Frankenstein, Blade Runner Context Essay

Good morning/ afternoon miss, today I will be speaking about the themes of two texts and the context in which they were written. The two texts ‘Frankenstein’ and ‘Blade Runner’ both embody themes of science, creation and nature that are reflected in the author’s life and what was happening in the world around them. By examining Mary Shelley’s life we can see many of the key themes of her time reflected in Frankenstein. The novel Frankenstein was written in 1818 and follows the story of a scientist, Victor Frankenstein and his quest for creating life. However his experiment goes wrong as his creature goes on a rampage after he has been rejected. One theme from this novel that is part of Shelley’s life is the natural world. The theme of the sublime natural world was embraced by Romanticists such as Mary Shelley who, in their writing, glorify the natural environment. By showing nature as a powerful force it gives an idea that nature is a great and controlling force, somewhat god like. Victor, depressed after the deaths of William and Justine for which he feels responsible for, heads to the mountains. A cold†¦ breeze†¦ upon my cheeks †¦ fills me with delight† is a shortened quote from Victor which expresses his feelings towards nature as a joyous one. The influence of nature on mood is evident throughout the novel and just like Victor feeling happy in the embrace of nature; the monster also feels his heart lighten as spring arrives after a being abandoned in the cold winter. â€Å"The weather became fine and the skies cloudless†. Contrasting to Frankenstein that explores the beauty of nature, Blade runner explores how when the natural environment fades the consequences for both humans and the planet are terrible. Blade Runner is a film directed by Riddley Scott in 1982 and follows the story of a blade runner named Deckard as he sets out on destroying artificial humans known as replicants. In the 1980s many Americans, including Scott feared their country was in a great decline and depression of the war and industrialization. These somber themes are evident within the film. At the beginning of the film we see a montage of manmade buildings and structures that overwhelm the landscape as there are no natural elements. Symbolism is very important in this opening scene as we also see setting in the background, the sun. The sun setting symbolizes the end of the earth and that humans are entering into the dark. Rain in many parts of this film and is used as a visual metaphor to suggest that nature is crying for its destruction by humanity. The effect of this impression is that when nature dies everything will mourn. The setting of this post apocalyptic film is not the only thing that has been urbanised. Many animals have been created artificially. When Deckard first goes to Tyrell he is shown an artificial owl, to which he responds â€Å"must be expensive†. The repetition of animals being artificial and expensive highlights that nothing natural remains and that nature has been taken over by commerce. Scott uses the animals as a symbol to represent how artificial the world has become. Another theme that is evident in both Frankenstein and Blade Runner is science and creation. Frankenstein was written in a period of technological advancement where science was just beginning to take shape and the thought of recreating life was evident. An event in Shelley’s life that impacted her was the work of Luigi Galvani who discovered that the muscles of dead frog’s legs twitched when struck by a electricity. This advancement leads Shelley to critique the ideals of science contrasting to the value of nature. Shelley is clear on her feelings about the use and abuse of technology. The reanimation of a man from the dead can be useful so we can always be with loved ones, but what responsibility should we take once we bring people back from the dead? How far can we go in raising the dead without destroying the living? Shelley seems to portray the idea that man cannot handle becoming like God without difficulty. Victor Frankenstein learns all he can about the field of science, both before, during, and after his work at the university and is continuously obsessed with creating life. The effect of uses a character obsessed with creating life, then later rejecting it further shows how Shelley feels about miss using technology. Similarly to Frankenstein, Blade Runner also questions the values of science and creation. Scott created his film when industrialization and when technology is rapidly becoming part of everyday life. As the creator of the replicants, Tyrell simply creates the androids for money and power then immediately outcasts them. Scott makes the company of Tyrell seem very dark and large to emphasize his power within the city. Both Mary Shelley and Riddley Scott draw inspiration from the events and other themes that are impacting their life, whether it is nature, the advancement of technology or creation issues at the time of writing.

Fear of Failure in Athletes

Fear of failure is the motive to avoid failure in achievement situations. It is not difficult to imagine a Division I college basketball athlete at the foul line, with no time left on the clock and a tied score. Is it the fear of failure or the achievement of success that determines whether the athlete will make the shot? Athletes of all levels and abilities fear failure, because of different experiences and developments. The fear of failure can be developed for a number of reasons and how the athlete copes with failure determines their success.A multidimensional, hierarchal model of fear of failure was created by David Conroy to attempt to analyze the different consequences of failing that lead to the fear of failure. Fear of failure can be represented in a hierarchal structure with five lower order factors and a single higher order factor, representing a general fear of failure. The five lower order fears of failing include fears of experiencing shame and embarrassment, fears of de valuing one’s self estimate, fears of having an uncertain future, fears of important others losing interest, and fears of upsetting important others (Conroy 2004).These fears show similar patterns with measures of self-talk, achievement goals, and contextual motivation. To investigate whether the hierarchal model was similar to the previous mentioned measures Conroy conducted a study between two different groups of athletes. Conroy chose 438 students from a large university that were engaged in recreational physical activities to complete the Performance Failure Appraisal Inventory. He also chose 71 female members of a Division I track team to complete the Performance Failure Appraisal Inventory, Achievement Goal Questionnaire for Sport, and the Sport Motivation Scale.Conroy found that all lower order fear of failure scores exhibited the same pattern of correlations with scores for self-talk while failing, achievement goals, and contextual motivation. Conroy learned that when the individuals thought they were going to fail, they reacted in a manner that resembled the original consequences they fear. The findings of this study suggest that different forms of fear of failure vary in their maladaptiveness. Fears are generally accepted as a standard during childhood and are considered an adaptive emotional reaction to threat.Therefore, it is acceptable to assume that fear of failure is developed during an athletes childhood. Three factors have been associated with the development of children’s fear of failure, parent-child communication and interaction, family climate, and parental high expectations and demands (Sagar 2009). To learn whether young athletes’ fear of failure comes from their parents Sagar conducted interviews on three families of young elite athletes. The athletes were 13 to 14 years old and competing at national or international levels.The interviews and observations were conducted with one family at a time during a three to fo ur week period. The results helped to better understand how the fear of failure was conveyed between parents and athletes. Sagar’s findings revealed failure was conveyed through parental punitive behavior, parental controlling behavior, and parental high expectations. The most common fears of failure reported were fears of others’ negative judgment, of not attaining aspirations, and of non-selection to future competitions.Sagar proved that parental view of failure influences the way young athletes view and interpret fear of failure. Sagar decided to further her research and initiate a study that would explain whether educational programs could help the parent-child relationships, thereby, helping to reduce the athletes’ fear of failure. Sagar comprised two separate programs that taught parents about the fear of failure and their importance in the development of their child’s fear of failure.A questionnaire administered after the program showed that the pa rents reduced their punitive behaviors and adopted more favorable ways of reacting to their child’s failures. The programs helped the parents to improve the condition of their interaction with their children and reduce the children’s levels of fear of failure. The cognitive-behavioral techniques used were proved helpful and could be implemented to other athletes to help reduce the children’s levels of fear of failure. One of the ongoing debates within the research is whether athletes fear failure or the consequences of failure.It is obvious that athletes interpret winning as a standard for success and losing as a standard for failing, but failure can be interpreted by the athlete’s perception of failure. Sagar conducted a study to distinguish what specifically athletes fear about failure. She interviewed nine British elite athletes aged 14-17 years old. Sagar asked questions concerning the athletes’ perceptions of consequences of failure. Examples of questions included, â€Å"tell me how you behaved after that failure† and â€Å"describe how you felt after that failure. The athletes described the consequences of failure as diminished perception of self, no sense of achievement, emotional cost of failure, letting down significant others, negative social evaluation, lose motivation and drop out, tangible losses, have an uncertain future, having reoccurring thoughts of failure, and intangible losses (Sagar 2007). The consequences that were perceived by all nine athletes were diminished perception of self, no sense of achievement, and emotional cost of failure. The athletes described consequences of failure that they disliked and wanted to avoid and deemed them as threats that they anticipated and feared.Multiple athletes reported a loss of motivation after failure, which in turn means failure could prevent athletes from reaching their potential. Furthermore, it is logical to assume that fear of failure can potentially by harmful to athletes’ performances, as fear of failure itself might be a threat to achieving their desired goal. Effective coping responses to fear of failure are exceptionally important in athletes. Athletes who do not posses effective coping skills to deal with situations that involve failure and are likely to experience negative effects such as, poor performance or the possibility of dropping out of the sport (Sagar 2009).Sagar created an experiment to examine the effects of fear of failure on athletes and how the athletes coped with the effects that fear of failure induced before competition. Sagar interviewed nine British athletes aged 14-17 years old that were competing at the national level and had experience competing at the international level. The interview allowed each athlete to individually relate to his or her own experiences in a free and open manner. The athletes were asked questions aimed to determine their perceptions of failure in sport, how their fears aff ected them, and how they coped with their fears.All of the athletes perceived failure as outcome oriented, such as losing, not winning, or getting beaten. The athletes described their coping strategies as mental disengagement, try not to let fear of failure affect them, become quiet and seek isolation, not talking about fear of failure, humor, chilling out, positive self-talk, positive reinterpretation, lowering goals, seeking emotional social support, increasing effort to prevent failure, and confronting their fears. All of the athletes that were interviewed identified with mental disengagement.Although, not all of the strategies identified are effective responses to the fear of failure. For example, increasing effort to prevent failure included increased training by athletes. Increased training can lead to overtraining, a possible source of burnout, which could accidentally lead to athletes’ withdrawal of the sport. Despite the fact that some of the athletes viewed increase d training as a positive outcome of fear of failure, increased training may not be an effective response to fear of failure. Therefore, athletes engaged in both effective and ineffective coping strategies to deal with the effects of failure before competition.Individuals high in fear of failure utilize self-regulatory strategies that can be harmful to their athletic performance, well being, and interpersonal behavior (Sagar 2009). Therefore, Sagar created a study to investigate whether fear of failure predicts antisocial behavior in the university and sport contexts, and whether sex compromises this prediction. Sagar interviewed 176 male students and 155 female students from 2 British universities, with an average age of 20. 11 years. The athletes had been competing for their schools for an average of 1. 80 years.Sagar used three different analyses to measure fear of failure antisocial behavior in sport, and antisocial behavior in university. The study showed, on average, antisocial university behavior occurred rarely for males and never to rarely for females, whereas antisocial behavior in sport occurred rarely to sometimes for males and rarely for females. The strongest fear reported for both sexes was experiencing shame and embarrassment. The weakest fear reported by males was the fear of devaluing one’s self estimate and for females the weakest fear reported was important others losing interest.Further analysis of fear of failure revealed that several significant differences occurred between male and females, but there was not a significant difference between sexes involving antisocial behavior. The study shows that fear of failure may contribute to more frequent student engagement in antisocial behavior in the university and sport contexts. The fact that males are more competitive and have a greater desire to win could explain the sex differences within the fear of failure. Thus, this study suggests that fear of failure might increase the frequency of antisocial behavior.The tendency to approach success is a function of the person’s motive to approach success as well as the situational factors (Gill 2008). Most athletes that participate in sports do so, because they want to achieve something. Although, to be able to achieve something, you must get past a fear of failure. Researching aspects of motivations regarding orientations and achievement can further understand how an athlete deals with fear of failure. In general, someone that is task oriented, rather than outcome oriented will have less fears of failure (Weinberg & Gould 2007).Focusing on personal performance can lead to greater control, more motivation, and less fear of failure. A task-oriented person has high perceptions of their own competence, so it is easier for them to feel good about themselves and not worry about failure. Those who are outcome oriented have lower perceptions of their competence. Therefore, they are more likely to give less effort to prot ect their self worth. Martin and Marsh (2003) concluded that fear of failure may be viewed as a friend or a foe, â€Å"a friend of sorts, but not a very good one†¦ [or as] a foe, but with some self-protective advantages. Research surrounding all aspects is still not extensive enough to draw strong conclusions about how fear or failure develops or how to treat fear of failure. Although, ignoring fear of failure and the problems associated with fear of failure could have negative consequences for individuals in achievement settings. Researchers should be encouraged to continue studying the coping behaviors of athletes in various age groups and investigate how people who play important roles in the lives and in the development of young elite athletes contribute to their development of fear of failure.Further research will inform prevention, assessment, diagnosis, and possibly the treatment of fear of failure in sports. References Conroy, D. E. , (2004). The unique psychological m eanings of multidimensional fears of failing. Journal of Clinical Sport & Exercise Psychology, 26, 484-491. Gill, D. , & Williams, L. , (2008). Motivational Orientations: Achievement and Competitiveness. Martin, A. J. , Marsh, H. W. (2003). Fear of failure: Friend of foe?. Australian Psychologist, 38, 31-38. Sagar, S. S. , Boardley, I. D. , Kavussanu, M. (2011). Fear of failure and student athletes’ interpersonal antisocial behavior in education and sport.British Journal of Educational Psychology, 81, 391-408. Sagar, S. S. , (2009). Fear of failure in youth sport: Building on the momentum of the new research. Sport & Exercise Psychological Review, 5, 5-15. Sagar, S. S. , Lavallee, D. , Spray, C. M. (2009). Coping with the effects of fear of failure: A preliminary investigation of young elite athletes. Journal of Clinical Sports Psychology, 3 73-98. Sagar, S. S. , Lavallee, D. , Spray, C. M. (2007). Why young athletes fear failure: Consequences of failure. Journal of Sports Sc iences, 25, 1171-1184. Weinberg, R. , Gould, D. , (2007). Motivation.

Near Shoring Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

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Organizations on the Move Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

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See attachments Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 10000 words

See attachments - Essay Example United States also used Gemini capsules to set out weapons and do surveillance of the outer space and the earth. This task highlights the endeavors taken by the United Nations in securing the use of the space. This task looks at the possibility of having the future war in the space. With the increased superiority struggle between different states over control of the space, there is a possibility that, indeed, the future war could be in the space. Satellites follow definite paths as they go around the earth. Likewise, other celestial bodies that move around other bodies follow regular pathways. Classification of orbits takes different approaches depending on the position of the orbit. They can be classified based on a number of considerations. Astronauts have devised taxonomy of orbits based on Centric Classifications, Inclination Classifications, Altitude Classification in Geocentric Orbits, Classifications based on Eccentricity, Synchronicity Classifications, Classifications based on galaxies and Galaxy Models, Pseudo-Orbital Classifications and other special classifications3. Special taxonomy of orbits classifies orbits into sun synchronous orbits and moon orbits. Sun synchronous orbits are those that combine inclination and altitude in such a manner that the satellite on the orbits passes over a particular point on the surface of the planet at the same local solar time. Such orbits place a satellite on a constant sunlight exposure and are useful for spying, imaging and as weather satellites. Moon orbits have the orbital traits of the Earth’s Moon. They lie at an average altitude of 238,857 miles and are elliptically inclined. Pseudo-Orbit Classification classifies orbits into Horseshoe Orbits, Lunar Transfer Orbits (LTO), Retrograde Orbits, Prograde Orbits and Halo Orbits4. To a ground observer, a Horseshoe Orbit appears to be orbiting another planet while in real sense they usually co-orbit another

Society gets what it pays for and the cost of reducing social risk is Essay

Society gets what it pays for and the cost of reducing social risk is regulation, leading to higher taxes and higher prices. Discuss - Essay Example Really, it is with the help of tax payments that social protection through the redistribution of social resources becomes possible. However, those who complain that social protection through regulation raises taxes and increases prices should remember that nobody is secured from various social risks, and it is through effective redistribution of social resources that individuals can insure themselves from the existing and future social risks. Social protection encompasses a series of public measures intended to reduce social risks and enhance income security of individuals (Holzmann & Jorgensen, 2000). Social protection measures rely on the payments provided by taxpayers to state budget; in other words, it is through the reallocation of limited social resources that social protection through regulation becomes possible. It is no wonder that not all taxpayers agree with the way social protection measures are provided to the vulnerable populations. However, all taxpayers should remember that they are not secured from the existing and emerging social risks (Holzmann & Jorgensen, 2000). Recent financial crises have shown that when social protection programs are not in place, individuals become extremely susceptible to the consequences of reduced GDP (Holzmann & Jorgensen, 2000). To a large extent, the presence of extensive social protection systems is both necessary and inevitable for any state or society that considers itse lf developed. Not all the people realize the principle of society-state relations. It is possible to say that society gets what it pays for, and the cost of reducing social risks is regulation, leading to higher taxes and increased prices. The latter are inevitable components of the social protection systems in the developed world. It is a reflection of the ongoing tension between the need for social protection and the overall non-affordability

Services Marketing. Case of Paul Smith Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

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