Aporia Definition and Examples

Aporia Definition and Examples Aporia is a  figure of speech in which the speaker expresses real or simulated doubt or perplexity. The adjective is  aporetic. In classical rhetoric, aporia means placing a claim in doubt by developing arguments on both sides of an issue. In the terminology of deconstruction, aporia is a final impasse or paradoxthe site at which the text most obviously undermines its own rhetorical structure, dismantles, or deconstructs itself. Etymology: From the Greek, without passagePronunciation: eh-POR-ee-eh Examples and Observations David MikicsScholars have described as aporetic early Socratic dialogues like the Protagoras (ca. 380 BCE), which end in puzzlement rather than resolution, and which fail to supply convincing definitions of sought-after concepts like truth and virtue. At the end of the Protagoras, wrote the philosopher Sà ¸ren Kierkegaard, Socrates and Protagoras resemble two bald men searching for a comb.Peter FalkI dont think its proving anything, Doc. As a matter of fact, I dont even know what it means. Its just one of those things that gets in my head and keeps rolling around in there like a marble.William WordsworthIf living sympathy be theirsAnd leaves and airs,The piping breeze and dancing treeAre all alive and glad as we:Whether this be truth or noI cannot tell, I do not know;Naywhether now I reason well,I do not know, I cannot tell.Ford Maddox FordAm I no better than a eunuch or is the proper manthe man with the right to existencea raging stallion forever neighing after his neighbor’ s womankind? Or are we meant to act on impulse alone? It is all a darkness. Julian WolfreysA particularly striking example of the experience of the aporetic appears in Karl Marxs consideration of the commodity fetish, where he finds it logically impossible to explain, within the limits of his discourse, what transforms material into its mystified form as desired commodity, and what invests the commodity object with its commodified mystique.David LodgeRobin wrote the word with a coloured felt-tip marker on the whiteboard screwed to the wall of her office. Aporia. In classical rhetoric it means real or pretended uncertainty about the subject under discussion. Deconstructionists today use it to refer to more radical kinds of contradiction or subversion of logic or defeat of the readers expectation in a text. You could say that its deconstructions favourite trope. Hillis Miller compares it to following a mountain path and then finding that it gives out, leaving you stranded on a ledge, unable to go back or forwards. It actually derives from a Greek word meaning a pathless path.

Business Ethics

Business Ethics Essay Ethics in Business From a business perspective, working under government contracts can be a very lucrative proposition. In general, a stream of orders keep coming in, revenue increases and the company grows in the aggregate. The obvious downfalls to working in this manner is both higher quality expected as well as the extensive research and documentation required for government contracts. If a part fails to perform correctly it can cause minor glitches as well as problems that can carry serious repercussions, such as in the National Semiconductor case. When both the culpable component and company are found, the question arises of how extensive these repercussions should be. Is the company as an entity liable or do you look into individual employees within that company? From an ethical perspective one would have to look at the mitigating factors of both the employees and their superiors along with the role of others in the failure of these components. Next you would have to analyze the final ruling from a corporate perspective and then we must examine the macro issue of corporate responsibility in order to attempt to find a resolution for cases like these. The first mitigating factor involved in the National Semiconductor case is the uncertainty, on the part of the employees, on the duties that they were assigned. It is plausible that during the testing procedure, an employee couldnt distinguish which parts they were to test under government standards and commercial standards. In some cases they might have even been misinformed on the final consumers of the products that they tested. In fact, ignorance on the part of the employees would fully excuse them from any moral responsibility for any damage that may result from their work. Whether it is decided that an employees is fully excused, or is given some moral responsibility, would have to be looked at on an individual basis. The second mitigating factor is the duress or threats that an employee might suffer if they do not follow through with their assignment. After the bogus testing was completed in the National Semiconductor labs, the documentation department also had to falsify documents stating that the parts had surpassed the governmental testing standards. From a legal and ethical standpoint, both the testers and the writers of the reports were merely acting as agents on direct orders from a superior. This was also the case when the plant in Singapore refused to falsify the documents and were later falsified by the employees at the have California plant before being submitted to the approval committees (Velazquez, 53). The writers of the reports were well aware of the situation yet they acted in this manner on the instruction of a supervisor. Acting in an ethical manner becomes a secondary priority in this type of environment. As stated by Alan Reder, . . . if they the employees feel they will suffer retribution, if they report a problem, they arent too likely to open their mouths. (113). The workers knew that if the reports were not falsified they would come under questioning and perhaps their employment would go into jeopardy. Although working under these conditions does not fully excuse an employees from moral fault, it does start the divulging process for determining the order of the chain of command of superiors and it helps to narrow down the person or department that issued the original request for the unethical acts. The third mitigating factor is one that perhaps encompasses the majority of the employees in the National Semiconductor case. We have to balance the direct involvement that each employee had with the defective parts. Thus, it has to be made clear that many of the employees did not have a direct duty with the testing departments or with the parts that eventually failed. Even employees, or sub-contractors, that were directly involved with the production were not aware of the incompetence on the part of the testing department. READ: Comparison Of The Piano Lesson And Sonnys Blues Essay For example, the electrical engineer that designed the defective computer chip could act in good faith that it would be tested to ensure that it did indeed meet the required government endurance tests. Also, for the employees that handled the part after the testing process, .

Limited Liabilty Partnership Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Limited Liabilty Partnership - Essay Example These businesses are the most common and simplest ones since they just have one owner who runs the business by himself and is self employed. These types of businesses are east to start since they do not require much, if not any, legal obligations, and paperwork. It is important to note that the sole trader assumes the â€Å"all† the responsibility of the business. This includes looking after all the operations, issues, debts, loans and others. The problem with this business is that the sole trader has unlimited liability for the business and in case of bankruptcy, the sole trader would have to pay off the debts and claims from his pocket or by selling off the company’s assets and the sole trader’s assets as well (Hicks & Goo, pp. 13-18). Important here to note that the law does not provide the sole trader’s company, the status of a â€Å"separate legal entity† which other forms of business enjoy having. These businesses do not have the option of equity financing or in simple words issuing bonds and stocks for raising capital. Moreover, if the sole trader goes for debt financing, even then, the loan would be on his name and not on the company’s name and he, not the company, would be liable for paying off the loan (Mancuso, pp. 65-69). The second type of business would be of partnerships where two or more partners jointly start their business and share the responsibilities and ownership of the business. Unlike sole proprietor where only one person is responsible for everything, in partnerships, all the partners share the responsibility of running the business. However, their liability remains unlimited. This is because of the fact that partners are liable for any decision whether taken by him or any other partner. Moreover, if one partner runs away than the rest would have to pay his or her debts liabilities from their pockets (Martin, pp. 41-49). These types of businesses are easy to form and easy to dissolve as

The Geopolitics of Oil Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Geopolitics of Oil - Assignment Example Hence, it got imperative for the West to dominate the politics and economy in the Middle East, a resolve that only strengthened with time. As the world began to reap the benefits of industrialization signified by mechanization and automation of most of the salient aspects of social, industrial and economic existence, oil and natural gas emerged to be the primary drivers of industrial growth, economic progress and social mobility in the developed world. The developing nations were still marred by colonial suppression, conventional economies, poverty, political marginalization and scientific backwardness. Thereby, the expected outcome of this scenario was that if on the one side the industrialized West became the primary consumer of the world oil and gas resources, the concentration of the world petroleum reserves in the Middle East made it a strategic imperative to tighten the Western grip over the region. The following decades only saw a continuation and expansion of this planned Western hegemony. The meddlesome mentality adopted by the political class in Europe and the US was conveniently followed by the Western corpo rations, once they realized that petro resources surpassed any other sector, when it came to maximizing returns on investment. In a post World War II scenario, the victorious powers that are the UK, France, and the US did assure that the nations they had artificially carved out of their erstwhile fiefdoms were governed by autocratic rulers, who relied on their military and political backing to hold on to power. In contrast, the common populace in the region deeply resented these West backed dictators. Consequently in many Middle Eastern nations, this popular aversion for the meddlesome, oil hungry West led to the rise of nationalist, Islamic or socialist political forces, the most salient examples being Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Egypt. This didn’t change the Western mentality or the urge to control petroleum wealth in the

A Flag for Canada Essay -- essays research papers

A Flag for Canada   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Canadian Government defines a flag as â€Å"a symbol to identify people belonging to a group.†   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Canada has been a country for many years but has always lacked one thing. Up until 1965, we did not have our own official flag. The first thoughts of Canada adopting its own flag started in 1925. A Privacy Council committee looked at the possibilities but their work was never completed. This meant that the Red Ensign and the Union Jack would continue to represent Canada. In 1946 a committee was again formed to determine a national flag. Over 2,600 designs were submitted but yet again, no flag was picked.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In 1964, the Canadian government decided that they wanted a flag chosen before the ...

The Hunters: Phantom Chapter 30

Stefan drove like a maniac al the way back to the boardinghouse. â€Å"I can't believe I forgot to tel him that his name had been cal ed,† he said for what felt like the hundredth time. â€Å"I can't believe we left him alone.† â€Å"Slow down,† Meredith told him, trying to hold Matt's sleeping body steady in the backseat as Stefan whipped around a corner, tires squealing. â€Å"You're going way too fast.† â€Å"We're in a hurry,† Stefan growled, yanking on the wheel to make a hard right. Alaric turned around in the passenger seat and gave Meredith a panicky look as Stefan narrowly missed a garbage truck. She sighed. She knew he was trying to make up for his mistake, for not tel ing them immediately that Matt's name had appeared in the herb shop, but kil ing them al in a race to get home wasn't exactly the solution. Besides, although they probably would have done things differently if they'd known, it might not have changed the outcome for Matt. It wasn't as if their precautions had saved either Bonnie or Elena. â€Å"At least you've got vampire reflexes,† she said, more to reassure Alaric than out of any particular confidence in Stefan's driving abilities. She'd insisted on being the one sitting in the back with Matt, and now she turned her attention to him. She put a restraining hand on his chest so he wouldn't go tumbling to the floor as the car jerked and swerved. He was so stil . None of the twitching and eye movements that usual y went with sleep, just the steady shal ow rise and fal of his breathing. He wasn't even snoring. And she knew from camping trips as far back as sixth grade that Matt snored like a buzz saw. Always. Meredith never cried. Not even when the worst happened. And she wasn't going to start now, not when her friends needed her calm and focused to try to figure out how to save them. But if she had been the kind of girl who cried, instead of the kind of girl who strategized, she would have been sobbing. And even now, the breath caught in her throat a little painful y, until she schooled herself into impassive calm again. She was the only one left. Of the four old friends who'd gone through school and summers and adolescence and al the horrors the supernatural world could throw at them, she was the only one the phantom hadn't captured. Yet. Meredith clenched her teeth and held Matt steady. Stefan pul ed up and parked in front of the boardinghouse, having somehow avoided causing any damage to other cars or pedestrians along the way. Alaric and Meredith started to inch Matt careful y out of the car, looping his arms around their necks and slowly shifting him forward into a half-standing position. But Stefan simply grabbed Matt away from them and threw him over his shoulder. â€Å"Let's go,† he said, and stalked off toward the boardinghouse, easily balancing Matt's unconscious body with one hand, not looking back. â€Å"He's become kind of a strange guy,† Alaric commented, watching Stefan alertly. The sunshine caught the stubble on Alaric's unshaven chin and it glinted with a touch of gold. He turned toward Meredith and gave her a rueful, disarming grin. â€Å"Once more into the breach†¦Ã¢â‚¬  he said. Meredith took his hand, warm and solid in her own. â€Å"Come on,† she said. Once they were in the boardinghouse, Stefan clomped straight upstairs to deposit Matt with the other bodies – the other sleepers, Meredith reminded herself fiercely. Meredith and Alaric, hand in hand, turned toward the kitchen. As she pushed the door open, Meredith heard Mrs. Flowers's voice. â€Å"Very useful indeed, my dear,† she was saying, a warm note of approval in her voice. â€Å"You've done very wel . I'm so grateful.† Meredith gaped. At the kitchen table with Mrs. Flowers, cool and calm and pretty in a blue linen dress, sat Dr. Celia Conner, sipping tea. â€Å"Hel o, Alaric. Hel o, Meredith,† said Celia. Her dark eyes bored cool y into Meredith's. â€Å"You'l never believe what I've found.† â€Å"What?† said Alaric eagerly, letting go of Meredith's hand. Her heart sank. Celia reached into a tote bag sitting by her chair and pul ed out a thick book bound in ragged brown leather. She smiled triumphantly and announced, â€Å"It's a book on phantoms. Dr. Beltram ended up sending me to Dalcrest Col ege, which actual y has a very comprehensive col ection of texts on the paranormal.† â€Å"I suggest we adjourn to the den,† Mrs. Flowers said, â€Å"where we can be more comfortable, and examine its contents together.† They moved to the den, but Stefan, when he joined them, did not seem any more comfortable. â€Å"Different types of phantoms,† he said, taking the book from Celia and flipping rapidly through the pages. â€Å"The history of phantoms in our dimension. Where is the banishment ritual? Why doesn't this thing have an index?† Celia shrugged. â€Å"It's very old and rare,† she said. â€Å"It was difficult to find, and it's the only book on the subject we're likely to be able to get our hands on, maybe the only one that exists, so we'l have to excuse things like that. These older texts, the authors wanted you to read straight through and real y learn about their subject, to understand what they wanted to tel you, not just to find the page you needed right away. You might try looking near the end, though.† Alaric was watching Stefan whip through the pages with an expression of pain. â€Å"It's a rare book, Stefan,† he said. â€Å"Please be more careful with it. Would you like me to look? I'm used to finding what I need in these kinds of books.† Stefan snarled, literal y snarled at him, and Meredith felt the hairs along the back of her neck rise. â€Å"I'l do it myself, teacher. I'm in a hurry.† He squinted down at the text. â€Å"Why does it have to be in such ornate print?† he complained. â€Å"Don't tel me it's because it's old. I'm older than it is, and I can barely read it. Huh. ‘Phantoms who are feeding like vampires on one choice sensibility, whether it be guilt, or despair, or grudge; or lust for victuals, the demon rum, or fal en women. The stronger be the sensibility, the worse be the outcome of the phantom created.' I think we could have figured that out ourselves.† Mrs. Flowers was standing slightly removed from the rest of the group, eyes fixed on empty air, muttering seemingly to herself as she communed with her mother. â€Å"I know,† she said. â€Å"I'l tel them.† Her eyes focused on the others as they stood around Stefan, peering over his shoulders. â€Å"Mama says that time is getting short,† she warned. Stefan leaped to his feet and exploded. â€Å"I know it's getting short,† he roared, getting right up into Mrs. Flowers's surprised face. â€Å"Can't your mother tel us something useful for once?† Mrs. Flowers staggered away from him, reaching out to steady herself on the back of a chair. Her face was white, and suddenly she looked older and more frail than ever before. Stefan's eyes widened, their color darkening to a stormy sea green, and he held out his hands, his face horrified. â€Å"I'm sorry,† he said. â€Å"Mrs. Flowers, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to frighten you. I don't know what came over me†¦ I'm just so worried about Elena and the others.† â€Å"I know, Stefan,† Mrs. Flowers said gravely. She had regained her balance and she looked stronger, calm and wise again. â€Å"We will get them back, you know. You must have faith. Mama does.† Stefan sat down, turning back to the book, his lips pressed together into a straight line. Her skin prickling with apprehension, Meredith gripped her stave more tightly as she watched him. When she had revealed to the others that the members of her family were hereditary vampire hunters and that it was now her turn to take on the duty, she had told Elena and Stefan that she would never turn on Stefan, that she understood that he wasn't like other, evil vampires, that he was good: harmless and benign to humans. She had made no such promises about Damon, and Elena and Stefan hadn't asked her to. They al shared an unspoken understanding that Damon couldn't real y be characterized as harmless, not even when he begrudgingly worked with them, and that Meredith would need to keep her options open when it came to him. But Stefan†¦ she had never thought this would happen, but now Meredith was worried that someday she might not be able to keep her promises about Stefan. She had never seen him acting the way he had been lately: irrational, angry, violent, unpredictable. She knew his behavior was probably caused by the phantom, but was Stefan becoming too dangerous? Could she kil him if she had to? He was her friend. Meredith's heart was racing. She realized that her knuckles had whitened against her fighting stave, and her hand ached. Yes, she realized, she would fight Stefan and try to kil him, if she had to. It was true that he was her friend, but her duty had to come first. She took a deep breath and consciously relaxed her hands. Stay calm, she coached herself. Breathe. Stefan was keeping himself more or less under control. It wasn't a decision she had to make. Not yet, anyway. A few minutes later, Stefan stopped flipping pages. â€Å"Here,† he said. â€Å"I think this is it.† He handed the book to Mrs. Flowers. She scanned the page quickly and nodded. â€Å"That feels like the right ritual,† she said seriously. â€Å"I ought to have everything we need to perform it right here in the house.† Alaric reached for the book. He read the spel , too, frowning. â€Å"Does it have to be a blood spel ?† he asked Mrs. Flowers. â€Å"If it backfires, the phantom might be able to turn it against us.† â€Å"I'm afraid it's going to have to be a blood spel ,† Mrs. Flowers replied. â€Å"We'd need more time to experiment to change the spel , and time is the one thing we don't have. If the phantom is able to use its captives the way we think it can, it's only going to get more powerful.† Alaric began to speak again but was interrupted. â€Å"Wait,† said Celia, a slightly shril note in her usual y husky voice. â€Å"A blood spel ? What does that mean? I don't want to get involved in anything† – she searched for a word – â€Å"unsavory.† She reached for the book, but Stefan slammed his hand down on it. â€Å"Unsavory or not, this is what we're doing,† he said quietly, but with a voice as hard as steel. â€Å"And you're a part of it. It's too late for you to back out now. I won't let you.† Celia gave a convulsive shudder and cringed back in her chair. â€Å"Don't you dare threaten me,† she said, her voice quavering. â€Å"Everybody calm down,† Meredith said sharply. â€Å"Celia, no one is going to make you do anything unless you agree to it. I'l protect you myself if need be.† Her eyes flew quickly to Alaric, who was glancing back and forth between them, looking worried. â€Å"But we need your help. Please. You may have saved us al by finding the spel , and we're grateful, but Stefan's right – you're part of this, too. I don't know if it'l work without you.† She hesitated a beat. â€Å"Or, if it does, it might leave you as the phantom's only target,† she added cunningly. Celia shivered again and wrapped her arms around herself. â€Å"I'm not a coward,† she said miserably. â€Å"I'm a scientist, and this†¦ irrational mysticism worries me. But I'm in. I'l help any way I can.† Meredith, for the first time, felt a flash of sympathy for her. She understood how hard it must be for Celia to continue to think of herself as a logical person while the boundaries of what she'd always accepted as reality col apsed around her. â€Å"Thank you, Celia.† Meredith glanced around the room at the others. â€Å"We've got the ritual. We've got the ingredients. We just need to gather everything together and start casting the spel . Are we ready?† Everyone sat up straighter, their faces taking on expressions of stern resolve. As scary as this was, it was good to final y have a purpose and a plan. Stefan breathed deeply and visibly took hold of himself, his shoulders relaxing and his stance settling into something less predatory. â€Å"Okay, Meredith,† he said. His stormy green eyes met her cool gray ones, in perfect accord. â€Å"Let's do this.†

Hallstatt Culture Early European Iron Age Culture

The Hallstatt Culture (~800 to 450 BC) is what archaeologists call the early Iron Age groups of central Europe. These groups were truly independent of one another, politically, but they were interconnected by a vast, extant trading network such that the material culture (tools, kitchenware, housing style, farming techniques) were similar across the region. Hallstatt Culture Roots At the end of the Urnfield stage of the Late Bronze Age, ca. 800 BC, the central Europeans were mostly farmers (herding and growing crops). The Hallstatt culture included an area between central France to western Hungary and from the Alps to central Poland. The term includes many different unrelated regional groups, who used the same set of material culture because of a strong network of trade and exchange. By 600 BC, iron tools spread into northern Britain and Scandinavia; elites concentrated in western and central Europe. The Hallstatt elites became concentrated within a zone between what is now the Burgundy region of eastern France and southern Germany. These elites were powerful and located in at least 16 hillforts called seats of power or fà ¼rstensitz. Hallstatt Culture and Hillforts Hillforts such as Heuneburg, Hohenasberg, Wurzburg, Breisach, Vix, Hochdorf, Camp de Chassey, and Mont Lassois have substantial fortifications in the form of bank-and-ditch defense. At least tenuous connections with the Mediterranean Greek and Etruscan civilizations are in evidence at the hillforts and some non-hillfort settlements. Burials were stratified with a few extremely richly outfitted chamber graves surrounded by up to a hundred or so secondary burials. Two dated to the Hallstatt which contain clear connections with Mediterranean imports are Vix (France), where an elite female burial contained a huge Greek krater; and Hochdorf (Germany), with three gold-mounted drinking horns and a large Greek cauldron for mead. Hallstatt elites clearly had a taste for Mediterranean wines, with numerous amphorae from Massalia (Marseille), bronze vessels and Attic pottery recovered from many fà ¼rstensitze. One distinctive trait of Hallstatt elite sites was vehicle burials. Bodies were placed in a timber-lined pit along with the ceremonial four-wheeled vehicle and the horse gear--but not the horses--that were used to move the body to the grave. The carts often had elaborate iron wheels with multiple spokes and iron studs. Sources Bujnal J. 1991. Approach to the study of the Late Hallstatt and Early La Tà ¨ne periods in eastern parts of Central Europe: results from ​comparative classification of Knickwandschale. Antiquity 65:368-375.Cunliffe B. 2008. The Three Hundred Years that Changed the World: 800-500 BC. Chapter 9 in Europe Between the Oceans. Themes and Variations: 9000 BC-AD 1000. New Haven: Yale University Press. p, 270-316Marciniak A. 2008. Europe, Central and Eastern. In: Pearsall DM, editor. Encyclopedia of Archaeology. New York: Academic Press. p 1199-1210.Wells PS. 2008. Europe, Northern and Western: Iron Age. In: Pearsall DM, editor. Encyclopedia of Archaeology. London: Elsevier Inc. p 1230-1240.