catalina figueroa iglesias

catalina figueroa iglesias  ¿Es mà ¡s barato comer comida rà ¡pida en tiempos de crisis econà ³mica? Estudios demuestran que, durante este perà ­odo de crisis econà ³mica, las tiendas de comida rà ¡pida han visto aumentar sus ganancias de manera considerable.  ¿Quà © factores inciden en el aumento del consumo? El servicio es mà ¡s rà ¡pido que el de un restaurant tradicional, y los precios son mucho mà ¡s baratos. Tambià ©n es mà ¡s barato que comer en la casa, ya que el gasto que se produce, en conjunto, abarca los productos comprados, el tiempo invertido en comprarlos y cocinarlos y hasta el gas utilizado en la cocina o la electricidad del microondas. Parece la solucià ³n mà ¡s adecuada para quienes buscan gastar menos y quedar mà ¡s satisfechos, ya que debido al alto contenido calà ³rico de la comida es mayor la sensacià ³n de saciedad. En tiempos de crisis hay mayor conciencia del gasto, en cada aspecto de la vida, tanto en lo monetario como en lo no monetario, como el tiempo. Ademà ¡s, en tiempos de crisis el gobierno no cuenta con fondos suficientes para gastar en fines â€Å"menos importantes† como campaà ±as para promover una vida saludable y evitar el sobrepeso, lo que tambià ©n condiciona la conducta de los consumidores. La posibilidad de que aumente la tasa de obesidad es bastante alta. Sin embargo, a nivel individual como estatal, este eventual sobrepeso se traduce en mayores gastos estatales en salud y campaà ±as que apunten a evitar la obesidad, y en un costo muy elevado para los consumidores, ya que arriesgan su bienestar fà ­sico, psicolà ³gico y otros como su apariencia fà ­sica. Comparativamente hablando, es mucho mà ¡s valioso para la mayorà ­a de los seres humanos racionales llevar una vida saludable y conservarse bien fà ­sica y mentalmente que ahorrarse unos cuantos pesos en el almuerzo. En el corto plazo parece muy conveniente la alternativa de la comida rà ¡pida, sin embargo, al largo plazo perjudica tanto al individuo como al Estado.

No Time to Think Essay

This week we were asked to analyse the following papers and a TED Talk presentation reflecting on how the accelerating pace of life and the distractions/noise in form of new means of communication are affecting our concentration and vanishing our â€Å"sanctuary† where we can dedicate time for thoughtful reflections. * â€Å"No time to think: Reflections on information technology and contemplative scholarship†, David M. Levy. (2007) * â€Å"Speed and the Unsettling of Knowledge in the Digital University†, Ray Land, (2011). TED Talk â€Å"5 ways to listen better†, Julian Treasure, (2011) Distractions serve anything but the knowledge It is true that today’s digitisation and networking tools speed up the pace of our communicative exchanges. In the other hand, these increasingly attractive tools are stealing our time and helping to distract us. These distractions serve anything but the knowledge because seriously limit our ability to focus and attention (and hence learning). Nowadays many people believe that reading an entire book is less attractive than commenting on their friends’ photos on Facebook or, open multiple tabs in a browser and quickly discover everything that is happening. It is precisely the possibility to access an incredible amount of information through the current digital technologies and encounter endless possibilities of knowledge that challenges our inability to build mental representations. Given the monumental supply of information obtained through the mass media, especially the Internet, the individual focuses his attention by very few moments in the data exposed on computer screens as they navigate through new links. However, the quality of these connections often contrasts with the amount of information, which are hardly assimilated because there is no time or effort to establish relations between concepts and thus, creating new meanings. As a result, individuals have habitual concentration difficulties, especially when â€Å"connect† with other people and at the same time read information in various news sites. It is not by chance the use of terms such as â€Å"connect†, â€Å"Liked† and â€Å"off† to describe relationships between people. It is as if the email’s boxes or the tweets call us all the time so that messages must be read and answered immediately. The schools adopting the digital education model have already evidenced these concentration problems. The use of new technologies in the classroom econfigures everyday identities of their teachers and students and thus, their own teaching practice in the presence of the students’ limitless access to information through the Internet. I believe that the teachers, as the digital immigrants, and students, as the digital natives, are overwhelmed with the emancipatory potential of the Internet that in somehow they are experienc ing a sense of loss as pointed out Ray Land: â€Å"Paradoxically this may be experienced as a sense of loss as an earlier, more secure stance of familiar knowing has to be abandoned as new and unfamiliar knowledge is encountered†. The temporary downside of this digital turn is a viral pact of mediocrity, through which teachers and students pretend to teach and learn, to the extent that the contents of academic papers are copied and pasted in the text with less and less reasoning being developed. New teachers adapted to this modus operandi disregard ethical issues and do not refute the information that the student presents through consultation online. Improving concentration in the digital environment Considering the above scenario, I believe that we need to re-think our strategy to overcome distraction and increase our capacity to learn in digital environments. As David M. Levy mentioned: â€Å"It might well be possible to begin to explore different modes of thinking – routine and creative modes, as well as obsessive mind chatter – not only to develop more nuanced and refined understandings of these processes but to understand how to encourage or discourage them†. The starting point could be the understanding of the mechanisms of human attention, decode how it works and even how to develop it. I personally think that concentration is not innate to the human being, but a skill that can be taught throughout life and can always be improved. Recently I read an intriguing book called â€Å"The Mind and the Brain: Neuroplasticity and the Power of Mental Force† (Jeffrey M. Schwartz and Sharon Begley, 2003) about the brain plasticity, which is the neurons’ ability to redistribute according to need and training. The conclusions regarding the brain’s ability to rewire itself and the idea that meditation may be driving neuroplastic changes are quite inspiring in the book. For J. Schwartz and S. Begley, the best way to ensure attention is to choose challenging activities. If the task is so hard that we almost cannot do it, will certainly require more focus. However, it is not always clear that we like or feel challenged by everything that we need to do. Sometimes the work is simply annoying, but still needs to be done. In these cases, the trick is to turn it into a kind of game, focusing on one phase at a time. Overcome steps, one by one, can leave the whole process more attractive. Something like the â€Å"gamification† strategies, i. e. points and titles that some programs or applications give each task is accomplished. Being totally concentrated has to do with the state of â€Å"flow† discussed in the week 4 of the IDLE course. The psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi tried to understand the phenomenon by calculating the amount of information that our neural networks are capable of absorbing. He reached a number: only 110bps (bits per second). Listening to someone talking, for example, requires the processing of 40bps. That means, there are 70bps left in to use for distractions around. So we can scribble on paper or think in others to-dos while listening to the conversation. Using the 110bps in an activity would be the equivalent of what Csikszentmihalyi calls â€Å"flow† that state of absolute concentration that makes us not even notice the time passing. Finally, the schools should debate more about the negative effects of distraction, the importance of the â€Å"white space† (or the sanctuary as we call at IDLE, the creation of physical spaces or times on the calendar for uninterrupted, unwired thinking and connection) and encourage students to apply basic practices to promote personal â€Å"white space†. These practices include: create a student routine, make lists with the priorities of the day, learn to organize time and to collect relevant study materials, learn to book time to solve everything else outside of the studies (a good way to fend off distractions is to take them out of our heads) and learn to absorb and to reflect on what has been collected.

Texting and Driving Persuasive

Just before senior year, it was a warm summer night. You were in the car with your friends, blasting music, singing along, and having a conversation on the phone all at the same time. It was all fun and games until you see the bright headlights of a large semi truck, and that was that. Crash! I’m sure there have been many situations like this one and it is a very distressing concept. Too many people make the wrong decision of texting and driving. When I tell them not to do it, they would just argue, â€Å"I’m really good at it though, trust me. I do understand that it turned into a continuous process; however, that doesn’t mean that accidents can’t happen. That is what they all think, but anything can happen to any driver, at anytime. My friends have learned not to text and drive when I am in the car with them, but that doesn’t mean they don’t do it when they are alone, or when I’m not in the car. In fact, I think that is even worse b ecause there is then no one to tell them, â€Å"Look out! † or â€Å"Stop! † By this point there is no turning back, just heartbroken family members and friends. Every day I see at least one person texting and driving, and it makes my heart skip a beat.Not only am I worried for that person to get in an accident, but I’m concerned for me, and other drivers on the road. I notice them driving carelessly, and swerving on the road. No matter what kind of situation you’re in, there are no good ones when it comes to the road. When my brother got his license he was caught texting and driving by my mom’s friend who then told her. She was furious! â€Å"Luke! † My mom snapped. â€Å"Why would you even think of texting and driving? You can get killed. † â€Å"It was only once; I don’t do it often though! † remarked Luke. â€Å"No matter how many times you do it, it only takes one accident to kill you. replied my mom, with fire in her eyes. She was very angry that day because she thought better of him. She too knows the bad of texting and driving; therefore, she is a strong nonbeliever too. I remember one bright sunny day, the snow was sparkling from the intense rays of the sun, and the icicles were melting. But apparently some black ice hid on the street. As we were driving, I saw a fellow driver not notice the turn for the exit. He drove straight ahead into the metal railing along the bend. And BOOM! I saw this event occur right at my own two eyes. It was miserable too, considering the fact that it was a luxury car.As we I drove past it, I knew right then and there that texting and driving is definitely not an option for me. Its hard to say how tempting texting while driving is, but all I know is that when I get my license, I am never going to start the habit. That is my thought now and I hope it will always stay that way. I am hoping to change not just the lives of my friends and family, but to others all over the road. Next time your cup holder vibrates, leave it alone, and focus on the road. Your life, and the lives of your passengers are in your hands, so make good decisions. Texting kills! This I believe.

Implementation Of Power Law Transform For Indication Of...

Implementation of Power Law Transform for Indication of Multi-Modal Brain Tumors Giritharan Ravichandran and A G Ramakrishnan Giritharan Ravichandran is with the E.G.S. Pillay Engineering College, Nagapattinam, TN 611001 India (corresponding author to provide phone: +91 9715589763; e-mail: rvenkkatprabu@gmail.com). A G Ramakrishnan is with Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, KA 560012 India. (e-mail: agrkrish@gmail.com). ABSTRACT In this paper , the problem of identification of masses or tumors in the Magnetic Resonance Image (MRI) of Brain . Here a novel method of Power Law Transformation is introduced on the Brain Image. The gamma value for the Brain Image is fixed as 1.5 and thresholding is done. Thus the resulting binary image clearly separates any kind of tumors or a mass present in the brain images, and makes the identification process easier. By exhaustive experimentations it is found that the proposed algorithm is performs well than the literature. The experimentations is done with the Virtual Skeleton Database (VSD) which is a brain tumor image dataset obtained from Challenge on Multimodal Brain Tumor Segmentation with are the outcomes of BRATS2012 and BRATS2013. It is reported that the tumor in the brain is identified correctly in majority of cases and the efficiency of the proposed algorithm is 90% in case of normal images and 82.51% in case of multimodal images. Keywords: CT Images, Brain Image, Power law transform, Binarization, Tumor,