How Civil Right And Domestic Policy Correspond By...

DeAndre DeHoney Professor: Chris Politz U.S. History 1301 Word Count: 1328 On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation as the nation approached its third year of bloody civil war. The Proclamation declared that all persons held as slaves within the rebellion states are and hence forward shall be free. In this paper I will specify how civil right and domestic policy correspond. The Emancipation Proclamation was a result of the 4 year civil war that was started by numerous unfair and brutal treatment to what was considered labor workers. Though all were not African American personnel that was bought and sold, all were freed when this policy was enforced. Domestic policy is an area of policy that is†¦show more content†¦They were added to the Constitution on December 5, 1791, in this time, slaves were not considered human. Three of every five slaves counted as one person in the population. The civil war that eventually ended with the Emancipation Proclamation stated that everyone being held as slaves within the r ebellion states where free after the brutal beating, killing, raping, and burning of slaves. The African Americans decided that I was time to stand for something and what better to stand for than themselves, and not only them, but for their children and their children’s children. African Americans began to band together and show the rest of the world what it truly means to be one nation under god. They showed what it means to be simply an American. A family by that name of Dahmer was a prime example of this. Vernon Dahmer was a free man that voiced to the African American people that they need to speak and be heard. When he began to lead people into victory, the Ku Klux Klan came to his home in the midst of the night while he and his family were sleeping and began to burn their home. After Mr. Vernon suffered horrific burns he died the following day, some of his last word where if you don’t vote you don’t count. The KKK hated and despised anything that meant bla cks would better them sleeves and be more than what they already where. Things that have taken place in the pass as well as what is currently taken place have left the questions have we overcome

Essay about An Inside Look at Norse Mythology - 985 Words

Creation: The Nine Worlds In the beginning of time, there was no soil and no sky. The Only thing that existed was the Ginnungagap, the abyss. (http://www.pantheon.org/articles/g/ginnungagap.html) The Frost from Niflheim and the flames from Muspelheim came toward each other until the met in Ginnungagap. And from the flames and Frost, it created Ymir, the only living being and first of the godlike giants. Ymir was able to produce asexually and when Ymir sweated more giants were born. As the frost melted a cow by the name of Audhumbla emerged from it. Audhumbla nourished Ymir with her milk. And because of that she was nourished by salt-licks in the ice. As she licked the ice she uncovered Buri, the first Aesir tide of gods. Buri then had a†¦show more content†¦Hvergelmir is the origin of every living and place where everyone will go back. The next world, Muspelheim, the land for fire. This world was created to the southern region of the world. Muspelheim is a lava filled world with flames, sparks and soot. Home to Muspelheim si the fire giants and fire demons. Who ruled the giant Surt. Surt is a sworn enemy of the Aesir and will ride out with his sword when Ragnarok comes. He would then smite Asgard and turn it into the flaming inferno world just like Muspelheim. The third world, Asgard, home of the Gods. Asgard is held in the middle of the world, high up in the sky. Asgard is home to the gods and goddesses. The males in Asgard are the Aesir, while the females are reffered to as Asynjur. Odin is ruler of Asgard and is also chief of the Aesir. Odins wife, Frigg, is the Queen of Aesir. Inside Asgard, is Valhalla; the place where Vikings died in battle go in the afterlife. Valhalla is in the front of Asgard and contain 540 doors. The doors are wide enough that 800 warriors can walk next to each other. The roof is made of golden shields, and the walls are made of wooden spears shafts. Only half came to the huge building while the other half were sent to the goddess Freya. In the mornings the warriors would put on their armor and grab their swords and fight. After every battle the great dinner would restore all of them back to normal. The world of humans, Midgard, also called â€Å"Middle Earth†. Midgard is in theShow MoreRelatedNorse Mythology : The Norse Gods1750 Words   |  7 PagesHow Marvel Comics has Americanized the Norse Pantheon Norse mythology has always been close to the consciousness of the public. If we look at all the references in comics, movies, literature, art, music and graphic novels it is absolutely full of them. This close relationship to the Norse myths could be embedded into our society partly because of the influence of Christianity into the Scandinavian culture during their changing of religion. The texts that we have as our source material are theRead MoreThe Tolkien s The Hobbit862 Words   |  4 Pagesjust have to look hard enough to find them. 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Jurisprudence - Natural Law free essay sample

Introduction Natural law theory is not a single theory of law, but the application of ethical or political theories to the questions of how legal orders can acquire, or have legitimacy, and is often presented as a history of such ethical and political ideas. These theories would explained the nature of morality, thus making natural law theory a general moral theory. The basic idea was that man could come to understand, either by his own reasoning or help from God, how he should act rightly in respect of his fellow man. However, within modern jurisprudence, much of the importance of natural law has been eroded from a question on the meaning of justice or how a system of law could be understood as legitimate; into a question of what is the relationship between natural law theories and the everyday operations of a legal system. This is because much of natural law has been savaged by two criticisms: a. Natural law theories assertion that in order to understand what law is, it is necessary to involve oneself in an exploration and explaination of what law ought to be is inherrently faulty. (the fact/value distinction) This confuses the description (laws actual existence) with prescription (the evaluation of law as good or bad). Natural law theories stray between the logically unconnect fields of meaning of is and ought, which is dubbed the naturalistic fallacy. The incompatibility between these two fields is illustrated by the classic interpretation of Humes law, that one cannot derive a statement about what ought to be from a statement about what is, or vice versa. To give an example of the non sequitur involved in this kind of reasoning is that the fact that only women can bear children, points to the conclusion that they This supposed link between the capacity to bear children and motherhood is provided through social conventions and is entirely contingent. The former does not follow the latter as if it was some sort of natural and unavoidable consequence, and thus cannot be seen to somehow be an inherent property of human beings and the way they organise their world. b. Any attempt to identify a necessary common element of ethics in all legal ststems appear to founder on the difficulty of agreeing on a common set of ethical values, as coherent moral values are extremely difficult to articulate, let alone to prove. c. The source of natural law It can be discerned from Ciceros works that there are two very different sources of natural law: i. Our shared reason Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory and it is not only justice and injustice that are distinguished naturally, but in general all honourable and disgraceful acts. For nature has given us shared conceptions and has so established them in our minds that honourable things are classed with virtue, disgraceful ones with vice These are our shared conceptions’ given us by nature by which we all classify things in the same way, evil with evil, good with good. ii. God as the author of natural law and there will not be different laws at Rome and at Athens, or different laws now and in the future, but one eternal and unchangeable law will be valid for all nations and all times, and there will be one master and ruler, that is, God, over all of us, for he is the author of the law, its promulgator, and its enforcing judge. Is it not possible for our reason to conflict with what we learn from the revelation of God’s will? Was the moral law as revealed by God good just because God willed it, or was it willed by God because it was good? There is a circularity in attemption to define morality in terms of Gods will. To say that God deserves our obedience because he is morally perfect can only make sense if we understand the notion of moral perfection before we relate it to God. This had led natural lawyers such as Grotius to say that natural law was willed by God, but, but was willed by him because it is that which is rationally good. It is not good merely because he happens to have willed it. Hence Grotius could conclude that natural law would hold good even if there were no God. A history of Natural Law The origin and focus of natural law theory is summed up in the form of a question posed by Aristotle: What is the reason for deminding a mina as a ransom for the prisoner, or that a goat and not two sheep should be sacrified? This question is the basis for the earliest distinctions between natural and positive law. The content of laws and the specific consequences that flow from the, is entirely arbitrary, in ancient as well as modern times. Laws are a matter of convention or convenience, political interest or local ideology. Two Greek philosophers, Plato and Aristotle, attempted to find an alternative ethical basis for social life: a. Plato Plato saw the basis of ethics and other knowledge in absolute values to which things could approximate. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory Plato saw the basis of ethics and other knowledge in absolute values to which things could approximate. For example, something can be beautiful, but it is not itself beauty. The elements of beauty found within the vase enable the description beautiful to be used. Men know that value intuitively, although its content could be more fully identified through the application of reason. We could thus grasp, albeit inperfectly, the true form or idea of these absolute values, which includes law, which plays an intrinsic relationship with law. Plato postulates that relationship is that only such law can be considered right.. which has something of the externally beautiful, and which neglects everything that is devoid of value. For Plato, ideas such as justice, virtue and beauty were ideals, but they have greater ethical value than the customs of particular regions. The latter are conventions, and thus have nothing sacred about them. Therefore he sought to locate ethics in universal values, which could transcend the particularity of local practices. b. Aristotle For Aristotle, the source of those values is not absolute values, but of those found in nature, in particular, human nature. For him, nature had elements of both change and stability. The concept that unified this opposition was the telos (end of things). Things evolve towards their ends, or purpose. Aristotle applied this teleogocal form of reasoning to human development. Man is a social animal, which meant that he needed social groups in orde to flourish. But man is also a political animal, it is his nature to live in a state. But politics was only possible within a polis , thus the creation of the polis allowed man to fulfil a potential. This reasoning led him to the conclusion about the law appropriate to a polis , for example, from mans nature as a social animal he concluded that there must be laws appropriate for the rearing and education of the young. Thus man is social, political and sought knowledge, and only when in a position to fulfil these aspects of his nature could men flourish and achieve the good life. Once Alexander the Great founded the Greek empire, Greeks and barbarians came into contact with in ways that went beyond the former making slaves of the latter. Attempts to make ethical sense of this experience led the Stoics to accord primacy to mans reason, as by reason man could determine those precepts of right conduct which transcended particular cultures, and therefore were universally appilcable. They also talked of a community beyond the city state. This philosophy represents the first attempt to identify sources of law that transcend particular states. This relationship, between local laws and more universal and higher legal order, forms the basis for the development of natural law from the time of the Stoics. With the creation of the Roman Empire, came the development of a common legal order for Roman Colonis and Rome itself, based on the customs common to them all, jus gentium . This notion started life as a second class legal system, a stripped down Roman civil law intended to facilitate trade, which applied to foreigners, but came to be regarded as a higher or superior legal With the creation of the Roman Empire,Moderndevelopment of a Theory legal order for Classical and came the Natural Law common Roman Colonis and Rome itself, based on the customs common to them all, jus gentium . This notion started life as a second class legal system, a stripped down Roman civil law intended to facilitate trade, which applied to foreigners, but came to be regarded as a higher or superior legal St. Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologica To Aquinas, law is a rule or measure of action that leads subjects to perform certain actions and restrain from doing others. But these rules and measure of actions is derived from reason, as Aristotle said, it is reason which directs action to its appropriate end. In addition, the object of said laws must be the well-being of the whole community. This is because, as according to Aristotle, mans purpose is to live in a political community, and therefore what is legal and just in a law will reflect this, to preserve the well-being of the community through common political action. Since the principle object of law is the ordering of the common good, the promulgation of law is the task of either the entire community or a political person whose duty is the care of the common good. The well being of one man is not a final end, but subordinate to the common good. It follows that unjust law is not according to reason, and is thus not law in the true and strict sense, but is rather a perversion of law. However, it does assume the nature of law to the extent that it provides for the well-being of the citizens. Aquinas then described orders of law, eternal, divine, natural and human, which purported to show the way in which human reason was able to appreciate what was good and godly. Man, by his reason, would be able to participate in the moral order of nature designed by God. 1. Eternal Law lex anterna This is divine reason, known only to God and the blessed who see God in his essence. It is Gods plan for the universe, a deliberate act of God and everything, not only man, is subject to it. Eternal law is thus the ideal of divine wisdom considered as directing all actions and movements. All laws, so far as they accord with right reason, derive from the eternal law. As Augustine said, in human law nothing is just or legitimate if it has not been derived by men from the eternal law. Thus, human law has the quality of law only in so far as it proceeds according to right reason. If it deviates from reason it is called an unjust law, and has the quality not of law but of violence. 2. Divine Law lex divina This deals with those parts of eternal law that are directly revealed to man by divine revelation. Aquinas notes the reasons why we need divine law to direct human life: a. It is by law that man is directed in his actions to his final end. Since man is destined to an end of eternal blessedness, and this exceeds what is proportionate to natural human faculties of reason, it is necessary that he should be directed to this end not just by natural and human law, but divine law. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory It is by law that man is directed in his actions to his final end. Since man is destined to an end of eternal blessedness, and this exceeds what is proportionate to natural human faculties of reason, it is necessary that he should be directed to this end not just by natural and human law, but divine law. b. There is an uncertainty of human judgment, resulting in contradictory laws. Therefore man, to avoid any doubt as to what he is to do and what to avoid, it is necessary that he should have direction from a divinely given law, which is known to be incapable of error. c. Because laws cannot reach to the interior actions of the soul. d. As Augustine says, human law can neither punish or prohibit all that is evilly done. Therefore, there should be divine law to ensure that no evil should go unforbidden and unpunished. Note: There is an overlap between divine law and natral law, in such matter as are covered by, for example, the Ten Commandments , where the prohibitions against murder, theft and so on, are declared by divine law but can also be appreciated as natural law precepts as well. 3. Natural Law lex naturalis This law consists of participation of the eternal law in rational creatures. It is thus the eternal law in so far as this is intuitively and innately known and knowable. Humans, being rational creaturesm are subject to eternal law in a special way, as they have a certain share in the divine reason itself, thus deriving a natural inclination to their own actions and the actions of others. Therefore, natural law is the same for all men since all are rational and it is proper for man to be inclined to act according to reason. Precepts of the natural law The order of the precepts of the natural law corresponds to our natural inclinations: a. The natural law contains all that makes for the preservation of human life, and all that is opposed to its dissolution. b. The natural law contains the inclination which nature has taught all animals, such as a sexual relationship, the rearing of offspring etc. c. The natural law contains the inclination towards good, corresponding to mans rational nature. Man has a natural inclination to know the truth about God and to live in society, to avoid ignorance, to not give offence to others etc. The law of nature, as far as first principles are concerned, is the same for all as a norm of right conduct and is equally well knowed by all. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory There are two ways in which natural law may be understood to change: a. Certain additions may be made to it. b. Certain substractions may be made from it. As far as first principles are concerned, it is wholly unchangeable. As to secondary principles (which follow as immediate conclusions from first principles), may change in rare cases: i. with regards to rightness ii. with regards to knowability Criticisms a. Primary secondary classification It is not clear which precepts are primary and which secondary. Nor is it clear how the secondary principles are derived from the primary ones. There may be only one primary precept: that good is to be done and evil to be avoided. But the question then leads to what is good and evil? According to neo-sholastic interpreters, good refers to those actions that conform to properly human ends, and evil to those actions that fail so to conforms. Note: Grisez challenges this, stating that the concept of good, as he understands from Aquinas, refers not only to what is morally good, but to whatever within human power can be understood as intelligibly worthwhile, and evil to any privation of intelligible goods. b. The explaination of change in secondary precepts Aquinas reasoned that obligations may change due to a change in human nature. Aquinas admits that human law, which derives its validity from natural law, changes with human circumstances and human reason. But are all these changes justifiable? For example: a. Attitudes to usury (immoral loans) were described as contrary to natural law by Aquinas, but Cardinal Cajetan had not difficulty in abandoning this doctrine. The growth of commerce and industry and the need for investment justified the change. b. The bellum justium (the just war theory), formulated by St. Augustine and expounded by Aquinas, seems weak in the face of the numerous armed conflicts which happened since, and the growth of nuclear ICBM stockpiled in numerous countries. c. The ban on contraception, restated in the Papal Encyclical Humanae Vitae, in light of the problems of over-population and the changed status of women. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory 4. Human Law lex humana This consists of the particular rules and regulations that man, using his reason, deduces from the general precepts of natural law to deal with particular matters. As Cicero says, law springs in its first beginnings from nature: then such standards as are judged to be useful become established by custom: finally reverence and holiness add their sanction to what springs from nature and is established by custom. Aquinas notes that since the first rule of reason is natural law, all humanly enacted laws must be derived from natural law. If it is at any variance with natural law, it is no longers legal, but a corruption of law. As to why we need a distinction between human and natural law, Aquinas exploits the analogy of an architech to explain this. That the natural law will explain the precepts or requirements of a house, that it needs doors, windows etc. This is what he refers to as specificatio, as it is specified by natural law itself. But we need human law to determine the size of the doors etc. This is a matter of determinatio, as concepts like the duration of punishment, fines etc are not directly provided for in natural law, but can be determined within the boundaries set by natural law. As to how human law should be derived from natural law, there are two ways: a. As a conclusion from more general principles, where demonstrative conclusions are drawn from first principles. b. As a determination of certain general features, where some common form is determined to particular instances. Note: Aquinas exploits the analogy of an architech to explain this. That the natural law will explain the precepts or requirements of a house, that it needs doors, windows etc. But we need human law to determine the size of the doors etc. Therefore we need human laws as natural law does not provide all or even most of the solutions to everyday life in society. In addition, we need human laws to compel those who are of evil disposition and prone to vice to refrain from acting selfishly, so that they will be drawn eventually, by force of habit, to practice virtue voluntarily. The limits of human law Human laws shuold take account of the condition of the men who will be subject to them, so that it is possible to obey them. For this reason there should be different laws for children and for those of limited capacity, as they do not have the capacity to act in accordance to those of perfect virtue. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory Human law should also be enacted with the fact that the mass of men are far from perfect in virtue in mind. Human law should thus not prohibit every vice from which the truly virtuous men abstains from. It should only prohibit the graver vices which the majority of man can abstain from, particularly vices which are capable of inflicting damage and misery over others. In addition, a law only obliges in conscience to the extent that it is in keeping with the natural law and thus just. Laws may be unjust for two reasons: a. Where they are detrimental to human welfare, contrary to the norms derived from natural law Either with respect to its objects where the laws are burdensome to the subjects and do not make for common prosperity; or with respect to its author where the legislator enacts laws which exceed the powers vested upon him; or with respect to their form where the burdens, although concerned with the common welfare, are distributed inequitably throughout the community. b. Where they are unjust through being contrary to divine goodness. However, Aquinas is not saying that an unjust law is not a law. Such a law continues to partake of the character of law in its form, and participates in the order of law in a minimal way. This is because the law is a necessary human institution of communal practical reason. Therefore, every person has the duty to support the law. Thus the fact that a law is unjust does not provide one with an absolute license to disobey it. One must take into account the consequences of ones disobedience, which might generate a willingness amongst people to disobey the law for selfish reasons. Man is to yield his right of rebellion, though such law clearly does not bind his conscience. The mutability of human law Aquinas notes that there are only two causes that justify the change of human law: a. On the part of reason It is natural for human reason to proceed by stages from the imperfect to the more perfect. Therefore regulations set by those who were not able to solve the entire problem can be later modifed by their successors. b. On the part of men whose actions are regulated by the law Changes in law may be justified on account of altered circumstances, which bring altered standards. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory St. Augustine gave an example of suffrage. If the people are orderly and looks after public interest, there is a justification in law to allow them to vote for their own magistrates and politicians. However if the people are largely corrupt, suffrage should only be extended for the few and honest. However, there are limits to such mutability. Constant change in the law is detrimental to the public welfare, as in the observance of law, custom is important. When law is changed, its coercive power is diminised to the extent that custom is set aside. Thus human law should never be changed unless the benefits which result to the public interest are such as to compensate for the harm done. John Finnis Natural Law and Natural Rights As a preliminary note, although Finnis makes reference to the Christian philosopher St. Thomas Aquinas, Finnis theory of natural law does not rest on theology. In fact, he rejects much in the natural law tradition: a. He claims that natural law does not necessitate a belief in morality as comprising observance of rationally demonstrable principles of behavior. b. He denies that natural law requires laws which infringe such principles be impugned as invalid. It is worth noting what the place of God is in Finnis scheme. Although Finnis is a devoted Christian, God does not loom large in his theory. God is Finniss conclusion, not his premise. Like Grotius, he believes a theory of natural law does not have to stipulate God. It stands out without the need of religious doctrine. Finnis however thinks that if one accepts the arguments of his book one will have a strong reason to believe in an Uncaused Cause of the Universe. For Finnis, natural law is the set of principles of practical reasonableness in ordering human life and human community. Drawing on Aristotle and Aquinas, Finnis posits that there are certain basic goods or objective values that every human must assent to their values as objects of human striving. Some may argue that Finnis argument is gulity of the naturalistic fallacy (see above); just because it might be possible to observe basic goods and values does not mean that they are linked of necessity to any particular conclusions. Finnis however tackles this head on, stating that he is not deriving an ought from an is. He reasons that normative conclusions are not based on observations of human nature but a reflective grasp of what is self evidently good. This whould make basic values indemonstrable but self evident, and are basic values that underlie all human societies. These basic values, or goods, are objective values in the sense that every reasonable person must assent to their value as objects of human striving. Note: As to what reflective grasp of what is self evidently good means, Finnis may mean that we perceive the good through reflection about our behavior, relating to an idea of conscience. For example, we feel bad when we do something we feel is wrong. This would be in line with Finnis reasoning that our grasp of basic goods is a human response. However, it could be instead argued that such a notion of good (appearing in conscience or self reflection) is not self evident, by entirely a product of education and training within a cultures world view. Consider Mau Mau tribe in Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory Note: As to what reflective grasp of what is self evidently good means, Finnis may mean that we perceive the good through reflection about our behavior, relating to an idea of conscience. For example, we feel bad when we do something we feel is wrong. This would be in line with Finnis reasoning that our grasp of basic goods is a human response. However, it could be instead argued that such a notion of good (appearing in conscience or self reflection) is not self evident, by entirely a product of education and training within a cultures world view. Consider Mau Mau tribe in Africa? Therefore, even if we argue that this notion of good is present in all cultures, this does not logically follow from Finnis encapsulation of the good as an innate activity. The Basic Goods Finnis lists seven of such basic goods: 1. Life The first basic value, corresponding to the drive for self-preservation, is the value of life. The term life signifies every aspect of vitality, which puts a human being in good shape for selfdetermination. 2. Knowledge A preference for true over false belief. It corresponds to that basic drive we call curiosity, a drive which leads us to reject any celebration of self-proclaimed ignorance or superstition. It is knowledge for its own sake, not merely instrumentally, as an end in itself. 3. Play Each one of us can see the point of engaging in performances which have no point beyond the performance itself. 4. Aesthetic experience The Appreaciation of beauty 5. Sociability acting for the sake of ones friends purposes, or ones friends well being. 6. Practical reasonableness The basic good of being able to bring ones own intelligence to bear effectively, on the problems of choosing ones actions and life-style and shaping ones own character. 7. Religion questions of the origins of cosmic order and of human freedom and reason, the need to bring ones actions and emotions into some sort of harmony what what one can surmise about transcedental order. Expressed thus, this view is a good that even an atheist can make. Finnis argues that there is a cross cultural importance of these basic goods. To illustrate, there is an agreement on the need value and preserve human life; that procreation as a positive event; that there is a concern for truth that makes for the valuing of education; that there is a consensus on the value of friendship, title for property, reciprocity and play; and that all cultures are finally concerned with treating the dead with rituals and having some form of religion. There is also no hierarchy within the list and thus the basic goods are considered incommensurable. None of the basic goods â€Å"can be analytically reduced to being merely an aspect of any of the others, or to being merely instrumental in the pursuit of any of the other,† and â€Å"each one, when we focus on it, can reasonably be regarded as the most important. † These goods are also pre-moral, in that they do not presuppose any moral judgment. Note: Finnis approach is contrasted from anthropological or psychological methodology. Anthropology or psychology may provide an explaination linking certain urges or drives but it does not justify the value of the basic goods. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory Note: Finnis approach is contrasted from anthropological or psychological methodology. Anthropology or psychology may provide an explaination linking certain urges or drives but it does not justify the value of the basic goods. Note: Finniss theory may be compared with Martha Nussbaums theory of capabilities. She attempts to articulate an idea of human capability, that can found an argument about adignity that is cross cultural and cross temporal. This universalist approach to capabilites is directed towards a specific content: of what all human beings share. This catalogue of capabilites which constitutes a good life distinguishes between a minimum level of basic human functioning, which a higher level which includes normal longevity, adequate food, health and shelter, and a capacity for pleasurable experiences. This idea of higher level of functioning is compatible with Finniss catalogue of basic goods. It explains the lack of any allocation in Finnis list of requirements for basic functioning (food, water, and shelter). It can be assumed that Finnis model presupposes that these have already been acheived to allow the intellectual engagement with the ends of life. Practical Reasonableness And it is practical reasonableness that allows us to articulate the relevance of the basic goods to our conduct. As practical reasonableness and the basic goods are cross cultural (see above), this analysis is univerally relevant and applicable. Since there is an ethical capcity that is somehow inherent in human beings, it can be modelled on the basis of the basic values and is brought to bear by considering practical reasonableness. Practical reasonableness thus serves as the engine for how we assess and persue the other basic human goods. Correspondingly, there are requirements of practical reasonableness that express the method of working out the basic goods, employing them to acheive fullness of well-being. a. b. c. d. e. f. g. h. Having a coherent plan of life, Not having an arbitrary preference amongst the basic goods, Not having an arbitrary preference amongst persons, Having a sense of detachment from all specific and limited projects one undertakes, After making a general commitment one should not abandon it lightly, One should act in accordance with his conscience and in fulfillment of personal full-being, Respecting every basic value in every act by never choosing against a basic good, Favouring and fostering the common good of one’s communities. Practical reason also articulates the terms of common existance. Only in communal life are there the conditions for the pursuit of basic goods, as ethics presupposed the embedding in a culture. And since the common good requires a legal system, this illustrates how law, as a structure of communal life, must reflect basic values. Note: Finnis acknowledges that legal systems can work against the common good. In such circumstances, Finnis refused to accept that man should not accept the law as lex iniusta non est lex. Unjust law are, in his view, a subordinate concern of natural law theory. If a ruler uses his authority to make stipulations against the common good, or against the basic goods of practical reasonableness, those stipulations lack the authority they would otherwise have. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory The first moral principle In addition to the principles of practical reasonableness, Finnis describes a first moral principle. The first principle of morality, or FPM, states: â€Å"In voluntarily acting for human goods and avoiding what is opposed to them, one ought to choose and otherwise will those and only those possibilities whose willing is compatible with integral human fulfillment. Finnis’ discussion of the good of persons and communities refers to integral human fulfillment, and not an individualistic self-fulfillment. The FPM is â€Å"a guiding ideal, rather than a realizable idea† because it operates as a basic good and is open ended. However, unlike a basic good the FPM does not give reasons for acting; instead, it moderates the interplay of the reasons given by the basic goods and allows deliberation to be thoroughly reasonable. With the introduction of the FPM, Finnis provides a morally perceptive rule that choices be compatible with integral human fulfillment. The FPM and the principles of practical reason present more specific moral norms to be derived, allowing one to distinguish between acting morally right or morally wrong and to formulate a set of general moral standards. Finnis theory of law Its focal meaning For Finnis (and Hart), law is a matter of rules. In a legal system, there is a sovereign authority that is determinate and effective, who creates universally binding rules. And this law resolves a communitys coordination problems, to create a coherent political, economic and social order. Finnis thus states laws focal meaning is an authoritative common ordering of a community, aimed at facilitating the realisation of the common good. Note: The ‘focal’ concept of law that Finnis describes is a theoretically narrowed, multifaceted conception of law as the rules and institutions which flow from working out of the requirements of practical reasonableness in its quest to provide a community in which the basic values can be realised. It is not the ordinary concept of law, which is much more diffuse, and which allows ‘law’ to be used of the anthropologist’s primitive ‘legal’ culture, or to be used of the rules of a tyrant’s coercive regime or the rules of the Mafia. To realise such common good, law must protect the basic goods, in a pratical reasonable way. Pratical reasonableness is defined by Finnis as a set of human actions, dispositions and conceptions which hang together by adapting to a specifiable set of human needs considered in the light of the human condition and found in varying forms and degrees of suitablility for human needs, as a reasonable person would access them. Thus, given that human beings are characterised by practical reason, and allowing the fact that the forms of practical reason can vary infinately to suit what is needed, we can understand how law should include and protect the basic goods. And it does so in rules like the prohibition against murder, as it would clearly relate to the first of the seven basic values. It thus has a normative content. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory However, Finnis notes that not all laws have such a normative vocabulary. Legislators do not draft laws saying that killing is prohibited, instead saying that Any person who kills will be guilty of an offence. This is because the legislators prefer to draft in the pattern of a future legal order, which is structured by formal categories of law that do not appear to be directly associated with values or normative terms. But this does not prevent the use of these formal categories to be used by citizens in applying practical reasoning about his duties and obligations. Even the law of it is an offence to kill, which is not drafted in normative vocabulary would imply a normative direction to citizens. For there is a legal norm, so intrinsic to any legal ordering of community that it need never be enacted, that criminal offences are not to be committed. Similarly, judges or legislators do not just apply the rules of practical reason or make deductions from it. Since there are laws whose structure cannot be simply or directly be derived from practical reason, law creating acts cannot simply be seen as having practical reason as their content. These rules, as quoted from Aquinas, are implementations or determinations, derived from natural law (see above). Finnis provides an example, if material goods are to be used efficiently for human well-being, there must be a regime of private property. This regime will be constituted by rules assigning property rights in such goods. But precisely what rules should be laid down in order to constitute such a regime is not determined by this general requirement of justice. Thus, the precise nature of these rules wil be determined by a variety of factors. When the reasonable legislator is constructing determinations, her principles include the Rule of law and a variety of other principles related at some level to the methodological requirements of practical reason. These principles (referred to as second order principles) express the desirability of stablilty and predictability in the relations between one person and another. These second order principles relate, in varying degrees, to the basic goods and methodlogical requirements of practical reason. These second order principles are listed as: a. Compensation for compulsory acquisition of property rights in terms of both actual losses and loss of profits. b. No liability for unintentional injury without fault. c. No criminal liability without mens rea d. no criminal liability without mens rea e. Estoppel f. He who seeks equity must do equity g. No aid to abuse of rights h. Fraud unravels everything i. Profits received without justification must be restored j. Contracts are to be performed k. Relative freedom to change existing patterns of legal relationships by agreement l. Weak are to be protected against their weakness m. Both sides to a dispute are to be heard n. No one can be the judge in his/her own cause. Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory Thus, to be authoritative or legitimate, a determination needs to be consistent with the basic requirements of practical reason. However, this does not mean that practical reason is somehow the direct content of law. Law does not have a moral or normative content. They are determined by a variety of factors- for instance- the requirement that the legal system is coherent. However, practical reason remains relevant as the broader structures of a legal system as derived from the requirements of practical reason. The effect of unjust laws As stated before, Finnis argues that natural law does not assert that an unjust law is not a law. He states that the principle concern of natural law theories is to identify the principles and limits of the Rule of Law and to trace the ways in which sound laws, in all their positivity and mutability, are to be derived from unchanging principles. But what is the effect of injustice in law? There are four ways this question can be played out in relation to the corresponding requirement of citizens obligation: 1. Does injustice affect the liability subjected to sanctions in the event of non-compliance? Aquinas refers to Austin calling this notion stark nonsense, when he impugned those who argue that human laws that are in conflict with divine laws are not law. If you break a law, you will be punished for that breach, even if you feel there was no obligation to obey the law. 2. Does injustice affect the legal obligation, in the intrasystemic sense, to obey law? By intrasystemic, it refers to the the assertion that conformity to the law is socially necessary as a framework principle insulated from the rest of practical reasoning. Finnis argues that legal systems are not infact â€Å"insulated† from practical reasoning that derives not from the authority of the legal system, but from other compelling sources, such as arguments about the public good or justice (the overturning of the common law exception to rape in marriage in R v. R , for example). This may lead to a stipulation being judged unjust and inapplicable. However, whether or not a rule is unjust or just will depend on the definitive ruling of a supreme court. 3. Does injustice affect the legal obligation, in the moral sense, to obey law? The question is phrased so: Given that legal obligation presumptively entails a moral obligation, and that the legal system is by and large just, does a particular unjust law impose on me any moral obligation to conform to it? This is the question that positivist have seen as inappropriate to jurisprudence. Finnis states that a ruler has, very strictly speaking, no right to be obeyed; but he has the authority to give directions and to make laws that are morally obligatory and that he has the responsibility of enforcing. He has this authority for the sake of the common good†¦Therefore, if he uses his authority to make stipulations against the common good, or against any of the basic Classical and Modern Natural Law Theory Finnis states that a ruler has, very strictly speaking, no right to be obeyed; but he has the authority to give directions and to make laws that are morally obligatory and that he has the responsibility of enforcing. He has this authority for the sake of the common good†¦Therefore, if he uses his authority to make stipulations against the common good, or against any of the basic principles of practical reasonableness, those stipulations altogether lack the authority that they would have by virtue of being his and simply fails to create any moral obligations whatever. † Thus Finnis is of the classical natural law position when it comes to this issue: for the purpose of assessing ones legal obligations in the moral sense, one is entitled to discount laws that are unjust, such laws lack the moral authority that in other cases comes simply from their origin. In this sense, unjust laws are not laws. 4. Does injustice affect a moral obligation, deriving from some collateral source, to obey law? In regards to the assumption that disobeying a single law may weaken the law as a whole with negative consequences for the public good, does this collateral fact create a moral obligation? Finnis argues that the obligation to comply with the law is a legal obligation in a moral sensebecause it is not founded on the â€Å"good of being law abiding†, but on the desirability of not rendering ineffective the just parts of a legal system- â€Å"Hence it will not require compliance with unjust laws according to their tenor or legislative intent, but only such degree of compliance as is necessary to avoid bringing the law as a whole into contempt. So, if an unjust stipulation is, in fact, homogenous with other laws in its formal source, in its reception by courts and officials, and in common acceptance, the good citizen may (not always) be morally required to conform to that stipulation to the extent necessary to avoid weakening the law, the legal system as a whole. The ruler still has the responsibility of repealing rather than enforcing his unjust law, and in this sense has not right that it should be conformed to. But the citizen, or official, may meanwhile have the diminished, collateral, and an important sense extra legal, obligation to obey it.

Tobias Wolff Essay Research Paper Tobias Wolff free essay sample

Tobias Wolff Essay, Research Paper Tobias Wolff, a male child of a troubled childhood, and a really tough male parent. Tobias Wolff had no purposes of being a author from the start ; it merely seemed to of popped into his life. The Amazing portion about this author is that he was non supported by anyone but himself. His male parent was against everything that he did, and his brother, Geoffrey, besides a author would ever take his male parents side, go forthing Tobias on a side of his ain. # 8220 ; I wasn # 8217 ; t just, I ever took my male parent # 8217 ; s side. # 8221 ; Said Geoffrey ( Wolff, G ; Duke of 144 ) Geoffrey was known as the # 8216 ; Good Brother # 8217 ; as his male parent would state. This was incorrect for a male parent to make, parents can # 8217 ; t play favourites, because it leads to one kid feeling left out, or arising against it like Tobias Wolff did. We will write a custom essay sample on Tobias Wolff Essay Research Paper Tobias Wolff or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page I feel that the ground for the male parent favouritism towards Geoffrey Wolff was because Tobias was the younger brother, and younger brothers may be known to be more rebellious. Although, there was nil said about how Tobias acted in his childhood, he might hold been a rebellious kid, which may of turned his male parent towards Geoffrey. Tobias decided to enlist himself into the ground forces one time he couldn # 8217 ; t cover with his male parent any longer. No, he was non drafted into the ground forces ; he chose to enlist himself into the ground forces moving on his ain free will. Many say that Tobias did this to get away his troubled childhood and chiefly his male parent. Shortly after Tobias enlisted himself into the ground forces, he was called to conflict in the Vietnam War where he experienced many different manners of life. Shortly after the war ended Tobias wrote a novel, most people say it was his best work, titled In Pharoh # 8217 ; s Army: memories of the lost war. The ground this came to be such an astonishing work was it contained his wartime experiences from the Vietnam War. Once Tobias completed In Pharoh # 8217 ; s Army, he said, # 8220 ; This is # 8230 ; my last memoir. # 8221 ; It is non understood why Wolff said this it seems as if he were to vanish from the universe of composing. Although I could non acquire a clasp of this book, from what I read about it, it was a really graphic memoir which unlike other wartime narratives, contained information and experiences from a author who really was at that place, in Vietnam, who experienced the difficult times of war. In the short narrative Powder by Tobias Wolff, there is a male child and his male parent, and they are kind of stranded out in the wilderness due to a snow storm, and the male parent keeps inquiring his child inquiries like we # 8217 ; re gon na do it place, right? And other inquiries to give the child assurance in his male parent. The child kept reacting with # 8216 ; umm yeah, # 8217 ; and stating yes in an diffident manner, like he didn # 8217 ; Ts have assurance in his male parent conveying him place safely. This ties in with the autobiography This Boys Life in which Tobias Wolff negotiations about his life, his male parent and how he began to lose religion in his male parent during his childhood old ages. I think that the short narrative Powder was really about him and his male parent # 8217 ; s relationship, and how Tobias lost religion in his male parent like it said in This Boys Life. Tobias Wolff # 8217 ; s male parent was besides really forceful, in holding things done his manner, and him seeking to pull strings Tobias into making things that he wanted. His male parent said to him: # 8220 ; Your brother Tells me you # 8217 ; re thought of Choate, Personally, I think you # 8217 ; d be happier at Deerfield. # 8221 ; Tobias replied: # 8220 ; Well I merely applied, Possibly I won # 8217 ; t acquire in. # 8221 ; ( Wolff, T ; Boys life 210 ) This shows how the male parent, non merely was he forceful, but he made his boy Tobias scared of him, in desiring to travel to a different school that his male parent wants him to travel to. The manner that Tobias responded # 8220 ; Maybe I wont acquire in # 8221 ; gives me this feeling, and besides gives his male parent the feeling that he truly doesn # 8217 ; t want to travel to Choate. Another thing I found interesting was the manner that Tobias and his brother would react to the male parent with # 8220 ; yes, sir, # 8221 ; and # 8220 ; no, sir. # 8221 ; ( Wolff, T ; Boys life 21 ) This make the male parent seem like he is more than a male parent, more like a general of the ground forces, or captain of the ship. This brings me to believe that the male parent would shout at Tobias a batch, and beat him excessively. # 8220 ; My male parent took off for Las Vegas with his girlfriend the twenty-four hours after I arrived in California, # 8221 ; this showed how his male parent wasn # 8217 ; t caring for his boy. He left for Vegas with his girlfriend after merely seeing his boy for a twenty-four hours. The male parent was or seemed to be insecure when a sheriff gave the school Yale his sentiment of Wolff # 8217 ; s male parent: # 8220 ; Wolff is a male child with considerable ability and really small anchor. He is good-humored and good natured, but lacks finding and steadfast. # 8221 ; ( Wolff, G ; duke of 41 ) This shows how the male parent was really insecure of him, and didn # 8217 ; t ha ve a strong caput on his shoulders. Wolff had a captivation with prevaricators, so much that he wrote a narrative about it: The Barrack # 8217 ; s Thief. Tobias Wolff wrote this award-winning novel in 1984. It is about a bond uniting three soldiers. One of the soldiers turns out to be a prevaricator and a stealer who stole the storyteller # 8217 ; s billfold, who was a portion of the three. # 8220 ; Wolff is fascinated with prevaricators, and many of his narratives pivot on their unusual uses of world. Through prevarication, his characters discover what they are, what they want to be, what they could hold been but missed, or what they one time were an have now lost. # 8221 ; ( Desmond ) Besides in Powder Wolff uses the male parent as a prevaricator towards his boy. The male parent said: # 8220 ; Look we # 8217 ; re speaking about four, five inches. I # 8217 ; ve taken this auto through worse than that. # 8221 ; But, in actuality he truly hasn # 8217 ; t done this and his boy knows it excessively. In an interview with Tobias Wolff, Joan Smith asked him assorted inquiries about his feelings and sentiments towards the art of authorship. One inquiry she asked was: # 8220 ; Do you believe that the art of authorship can be taught? # 8221 ; ( Smith 1 ) Wolff replied with a simple but steadfast # 8220 ; No. # 8221 ; I guess he feels that people are either born with the art of composing or they aren # 8217 ; T, there is no 1 in between who can be taught to go a author. You are given the gift of authorship, non taught. Tobias besides said that everyone has their ain type of authorship in which they are born with, which can non be taught, but may be worked on or improved, but non changed. The undermentioned inquiry by Smith in response to Wolff # 8217 ; s # 8220 ; no # 8221 ; was: # 8220 ; So what do you learn in your authorship seminar at Syracuse? # 8221 ; Wolff replied: I try to assist people go the best possible editors of their ain work, to assist them go witting of thing s they do good, of things they need to look at once more, of the Wellss of stuff they have non even begun to dunk their pails into. You want them to inquire more of every sentence. These are truly values ; I suppose frames of believing instead than discrete spots of information. You don # 8217 ; t learn information in a authorship workshop. # 8221 ; This explains his point of there being no manner to learn person to go a author ; all you can make is better their ain technique or manner. Wolff teaches a semester a twelvemonth, normally people in their 20 # 8217 ; s or 30 # 8217 ; s who want to go better authors, and need person to force them along the way. Tobias Wolff had much success in his authorship due to his womb-to-tomb experiences, particularly his childhood. These experiences helped him to give the reader a more graphic, and existent description. His two best plants: In Pharoh # 8217 ; s Army, and This Boy # 8217 ; s Life both were approximately experiences in his life such as his childhood, and his experiences in the Vietnam War. The ground for these plants going so successful is the manner it is really about existent individuals existent experiences, and readers love to read about other people # 8217 ; s experiences. Basbanes, Nicholas A. Tobias Wolff: # 8216 ; This is # 8230 ; my last memoir # 8217 ; Article 29. hypertext transfer protocol: //web7.infotrac.galegroup.com # 8230 ; rn_29_0_a15845467? sw_aep=pace_main ; Oct. 24, 1994 ; March 22, 2000. Skow, John. Memory, excessively, is an histrion, Article 40. hypertext transfer protocol: //web7.infotrac.galegroup.com # 8230 ; rn_40_0_a15845467? sw_aep=pace_main ; April 19, 1993 ; March 22, 2000. Desmond, John F. Catholicism in Contemporary American Fiction, Article 38. hypertext transfer protocol: //web7.infotrac.galegroup.com # 8230 ; rn_38_0_a15271499? sw_aep=pace_main ; May 14, 1994 ; March 22, 2000. Glass, Elizabeth. Mastering the Memoir: Tobias Wolff, Article 3. hypertext transfer protocol: //web7.infotrac.galegroup.com # 8230 ; rn_3_0_a19511039? sw_aep=pace_main ; July, 1997 ; March 22, 2000. Malin, Irving. The vintage book of Contemporary American Short Stories, Article 17. hypertext transfer protocol: //web7.infotrac.galegroup.com # 8230 ; rn_17_0_a16559373? sw_aep=pace_main ; Spring, 1995 ; March 22, 2000 Meyer, Michael. The Compact Bedford debut to Literature, # 8220 ; Powder, # 8221 ; Tobias Wolff, p.525. 2000 by Bedford/St. Martin # 8217 ; s. Wolff, Tobias. In the Garden of North American Martyrs. 1945, The Ecco Press, New York. 175pgs. Smith, Joan. # 8220 ; The Salon Interview # 8211 ; Talking into the Unknown, # 8221 ; hypertext transfer protocol: //www.salon.com/dec96/interview961216.html, 3pgs. Wolff, Tobias. Hunters in the snow, hypertext transfer protocol: //www.bnl.com/shorts/stories/huntsnow.html, 1997 B A ; L Associates, Renton, Washington, 12 pgs. ( Gary Lindquist # 8212 ; Remarks ) . Wolff, Tobias. This Boys Life, 1989 Grove Press, New York, NY, 288pgs. Wolff, Geoffrey. The Duke of Deception # 8211 ; memories of my male parent, Random House inc. 1979, 275 pgs.

Is the New SAT Easier 6 Helpful Changes to Know

Is the New SAT Easier 6 Helpful Changes to Know SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips Change is scary, and the SAT was already kind of scary in the first place, so you might be feeling apprehensive about the new test. Good news: It's possible that the new SAT will be easier for some (or even most!) students. In this article, I'll go through some predictions about which aspects of the new SAT have the potential to make it a less challenging test and which types of students are most likely to benefit. Overview of Changes for the New SAT First, I’ll just do a quick summary of the changes you can expect on the test in general. It's helpful to have some background information before I give you my predictions. You can also read this article for a more substantive description! Changes to Overall Format: The new SAT is out of 1600 points rather than 2400. The Reading and Writing sections will be compressed into one section worth 800 points (Math will still have its own section). There will be four answer choices for each question instead of five. The test will have just four large sections (Reading, Writing, Math with no calculator, and Math with a calculator) plus the essay. Changes to Reading: There will be no more sentence completion questions (all questions are passage-based). Some questions will ask you to identify textual evidence for your answers to previous questions. Data interpretation questions that ask you to read charts and graphs will show up alongside some passages. Passages will always be in the same topic order (one passage dealing with US and World Literature, two passages dealing with History and Social Studies, and two passages dealing with Science). Changes to Writing ("Writing and Language" on the New Test): All questions will be based on longer passages rather than isolated sentences. Writing style will be more important (structuring paragraphs and making logical reasoning flow appropriately). Some data interpretation questions will show up here as well. Changes to the Essay: It's gonna be optional! You'll have 50 minutes instead of 25. You will need to analyze an argument that you read in a passage rather than writing your own opinion-based response to a prompt. Your essay score won’t impact your Reading and Writing score. Changes to Math: There will be basic trigonometry on the test. Some problems will have more than one part. Questions will deal with real-world scenarios more frequently and have less tricky wording. There is a no-calculator section. Why Might the New SAT Be Easier? Here are a few reasons why the test might be easier, based on the changes I outlined in the previous section. You Won’t Have to Jump Back and Forth Between Subjects One of the struggles that a lot of people had with the old SAT was that it required you to switch test-taking mentalities constantly through ten short sections.It was impossible to know ahead of time how the sections would be ordered.You might encounter a Math section, a Reading section, and then another Math section, which was disorienting to students who are better at focusing on a single subject for a longer period of time.With the longer sections on the new SAT that occur in the same order on every test, you’ll know exactly what to expect, and you'll get everything over with at once for each subject (similar to the ACT). You Won’t Need to Know Obscure Vocabulary Words Sentence completion questions, the bane of many a student's existence, are no more on the new test.Vocabulary will be tested in context rather than in isolation.You’ll still be asked what words mean, but they will be embedded in passages, so there will be more context clues to help you determine their meanings.These will be challenging but commonly used words, which have more practical value to most students than many of the words that were tested on the old SAT. You'll Be Able to Plan Better for the Reading Section As I mentioned, the passages in the Reading section are now predictable in their basic subject matter.This means that you can come up with a strategy for which passages to read first before you even see the test.You can decide to skip straight to the science passages if you think they’ll be easiest for you. (I’d recommend starting with your strongest subject.) Ben Franklin probably would have read the science passages first. Although he had many interests, so I can't say for sure. When he was 16, he trolled his own brother's newspaper with satirical letters to the editor that he wrote as a widow named "Silence Dogood." The Essay Will Be Less Stressful You don’t even have to write an essay on the new SAT if the colleges where you’re applying don’t require it. The mandatory essay was one of the aspects of the old SAT that students always feared.You had so little time to write, and the essay could heavily influence your overall Writing score.The new essay is scored completely separately from the rest of the test, so it won’t impact your Reading/Writing score. You also have 50 minutes for it rather than 25.If writing under pressure is difficult for you, this is good news! Writing Will Be Less Nit-Picky and More Practical The Writing section on the old version of the SAT contained many questions that asked about tricky little grammar issues likeillogical comparisons and subject-verb or pronoun agreement. The new Writing section will have fewer questions like this and more questions that ask about writing skills that will be familiar to you based on your high school coursework. For example, you might be asked where a sentence fits most logically in a paragraph. Math Questions Will Be More Straightforward Although some more challenging math concepts will be tested on the new SAT (trigonometry), the questions will be less puzzle-like.The steps you need to take to find the answer will be clearer, so you won’t have to use your reading comprehension skills as much on the math section.Here’s a sample grid-in question labeled as an â€Å"easy† problem on the new test: If a2 + 14a = 51 and a 0, what is the value of a + 7? This question gets right to the point and is not worded confusingly.If you have the foundational math skills, you’ll be able to solve it without getting tripped up by phrasing. You can solve the equation with factoring, and the correct answer is 10!Now, here’s a sample multiple choice question labeled as a â€Å"hard† problem: Which of the following is equal to sin(Ï€/5)? A. -cos(Ï€/5)B. -sin(Ï€/5)C. cos(3Ï€/10)D. sin(7Ï€/10) Notice that this question isn’t any more confusing or â€Å"tricky† than the easy question; it just requires more advanced math knowledge.In this case, you would need to know the trigonometric identity sin(x) = cos(Ï€/2 - x).Plug in Ï€/5 for x, and you get cos(3Ï€/10), choice C. Pizza can help you learn trigonometry. This slice is approximately 45 degrees of deliciousness (minus the olives). Will the New SAT Be Easier for You? Although there are some aspects of the new SAT that could potentially make it easier for all students, specific types of students may find the test to be significantly easier.If any of these descriptions apply to you, you might be in for a pleasant surprise on the new SAT. Math and Science Are Your Strong Suits Math will make up a greater proportion of your score on the new SAT (half versus a third), so math geeks will have a bit more of an edge.The Math section will also test slightly more advanced concepts and will not require as much reading comprehension.The Reading section of the test even includes data interpretation, which should be a breath of fresh air for students who feel more comfortable with science than English. Writing Is a Weaker Subject for You The essay on the new SAT involves reading a passage and then writing an analysis of the author’s argument.If you had trouble with the old SAT’s opinion-based essay format, you might feel more comfortable with the more specific expectations of the new essay.The essay is also optional, as I’ve mentioned a couple of times before, so if you’re not confident in your writing skills, you may be able to avoid it altogether.Writing is combined with Reading in your final score, so it no longer makes up a separate score out of 800. It’s will be slightly less important to your overall score. You’re Not Very Confident in Your Vocabulary Skills Have you spent a lot of time dreading the SAT because of all the crazy words you need to know for sentence completion questions?You’ll be much better off on the new version of the test.Many students find the vocabulary to be one of the most intimidating aspects of the SAT; being tested on more practical words in the context of the passageshould make it less intimidating. You Can Read Quickly This would have been an advantage on the old SAT too, but it will play even better on the new test.Since all Reading and Writing questions are passage-based, there’s more reading overall on the test.If you’re a fast reader, you’ll be able to overcome what I think will be one of the toughest problems for students on the new SAT: time management. Be a cheetah! Not to be confused with a cheater (although PrepScholar is based in the Boston area). Conclusion: Is the New SAT Easier? The changes that are coming to the SAT may make the test easier to handle for certain students.Changes that could make the new SAT less challenging overall include: No sentence completion questions Optional essay Less confusing math questions More predictable structure and content You personally might like the new test a lot better if: You’re more comfortable with Math/Science than Reading/Writing Vocabulary is not your strong suit You’re a fast reader The test will be significantly different, but don’t let it scare you too much.It’s highly possible that you’ll feel more confident on the new version of the SAT! What's Next? Are you still trying to decide whether you should take the new SAT or the ACT this year? Read this article for advice on which test will suit you better. If you're planning on taking the new SAT, it might be difficult to settle on a goal score with the changes to the format. Learn more about how to calculate a reasonable target score for the updated version of the test. You should also check out the SAT test dates for this year so you can plan ahead for the test! Disappointed with your scores? Want to improve your SAT score by 240 points?We've written a guide about the top 5 strategies you must be using to have a shot at improving your score. Download it for free now:

French Wine Pronunciation

French Wine Pronunciation If you love French wine but hate ordering it, heres a page that can help. This list of French wines and related vocabulary includes sound files to help you pronounce the names of French wines. A la và ´tre  !le vin  Ã‚  Ã‚  winele vin blanc  Ã‚  Ã‚  white winele vin rosà ©Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  rosà © winele vin rouge  Ã‚  Ã‚  red wineun verre  Ã‚  Ã‚  glassune bouteille  Ã‚  Ã‚  bottleune dà ©gustation de vin  Ã‚  Ã‚  wine tasting(learn more)French WinesArmagnacBeaujolais nouveauBordeauxBourgogne  Ã‚  Ã‚  (burgundy)Cabernet sauvignonChablisChampagneChà ¢teauneuf-du-PapeChenin blancCognacMà ©docMerlotMuscatPinot blancPinot grisPinot noirPomerolPouilly-Fuissà ©SancerreSauternesSauvignon blancSà ©millonSt ÉmilionViognierVouvrayGo on to page 2 to learn some French wine tasting terms.Related Articles Wine festival in Hyà ¨res French Expressions la và ´tre !Mettre de leau dans son vinLe nouveau est arrivà © Now that you know how to pronounce French wine and have ordered it, what next? There is a whole science to wine, called oenology, that analyzes everything from making wine to tasting wine. The latter is the most important part for consumers, so here are some terms to help you talk about what youre drinking.La dà ©gustation de vin , or wine tasting, can be summed up into three steps.1. La robe - AppearanceBefore you take even one sip, look at the wine and consider its color, clarity, and consistency. Here are some French terms to help you describe what you see.La couleur - ColorIn addition to obvious colors like rouge (red) and blanc (white), you might see ambrà © - amberbrun - browncarmin - crimsoncuivrà © - copperydorà © - goldenjaunà ¢tre - yellowishorangà © - orangeypaille - strawpourpre - scarletrose saumon - salmon pinkrubis - rubyverdà ¢tre - greenishviolacà © - purplishclair - lightfoncà © - darkpà ¢le - paleprofond - deep La clartà © brillant - brilliantbrumeux - mistyclair - clearcristallin - crystal-clearopaque - opaqueun reflet - glintterne - dulltrouble - muddy La consistance des bulles - bubblesdes dà ©pà ´ts - sedimentdes jambes, larmes - legs or tears; how the wine flows down the sides of the glassde la mousse - foam, bubbles 2. Le nez - Smellles arà ´mesFrench food vocabularyfruità ©và ©gà ©talfruits and vegetablesagrumesfruits rougespamplemousseartichautchampignonsflorallavandejasminvioletteun goà »t de chà ¢taignenoisettenoixà ©picà ©poivrecannellemuscadeherbacà ©rà ©glissethymmenthe boisà © - woodybrà »là © - burnt tastecacao - cocoacafà © - coffeecà ¨dre - cedarcharnu - meatychocolat - chocolatefoin - hayfumà © - smokymà ©dicinal - medicinalminà ©ral - mineralmusquà © - muskyparfumà © - fragrantpin - pinerà ©sinà © - resinoustabac - tobaccoterreux - earthythà © - teavanille - vanilla un dà ©faut bouchonnà © - corkedmildiousà © - mildewedmoisi - moldy, mustyoxydà © - oxidized 3. La bouche - Taste acerbe - tartacide - acidicaigre - souraigu - sharpamer - bitterun arrià ¨re-goà »t - aftertastebien à ©quilibrà © - well balanceddoux - sweetfrais - freshfruità © - fruityun goà »t - tastela longueur / persistance en bouche - time the flavor remains in your mouth after swallowingmoelleux - sugaryune note - hintplat - flatrond - mildrude - harshsalà © - saltyune saveur - flavorsec - drysucrà © - sweetapercevoir - to perceiveavaler - to swallowboire - to drinkcracher - to spit outfaire tourner le vin dans le verre - to swirl the wine in the glassincliner - to tilt (the glass)remarquer - to noticesiroter - to sipvoir - to see How to Taste Wines

Arguement essay ---education related( preferred differences between

Arguement ---education related( preferred differences between chinese and western education - Essay Example Education happens through exploration, preparing or teaching under the direction of instructors and can too be self-teaching. Teachers have the obligation to instruct their learners in the most ideal ways that could be available. Educating is the giving of information, aptitudes and qualities to the learners through the use of suitable teaching methods that are satisfactory. Through the routines the general public has the capacity accomplish set objectives and instructive destinations (Chua 67). Good teachers know how to viably teach their students the skills they really require in life based on the numerous teaching techniques. Therefore, educators must be adaptable in their teaching methods and frequently modify their styles to have the capacity to suit all students, thus effective education. However, the obvious question that has led to heated debates is â€Å"what makes the difference in education?† The difference comes as a result of different education systems that are adopted by the various nations; most countries use different approaches in their teaching and learning. This brings the big difference that is between Chinese system of education and that of the Westerners. First and foremost, the most detectable contrast at the center school and secondary school level is the size of the classes (Hsu, and Yuh-Yin 17). In china teachers regularly teach two classes with 55 to 60 students. While on the other hand, American secondary teachers regularly teach five or six classes with class sizes extending from 25 to 30. It should be noted that students have got different behavioral entries based on their psychological development, socio-economic background and culture as well. This makes it very important that the teacher-student ratio be manageable, so that every st udent gets special attention. In Western culture, students are free to ask and answer questions in order to get clarifications, they

Statistical Methods in Economics and Business Essay

Statistical Methods in Economics and Business - Essay Example A standard made by the institution. Now the conductors of the study have thought of using British Studies Program to see whether or not students will excel in the said aspect. Students form 10 institutions have attended to participate in the study and together with them, the faculty gets to supervise and coordinate with what are being offered by the Program. As a brief background of the British Studies Program, it offers business courses such as accounting and economics and non - business courses like the Legend of King Arthur and the Geography of Great Britain. The objective of the program regarding the study is that students are to be: As what can be observed from the design formulated form the study, we can clearly and able to see the changes or improvements made by the subject students so we can say that it is an appropriate design. A very systematic approach to the study and almost no subjectivity involved. At the beginning, those who conduct the study, of course, hypothesized that the program gives some significant positive effect on the students, but in conforming with technicality of using statistics to assess the subject to see any progress made, they just gave a hypothesis th

Authenticity Indigenous Media Essay Example for Free

Authenticity Indigenous Media Essay â€Å"Authentic† is a double-edged sword. Discuss this statement using at least 2 indigenous media examples. How can something be a double-edged sword? How can something be harmful and at the same time helpful? We are currently living in the 21st century; there have been many lives that lived on this earth before us. These lives have done a lot of work that have got us to where we are today. This being said it is so hard to think of something new to come up with when it has probably been done before in the past in one way or another. According to dictionary. com authentic means â€Å"not copied, false, original. † To the dominant culture being authentic means coming up with something new to show the world but because, often words have more than one definition, being authentic does not always mean inventing something new to show the world. In fact, to indigenous groups it means keeping their beliefs, everyday activities, culture, etc intact. It is keeping everything they know their ancestors did and what their parents taught them to do without improvements or change. In this essay I will be comparing different indigenous groups and how the meaning of† Authentic† can be a double-edged sword to these indigenous groups. For indigenous groups being authentic is critical. Not only because it is important for them to keep their culture intact but also because it is an effective political tool. This political tool can help them negotiate land, which is one of the most important things for them because it is the main tool of survival. Many critics argue that even though these tribes are isolated they are not untouched by outsiders therefore they are not indigenous, they are just isolated groups. Video in the village’s project has been working with many tribes such as the Nambiquara, Caviao, Tikuna, Kijani Iakaha and Kaiapo. Their goal is to introduce them to the art of film so they can preserve their culture and find their identity within themselves. They have done this by giving cameras to various indigenous people themselves teaching them the basics of how to record. These people have been given the chance to record what they want to see about themselves and what they think is important to communicate to the world. Although it was a long process that took a lot of work and patience, many villages have had success. For example the Kijani Iakaha group recorded a regular day in the village where in the beginning of the film the women are lined up so they could get pat in their backs and their stomachs with a wooden stick. This, to them, represents protection; it helps their women throughout their pregnancy. They also show some of the habits they have such as picking each other’s ticks out. They also follow the regular activities of other indigenous villages. They send the kids to fish, the women stay in cleaning, cooking and watching the smaller children and the men go out to hunt. They make use of their land by planning and hunting so they can provide goods for themselves and their family. Even though these people are wearing items that belong to the dominant culture they still do what indigenous groups do. The only difference that can be taken out of the villagers is what they wear and some of their traditions; women are wearing skirts and men are wearing shorts. When indigenous groups decides to make a change to their culture it becomes harmful because it gives the government proof that these people have had contact with the dominant culture. In the article by Beth A. Conklin, Body paint, feathers, and VCRs: aesthetics and authenticity in Amazonian activism, he states, â€Å"The first, obvious idea is that outsiders (anthropologists included) tend to see complex western technology as a corrupting force that undermines traditional cultures. Real natives dont use VCRs. † Many people argue that if indigenous people work with the camera their focus is no longer in trying to keep their culture and origin instead it is to try to look good for the camera that would potentially lead to a change in their culture. The reason why it is a big deal if these tribes are up to date with the dominant world is because being indigenous gives them special rights, such as land right and political rights. When exposed to technology which essentially means they have been exposed to society they are no longer innocent and â€Å"original† they are now exposed and experienced. This, once again, creates doubts about their originality. To the eyes of the government if they are up to date with the dominant culture they are just taking up land that real indigenous people could use. According to the government and the dominant society an authentic indigenous group is that which does what the typical stereotype of an indigenous group does. They use paint to paint their bodies in a way which they can express themselves; a lot of the groups do it for special occasions such as ceremonies and different rituals. They have different rituals that represent who they are becoming. This is not always true. In the film Signs don’t speak the people in the group are wearing regular clothes yet they still behave like other indigenous groups. They still dislike white man because according to them these only bring harm. One of the villagers quotes â€Å"My father told me white man would come to take over our land. † In this film the villagers talk about an encounter they had with the white man. They thought that they would only stay and work for a short time but they end it up staying longer, working hard and destroying their land. They are well aware of the stereotypes people have about them, they prefer to stay away from one of their biggest threat, white man. In the other hand in the film video cannibalism the villagers are walking around naked, fulfilling the stereotypes, making vulgar jokes that to them have no vulgar intention and with paint all over their bodies. This group has no complications with the government because to the government these are the true indigenous people. At best, indigenous groups begin to understand how they are different from not only the dominant culture or other indigenous groups but themselves as well. It can also confirm the stereotypes many people believe making it almost impossible for these to be changed for future generation. Being authentic can be harmful because it can limit indigenous groups from self-determination and development. Authenticity can be helpful because maybe in some cultures having a primitive way of life restores some of the good interactions between people. There is not as much drama and people’s views can be heard more easily. Stereotyping brings about hardship for certain cultures, however, a culture may learn to embrace stereotyping and not be hurt as much due to the fact that they are primitive and do not have to understand what media says about them. Their portrayal is to people that they probably will never see. Technology could be what is saving these cultures from many hardships that are in modern society today. An authentic indigenous culture does not have to bear the economic difficulties that modern societies do. In the end, many cultures are indigenous, but according to what the modern society defines as authentic, modern society can have the power to say that a group is not original and therefore just aboriginal, meaning they still have the technologically advanced capabilities, but choose not to use them. Work cited Dictionary. com. Dictionary. reference. com. LLC. 2012. Web. 14 March 2012 Video in the Villages. Dir. Vincent Carelli. Documentary Educational Resources. 1989. Film. Conklin, B. A. Body paint, feathers, and VCRs: aesthetics and authenticity in Amazonian activism. JSTOR. org. JSTOR. 1997. Web. 14 March 2012. Signs Don’t Speak. Dir. Vicent Carelli, Dominique Gallois. Documentary Education Resources. 1996. Film. Video Cannibalism. Dir. Vicent Carelli. Documentary Educational Resources. 1995. Film.

Sanitation and Medicine Changes in the Nineteenth Century :: Essays Papers

Sanitation and Medicine Changes in the Nineteenth Century The revolution in sanitation and medicine in the nineteenth century was a huge step forward in the public health movement. It brought about a major shift in the ideas of how individuals fell ill with a particular disease. While people used to think that diseases were sent by gods, they came to realize that illnesses were the result of germs, and could be controlled. There were new ideas about disease, and new discoveries in medicine and surgery that were a benefit to all people. What resulted was a much healthier population overall, from the working class to the upper class. Society used to think that people got sick because of religious reasons. They thought that people would become ill because they had somehow displeased the gods that ruled the earth. In order to restore health, people brought offerings to temples and prayed to the gods. Any "medical" procedures, or procedures that society later considered to be medical, were done not by any rational means, but done because they were parts of superstitious rituals. For example, when a person got a massage, or underwent bloodletting, a spell was said while the procedure was taking place, and the spell was what was considered to be the most essential part, and able to restore the person’s health (Sigerist, pg.132). Although the practice of healing through rituals took place much earlier in history (it began in ancient times), most of society still had not caught on to the idea that dirt and health were related by the beginning of the nineteenth century, and they certainly had not thought of germs yet. People bathed once a week, at most. If skin was covered by an article of clothing, there was no reason for it to be clean. Of this view, Henry E. Sigerist writes, "A woman’s leg clad in silk was attractive, even if it was filthy underneath," (pg. 26). In addition, doctors and other early health professionals had not yet come to realize that their clothes could be a transport for germs from one patient to another. Ann F. la Berge, who wrote about the public health movement in France, pointed out that society, once it began to figure out how germs could be spread, failed to realize that germs could simply be airborne, causing anyone to get sick.

History of Goods and Service Tax in Malaysia Essay

1. Introduction of GST Goods and service tax were first deliberated in 2005 with the intention to introducing it in 1st January 2007. However, it was withdrawn in the following year. In 2009, GST was revived with a proposed rate of 4% to replace current Sales Tax of 10% and Service Tax of 5% in a bid to diversify national revenues. However, the idea of GST still end up floating around as it has now been officially deferred. 2. Concept of GST Goods and Service Tax (GST), also known as Value Added Tax (VAT), is a broad consumption tax. The purpose of the introduction of GST is to spread the burden which borne by consumer in some particular areas into a wide range of goods and services with a lower tax rate. Thus, government’s revenue income will eventually increase to enable the further development and budget control to the country, other than just relying on petroleum and income tax revenues. GST is a multi-stage tax as it is levied on the â€Å"value added† created at the various stages in the importation†production†distribution chain of the product to which the tax is applicable. This tax structure helps to avoid the cascading effect embedded in current Sales Tax and Service Tax (SST) which are single-stage tax. It adopts a credit offset mechanism whereby tax charged on supplies (called output tax) made by a taxable business may be net off against tax paid on inputs (called input tax) to production. Only the difference is remitted to the tax authority. Nevertheless, the cost of GST is actually borne by final customers. However, not all supplies are standard rated supply, which are subject to proposed rate of 4%. Malaysian government has announced that some 40 items, mostly essential consumables and commodities will be free of GST, that is, either the items are exempted or given a zero-rating. The only difference is that input tax credits can be claimed by registered suppliers of zero rated supplies but not the exempted suppliers. Thus, lower income groups are protected. Furthermore, GST is a form of indirect tax as it is not a statutory obligation of a person to pay the tax unless certain GST taxable goods and services are consumed. Besides, the Malaysian government has indicated that Mandatory GST registration for suppliers will be based on a threshold of sales. Current indications are that the threshold will be set at RM500, 000.00 per year. Thus, with the introduction of GST, government is able to shift the reliance on direct tax to indirect tax for sources of revenue income to maintain its competitiveness as well as sustain long-term growth of the country. 3. Fate of GST in Malaysia The passage of GST in Malaysia has not been an easy sailing. As mentioned above, the idea of GST was first announced in 2005. However, it was shelved in 2006. Again, after the GST bill tabled in 2009, the second and third reading for GST is now being deferred again. Over-reliance on the direct tax and depleting petroleum are actually the major concern of government that contributes to the imposition of GST. Furthermore, the government is of the opinion that Sales and Service Tax (SST) has reached its threshold. To increase it the country’s exports uncompetitive. Under SST, exporters were incurring as much as RM1.4 billion annually. Therefore, the only way is to institute GST. GST is considered an equitable and comprehensive system of taxation that minimizes evasion and ensures a broader revenue stream. 3.1 Judgments from Macro-economic aspect By replacing the Sales and Service Tax with GST, the government is able to diversifies its sources of taxation to avoid being dependent on any particular tax base and the stability of tax revenue is ensured. As revenue from imports and taxes from the corporate sector may fluctuate, GST will not fluctuate, thereby bringing in a steady and sustainable revenue stream that is locally generated. However, the immediate outcry is that GST will cause the general price level goes up. However, empirical study in China indicates that GST implementation did not cause any inflation. Furthermore, public do not have to be over-worried of the continuous inflation as recent research also point out that GST may bring about a one-time increase in cost of living, but the impact on inflation is low. Meanwhile, according to the Ministry of Finance, Consumer Price Index is going to reduce 0.1% due to the lower GST rate. This can be further supported by studies that indicate prices did not increase significantly before and after the introduction of GST. Thereby it is clear that imposition of GST will only cause one time increase in general prices but would not necessarily lead to inflation which is continuous increase in the average of price over the time. Furthermore, a study done by Malaysian government also shows that households could enjoy annual savings of between RM14.50 and RM347 under SST system and GST system respectively. Additionally, it is indicated that the business sector could expect total annual savings of some RM4billion under the GST regime, while exporters would save RM1.4billion annually under a zero-rate system. Also, GST improve export competitiveness due to zero-rated and boost tourism because of the refund of GST.However, recent study argues that Malaysia can enjoy this trade competitive advantages only when there is no delay in input tax refund that cause increase in price of exports. Furthermore, there are many arguments against the indirect tax reform in developing countries. A country like Malaysia with presence of a substantial ‘informal’ sector, substituting VAT for border taxes is likely to deter the growth and development of the economy as a whole as VAT might drives firms from the formal sector into the shadow of informal economy. Many studies have indicated that developing countries consists of a very large size of informal economy. Informal economy is defined as the segment of the economy that escapes the tax net; it thus includes both the shadow economy and agriculture. Also, they argue that the imposition of VAT may also retard the development of markets, especially in the rural areas. As mentioned, imposition of GST diversifies government’s revenue sources and increase income. However, a previous study of GST in Mexico indicated that tax revenue increase might not be as large as suggested by standard literature due to the increase of the informal sector, shrinking the tax base. Furthermore, as a developing country, Malaysia may not benefit from the implementing GST due to the high administrative costs. Meanwhile, as GST was deferred, road shows, seminars and public education campaign are still being held by the authorities ever since the first announcement of GST in order to create awareness amongst the public about the oncoming tax transition. On the contrary, in the same time, GST opponents have been expressing negative by starting an anti-GST task force to protests against the implementation. Sentiment is that Malaysia is ranked more corrupt than ever and people are cynical that imposing GST will only be another avenue for corruption. From the discussion above, it can be seen that imposition of GST can improve collection of revenue in a more comprehensive, transparent and effective manner. Furthermore, more savings for households and corporate sectors can be expected with the substitution of SST with GST. Government has been paying effort in educating the public, however, hesitated in implementing the GST several times because of the lack of infrastructure to effectively collect the taxes. Furthermore, Malaysia is currently in a developing stage. There are still many informal sectors like agriculture sector and goods that are exempted from this system. Besides, the corruption issues in the country have yet to be addressed. It seems that the government needs more time to get ready for the implementation of GST and, thus GST might be implemented later rather than sooner. 3.2 Judgments from Micro-economic aspect (i) Corporate aspect GST is tax collected on behalf of government. Given the claimable input tax feature, GST is deemed not to be a business cost. However, GST will place a burden on the corporate sector (especially Small and Medium Enterprises), which will be responsible for collecting the new tax. SMEs may face the problem of cash flow difficulty due to the payment of GST upfront. Also the employment of qualified internal staff with the necessary experience can be quite costly. To add on to the problem, software programs would need to be revised to take into account the GST element hence adding on to the cost of operating a business. As conclude by studies, the compliance cost of SMEs is substantially higher than larger firms. Thus, GST compliance is four times more regressive to SMEs as compared to large firms. Again, representatives of the corporate sector have already expressed fears that corruption and bureaucratic ineptitude could raise the cost of administering the tax, thereby increasing companies’ operating costs. Furthermore, with regards to the threshold limit, survey done by The Associated Chinese Chambers of Commerce & Industry of Malaysia (ACCIM) ,with a small samples of 2000 people, has indicated that a threshold of RM5 million above is the most acceptable level instead of RM500,000. Extra compliance cost has a very high possibility of causing them to have substantial amount of revenue forgone. Even the neighbor country of Malaysia, Singapore, has a threshold limit of SGD$1 million. Shockingly, 80% of the respondents indicated that their computer systems are not ready to cater for the administration of GST. All of the reasons above clearly show that GST compliance is a very big issue to the corporate sectors, especially SMEs. High compliance costs that will be incurred for new software purchasing, staff training and low threshold limit have make them react very negatively towards the proposed GST. Thereby, it takes time for government to allay the fear of the corporate sectors and address the compliance cost issue. Thus, GST might be implemented later rather than sooner. (ii) Individual aspect Public are very reluctant to accept the implementation of GST. Some of them even formed a group representing the public to protest and express their non-approval for the introduction of the proposed GST with the contention of GST will â€Å"feed the rich and starve the poor†. Also, they are worried that those unscrupulous traders might take advantage of the GST to unnecessarily increase prices and pass this down to the final consumer. Actually, government has been spending time creating public awareness about the GST. However, the effort does not seem to be enough that most of the people do not actually realize that the lower income groups are protected as most of the basic necessities are actually zero-rated and tax exempted. Consumers have a choice to a certain extent whether to pay the tax should they decide to consume any of the non-essential goods and services. When it comes to exempting â€Å"basic essentials† from GST, however, there are arguments against list for political popularity. This is because too many exemptions can nullify the purpose of GST as a broad revenue base. Again, the â€Å"bureaucratic culture† in Malaysia further erodes the confidence of public towards GST. To sum up all the reasons above, given political sensitivity of the GST and the difficulty of controlling the reactions of the public and the corporate sector, the government might want to ensure that there is a long gap in between for the introduction of GST even though GST can be beneficial to the country. Besides, the Malaysian government needs time to establish computerization system and trained personnel for the tax transition. However, the budget deficit and depleting natural resources leave the federal government with little choice. Furthermore, the authorities has stressed that SST has reached its threshold, GST is the best option for the tax reform. Thus, given the reasons above and efforts of government create public awareness of GST, it might seen that GST is already in the pipeline and the current deferment was actually to allow the authorities to have more public awareness program and to give the corporate sector more time to get ready for the tax transition. 4. Equity of GST As indicated by government, GST provides equitable treatments as lower income groups are protected by zero-rated and exempted mechanisms. This method has been argued as simplistic as it ignores a number of important facts. First, empirical research indicates that there are significant difference in the pattern of expenditure between the poor and rich. Engel’s law point out that the share of expenditure on food and clothing is very high for the poorest households. According to the estimates of Hossain, VAT can be made less regressive with zero-rating of commodities that are consumed more by the poor households. Zero-rating â€Å"basic-commodities† protecting the poor and also the rich, since they also buy these commodities. In other words, zero-rating is an expensive way of protecting the poor since much of the â€Å"protection† is wasted on the rich. Second, the case for imposing VAT as has long been known a uniform VAT is likely to increase the price of many goods essential to the poor (Ahmad Stern 1987). Research on Bangladesh shows that a uniform VAT that disregards the differences in expenditure spending of the rich and the poor is significantly regressive as the poor suffer 2 to 3.5 percent loss in their income while the rich benefits from such reform. Because the poor may consume a relatively small amount of such products, it is undoubtly true that much of the benefits of such exemptions will go to the non-poor. Third, before the introduction of GST, the price of all commodities in fact has already incorporated an indirect tax component that is the tax charged on inputs for production. Therefore, no commodities will increase in price to the full extent of GST. Moreover, proponents of the tax reform have neglected the presence of a large informal economy in Malaysia. According to Emran and Stiglitz, the dramatic shift in favor of VAT as the main instrument for revenue rising in developing countries which have a large informal sector is misguided both on efficiency and equity grounds. Even a uniform broad-based VAT may be more progressive than more nominally progressive taxes (such as the personal income tax) that in practice burden only a limited group of wage-earners. This can be happen, for instance, informal sector producers that produce a close substitute of the formal GST-liable commodity will get high profit without bearing tax while formal sector producer may get lower profit and bearing tax. Therefore, informal sectors of a Malaysia might distort the equity treatment of GST amongst the corporate sectors. A further consequence is that the tax base of the GST is eroded and either less revenue is available for national expenditure prio rities, or higher rate of GST is required. Thus, the equity of GST still remains a question. The actual impact of a broad-based GST needs to be estimated by econometric model in order to answer the major arguments of broad-based GST. 4. Conclusion GST has been proposed by government to reduce the reliance on direct tax and the petroleum revenue. Also, it was planned to replace current SST. With a broader base for goods and services being subject to GST, the revenue for the government is expected to be higher. However, the implementation GST is being deferred again due to the political sensitivity and the negative reaction of the public. Furthermore, the lacking of infrastructure to effectively collect the taxes, negative responses by the corporate sectors and protests against GST by the public contributes further to the deferment of GST. However, it does not mean GST going to be shelved forever as Deputy Director of Customs, Subromaniam Tholasy, has made a clear statement that the implementation of GST has only been deferred, not cancelled. Also, the officials have been keen to stress that both consumers and businesses are likely to make savings under the GST. Thus, it is obvious that the GST already is in the pipeline. However, many things have to be done for the imposition of GST, thus GST might be implemented later rather than sooner due to the substantial time and cost incurred by the corporate sector and government in the preparation for the transition. Also, equity of GST still remains an issue. In order to make the implementation of GST to be successful, the government should start an extensive education and public awareness drive now to explain how the tax works and its impact on prices. Also, the government should address its major problem which is corruption to regain the confidence of public. Also, they has to take into consideration of the neglected factors such as informal sector and reconsider the equity issue in order to make the implementation of GST to be equitable and efficient.