Marbury V Madison Essay - 1362 Words

Marbury v. Madison (1803) Marbury v. Madison has been hailed as one of the most significant cases that the Supreme Court has ruled upon. In this paper, I will explain the origins and background in the case, discuss the major Constitutional issues it raised, and outline the major points of the courts decision. I will also explain the significance of this key decision. Origins and background of the case In the late 1700s, John Adams was President. Adams was a member of the Federalist Party. The Federalists were in control of the Congress. Adams and other Federalists were Pro-British and the Republican Party was Pro-French. Thomas Jefferson led the Republicans. Federalists were worried that the influx of French into the country†¦show more content†¦There was a long lame duck period between the November election and the inauguration of a new president, and the Congress that met in December 1800 was the old Congress. The Federalist controlled Congress passed the Judiciary Act of 1801, which created circuit courts of appeal, and relieved the justices of the Supreme Court of their obligation to travel around the country to hear cases. It also increased the jurisdiction of the federal courts. Adams immediately appointed several new judges and the Senate confirmed the 16 new judges to these courts, all Federalists. James Madison was one of the 42 Justices of the Peace that were also created with the Judiciary Act of 1801. These Justices served the Washington and Virginia areas. It is also important to know that all of these Justices were also Federalists. Adams was trying to stack the Judiciary with the outgoing Federalist Party members. Many of these Justices were qualified to hold these jobs however. John Marshall was the Secretary of State for President Adams. It was his job to deliver these commissions to the new appointees. Many of them were delivered, but some were not, including, William Marburys. When the new President, Thomas Jefferson, was sworn in, he told the new Secretary of State, James Madison, to not deliver the commissions to the other judge appointees. Marbury and several others broughtShow MoreRelatedMarbury V. Madison991 Words   |  4 PagesMarbury v. Madison On February 24, 1803 Chief Justice John Marshall and the rest of the Supreme Court decided on the seemingly insignificant case of Marbury v. Madison. While ruling the Judiciary Act of 1789 unconstitutional, Judicial Review was established. Granting the Supreme Court the power to rule acts of the Legislative and/or Executive Branch of government unconstitutional, hence serving as a landmark case that further legitimatized the Judicial Branch as a separate, but balanced branchRead MoreThe Case Of Marbury V. Madison1635 Words   |  7 PagesThe Constitution was founded in order to limit the power of the government and protect the rights American citizens. This proved true in the case of Marbury v. Madison (1803), when the Supreme Court of the United States established its power of judicial review when it declared that Section 13 of the Judiciary Act of 1789 was unconstitutional according to Article III of the Constitution. Considering this, the Supreme Court’s decision to uphol d an interpretation of the Constitution that aligns withRead MoreThe Case Of Marbury V. Madison854 Words   |  4 Pagesdecide whether a law or action is consistent with fundamental laws such as the Constitution. This paper will be exploring the history behind the paramount case of Marbury v. Madison, 1803 and its decision that established the power of Judicial Review, the importance and relevancy of Judicial Review in modern government through the case of Ladue v. Gilleo, 1994, and lastly the criticisms of the powers and duties behind Judicial Review. The intentions behind the judicial review sprouted from the disagreementsRead MoreMarbury V. Madison, 1803881 Words   |  4 PagesAPUSH: 1 27 October 2015 Case Briefs Marbury v Madison, 1803 John Adams, on the last day of his term, appointed forty-two justices of the peace and sixteen new circuit court justices under the Organic Act, which was an attempt by the Federalists to take over the judicial branch before Thomas Jefferson took the office. The commissions were not delivered before the end of Adam’s term, so Thomas Jefferson claimed they were invalid and did not honor them. William Marbury was one of the appointed justicesRead MoreThe Case Of Marbury V. Madison1601 Words   |  7 PagesIn the year 1803 the case of Marbury v. Madison was brought before the Supreme Court in order to address the issue of William Marbury’s appointment as federal circuit judge. This created a unique and complex challenge for the Supreme Court of the time because they were operating under no legal precedent, which meant that they had no prior cases to reference to reach a ruling. The issue came to a head after the Judiciary Act of 1801 allowed for President John Adams to ap point sixteen new circuit judgesRead MoreThe Case Marbury V. Madison1442 Words   |  6 PagesOne of the major results of the case Marbury v. Madison was this term called judicial review. Judicial review, today, is a task that the Judiciary Branch of the government performs on legislative acts that are passed to determine whether or not the acts are considered Constitutional. One of the biggest changes made not too long ago by the Judges in the Judiciary Branch, using judicial review, was the ruling that restricting same-sex marriage is considered unConstitutional and they made same-sex marriageRead MoreMarbury V. Madison Case3462 Words   |  14 PagesMarbury v. Madison Marbury v. Madison was the case that was considered a landmark concerning judicial review in regards to the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. What had taken place was that the President at the time had appointed a group of men to the positions for justices of the peace and for the District of Columbia, circuit judges, which included in the group, William Marbury. Later they were subsequently approved by the senate. After approval, President Adams signed the commissionsRead MoreThe Case Of Marbury V. Madison940 Words   |  4 PagesJurisdiction†. The case of Marbury v. Madison interprets matters of original Jurisdiction, â€Å"The 1789 act to establish the Judicial courts of the United States authorizes the Supreme Court to issue writs of mandamus, however this can only be granted when the Court has original jurisdiction, in al other cases, the Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as law and fact†¦Ã¢â‚¬  furthermore, we consider, if this statute was good law, it would make the state a party, to that we turn to Cohens v. Virginia, a caseRead MoreEssay on The Case of Marbury v. Madison973 Words   |  4 Pages The case of Marbury v. Madison centers on a case brought before the Supreme Court by William Marbury. Shortly after Thomas Jefferson defeated John Adams in the election of 1800, Congress increased the number of circuit courts. Adams sought to fill these new vacancies with people who had Federalist backgrounds. To accomplish this, he used the powers granted under the Organic Act to issue appointments to 42 justices of the peace and 16 circuit court justices for the District of Columbia. AdamsRead MoreMarbury v. Madison: Judicial Review Essay1032 Words   |  5 PagesIn the case of Marbury v. Madison the power of judicial review was granted to the Supreme Court in 1801. The Constitution does not give power of judicial review. On Adams last day in office, several government officials upheld the case. Judicial review does not exist in countries that have a centralized or unitary form of government. The elected parliament declares it is the law of the land. Halsema Proposal to Netherlands has taken the initiative to start the process of judicial review.

Native American Identity Essay - 1363 Words

Cornell University Professor Clinton Rossiter explains identity as, â€Å"an intangible feeling. It is something that is felt†¦ An identity is not static. Feelings change with time and therefore, so can identity.†(http://ushistorythemes.weebly.com/american-identity.html). When colonists first arrived to North America, some people wanted to establish an identity unique to themselves and their new colonies. In the beginning, this proved challenging as they were constantly succumbing to Britain s authority all the way across the Atlantic ocean. When moving to the new world, there was not one single factor that encouraged Britians to move, but a combination of the desire of exploration, to accumulate wealth, to own and live on land on their own,†¦show more content†¦All of these different groups of people had widely different customs, culture, and belief and they were very proud of their culture. A Frenchman Would be offended to be considered similar to an Englishmen , they prided themself on their distinct cultures and did not want them to be similar to others. There is a lack of a common heritage in religion, politics, culture, or language that the colonists needed in order to create a unique identity.Some groups of people, such as the Pilgrims and Puritans, came to the new world in order to escape religious persecution and practice their religion freely and peacefully. Others came to accumulate wealth and land in order to live a more prosporous life (http://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/colonial/jb_colonial_subj.html).All of these disparate groups of people came to the new world for completely different reasons fully intending on preserving their own cultures, not contributing to the idea of a new identity among the colonists. When first arriving in the new world, many colonists first considered themselves British, and then their colony second. This shows the strong dedication some colonists still had to Britain, which would explain why there were some colonist that were not supportive of a revolution against Britain. Many colonist continued to develop a culturally similar lifestyle to that of a Briton, mimicking their clothing trends and dining ware by purchasing themShow MoreRelatedNative American Identity Essay1078 Words   |  5 PagesThe Native American identity To explain the Native American identity is necessary to take into consideration several arguments. A group’s identity is never a universal consensus, since every individual’s experience would define the meaning of what is to be member of a certain group. Despite these differences in experiencing and living within a given culture; the commonality is that members of the group are recognized are part of It by members of the group they claim to belong. Native American’sRead MoreBlue Winds Dancing795 Words   |  4 PagesLiving Between Two Worlds In the essay, â€Å"Blue Winds Dancing,† by Tom Whitecloud, the theme is motivated by the conflict the narrator faces while missing what he considers home. Satisfaction for ones culture is a fine line between appreciation of your own and disapproval for those that are different. This conflict is brought to light by the narrator’s different views of the two cultures to which he lives. These differences are felt internally and externally as the writer searches for his individualityRead MoreTurner and the Glorification of Westward Expansion Essay1634 Words   |  7 Pagesdelivered his famous essay â€Å"The Significance of the Frontier in American History,† the United States had recently fulfilled the goal of Manifest Destiny by finishing its conquest of the West. Westward expansion had been an integral aspect of the American identity and its citizens were left wondering what would continue to propel the United States into the future. At the same time, people wer e also looking back and trying to decide how exactly the frontier had shaped American life. The common beliefRead MoreEssay on America, Land of Immigrants746 Words   |  3 Pageselse on the planet, unless you are a Native American. If we are not native, then where do we come from? Our country was founded by people from across the globe aspiring to become established in America. In the process of doing so, these early immigrants produced the social and cultural framework of life in America. For nearly four hundred years, our nation has continuously had every race, language, and culture contribute to the characterization of being an American. There can be many difficultiesRead MoreEthnic Minorities and the Preservation of Culture in the U.S.908 Words   |  4 Pagesdifficult to give up their native languages to speak the English language, because they feel that they are losing a part of their culture. However, what they should realize is that by accepting the English language into their lives they are not losing a part of their culture, they are gaining a new identity for themselves and their culture. The most common reason for ethnic minorities’ fear of giving up their languages is fear that they are losing a part of their heritage and identity. They feel that withoutRead MoreBecoming Members of Society: Learning the Social Meanings of Gender (Devor1029 Words   |  5 PagesMelvin Richardson Professor Shana Smith English 112 (D22P) March 21, 2013 Machin Rifamos (The Rise of Brown America An argument essay by Melvin Richardson) â€Å"Resistance is futile† is a resounding statement first exclaimed by the alien race called the Borg in the Gene Roddenberry long running television series Star Trek. â€Å"Why do you resist? Asked the Borg commander, Ryker replies â€Å"I like my species the way it is†! Borg commander counters with, â€Å"We only wish to raise qualityRead MoreNative Americans Analytical Essay1200 Words   |  5 PagesUniversity of Puerto Rico in Bayamà ³n English Department Native Americans Analytical Essay Jhon Smith 841-03-9669 INGL 3326 LJ1 Dr. Vallejo Native Americans Analytic Essay Among the many cultures around the world, the Native American community is one of the many minorities who have gone through horrid times and still struggle to preserve their traditions. Their submission to the mainstream Anglo-Americans has led to a lot of issues. These are presented in Blue Winds Dancing by TomRead MoreBilingualism Vs Bilingual Education1058 Words   |  5 Pagesspeakers and latinos, American english speakers become more defensive against the spanish speakers. English speakers try to stop people speaking their own language in school settings, and threaten to harm non natives. The idea of bilingualism goes beyond just speaking two languages, it ties to a person’s identity and their culture. Both english speakers and spanish speakers want to keep who they are, they both fear each other, anxiety rests between both, both have troubles but American born people haveRead MoreAnalysis Of Martin Espada And Richard Rodriguez1651 Words   |  7 Pagesshowed me the di fference between a public and a private identity, and the importance behind bilingualism in the world today. However, before I can recount what I’ve learned, we must first discuss two contrasting concepts about bilingualism from two very accomplished and controversial writers: Martà ­n Espada and Richard Rodriguez. Editor, essayist, and winner of the Paterson Award for Sustained Literary Achievement, Martà ­n Espada, in his essay, â€Å"The New Bathroom Policy at English High School,† tellsRead More Reviews of Notes of a Native Son Essay1238 Words   |  5 Pages Reviews of Notes of a Native Son Notes of a Native Son, a widely acclaimed and celebrated book by James Baldwin was subjected to many reviews upon its first publication. There were many opposing views between reviewers but almost all came to the conclusion that Baldwin’s use of words was extremely eloquent and intelligent. Specifically an article titled â€Å"Rage unto Order† by Dachine Rainer was very adamant about Baldwin’s genius as a writer but hardly did anything to explain or exemplify that

Philosophies In Fyodor Dostoevskys Crime And Punishment

For a recent reading assignment our english class was introduced to the master-work that is Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. Set in 1860s Saint Petersburg Russia, Dostoevsky goes to great lengths to describe his dark and decrepit world in which his characters to inhabit. The events of an axe murder and eventual redemption could have taken place in any setting, but Dostoevsky on the contrary chose this specific time in which to make his commentary on society. Many of the characters of the novel are exaggerations; Furthermore, they are used by the author as instruments of comparing and contrasting philosophies in their most realized forms. Svid, a hedonist and patriarch; Sonia, a devout Christian prostitute; and Raskolnikov, a†¦show more content†¦Sofya Semyonovna Marmeladov is a character defined mostly by her faith in Christianity; A meek and submissive woman fit great in stereotyping the traditions of obedience and modestness that women were expected to be s ubservient to in the Faith. In one of the first times the reader is introduced to the character of Sonia, she is describe as this, â€Å"At that moment the door was softly opened, and a young girl walked into the room, looking timidly about her†¦ Now she was a modestly and poorly-dressed young girl, very young, indeed, almost like a child, with a modest and refined manner, with a candid but somewhat frightened-looking face†(Dostoevsky 220). Lastly, Raskolnikov is created to embody utilitarianism and Nietzsches Ubermensch. His inner conflict of weather or not to murder the pawnbroker was eventually persuaded by his reasoning that society would be better without her; That under utilitarianism he determined that her death would bring the most happiness to the most amount of people. It is hard to judge the happiness of a dead person, so this justification could be a little murky on if he truly believes that he was morally right in killing the pawnbroker. When compared to the other two characters he is also the most morally conscious and realistic. He demonstrates his battle with his inner morals often throughout the whole book, but in the first couple pages of theShow MoreRelatedFyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, Notes From The Underground, And The Idiot1713 Words   |  7 PagesFyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was a Russian novelist and philosopher best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, Notes F rom the Underground, and The Idiot. He used his works to learn about the social customs and movements of nineteenth-century Russia, and also to explore himself and gain a deeper understanding of his life. Dostoevsky’s personal life experiences and the philosophical movements of his time influenced his works by shaping the subjects he discussed and theRead MoreIrrationality in Dostoevskys Crime and Punishment and Shakespeares Macbeth1378 Words   |  6 PagesShakespeares Macbeth and Dostoevskys Crime and Punishment both explore the significant psychological damage caused by their protagonist’s crimes. They both explore varies forms of existential beliefs in tragedies. The existentialist theory explains the idea that man can satisfy his own needs if he has the power to act on his desires, although its against the social ruling. Raskolnikov and Macbeth both have the power to act, but they both face an internally struggle of action and inaction. BothRead MoreThe Ethics Of Care : An Argument Against Mill s Utilitarianism922 Words   |  4 PagesIn Support of Held’s Ethics of Care: An Argument Against Mill’s Utilitarianism in Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky This ethics study will define the problem of utilitarianism in the â€Å"ethics of care proposed by Virginia Held (2006) within the literary context of Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Held (2006) defines the problem of utilitarian ethics as an abstraction of emotions in moral issues, which alienates the individual in the care process. This method denies the premiseRead More Nature and Nurture in Crime and Punishment Essay1362 Words   |  6 PagesNature and Nurture in Crime and Punishment       In the news today there is an article about a high-school boy who brought guns to school and shot several students. The parents of the victims are suing various computer game companies saying that the violent games present shooting and killing people as pleasurable and fail to portray realistic consequences. A representative of one of the companies released a statement saying that this is another example of individuals seeking to elude responsibilityRead MoreFrankenstein, By Mary Shelley1664 Words   |  7 Pagesanalysis of the main characters and settings of the story, it can be concluded that Mary Shelley’s novel is, above all, about the theme of alienation and the innocent victims that are affected by it, a theme that is also prominent in Fyodor Doestoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. In the book Frankenstein, alienation is something Victor Frankenstein faces through pretty much his entire life. At first he alienates himself due to the creation of a monster, and then out of fear of the monster. During hisRead More The Struggle in Crime and Punishment Essay1524 Words   |  7 PagesThe Struggle in Crime and Punishment Reading this book makes you ill because from the beginning to the end you watch as psychological forces eat away at the thoughts and actions of their victim causing him to finally confess to the hideous crime he has committed. The story is basically the struggle between Raskolnikovs Napoleon-à ¼bermensch theory and his conscience which make him confess to his crime. Dostoevskys genius is in describing how Raskolnikov struggles in his thoughts and actionsRead MoreTheme Of Guilt In Crime And Punishment830 Words   |  4 Pages Guilt is a universal emotion that many feel after crime, wrongdoing or simple acts of unkindness. This is apparent in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment, where Rodion Raskolnikov’s growing remorse stems from the mediocrity he realizes in himself after he commits murder to test his Ubermensch-qualities. Rubbishing the thought of confessing and refusing to embrace his guilt, Dostoevsky uses Raskolnikov’s torn thoughts to explore the novel’s theme of revolution: he condemns nihilism as a wayRead MoreEssay about Dostoevsky and Nietzsches Overman2123 Words   |  9 Pagesconsidering that this is a summary of one part of Nietzsches ideas, and that the encyclopedia reduces his entire philosophy to one short paragraph, this is not a poor definition. But it eliminates parts of Nietzsches concept of the overman, or superman, which are essential to an understanding of this idea.    Walter Kaufmann provides a detailed analysis of Nietzsches philosophy in his work Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, a book which Thomas Mann called a work of great superiorityRead MoreCrime and Punishment: Dostoevskys Portrayal of Anti-Nihilism 1443 Words   |  6 PagesNihilism. According to Whitney Eggers on Philosophies in Crime and Punishment, Nihilists argued that there was a distinction between the weak and the strong, and that in fact the strong had a right to trample over the weak (Eggers). Nihilism is commonly linked to utilitarianism, or the idea that moral decisions should be based on the rule of the greatest happiness for the largest number of people. Raskolnikov, the protagonist in Crime and Punishment, is a Nihilist, which is his main reason forRead MoreFyodor Dostoevsky Crime And Punishment Analysis1214 Words   |  5 Pages Dostoevsky’s disapproval on the Superman theory In the novel â€Å"Crime and Punishment†, by Fyodor Dostoevsky, Dostoevsky expresses his disapproval of the Ubermensch theory by using his main character; Raskolnikov who tries to become an extraordinary person but fails to do so. Raskolnikov is put in a group where people maintain the idea that man is not actually equal but are divided into two separate groups which are; the ordinary people who are locked within the laws and tradition of society by only

The Article I Chose To Review Is “Studying The Effect Of

The article I chose to review is â€Å"Studying the effect of perceived hedonic mobile device quality on user experience evaluations of mobile applications† which can be found in the Behavior Information Technology Journal. When people interact with digital artefacts they perceive their pragmatic and hedonic qualities. In the case of interacting with mobile devices and applications, users seek utility as they try to satisfy certain needs, but at the same time they have certain feelings and emotions when, for example, they feel attached to their personal phone and/or trust its brand. Because of the strong relation between users and mobile devices a signiï ¬ cant problem occurs when researchers want to evaluate the user experience of a mobile†¦show more content†¦After reviewing these papers, the authors determined the approach used by these other authors were misleading because they ignored to address the hedonic qualities that users might face when evaluating mobil e devices. After they had set up their experimental design, the researchers split the participants into two groups and asked them to evaluate the same application on two different devices. In order to achieve accurate results, the researchers clearly picked two phones with very similar pragmatic qualities and very obvious different hedonic qualities. After considering these requirements, the researchers decided to go with an iPod touch 2nd generation and a Dell X51v. After selecting his devices, the researcher then had to choose the applications they would present to the participants to use. They decided to go with an application called beNatural. They chose this app, because one of the users had any experience with it also because software changes could be made easily to the app. This application, beNatural, tells users the environmental effect of a product they are purchasing. For example, the app would tell users if a certain product is recyclable or not. To ensure that the app was similar on both devices, the researchers modified the software to make the interface of the app similarShow MoreRelatedIntervention Child Birth Vs Natural1501 Words   |  7 Pagesto ans wer my question, I searched Google Scholar, Google Scholar is a search tool that is made up of articles from scholarly resources. When searching I used the terms, â€Å"epidural†, â€Å"c-section†, and â€Å"labor to find my articles. I made specific that all articles should be published later than 1995, so that I got the most up to date articles and information. This gave me 54 results, in which I sorted through reading the abstract first. Through this process I deemed that 5 articles were likely to answerRead MoreCommon Forms Of Pain Relief During Labor1520 Words   |  7 Pagesquestion, I searched Google Scholar, Google Scholar is a database that compiles articles from scholarly sources. When searching, I used the terms â€Å"epidural†, â€Å"c-section† and â€Å"labor† to find my articles. I also used exclusion criteria. I specified that all articles should be published later than 1995, so that I got the most up to date articles. This search yielded 54 results, which I then sorted through. First, I read the titles of the articles and if they seemed to apply to the question, I read theRead MoreA Research Study On Ivf890 Words   |  4 Pagesthis systematic review published, only two reviews were available of outcomes for singletons after IVF techniques. In comparison with natural conception, it has been proposed that the obstetric results of pregnancies are poorer with IVF/ICSI. Today, it is reported that the number of women that undergo IVF/ICSI process is increasing around the world. With this, I am curious about the risks for women having IVF/ICSI and how perilous it is to them since the process is not natural. I would also likeRead MoreEffects of Social Networking on Undergraduate Student’s Grades1550 Words   |  7 Pagesnetworking, whether they are positive or negative standpoints. Nevertheless, social media and networking is a part of our American lifestyles as a whole. As a Computer Information Systems m ajor and studying the foundations and composition of computer applications, I would like to research the effects that social networks have on underclassmen undergraduate students attending an Historically Black College or University. In order to conduct this research, a study and survey must be held to determineRead MoreAn Analysis Of Leadership As Exhibited By Rebecca S. Halstead1519 Words   |  7 PagesS. Halstead. The article published at Harvard Business School by Boris Groysberg and Deborah Bell details the traits, motivations and leadership style that Halstead exemplified. Through the analysis of this article I hope to not only document the achievements of Rebecca Halstead but also document and assimilate the leadership lessons imparted by her. An important observation I have made from the progress of time I this course is that study of leadership is synonymous with studying great leaders. TheRead MoreA Study On Engineering And Mechanical Engineering1710 Words   |  7 Pag esgoing to be my degree. This text is divided into three parts, part A describes my degree choice, why I chose it and what I am hoping to be in the future. Part B will be a comparison between LJMU and the University of Liverpool, also it will provide an information about a lecturer in LJMU. Part C will compare and contrast two types of internal combustion engines. Part A I am interested in studying engineering especially mechanical engineering which is the subject of teaching the understanding of theRead MoreA Study On Engineering And The University Of Liverpool1723 Words   |  7 Pagesthree parts, part A describes my degree choice, why I chose it and what I am hoping to be in the future. Part B will be a comparison between LJMU and the University of Liverpool, also it will provide an information of a lecturer in LJMU. Part C will compare and contrast between two types of internal combustion engines. Part A Engineering is a very important specialization and it can be founded in every organization, I am interested in studying engineering especially mechanical engineering which isRead MoreThe Theory Of Social Bonds1159 Words   |  5 Pages(paragraph. 6) The first peer reviewed article I chose was based on Social bonds and male juveniles while on probation. This article was focused on a study in Hong Kong which was broken down into five main points, Introduction to the lack of research, literature review, present study, data and methods, and the results of the probation study. Being a study that has never been performed before in Hong Kong, it directs their attention to examine the effects of different social bonds of juvenile delinquentsRead MoreThe Effects Of Long Term Radiation Related Health On A Unique Human Population1347 Words   |  6 Pages Long-term Radiation-Related Health Effects in a Unique Human Population Journal Article Review We learned about the end World War 2 and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with the atomic bomb but rarely do people talk about the affect effects of what happened after that to the people who were affected by the bombs. This scholarly journal titled: â€Å"Long-term Radiation-Related Health Effects in a Unique Human Population: Lessons Learned from the Atomic Bomb Survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki†Read MoreNursing and The Organizational Culture of Human Resource Management1495 Words   |  6 Pagesan adequate nursing workforce supply in order to achieve quality patient care. Nurse managers play a pivotal role in the organizational culture with in their unit of division. This article provides a literature review of organizational culture and its link to nursing and the health care profession as a whole. I. Introduction People are important to any organization’s success and the variety of cultures, especially here in the United States, that are within an organization should be considered

Alzheimers Unlocked Essay Sample free essay sample

After old ages of dissatisfactory vaccinum and drug tests. research workers are happening new ways to disrupt the memory-robbing disease. merely in clip for an awaited detonation in instances Not all of Dr. Richard Mayeux’s aged patients have Alzheimer’s disease ; non all will even travel on to develop it. Most of them are still taking full. healthy lives. interacting with their households and lending to their communities. But Mayeux. an Alzheimer’s research worker and doctor at Columbia University. asks them all anyhow: Will they help him in his war against the disease? It’s been a long and dissatisfactory run so far. Alzheimer’s disease–the degenerative encephalon status that is non content to kill its victims without first snuffing out their essence–has for decennaries merely laughed at such attempts. More than 5 million Americans presently suffer from Alzheimer’s disease. a figure that will turn to 13. 4 million by 2050. There is no remedy. The therapies that exist–drugs and lifestyle behaviours such as maintaining the head crisp with enriching societal relationships and exciting the encephalon with games and puzzles–can merely hold. non halt. the oncoming of memory loss. confusion and cognitive diminution that by and large extend over a period of several old ages or. more frequently. decennaries. There isn’t even a unequivocal trial for Alzheimer’s. Mayeux knows that get the better ofing Alzheimer’s means first enrolling voluntaries to fall in a survey that can assist place who is at greatest hazard of developing the status. The consequences could paint a clearer image of the factors that put people in danger. A disease that gives up hints to those factors is one that has revealed its weak spots–and that. possibly. can take to better interventions. Mayeux profoundly believes this. and that’s what he tells his patients. but still. they take some convincing. Said one prospective participant: â€Å"The manner I see it. even if you predict when I will acquire Alzheimer’s. you haven’t got anything that I can make for it. † The patient has a point. Who in his right head would desire to cognize he had a disease that would necessarily rob him of that head? But a batch of us may finally happen ourselves stealing off in that sad manner. Health experts estimate that a 65-year-old has a 10 % hazard of developing Alzheimer’s and that babe boomers presently nearing peak age for the disease ( 60 to 80 ) will add $ 627 billion in Alzheimer’s-related wellness attention costs to Medicare. There is a considerable psychological monetary value ticket excessively. for patients and health professionals alike–and a fright factor. In a recent canvass conducted for The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Takes On Alzheimer’s. 84 % of grownups surveyed were concerned that they or person in their household would be affected by the disease. That fright is compounded by the belief that research for Alzheimer’s is dawdling behind that for other diseases. While 81 % of those polled saw great advancement being made in bring arounding bosom disease and 74 % said the same for malignant neoplastic disease. merely 48 % felt research workers were doing paces against Alzheimer’s. Money is partially why. â€Å"We spend $ 5. 6 billion a twelvemonth support malignant neoplastic disease surveies. $ 1 billion a twelvemonth for bosom disease †¦ and $ 500 million to analyze Alzheimer’s. † says Dr. Ronald Petersen. manager of the Mayo Clinic Alzh eimer’s Disease Research Center. â€Å"Yet what is traveling to acquire most of us in the following few old ages is Alzheimer’s. † Over clip. the feeling has taken clasp that crushing Alzheimer’s is the cold merger of medical research: everyone agrees it would be great. and everyone who tries it fails. And yet possibly. merely possibly. that’s altering. For the first clip since the disease was identified more than a century ago. physicians are closer to bring outing its secrets. Alzheimer’s. like all other degenerative ailments. is driven by cistrons. and in the past twelvemonth. scientists have come up with a suite of relevant 1s. The disease is thought to be caused by a buildup of protein-based plaques in the encephalon. and research workers now believe they have an apprehension of possible ways to disrupt that procedure. Technology is assisting excessively. as research workers exploit new ways to scan the encephalon and observe the first marks of problem. peering deeper into human and carnal nervous tissue to nail the really molecules that give rise to the disease. â€Å"Our apprehension of Alzheimer’s is better than it looks based on the clinical tests. † says Lennart Mucke. manager of the Gladstone Institute for Neurological Diseases and a brain doctor at the University of California. San Francisco ( UCSF ) . â€Å"Despite all the studies about how blue the state of affairs is. it is likely more hopeful in some respects now because there are more candidate [ interventions ] in the grapevine. † Treatments and hope are the two things people are looking for most. and if you’ve listened to Alzheimer’s experts over the old ages. you haven’t heard them talk much about either. They are making so now–cautiously. tentatively. assuring nil yet. but the alteration is existent. And the ground is the research. Get downing Early If even the most optimistic scientists are still speaking merely warily about advancement. it’s no admiration. The Alzheimer’s field has until now been a cemetery of hope. In 2002 a promising vaccinum caused unsafe redness in the encephalon and spinal column and had to be abandoned after old ages of research ; last August. a extremely awaited drug worsened instead than improved cognitive symptoms. The fact that optimism does be comes largely from scientists’ ability to use two of import lessons learned from the letdowns of the yesteryear. The first involves clocking. Experts are now positive that it’s important to handle Alzheimer’s patients every bit early as possible. possibly even before they show marks of memory loss or cognitive diminution. instead than try to better a encephalon already scourged by the disease. The 2nd involves the range of the medical assault: following a multipronged attack that addresses as many of the disease’s comp lex abnormalcies as possible may better the opportunities that new therapies used early on will non merely detain symptoms but besides change by reversal them. Switching the focal point to the earliest phases of the disease wasn’t every bit obvious as it seems in hindsight. Cognitive diminution is a natural effect of aging. and confusion and memory loss are frequently merely inconvenient parts of acquiring older. It was apprehensible. so. that physicians were loath to present more uncertainness by trying to badger apart Alzheimer’s dementedness from the alleged senior minutes typical of normal aging. So instead than do the effort. they focused on the most obvious mark: the buildup of a protein called amyloid in the encephalons of Alzheimer’s patients. While amyloid in life patients can be detected with a spinal pat. its presence doesn’t needfully bespeak the disease ; it’s the accretion of the protein into plaques. which besides include cellular dusts like dead and dying nerve cells. that is linked to the disease’s symptoms. A unequivocal Alzheimer’s diagnosing is therefore possible merely after the patient’s decease. when an necropsy of encephalon tissue can verify the trademark lesions. Initially it mad e sense for research workers and drugmakers to concentrate on happening ways to shrivel plaque buildup and cut down the amyloid load in the encephalon. That. certainly. would take to betterment. But to day of the month. these well-meaning attempts have been fraught with failure and riddled with side effects. The agents that target starchlike plaques affect other procedures in the organic structure excessively. including those that regulate how cells communicate every bit good as the development of bosom. pancreas and immune-system cells. What’s more. it’s non even clear that acquiring rid of the plaques has any consequence on encephalon map at all. When scientists analyzed the autopsied encephalons of patients in the failed vaccinum test. for illustration. they noted that the topics had fewer plaques than before they received the vaccinum but still had shown no betterment on trials of mental map. To confound affairs more. in trials affecting animate beings with the equivalent of Alzheimer’s. mice whose encephalons were loaded with amyloid performed every bit good as those without the plaques. When so axiomatic an Angstrom does non take neatly to a B. scientific discipline gets terribly flummoxed. There were several accounts for the apparently at odds consequences. al l of which meant that the research workers might unluckily hold steered their work excessively to a great extent in one way. Possibly amyloid was non a critical subscriber to the disease at all but a ruddy herring. and something else was driving the decease of nerve cells. Or possibly amyloid was a factor in the pathology but merely one of many. It was besides possible that amyloid was so forcing the disease but that the vaccinum and drugs used to fade out the plaques were introduced excessively late and in excessively little a dose. Many of those drugs were designed to barricade the dislocation of amyloid into smaller fragments. which have a greater inclination to clop together. â€Å"By the clip a individual is impaired to the point of dementedness. there is likely sufficient harm done to the encephalon that we truly can’t contrary it. † says the Mayo Clinic’s Petersen. â€Å"It has gone excessively far. † If that’s the instance. so proving the drugs on patients whose encephalons are merely get downing to roll up amyloid might give more success. But happening such patients. many of whom show no marks of memory loss or diminution in mental map. is a challenge. So in 2004. the National Institute on Aging ( NIA ) . por tion of the National Institutes of Health. partnered with pharmaceutical companies to make the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative. a $ 60 million undertaking tasked with placing easy noticeable differences–preferably through blood trials or encephalon scans–between Alzheimer’s patients and unaffected persons. It was nuts-and-bolts scientific discipline. commonplace but indispensable. and it wound up pulling 600 patients who either already suffered from symptoms of Alzheimer’s dementedness or had mild cognitive impairment–a preliminary phase of the disease–as good as 200 cognitively normal control-group voluntaries. Already the plan has isolated a few twelve fascinating protein markers in blood and spinal fluid that may announce Alzheimer’s disease and could assist research workers place bad persons before symptoms set in. Besides. newer. better encephalon scans are assisting observe the amyloid patterns that antecedently could be verified merely by necropsy. Bing able to state. â€Å"This patient appears to hold Alzheimer’s†Ã¢â‚¬â€œas opposed to. â€Å"This asleep patient had Alzheimer’s†Ã¢â‚¬â€œis no little thing. Still. as with the blood and spinal-fluid trials. the challenge remains to understand the nexus between the plaques and the existent symptoms. What is the threshold between normal and morbid provinces? For those replies. scientists need to prove the steps on at-risk. symptomless populations. And for that. they need a consistent manner to place those populations. even if nil is available to handle them. That’s why in July. the NIA and the Alzheimer’s Association decided to update their standards for assisting physicians diagnose Alzheimer’s by specifying three distinguishable patient groups: those who are symptom-free but at high hazard. those with mild cognitive damage and those with Alzheimer’s dementedness. The guidelines fold in the latest apprehension of how encephalon scans and other trials can assist separate among the three groups and possibly even stipulate which interventions among the many being explored might be most effectual at each phase of the disease. Because Alzheimer’s can non be perfectly. definitively diagnosed until decease. patients are presently given a likely diagnosing based on their public presentation on memory and callback trials and studies from household members. The blood and spinal-fluid trials. along with the encephalon scans. could better the prognostic truth of these steps. But Mayeux is still wary. â€Å"While everyone acknowledges that the [ markers ] are utile. † he says. â€Å"there isn’t yet a standard trial that everybody agrees means the same thing when they see a mark. † Still. the early informations expression promising. proposing the screens may be 80 % to 90 % accurate in picking up the earliest marks of the disease. This has more than merely diagnostic value ; it besides allows research workers to get down aiming candidate medicines and be more confident that the patients who receive them will profit. â€Å"Getting early diagnosings will hold an of import impact on the manner we design tests and perchance even the rate at which we complete those tests and come up with effectual interventions. † says Dr. William Thies. medical manager of the Alzheimer’s Association. For illustration. matching testing trials with intervention could cut a 65-year-old’s life-time hazard of developing Alzheimer’s i n half. Widening the Approach But that can’t go on. says UCSF’s Mucke. unless scientists start planing smarter therapies. It’s clear that concentrating on starchlike alone is non sufficient to change by reversal Alzheimer’s. so research workers are working hard to place extra marks. Among the possible countries of involvement are cistrons like apolipoprotein E ( ApoE ) . which in certain signifiers can advance the formation of amyloid. Besides pulling involvement is a nervous protein known as tau. which stabilizes axons. the long extensions that nerve cells send out like main roads to pass on with one another and make faraway tissues like musculuss in the fingers and toes. Research workers now have a better thought of how all of these constituents come together in the deathly cascade that leads to Alzheimer’s. The disease begins. they believe. when for still unknown familial and other grounds. the encephalon starts to churn out amyloid. Initially the starchlike appears as a long protein that is so cut by enzymes into shorter fragments that become molecularly gluey and clop together. organizing a plaque. Once the plaques form. tau proteins that maintain the structural unity of the nervous main road interrupt down. go forthing the equivalent of chuckholes that interrupt the electrical signals going along the nervus. With this communicating flow disrupted. nervus cells start to shrivel and decease. go forthing behind their tangled remains. That in bend activates the immune system’s inflammatory response. which attempts to take the dust. The consequence is a encephalon full of dead and dying nerve cells. and the closure of nervous connexions leads to a bead in cognitive map. Targeting each of these players–inhibiting ApoE’s consequence on starchlike production. commanding the formation of starchlike fragments and restricting tau’s dislocation of nervus connections–may be necessary to command the ensuing muss. â€Å"We have many leads for possible intervention marks. † says Mucke. â€Å"But the hard thing is to cognize what the comparative impact of each is on the human status. And we won’t cognize this until we have found drugs that can barricade each of them or combinations of them. to see how much betterment consequences. † Sing that benefit in the mental map of those at hazard for Alzheimer’s disease will be the ultimate trial for this new scheme. But even if therapies are old ages or decades off. placing patients earlier in the disease rhythm will stay valuable. By cognizing they are at hazard for Alzheimer’s. patients can be after better for the hereafter and do alterations to their life style. such as exerting and remaining mentally and socially engaged–behaviors known to detain the oncoming of symptoms. It is a complete individual who typically receives a diagnosing of Alzheimer’s ; it’s the wreckage of that individual that is finally killed by the disease. But before that happens. the complete individua l has power. Those who build a deeper modesty of nervous map by remaining cognitively active remain fit longer. That means populating robustly and good is one of the best arms we have against the disease–at least until science’s heavier heavy weapon is eventually ready to be wheeled into topographic point.

Price Elasticity of Demand for Broadband

Question: Discuss about the Price Elasticity of Demand for Broadband. Answer: Introduction Price elasticity of demand is a measurement, which is used in economics to reflect the responsiveness or the elasticity. According to Thimmapuram Kim (2013), it can be mentioned that price elasticity of demand is the measurement, which reflects the relationship among the change of the quantity demand of a particular products and the change in price. Therefore, it can be stated that, Price elasticity of demand= (percentage change in quantity demanded/ percentage change in price) Price elasticity on normal goods In terms of economics, normal goods are the goods when the income increases; demand for the goods will be increased. However, if the price level of the products would increase, then the demand for the goods would be decreased. Figure 1: Normal goods (Source: Created by author) The above figure depicted that the demand for goods would increase with the rise in income level, but if the price level would increase of the normal goods, the quantity purchase by the consumers would be decreased. This would decrease the price elasticity of demand for the normal goods would decrease. Price elasticity on luxury goods In terms of economics, luxury goods are the goods for which the demand for the products would increase higher than the increase in income. On the other hand, it can be mentioned that change of quantity demand of luxury goods would be decreased if the price of the goods would increase. However, if the income level of the consumers would increase, then the demand for the luxury goods also increase with the rise in the price level. In the opinion of Liu et al., (2016), price elasticity of the luxury goods is highly elastic. Some of the examples of luxury goods are jewellery, cars, air conditions etc. Figure 2: Demand curve for luxury goods (Source: Created by author) From the above figure, it can be observed that with the rise in the price level of the luxury goods from P1 to P2, percentage of quantity demand would also increase from Q1 to Q2. The demand would also increase from D1 to D2 with the rise in the income level. This will also happen when the level of income will also increase. Therefore, the above figure depicted that the change in the price level is lower than the change in demand. Therefore, it can be inferred that due to the change in price level, the change in quantity demand would increase more if the income level would increase. In this connection, Coglianese ey al., (2016) added that the price elasticity of demand is inelastic in case of upper class people, whereas is elastic in case of lower and the medium income group people. Price elasticity on giffen goods As per the concept of consumer theory, Galperin Ruzzier (2013) mentioned that giffen good is the good, which people consume more if the price of the products increase or the level of income of the consumers also decreases. Some of the examples of giffen goods are salt and sugar. Demand for these products is perfectly inelastic. Therefore, in this context, it can be mentioned that if the price of the products would change or fluctuate massively, percentage change in the quantity demand for the products would be remaining same. Figure 3: Demand curve for giffen goods (Source: Created by author) The above figure depicted that in case of giffen goods, the demand curve is perfectly inelastic elastic. If the income level deceases or the price level of the products increases, then the percentage of quantity demanded will be increased. From the above figure, it can be observed that with the rise in price level from P1 to P2, the demand for the goods is remaining same. Therefore, in case of giffen goods the price elasticity would be increased. As per the statement of Thimmapuram Kim (2013), the income effect dominated the substitution effect. Conclusion This study highlights the price elasticity of three different types of goods such as normal goods, luxury goods and the giffen goods. After analyzing the study, it can be inferred that the price elasticity would be decreased with the rise of price level of goods in case of normal goods. On the other hand, in case of luxury goods, the price elasticity would be inelastic in case of upper income group people and would be elastic in case of medium and lower income group of people. Lastly, it can be concluded that the price elasticity of demand for the giffen goods would be inelastic. References Coglianese, J., Davis, L. W., Kilian, L., Stock, J. H. (2016). Anticipation, tax avoidance, and the price elasticity of gasoline demand.Journal of Applied Econometrics. Galperin, H., Ruzzier, C. A. (2013). Price elasticity of demand for broadband: Evidence from Latin America and the Caribbean.Telecommunications Policy,37(6), 429-438. Liu, S., Jackson, J., Khalaf, K., Meyer, K. L., Brown, D. (2016). Price Elasticity of Demand for New Oral Anticoagulant Agents among Patients with Non-Valvular Atrial Fibrillation.Value in Health,19(3), A49. Thimmapuram, P. R., Kim, J. (2013). Consumers' price elasticity of demand modeling with economic effects on electricity markets using an agent-based model.IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid,4(1), 390-397.

Economy of Anishinaabe People Negative Impact of the Economic Growth

Question: Discuss about theEconomy of Anishinaabe Peoplefor Negative Impact of the Economic Growth Policies. Answer: Introduction of the Issues The Anishinaabe are the indigenous people of Canada, which includes groups such as Odawa, Ojibwe people. These communities are called the First Nations of Canada. The livelihood of most of the Anishinaabe people depends on the forest and land. The boral forest region of Canada is the home of more than four million people. During recent decade, major industrial development programmes are undertaken in those regions including logging, mining and hydroelectricity development. Eco system of these regions is hampering and has effect on the lively hood of the Anishinaabe (Bellrichard, 2016). Historical Causes Canadian boreal region mainly depends on the periodic natural fires to renew it. Historically, the Shoal Lake Anishinaabe created disturbance in the forest using fire. However, this forest management tool has been banned in this region. Now, the start of new bio-diversity management system does not allow use of fire. Mining activities and hydroelectricity projects have been started in the forest area for economic growth, which is hampering present livelihood of the Anishinaabe (Thompson, 2015). Who and what is Impacted Social, cultural and land use activities are impacted through modern bio diversity management system. Lack of accession of fresh drinking water affects the health condition and standard of living of these people. Social exclusion and marginalisation has negative impact on the employment and education of the Anishinaabe people. Income of these people is already low. Any kind of negative impact on health and social standard of living increases the cost burden on the people belongs to Anishinaabe group (Uprety et al., 2012). Case Example of the Issues During 2014, Anishinaabe communities suffered from not getting fresh drinking water in the Canadian boreal region. Hydroelectric project at the boreal region has negative impact on the food habit of those people. Historically the Ojibwa community is exposed to several health diseases. Therefore, contamination of river water aggravates the probability of health hazard (Ramp-alberta.org, 2016). Recommended Strategy to Address the Issues The Canadian government needs to take initiative to address the issues. Government can start a compensation scheme for the Anishinaabe communities, who are affected by the mining, hydroelectric or any other development project. Cost and benefit analysis helps to reduce the risk of deprivation. Along with economic growth, development of these communities has positive impact on the Canadian economy. Development of these communities can positively contribute to the active workforce of the country. Increasing rate of mining and cutting down of forest hampers the standard of living of these people. Their livelihood mainly depends upon seasonal work such as forestry, farming, and tourism. Therefore, conservation of forest is necessary for this Anishinaabe people. Government of Canada can arrange vocational training to increase employment opportunity, which can help to reduce dependency upon forestry. A Pros/ Cons of the Analysis The analysis is helpful from economic and social perspective. However, the implementation process is not easy. As this is a brief analysis, details analysis of policy recommendation has not been possible. There has not been much research on the issues faced by the Anishinaabe community due to change in bio diversity. Therefore, this analysis may focus on the highlighted issues to some extent. Further study can be possible on these issues. In the view of Thompson (2015), Anishinaabe people are the part of the natural order of the land. Therefore, disturbance in the natural resources are allowed as far it is beneficial for the nature and those people, who are dependent on the forest for their livelihood. Feasibility of the Recommendations The recommendations are feasible as these are beneficial for both economic growth and development. Improvement of the deprived community in the country reduces the scope of migration of the community into other countries. Creation of patches, gaps and mosaics are recommended as this are well-known ways of conserving bio diversity in an area. Conservation of water resources helps to improve the use of water and reduces the water borne diseases in the community. Reduction in health hazard reduces burden of personal cost and health spending by the government. Description of the Resources Government needs to provide those resources. Conserved natural resources have no private property rights. Natural resources such as forest, river water are used as public goods without regulation. Provision of public goods and their maintenance is done by the government. Moreover investment on education for the Anishinaabe people needs to be done by the government. Private organisations such as NGOs may take initiative for the skill development of these people. Health awareness among these people can be grown up by the government through private-public partnership. References Bellrichard, C. (2016). First Nations issues: What will make Canadians care?. CBC News. Retrieved 24 October 2016, from https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/first-nations-issues-what-will-make-canadians-care-1.2689979 Ramp-alberta.org (2016). Impacts on Boreal Forests and Biodiversity - Regional Aquatics Monitoring Program (RAMP). Retrieved 24 October 2016, from https://www.ramp-alberta.org/river/boreal/impacts.aspx Thompson, S. (2015). Flooding of First Nations and Environmental Justice in Manitoba: Case Studies of the Impacts of the 2011 Flood and Hydro Development in Manitoba.Man. LJ,38, 220-284. Uprety, Y., Asselin, H., Dhakal, A., Julien, N. (2012). Traditional use of medicinal plants in the boreal forest of Canada: review and perspectives.Journal of ethnobiology and ethnomedicine,8(1), 1.

Jack Bennys Autobiography Essays - Jack Benny, Mary Livingstone

Jack Benny's Autobiography The late Jack Benny wrote an autobiography that was known to almost no one. So few, in fact, that his only daughter Joan was surprised to find the finished manuscript among her mother's files after her death in 1983. Joan Benny has augmented her father's words with her own memories and some interviews accomplished expressly for the book. It is very good. As one might expect from the most popular comedian of the age of radio, Jack Benny's memoirs are fast-paced, lively, and entertaining. His recollections are positive, and he says almost nothing negative about anyone. He traces back to his humble beginnings as Benjamin Kubelsky in Waukegan, Ill., and reveals many intriguing facts about his early life and entry into show business. He was a high school dropout (although, as he notes with irony, Waukegan eventually built a junior high school in his honor) and took to serious study of the violin only after flunking out of the family haberdashery business. ("Do we have to know their names?" he asked his father after an unknown customer left an account payment with him.) Over his mother's objections, he eventually found employment as a violinist with a local touring singer. After a while, he began to talk, which grew into a comedy monologue. Jan Kubelik, a concert violinist, forced Benny Kubelsky to change his name in 1912. He next became Ben Benny, and became fairly well known as a violin-and-comedy performer. After serving in the Navy in World War I, a similar entertainer named Ben Bernie forced him to change his name again, and he chose the name Jack, by which all sailors in the war were informally known to each other. Some of the stories have been told before, but get a much- deserved retelling from the horse's mouth here. Jack met his wife, Sadie Marks (she later changed her name to Mary Livingstone, the name of the character she played on the radio show) when he was 27 and she 14 at her family's Passover celebration in Vancouver. She was related to the Marx brothers, and Zeppo Marx (then Marks) had brought his colleague to the home for the occasion. Mary insisted that Jack listen to her violin playing. He found it horrible and he and Zeppo made a quick exit. Several years later, they met again and married in 1927 after a brief courtship. It was only after they were married that Mary reminded Jack of their first meeting. Jack continued his successful career in vaudeville, and when his partner took ill, he persuaded Mary to fill in. She was a hit. Eventually he found himself on Broadway and then in the movies. He vacillated for a time before deciding that going into radio would be worthwhile. While they were living in New York, they adopted Joan. She learned in writing the book that Mary Benny had planned to take her only to nurse her to health while they awaited an arranged baby. (Jack opposed this idea.) Naturally, they found they couldn't part with Joan. Much of the book consists of Joan's writing. She seems to be in a different book from her father. It would be a major help if she used a writing style that conformed more closely to that set by her father in the early chapters. Her short, simple sentences slow the pace in a sudden manner. She provides extreme levels of detail about her early life, homes, and the trappings of being a celebrity daughter. While this matter is interesting to a Benny buff, one hopes that none of the venerable comedian's material was subjugated to make room for it. It would be far more relevant if Joan Benny were a celebrity in her own right. But this is the fall of 1990 and such things are to be expected of celebrity offspring. George Bush is our president and no doubt he approves. Some of Joan Benny's passages are curious. Obviously, had her father wanted details of his premarital womanizing in his book, he would have put them there himself. Her life is very well detailed up to about 1965, but she says almost nothing of her activities for the past quarter century. Joan Benny pulls no punches in discussing her mother. The two had what would mildly be described as an adversarial relationship. Mary Livingstone Benny (who always introduced herself as Mrs. Jack Benny) is portrayed as a vain, insecure spendthrift. She allegedly was most interested in being with and accepted by the Hollywood elite. Studio

How to Change WordPress Login Page URL + How It Keeps You Safe

You’re no doubt aware how important security is to your WordPress site. In fact, you’ve probably heard plenty of advice on the subject – including that you should change your WordPress login page URL. However, you may not be sure why or how to do that.Changing your login page URL is a simple but effective security technique that can help keep hackers out. After all, a unique, difficult-to-guess URL is harder to locate. This means people are less likely to gain access to your site unless you want them to.In this post, we’ll briefly discuss why changing your WordPress login page URL is a smart idea. Then we’ll show you how to do so using a free plugin. Let’s take a look! you customize your login page, it looks something like thisBy default, WordPress sites all use identical URL structures for this page. If your website’s domain is www.mysite.com, for example, you can log in by visiting www.mysite.com/wp-login.php or www.mysite.com/wp-adm in.This makes it easy to remember how to access your site. However, the downside is that anyone who knows the first thing about WordPress can find your login page quickly. Once theyve located it, hackers can get busy trying to break in. If you change the URL to something hard to guess, on the other hand, you’ll slow those same hackers down by making your login page harder to find.Additionally, changing your login page URL has a secondary benefit in that it can eliminate a lot of resource-wasting bot traffic to your site.Why you shouldnt change your login page URL manuallyBelow, well walk you through the process of changing your login page URL using a plugin. However, in some cases you may be tempted to complete this task manually (for instance, if you want to limit the number of plugins you install on your site).While you can use File Transfer Protocol (FTP) or another method of accessing your sites files directly to  sort of make this change, this is  not a good idea   for a couple main reasons:Every time you update WordPress, it will recreate the login page file. This means youll need to change the URL all over again.Manually changing your login page URL can create errors with your logout screen, and cause other issues with important site functionality.In general, we recommend not altering your sites core files if you dont have to. Doing this can have unintended consequences. Fortunately, theres a better way of hiding your login page.How to change your WordPress login page URL using a pluginWe should emphasize that this technique won’t prevent hacking completely. However, it does provide an extra layer of security for your site. Changing your login page URL is best used in combination with other methods of protecting your admin area, such as implementing Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) and limiting the number of login attempts allowed.To change your WordPress login page URL, we recommend WPS Hide Login: WPS Hide Login Author(s): WPServe ur, NicolasKulka, tabrisrpCurrent Version: 1.5.4.2Last Updated: August 22, 2019wps-hide-login.1.5.4.2.zip 98%Ratings 3,615,198Downloads WP 4.1+Requires This is a lightweight solution that gets the job done simply and quickly. What’s more, its popular, has excellent reviews, and receives regular updates from the developer.You’ll want to start out by backing up your site, just to be safe.  Then, you’ll need to install and activate the plugin.After those tasks are done, navigate to Settings General in your WordPress dashboard.If you scroll to the very bottom of the page, you’ll find a new section labeled WPS Hide Login:This option will enable you to create a new URL for your login page by typing it into the field after your website’s domain name. Your best bet is to choose something random, as you would for a password (for example, a string of numbers and letters). Just make sure you record the new URL somewhere secure, so you don’t los e access to your site.When you’re happy with the new URL, click on the Save Changes button.From now on, you’ll be able to use this address to log into your site, and the default URL will be disabled. If for some reason you ever want to reverse this process, just deactivate WPS Hide Login, and the URL will return to normal.ConclusionWordPress is a very secure platform, but there are always steps you can take to further protect your website. Changing your login page URL is a small tweak that – when implemented as part of a comprehensive security plan – makes it more difficult for hackers and spammers to gain access.Furthermore, using this technique is surprisingly simple. In fact, it will only take you a few minutes if you use the right tool. By installing a  plugin like  WPS Hide Login, you can alter your login pages URL through your dashboard settings, and see the change take effect immediately.Do you have any questions about how to change your WordPr ess login page URL? Tell us in the comments section below! How to change your #WordPress login page URL. Plus how it helps keep your site secure! #tutorial

Social Sciense

Social Sciense 3‚ º AÂÆ'‘OECONOMÂÆ' A Y CONTABILIDAD2014GUÂÆ' ATEÂÆ'“RICO-PRÂÆ' CTICAAUTOR:Prof. Claudio H. OlivetoEconomÂÆ' ­a y ContabilidadÂÆ' MBITO ECONÂÆ'“MICOEL HOMBREen su relaciÂÆ' ³n con elECONOMÂÆ' A POLÂÆ' TICA CULTURA TECNOLOGÂÆ' AVive en utiliza necesitaContextoSOCIEDADENCUESTAS ENTREVISTAS ESTADÂÆ' STICAS POLÂÆ' TICAS ECONÂÆ'“MICASLA ORGANIZACIÂÆ'“NPor lo cual se creanrequiereNutreSOCIEDADES COMERCIALESSISTEMAS DE INFORMACIÂÆ'“NAMBIENTE EXTERNOprovieneAMBIENTE INTERNOQue utilizanREGISTRACIÂÆ'“N CONTABLEDOCUMENTOS COMERCIALESque respaldan laUNIDAD 1 : El Universo EconÂÆ' ³micoLa EconomÂÆ' ­a cuenta con recursos naturales (bosques, minerales), bienes (libros, mÂÆ' ¡quinas) y capacidad del hombre (inteligencia, creatividad) para satisfacer las necesidades de los hombres.En el circuito econÂÆ' ³mico encontramos dos unidades econÂÆ' ³micas fundamentales: Unidad de Consumo (familias) y Unidad d e ProducciÂÆ' ³n (empresas). La primera ofrece a la segunda los Factores Productivos (naturaleza, trabajo, capital y direcciÂÆ' ³n) a cambio la unidad de producciÂÆ' ³n le retribuye con Ingresos (renta, salario, interÂÆ' ©s y beneficio). Con los factores productivos la unidad de ProducciÂÆ' ³n produce Bienes y Servicios que se los entregan a la unidad de Consumo a cambio de un Precio.Precios de Referencia PROCREAR. La Rioja y Catamar...Factores Productivos : Todo proceso productivo implica la concurrencia de los factores que hacen posible esa producciÂÆ' ³n de bienes y servicios.Trabajo: mano de obra.Capital: equipo fÂÆ' ­sico, que constituye los recursos productivos (materia prima, maquinaria, etc.).Naturaleza: recursos naturales.DirecciÂÆ' ³n: conducciÂÆ' ³n, administraciÂÆ' ³n.Moneda - MercadoLas primeras transacciones comerciales se desarrollaron a travÂÆ' ©s del trueque. Luego surgiÂÆ' ³ la necesidad de utilizar una unidad de cambio de acepta ciÂÆ' ³n generalizada que se denominÂÆ' ³ moneda.La moneda cumple estas funciones elementales: Medida de todos los valores, medio de divisibilidad y medio de atesoramiento.La moneda puede ser metÂÆ' ¡lica y billetes (el circulante de un paÂÆ' ­s).El concepto de dinero es mÂÆ' ¡s amplio que el de moneda. El dinero es el intermediario de todos los cambios. Tiene tres funciones: Medio de compra...

A Raisin in the Sun Study Guide for Act Three

A Raisin in the Sun Study Guide for Act Three This plot summary and study guide for Lorraine Hansberrys play, A Raisin in the Sun, provides an overview of Act Three. To learn more about the previous scenes, check out the following articles: A Raisin in the Sun: Act One, Scene OneA Raisin in the Sun: Act One, Scene TwoA Raisin in the Sun: Act Two, Scene OneA Raisin in the Sun: Act Two, Scene TwoA Raisin in the Sun: Act Two, Scene Three The third act of A Raisin in the Sun is a single scene. It takes place an hour after the events of Act Two (when $6500 was swindled from Walter Lee). In the stage directions, playwright Lorraine Hansberry describes the light of the living room as gray and gloomy, just as it was at the beginning of Act One. This dismal lighting represents the feeling of hopelessness, as though the future promises nothing. Joseph Asagais Proposal Joseph Asagai pays a spontaneous visit to the household, offering to help the family pack. Beneatha explains that Walter Lee lost her money for medical school. Then, she recounts a childhood memory about a neighbor boy who injured himself severely. When the doctors fixed his face and broken bones, young Beneatha realized she wanted to become a doctor. Now, she thinks that she has stopped caring enough to join the medical profession. Joseph and Beneatha then launch into an intellectual discussion about idealists and realists. Joseph sides with idealism. He is dedicated to improving life in Nigeria, his homeland. He even invites Beneatha to return home with him, as his wife. She is both bewildered and flattered by the offer. Joseph leaves her to think about the idea. Walters New Plan During his sisters conversation with Joseph Asagai, Walter has been listening intently from the other room. After Joseph leaves, Walter enters the living room and finds the business card of Mr. Karl Lindner, the chairman of the so-called welcoming committee of Clybourne Park, a neighborhood with white residents who are willing to pay a large amount of money to prevent black families from moving into the community. Walter leaves to contact Mr. Lindner. Mama enters and starts to unpack. (Because Walter lost the money, she no longer plans to move to the new house.) She remembers when as a child people would say that she always aimed too high. It seems she finally agrees with them. Ruth still wants to move. She is willing to go to work extreme hours in order to keep their new house in Clybourne Park. Walter returns and announces that he has made a call to the Man more specifically, he has asked Mr. Lindner back to their home to discuss a business arrangement. Walter plans to accept Lindners segregationist terms in order to make a profit. Walter has determined that humanity is divided into two groups: those who take and those who are tooken. From now on, Walter vows to be a taker. Walter Hits Rock Bottom Walter breaks down as he imagines putting on a pathetic show for Mr. Lindner. He pretends that he is speaking to Mr. Lindner, using a slave dialect to express how subservient he is in comparison to the white, property owner. Then, he goes into the bedroom, alone. Beneatha verbally disowns her brother. But Mama devoutly says that they must still love Walter, that a family member needs love the most when they have reached his lowest point. Little Travis runs in to announce the arrival of the moving men. At the same time, Mr. Lindner appears, carrying contracts to be signed. A Moment of Redemption Walter enters the living room, somber and ready to do business. His wife Ruth tells Travis to go downstairs because she does not want her son to see his father debase himself. However, Mama declares: MAMA: (Opening her eyes and looking into Walters.) No. Travis, you stay right here. And you make him understand what you doing, Walter Lee. You teach him good. Like Willy Harris taught you. You show where our five generations done come to. When Travis smiles up at his father, Walter Lee has a sudden change of heart. He explains to Mr. Lindner that his family members are plain but proud people. He tells of how his father worked for decades as a laborer, and that ultimately his father earned the right for his family to move into their new home in Clybourne Park. In short, Walter Lee transforms into the man his mother had prayed he would become. Realizing that the family is bent on moving into the neighborhood, Mr. Lindner shakes his head in dismay and leaves. Perhaps the most excited of all the family members, Ruth joyously shouts, Lets get the hell out of here! The moving men enter and begin to pack up the furniture. Beneatha and Walter exit as they argue about who would be a more suitable husband: the idealistic Joseph Asagai or the wealthy George Murchison. All of the family except Mama have left the apartment. She looks around one last time, picks up her plant, and leaves for a new home and a new life.

Argumentative Essay on Dog Fighting

Argumentative Essay on Dog Fighting Argumentative Essay on Dog Fighting Dog fighting is a sadistic practice that should be banned because of the many inhumane events that this practice entails. This practice entails breeding dogs specifically to make them fight. Such dogs are usually enclosed in small pits very early in their lives and, as they grow, are made to fight with other dogs to satisfy their owner’s gambling appetites. One of the main reasons why dog fighting should be illegal is because of the high level of suffering that these fights put the dog through. Given that the average dog fight lasts anywhere between one and two hours, the dogs that are participating in dog fights often suffer severe injuries that sometimes result in fatalities. Unlike other animals that naturally flee when they sense they cannot win a fight, the dogs that participate in dog fights are trained not to run away but to continue fighting regardless of the amount of injuries they sustain. It is only when the gambling appetites of their owners have been satisfied that the dogs are allowed to stop fighting. One of the most commonly used dogs in dog fights are pit bulls, which have powerful jaws and given that they rarely let go once they bite, the victim dog could end up suffering severe injuries, broken bones, and may even die just so their owner can have a chance of winning a bet. Some of the common injuries experienced by dogs that engage in dog fights include extreme blood loss, dehydration, extreme exhaustion, and even infections in the wounds they sustain. To make things even worse for these dogs, those that lose fights one too many times are often sacrificed for being weak and the same fate follows those dogs that are deemed old or those that do not fight as viciously as their owners expect them to. The injuries suffered by dogs that engage in fights have raised concerns in many authorities and in many places; this form of sadist sport has been classified as an illegal sport. Some individuals have even faced felony charges in courts of law. However, this seems not to have stopped some individuals from continuing to breed dogs so they can reap benefits from dog fighting. Interestingly enough, illegalizing this sport seems to have turned into a fortune for those who own dogs that engage in these fights because of the massive profits they get from those who are willing to pay large amounts of money so they can watch the illegal fights. It appears the authorities still need to do much more to deter people from willingly participating in dog fights. The minor penalties and convictions given to those found to have participated in dog fighting is not doing much to discourage this sport. The profits the dog fighters receive from the fights make the punishment, according to them; seem li ke a drop in the ocean. Perhaps it is time more severe penalties were enforced. Some tips on writing an argumentative essay: Make sure your thesis statement is clearly defined. Use transition words between paragraphs and make sure that your paragraphs are logically connected. Use facts and statistical data to support your arguments. Visit to buy argumentative essay on  Dog Fighting which will be written from scratch by highly qualified writers. You can get a free quote now!

Russian taxation and tax optimization schemes Essay

Russian taxation and tax optimization schemes - Essay Example Tax optimization schemes can therefore be said to be the structuring and organizing of a company’s or individual’s activities in order to reduce of minimize that their tax liabilities. This exercise which is becoming legal increases the amount of money maybe a company wishes to reinvest in its productive assets or even distribute among its shareholders (Saez, Slemrod, and Giertz 13 –50). There is no way to escape interacting with the tax authorities. Of the surveys conducted in the recent past, it emerges that there has been charged additional tax liabilities which are related to VAT and profit tax. These tax charges were due to insufficient economic documentation and justification. There has been consistent strengthening of the tax policy in Russia. This has lead to a marked reduction of tax payments. The Russian government introduced changes. These tax changes protect the integrity of the country’s tax system. These changes included the introduction of a mendments to the general anti-tax avoidance provisions. These are part of the tax optimization schemes that Russia is implementing. They include income tax exemptions and the introduction of the option of a tax liability in cases where a tenant qualifies for tax deductions. There are also schemes that let companies avoid declaring de facto members of staff as employees. This frees such staff from the obligation of paying high payroll taxes which my go up to thirty percent of one’s salary. This paper will look at income taxes or VAT and the tax Optimization schemes (Selen 17-67). Income taxes or VAT in Russia in 2012 and the tax Optimization schemes According to Ernst & Young (14 – 32), one of the structures for optimization in Russian that is most common is the creation and the usage of the of the corporate profit centers in the internal offshore zones as well as in foreign offshore jurisdictions. This has created an environment whereby some certain taxpayers are relea sed from taxation and the administrative territorial formations enjoying reductions in the tax rates in federal taxation. By utilizing these optimization schemes, they result to an effective profit tax rate. Most companies are employing these optimization schemes because of that they need to disclose their statements, so they can be issued with foreign securities, or obtain loans from foreign banks or even in cases of multinational mergers. Compared to other countries round the world the Russian Federation offers more protection to taxpayers. This is done by putting the burden of proving the usage of illegal tax shelters on the tax authorities. This has resulted to having the tax inspectorate taking the taxpayers to court to prove that tax shelters are illegal and in most cases the inspectorate loses such (Ernst & Young 14 – 32). The draconian rules that exist in other parts of the world, for instance the disclosure rules that were introduced in order to evaluate in United Ki ngdom the Inland Revenue on tax planning in advance, do not exist in Russia (Long 855-869). Russian businesses and foreign investors will at times be embroiled in tax disputes with the tax authorities. Due to changes introduced in tax laws which require a taxpayer to appeal to the highest tax authority before proceeding to court, it has really reduced these tax disputes. The tax optimization schemes have created an opportunity whereby conclusive amicable agreements with the tax authorities are reached during the litigation process (Long 855-869).

Organisational change and development Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Organisational change and development - Essay Example In addition, this paper will explain two approaches that may become critical in addressing such difficulty: project management and systems approach to management. Change in Organisations There are at least three important changes in organisational life today. First, there is the case of changing the organisational goals and objectives. An organisation passes through a life cycle and that, along the way, it is inevitable to make modifications in order to address and adapt to unforeseen challenges as well as new opportunities. Managers, in these cases, revise organisational objectives in order to enforce better management and operational initiatives (Stam and Andriessen, 2009, p. 136). Changing this fundamental aspect in an organisation entails far ranging restructuring and shifts. It involves the changing the rationale behind the organisation’s existence. Secondly, there is cultural change. It is the next logical step once a strategic change is adopted or when management decide s to change the organisational goals and objectives. The rationale is that in order to achieve effective change in that direction, a gradual change in mentalities must be achieved as well (Hamalainen and Saarinen, 2004, p.143). This is crucial in changing the organisational behaviour. ... In tandem with several external variables such as the spurt of innovations in the market, the increase in competition, and the level of complexity of the supply chain, among others, it forces organisations to change. Resistance Resistance to change is inherent in every organisation. This is the general consensus in academic literature and is largely based on the principle that organisations are made up of human beings and that resistance is part of human characteristics (Passmore, Woodman and Shani, 2010, p.234). Even researchers and academics who question the assumption of such pervasiveness, tacitly recognize the inevitability of resistance when they argue in focusing on the differences and contexts in the way people respond to change (Fisher and Howell, 2004; Piderit, 2000). The human variable in this theme ensures the persistence of such behaviour and underpins the methods behind change initiatives. Several thoughts attempted to explain resistance as a concept. For example, there is the position that it is â€Å"a reactive process where agents embedded in power relations oppose initiatives by other agents† (Jermier et al., 1994, p.9). The breadth of scholarly work and empirical evidences on this subject show conceptualizations of resistance as a behaviour, emotion and belief that determine the way people respond to change (Piderit, 2000, p.786). All in all, the theoretical and empirical evidences highlight the dominant view that resistance is both negative and counterproductive in implementing change; hence, it must be addressed. An excellent way to demonstrate the difficulty in handling resistance to change at the group level is to explain the dynamics of an approach in forming a team. When one is building a team from the ground

Keylogger Scam Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Keylogger Scam - Essay Example ger pertains to hardware, a computer program, or a physical device, which aims at logging all the keystrokes that are input by the users and generated from the keyboard. These keystrokes are then secretly stored and logged without letting the computer users know that all that is being typed in can be seen by anyone else. Generally, the logs can be retrieved by the individual who has installed the key-logger into the computer only through the pressing of an arrangement of different keys at once and/or by inputting a confidential password. In numerous situations, the log cannot be transferred by the key-logger remotely through Bluetooth, email or any such methods. There are various ways in which the individuals can avoid being subject to the keylogger scams. For instance, it is essential to read all the terms and conditions when any offer is received over the Internet because claims made by extremely cheap offers have costs and threats hidden in them. Unsolicited or suspicious emails should not be opened, and no links in spam mails should be clicked. Above all, the software should be installed to protect the computer from unwanted programs or viruses. Any harmful gaming or music websites should not be opened as they may become a source of hidden viruses or scams (Scam watch, 2012). Public computers should never be used for making any transactions which expose private information. It is essential to keep the spyware updated, and an encrypted file should also be maintained to keep passwords. There are several types of computer crimes that are committed in the modern era. They include identity theft, bank frauds, theft of classified information, extortion, cyber stalking, phishing scams and many others. All these are the modern crimes that aim at spoiling an individuals identity or posing harms and dangers to the personal or financial assets. In both political and industrial espionage, keyloggers can be utilized as tools to access data which might include classified

Knowledge Management, Social Networks and Innovation Essay - 4

Knowledge Management, Social Networks and Innovation - Essay Example Through this, organizations aim to acquire and create potentially useful knowledge that can be used to achieve maximum effective usage to influence the organizational performance positively. What has been learned is then embedded into the organization’s fabric through organizational learning that is complementary to knowledge management (Easterby et al, 1999). A company like China Telecom happens to be the largest fixed-line service provider in China. It is also the third largest mobile telecommunication provider in the country. The company offers an attractive full range of integrated information, application services, and internet connection. It has over 200,000 staff members with branches in other regions of the Americas, Hong Kong, Europe and Macao. In order to stay competitive, the company accelerates creation of new products through optimal use of its worker base in a unified innovation process. To facilitate collaboration among employees, customers, and partners the company developed innovation platforms with Web portal interfaces. The portal in turn accepts ideas and innovative experiences from the enlarged community. The company’s marketing team analyzes new acquired information that is gathered from the consumers’ Web 2.0 entries and uses the information to introduce and launch new products and services with the kn owledge that subscriber demand exists. The company embraces an open dialog with its customers, employees and partners through social tools that involve them in internal and external processes. By using social networking tools like social media tools, a culture of information sharing is encouraged within an organization. They provide a gateway for the exchange of current and relevant information across organizational silos and geographies. To drive a social change in the work force it is essential for organizations to build trust and encourage social interactions. Social networking tools also empower employees and

Self-Disclosure Peer Review Essay Example for Free

Self-Disclosure Peer Review Essay In the field of psychiatry, self-disclosure is only limited on the side of the therapist because the purpose of the session is to elicit as much information as the therapist can from the client. This is necessary so as to effectively provide solutions for the client’s psychological problems. If the therapist would inject self-disclosing moments during the session, this can either make the client feel insignificant and incompetent. However, if self-disclosure would be used appropriately, it can further enhance the session thus speeding up the process. In line with this, I think if a therapist decides to disclose personal experiences or information to the client, caution must always be in mind. Clients should be treated gently as if they are always in a vulnerable state. Through this, additional problems or conflicts can be prevented from manifesting. Post No. 2 by Meagan Bowser I agree with what the learner have posted about self-disclosure. This method should be utilized correctly and it should be implemented at the right time. Therapists must always put the clients first before themselves during sessions so as to emphasize that the focus are the clients and not the therapists. However, since people are distinct from one another using self-disclosure as a tool to resolve problems can have varying results. A certain approach for a specific client may not be applicable to another client. More so, is it appropriate for therapists to make up information in order to show empathy? For example, if a therapist has no experience or any idea about the situation of the client, can the therapists create fictional experiences so as to make the clients feel that they are not alone? Will this gesture be ethical or not?

Artificial Neural Networks to forecast London Stock Exchange

Artificial Neural Networks to forecast London Stock Exchange Abstract This dissertation examines and analyzes the use of the Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) to forecast the London Stock Exchange. Specifically the importance of ANN to predict the future trends and value of the financial market is demonstrated. There are several contributions of this study to this area. The first contribution of this study is to find the best subset of the interrelated factors at both local and international levels that affect the London stock exchange from the various input variables to be used in the future studies. We use novel aspects, in the sense that we base the forecast on both the fundamental and technical analysis.The second contribution of this study was to provide well defined methodology that can be used to create the financial models in future studies. In addition, this study also gives various theoretical arguments in support of the approaches used in the construction of the forecasting model by comparing the results of the previous studies and modifying some of the existing approaches and tested them. The study also compares the performance of the statistical methods and ANN in the forecasting problem. The main contribution of this thesis lies in comparing the performance of the five different types of ANN by constructing the individual forecasting model of them. Accuracy of models is compared by using different evaluation criteria and we develop different forecasting models based on both the direction and value accuracy of the forecasted value. The fourth contribution of this study is to investigate whether the hybrid approach combining different individual forecasting models can outperform the individual forecasting models and compare the performance of the different hybrid approaches. Three hybrid approaches are used in this study, two are existing approaches and the third original approach, the mixed combined neural network -is being proposed in this study to the academic studies to forecast the stock exchange. The last contribution of this study lies in modifying the existing trading strategy to increase the profitability of the investor and support the argument that the investor earns more profit if the forecasting model is being developed by using the direction accuracy as compared to the value accuracy. The best forecasting classification accuracy obtained is 93% direction accuracy and 0.0000831 (MSE) value accuracy which are better than the accuracies obtained by the previous academic studies. Moreover, this research validates the work of the existing studies that hybrid approach outperforms the individual forecasting model. In addition, the rate of the return that was attained in this thesis by using modified trading strategy is 120.14% which has shown significant improvement as compared to the 10.8493% rate of return of the existing trading strategy in other academics studies. The difference in the rate of return could be due to the fact that this study has developed good forecasting model or a better trading strategy. The experimental results show our method not only improves the accuracy rate, but also meet the short-term investors’ expectations. The results of this thesis also support the claim that some financial time series are not entirely random, and that contrary to the predictions of the efficient markets hypothesis (EMH), a trading strategy could be based solely on historical data. It was concluded that ANN do have good capabilities to forecast financial markets and, if properly trained, the investor could benefit from the use of this forecasting tool and trading strategy. Chapter 1 1 Introduction 1.1 Background to the Research Financial Time Series forecasting has attracted the interest of academic researchers and it has been addressed since the 1980.It is a challenging problem as the financial time series have complex behavior, resulting from a various factors such as economic, psychological or political reasons and they are non-stationary , noisy and deterministically chaotic. In today’s world, almost every individual is influenced by the fluctuations in the stock market. Now day’s people prefer to invest money in the diversified financial funds or shares due to its high returns than depositing in the banks. But there is lot of risk in the stock market due to its high rate of uncertainty and volatility. To overcome such risks, one of the main challenges for many years for the researchers is to develop the financial models that can describe the movements of the stock market and so far there had not been an optimum model. The complexity and difficulty of forecasting the stock exchange, and the emergence of data mining and computational intelligence techniques, as alternative techniques to the conventional statistical regression and Bayesian models with better performance, have paved the road for the increased usage of these techniques in fields of finance and economics. So, traders and investors have to rely on the various types of intelligent systems to make trading decisions. (Hameed,2008). A Computational Intelligence system such as neural networks, fuzzy logic, genetic algorithms etc has been widely established research area in the field of information systems. They have been used extensively in forecasting of the financial market and they have been quite successful to some extent .Although the number of purposed methods in financial time series is very large , but no one technique has been successful to consistently to â€Å"beat the market†. For last three decades, opposing views have existed between the academic communities and traders about the topic of â€Å"Random walk theory â€Å"and â€Å"Efficient Market Hypothesis(EMH)† due to the complexity of the financial time series and lot of publications by different researchers have gather various amount of evidences in support as well as against it. Lehman (1990), Haugen (1999) and Lo (2000) gave evidence of the deficiencies in EMH. But the investors such as Warren Buffet for long period of time have beaten the stock market consistently. Market Efficiency or â€Å"Random walk theory† in terms of stock trading in the financial market means that it is impossible to earn excess returns using any historic information. In essence, then, the new information is the only variable that causes to alter the price of the index as well as used to predict the arrival and timing. Bruce James Vanstone (2005) stated that in an efficient market, security prices should appear to be randomly generated. Both sides in this argument are supported by empirical results from the different markets across over the globe. This thesis does not wish to enter into the argument theoretically whether to accept or reject the EMH. Instead, this thesis concentrates on the methodologies to be used for development of the financial models using the artificial neural networks (ANN), compares the forecasting capabilities of the various ANN and hybrid based approach models, develop the trading strategy that can help the investor and leaves the research of this thesis to stack up with the published work of other researchers which document ways to predict the stock market. In recent years and since its inception, ANN has gained momentum and has been widely used as a viable computational intelligent technique to forecast the stock market. The main challenge of the traders is to know the signals when the stock market deviates and to take advantage of such situations. The data used by the traders to remove the uncertainty in the stock market and to take trading decisions whether to buy or sell the stock using the information process is â€Å"noisy†. Information not contained in the known information subset used to forecast is considered to be noise and such environment is characterized by a low signal-to noise ratio. Refenes et.al (1993) and Thawornwong and Enke (2004) described that the relationship between the security price or returns and the variables that constitute that price (return), changes over time and this fact is widely accepted within the academic institutes. In other words, the stock market‘s structural mechanics may change over time which causes the effect on the index also change. Ferreira et al. (2004) described that the relationship between the variables and the predicted index is non linear and the Artificial neural networks (ANN) have the characteristic to represent such complex non-linear relationship. This thesis presents the mechanical London Stock Market trading system that uses the ANN forecasting model to extract the rules from daily index movements and generate signal to the investors and traders whether to buy, sell or hold a stock. The figure 1 and 2 represents the stock exchange and ANN forecasting model. By viewing the stock exchange as a financial market that takes historical and current data or information as an input, the investors react to this information based on their understanding, speculations, analysis etc. It would now seem very difficult to predict the stock market, characterized by high noise, nonlinearities, using only high frequency (weekly, daily) historical prices. Surprisingly though, there are anomalies in the behavior of the stock market that cannot be explained under the existing paradigm of market efficiency. Studies discussed in the literature review have been able to predict the stock market accurately to some extent and it seems that forecasting model developed by them have been able to pick some of the hidden patterns in the inherently non-linear price series. While it is true that forecasting model need to be designed and optimized with care in order to get accurate results . Further, it aims to contribute knowledge that will one day lead to a standard or optimum model for the prediction of the stock exchange. As such, it aims to present a well defined methodology that can be used to create the forecasting models and it is hoped that this thesis can address many of the deficiencies of the published research in this area. In the last decade, there has been plethora of the ANN models that were developed due to the absence of the well defined methodology, which were difficult to compare due to less published work and some of them have shown superior results in their domains. Moreover, this study also compares the predictive power of the ANN with the statistical models. Normally the approach used by the academic researchers in the forecasting use technical analysis and some of them include the fundamental analysis. The technical analysis uses only historical data (past price) to determine the movement of the stock exchange and fundamental analysis is based on external information (like interest rates, prices and returns of other asset) that comes from the economic system surrounding the financial market. Building a trading system using forecasting model and testing it on the evaluation criteria is the only practical way to evaluate the forecasting model. There has been so much prior research on identifying the appropriate trading strategy for forecasting problem. This thesis does not wish to enter into the argument which strategy is best or not. Although, the importance of the trading strategy can hardly be underestimated, but this thesis concentrates on using one of the existing strategy, modify it and compares the return by the forecasting models. But there has always been debate in the academic studies over how to effectively benchmark the model of ANN for trading. Some of the academic researchers stated that predicting the direction of the stock exchange may lead to higher profits while some of them supported the view that predicting the value of the stock exchange may lead to higher rate of return. Azoff (1994) and Thawornwong and Enke (2004) discussed about this debate in their study. In essence, there is a need for a formalized development methodology for developing the ANN financial models which can be used as a benchmark for trading systems. All of this is accommodated by this thesis. 1.2 Problem Statement and Research Question The studies mentioned above have generally indicated that ANN, as used in the stock market, can be a valuable tool to the investor .Due to some of the problems discussed above, we are not still able to answer the question: Can ANNs be used to develop the accurate forecasting model that can be used in the trading systems to earn profit for the investor? From the variety of academic research summarized in the literature review, it is clear that a great deal of research in this area has taken place by different academic researchers and they have gathered various amounts of evidences in support as well as against it. This directly threatens the use of ANN applicability to the financial industry. Apart from the previous question, this research addresses various other problems: 1. Which ANN have better performance in the forecasting of the London Stock Exchange from the five different types of the ANN which are widely used in the academics? 2. Which subset of the potential input variables from 2002-08 affect the LSE? 3. Do international stock exchanges, currency exchange rate and other macroeconomic factors affect the LSE? 4. How much the performance of the forecasting model is improved by using the regression analysis in the factor selection? 5. Can use of the technical indicators improve the performance of the forecasting model? 6. Which learning algorithm in the training of the ANN give the better performance? 7. Does Hybrid-based Forecasting Models give better performance than the individual ANN forecasting models? 8. Which Hybrid-based models have the better performance and what are the limitations of using them? 9. Does the forecasting model developed on the basis of the percentage accuracy gives more rate of the return as compared to the value accuracy? 10. Does the forecasting model having better performance in terms of the accuracy increase the profit of the investor when applied to the trading strategy? Apart from all questions outlined above, it addresses various another questions regarding the design of the ANN. †¢ Are there any approaches to solve the various issues in designing of the ANN like number of hidden layers and activation functions? This thesis will attempt to answer the above question within the constraints and scope of the 6-year sample period (from 2002-2008) using historical data of various variables that affect the LSE. Further, this thesis will also attempt to answer these questions within the practical constraints of transaction costs and money management imposed by real-world trading systems. Although a formal statement of the methodology or steps that is being used is left until section 3, it makes sense to discuss the way in which this thesis will address the above question. In this thesis, various types of ANN will be trained using fundamental data, and technical data according to the direction and value accuracy. A better trading system development methodology will be defined, and the performance of the forecasting model will be checked by using evaluation criteria rate of the return .In this way, the benefits of incorporating ANN into trading strategies in the stock market can be exposed and quantified. Once this process has been undertaken, it will be possible to answer the thesis all questions. 1.3 Motivation of the Research Stock market has always had been an attractive appeal for the researchers and financial investors and they have studied it over again to extract the useful patterns to predict the movement of the stock market. The reason is that if the researchers can make the accurate forecasting model, they can beat the market and can gain excess profit by applying the best trading strategy. Numerous financial investors have suffered lot of financial losses in the stock market as they were not aware of the stock market behavior. They had the problem that they were not able to decide when they should sell or buy the stock to gain profit. Nevertheless, finding out the best time for the investor to buy or to sell has remained a very difficult task because there are too many factors that may influence stock prices. If the investors have the accurate forecasting model, then they can predict the future behavior of the stock exchange and can gain profit. This solves the problem of the financial investors to some extent as they will not bear any financial loss. But it does not guarantee that the investor can have better profit or rate of return as compared to other investors unless he utilized the forecasting model using better trading strategy to invest money in the share market. This thesis tries to solve the above problem by providing the investor better forecasting model and trading strategies that can be applied to real-world trading systems. 1.4 Justification of Research There are several features of this academic research that distinguish it from previous academic researches. First of all, the time frame chosen for the investigation of the ANN (2002-08) in the London Stock Exchange has never been tested in the previous academic work. The importance of the period chosen is that there are two counter forces, which are opposing each other. On the one hand, the improvement of the UK and other countries economy after the 2001 financial crises happened in this period as a whole. On the other hand, this period also shows the decline in the stock markets from Jan, 2008 to Dec, 2008. So, it is important to test the forecasting model for bull, stable and bear market. Second, some of the research questions addressed in the above section, have not been investigated much in the academic studies, especially there is hardly any study which have done research on all the problems. Moreover, original hybrid based mixed neural network, better trading strategy and other modified approaches have been successfully being described and used in this study Finally, there is a significant lack of work carried out in this area in the LSE. As such, this thesis draws heavily on results published mainly within the United States and other countries; from the academics .One interesting aspect of this thesis is that it will be interesting to see how much of the published research on application of ANN in stock market anomalies is applicable to the UK market. This is important as some of the academic studies (Pan et al (2005)) states that each stock market in the globe is different. 1.5 Delimitations of scope The thesis concerns itself with historical data for the variables that affect London Stock Exchange during the period 2002 – 2008. 1.6 Outline of the Report The remaining part of the thesis is organized in the following six chapters. The second chapter, the background and literature review, provides a brief introduction to the domain and also pertinent literature is reviewed to discuss the related published work of the previous researchers in terms of their contribution and content in the prediction of the stock exchange which serves as the building block for much of the research. Moreover, this literature review also gave solid justification why a particular set of ANN inputs are selected, which is important step according to the Thawornwong and Enke (2004) and and some concepts from finance. The third chapter, the methodology, describes the steps in detail, data and the mechanics or techniques that take place in the thesis along with the empirical evidence. In addition, it also discuss the literature review for each step. Formulas and diagrams are shown to explain the techniques when necessary and it also covers issues as software and hardware used in the study. The fourth chapter, the implementation, discusses the approaches used in the implementation in detail based on the third chapter. It also covers such issues as software and hardware used in the study. The fifth chapter, the results and analysis, present the results according to the performance and benchmark measures that we have used in this study to compare with other models. It describes the choices that were needed in making model and justifies these choices in terms of the literature. The sixth chapter, conclusions and further work, restates the thesis hypothesis, discuss the conclusions drawn from the project and also thesis findings are put into perspective. Finally, the next steps to improve the model performance are considered. Chapter 2 Background and Literature Review 2 Background and Literature Review This section of thesis explores the theory of three relevant fields of the Financial Time Series, Stock Market, and Artificial Neural Networks, which together form the conceptual frameworks of the thesis as shown in the figure 1. Framework is provided to the trader to make quantitative and qualitative judgments concerning the future stock exchange movements. These three fields are reviewed in historical context, sketching out the development of those disciplines, and reviewing their academic credibility, and their application to this thesis. In the case of Neural Networks, the field is reviewed with regard to that portion of the literature which deals with applying neural network to the prediction of the stock exchange, the various type of techniques and neural networks used and an existing prediction model is extended to allow a more detailed analysis of the area than would otherwise have been possible. 2.1 Financial Time Series 2.1.1 Introduction The field of the financial time series prediction is a highly complex task due to the following reasons: 1. The financial time series frequently behaves like a random-walk process and predictability of such series is controversial issue which has been questioned in scope of EMH. 2. The statistical property of the financial time series shift with the different time. Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]). 3. Financial time series is usually noisy and the models which have been able to reduce such noise has been the better model in forecasting the value and direction of the stock exchange. 4. In the long run, a new forecasting technique becomes a part of the process to be forecasted, i.e. it influences the process to be forecasted (Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]). The first point is explained later in this section while discussing the EMH theory (Page).The graph of the volatility time series of FTSE 100 index from 14 June, 1993 to 29 December, 1998 and Dow Jones from 1928 to 2000 by Nelson Areal (2008) and Negrea Bogdan Cristian (2007) illustrates the second point of the FTSE 100 [2.1.r]in figure 2.1.1 and 2.2.2.These figures also shows that the volatility changes with period , in some periods FTSE 100 index value fluctuates so much and in some it remains calm. The third point is explained by the fact the events on a particular data affect the financial time series of the index, for example, the volatility of stocks or index increases before announcement of major stock specific news (Donders and Vorst [1996]). These events are random and contribute noise in the time series which may make difficult to compare the two forecasting models difficult to compare as a random model can also produce results. The fourth result can be explained by the example. Suppose a company develop a model or technique that can outcast all other models or techniques. The company will make lot of profits if this model is available to less people. But if this technique is available to all people with time due to its popularity, than the profits of the company will decrease as the company will not no longer take advantage of this technique. This argument is described in Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998] and Swingler [1994] . 2.1.2 Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) EMH Theory has been a controversial issue for many years and there has been no mutual agreed deal among the academic researchers, whether it is possible to predict the stock price. The people who believe that the prices follow â€Å"random walk† trend and cannot be predicted, are usually people who support the EMH theory. Academic researchers( Tino et al. [2000]), have shown that the profit can be made by using historical information , whereas they also found difficult to verify the strong form due to lack of all private and public data. The EMH was developed in 1965 by Fama (Fama [1965], Fama [1970]) and has found widely accepted (Anthony and Biggs [1995], Malkiel [1987], White [1988], Lowe and Webb [1991]) in the academic community (Lawrence et al. [1996]).It states that the future index or stock value is completely unpredictable given the historical information of the index or stocks. There are three forms of EMH: weak, semi-strong, and strong form. The weak EMH rules out any form of forecasting based on the stock’s history, since the stock prices follows a random walk in which in which successive changes have zero correlation (Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]). In Semi Strong hypothesis, we consider all the publicly available information such as volume data and fundamental data. In strong form, we consider all the publicly and privately available information. Another reason for argument against the EMH is that different investors or traders react differently when a stock suddenly drops in a value. These different time perspectives will cause the unexpected change in the stock exchange, even if the new information has not entered in the scene. It may be possible to identify these situations and actually predict future changes (Hellstr  ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]) The developer have proved it wrong by making forecasting models, this issue remains an interesting area. This controversy is just only matter of the word immediately in the definition. The studies in support of the argument of EMH rely on using the statistical tests and show that the technical indicators and tested models can’t forecast. However, the studies against the argument uses the time delay between the point when new information enters the model or system and the point when the information has spread across over the globe and a equilibrium has been reached in the stock market with a new market price. 2.1.3 Financial Time Series Forecasting Financial Time series Forecasting aims to find underlying patterns, trends and forecast future index value using using historical and current data or information. The historic values are continuous and equally spaced value over time and it represent various types of data . The main aim of the forecasting is to find an approximate mapping function between the input variables and the forecasted or output value . According to Kalekar (2004), Time series forecasting assumes that a time series is a combination of a pattern and some error. The goal of the model using time series is to separate the pattern from the error by understanding the trend of the pattern and its seasonality Several methods are used in time series forecasting like moving average (section ) moving averages, linear regression with time etc. Time series differs from the technical analysis (section) that it is based on the samples and treated the values as non-chaotic time series. Many academic researchers have applied t ime series analysis in their forecasting model, but there has been no major success. [1a] 2.2 Stock Market 2.2.1 Introduction Let us consider the basics of the stock market. MM What are stocks? Stock refers to a share in the ownership of a corporation or company. They represent a claim of the stock owner on the company’s earnings and assets and by buying more stocks; the stake in the ownership is increased. In United States, stocks are often referred as shares, whereas in the UK they are also used as synonym for bonds, shares and equities. MM Why a Company issues a stock? The main reason for issuing stock is that the company wants to raise money by selling some part of the company. A company can raise money by two ways: â€Å"debt financing† (borrowing money by issuing bonds or loan from bank) and â€Å"equity financing â€Å"(borrowing money by issuing stocks).It is advantageous to raise the money by issuing stocks as the company has not to pay money back to the stock owners but they have to share the profit in the form of the dividends. MM What is Stock Pricing or price? A stock price is the price of a single stock of a number of saleable stocks traded by the company. A company issue stock at static price, and the stock price may increase or decrease according to the trade. Normally the price of the stocks in the stock market is determined by the supply/demand equilibrium. MM What is a Stock Market? Stock Market or equity market is a public market where the trading and issuing of a company stock or derivates takes place either through the stock exchange or they may be traded privately and over-the counter markets. It is vital part of the economy as it provides opportunities to the company to raise money and also to the investors of having potential gain by selling or buying share. The stock market in the US includes the NYSE, NASDAQ, the AMEX as well as many regional exchanges. London Stock Exchange is the major stock exchange in the UK and Europe.As mentioned in the Chapter 1, in this study we forecast the London Stock Exchange (Section 2.2.2.). Investing in the stock market is very risky as the stock market is uncertain and unsteady. The main aim of the investor is to get maximum returns from the money invested in the stock market, for which he has to study about the performance, price history about the stock company .So it is a broad category and according to Hellstrom (1997), there are four main ways to predict the stock market: 1. Fundamental analysis (section 2.2.3) 2. Technical analysis, (section 2.2.4) 3. Time series forecasting (section 2.1) 4. Machine learning (ANN). (Section 2.3) 2.2.2 London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange is one of the world’s oldest and largest stock exchanges in the world, which started its operation in 1698, when John Casting commenced â€Å"at this Office in Jonathan’s Coffee-house† a list of stock and commodity prices called â€Å"The Course of the Exchange and other things† [2] .On March 3, 1801, London Stock Exchange was officially established with current lists of over 3,200 companies and has existed, in one or more form or another for more than 300 years. In 2000, it decided to become public and listed its shares on its own stock exchange in 2001. The London Stock market consists of the Main Market and Alternative Investments Market (AIM), plus EDX London (exchange for equity derivatives). The Main Market is mainly for established companies with high performance, and AIM hand trades small-caps, or new enterprises with high growth potential.[1] Since the launch of the AIM in 1995, AIM has become the most successful growth market in the world with over 3000 companies from across the globe have joined AIM. To evaluate the London Stock Exchange, the autonomous FTSE Group (owned by the Financial Times and the London Stock Exchange) , sustains a series of indices comprising the FTSE 100 Index, FTSE 250 Index, FTSE 350 Index, FTSE All-Share, FTSE AIM-UK 50, FTSE AIM 100, FTSE AIM All-Share, FTSE SmallCap, FTSE Tech Mark 100 ,FTSE Tech Mark All-Share.[4] FTSE 100 is the most famous and composite index calculated respectively from the top 100 largest companies whose shares are listed on the London Stock Exchange. The base date for calculation of FTSE 100 index is 1984. [2] In the UK, the FTSE 100 is frequently used by large investor, financial experts and the stock brokers as a guide to stock market performance. The FTSE index is calculated from the following formula: 2.2.3 Fundamental Analysis Fundamental Analysis focuses on evaluation of the future stock exchange movements Artificial Neural Networks to forecast London Stock Exchange Artificial Neural Networks to forecast London Stock Exchange Abstract This dissertation examines and analyzes the use of the Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) to forecast the London Stock Exchange. Specifically the importance of ANN to predict the future trends and value of the financial market is demonstrated. There are several contributions of this study to this area. The first contribution of this study is to find the best subset of the interrelated factors at both local and international levels that affect the London stock exchange from the various input variables to be used in the future studies. We use novel aspects, in the sense that we base the forecast on both the fundamental and technical analysis.The second contribution of this study was to provide well defined methodology that can be used to create the financial models in future studies. In addition, this study also gives various theoretical arguments in support of the approaches used in the construction of the forecasting model by comparing the results of the previous studies and modifying some of the existing approaches and tested them. The study also compares the performance of the statistical methods and ANN in the forecasting problem. The main contribution of this thesis lies in comparing the performance of the five different types of ANN by constructing the individual forecasting model of them. Accuracy of models is compared by using different evaluation criteria and we develop different forecasting models based on both the direction and value accuracy of the forecasted value. The fourth contribution of this study is to investigate whether the hybrid approach combining different individual forecasting models can outperform the individual forecasting models and compare the performance of the different hybrid approaches. Three hybrid approaches are used in this study, two are existing approaches and the third original approach, the mixed combined neural network -is being proposed in this study to the academic studies to forecast the stock exchange. The last contribution of this study lies in modifying the existing trading strategy to increase the profitability of the investor and support the argument that the investor earns more profit if the forecasting model is being developed by using the direction accuracy as compared to the value accuracy. The best forecasting classification accuracy obtained is 93% direction accuracy and 0.0000831 (MSE) value accuracy which are better than the accuracies obtained by the previous academic studies. Moreover, this research validates the work of the existing studies that hybrid approach outperforms the individual forecasting model. In addition, the rate of the return that was attained in this thesis by using modified trading strategy is 120.14% which has shown significant improvement as compared to the 10.8493% rate of return of the existing trading strategy in other academics studies. The difference in the rate of return could be due to the fact that this study has developed good forecasting model or a better trading strategy. The experimental results show our method not only improves the accuracy rate, but also meet the short-term investors’ expectations. The results of this thesis also support the claim that some financial time series are not entirely random, and that contrary to the predictions of the efficient markets hypothesis (EMH), a trading strategy could be based solely on historical data. It was concluded that ANN do have good capabilities to forecast financial markets and, if properly trained, the investor could benefit from the use of this forecasting tool and trading strategy. Chapter 1 1 Introduction 1.1 Background to the Research Financial Time Series forecasting has attracted the interest of academic researchers and it has been addressed since the 1980.It is a challenging problem as the financial time series have complex behavior, resulting from a various factors such as economic, psychological or political reasons and they are non-stationary , noisy and deterministically chaotic. In today’s world, almost every individual is influenced by the fluctuations in the stock market. Now day’s people prefer to invest money in the diversified financial funds or shares due to its high returns than depositing in the banks. But there is lot of risk in the stock market due to its high rate of uncertainty and volatility. To overcome such risks, one of the main challenges for many years for the researchers is to develop the financial models that can describe the movements of the stock market and so far there had not been an optimum model. The complexity and difficulty of forecasting the stock exchange, and the emergence of data mining and computational intelligence techniques, as alternative techniques to the conventional statistical regression and Bayesian models with better performance, have paved the road for the increased usage of these techniques in fields of finance and economics. So, traders and investors have to rely on the various types of intelligent systems to make trading decisions. (Hameed,2008). A Computational Intelligence system such as neural networks, fuzzy logic, genetic algorithms etc has been widely established research area in the field of information systems. They have been used extensively in forecasting of the financial market and they have been quite successful to some extent .Although the number of purposed methods in financial time series is very large , but no one technique has been successful to consistently to â€Å"beat the market†. For last three decades, opposing views have existed between the academic communities and traders about the topic of â€Å"Random walk theory â€Å"and â€Å"Efficient Market Hypothesis(EMH)† due to the complexity of the financial time series and lot of publications by different researchers have gather various amount of evidences in support as well as against it. Lehman (1990), Haugen (1999) and Lo (2000) gave evidence of the deficiencies in EMH. But the investors such as Warren Buffet for long period of time have beaten the stock market consistently. Market Efficiency or â€Å"Random walk theory† in terms of stock trading in the financial market means that it is impossible to earn excess returns using any historic information. In essence, then, the new information is the only variable that causes to alter the price of the index as well as used to predict the arrival and timing. Bruce James Vanstone (2005) stated that in an efficient market, security prices should appear to be randomly generated. Both sides in this argument are supported by empirical results from the different markets across over the globe. This thesis does not wish to enter into the argument theoretically whether to accept or reject the EMH. Instead, this thesis concentrates on the methodologies to be used for development of the financial models using the artificial neural networks (ANN), compares the forecasting capabilities of the various ANN and hybrid based approach models, develop the trading strategy that can help the investor and leaves the research of this thesis to stack up with the published work of other researchers which document ways to predict the stock market. In recent years and since its inception, ANN has gained momentum and has been widely used as a viable computational intelligent technique to forecast the stock market. The main challenge of the traders is to know the signals when the stock market deviates and to take advantage of such situations. The data used by the traders to remove the uncertainty in the stock market and to take trading decisions whether to buy or sell the stock using the information process is â€Å"noisy†. Information not contained in the known information subset used to forecast is considered to be noise and such environment is characterized by a low signal-to noise ratio. Refenes et.al (1993) and Thawornwong and Enke (2004) described that the relationship between the security price or returns and the variables that constitute that price (return), changes over time and this fact is widely accepted within the academic institutes. In other words, the stock market‘s structural mechanics may change over time which causes the effect on the index also change. Ferreira et al. (2004) described that the relationship between the variables and the predicted index is non linear and the Artificial neural networks (ANN) have the characteristic to represent such complex non-linear relationship. This thesis presents the mechanical London Stock Market trading system that uses the ANN forecasting model to extract the rules from daily index movements and generate signal to the investors and traders whether to buy, sell or hold a stock. The figure 1 and 2 represents the stock exchange and ANN forecasting model. By viewing the stock exchange as a financial market that takes historical and current data or information as an input, the investors react to this information based on their understanding, speculations, analysis etc. It would now seem very difficult to predict the stock market, characterized by high noise, nonlinearities, using only high frequency (weekly, daily) historical prices. Surprisingly though, there are anomalies in the behavior of the stock market that cannot be explained under the existing paradigm of market efficiency. Studies discussed in the literature review have been able to predict the stock market accurately to some extent and it seems that forecasting model developed by them have been able to pick some of the hidden patterns in the inherently non-linear price series. While it is true that forecasting model need to be designed and optimized with care in order to get accurate results . Further, it aims to contribute knowledge that will one day lead to a standard or optimum model for the prediction of the stock exchange. As such, it aims to present a well defined methodology that can be used to create the forecasting models and it is hoped that this thesis can address many of the deficiencies of the published research in this area. In the last decade, there has been plethora of the ANN models that were developed due to the absence of the well defined methodology, which were difficult to compare due to less published work and some of them have shown superior results in their domains. Moreover, this study also compares the predictive power of the ANN with the statistical models. Normally the approach used by the academic researchers in the forecasting use technical analysis and some of them include the fundamental analysis. The technical analysis uses only historical data (past price) to determine the movement of the stock exchange and fundamental analysis is based on external information (like interest rates, prices and returns of other asset) that comes from the economic system surrounding the financial market. Building a trading system using forecasting model and testing it on the evaluation criteria is the only practical way to evaluate the forecasting model. There has been so much prior research on identifying the appropriate trading strategy for forecasting problem. This thesis does not wish to enter into the argument which strategy is best or not. Although, the importance of the trading strategy can hardly be underestimated, but this thesis concentrates on using one of the existing strategy, modify it and compares the return by the forecasting models. But there has always been debate in the academic studies over how to effectively benchmark the model of ANN for trading. Some of the academic researchers stated that predicting the direction of the stock exchange may lead to higher profits while some of them supported the view that predicting the value of the stock exchange may lead to higher rate of return. Azoff (1994) and Thawornwong and Enke (2004) discussed about this debate in their study. In essence, there is a need for a formalized development methodology for developing the ANN financial models which can be used as a benchmark for trading systems. All of this is accommodated by this thesis. 1.2 Problem Statement and Research Question The studies mentioned above have generally indicated that ANN, as used in the stock market, can be a valuable tool to the investor .Due to some of the problems discussed above, we are not still able to answer the question: Can ANNs be used to develop the accurate forecasting model that can be used in the trading systems to earn profit for the investor? From the variety of academic research summarized in the literature review, it is clear that a great deal of research in this area has taken place by different academic researchers and they have gathered various amounts of evidences in support as well as against it. This directly threatens the use of ANN applicability to the financial industry. Apart from the previous question, this research addresses various other problems: 1. Which ANN have better performance in the forecasting of the London Stock Exchange from the five different types of the ANN which are widely used in the academics? 2. Which subset of the potential input variables from 2002-08 affect the LSE? 3. Do international stock exchanges, currency exchange rate and other macroeconomic factors affect the LSE? 4. How much the performance of the forecasting model is improved by using the regression analysis in the factor selection? 5. Can use of the technical indicators improve the performance of the forecasting model? 6. Which learning algorithm in the training of the ANN give the better performance? 7. Does Hybrid-based Forecasting Models give better performance than the individual ANN forecasting models? 8. Which Hybrid-based models have the better performance and what are the limitations of using them? 9. Does the forecasting model developed on the basis of the percentage accuracy gives more rate of the return as compared to the value accuracy? 10. Does the forecasting model having better performance in terms of the accuracy increase the profit of the investor when applied to the trading strategy? Apart from all questions outlined above, it addresses various another questions regarding the design of the ANN. †¢ Are there any approaches to solve the various issues in designing of the ANN like number of hidden layers and activation functions? This thesis will attempt to answer the above question within the constraints and scope of the 6-year sample period (from 2002-2008) using historical data of various variables that affect the LSE. Further, this thesis will also attempt to answer these questions within the practical constraints of transaction costs and money management imposed by real-world trading systems. Although a formal statement of the methodology or steps that is being used is left until section 3, it makes sense to discuss the way in which this thesis will address the above question. In this thesis, various types of ANN will be trained using fundamental data, and technical data according to the direction and value accuracy. A better trading system development methodology will be defined, and the performance of the forecasting model will be checked by using evaluation criteria rate of the return .In this way, the benefits of incorporating ANN into trading strategies in the stock market can be exposed and quantified. Once this process has been undertaken, it will be possible to answer the thesis all questions. 1.3 Motivation of the Research Stock market has always had been an attractive appeal for the researchers and financial investors and they have studied it over again to extract the useful patterns to predict the movement of the stock market. The reason is that if the researchers can make the accurate forecasting model, they can beat the market and can gain excess profit by applying the best trading strategy. Numerous financial investors have suffered lot of financial losses in the stock market as they were not aware of the stock market behavior. They had the problem that they were not able to decide when they should sell or buy the stock to gain profit. Nevertheless, finding out the best time for the investor to buy or to sell has remained a very difficult task because there are too many factors that may influence stock prices. If the investors have the accurate forecasting model, then they can predict the future behavior of the stock exchange and can gain profit. This solves the problem of the financial investors to some extent as they will not bear any financial loss. But it does not guarantee that the investor can have better profit or rate of return as compared to other investors unless he utilized the forecasting model using better trading strategy to invest money in the share market. This thesis tries to solve the above problem by providing the investor better forecasting model and trading strategies that can be applied to real-world trading systems. 1.4 Justification of Research There are several features of this academic research that distinguish it from previous academic researches. First of all, the time frame chosen for the investigation of the ANN (2002-08) in the London Stock Exchange has never been tested in the previous academic work. The importance of the period chosen is that there are two counter forces, which are opposing each other. On the one hand, the improvement of the UK and other countries economy after the 2001 financial crises happened in this period as a whole. On the other hand, this period also shows the decline in the stock markets from Jan, 2008 to Dec, 2008. So, it is important to test the forecasting model for bull, stable and bear market. Second, some of the research questions addressed in the above section, have not been investigated much in the academic studies, especially there is hardly any study which have done research on all the problems. Moreover, original hybrid based mixed neural network, better trading strategy and other modified approaches have been successfully being described and used in this study Finally, there is a significant lack of work carried out in this area in the LSE. As such, this thesis draws heavily on results published mainly within the United States and other countries; from the academics .One interesting aspect of this thesis is that it will be interesting to see how much of the published research on application of ANN in stock market anomalies is applicable to the UK market. This is important as some of the academic studies (Pan et al (2005)) states that each stock market in the globe is different. 1.5 Delimitations of scope The thesis concerns itself with historical data for the variables that affect London Stock Exchange during the period 2002 – 2008. 1.6 Outline of the Report The remaining part of the thesis is organized in the following six chapters. The second chapter, the background and literature review, provides a brief introduction to the domain and also pertinent literature is reviewed to discuss the related published work of the previous researchers in terms of their contribution and content in the prediction of the stock exchange which serves as the building block for much of the research. Moreover, this literature review also gave solid justification why a particular set of ANN inputs are selected, which is important step according to the Thawornwong and Enke (2004) and and some concepts from finance. The third chapter, the methodology, describes the steps in detail, data and the mechanics or techniques that take place in the thesis along with the empirical evidence. In addition, it also discuss the literature review for each step. Formulas and diagrams are shown to explain the techniques when necessary and it also covers issues as software and hardware used in the study. The fourth chapter, the implementation, discusses the approaches used in the implementation in detail based on the third chapter. It also covers such issues as software and hardware used in the study. The fifth chapter, the results and analysis, present the results according to the performance and benchmark measures that we have used in this study to compare with other models. It describes the choices that were needed in making model and justifies these choices in terms of the literature. The sixth chapter, conclusions and further work, restates the thesis hypothesis, discuss the conclusions drawn from the project and also thesis findings are put into perspective. Finally, the next steps to improve the model performance are considered. Chapter 2 Background and Literature Review 2 Background and Literature Review This section of thesis explores the theory of three relevant fields of the Financial Time Series, Stock Market, and Artificial Neural Networks, which together form the conceptual frameworks of the thesis as shown in the figure 1. Framework is provided to the trader to make quantitative and qualitative judgments concerning the future stock exchange movements. These three fields are reviewed in historical context, sketching out the development of those disciplines, and reviewing their academic credibility, and their application to this thesis. In the case of Neural Networks, the field is reviewed with regard to that portion of the literature which deals with applying neural network to the prediction of the stock exchange, the various type of techniques and neural networks used and an existing prediction model is extended to allow a more detailed analysis of the area than would otherwise have been possible. 2.1 Financial Time Series 2.1.1 Introduction The field of the financial time series prediction is a highly complex task due to the following reasons: 1. The financial time series frequently behaves like a random-walk process and predictability of such series is controversial issue which has been questioned in scope of EMH. 2. The statistical property of the financial time series shift with the different time. Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]). 3. Financial time series is usually noisy and the models which have been able to reduce such noise has been the better model in forecasting the value and direction of the stock exchange. 4. In the long run, a new forecasting technique becomes a part of the process to be forecasted, i.e. it influences the process to be forecasted (Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]). The first point is explained later in this section while discussing the EMH theory (Page).The graph of the volatility time series of FTSE 100 index from 14 June, 1993 to 29 December, 1998 and Dow Jones from 1928 to 2000 by Nelson Areal (2008) and Negrea Bogdan Cristian (2007) illustrates the second point of the FTSE 100 [2.1.r]in figure 2.1.1 and 2.2.2.These figures also shows that the volatility changes with period , in some periods FTSE 100 index value fluctuates so much and in some it remains calm. The third point is explained by the fact the events on a particular data affect the financial time series of the index, for example, the volatility of stocks or index increases before announcement of major stock specific news (Donders and Vorst [1996]). These events are random and contribute noise in the time series which may make difficult to compare the two forecasting models difficult to compare as a random model can also produce results. The fourth result can be explained by the example. Suppose a company develop a model or technique that can outcast all other models or techniques. The company will make lot of profits if this model is available to less people. But if this technique is available to all people with time due to its popularity, than the profits of the company will decrease as the company will not no longer take advantage of this technique. This argument is described in Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998] and Swingler [1994] . 2.1.2 Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) EMH Theory has been a controversial issue for many years and there has been no mutual agreed deal among the academic researchers, whether it is possible to predict the stock price. The people who believe that the prices follow â€Å"random walk† trend and cannot be predicted, are usually people who support the EMH theory. Academic researchers( Tino et al. [2000]), have shown that the profit can be made by using historical information , whereas they also found difficult to verify the strong form due to lack of all private and public data. The EMH was developed in 1965 by Fama (Fama [1965], Fama [1970]) and has found widely accepted (Anthony and Biggs [1995], Malkiel [1987], White [1988], Lowe and Webb [1991]) in the academic community (Lawrence et al. [1996]).It states that the future index or stock value is completely unpredictable given the historical information of the index or stocks. There are three forms of EMH: weak, semi-strong, and strong form. The weak EMH rules out any form of forecasting based on the stock’s history, since the stock prices follows a random walk in which in which successive changes have zero correlation (Hellstr ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]). In Semi Strong hypothesis, we consider all the publicly available information such as volume data and fundamental data. In strong form, we consider all the publicly and privately available information. Another reason for argument against the EMH is that different investors or traders react differently when a stock suddenly drops in a value. These different time perspectives will cause the unexpected change in the stock exchange, even if the new information has not entered in the scene. It may be possible to identify these situations and actually predict future changes (Hellstr  ¨om and Holmstr ¨om [1998]) The developer have proved it wrong by making forecasting models, this issue remains an interesting area. This controversy is just only matter of the word immediately in the definition. The studies in support of the argument of EMH rely on using the statistical tests and show that the technical indicators and tested models can’t forecast. However, the studies against the argument uses the time delay between the point when new information enters the model or system and the point when the information has spread across over the globe and a equilibrium has been reached in the stock market with a new market price. 2.1.3 Financial Time Series Forecasting Financial Time series Forecasting aims to find underlying patterns, trends and forecast future index value using using historical and current data or information. The historic values are continuous and equally spaced value over time and it represent various types of data . The main aim of the forecasting is to find an approximate mapping function between the input variables and the forecasted or output value . According to Kalekar (2004), Time series forecasting assumes that a time series is a combination of a pattern and some error. The goal of the model using time series is to separate the pattern from the error by understanding the trend of the pattern and its seasonality Several methods are used in time series forecasting like moving average (section ) moving averages, linear regression with time etc. Time series differs from the technical analysis (section) that it is based on the samples and treated the values as non-chaotic time series. Many academic researchers have applied t ime series analysis in their forecasting model, but there has been no major success. [1a] 2.2 Stock Market 2.2.1 Introduction Let us consider the basics of the stock market. MM What are stocks? Stock refers to a share in the ownership of a corporation or company. They represent a claim of the stock owner on the company’s earnings and assets and by buying more stocks; the stake in the ownership is increased. In United States, stocks are often referred as shares, whereas in the UK they are also used as synonym for bonds, shares and equities. MM Why a Company issues a stock? The main reason for issuing stock is that the company wants to raise money by selling some part of the company. A company can raise money by two ways: â€Å"debt financing† (borrowing money by issuing bonds or loan from bank) and â€Å"equity financing â€Å"(borrowing money by issuing stocks).It is advantageous to raise the money by issuing stocks as the company has not to pay money back to the stock owners but they have to share the profit in the form of the dividends. MM What is Stock Pricing or price? A stock price is the price of a single stock of a number of saleable stocks traded by the company. A company issue stock at static price, and the stock price may increase or decrease according to the trade. Normally the price of the stocks in the stock market is determined by the supply/demand equilibrium. MM What is a Stock Market? Stock Market or equity market is a public market where the trading and issuing of a company stock or derivates takes place either through the stock exchange or they may be traded privately and over-the counter markets. It is vital part of the economy as it provides opportunities to the company to raise money and also to the investors of having potential gain by selling or buying share. The stock market in the US includes the NYSE, NASDAQ, the AMEX as well as many regional exchanges. London Stock Exchange is the major stock exchange in the UK and Europe.As mentioned in the Chapter 1, in this study we forecast the London Stock Exchange (Section 2.2.2.). Investing in the stock market is very risky as the stock market is uncertain and unsteady. The main aim of the investor is to get maximum returns from the money invested in the stock market, for which he has to study about the performance, price history about the stock company .So it is a broad category and according to Hellstrom (1997), there are four main ways to predict the stock market: 1. Fundamental analysis (section 2.2.3) 2. Technical analysis, (section 2.2.4) 3. Time series forecasting (section 2.1) 4. Machine learning (ANN). (Section 2.3) 2.2.2 London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange is one of the world’s oldest and largest stock exchanges in the world, which started its operation in 1698, when John Casting commenced â€Å"at this Office in Jonathan’s Coffee-house† a list of stock and commodity prices called â€Å"The Course of the Exchange and other things† [2] .On March 3, 1801, London Stock Exchange was officially established with current lists of over 3,200 companies and has existed, in one or more form or another for more than 300 years. In 2000, it decided to become public and listed its shares on its own stock exchange in 2001. The London Stock market consists of the Main Market and Alternative Investments Market (AIM), plus EDX London (exchange for equity derivatives). The Main Market is mainly for established companies with high performance, and AIM hand trades small-caps, or new enterprises with high growth potential.[1] Since the launch of the AIM in 1995, AIM has become the most successful growth market in the world with over 3000 companies from across the globe have joined AIM. To evaluate the London Stock Exchange, the autonomous FTSE Group (owned by the Financial Times and the London Stock Exchange) , sustains a series of indices comprising the FTSE 100 Index, FTSE 250 Index, FTSE 350 Index, FTSE All-Share, FTSE AIM-UK 50, FTSE AIM 100, FTSE AIM All-Share, FTSE SmallCap, FTSE Tech Mark 100 ,FTSE Tech Mark All-Share.[4] FTSE 100 is the most famous and composite index calculated respectively from the top 100 largest companies whose shares are listed on the London Stock Exchange. The base date for calculation of FTSE 100 index is 1984. [2] In the UK, the FTSE 100 is frequently used by large investor, financial experts and the stock brokers as a guide to stock market performance. The FTSE index is calculated from the following formula: 2.2.3 Fundamental Analysis Fundamental Analysis focuses on evaluation of the future stock exchange movements