Brake disc Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Brake disc - Essay Example The braking system is a crucial element of modern day automobiles (Kuroki, et al., 2000, p.34). Apart from automobiles, the brake system also plays a critical role in bicycles, carts, motorcycles and other motor-propelled machines in the transport sector. It is argued that the operation of the brake system involves a lot of friction between the brake disc and the wheel. In scientific terms, it is the change of kinetic energy into heat energy. During this process, the car rotor rotates in the clockwise direction, as the driver steps on the brake pedal the disc is pushed towards the rotor. The resultant friction causes the vehicle to stop (Brancolini, 2003, p. 441). The brake system is comprises three key parts the iron disc, the brake pads, and hydraulic pistons. The metal disc is fixed on the wheel on which friction is applied by the brake pad. The hydraulic pistons control the movement of the brake pads. The entire braking process is initiated the brake pedal. As the driver steps on the brake pedal, the hydraulic fluid moves from the master cylinder to the slave cylinder. As a result, it pushes the slave pistons; the slave piston pushes the brake pad on the metal disc. The resultant friction stops the vehicle. The hydraulic system reduces work easier since the pressure exacted on the lever is distributed to all wheels (Miller, 2002, p.43). Friction is a primary cause of wear and tear of the brake disc. Therefore, a number of conditions should be met to enhance its durability. During the braking process, kinetic energy is converted into heat energy. As a result, the temperature of the brake disc increases significantly. The high temperature has a major effect on the brake disc material resulting in wear and tear of the brake disc. According to research, the temperature generated on the brake disc is estimated to range from 300 to 800 degrees Celsius. Such high temperature causes the brakes disc to crack hence rendering it useless

Stock marketing and the great depression Movie Review - 1

Stock marketing and the great depression - Movie Review Example In this movie, it is revealed that the creators of this model were two Nobel Peace Prize winners in Economics in the year 1997. Through out this documentary, I was impressed by the manner in which the characters sought to highlight and build upon the key themes. For instance, these Nobel Prize winners are noted to have engaged the formula which seemed to have worked well for them until 1 year later when their Long Term Capital Management hedge fund collapsed thus, forcing them to stagger with a debt of $100 billion. In this regard, it is prudent to note that apart from all the speculations that have been aired regarding the same, the collapse was due to a significant leverage in the strategy which they employed. So basically, I noted that the whole concept in this documentary was about the failure of the Long Term Capital Management hedge fund in the year 1998. First, the movie started by describing the stock exchange market at that particular time in relation to the psychological views that were held by different traders of the same market. More particularly, I am impressed at this point by the argument of how traders sell in the market. For instance, the fearful ones are seen as rushing in to sell all their stocks, a clear contrast of the greedy buyers who rush in to buy and accumulate the same stocks for speculation purposes. Thus, this behavior depicts the market as one purely based on irrational emotion. In my view, this notes that should a trader be willing to walk the path of success in the market, he would need to master the public’s psychoanalysis opinion on the nature of the market. Through this, a trader can be able to correctly predict the market movements and benefit from them (Beaudreau 70). However, as the movie progresses, the notion above is greatly contrasted by the views of academicians who perceive the stock market as a random walk with no defined or precise method to predict its

Cause and Effect Essay Example for Free

Cause and Effect Essay The dedication and self-motivation required to balancing schoolwork and practice is the most difficult part of being a student-athlete. I find that being a student-athlete plays out to be much harder than most people think. It’s very difficult especially at the beginning of the year, when it finally hits you that you’re growing up and finally have to do your own laundry. You’re not only getting your-self situated as far as classes go, but also meeting new people. You have to balance all the new tasks in your life as well as starting new relationships. One obvious cause of wanting to become a student-athlete is the persona. Everyone wants to be the star athlete and everyone wants to be the cool kid on the sports team that gets all the chicks. This is something that we were raised around, all the professional athletes getting praised as kings while walking around with a supermodel around their arm. I mean who wouldn’t want that kind of life? Being a student-athlete is something that you can take pride in. You want to take pride in yourself by representing your team in athletics but also want to further your education by acquiring a degree witch causes you to be a student athlete. It also makes you stand out among the rest because not only are you a full time student but also a full time athlete. Which gives you life skills like motivation and determination that you take with you through out life. Above all it gives your parents something to brag about to their siblings because their twenty three year old son is still living in their house, while flipping burgers down the street. The major cause of being a student-athlete is that you want to have friends. Sure being a student-athlete teaches you how to balance a crazy life style and creates better time management but it also allows you to create great friendships. With schoolwork and practice you usually don’t have socializing time but you will always have your teammates. Knowing this could cause you to become a student-athlete. The cause of student-athletes is when a person wants to thrive to better them self, they want to push themselves to new heights, they want an edge on their competition, want to hopefully find new friendships and in some cases they just want the praise of being a student-athlete. It takes a special person to want to be a student athlete for the right causes, and might need to be revaluated if all you want is the praise of being a student-athlete. A plus is that most of the student-athletes either quickly realize its not for them because their grades become less of an importance and cheerleaders along with a thirty rack becomes a priority, or they end up seeing the importance of education and find themselves succeeding in life. The first effect of a student-athlete is that you will develop physical abilities. Your body will be in better shape, and you’ll be able to achieve things that physically you couldn’t accomplish before. You will push your self to levels you didn’t think wherever possible to reach. You my not have your photo in all the papers and the model on your arm is more likely to be a cute hometown girl that you met at a party, but you have still accomplished more than you would have if you where a normal college student that sits in front on his video games all day, only leaving the room to buy more chips because he destroyed his last bag of Doritos. The second effect has to do with your personal life. Practicing a sport requires some time, plus schoolwork and everything else going in your life you usually don’t have time to lie around and be lazy. Which teaches you not only to have an amazing work ethic but also how to manage the time that you have. It also keeps you busy enough to stay out of trouble, most of the time. When you are playing for a team the name on the front means a hell of a lot more important than the name on the back. When you go some place to play your not representing your self, you’re representing your team and your university. There is only a fortunate bunch of people that get to put on a uniform to represent something bigger than them, so as a student-athlete you take pride in what you do, and you take advantage in representing your school every time you touch the field. The most important effect of being a student athlete is your teammates and your everlasting friendships. You will meet a lot of people being a student-athlete but only a small group of individuals will become your friends to the point you can call them your second family. That is the meaning of a team. As an athlete you will develop a strong character and a competitive spirit. You’ll become more disciplined and responsible, which will certainly help you in your professional life. Above all you develop relationships that can be unbreakable. You go through hell with each other, or as some people like to call it conditioning. You step on the field and go to battle with one another trusting that the other guys in the game will give as much effort if not more to win. You’ll get on each other’s nervous and sometimes get into fights, but no matter what at the end of the day you’ll always have your second family. The effect of being a student-athlete shapes your body, your life, and your mind in good ways. Practicing a sport, going to classes, doing homework and trying to balance a social life keeps you entertained and far away from boredom. In addition you will have the chance to experience the amazing feeling of success after all the hard work you put in to being a student-athlete. It’s worth all the early morning practices, and tough love conditioning to be able to see defeat in your opponents face. It’s worth all the seven o’clock classes, and professors’ monotone lectures to be able to see the overwhelming sense of joy on your mothers face as you receive you diploma. It’s worth the long bus rides, and all the tough losses to be able to have a group of guys you can call you’re family. Even though its hard work being a student-athlete is a great experience that will stay with you forever.

Brain Mechanism And Artificial Intelligence Psychology Essay

Brain Mechanism And Artificial Intelligence Psychology Essay Artificial Intelligence is the art of programming computers in order to produce intelligent behavior, whereas brain theory is the study of the brains function, to understand how the brain functions, the stimulations that go within and how outputs are produced via mathematical modeling and computer stimulation. It can be argued that both contain similar characteristics for functionality, both works together, this can be seen through artificial intelligence used to understand the roles of brain mechanisms. Furthermore both are involved in high cognitive task, such as reasoning, problem solving and decision making. Although some philosophers have accepted that machines can do everything that humans can do, some disagree with this view arguing that such high sophisticated behavior such as love, emotions discovery and moral decisions can only be carried out by humans. AI for many years has been pursuing the study of intelligent behaviour, but using artificial methodology. Intelligence can be defined as the ability to learn and understand, to solve problems and make decisions, both AI and the human brain share this characteristic. In order to study human intelligence some use artificial intelligence to understand human processes. One of the most significant papers on machine intelligence has been explored by Alan Turning; however his theories still remain universal. Turning (1950) predicted that by 2000, a computer could be programmed to have a conversation with a human interrogator for five minutes and that it would be able to deceive the interrogator that it is human, this suggest a link between AI and brain mechanisms. Both the human brain and machines are able to solve complex mathematical calculations; a machine may be designed to solve these calculations faster than the human brain. Although evidence suggests that our brain stores the equival ent of about of over 1018 bits and can process information at the equivalent of about 1015 bits per second. Therefore both AI and brain mechanisms can work together to produce efficient results, as it is evident that both accept input and generate the correct output. It is required that an intelligent machine should help human make decisions, to search for information, to control complex objects, and finally to understand the meaning of words. One of the possible definitions of AI refers to cognitive processes and especially to reasoning. Before making any decisions, people also reason, it is therefore natural to explore the links between both. Since the early 1950s, there has been a vast development of AI where it has become a valuable tool to support humans making decisions, similarly specific brain mechanisms are involved in decision making in the brain, one can argue that both working together will lead to more valid and faster decisions. To support this, research shows that more sophisticated and user-friendly forms of computer-assisted decision aiding technologies are being developed, examples include decision support systems and external information retrieval system, this then can work alongside brain mechanisms. AI has largely been used for problem solving; such machines have been created than can go beyond the human brain ability to solve problems. These include solving mathematical problems of high complexity; these are programmed to do exactly what we want them to do. AI is now involved in solving real life issues, which are usually dealt by human brain mechanisms, some may suggest that it may reach to such an extent that it outperforms the best traders and investors. Evidence suggest that they are already involved in to forecast the economy and analyze credit risk, these just being to examples. This is a rapid growing field which needs to be given attention. More money is being spent on this as the developments in this field have been immense. Neural networks, is one specific type of AI that mimics many characteristics of the human brain. Research suggests that neural networks are able to draw conclusions of data that is incomplete and may learn from previous mistakes, thus imitating per formance outputs by brain mechanisms. AI systems are increasingly being developed and increasing rapidly, this is because of the variety of applications it includes, such as symbolic reasoning, flexibility and explanation capabilities, thus both AI and brain mechanisms can work together and produce efficient results that would make every day life seem less effortless and produce faster results. The goal of building AI agents was that it provides efficiency and most importantly works parallel to brain mechanisms, such as contains features such as cognitive abilities which will play a role in decision making and help in difficult and complex human situations. Furthermore cognitive abilities such as perception, reasoning, learning and planning turn technical systems into systems that know what they are doing; therefore they may function in parallel to the ways brain mechanisms do. Through the years there has been vast developments and more work is being put into these systems in order to it contains certain amount of repres ented knowledge , learn from previous experiences in order to prevent mistakes previously made and so that it makes further improvement and changes. Furthermore developers have aimed to develop AI even further, such as justify the actions and decisions made, be aware of the capabilities it contains and be able to reflect on its behaviour, these are the same roles that brain mechanisms play, thus they aim to create a parallel model. Although such developments have been made through many years, it may be argued that AI may still not be able to compete with the advanced functionality of brain mechanisms. Despite the speed and memory capacity, AI struggles to contend. The human brain contains around 20 billion neurons, each neuron being connected through synapses of approximately 10,000 other neurons, which AI cannot possibly mimic. However there has been continuous progress and advances of AI, an example might be face recognition software, which detects photos; the brain does this automatically, and relies on memory similar to AI where it uses its stored memory for collection. In AI this has been used for security purposes, which have demonstrated to be very successful. Previous advances include voice recognition, which both AI and brain mechanisms share. For AI this has not only be used in terms of security reasons but also in order to function the device and making it more easier and convenient for use, this has been done through using different applications, where it involves programming, the same way the brain mechanisms programme in order to carry out specified roles. In addition although AI applications use many techniques, the fundamental building block is called the neural network, likewise brain mechanisms functions the same way. Things that were difficult to reason earlier on have become easier to understand through advances in technology. As the human brain being such a complex mechanism it has been difficult to observe human brain activity. New advances have been made in recent years, FMRI (Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging) being one of these discoveries which has helped immensely to capture brain activity, this has been significant help for AI as it enables to have an insight on brain activity, which may help advance and help imitate brain mechanisms. Furthermore, this then shifts the balance between building artificial intelligent systems and studying natural intelligence. It should be expected that in the future, there should be numerous studies on relating artificial intelligence to natural intelligence. Current evidence suggests that both can work together to demonstrate different cognitive states in humans, here artificial intelligence has been used for learning algorithms to distinguish between various cognitive states observed through FMRI. Looking at this area further, natural and artificial intelligence are both said to be closely related in most objects and in everyday life generally. Both get impacted if are hit physically. Human behavior is said to be artificial at times, both function through language and communication. Communication is essential for both AI and brain mechanisms in order to function. Through communication they are able to send out essential messages, which helps to maintain these systems and allows them to function effectively and plays a key role in all aspects. AI shares many characteristics with brain mechanisms; one may argue that an essential feature which only human mechanisms can produce is emotions. Emotion is defined as a persons feelings and behavior which has a direct affect on the performance, emotions may act as an obstacle to produce intelligent outcome, thus it can be argued that because AI lacks to produce emotions this may not have an impact, therefore not having an influence on the outcomes it produces. However it is essential, that in order to emulate human behavior and to work alongside humans that AI should have emotions, it is required that not only should it think and reason but also be able to show emotions. Overall evidence suggests that both artificial intelligence and brain mechanisms are closely related, both work together in order to produce efficient outcomes. AI and brain mechanisms share many key characteristics such as reasoning, problem solving and decision making and intelligence. Recent evidence suggest that AI has allowed us to understand complex brain processes, this then enables to understand human actions and decisions in more depth. However many researchers still argue that the high level cognition can only be produced by brain mechanisms, such as emotions and feelings that AI fails to produce.

Letters and Correspondence in Austens Emma Essay -- Jane Austen

Letters and Correspondence in Austen's Emma Emma as the next step in the epistolary novel Jane Austen’s novel Emma was written at a time when the epistolary novel had just passed its peak (Cousineau, 32). Not only do letters and correspondence feature heavily in the novel, but according to April Alliston, â€Å"elements†¦ characteristic of novels of women’s correspondence recur in Austen† (221). Some examples of these elements that Alliston provides are the existence of young marriageable heroines; deceased mothers, or threatening ones which, in Austen’s novels, have become merely negligent; and substitute mothers who pass advice on to the daughter (221). As epistolary novels were comprised entirely of letters, early novelists could assert the pretended truth of their work rather than label it as fiction (Cousineau, 28). However, one disadvantage to this practice is that artefacts such as letters are â€Å"inscribed in doubleness and contradiction" (Cousineau, 14). Letters serve as a medium between the letter-writers and the reader, a medium which has the potential to warp the truth according to the private and unknown whims of the writers. By adopting an omniscient narration of her characters’ thoughts instead, Austen â€Å"[focussed] the reader’s â€Å"gaze† on the private space from which the heroine gazes out, thus fixing her more squarely in its exemplary frame than letter fiction ever could† (Alliston, 234). Although this method of narration â€Å"sacrifices the â€Å"documentary status†Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ that eighteenth century fiction strove to achieve† (Alliston, 236), Austen’s novels al low us to see directly into a character’s thoughts. This both promises a more reliable version of "truth" by enabling the reader to learn a character’s genuine motivation, an... ...aults: Correspondences in Eighteenth-Century British and French Women’s Fiction. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1996. 219-241. Austen, Jane. Emma. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., 2003. Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions, 1997. Cousineau, Diane. â€Å"Letters and the Post Office: Epistolary Exchange in Jane Austen’s Emma.† Letters and Labyrinths. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Press, 1997. 13-51. Knoepflmacher, U. C. 2. The Importance of Being Frank: Character and Letter-Writing in Emma. Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900, 1967. JSTOR 7 April 2007. Wheeler, David. The British Postal Service, Privacy, and Jane Austen’s â€Å"Emma†. South Atlantic Review, 1998. JSTOR. 7 April 2007.

Eye movements are a reflection of cognitive processes Essay -- Psychol

Introduction The mind is an intriguing element of the human life not only because of its complexity and capability but mostly because of its opacity. How does psychology begin to understand something so obscure and complex? Evidently, by observing and measuring the product of the cognitive processes that occurs through an interaction between the external and internal world. The term ‘cognitive processes’ is a rather collective term referring to a range of mental processes such as perceiving, thinking, speaking, acting, planning and imagining (Ward, 2006). The processes themselves are immensely difficult to measure directly, if possible at all. However, one may gain insight into these mental processes through observing the covert products, such as haemodynamic and electrophysiological changes and the overt products, such as behaviour, accuracy, response times and eye movements. The scope of this essay is to review the evidence that demonstrates exactly how eye movements reflect cognitive processes. Due to the vastness of the topic, this essay will focus on only one of the aforementioned cognitive processes. There has been much attention and extensive literature and reviews regarding eye movements as a tool for understanding the processes of reading, visual perception, visual search and attention (e.g., Rayner, 1998; Liversedge and Findlay, 2 000; Schutz, Braun and Gegenfurtner, 2011). All the mentioned research fields involve measuring eye movements while view some form of visual stimulus, this dissertation will explore a more aberrant field, evidence will be based on literature relating to eye movements when sensory visual input is absent, during visual mental imagery. While reviewing the literature basic themes relating eye m... ...nformation processing: 20 years of research. Psychological Bulletin, 124, 372-422. Schutz, A.C., Braun, D.I., & Gegenfurtner, K.R. (2011). Eye movements and perception: A selective review. Journal of Vision, 5, 1-30. Shallice,T. (1988). From neuropsychology to mental structure. New York: Cambridge University Press. Sima, J.F., Lindner, M., Schultheis, H., & Barkowsky, T. (2010). Eye movements reflect reasoning with mental images but not with mental models in orientation knowledge tasks. Spatial Cognition, 10, 248-261. Spivey, M.J., & Geng, J.J. (2001). Oculomotor mechanisms activated by imagery and memory: eye movements to absent objects. Psychological Research, 65, 235-241. Ward, J. (2006). The students guide to cognitive neuroscience. New York: Psychology Press. Watson, J.B. (1913). Psychology as the behaviourist views it. Psychological Review, 20, 158-177.

Ethical Movie Review: Blood Diamond Essay

0.1 Introduction The following essay will examine ethical issues addressed through the movie â€Å"Blood Diamond†. The two main issues identified and discussed are; child soldiers and conflict diamonds. My main lens of ethical theories will consist of the four western theories, this includes, egoism, utilitarianism, ethics of duties and ethics of rights. Even though these theories are based on ethical absolutism, I will still try to apply a pluralistic view. Additionally, some of these theories will be expanded and other theories that do not tend so much towards ethical absolutism will be added. The following section will concentrate more on how these issues occurred and try to give some potential answer to the problems. In order to do so descriptive ethical theories will be tools in the examination. Finally the conclusion will be presented by a combination of a film review and a short summary of the findings in the text. 1.1 Children with guns The first of the two ethical issues that will be examined is the use of kids as soldiers. In order to do so I believe I have to take a subjective role on the subject, looking from a rebel soldier. The reasons for this is because I believe objective or western views on this topic will in the end state that this is neither moral or ethical. In order to get a more interesting view on the matter, I will use an alternative approach and try to look out of the eyes of a soldier taking the use of kid soldiers. The question is; how can the use of kids as soldiers be justified? The situation described in the movie tells us about the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), which is a rebel group fighting the government in Sierra Leone 1999. To put the situation in a soldiers mind, one could argue that his or hers thoughts were, â€Å"I am being invaded by the west, they are stealing my diamonds, the government is corrupt, how can I win this fight?† This perspective is based on RUF as one minded soldiers, of course they are not, but in order to make this argument the assumption is so. The first ethical theory that can be linked to the response of child soldiers is egoism. The main concept of this theory is justified with one having to focus on one self; to control all other things is to hard (Crane and Matten 2010). It is important to distinguish from selfishness, and one can argue that this action can be justified as an egoistic mindset, not a selfish point of view. They do not fight only for their own winning; they fight for what they believe is best for the country and RUF. The rest of the world would probably disagree to the use of kids, but how can they judge a situation that for most of them is so far away that they can only be prejudice not knowledgeable about the situation? One can even go so far to say that both the consequentialist theories supports the actions performed by this rebel group, they are fighting for their own desires and what they believe is the greater good. In order to do so they have to utilise the resources available, ergo using children as soldiers and living in utilitarianism. Consequentialist theories focus on the outcome, and one can state that is what has to be the focus in order to actually use so young people for means in war. The differences between the theories are that egoism focuses on the decision-maker while utilitarianism casts an eye on the wider community, which RUF seems to do as well when fighting against the government (Crane and Matten 2010). For the remaining theories on this issue, there is no one that can be associated with the use of children for these actions. Both non-consequentialist theories have clear moral guidance that will not support the course of actions taken by the RUF. Ethical duties have three main maxims, and I believe no RUF soldier would want the use of child soldiers to become a universal law. Maxim two analyses will tells us that all the children have not freely decided to become soldiers, and can be said to be used as means by the RUF to achieve their goals, not to educate the children in the right way. The third maxim asks if the actions are universally accepted, there is no need for explanation here, it is not accepted by the world. Ethics of rights and justice has a large focus on human dignity and humanity; one can reasonably state that there is neither in the use of children as soldiers. So we can now make a short summary to say that with a pluralistic (maybe a bit more relativistic) view on the two consequentialist ethical theories the use of kids to bear arms can be justified. We will discuss this issue further in the next section of the essay, but first the issue of blood diamonds will be addressed. 1.2 â€Å"Bling-Bang† Conflict diamonds or blood diamonds as the title of the movie confirms is an important ethical issue enlightened by director Edward Zwick. Before going into discussion around ethics regarding this topic, a short definition of conflict diamonds is appropriate: â€Å"Conflict Diamonds – also known as blood diamonds – are diamonds that are used to fuel conflict and human rights abuses. They have founded brutal conflicts†¦ that have resulted in the death and displacement of millions of people.† (Global Witness 2011). In Sierra Leone 1999 the diamonds are traded for mostly weapons by the RUF, the buyers are big diamond companies using cleansing methods around the world in order to â€Å"wash† the stones. As the movie shows us, the diamond industry is powerful and unethical. Working from a view of pluralism which is an ethical middle way between absolutism and relativism, one which I believe should and is being used the most, the actions of the diamonds corporations are highly immoral and unethical. Pluralism is based on the notion that morality is a social phenomenon according to Kaler (Crane and Matten 2010). If one would argue that morality is a social phenomenon, the morality of taking use of rebel groups as RUF and their extreme methods of operations can in no way be justified. Aiding criminal and horrifying actions like these should never be done. The scary part is that this is nothing new, corporations do think of people as means only which is opposite of what the second maxim of ethical duties suggest (Crane and Matten 2010). A quote from the movie which describes this situation, and implies that the companies fool consumers into believing that every diamond comes without blood is said by Danny Archer when talking to an American journalist, â€Å"In America it’s bling bling, but out here it’s bling bang.† (Imdb.com 2011), What Mr. Archer here says is very on the spot on how unethical the operations of diamond companies deceive the world. And they do so knowingly, after all the intro of the movie shows a G8 conference where diamond CEO’s are precent and applauded for attending the fight against blood diamonds. When they at the end then still buy blood diamonds, their actions can be nothing else than both immoral and unethical. For every ethical theory that include morality, honour, or even the greater good, these people do not seem to care, and it is hard to find any way to justify their means except for financial winnings, which is sad, unethical and immoral. Their actions can be found as unethical by three of the four ethical theories mentioned; the only one that again can come to create peace of mind for the CEO’s is the line of egoism. Again the financial desires of diamond companies seems to be all they care about, and if they believe that everything else is not their problem, then egoism will accept the actions of these people. There is a but here, and as the last paragraph stated, they knowingly deceive and knowingly know what the history of their stones are. They make that history matter to them as soon as they attend the diamond meeting. And when they make that blood covering those diamonds matter, stepping out of line of the egoistic theory is something they do, and as ethical theories are rules and principals that determines right and wrong, these actions can clearly be stated as wrong (Crane and Matten 2010). I will not spend much time on covering the three remaining theories on this topic because I do not see room for much distortion when measuring the decisions up to the remaining three theories. Put simply, utilitarianism is not supported because their actions are not for the greater good. There is no â€Å"greater good† in buying conflict diamonds unknowingly for consumers; neither is there for exploiting a brutal civil war for economical purposes. There are to significant impacts on world’s society for this to be disregarded. Over to the non-consequentialist theories they are as described previously in the essay based much on morality, dignity and humanity, and there are room for little of these concepts in the actions of Van de Kaap. Van de Kaap is the character of the diamond CEO in this movie. And as mentioned earlier supporting such horrible military actions defies what the second maxim of ethical duties suggests. Now that the four main ethical theories have been discussed with this issue the following section of this essay will seek meaning in the actions performed by RUF and diamond corporations. 2.1 Finding the reasons Normative theories tend to focus more on the problems after actions and decisions have been made, this section will use tools from descriptive ethical theory, which are used as tools on how the decisions are made and why (Crane and Matten 2010). There are two main categories to address, individual factors and situational factors. I believe that individual factors do not play an important role compared to situational factors. I do acknowledge Ford and Richardson’s (1994) argument that socialisation matters, but I do not recognise this as an individual factor; this goes over to the situational factor. One can argue that adults have individual factors when presenting different childhood environments, and this is true, but to determine how a person will act when born is not possible. The only factor recognised with individuals to really matter is mental illness, and then I mean birth sickness not sickness developed during the life. The other factors all depends on environment. As a scene in the movie show, Mr. Archer is found in a conversation with a local man taking care of children and is asked the question if he believes people generally good or bad and responds; â€Å"No. I’d say their just people.†(Imdb.com 2011). This is true, there are none born evil or good, it is our actions that show us what we become. So the tool that will be used to interpret the actions of RUF and Van de Kaap are mostly situational factors. Assumptions are telling us that 10 000 children were fighting for the RUF (Murphy 2003). As we can exclude most individual factors, one can start by blaming environment for actions performed by human beings. Beginning this will be with exploring the relevant situational factors. The situation described in the movie is a rebel group fighting the government in which they believe are corrupt and see no other solution than to take the fight in their own hands. As the movie provides us only with one way the children end up as soldiers, there are other reasons for children to bear the RUF uniform. Murphy (2003) talks of four models of child soldiers, the first one is called â€Å"coerced youth† which is the model of brutal coercion of children into the army, just as the one we see in the movie. The remaining three models are not going to be described in detail here, but tell us a bit different story. Children living in poverty and with a rough childhood, bad parenting in a chaotic country can easily tend to blame the government. The search for authority and some sort of place for them in society can make them join what they feel is the right fight, or maybe just to get some meaning in their lives. The society has not provided the safety that a child needs so it seeks it, the cognitive moral stage these kids live in is named preconvention. Their cognitive moral development is shaped by the environment, and it â€Å"refers to the different levels of reasoning that an individual can apply to ethical issues and problems.† (Crane and Matten 2010:153). The preconventional stage says that to determine what is right and wrong out from punishment or rewards from their subordinates, and in this case RUF rewards unethical behaviour. The mindset of children are found in the strategy of denial (Anand, Ashforth and Joshi 2004) they remove responsibility from themselves; hereby their actions can be accepted by themselves and then implemented. In addition their locus of control is probably low in a kids mind, and seeking control in authority figures. Now to the RUF, one can see reasons for why child soldiers were used, if one is to believe that a combination of kidnapping and children joining willingly were the start up. The way from there can be that children were seen to be useful and thereby just adapting more children as they felt the need. This may very well be one of the reasons for the use of child soldiers. The next point will pursue reasoning for which diamonds create unethical behaviour. To find the meaning of exploiting Sierra Leone for their diamonds we can draw similarities with the reasoning above. More accurately the strategy used to rationalise unethical behaviour. Van de Kaap will be again the person of interest in this, and in this movie this person represents the strategy denial of responsibility (Anand, Ashforth and Joshi 2004). Not in the same way as the children described above, but in the sense that they believe that if they do not take advantage of these diamonds, someone else will. By having that attitude the other strategy, denial of injury (Anand, Ashforth and Joshi 2004) also fits. They may acknowledge that people are getting harmed, but it is not their responsibility since someone else would take their place if they were not there. The reward is what gives the organisation meaning, people tend to do what they are rewarded for, and in that process it is easy to forget the ethics regarding their actions (Crane and Matten 2010). We can also blame the world’s ignorance of the issue, Crane and Matten (2010) writes that â€Å"Quite simply, ethical violations that go unpunished are likely to be repeated.† And this is the world’s responsibility, in the movie we find a journalist to take this job, fighting against a world that seems oblivious to the issue. So what possible solution can be proposed to it all? 2.2 Possible solutions The first proposed solution to be addressed will be blood diamonds. Already the Kimberly process has been formed in 2003. This is a response on conflict diamonds and mentioned in the beginning of the movie (Global Witness 2010). The imitative is a non-government, non-corporate and therefore independent imitative which sertify conflict diamonds. It is said to be an exclusive club as only members can trade with members and therefore something countries long to take a part in. Global Witness state on their homepage â€Å"†¦ attempts at industry self-regulation have been woefully insufficient; meaning that it still isn’t possible to guarantee to consumers that the diamonds they purchase are free from the taint of conflict and human rights abuse.† And this tells us that it is hard, but at least someone is putting in an effort. So when the regulation is hard, we should take care of some roots of the problem. Diamonds is a good defined as a want, it is not a need. One can therefore blame the consumers on making it possible for companies to profit so much of diamond trade, and by doing so I want to put some of this responsibility back in their hands. The consumer has to make sure that what they are buying does not support conflicts in other nations. If a system would be demanded by the people, one could argue that the power which lies with the people is strong enough to make the corporations act. The second solution is in some way already shown in the movie, a rehabilitation â€Å"centre† in the jungle for kids. It is important to do this properly and not ignore the kids once they have become soldiers. In addition I believe that by fighting poverty is a way of fighting children turning to killers. To perform these two tasks that here is proposed is something that the western world should be obligated to do when thinking of all the pain it have caused for Africa in the past centuries. One possibility would be for the G8 to take use of discourse ethics and form a panel with parties from rebel groups, ex-child soldiers, local government and objective minds. That concludes this section of the essay; the next one will be a short summary and review of the movie. 3.1 Short review of movie and text The final section of this essay will be a short movie review combined with some conclusions from this essay. The director Edward Zwick has in my eyes done a fantastic job, the movie is stuffed with real life issues, and two are presented in this text by child soldiers and blood diamonds. Zwick presents ethical issues in an action packed thriller filled with good acting and effects. I view this movie as a perfect combination of Hollywood and the real world, there are a few clichà ©s, but that has to be expected; the rest is a mind opening truth that certainly was a goal for the production when the release date was set 18th of December, right before the year’s biggest diamond sale period. The three main characters each present separate ethical morality, the â€Å"soldier of fortune† gives us an egoistic mindset, but gets softer as the movie closes to the end. The way the movie presents both the understanding for the desire in egoism as well as showing that it is possible to change and also show compassion a moral twist. The second character is a fisherman presenting a more feminist ethical theory, showing much love for family and care for people, even a man that is likely to steal from him. The last character is a female journalist fighting for fairness and justice. And Maddy Bowen can easily be linked to several ethical theories, but closest to theories of justice. Her fight for fairness and getting the west to open their eyes gives another moral angel to the situation in Sierra Leone. All in all Zwick with good help from his actors presents the issues of child soldiers and blood diamonds in a very good way, one can see that the diamond corporations of the world did not like it, they fought the movie for a long time and ended up with a 15$ US million PR campaign (PRWatch 2006) that resulted in a website called diamondfacts.org. This is interpreted as a sign that he is pushing on the correct buttons and may be something that forces change. I do not believe I would change anything with his movie, in order to reach the target market a combination of fiction and facts are needed. This essay has proved that the use of child soldiers as well as trading conflict diamonds is unethical and has asked the world to act as a solution; there is power within the people that should be used to pressure changes to these issues.