Can Biodiversity loss be the downfall of an ecosystem and human well be

People often say "Why should I care if a species goes extinct? It’s not essential to my daily life†. But what use are humans, really? We waste a lot of resources and have managed to damage the ecosystem without a second thought. Eliminating species to extinction, destroying plants and trees a critical part of human well-being and organisms in an ecosystem leading to tremendous consequences. Organisms depend on each other for survival and the loss of one species can greatly alter the balance of an ecosystem as a whole, as seen in the Yellowstone National Park ecosystem. Gray wolves were poached to extinction from Yellowstone during the early twentieth century, then were reintroduced to restore a complete food web. Researchers, Marshall, Hobbs and Cooper the authors of â€Å"Stream hydrology limits recovery of riparian ecosystems after wolf reintroduction† suggested â€Å"excessive browsing of willows by elk after wolves were gone was implicated in the disappearance of beavers from streams". Furthermore, when the gray wolves disappeared the willows were terminated by elk glazing and with no willows to slow stream flow, creeks flowed faster and beavers prefer slow-moving water, so they disappeared as well. In addition, when the wolves were reintroduced they hunted elk and brought down numbers of these. But, removing elk glazing wasn't enough for the willows, needing slow streams created by beavers allowing more willows to grow. Alan Tessier, program director in the National Science Foundation's Division of Environmental Biology whom funded the concludes "the research illustrates the value of long-term ecological experiments to understanding how species interactions cascade through food webs to determine ecosystem resilience†. Theref... ...vores, meaning no food for carnivores, meaning much quicker extinction of all life. In conclusion, losing even a small strand in the web of life contributes to the unraveling of our planet's sustainability, and that makes a difference to each one of us. Works Cited Marshall Kristen N, Hobbs N. Thompson and Copper David J. â€Å"Stream hydrology limits recovery of riparian ecosystems after wolf reintroduction†. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. Vol. 280. (2013). "Traditional Medicine." (2003) World Heath Organization. Web. 11 Mar 2014. "Facts and figures on biodiversity." (2012) The International Union for Conservation of Nature. Web. 11 Mar 2014. Chivian, Eric and Bernstein, Aaron. â€Å"Sustaining Life: How Our Health Depends On Biodiversity†. 2008. Print. "How much do oceans add to world’s oxygen?." (2013) Earth sky. Web. 11 Mar 2014.

Safety Management System

By recognizing the organization's role in accident prevention, SMSs provide to both certificate holders and the national aviation authority e. g. (CAAS): A structured means of safety risk management decision making A means of demonstrating safety management capability before system failures occur Increased confidence in risk controls though structured safety assurance processes An effective interface for knowledge sharing between regulator and certificate holder A safety promotion framework to support a sound safety culture Safety begins from both the top down and the bottom up.Everyone from the receptionist, ramp worker, pilot, manager, and CAAS Inspector has a role to perform. SMS is all about decision-making. Thus it has to be a decision-maker's tool, not a traditional safety program separate and distinct from business and operational decision making. Why do we need SMS? We are now in a position where the â€Å"common cause† accidents are diminishing in number. While it's a major success story, it's not a place to rest.When we find a cause that affects all or part of a large population of operators or other aviation participants, we can address risk through rulemaking – a risk control that applies to veryone to address risks to which everyone is exposed. There will always be some of these risks and work will continue to find them and address them. Many accidents that occur, however, are due to the unique aspects of the operating environments of individual operators of narrow segments of the aviation community.The causal factors of these accidents aren't common to everyone; they must be found and addressed with methods that are sensitive to the nuances of the individual operator's situation. One of the defining characteristics of an SMS is its emphasis on isk management [within the individual operators' environment and situation] – it's a gap filler between the common cause risk factors that are addressed by traditional regulations and th ose that are more elusive. Hypothetical Scenario Demonstrating the Need for SMS A well-designed aircraft with a history of reliable service is being prepared for a charter flight.Employees tow the aircraft from the hangar to the terminal. One employee sees wetness on the right tire as he unhooks the tow bar. However, he does not give it attention, as he is very busy and has three other aircraft to move in the ext 15 minutes. At the same time, a safety inspector is walking through the hangar when she encounters a hydraulic oil spill on the hangar floor. She notifies a Janitor to clean up the slip hazard as she leaves. While cleaning the spill, the Janitor wonders aloud where the spill came from. Afterwards, both the inspector and the Janitor continue with their respective Jobs.Meanwhile, the Chief Pilot assigns the charter flight to a new pilot with the company. While new to the company, the pilot is well trained and prepared for the flight. He is also eager to do a good Job and to i mpress the chief pilot. The chief tells him that the passengers and the aircraft are waiting at the terminal, and the new pilot has to get over there right away to keep the clients happy and on schedule. The flight requires a little more fuel, so a fuel truck is called. While the aircraft is being filled, the fueler notices a small puddle of reddish fluid under the right main landing gear.He sees the pilot walking out to the aircraft, but before he can say anything, his supervisor calls and tells him to get right over to another aircraft. Recently, the fueler was criticized by his supervisor for taking too long to finish his ork, so he quickly Jumps in his truck and drives off to the next Job without saying anything to the pilot. The pilot, wanting to make a good impression on his passengers and the chief pilot, personally escorts them to the aircraft and begins his preparation for the flight.One passenger asks him a brief question as he is on the right side of the aircraft. In a mo ment of distraction, he does not bend down to inspect the right hand main landing gear. During taxi, the pilot feels the aircraft is taking the bumps a little hard, but continues to the runway for take-off. Meanwhile, up in the tower, an air traffic controller, who appens to like this particular model of aircraft, picks up her binoculars to take a look at the taxiing aircraft. She notices a â€Å"wet spot† on the right main tire and radios the pilot.The pilot tells the controller that he probably ran over a puddle and asks for his clearance. At the destination airport, the pilot executes a perfect landing and applies the brakes. The leaking hydraulic fluid heats up and ignites. The right main landing gear is engulfed in flames. The controller notifies the pilot and then calls the crash fire rescue squad. The pilot calmly and proficiently manages the situation, successfully vacuating everyone from the aircraft without injury. The pilot and passengers watch from a safe distance while a perfectly good aircraft burns to the ground. How could this have happened? † wonders the pilot. Soon afterwards, the pilot is fired for failure to perform an adequate preflight inspection. Six months later, an aircraft is being towed out of a hanger. One of the employees sees wetness on the left main landing gear tire as he unhooks the tow bar†¦ Evolution of Safety Management Safety Management Systems (SMSs) are the product of a continuing evolution in aviation satety. Early aviation pioneers nad little satety regulation, practical experience, or engineering knowledge to guide them.

Explain Why It Is Difficult to Talk Meaningfully About God Essay

Religious language is defined as the communication of ideas about God, faith, belief and practice. This definition makes it difficult to talk meaningfully about it as each of these words have concepts behind them and each and every individual interprets these differently, so religious language is different to everyday language, as it only denotes to an individual’s belief and faiths traditions. There are also many problems with religious language as a whole as it anthropomorphises God, by using terminology such as ‘Him’ ‘King’ and ‘Shepherd’ this is limiting and subjects God to have human qualities, which is against what The Bible wants to portray God as. Also another problem is that some think that religious language is cognitive, thus something must be known about God to talk meaningfully about it. Yet this creates the problem that religious statements are not about objective facts that can be proved true or false but are answers to questions that are unable to be validated, as they are based on objective facts that are open to cognition. These issues have led to religious believers to find ways in which they can talk about God in a meaningful way and the opposite as non-believers are searching for ways to render religious language meaningless. A group of philosophers called the logical positivists who as a group did not seek to understand how we gain knowledge of the external world, but how we use language to convey it. They believed that everything that can be verified is meaningful. Thus the verification principle was developed which stated that if it could be empirical tested by the five senses then it was meaningful, for example, a house is made of gingerbread, is meaningless as it can be proved false by taking stone samples from the house. Yet this causes a problem when talking about philosophical and religious aspects. The logical positivists thought it was pointless to talk about art, music, ethic and God as it could never be verified, so couldn’t be rendered true or false. Therefore it is meaningless as it is used to consider things beyond the human experience and this creates the ‘impossibility’ to understand to meaning of anything being said. A. J. Ayer; a logical positivist introduces two types of verification, strong and weak, to deal with the acceptation of scientific and historical propositions which are struggling to regard as meaningful or not. Strong verification is when there is absolute no doubt that a statement is true, as it is verified through sense, for example, ‘It is sunny today’. Yet weak verification occurs when some of the observations are not conclusively true or false, for example, ‘humans are made of atoms’ as this may be accepted by people who were at the time of the discovery, also future scientific statements are verified by the weak, as they will only be affirmed in the future not at present. The falsification principle created by Flew, stated that religious statements are meaningless as there nothing which can count against a religious believer, as they will not count or accept any of the evidence against their faith. Criticism ‘dies the death of a thousand qualifications’. For example Flew used the story of a father of a terminally ill child, prayed for God to make their child better, but the child died, the father qualifies this by saying it was God’s decision and maybe God’s love is ‘not merely human love’. Tillich believed that religious language was meaningful as it was conveyed through metaphors and symbols, however philosophers such as Paul Edwards thought that revelation could not be portrayed through the verification principle using empirical evidence therefore symbols don’t elude any factual knowledge, and are meaningless. Another critique of Tillich is that he stated that metaphors and symbols can be mistranslated and over time the original meaning may have been lost or forgotten therefore considering symbols meaningless as the meaning may have been changed from what was originally intended to represent. Also with the criticism that symbols can be interpreted in any way the individual wants to, this is demising the ultimate truth of reality it is trying to convey as it may point in a different direction as to which was also originally intended. Overall, the verification and the falsification principles argue that it is not possible to talk about God meaningful way as it is not possible to prove the existence of God of go verify any of the statements related to God.

No One’s A Mystery Essay

â€Å"No One’s a Mystery† is mainly about innocence and how coming-of-age plays an important role in a relationship. Tallent plays out a contrast between hopeful expectations and disappointing reality through the character of a naive, innocent girl involved with an older, experienced man. The girl appears to be very comfortable with Jack, even though he pushes her into hiding below the dashboard, and despite her spirited singing along with Rosanne Cash on the tape deck, her casual drinking of tequila, and her acceptance of the gift. The curiosity builds when he gives her a five-year diary for her eighteenth birthday, almost foreshadowing a future together. The girl had experienced many changes in consequence of being with Jack. Her loss of innocence is further emphasized as she offers the following insights regarding their future together: â€Å"Jack should be home any minute now, but I don’t know if I can wait until after the trout a la Navarra to make love to him. â€Å"In Tallent’s â€Å"No One’s a Mystery†, the story shows having faith in someone is difficult to do especially when you’re in a relationship with a person. In Jack and the girl’s case, the naive girl questions her future with Jack when he treats her like a child and mocks her when she speaks. Jack chooses to mock her realism by challenging her playfully. Although she still has a serious love for Jack, she is now jaded and aware of what difficulties lay ahead. Another example would be when she is interrupted by a skeptical comment from the older man she continues, â€Å"Little Jack is hungry for his supper.† Jack laughs as she draws to a close, â€Å"My nipples are a little sore from nursing Eliza Rosamund.† Stirring traces of sight, smell, sound, and touch, all feed into her introspective outlook, but strangely. The story, â€Å"No One’s a Mystery† by Elizabeth Tallent explores the relationship of two characters, whom are both rather disputable. The young girl in the story remains unnamed and could be considered naà ¯ve and dim-witted while the guy, Jack, is a chauvinist pig. He uses his 18 year-old admirer as an excuse to make himself think he is still young. It is a way to keep him in the frame of mind that he doesn’t need a wife, he can do what he wants and get what he wants without her. Jack doesn’t seem to want a predictable life. His comments to his admirer show that he isn’t ready to settle down with his wife. For the most part his comments are short and indirect, â€Å"It’s her,’ he said. ‘She keeps her lights on in the daytime. I cant think of a single habit in a woman that irritates me more than that.† This quote is showing Jack belittling his wife. It’s something that would be said in a high school relationship. He also puts her down once again by saying, â€Å"She thinks it’s safer. Why does she need to be safer? She’s driving exactly fifty-five miles an hour. She believes in those signs: ‘Speed Monitored by Aircraft.’ It doesn’t matter that you can look up and see the sky is empty† It’s like he is saying these comments to win his admirers affection. However when Jack saw his wife coming in the distance his actions showed little respect for his young admirer. Jack is a selfish person who only cares about himself. Usually cheaters do not look out for others but themselves but he demonstrates it in several ways. The girl notes â€Å"He pushed me down onto the dirty floor of the pickup and kept one hand on my head while I inhaled the musk of his cigarettes in the dashboard ashtray†. This is horrible to have to go through but the girl has fallen in love with him to the point where she doesn’t think anything is wrong with the situation. â€Å"When he saw that I was going to stay still he took his hand from my head and ran it through his own dark hair†. Jack has to be really inconsiderate to put someone through that. He cares for her about as much as he does with all his pop-tops that are on his truck floor. Later on in their trip Jack tells his admirer what he thinks she will be writing in her diary. â€Å"I wonder what I ever really saw in Jack. I wonder why I spent so many days just riding around in his pickup. It’s true he taught me something about sex†. This comment here shows a little about how Jack sees their situation. He knows its not going to last forever and it will come to and end with in a year. You can tell the two have a very comfortable sexual relationship by the â€Å"taught me something about sex† line in his speech. They are both so comfortable around it that he feels free to joke about it around her. Jack’s situation is not one that’s seen as mature or respectful among most people. He uses his lover for sex and keeps his wife in the dark of the whole situation. It is selfish and wrong for Jack to be acting like this. Jack does what he wants all day and has no respect for either of the two women involved in this affair, therefore showing a childish attitude.

Discuss some of the benefits and drawbacks of studying for a Essay - 2

Discuss some of the benefits and drawbacks of studying for a university degree, Which appear to be more persuasive Refer to the text and other sources - Essay Example Not only does a degree from a university improve a person’s career prospects but it also helps him socially. His societal status improves and he is respected more. Saying that, however, does not mean that attaining a university degree is a sure shot at landing at your dream job. It is very commonly seen that graduates are jobless or working at a lowly position which is not what they had in mind when pursuing their degree. The value of a university degree should not be gauged monetarily only although that is what most people do and high paying jobs are why people pursue a degree. A university degree gives other possible benefits as well that will be detailed in the rest of this paper. Nevertheless, a degree is never a waste of investment and even if a person does not end up getting a job right away he will find that later on, when he has some experience in lowly jobs, his degree is what will set him out from non-graduates and help him get a good job. I am a single mother of four, having lost my husband a year back. I have a background in nursing and 15 years of experience in the same field. Now I have decided to move into Public Health. I am currently enrolled in the program and also working a part time job side by side. The reason I decided to pursue this degree is that I have a passion for academics and I believe that it will help me a lot in climbing up my career ladder. Yes, it is a pretty hard task managing studies, work and a family and yes, it is extremely difficult to give equal time to all, not to mention it becomes very tiring and stressful too. But then, if you want to achieve something you have to sacrifice and work hard for it. I have also planned to complete my university training as that will be counted a lot. Training and experience is always a bonus in professional life. I believe that once I have this degree I can apply for a better position and be able to earn and support my family better. Even if the results

Aboriginal history in north america-the circle of life with mention of Essay

Aboriginal history in north america-the circle of life with mention of the medicine wheel - Essay Example There were numerous ways in which the circle of life is interpreted, all of which illustrate the need for harmonious existence with others and nature. The medicine wheel is a physical manifestation of spiritual energy, through which one can visualize surrounding events, which allowed the Aboriginals to be in harmony with the self and nature by creating notions of new life and renewal (Liebmann 69). The circle illustrates continuity of nature and in human beings, while the four points bear different meanings, for instance, nature’s four elements that are: fire, earth, air and water are all part of the same physical world and should be respected (The Sacred Foundation of Aboriginal Education 5). In addition, it is indicative of human development stages as well as the human potentialities, which include mental, physical, emotional and spiritual. The circle of life also teaches that the symbolic races are part of the same human family, and should live in harmony as brothers and sisters. In this regard, as the Europeans explored the new territory, they would be compelled to respect nature and other races present before them. Thus, the Aboriginal people continued with their beliefs regardless of the prevailing new influence and culture (Bramadat and Seljak 266). Winnipeg, Manitoba. Cultural & Spiritual Values The Sacred Foundation of Aboriginal Education 2012, Sustaining our Ways: Educating for Sustainability. 2012. Web. 9 Oct. 2012.

Literature Review For Creating strong teacher-student relationships to Research Paper

Literature Review For Creating strong teacher-student relationships to improve student achievement in Mathematics class - Research Paper Example Joffrey, with preparation and a sense of delight and gratitude, gave students a chance to explain mathematics inculcating a love for the subject (Strogatz and Joffray, 2009). The Calculus of Friendship is not only a delightful read for aspiring mathematics teachers, but also emphasized the importance of teacher-student relationship for mathematics learning. Mathematics education has evolved over the last hundred years (Jankvist, 2010). Recent perspectives on mathematics teaching and learning have stressed on the importance of mathematical reasoning, problem-solving skills, and their application of real life situations. Depaepe et al. (2007) argued that aspects of classroom culture assumed to enhance beliefs and problem-solving competencies include establishment of classroom norms; instructional techniques and classroom organizational forms; and set of tasks. Strong focus on heuristic skills and embedding tasks in real life are aspects that are easier to implement. The use of technology has been brought about by professional thinking about pedagogy (Katz and Solomon, 2008). Systems include the use of computer-based tools and resources (Smith, 1998; Pear and Crone-Todd, 2002). Ruthven et al. (2004) described the contribution of technology in seven themes including improving working processes and production; supporting processes such as trialling, checking, and refinement; enhancing the variety and appeal of classroom activity; fostering independence among pupils and peer support; overcoming difficulties among pupils and building reassurance; broadening reference and increasing activity currency; and focussing on overarching issues and accentuating important features. Professional thinking and use of technology is anchored in student motivation and classroom learning. Kilpatrick et al. (2001) argued that students need to think mathematically for learning mathematics. In order to be mathematically proficient, students must