The Relationships between Happiness and Meaning Essay Example for Free

The Relationships between Happiness and Meaning Essay Every person on earth experiences happiness as well as unhappiness.   Even infants cry as well as laugh.   Ultimately they grow to realize that there are things that make them happy just as there are situations that make them unhappy.   Understanding the nature of these different things and/or situations is to know how the meanings of these things and/or situations are related to one’s happiness or unhappiness.   Thus, happiness and meaning happen to be closely connected with each other.    There is a reason why we experience happiness or unhappiness.   These reasons are the meanings of our experiences of happiness or unhappiness.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   There are many ways to understand happiness.   A person who is ecstatic is understood to be extremely happy.   Another person may experience happiness as he or she enjoys life.   Conversely, a person who does not really attempt to enjoy life may be satisfied with his or her life nevertheless.   All of these people may be happy.   Even so, all of them may have different reasons for being happy.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Prophets and sages have often stated that things on earth cannot always make us happy.   A person who is truly happy with life because he or she enjoys a nearly perfect relationship with his or her spouse may lose the spouse to death.   Another person may believe that material things, e.g. new cars, are responsible for his or her happiness.   The person who loses his or her spouse will experience unhappiness, just as the individual who loses all of his or money would become depressed.   People who believe that happiness is equivalent to material success may also develop â€Å"affluenza,† described in the following ways: (1) â€Å"The bloated, sluggish and unfulfilled feeling that results from efforts to keep up with the Joneses;† (2) â€Å"An epidemic of stress, overwork, waste and indebtedness caused by dogged pursuit of the American Dream;† and (3) â€Å"An unsustainable addiction to economic growth (Leon).†Ã‚   Perhaps the rich people who have committed suicide, e.g. Kurt Cobain, were suffering from affluenza.   Regardless, it is generally believed that a person must find the meaning of his or her life to be truly happy (Brain).   Hence, the person who loses his or her spouse has a couple of choices: (1) Either to commit suicide because he or she cannot deal with the unhappiness caused by the loss; or (2) Find reasons to be happy despite the loss.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Psychologists have found that people feel happy when they increase their understanding.   In other words, knowing the meaning of the things in our world is bound to increase our happiness.   Thus, many people feel satisfied when they read books.   The person who was dependent on his or her spouse for happiness may find happiness in this way.   Alternatively, the individual may decide to pursue a goal that helps to move the human society forward in some way.   The meaning of life is also understood by people to be the service of God (Brain). Regardless of the meaning of life realized by the person who had believed that his or her spouse was responsible for his or her happiness; understanding what his or her life is worth may help the individual to experience satisfaction with life once again.   Moreover, whether the person chooses to serve society or God, by knowing the meaning of his or her existence, the individual opens up to future experiences that may very well allow him or her to find happiness without the spouse.   After all, pursuing a goal to fulfill the meaning of life may lead the person to joyful experiences.   Hence, meaning and happiness could never be separated. Works Cited Brain, Marshall. â€Å"Chapter 41: Material Things Will Not Bring You Happiness.† The Teenager’s Guide to the Real World. 1997. 10 Dec 2007. http://www.bygpub.com/books/tg2rw/chap41excerpt.htm. Leon, Virginia De. â€Å"Money cant buy meaning: Many simplify to find happiness.† Spokesman Review. 9 Jul 2006.

Essay --

One with Nature William Wordsworth wrote the poem â€Å"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud† in the year of 1802 while he was walking home with his sister Dorothy, and they discovered and saw a patch of daffodils (http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/). This poem deals with the interchange between human and nature, and then due to the comparison between the poet and the daffodils, the poet makes himself a piece or part of nature. Furthermore, the daffodils are portrayed as heavenly and spiritual creatures who â€Å"dance† (l 6) which makes the poet become one as well. This symbolizes the poets mind’s overflow of ideas which inspire him to write, and it leads to his mind’s rebirth. Hence, the poet uses figurative language and form to show the overflow of ideas and rebirth that is achieved through the exchange between man and nature. Wordsworth makes use of similes and personifications to convey an exchange between man and nature. To begin with, the poet utilizes the simile â€Å"I wandered lonely as a cloud† (l 1) to compare himself to a cloud. Due to the cloud existing as a part of nature, when he compares himself to it, he becomes a part of the natural world as well. The poet then personifies the daffodils with the assistance of the words â€Å"crowd†(l 3) and â€Å"dancing† (l 6). These terms are human attributes given to the daffodils, thus making the daffodils â€Å"human†. Furthermore, the poet uses these terms to construct a simile comparing daffodils and humans. When these daffodils, which are now â€Å"human†, are compared to humans, which are a part of nature, they interchange positions. Therefore, through the usage of similes and personifications, Wordsworth exhibits an exchange between man and nature. Following this exchange between man and nature,... ...would not be complete. This overlap, which completes the meaning, is an overflow of thoughts. Therefore, the couplets, both being excessive and overlapping, symbolize an overflow of thoughts. The poem conveys a trinity that unites as one through the number of stanzas. In the first three stanzas, the poet is wandering in nature and is experiencing the beauty of nature. The stanzas, being three, and dealing with the beauty of nature that is said to be heavenly symbolizes the trinity between man, nature, and god. Furthermore, the fourth stanza deals with the poet’s remembrance of nature on the couch. The fourth stanza, being one, deals with the unison of both nature and heavenly into men. Hence, the first three stanzas symbolize the exchange between man and nature that leads to an exchange between man and god, and the fourth stanza symbolizes them becoming one in man.

Fathers Have Few Rights in Washington State Essay example -- Argumenta

During a child’s early years he/she establishes parental bonds which will influence the rest of his/her life. However, in Washington few children will realize this bonding with their fathers. In fact, the evidence is clear, census reports, court records, and statements from the people of Washington themselves all point to a State biased against fathers. Unfortunately, this bias extends beyond just the courts, even beyond state run agencies like DSHS; this behavior runs rampant through our very streets. We, as citizens, partisans, and voters of Washington State have been given the impression, through media outlets, feminist organizations, and movies that mothers simply make better parents. In reality, there is another side of the story, one which we rarely saw or heard, until now. The other side of the story starts in the early 90’s. 1991 census reports, less than 20% of all custodial-parents were children’s biological fathers. When asking why, one could look to SPARC an online resource for men which reports 50% of all mothers admitted to seeing no benefits being provided by fathers; and 40% of all mothers admitted to interfering with the father’s visits as punishment. Taken together, these statistics portray a picture of men as providers, and incapable of being nurturing parents (SPARC). According to Cohn, Alvin W. based on census reports, infant fatalities decreased, general living conditions for juveniles had seen a substantial increase, and single father homes also increased between 1991 and 2001. These particular increases portray that fathers, in contrast to popular belief, are capable of providing nurturing stable homes for their children, possibly even more so then mothers. However, today, based on the WSCCR (Washingt... ...gov/wsccr/docs/ResidentialTimeSummaryReport2010.pdf† Bleckblog, Anonymous, â€Å"Fathers rights endangered in Washington Stateâ€Å", Sun, 05/31/2009 - 22:20 â€Å"http://bleckblog.org/comp/node/3400† Alan Booth, Mindy E. Scott, and Valarie King â€Å"FATHER RESIDENCE AND ADOLESCENT PROBLEM BEHAVIOR: ARE YOUTH ALWAYS BETTER OFF IN TWO-PARENT FAMIIES?† Columnist, Tabitha S. "Labors of Love: Trying to make Marriages Work." Seattle Post - Intelligencer: A.17.Washington State Newsstand. Apr 07 1995. Web. 29 Sep. 2011 Thompson, Bankole, â€Å"Fathers, step up† Michigan Times, 6/13/07 Mike Mccormick â€Å"Obama's Responsible Fatherhood Bill--Not Enough Carrot, Too Much Stick† the Buffalo News, 6/30/07 Mike Mccormick and Glenn Sacks â€Å"Protect Fathers' Loving Bonds with Their Childrenâ€Å", Web, 1 October, 2011, http://acfc.convio.net/site/DocServer/Protect_Fathers_Article_June_18_2008.pdf?docID=1521

Cultural evolution Essay

In his article â€Å"Where Do Social Relations Come From? †, Michael Grossetti discusses the ways that human relationships are studied by sociologists, citing that often the methodology begins by starting with the relationship ad working backward to define it (Grossetti,p. 289). The most lasting relationships are the ones that come from organizations, he concludes, especially those related to family and friends. When we related this conclusion back to cultural evolution theory, we can argue that the lasting relationships of this generation because at this point in time most relationships are forged out of organizations or via our families. However, we can clearly argue that once this may not have been true as people had longer term relationships with people in their neighborhoods and those with whom they had a physical proximity. Grossetti argues that neighborhoods do not provide a basis for lasting relationships as they do not necessarily share life values or interests which draw people together (p. 292). When discussing this assertion in relation to cultural evolution, we can argue that in the recent past, neighborhoods did share a commonality that is now missing – immigrants would tend to settle in neighborhoods, neighborhoods would be divided by racial or religious lines, or at the most tangential neighborhoods would be reflective of a certain socio-economic status. Now, according to Grossetti’s study, relationships have evolved to the point that people develop relationships based primarily on organizations which they belong to –church groups, work groups, or interest organizations. When this is combined with the use of social networks, it can be observed that people are then creating a new means to segregate themselves via their interests. People have developed a new means to identify people with like interests and create new association groups. The interesting aspect of this evolving form of meeting may be that it creates relationships among people who in previous generations may never even have met. Because social networking allows people with common interests to meet without the traditional introduction of a mutual friend, they may completely change the way relationship develop in the future, dovetailing nicely with the theory of cultural evolution.

3 Comma Splices and How to Repair Them

3 Comma Splices and How to Repair Them 3 Comma Splices and How to Repair Them 3 Comma Splices and How to Repair Them By Mark Nichol A comma often serves to link two independent clauses, but it does so in partnership with a conjunction (as shown in this sentence). When a pair of independent clauses butt up against each other with a comma but no conjunction, the grammatical infraction is known as a comma splice- the name refers to the writer’s effort to splice the clauses together with a comma, which is the wrong use of the tool. Which tool is the correct one? Several are available in your writer’s toolbox: The semicolon (a supercomma of sorts) is usually the best choice, but depending on the interrelationship of the clauses, you could, alternatively, employ a period (creating two distinct sentences) or even a dash (showing an abrupt break in thought). Here are three sentences containing a comma splice and their revisions. 1. â€Å"You can sense the frustration, their morale is down,† Smith said of his colleagues. â€Å"‘You can sense the frustration; their morale is down,’ Smith said of his colleagues† is the technically correct solution, but a semicolon is overly formal for a quotation. In this case, use the more casual dash: â€Å"‘You can sense the frustration- their morale is down,’ Smith said of his colleagues.† Another option is to break the statement into two sentences; but insert the attribution between them: â€Å"‘You can sense the frustration,’ Smith said of his colleagues. ‘Their morale is down.’† (Do not use a semicolon or a dash after an attribution.) 2. The devices themselves don’t use logarithms, rather they are tools to reduce multiplication and division of natural numbers to simple addition and subtraction operations. A transitional word such as rather between two independent clauses is a clear signal that a stronger punctuation mark than a comma is required, because one should follow the word, and a stronger punctuation mark should set the clauses off from each other. A semicolon will suffice: â€Å"The devices themselves don’t use logarithms; rather, they are tools to reduce multiplication and division of natural numbers to simple addition and subtraction operations.† (Rather can also begin a separate sentence, but the second clause is so closely related to the first that a semicolon seems more suitable.) 3. The frame was finished two years later- a little behind schedule, the structure was supposed to open in 1989. The inclusion of a dash in this sentence complicates it, because it introduces confusion about which phrase deserves the most emphasis. A simple solution is to demote the â€Å"Hey, look at me!† dash to a more workmanlike comma and use a semicolon to tack on the final phrase as an independent clause: â€Å"The frame was finished two years later, a little behind schedule; the structure was supposed to open in 1989.† One could use a dash in place of the semicolon, but the information that follows isn’t surprising enough to merit the attention-seeking punctuation mark. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Punctuation category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:50 Synonyms for â€Å"Leader†Proved vs. Proven20 Movies Based on Shakespeare Plays

Effects of Technology

Effects of Technology Free Online Research Papers Technology and the changes it brings can have a very big effect on our lives. The technological change that has had the largest effect on life in this country, I think, is the iPod. The iPod is a brand of digital music player developed by Apple in the early 2000’s that revolutionized the way we can carry our own music with us wherever we go. One of the very first portable music players was the Sony Walkman personal stereo. It was capable of playing radio and cassettes. As time and technology worn on, the stereo improved. The CD Walkman came around as the cassette generation became phased out. First generations of these portable CD players saw no skip protection and did not make good portable units. Skip protection became known and widely used as on-board computers helped to read the information on the CD and prevented the CD from being read as it got bumped. As technology improved further, the codecs of MP3, AAC, and WMA became prevalent. Users burned CDs of MP3s as the first generations of MP3 capable CD players became the most noticeably used music player on the market. (1) As conveniently as the MP3 format started to take over our way of life, so had to be a way to play those computer files. Embedding hard drives and flash memory into players was only the start. The players themselves had to be easy to use, and of utmost importance, extremely portable. The time was ready for iPod. Sony had tried to make their own Walkman with flash memory capability but eventually was deemed too expensive and too constricting (their computer software interface was very buggy and the memory was lower than expected) vs. Apple’s iPod. (1) Apple’s iPod made all aspects of playing your music files better. They had more memory than all other portable units at the time, which meant you can transport more of your music than ever before. It also boasted more battery life, although critics were quick to denounce this as the numbers just could not be reached in real-life. Newer technologies continue to make these units better, with more and more memory, and increased user-friendly features. (2) With the advent of iPod and all of its’ permutations, iPod accessories and attachments have become very prevalent and seems to be something that can’t be lived without. This has had the most lasting effect of technology I’ve seen. References: (1) Walkman entry, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkman (2) iPod entry, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPod Research Papers on Effects of TechnologyThe Hockey GameHip-Hop is ArtBionic Assembly System: A New Concept of SelfMarketing of Lifeboy Soap A Unilever ProductPETSTEL analysis of IndiaWhere Wild and West MeetOpen Architechture a white paperThree Concepts of PsychodynamicCapital PunishmentAnalysis of Ebay Expanding into Asia

Flotation Method in Archaeology

Flotation Method in Archaeology Archaeological flotation is a laboratory technique used to recover tiny artifacts and plant remains from soil samples. Invented in the early 20th century, flotation is today still one of the most common ways to retrieve carbonized plant remains from archaeological contexts. In flotation, the technician places dried soil on a screen of mesh wire cloth, and water is gently bubbled up through the soil. Less dense materials such as seeds, charcoal, and other light material (called the light fraction) float up, and tiny pieces of stone called microliths or micro-debitage, bone fragments, and other relatively heavy materials (called the heavy fraction) are left behind on the mesh. History of the Method The earliest published use of water separation dates to 1905, when German Egyptologist Ludwig Wittmack used it to recover plant remains from ancient adobe brick. The widespread use of flotation in archaeology was the result of a 1968 publication by archaeologist Stuart Struever who used the technique on the recommendations of botanist Hugh Cutler. The first pump-generated machine was developed in 1969 by David French for use at two Anatolian sites. The method was first applied in southwest Asia at Ali Kosh in 1969 by Hans Helbaek; machine-assisted flotation was first conducted at Franchthi cave in Greece, in the early 1970s. The Flote-Tech, the first standalone machine to support flotation, was invented by R.J. Dausman in the late 1980s. Microflotation, which uses glass beakers and magnetic stirrers for gentler processing, was developed in the 1960s for use by various chemists but not extensively used by archaeologists until the 21st century. Benefits and Costs The reason for the initial development of archaeological flotation was efficiency: the method allows for the rapid processing of many soil samples and the recovery of small objects which otherwise might only be collected by laborious hand-picking. Further, the standard process uses only inexpensive and readily available materials: a container, small-sized meshes (250 microns is typical), and water. However, plant remains are typically quite fragile, and, beginning as early as the 1990s, archaeologists became increasingly aware that some plant remains split open during water flotation. Some particles can completely disintegrate during water recovery, particularly from soils recovered in arid or semi-arid locations. Overcoming the Shortcomings The loss of plant remains during flotation is often linked to extremely dry soil samples, which can result from the region in which they are collected. The effect has also been associated with concentrations of salt, gypsum, or calcium coating of the remains. In addition, the natural oxidation process that occurs within archaeological sites converts charred materials which are originally hydrophobic to hydrophilic- and thus easier to disintegrate when exposed to water. Wood charcoal is one of the most common macro-remains found in archaeological sites. The lack of visible wood charcoal in a site is generally considered the result of the lack of preservation of the charcoal rather than the lack of a fire. The fragility of wood remains is associated with the state of the wood on burning: healthy, decayed, and green wood charcoals decay at different rates. Further, they have different social meanings: burned wood might have been building material, fuel for fire, or the result of brush clearing. Wood charcoal is also the main source for radiocarbon dating. The recovery of burned wood particles is thus an important source of information about the occupants of an archaeological site and the events that happened there. Studying Wood and Fuel Remains Decayed wood is particularly underrepresented at archaeological sites, and as today, such wood was often preferred for hearth fires in the past. In these cases, standard water flotation exacerbates the problem: charcoal from decayed wood is extremely fragile. Archaeologist Amaia Arrang-Oaegui found that certain woods from the site of Tell Qarassa North in southern Syria were more susceptible to being disintegrated during water processing- particularly Salix. Salix (willow or osier) is an important proxy for climate studies- its presence within a soil sample can indicate riverine microenvironments- and its loss from the record is a painful one. Arrang-Oaegui suggests a method for recovering wood samples that begins with hand-picking a sample before its placement in water to see if wood or other materials disintegrate. She also suggests that using other proxies such as pollen or phytoliths as indicators for the presence of plants, or ubiquity measures rather than raw counts as statistical indicators. Archaeologist Frederik Braadbaart has advocated the avoidance of sieving and flotation where possible when studying ancient fuel remains such as hearths and peat fires. He recommends instead a protocol of geochemistry based on elemental analysis and reflective microscopy. Microflotation The microflotation process is more time consuming and costly than traditional flotation, but it does recover more delicate plant remains, and is less costly than geochemical methods. Microflotation was used successfully to study soil samples from coal-contaminated deposits at Chaco Canyon. Archaeologist K.B. Tankersley and colleagues used a small (23.1 millimeters) magnetic stirrer, beakers, tweezers, and a scalpel to examine samples from 3-centimeter soil cores. The stirrer bar was placed at the bottom of a glass beaker and then rotated at 45-60 rpm to break the surface tension. The buoyant carbonized plant parts rise and the coal drops out, leaving wood charcoal suitable for AMS radiocarbon dating. Sources: Arranz-Otaegui A. 2016. Evaluating the impact of water flotation and the state of the wood in archaeological wood charcoal remains: Implications for the reconstruction of past vegetation and identification of firewood gathering strategies at Tell Qarassa North (south Syria). Quaternary International In pressBraadbaart F, van Brussel T, van Os B, and Eijskoot Y. 2017. Fuel remains in archaeological contexts: Experimental and archaeological evidence for recognizing remains in hearths used by Iron Age farmers who lived in peatlands. The Holocene:095968361770223.Hunter AA, and Gassner BR. 1998. Evaluation of the Flote-Tech machine-assisted flotation system. American Antiquity 63(1):143-156.Marekovic S, and Ã…  oÃ… ¡taric R. 2016. A comparison of the influences of flotation and wet sieving on certain carbonized legume and cereal remains. Acta Botanica Croatica 75(1):144-148.Rossen J. 1999. The Flote-Tech flotation machine: Messiah or mixed blessing? American Antiquity 64(2):370-372.Tanker sley KB, Owen LA, Dunning NP, Fladd SG, Bishop KJ, Lentz DL, and Slotten V. 2017. Micro-flotation removal of coal contaminants from archaeological radiocarbon samples from Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, USA. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 12(Supplement C):66-73.