a woman, Daisy Buchanan. And it is about Jay’ Gatsby’s will to achieve greatness as he perceives it. He is a driven by money and power. He was a man with a vision to succeed in life. As a child, Jay Gatsby grew up on a farm. He saw his parents as nothing but farmers. Gatsby knew exactly what he didn’t want to be and that was like his parents. They were people who were content with who they were. Gatsby, on the other hand, was the exact opposite. He wanted to move on. Jay Gatsby wanted to be someone special, someone with prestige and someone definitely with money. Gatsby developed a self improvement plan to help him flourish as a young man. His plan detailed dumbbell exercises, studying electricity, practicing elocution and studying needed inventions. Even his parents knew he was driven. His father said: "Jimmy was bound to get ahead. He always had some resolve like this or something. Do you notice what he’s got about improving his mind? He was always great for that". The structured drive let Gatsby prevail in his endeavors. However, there are some things people just can’t get away from. James Gatsby desperately wanted to achieve success in life. However, it is difficult to flourish with a background like Gatsby’s. So to escape his past, he changed his name at the age of 17 from James Gats to Jay Gatsby. Nonetheless, changing his name only did so much for him. Gatsby ended up living a life of lies because of his hidden identity. Nobody really knew Gatsby. So in the absence of people’s knowledge, they conjured up rumors. "One time he killed a man who found out he was a nephew of von Hindenburg and second to the devil". The rising action is Gatsby is meeting the young lady named Daisy. Daisy was very beautiful and came from a wealthy background. Nonetheless, Daisy’s background was the one thing preventing them from marriage.

Literature and Human Behaviour Essay

Literature has been a major part of human culture throughout human existence. It has always been used as a way of defining how humans interact with each other. Literature is defined as ‘the writings of a period, language, or country’. If ancient times are also to be considered, then myths, legends, and theatre, which passed down literary ideas, and social critiques before the time of the written word, should also be included in this definition. The plays of William Shakespeare are a perfect example of pieces of literature that are not only entertaining, literature for literature’s sake, but also provide great insight into human nature. In one form or another, literature is entrenched as an expression of the ways of humanity, and so by absorbing it, one can gain a greater understanding of human behaviour. The human sciences offer a different angle to the understanding of human behaviour as literature does. Literature gives us insight into what is going on inside people’s minds. How someone from a culture that one might not understand, thinks. Many of Shakespeare’s plays are centered around the downfall of a particular character. This downfall arises from within the character, it is the result of a tragic flaw. The human sciences on the other hand, provide information on how humans interact with each other. They often involve social studies in which experiments involving the interactions of humans are observed and recorded. If for example some human scientists performed a particular experiment with enough people, and got a similar result each time, they can conclude that a human being is likely to act in a certain way, given the situation which was in the experiment. In this way human scientists can draw conclusions as to what is a normal reaction for a person to have in a situation, and can describe traits which are almost universal to humans. These human sciences give us a knowledge of the external aspects of human behaviour, which is extremely valuable to have. If for example, a police force wanted to know whether or not a new method they had developed for deterring graffiti artists worked efficiently or not, they might perform a human science experiment, where they secretly test their  method on a sample of would-be graffitists. The results could tell them if it would be productive for them to put resources into developing and employing this method, or whether it was inefficient and would be a waste of resources. Literature will often delve deep into the human mind, to seek the unknown. Some literature may attempt to describe perceptions of the world from the mind of a serial killer. If written well, and researched thoroughly, this literature would be enthralling, and probably disturbing, because it is teaching us about the human behaviour of someone who is very different from ourselves. (hopefully) It would show to the reader an aspect of human behaviour that is not common among all people, but is infact rare. From this we would learn about an aspect which we did not have an understanding of, and would therefore increase our knowledge of human behaviour. Other literature may reveal something about people that relates to a great many people. People will engage with this literature because they will have some understanding of it, and so the book would increase their knowledge of their own human behaviour, and would also show them that this human behaviour is common to many people. From this we can see that a study of literature can give someone a deeper understanding of what goes on in the human mind, and a study of the human sciences can allow someone to have a greater knowledge of the way that humans interact with each other, and certain situations they may be faced with. There are of course some problems with both of these ways of attaining knowledge of human behaviour. Although experiments can be done in the human sciences, they can never give a result which is 100% accurate. They may provide a conclusion which will probably be correct in most cases, but it’s never certain. This is because of the fact that these experiments deal with people. People are not like objects in the experiments of natural sciences. They are prone to performing differently each time the experiment is carried out. For example, if sodium bi-carbonate is put in vinegar, it will cause an almost violent chemical reaction every time, but if icing sugar is put in,  it will not. However, if a person suffering from a headache is given a painkiller, they might feel an easing of the pain, but if they are given a placebo pill, they might still think they are feeling an easing of the pain, but it would be purely psychological. This shows that what people expect to happen can alter the results of the experiment, and this gives the observer inconclusive answers. Basically, when looking at results achieved through the human sciences, we can not be totally sure that we are learning anything about human behaviour, because we can never be certain that the results are completely accurate. There are also problems that can occur when trying to gain a greater understanding of human behaviour through the study of literature. I don’t feel that all literature is valid for this purpose. If a piece of literature has not been well researched, and not well written, then it’s content may give a misrepresentation of the real world. A book written by an english pioneer on the subject of the lifestyle of the Aboriginal race may provide a bias and incorrect view. This would lead the reader to gain a perception of the human behaviour of that particular culture and people that does not coincide with the truth. If this is the case then it is clear that in order for somewhere to gain a greater understanding of human behaviour in reference to a particular culture, then a wide range of literature need to be considered. However, the pieces of literature that give a bias or incorrect view needn’t be totally disregarded. These pieces of literature, while they may not provide a truthful description of a culture or civilisation, they can often reflect on the culture that the author of the literature belongs too. They can give an idea of what kind of perceptions were held by that culture, on the other culture. This can add to our understanding of human behaviour because when several of these types of articles are read, patterns can emerge as to how a culture that is seemingly more civilised than other, views that less civilised culture. A wide study of literature, and an appreciation of the human sciences can greatly add to our understanding of human behaviour. Though often biases, and discrepancies in results have to be taken into account, they provide insight into what goes on inside the minds of people, and in what ways they  react to other people and situations. When this sort of knowledge has been attained, one can have a greater understanding of the human behaviour related to different cultures, different ages, different sexes, and it can also give them a greater understanding of themselves. Bilbliography: The World Book Dictionary, Doubelay & Company, Inc. 1982

Challenge ineffective practice in the promotion of the safeguarding Essay

1. Disseminate knowledge based on good practice 2. To involve service users , carers, practitioners , care providers and policy makers in the promoting good practice 3. Enhance the skills and professionalism in social care workers through tailored, targeted and user friendly resources. Before challenge can be made we will need to identify who is at risk of abuse? The vulnerable adult in this context is at risk of abuse ; people with learning disability; older people ; family members and carers. Identifying risks in services. Risk factors associated with abuse can help to point the way for appropriate prevention strategies. For example Institutional abuse has the following factors as indicators: Exogenous-Staff rate and ratio, bed supply. Institutional Environment-Organisation that stifles staff and prevent criticism. Patient Characteristics-very frail, challenging behaviours  staff Characteristics- Stress, negative attitude to work, low esteem and low educational attainment neutralisation of moral concerns leading to residents being seen as objects rather than human beings. Lack of policy awareness. To challenge these abuse we need 1 public awareness 2 Awareness of domestic violence 3 Awareness strategies of other types abuse such as financial abuse 4 Information awareness and advocacy 5 Training and education through development programmes 6 Awareness of the organisation policy and procedures 7 Community links 8 awareness of regulations and legislation 9 Multi- disciplinary and agency collaboration. 10 Empowerment and choice 11 balancing the idea of choice and risk involvement based on decision taken by the service users and carers.

Free Essays on 1960s

, it was not simply a matter of going over there at the age of seventeen to fight for one’s country. Rather, it was a matter of leaving behind the safety and security of the home to which you were accustomed, with little expectation of returning. At a time when th... Free Essays on 1960's Free Essays on 1960's Freedom Rides, Vietnam, and Social activism among the youths of America have left the 60’s with a very profound effect on our society. Without question, the decade of the 1960’s was one of the most controversial in American History. Throughout this period of social unrest, anti-war attitudes were gaining prevalence in a peace-loving subculture, and individuals began to question certain aspects of governmental policy and authority. This was the decade of peace and war, optimism and despair, cultural turbulence and frustration. Vietnam Arguably, no conflict during this era more profoundly affected American societal structure than did the Vietnam war. While an average tour in Vietnam lasted only about one year, the physical, economical, and psychological effects of the war proved so phenomenal that they would remain forever imprinted in the minds of both the American soldiers who fought, and all Americans of military age who feared they would go next. During the course of the Vietnam war more then twenty-six million men came of age to be eligible for the draft, 2.15 million of which were sent to Vietnam. The army assembled for the Vietnam war was significantly younger than any other American army, with the average age of soldiers ranging from seventeen to twenty one. There were many feelings of animosity towards the war and draft, especially from the soldiers themselves. Corpsman Douglas Anderson represented popular feelings of animosity towards the war, especially regarding the youngest of the soldiers fighting when he was quoted saying: â€Å"if your parents signed certain kinds of papers, you could get over there and die at seventeen.† As evidenced by his words, it was not simply a matter of going over there at the age of seventeen to fight for one’s country. Rather, it was a matter of leaving behind the safety and security of the home to which you were accustomed, with little expectation of returning. At a time when th...

Legalization of Marijuana essays

Legalization of Marijuana essays Most Americans dont realize how extreme the war on Marijuana actually is. Since 1965 there have been over 9 million arrests for Marijuana law violations. Over 7 million of these arrests were for possession of personal amounts (Hightimes 1). The average time served in prison for selling Marijuana is four years, compared with just one year for rape or manslaughter (Drugsense 1). Our country treats drug crime as more important than our God-given, constitutionally protected rights. It puts more emphasis on Marijuana than it does on violent crime. These are facts which need to change. Why is Marijuana illegal? The adverse health effects of marijuana are still unproven and it is known to be a rather soft drug, yet it is still illegal, even though alcohol and tobacco, which are other soft drugs, are not. The reason for this is that Marijuana is a gateway drug. It is a soft-illegal drug that opens the gate between less dangerous legal drugs and hard-illegal narcotics. LSD, ecstasy, mushrooms, cocaine, heroin and other hard drugs all have seriously harmful side-effects which can range from permanent psychosis to death, and this is why Marijuana is feared. Who has the most to fear from marijuana legalization parents. They fear that if marijuana is legal more kids will smoke it and use hard illicit drugs. The fact is that legalizing marijuana will help protect America's children from more potentially dangerous drugs. Juvenile marijuana use is inevitable. The real fear, though, is that this will lead to an increase in hard drug use. This is not true. Legalizing marijuana will finally close the gateway between legal drugs and illegal drugs. Marijuana, alcohol, and tobacco will be known as legal and reasonably safe whereas hard drugs will be known as illegal and extremely dangerous. Recreational marijuana users are not the only people hurt by the prohibition of marijuana. There are hundreds ...

ESL Lesson Plan to Teach the Future Tenses Going to and Will

ESL Lesson Plan to Teach the Future Tenses Going to and Will Making the choice to use will or going to is difficult for many ESL students. This lesson focuses on providing context for students so that they can understand the basic difference between something that is planned for the future (use of going to) and a spontaneous decision (use of will). Students first study a short dialog and answer some questions. After this, students give answers to a number of questions which elicit either will or going to. Finally, students get together for some small talk to practice. ESL Lesson Plan Aim: Developing a deeper understanding of the use of the future with will and going toActivity: Dialog reading, follow-up questions, small talkLevel: lower-intermediate to intermediate Outline: Start the lesson by asking some questions with will and going to. Be sure to mix the questions up. For example:​Â  What do you think will happen at school tomorrow?, What are you going to do after school today?, What will you do if you dont understand this lesson?, Where are you going to travel on your next vacation?Ask students to reflect on the questions you asked. Which forms did you use? Can they explain why?Pass out the dialog and ask the students to read through and answer the questions.As a group, correct the questions and ask students to explain why certain questions used will and others going to. A further possibility is to ask students to highlight the sections of the dialog that used will and those that used going to. Ask them to explain why.Have students write out answers to the question sheet. Go around the room to help individual students and check that students are answering using the correct form.As a class, elicit answers from various students. When appropria te, ask students to elaborate on their answers in order to give them a further chance to use these forms. Ask students to use the small talk questions with each other in pairs or in small groups. Optional homework:Â  Ask students to prepare a short paragraph on their future plans for study, hobbies, marriage, etc. (Use of going to). Ask them to write out a few predictions about the future of their lives, the country, the current political party, etc. (future with will) Dialogue Exercise 1: The Party Martha: What horrible weather today. Id love to go out, but I think it will just continue raining.Jane: Oh, I dont know. Perhaps the sun will come out later this afternoon.Martha: I hope youre right. Listen, Im going to have a party this Saturday. Would you like to come?Jane: Oh, Id love to come. Thank you for inviting me. Whos going to come to the party?Martha: Well, a number of people havent told me yet. But, Peter and Mark are going to help out with the cooking!Jane: Hey, Ill help, too!Martha: Would you? That would be great!Jane: Ill make lasagna!Martha: That sounds delicious! I know my Italian cousins are going to be there. Im sure theyll love it.Jane: Italians? Maybe Ill bake a cake...Martha: No, no. Theyre not like that. Theyll love it.Jane: Well, if you say so... Is there going be a theme for the party?Martha: No, I dont think so. Just a chance to get together and have fun.Jane: Im sure itll be lots of fun.Martha: But Im going to hire a clown!Jane: A clown! Youre kidding me. Martha: No, no. As I child, I always wanted a clown. Now, Im going to have a clown at my own party.Jane: Im sure everyone will have a good laugh.Martha: Thats the plan! Follow-Up Questions What do they think about the weather?What does Martha have to share?What are Peter and Mark going to do?What does Jane offer to do?How does Jane react to the news about the Italian cousins?What special plan is there?Why does Martha want a clown?Does Martha know exactly how many people are going to come? If yes, how many. If not, why not?How does Jane think people will react to the clown?Is there a theme for the party? Dialogue Exercise 2: Questions Tell me about your future plans for work or study.What important event do you think will happen soon?Your friend needs some help with some homework. What do you say?Tell me about your plans for this coming summer.Complete this sentence: If I dont understand this exercise ...What do you think future English lessons will be about?

Personal Computers Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Personal Computers - Essay Example From the time we wake up in the morning, until the time we go to bed, computers direct and assist our life. Personal computers today come in various forms – there are the desktops, the laptops, and the palmtops and if that was not enough, even cell phones can be used as personal computers. A computer in every home has changed the way people communicate. People wake up by the alarm that rings from the cell phones and even before they are out of bed, they check the emails on the cell phone itself. In Japan, people describe the cell phone as an extension of themselves (Faiola, 2004). Fifty-five percent of the population in Japan has signed up for internet access from their cellular phones. On the way to work, they answer all their emails. Cell phone is now a way of life, as they link it to their home-office PC, download music, use it to access information, read newspaper and even read novels. They use it to watch the TV programs, navigate the streets with the built-in GPS system, scan bar-coded information, get e-coupons for discounts on food and entertainment, and pay bills. They use it at school too by emailing the questions to the professors in the classroom. The professors answer them orally. The Japanese are so skilled at writing emails on cell phones, that they find it simpler than using computer keyboards. Computer technology is used in everyday lesson plans at the Highland Middle School (Horace). A SMART board, or a dry-erase board, when teamed with the projector becomes a touch-screen computer monitor that the whole class can see. The operator’s fingers act as the mouse and as soon as the board is touched, signal is sent back to the computer. This way they can browse the internet, make interactive presentations, and write on the screen. At The Pennsylvania State University, emails have replaced letters, telephone calls and memorandum as the preferred means of communication (Auguston, 2002). Learning occurs in classrooms, labs, libraries, residence

Process essay about how to be a mind reader Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Process about how to be a mind reader - Essay Example Scientific methods or tricks are often used to understand or know another person’s thoughts. In this paper, some basic techniques of mind reading will be presented to show how mind reading can both be scientifically intriguing and mentally entertaining. For the first kind of mind reading that mainly involves scientific procedures, one needs a basic understanding of both the verbal and non-verbal cues that a person gives off. There are no materials needed to do this kind of mind reading other than knowledge of scientific theories that govern how people behave and communicate. Knowledge in the fields of communication and psychology greatly helps in this matter. Additionally, knowledge in effectively using the senses is also necessary (â€Å"Mind Reading† 1723). On the other hand, the other kind of mind reading that involves tricks might need a couple of materials before one can actually perform the mind reading process. Some of the most basic things to use are paper, penc il, scissors, ruler, and stapler. In addition, one needs an assistant to do the mind reading trick. This trick should be done in a place where the mind reader can be safely isolated from the others at certain times during the mind reading process (Clark 75-6). ... Third, the mind reader can then throw in suggestive remarks that will elicit more hints from the participant. Fourth, the mind reader will merge all these verbal and non-verbal cues and form them into an observation that the participant can believe as successful mind reading. From this, the mind reader can go on and do more mind reading from the added clues, from the participant, or end the process entirely. The mind reader should be careful enough, though, to make sure that the observations thrown at the participant are vague and general enough to stay on the safe side, yet phrased in almost a personalized way. If the process is successful, the participant will believe the mind reader can truly read his or her thoughts. For the other type of mind reading, there is not much mental calisthenics required. First, the mind reader should acquire the help of the assistant. Second, both the mind reader and the assistant will reveal to the group that the mind reader can actually read minds, and is willing to perform for them. They should explain the mechanics of the mind reading presentation, wherein the group members will choose a particular object from the table. This materials stated above --- paper, pencil, scissors, ruler, and stapler --- may be used as choices. Third, the mind reader will leave the room while the group chooses a preferred object without physically touching it. Once an object is chosen, the mind reader can go back with the group. Fourth, the mind reader will correctly identify the object that the group chose. This will be done through a previous understanding between the mind reader and the assistant. Each object will be associated with a specific phrase. For example, if the group chooses the pencil, the assistant will

The Addition of Steroids and Antibiotics in Food Research Paper

The Addition of Steroids and Antibiotics in Food - Research Paper Example This increase in production means a lot of profit for the meat and dairy product industries but on the other hand it is also risking the health of its consumers. FDA and USDA claims that these hormones (steroidal in nature) are free from any harm. Antibiotics which are also used in cattle as preventive measures or to increase the weight of the animal are also producing health concerns in the consumers of the meat and milk. Although the use of antibiotics is banned in Europe it is still legal to inject the low doses of these antibiotics in America and Canada. First we need to be acquainted with Hormones and Antibiotics and to what extent they can affect the health of its consumer. Hormones are the biochemicals produced in the body of human’s as well as animals. Even though they are released in small amounts they control the important body functions such as growth, maturity and reproduction. They are produced by special organs which function to release the hormones according to the requirement and proper timings of its release. This is called the feedback mechanism of the body which manages the amount of hormone released. If body’s requirement of the hormone is fulfilled, by negative feedback mechanism, hormone production automatically stops. Unfortunately, if these hormones are being consumed from any outside sources they can cause serious consequences as there won’t be any mechanism indicating the red alert for the overconsumption. Hormones can be of steroidal or protein in nature. Steroidal hormones remain active even if they are consumed via mouth. Whereas, protein hormones needs to be injected as they are destroyed immediately in the G.I tract (Gastrointestinal tract) by the action of acids and other secretions such as insulin hormone injections by diabetics. Hormones are being used in farm animals to increase their weight and by the use of growth hormones they grow much faster and to a larger extent. They also increase the weight of the animal even if the animal’s food consumption is reduced. In cows, hormones increase the production of milk. Approximately 22% of the Cows are being injected or fed steroidal hormones to get the desired result. Thus, the faster animal reaches to the slaughter weight, the more profitable this procedure becomes for the industries. According to European Union Scientific committee on Veterinary Measures Relating to Public Health, Potential risk to human health can be caused by the use of six types of hormones, including both synthetic and natural hormones. Natural include Oestradiol, Testosterone and Progesterone. Synthetic hormones are Melengestrol, Zeranol, Trenbolone. (Artificial Hormones, 2006). Estradiol and Progesterone are natural female sex hormone and Testosterone is male sex hormone. The other three synthetic hormones are used as growth promoters. FDA approves the use of these hormones in sheep’s and Cattle but not on poultry and Hogs. Recombinant Bovine Growth H ormones (rbGH) is being used in dairy cattle but not on beef cattle.( Consumer Concern about Hormones in Food, 2010) The Committee also put forth questions regarding the issue of such hormone injected animal consumption can cause any imbalance in human hormone system. However, FDA and USDA continuously ensures the consumers that very little amount is

Black Nationalism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Black Nationalism - Essay Example ings in a comprehensive manner; comparing various views, common sense, philosophical tendencies, and/ or set of ideas that are proposed by class that is dominant in a given society (Michael 6). The main logic behind ideology is to bring about change that is deemed desirable in the society, or through a normative process, facilitate adherence to certain ideals where there is already the existence of conformity. The use of ideology in search for freedom among the blacks is one of the most evident across the world. This is because, for a long time the blacks have been advocating for gaining the national identity like the other races. Their advocacy was informed by the fact that the blacks across the world were under various forms of bondage namely colonialism in Africa and slavery in America. As a result, they were racially discriminated, and politically and economically sidelined in addition to losing their identity, thus, the rise of Black Nationalism. In the United States, Black Nationalism referred to a social and political movement that held set of beliefs that the American Americans should have political, economic, and social institutions that are distinct and separate from those of white society. This discussion will critically analyze the significance of black separatism ideological approach that was beneficial to the Black quest for freedom and self- determination. The ideology of Black separatism was one of the major ideologies under the political slogan ‘Black Power’. The ideology was pushed forward by Black Power adherents who believed in Black autonomy and the need of blacks separating from the whites economically, politically, and socially. The ideology was prominent in the 1960s and 1970s during the Black Power movement that emphasized on recognition and respect of black race identity and advocated for the creation of black social and political institutions in order to promote the collective interests of the blacks and advance their values as well

Strong and weak states Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Strong and weak states - Essay Example Current paper focuses on the presentation and the explanation of the differences between strong and weak states – as these differences are highlighted in the relevant literature. Emphasis is given on both the characteristics of strong and weak states and the reasons for the existing differences between the above types of states. The understanding of the criteria and the reasons for the categorization of states to strong and weak could help to explain the format of relationships among states in the context of international community. More specifically, strong states are most likely to show their power in influencing key international policies by intervening in the political, social and economic decisions of the weak states (Nelson et al. 2002). Moreover, the presentation of the causes for the differences between strong and weak states would help to identify the strategies that would help inequality in the global politics to be effectively controlled. 2. Strong and weak states à ¢â‚¬â€œ characteristics and differences In the context of the international community, two different major types of states can be identified: a) the states which are strongly centralized and where the social needs are effectively addressed using appropriate economic (for instance, the industrialization) and political schemes; these states can be characterized as strong (Migdal 2001), b) on the other hand, there are those states where the government is not able to monitor the social and the economic changes developed across the national territory; these are the weak states where changes in society and economy are inevitable under the pressure of ‘uncontrollable forces coming from large powers and the world economy’ (Migdal 2001, p.58). In practice, a series of different criteria can be used in order to decide whether a particular state should be characterized as a strong or weak. For instance, in the study of Kopstein et al (2005) it is noted that the autonomy of a state in developing its own decisions on issues that are key for its existence and development should be considered as the key criterion for characterizing the specific state as strong. In other words, strong states are characterized by the ability of their leaders to make clear their preferences on the state’s priorities and initiatives – both in the short and the long term (Kopstein et al 2005). Moreover, capacity should be regarded as another key criterion for characterizing a state as strong; capacity in this case, as the term is used in the study of Kopstein et al (2005), is related to the existence of adequate resources for the development of the various plans of the state. Reference is made not just to financial resources, i.e. the funds available for the realization of the governmental plans, but also to the social resources, i.e. the people who are willing and capable of supporting the relevant initiatives (Kopstein et al. 2005). As for the weak states, it can be c oncluded – referring to the issues highlighted in the study of Kopstein et al. (2005) – that these states are expected to have limited autonomy and capacity, as these two terms were explained above. However, at this point, the following issue should be highlighted: the level of autonomy and capacity of a state cannot be always clearly identified. Even if many indications exist that show a high

Try to defend dualism as a viable philosophical position. Entertain Essay

Try to defend dualism as a viable philosophical position. Entertain objections to your arguments and reply showing how dualism c - Essay Example Dualism is the concept that declares that the brain is not everything and that there is a mind that exists apart from it. In fact, the idea of dualism has extended from metaphysics to religion, psychology and phenomenology. Dualism is not only about the physical and the nonphysical; it is also about good and evil, mental states and outward behavior, as well as neural connections and physical action. One of the arguments for dualism is the Knowledge Argument, or the idea that the physical and mental substances seem to have properties which are irreconcilable, or that the mental substances have properties that can never be reduced to physical forms. Thus, as the goal of the Knowledge Argument is to argue for the existence of the â€Å"irreducible [and] immaterial nature of the mind† (Robinson), then it is an argument for dualism. In a thought experiment that demonstrates the validity of the Knowledge Argument, a scientist who is deaf from birth has learned all the perfect scient ific understanding of the mechanism of hearing, but when this scientist undergoes an operation to restore his hearing, â€Å"it is suggested that he will then learn ‘something’ he did not known before† (Robinson). ... It is true that the knowledge one has of hearing, such as its anatomical and physiological aspects – or â€Å"how to hear,† can be reduced to the physical and can be proven by physical experiments. Nevertheless, â€Å"what it is like to hear† can only remain mental and the existence of such somehow prove the validity of the Knowledge Argument and of Dualism as well. However, one objection to this argument is the idea that â€Å"physical concepts [such as â€Å"how to hear†] and phenomenal concepts [such as â€Å"what it is like to hear†] are cognitively independent† (Nida-Rumelin). Based on the previously discussed thought experiment, it is possible for the scientist to know phenomenal hearing or â€Å"what it is like to hear† simply from knowing the physical concept of â€Å"how to hear.† This therefore means that â€Å"what it is like to hear† is actually an entirely different piece of information from â€Å"how to hea r† and thus the former cannot be regarded as the irreducible mental property of the latter. My reply to this objection is that although the physical may be considered different from or unrelated to the phenomenal, the mere fact that the phenomenal is distinct from the physical is a proof that there are indeed two aspects of something: the physical and the nonphysical. The objection presented against dualism is weak as it simply evades the issue by criticizing the connection between the physical and the phenomenal. Aside from the Knowledge Argument, dualism is also argued for by the validity of predicate dualism. Predicate dualism is the concept which states that â€Å"psychological predicates are not reducible to physical