darwinianvision's Profile

The only acknowledgment of religion in the original Constitution is a utilitarian one: the document is dated “in the year of our Lord 1787.” Even the religion clause of the First Amendment is framed dryly and without reference to any particular faith. The Connecticut ratifying convention debated rewriting the preamble to take note of God’s authority, but the effort failed.

A pseudonymous opponent of the Connecticut proposal had some fun with the notion of a deity who would, in a sense, be checking the index for his name: “A low mind may imagine that God, like a foolish old man, will think himself slighted and dishonored if he is not complimented with a seat or a prologue of recognition in the Constitution.” Instead, the framers, the opponent wrote in The American Mercury, “come to us in the plain language of common sense and propose to our understanding a system of government as the invention of mere human wisdom; no deity comes down to dictate it, not a God appears in a dream to propose any part of it.”

The definition of the word "theory" in the context of science is sometimes hotly argued by non-scientists

The origin of this confusion has it's roots in the history of the development of science. When we speak of early, classical physics, we talk about laws, Newton's laws of motion for instance, the ideas have the weight of veracity. After all, the word "law" has a serious and strictly defined meaning in our culture. Back when Newton declared his laws, he believed them to be absolute descriptions of how the universe worked. At the time, they were irrefutable. We now know that his laws are in fact approximations, rules that work when describing motion on the macroscopic scale but which break at the quantum scale.

The key is to remember that each channel has different requirements including:



* Product
* Support
* Pricing
* Collateral



Essentially everything.



One very important channel that can be instrumental in the launch of consumer electronics is Manufacturer Representatives. Territory and account-based representatives can be instrumental in introducing and maintaining and active presence of a product line.

National Service is Richard Eyre's riveting diary of a decade as the director of the Royal National Theatre, charting his own personal and professional dramas, from mutinous actors and budgetary nightmares to the devastating illness of his father.

In this extract, from 1989, he prepares for a production of Hamlet, starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Judi Dench, and a fatwa is pronounced upon his friend Salman Rushdie.





January 7, 1989 About to start Hamlet. Nervous—well, afraid. I must stop worrying. George Kaufman [American playwright and director] used to time his rehearsals so that he would start a scene a few minutes before rehearsals were due to end. He’d work his way to the back of the auditorium during the scene, wait till it was finished, say, ‘Thank you, everybody’, and dart through the foyer into the street before any actor could catch him to share their problems with him. It’s not a tactic that would work if you run a theatre.

nnovation
Why Bad Things Happen
To Good Technology
New ideas take you only so far. Firms also need to innovate their business models.
By HENRY CHESBROUGH
April 28, 2007; Page R11

In most companies, innovation is the responsibility of the technical side of the organization. The research and development staff is supposed to come up with the cool new technologies, and the rest of the company takes them to market.

But that model doesn't assure success, as the recent history of innovation shows. Betamax lost out to VHS. Macintosh, to a lesser degree, lost out to Windows. We still use color-TV standards from the 1940s, despite many initiatives to improve picture quality.

30 years ago a flurry of new laws were introduced in the UK aimed at creating equality for women and there was a surge of interest in women's rights and feminism.

The 1970s were a time of great change for women in the UK. It was a time of optimism too - many in the women’s movement hoped that if only they pushed hard enough they would see equality for their daughters’ generation.

In 1975 the Equal Pay Act came into force, the Sex Discrimination Act was passed and the Equal Opportunities Commission was established. In the same year the Employment Protection Act 1975 made maternity leave a statutory right. One year later the Sexual Offences Amendment Act was passed.

The Basics of Foreign Trade and Exchange

1. Growing Trade, Shrinking World
1. What is international trade?
2. World Trade is Diverse
3. Trade: Important for Economic Well Being
4. Trade: Why Do It
2. Benefits of Trade
1. Specialization and its Benefits
2. Law of Comparative Advantage
3. Benefits of Diversity
4. Competitiveness
5. Economies of Scale
6. Knowledge-intensive Products Contribute to the U.S. Boom
3. Free Trade Vs. Protectionism
1. Arguments for Protection
2. Methods of Protection
3. Arguments for Free Trade
4. Measures of Trade
5. Statistics Can Have Different Interpretations
4. Foreign Currency Exchange
1. Foreign Exchange Market: What is it?
2. Foreign Exchange Market Participants
3. Foreign Exchange Rates
4. Determination of Foreign Exchange Rates
5. Foreign Currency Trading
6. Types of Transactions
7. Floating and Fixed Exchange Rates
5. Role of Central Banks
1. Intervention
2. Concerns About Eurocurrency
6. Working Across Borders
7. International Organizations and Trade Issues
8. Useful Web Links