Jeremy Burlingame Essays - Literature, Fiction, Goethes Faust

Jeremy Burlingame Jeremy Burlingame The hero that never was In Faust, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe builds a dramatic poem around the strengths and weaknesses of a man who under a personalized definition of a hero fails miserably. A hero is someone that humanity models themselves and their actions after, someone who can be revered by the masses as an individual of great morality and strength, a man or woman that never sacrifices his beliefs under adversity. Therefore, through his immoral actions and his unwillingness to respect others rights and privileges, Faust is determined to be a man of un heroic proportions. It is seen early in the poem, that Faust has very strong beliefs and a tight moral code that is deeply rooted in his quest for knowledge. Sitting in his den, Faust describes his areas of instruction, "I have, alas, studied philosophy, jurisprudence and medicine, too, and, worst of all, theology with keen endeavor, through and through..." It is obvious that through his studies he has va lued deep and critical thinking, however with the help of Mephisto, he would disregard his values and pursue the pleasures of the flesh. Faust's impending downward spiral reveals the greed that both Mephisto and Faust share. Mephisto's greed is evident in the hope that he will overcome Faust's morality and thus be victorious in his wager with God; also because he is the devil and that is what he does. For Faust, greed emerges because of his desire to attain physical pleasures and therefore become whole in mind, body and spirit. Faust's goal to become the ?berminche is an understandable desire, however, the means at which he strives for those ends are irresponsible and unjust. It is through this greed that Faust with the help of Mephisto exploit others in the pursuit of Faust's earthly desires. Enter innocent Gretchen, a poor lower class young woman who experiences the impossible, love. Under Mephisto's magical potion, Faust becomes intoxicated with passion and controlled by his hor mones. It is under this spell that he approaches the "beautiful" Gretchen, however, the feeling of passion is not mutual between the two. Faust realizes then, that his simple looks and personality will not attract Gretchen, rather Faust must deceive and manipulate this woman in order to possess her. Thus, Faust turns to Mephisto for help in his quest for Gretchen, "Get me that girl, and don't ask why?"(257) Mephisto replies with a quote that establishes the nature at which Faust will pursue Gretchen with, "We'd waste our time storming and running; we have to have recourse to cunning."(261) It is from this point in the story that Faust declines into a state of immorality and irresponsibility; a level he will remain at for the majority of the story. Faust's immorality emerges from the idealization that despite harming others, there are not any consequences to his actions. The harm in combining Faust and Mephisto is that their actions become dangerous and deadly. Faust becomes an unstoppable, Napoleonic figure, when his irresponsibility is mixed with Mephisto's lethal power. Gretchen is Faust's first victim, before her death she was responsible for three deaths; ultimately she is imprisoned because of Faust's influence upon her. Faust's desire for progress and reformation in society led to the deaths of his second set of victims, an elderly couple. Thus, Mephisto burns them out, a result that Faust had not asked for specifically, but an action which served the purpose and was almost as detrimental as what Faust had intended for them, to move them out of their home. This action against the elderly is analogous to any other parts of the story in which Faust commits an illegal or immoral act to heighten himself in his own eyes. It is obvious then that Faust is a criminal, a man who abuses the rights of others to gain spiritual and financial freedom for himself. A criminal is a personn that should neither be rewarded or idealized for his actions against society . The only endeavor that Faust does in order to save himself, is to feel apologetic and remorseful for his immoral and self-serving actions, and is therefore allowed into heaven, an ending to the story which is unreal

A Free Essay Sample to Help You Make Use of It

A Free Essay Sample to Help You Make Use of ItThe Extended Essay Sample is a free report that covers writing samples, the writing process, brainstorming techniques, story/character development, and information, language, and composition skills. If you're just starting out in writing or looking to learn some new tricks, then this sample is for you. If you've already started writing, or don't really know how to write your first essay, then this can be a good primer for you.The interactive sample is written using Microsoft Word and contains lots of illustrations and screenshots. You can also download a free digital college textbook for use in creating this sample. The questions and answers that appear on the screen are all the same as what you'll find on the actual sample essay, so you won't have to worry about re-reading them, or spending your valuable time looking for solutions. They're simply included for your convenience.You may be thinking that all this involves is using a Word doc ument for your Extended Essay Sample. Well, no, it's actually more than that. Even though this is an easy 'paper work' document that you can customize in a number of ways, it contains advice on grammar, spelling, punctuation, style, structure, and more.The free articles are not only helpful in understanding the fundamentals of writing, but they are also a great tool for marketing or advertising, and can help you build up your writing skills. This free product is just like your standard business or informational articles that you find on the internet. The only difference is that it is written in English, by a professional writer, and you are able to customize it to fit your needs.The free sample includes not only online help but video tutorials, and links to paid resources. There are many samples and videos online, and you can find them for free. Once you're ready to get started, just go to one of the websites and begin browsing the different topics covered. You'll find articles that will teach you how to write, and all the necessary information you need to help you with writing a better essay.It's also recommended that you first brush up on your grammar and write your essay according to the guidelines. With this free 'essay sample,' you're given guidelines and sample problems, so you'll know how to do things properly. After learning how to handle different types of essays, you'll be well on your way to a greater degree of success. This will prepare you for other free resources that are available.The material you receive from this free course will be very helpful. Since you can customize it to your own needs, you can easily create your own unique resources or choose to purchase a professional version. Whatever you choose, this is just one step away from having your own free essay on the web.Free means that it is completely accessible and totally free. After purchasing the items on this free resource, you'll be ready to publish your own free eBook with more comp rehensive information.

Industrial Revolution Essays - Factory, Manufacturing, Free Essays

Industrial Revolution Essays - Factory, Manufacturing, Free Essays Industrial Revolution Robert Chaplin History 112 Dr. Farrell 20 April 2000 Industrial Revolution One of the most significant personality changes that has occurred in the world took place during the 1700s to the early 1800s; the Industrial Revolution. It is described as a time of drastic change from hand made items to machine made goods. This meant basically that people had to learn how to manufacture goods in enormous factories instead of cultivating them from the land. The Industrial Revolution began in England because of their large demand for coal and iron. And since they had a large supply of this, England soon began to have to produce vast amounts across all of Europe. In the 1700s, England was one of the worlds leading producers of iron and coal and was considered as having the most colonial power. This is all due to their newly acquired colonies. The colonies currently known as the United States of America. The colonies provided a market for manufactured products. The markets helped stimulate the textile and iron industries in England. The colonies also gave England all of the

Prosauropods - The Ancient Cousins of the Sauropods

Prosauropods - The Ancient Cousins of the Sauropods If theres one rule of evolution, its that all mighty creatures have smaller, less overwhelming ancestors lurking somewhere back in their family treesand nowhere is this rule more evident than in the relationship between the giant sauropods of the late Jurassic period and the smaller prosauropods that preceded them by tens of millions of years. Prosauropods (Greek for before the sauropods) werent simply scaled-down versions of Brachiosaurus or Apatosaurus; many of them walked on two legs, and theres some evidence that they may have pursued an omnivorous, rather than strictly herbivorous, diet. (See a gallery of prosauropod dinosaur pictures and profiles.) You might assume from their name that prosauropods eventually evolved into sauropods; this was once thought to be the case, but paleontologists now believe that most prosauropods were actually second cousins, once removed, of the sauropods (not a technical description, but you get the idea!) Rather, it appears that prosauropods evolved in parallel with the true ancestors of sauropods, which have yet to be definitively identified (though there are a number of likely candidates). Prosauropod Physiology and Evolution One of the reason prosauropods are fairly obscureat least compared to raptors, tyrannosaurs and sauropodsis that they didnt look all that distinctive, by dinosaur standards. As a general rule, prosauropods had long (but not very long) necks, long (but not very long) tails, and only attained median sizes of between 20 and 30 feet and a few tons, max (with the exception of odd genera like the giant Melanorosaurus). Like their distant cousins, the hadrosaurs, most prosauropods were capable of walking on two or four feet, and reconstructions tend to show them in a relatively clumsy, ungainly posture. The prosauropod family tree stretches back to the late Triassic period, about 220 million years ago, when the first dinosaurs were just beginning to establish their worldwide dominance. The earliest genera, like Efraasia and Camelotia, are wrapped in mystery, since their plain vanilla appearance and anatomy meant their ancestors could have evolved in any number of directions. Another early genus was the 20-pound Technosaurus, named after Texas Tech University, which many experts believe to have been an archosaur rather than a true dinosaur, much less a prosauropod. Other early prosauropods, like Plateosaurus and Sellosaurus (which may have been the same dinosaur), are much better established on the dinosaur evolutionary tree thanks to their numerous fossil remains; in fact, Plateosaurus appears to have been one of the most common dinosaurs of late Triassic Europe, and may have roamed the grasslands in giant herds like modern bison. A third famous prosauropod of this period was the hundred-pound Thecodontosaurus, which was named for its distinctive, monitor-lizard-type teeth. Massospondylus is the best-known of the early Jurassic prosauropods; this dinosaur did in fact look like a scaled-down sauropod, but it probably ran on two legs rather than four! What Did Prosauropods Eat? Over and above their evolutionary relationship (or lack of relationship) to the giant sauropods, the most controversial aspect of prosauropods concerns what they ate for lunch and dinner. Based on an analysis of the teeth and relatively lightweight skulls of certain prosauropod genera, some paleontologists have concluded that these dinosaurs werent very well equipped for digesting the tough vegetable matter of the late Triassic period, though there are no direct proof that they ate meat (in the form of fish, insects or smaller dinosaurs). On the whole, the preponderance of the evidence is that prosauropods were strictly herbivorous, though that what if still lingers in the minds of some experts.

World poverty Annotated Bibliography Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

World poverty - Annotated Bibliography Example There are clear recommendations in the article that can help in combating these issues in the future. For instance, Andrew asserts that increasing literacy levels and offering employment may reduce poverty levels among the populations affected. In another perspective, the journal article addresses the impact of AIDS across the world and its effects on the international development. It further addresses how these effects have contributed to high poverty levels in the world. The journal article elaborates how AIDS impacts are experienced from a personal level, community level, household level, and international level. The article also addresses how the impacts of AIDS has resulted into high levels of mortality and increased rates of crude death. The purpose of the author in writing this journal article is to address the causes of high poverty levels as well as the suggested solutions to the same. The article asserts that the effects of AIDS on quality of education, and poor access to healthcare services are responsible for high poverty levels in the world; therefore any measures to curb this vice will automatically reduce the levels of poverty in the world. The journal article targets the whole world as the audience since poverty is a global issue. Finally, the journal article says that the increasing deaths in the population’s most productive segment impacts on both the quantity and quality of labor force, this according to Andrew is very costly to the world and results into high poverty levels. The author of the article is a specialist in world sociology; he has documented information about poverty in many other articles. His work is reliable due to the multiple other sources and references that he cited in his wor k. This source is relevant to my work as it addresses the major concerns of poverty and I will use it to highlight and cite the global poverty as a problem. According to Chartres and Varma, there is a major problem of

Alzheimer's disease Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Alzheimer's disease - Essay Example lois Alzheimer first detected and described this disease in 1907 in Auguste Deter, a middle aged woman who was diagnosed with the dementia and some disorders in her brain function. Untill 1970s this disease defined as a rare condition that affect old people, but Robert Katzman proved that Alzheimer`s disease is not a normal part of aging and it is the same condition as senile dementia. The statistic shows that Alzheimer`s disease affected approximately 26.6 million of people in 2006. Clinical trials predict that prevalence of the Alzheimer`s will be 1 out of 85 people by 2050 worldwide. (Web MD, 2014) There are several types of Alzheimer`s disease depending on the severity. They include mild and moderate Alzheimer`s disease. Mild Alzheimer`s is an early stage of this disease that characterized with temporary memory loss. Patients at this stage usually have problems with complicated tasks, forget where they put their things, get lost, cannot find words to explain their thoughts and have changeable mood. People can normally survive with this type of Alzheimer`s but they required appropriate treatment to reduce possible symptoms. (FÃ ¶rstl H, 1999) Neuropsychological testing can detect this type of Alzheimer`s disease because the symptoms can be confusing with aging. Moderate Alzheimer`s is the most complicated and longest stage of the disease. It is progressive and can leads to overall memory lost. Patients with this type of Alzheimer`s usually do not remember their biography, family, friends and have problems with thinking and language. In this stage patient`s cannot normally live without help of the caregivers and treatment. It can last for years and finally lead to death. People with Alzheimer`s disease can live approximately 7 years after diagnosis. Only in 3% of all Alzheimer`s cases patients lived for 14 years after diagnosis. (Wenk GL,2003) At the cellular level Alzheimer`s disease mainly affect neurons in the cerebral cortex. Neurons lose their ability to

Distal Symmetrical Neuropathy (DPN)

Distal Symmetrical Neuropathy (DPN) Abstract The most common complication of diabetes, distal symmetrical neuropathy (DPN), decreases quality of life and causes disability. Therefore, it hasa significant impact on social and economic aspects. Unfortunately, the treatment of this condition remains challenging because, apart from improving glycaemic control, there are currently no pathogenetic drugs that meet the requirement set by US regulation. This is not necessarily due to a lack of therapeutic potential, but because the endpoints were not robust enough to detect the therapeutic benefit. This essay will address several acknowledged surrogate endpoints (SE) for DPN. Corneal confocal microscopy will also be reviewed as a potential SE for DPN. Introduction Neuropathy, a common long-term complication of diabetes, is associated with the progressive loss of nerve fibres affecting both the somatic and autonomic nervous systems.1 The most common type of diabetic neuropathy is DPN, of which manifestation may vary from painful sensations to foot insensitivity at risk of ulceration.2 In an attempt to treat DPN, clinicians use symptomatic drugs such as tricyclic antidepressants, anticonvulsants, opioids, and opioid-like agents that alleviate painful symptoms in the lower limbs.3 These drugs, however, do not affect the underlying cause of the disease, which is believed to be progressive loss of nerve fibres. Drugs that target putative pathogenesis of the disease, therefore, may become great alternatives. There are currently two main experimental drugs that belong to this group: namely, antioxidant ÃŽ ±-lipoic acid4 and aldose-reductase inhibitor epalrestat.5 However, although theyhave been approved in a limited number of countries, they fail to demonstrate sufficient efficacy to be approved by US regulation. This has raised a question about the reason behind this problem. Poorly designed trials, slow progression of the disease, relatively short duration of the trials, strong placebo effect, and endpoints selection are amongst the factors proposed behind this problem.6The latter factor is of particular interest because some of the current surrogate endpoints for DPN assessment may be subjective due to reliance on the patient’s response. Further discussion of SE for DPN will be reviewed below. Surrogate endpoints for DPN The endpoints used in clinical trialsare variable to evaluate the changes in patient condition after they have been given certain treatment. The ideal endpoints should be clinically meaningful and directly measure how the patients feel, function, and survive.7 However, it is difficult in some cases to apply them in clinical trials due to subjectivity or measurement difficulty. Moreover, the clinical trials have to be conducted overa very long periodto measure these ideal endpoints. To solve this problem, the researchers use the surrogate endpoints which define any laboratory measures, signs or symptomsthat are intended to be used as substitutes for clinically meaningful endpoints.7 Therefore, any changes in the surrogate endpoints induced by treatment are expected to reflect the changes in the clinically meaningful endpoints. In the case of DPN, several endpoints have been used to diagnose and evaluate progression or severity of the disease, including clinical assessment, electrophysiology, quantitative sensory testing (QST),8 sympathetic skin response (SSR),9 quantitative sudomotor axon reflex test (QSART),9, 10 autonomic testing, nerve/skin biopsy,11-13 and corneal confocal microscopy (CCM).14 Clinical assessment of DPN involves assessing the severity of the patients’ symptoms and neurological examination. Most components of this examination rely on patients’ responses and the physicians’ experiences; therefore it has poor reproducibility and marked variation in inter-observer agreement.Dyck15 tried to overcome this problem by developing composite scores that assess the symptoms and signs of DPN. The neuropathy symptom score (NSS) was developed to assess the symptoms, whereas the neuropathy disability score (NDS) was devised as a quantified neurological examination.15 Later, NDS was replaced by the neuropathy impairment score (NIS).16 However, these scores still have a certain degree of subjectivity, meaning the evaluation of disease severity may be biased. An electrophysiology study measures the electrical conduction along the nerve fibres to evaluate their function. As a surrogate endpoint, it has been criticised due to the need for special equipment and a trained examiner.17 Moreover, there is evidence that it only assesses the function of large fibres,18 yet the earliest fibres affected by diabetes aresmall unmyelinated fibres.12 QST, on the other hand, evaluates both large (A-beta) and small (A-delta and C) nerve fibres. It measures sensory response after the application of accurately calibrated sensory (mechanical and thermal) stimuli.8 However, it has been criticised because it is subjective (based on patient response) and thus cannot differentiate between fake or real response. Due to this reason, QST results are not recommended to be the sole criteria to diagnose DPN. The combination of composite score, electrophysiology, and QST offers a relatively robust tool to define neuropathic severity but fails to detect the earliest sta ge of nerve damage that happens in small unmyelinated fibres.19 The somatic nerve disturbances due to diabetes are usually accompanied by vasomotor or sudomotor changes that suggest autonomic involvement. QSART examines the sudomotor changes in neuropathic patients by measuring sweat volume produced by skin after chemical10 or electrical stimulation.20 QSART is considered as a robust endpoint for DPN because it is quite sensitive, objective, and reproducible.9, 20 It has been shown to be able to detect C-fibres involvement in DPN patients who have otherwise normal neurological examinations and nerve-conduction studies.10 However, it requires special equipment and needs a relatively long time to be carried out. These drawbacks limit the application of QSART in clinical trials, especially if a large number of subjects are required. Sural-nerve biopsies and skin biopsies directly assess the damage and repair of small nerve fibres and have been proposed to be surrogate endpoints in clinical trials.11, 12Both of these methods have been shown to be very sensitive in detecting regeneration or abnormality insmall nerve fibres. The quantification of intra-epidermal nerve-fibre density (IENFD) from a skin biopsy, for example, is shown to be more sensitive than QSART and QST in diagnosing DPN.13 Nevertheless, the invasive nature of these procedures may become a problem, especially for diabetic patients. To solve this problem, anon-invasive measurement needs to be developed. CCM offers a new approach to directly measure the severity of DPN through visualisation of the subbasal nerve plexus in Bowman’s layer of the cornea. The cornea is a highly innervated organ which contains dense A-delta and C-unmyelinated fibres. The question remains whether corneal innervation has a connection with neuropathy caused by diabetes. Recent evidence, however, shows that corneal sensation is impaired in both diabetic21 and galactose-fed rats.22Moreover, in diabetic patients the subclinical abnormalities of corneal innervations23 and corneal ulceration24 are commonly recognised. This is due to the progressive loss of corneal nerve fibres which in turn reduces the neurotrophic stimuli required to develop a healthy and thick corneal epithelium. In 2000, Rosenberg et al.25 found that corneal sensation and nerve-fibre number werereduced in patients with type I diabetes. Later, the degree of corneal-n erve-fibre loss was shown to correlate with the degree of DPN assessed by a combination of NDS, electrophysiology and QST.26 These suggest that diabetes may affect the corneal innervations and therefore it is possible to assess neuropathy through corneal-nerve-fibre evaluation. CCM assesses corneal nerve morphology by quantifying three different parameters: namely, corneal-nerve-fibre density (NFD), the total number of major fibres per square millimetre; nerve-branch density (NBD), the number of branches emanating from major nerve trunks per square millimetre; and nerve-fibre length (NFL), the total length of nerve fibres and branches per square millimetre.26Quattrini et al.14 provided further evidence that CCM parameters can be used to assess small-fibre damage in humans. Moreover, they found that CCM results correlated with IEFND, which was considered a robust tool to assess small-fibre damage. Later, a study in patients who underwent simultaneous kidney-and-pancreas transplantation showed that CCM was, in fact, more sensitive than IEFND to detect early nerve damage and regeneration.27 The role of CCM is not limited to evaluating the progression of disease;it can also be used to diagnose DPN and identify at-risk patients due to high sensitivity.28 These s uggest that CCM may be used as a tool to diagnose, identify at-risk patients, and evaluate nerve-fibre damage or repair. Recently, CCM has successfully detected corneal nerve damage which correlates with neuropathic measurements in several diseases other than diabetes, such as idiopathic small-fibre neuropathy,29 Fabry disease,30 and Charcott-Marie-Tooth type 1A disease.31The evidence so far shows that CCM may have the potential to be an ideal surrogate endpoint for DPN. It is sensitive, quantitative, highly reproducible, and noninvasive.32, 33However, more research is needed to establish a connection between CCM measurement and clinically meaningful endpoints which, in the case of DPN, are pain, disability, and the curtailment of quality of life. Conclusion Apart from the possibility that the tested drug may not yield the intended outcome, the failure to detect the effectiveness of experimental drugsmay, in case of DPN, be caused by improper selection of surrogate endpoints in clinical trials. There are currently several acknowledged surrogate endpoints for DPN, such as clinical assessment, electrophysiology, QST, QSART, SSR, monofilament test, nerve/skin biopsy, and autonomic testing.However, they have several drawbacks, such as being time consuming, subjective, and difficult to practice. Recently, CCM has emerged as a potential surrogate endpoint for DPN because it is non-invasive, highly reproducible, quantitative, and sensitive. However, more research is needed to establish its position as a game changer in neuropathy-outcome assessment.