Janmar Coating case study Essay

This case is about an organization doing business on paint coatings market served by company in the southwestern United States. The organization has some challenges on how to deploy marketing efforts among the various architectural paint coatings markets served in the southwestern United States. 1. Janmar Coating, Inc. Janmar Coating, Inc. is a privately held organization produces and markets architectural paint under Janmar brand name. In addition to producing a full line of architectural coatings, the company sells paint sundries (brushes, rollers, thinner, etc.) under the Janmar name, even though these item are not manufactured by the company. 2. Architectural painting Industry sources estimated U. S sales of architectural paint coatings and sundries (brushes, rollers, paint removers and thinners, etc) to be 12 billion plus in 2004. Architectural coating are considered to be mature market with long term sales growth projected in the range of 1 to 2 percent per year. Demand for architectural coatings and sundries and sundries reflects the level of house redecorating, maintenance, and repair, as well as sales existing homes, and to a lesser extent new home, commercial, and industrial construction. 2. 0 Identify Problem 1. Competitor The competition in Architectural coating segment are increasing. Companies seeking growth and a higher sales base to support increasing costs are making acquisition. Major products of paint for the architectural coatings segment include Sherwin-Williams, Benjamin Moore, the Glidden unit of Imperial Chemicals, PPG Industries, Valspar Corporation, Grow group and Pratt & Lambert. These producers account upward for 60% of sales in architectural coatings segment. They market under their own brand names and  for retailers under private, controlled and store brand names. 2. Volatile Organic Compound (VOCs) U. S paint manufacturer are under growing pressure to reduce emissions volatile organic compound (VOCs) from paints and to limit the consumption of solvents. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has adopted a three step plan for reduction of VOCs in architectural and industrial maintenance coatings. Compliance with EPA regulations eroded historically low profit margins in paint industry. 3 DFW and Non DFW Janmar Coating, Inc.  market its paint and sundry item in over 50 countries in Texas, Okhlahoma, New Mexico, and Lousiana from its plant and headquarter in Dallas, Texas. The 11- Country Dallas – Fort Worth (DFW) metropolitan area is the major business and financial center in their company’s southwestern service area. According to Vice president of sales â€Å" we have added only five accounts in the five years; our account penetration in non DFW areas is 16%† . 3. 0 Consider relevant information There are some alternatives that should be considered: 1. Customer advertising awareness at least 30 percent among do-it-yourselfers. As per Vice President of Advertising, Ron, he believed that they must direct their efforts towards bolstering their presence in the DFW do-it-yourselfer market by at least 30 percent. The awareness is well related to paint purchase behavior. Through advertising, the customers will be aware about the Janmar Coatings’ paint as well as they have seen it been advertised via media. However according to Mr. Burns, advertising is not a good idea since he did not sure what advertising it is because 75 percent of the audience in DFW is not buying paint. He suggested that the cost of advertising amounted $350,000 used for advertising in non DFW areas. 2. Price cut by 20 percent of all paint products. Based on Vice President of Operations, he suggested that they must cut price by 20 percent on all their products to meet customers’ wants. It is because the customers are price sensitive due to the research program. Their price is still higher than a mass merchandiser’s although they have advertised price-off special. But as per Mr. Burns, their sale representative has forecasted that their demand for paint will not increase next year. Therefore, they cannot cut price this year. 3. Hire a sale representative costing $60,000 a year in non DFW areas. Vice President of Sales wants to develop a new retail account in non DFW areas after only five accounts for the last 5 years. They want to focus on non DFW areas because half of their sales and dealers exist in that particular area. It has been asking by Mr. Burns on what the sale representative will do, either focusing on retail account side or on recruiting the professional painter. 70 percent of sale is through their professional painters in DFW areas, while 70 percent of sale went to do-it-yourselfers in non DFW areas. They would need 40 percent price cut to attract contractors since they have minimum number of contractor sale in DFW and other areas. 4. Maintaining their current approach. Referring to Vice President of Finance, he want to pursue the current approach because they are in profitable based on contribution margin by 35 percent. The company just needs to monitor their margin in control their cost well. 4. 0 Choose the best alternative The best alternative is sales representative, since it focuses on non DFW areas because half of their sales and dealers exist in that particular area. 5. 0 Implementation of the alternative: Based on the case study, the way to implement the problem is through market targeting. There is the way of target the market which is: 1. Where to compete Janmar Coating Inc. needs to specify the market segment that they want to pursue. They need to make marketing improvement in the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) and Non Dallas-Fort Worth (Non-DFW) to compete with their competitors such as Sherwin-Williams, Benjamin Moore and Grow Group. They should pursue the 400 or so professional painting firms in DFW area and the 200 professional painters outside the DFW area or the do-it-yourselfer market. 2. How to compete Janmar Coating Inc. can compete with their rival by increasing the hiring of representative at the DFW area and non-DFW area. This strategy can make Janmar Coating Inc. customers feel convenience and can build a good relationship with them. The representative that had been hired by Janmar Coating Inc. is only eight people. Due to it, they cannot monitor each of the retail outlets all over 50 countries in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Louisiana. By adding representative and allocate them accordingly through the country, they can make a promotion aggressively and can get information about the buying trend of the consumer from the retailers. 3. When to compete Janmar Coating Inc. can start to make their new marketing targeting according to the seasonal or trend of the demand from the consumers. For an example, consumers will be attracting to purchase when there is a promotional allowances during seasonal festival such as Charismas festival. 6. 0 Conclusion: It can be conclude that to make a decision for the problem of where and how to deploy corporate marketing efforts among the various architectural paint coating, the company should adding amount of representative to make a promotion that can increase level of the awareness of the Janmar brand among the consumer. Due to the new strategy, the sales of the architectural paint coating will be increase and it can compete with the rival product. 7. 0 Reference A. Peterson, R. A. (2013). Strategic Management Problems: Cases and Comments. Pearson Education. Kerin, R. A.

Pre-Socratic Philosophers Essay

â€Å"Pre-Socratic† is the expression commonly used to describe those Greek thinkers who lived and wrote between 600 and 400 B.C. It was the Pre-Socratics who attempted to find universal principles which would explain the natural world from its origins to man’s place in it. Although Socrates died in 399 B.C., the term â€Å"Pre-Socratic† indicates not so much a chronological limit, but rather an outlook or range of interests, an outlook attacked by both Protagoras (a Sophist) and Socrates, because natural philosophy was worthless when compared with the search for the â€Å"good life.†To give the Pre-Socratic thinkers their full due would require an article of encyclopedic scope. Given that, I have decided to list a number of sites on individual Pre-Socratic thinkers.Anaximander1. Life and SourcesThe history of written Greek philosophy starts with Anaximander of Miletus in Asia Minor, a fellow-citizen of Thales. He was the first who dared to write a treatise in prose, which has been called traditionally On Nature. This book has been lost, although it probably was available in the library of the Lyceum at the times of Aristotle and his successor Theophrastus. It is said that Apollodorus, in the second century BCE, stumbled upon a copy of it, perhaps in the famous library of Alexandria. Recently, evidence has appeared that it was part of the collection of the library of Taormina in Sicily, where a fragment of a catalogue has been found, on which Anaximander’s name can be read. Only one fragment of the book has come down to us, quoted by Simplicius (after Theophrastus), in the sixth century AD. It is perhaps the most famous and most discussed phrase in the history of philosophy.We also know very little of Anaximander’s life. He is said to have led a mission that founded a colony called Apollonia on the coast of the Black Sea. He also probably introduced the gnomon (a perpendicular sun-dial) into Greece and erected one in Sparta. So he seems to have been a much-traveled man, which is not astonishing, as the Milesians were known to be audacious sailors. It is also reported that he displayed solemn manners and wore pompous garments. Most of the information on Anaximander comes from Aristotle and his pupil Theophrastus, whose book on the history of philosophy was used, excerpted, and quoted by many other authors, the so-called doxographers, before it was lost. Sometimes, in these texts words or expressions appear that can with some certainty be ascribed  to Anaximander himself. Relatively many testimonies, approximately one third of them, have to do with astronomical and cosmological questions. Hermann Diels and Walter Kranz have edited the doxography (A) and the existing texts (B) of the Presocratic philosophers in Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, Berlin 1951-19526. (A quotation like â€Å"DK 12A17†³ means: â€Å"Diels/Kranz, Anaximander, doxographical report no.17†³).| 2. The â€Å"Boundless† as Principle According to Aristotle and Theophrastus, the first Greek philosophers were looking for the â€Å"origin† or â€Å"principle† (the Greek word â€Å"archà ªÃ¢â‚¬  has both meanings) of all things. Anaximander is said to have identified it with â€Å"the Boundless† or â€Å"the Unlimited† (Greek: â€Å"apeiron,† that is, â€Å"that which has no boundaries†). Already in ancient times, it is complained that Anaximander did not explain what he meant by â€Å"the Boundless.† More recently, authors have disputed whether the Boundless should be interpreted as spatially or temporarily without limits, or perhaps as that which has no qualifications, or as that which is inexhaustible. Some scholars have even defended the meaning â€Å"that which is not experienced,† by relating the Greek word â€Å"apeiron† not to â€Å"peras† (â€Å"boundary,† â€Å"limit†), but to â€Å"perao† (â€Å"to experience,â⠂¬  â€Å"to apperceive†). The suggestion, however, is almost irresistible that Greek philosophy, by making the Boundless into the principle of all things, has started on a high level of abstraction. On the other hand, some have pointed out that this use of â€Å"apeiron† is atypical for Greek thought, which was occupied with limit, symmetry and harmony. The Pythagoreans placed the boundless (the â€Å"apeiron†) on the list of negative things, and for Aristotle, too, perfection became aligned with limit (Greek: â€Å"peras†), and thus â€Å"apeiron† with imperfection. Therefore, some authors suspect eastern (Iranian) influence on Anaximander’s ideas. Anaximenes (d. 528 BCE) According to the surviving sources on his life, Anaximenes flourished in the mid 6th century BCE and died around 528. He is the third philosopher of the Milesian School of philosophy, so named because like Thales and Anaximander, Anaximenes was an inhabitant of Miletus, in Ionia (ancient Greece). Theophrastus notes that Anaximenes was an associate, and possibly a student, of Anaximander’s. Anaximenes is best known for his doctrine that air is the source of all things. In this way, he differed with his predecessors like Thales, who held that water is the source of all things, and Anaximander, who thought that all things came from an unspecified boundless stuff. 2. Doctrine of Change Given his doctrine that all things are composed of air, Anaximenes suggested an interesting qualitative account of natural change: [Air] differs in essence in accordance with its rarity or density. When it is thinned it becomes fire, while when it is condensed it becomes wind, then cloud, when still more condensed it becomes water, then earth, then stones. Everything else comes from these. (DK13A5) Influence on later Philosophy Anaximenes’ theory of successive change of matter by rarefaction and condensation was influential in later theories. It is developed by Heraclitus (DK22B31), and criticized by Parmenides (DK28B8.23-24, 47-48). Anaximenes’ general theory of how the materials of the world arise is adopted by Anaxagoras(DK59B16), even though the latter has a very different theory of matter. Both Melissus (DK30B8.3) and Plato (Timaeus 49b-c) see Anaximenes’ theory as providing a common-sense explanation of change. Diogenes of Apollonia makes air the basis of his explicitly monistic theory. The Hippocratic treatise On Breaths uses air as the central concept in a theory of diseases. By providing cosmological accounts with a theory of change, Anaximenes separated them from the realm of mere speculation and made them, at least in conception, scientific theories capable of testing. Thales of Miletus (c. 620 BCE – c. 546 BCE) The ancient Greek philosopher Thales was born in Miletus in Greek Ionia. Aristotle, the major source for Thales’s philosophy and science, identified Thales as the first person to investigate the basic principles, the question of the originating substances of matter and, therefore, as the founder of the school of natural philosophy. Thales was interested in almost everything, investigating almost all areas of knowledge, philosophy, history, science, mathematics, engineering, geography, and politics. He  proposed theories to explain many of the events of nature, the primary substance, the support of the earth, and the cause of change. Thales was much involved in the problems of astronomy and provided a number of explanations of cosmological events which traditionally involved supernatural entities. His questioning approach to the understanding of heavenly phenomena was the beginning of Greek astronomy. Thales’ hypotheses were new and bold, and in freeing phenomena from godly intervention, he paved the way towards scientific endeavor. He founded the Milesian school of natural philosophy, developed the scientific method, and initiated the first western enlightenment. A number of anecdotes is closely connected to Thales’ investigations of the cosmos. When considered in association with his hypotheses they take on added meaning and are most enlightening. Thales was highly esteemed in ancient times, and a letter cited by Diogenes Laertius, and purporting to be from Anaximenes to Pythagoras, advised that all our discourse should begin with a reference to Thales (D.L. II.4). 1. The Writings of Thales Doubts have always existed about whether Thales wrote anything, but a number of ancient reports credit him with writings. Simplicius (Diels, Dox. p. 475) specifically attributed to Thales authorship of the so-called Nautical Star-guide. Diogenes Laertius raised doubts about authenticity, but wrote that ‘according to others [Thales] wrote nothing but two treatises, one On the Solstice and one On the Equinox‘ (D.L. I.23). Lobon of Argus asserted that the writings of Thales amounted to two hundred lines (D.L. I.34), and Plutarch associated Thales with opinions and accounts expressed in verse (Plutarch, De Pyth. or. 18. 402 E). Hesychius, recorded that ‘[Thales] wrote on celestial matters in epic verse, on the equinox, and much else’ (DK, 11A2). Callimachus credited Thales with the sage advice that navigators should navigate by Ursa Minor (D.L. I.23), advice which may have been in writing. Diogenes mentions a poet, Choerilus, who declared that ‘[Thales] was the first to maintain the immortality of the soul’ (D.L. I.24), and in De Anima, Aristotle’s words ‘from what is recorded about [Thales]‘, indicate that Aristotle was working from a written source. Diogenes recorded that  Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ[Thales] seems by some accounts to have been the first to study astronomy, the first to predict eclipses of the sun and to fix the solstices; so Eudemus in his History of Astronomy. It was this which gained for him the admiration of Xenophanes and Herodotus and the notice of Heraclitus and Democritus’ (D.L. I.23). Eudemus who wrote a History of Astronomy, and also on geometry and theology, must be considered as a possible source for the hypotheses of Thales. The information provided by Diogenes is the sort of material which he would have included in his History of Astronomy, and it is possible that the titles On the Solstice, and On the Equinox were a vailable to Eudemus. Xenophanes, Herodotus, Heraclitus and Democritus were familiar with the work of Thales, and may have had a work by Thales available to them. A solstice is an astronomical event that happens twice each year when the Sun reaches its highest position in the sky as seen from the North or South Pole. The word solstice is derived from the Latin sol (sun) and sistere (to stand still), because at the solstices, the Sun stands still in declination; that is, the seasonal movement of the Sun’s path (as seen from Earth) comes to a stop before reversing direction. The solstices, together with the equinoxes, are connected with the seasons. In many cultures the solstices mark either the beginning or the midpoint of winter and summer. The term solstice can also be used in a broader sense, as the date (day) when this occurs. The day of the solstice is either the â€Å"longest day of the year† (in summer) or the â€Å"shortest day of the year† (in winter) for any place on Earth, because the length of time between sunrise and sunset on that day is the yearly maximum or minimum for that place. Proclus recorded that Thales was followed by a great wealth of geometers, most of whom remain as honoured names. They commence with Mamercus, who was a pupil of Thales, and include Hippias of Elis, Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, Eudoxus of Cnidus, Philippus of Mende, Euclid, and Eudemus, a friend of Aristotle, who wrote histories of arithmetic, of astronomy, and of geometry, and many lesser known names. It is possible that writings of Thales were available to some of these men. Any records which Thales may have kept would have been an advantage in his own work. This is especially true of mathematics, of the dates and times determined when fixing the solstices, the positions of stars, and in  financial transactions. It is difficult to believe that Thales would not have written down the information he had gathered in his travels, particularly the geometry he investigated in Egypt and his measuring of the height of the pyramid, his hypotheses about nature, and the cause of change. Proclus acknowledged Thales as the discoverer of a number of specific theorems (A Commentary on the First Book of Euclid’s Elements 65. 8-9; 250. 16-17). This suggests that Eudemus, Proclus’s source had before him the written records of Thales’s discoveries. How did Thales ‘prove’ his theorems if not in written words and sketches? The works On the Solstice, On the Equinox, which were attributed to Thales (D.L. I.23), and the ‘Nautical Star guide, to which Simplicius referred, may have been sources for the History of Astronomy of Eudemus (D.L. I.23). Pythagoras (c.570—c.495 BCE) The pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Pythagoras must have been one of the world’s greatest persons, but he wrote nothing, and it is hard to say how much of the doctrine we know as Pythagorean is due to the founder of the society and how much is later development. It is also hard to say how much of what we are told about the life of Pythagoras is trustworthy; for a mass of legend gathered around his name at an early date. Sometimes he is represented as a man of science, and sometimes as a preacher of mystic doctrines, and we might be tempted to regard one or other of those characters as alone historical. The truth is that there is no need to reject either of the traditional views. The union of mathematical genius and mysticism is common enough. Originally from Samos, Pythagoras founded at Kroton (in southern Italy) a society which was at once a religious community and a scientific school. Such a body was bound to excite jealousy and mistrust, and we hear of many struggles. Pythagoras himself had to flee from Kroton to Metapontion, where he died. It is stated that he was a disciple of Anaximander, his astronomy was the natural development of Anaximander’s. Also, the way in which the Pythagorean geometry developed also bears witness to its descent from that of Miletos. The great problem at this date was the duplication of the square, a problem which gave rise to the theorem of the square on the hypotenuse, commonly  known still as the Pythagorean proposition (Euclid, I. 47). If we were right in assuming that Thales worked with the old 3:4:5 triangle, the connection is obvious. Pythagoras argued that there are three kinds of men, just as there are three classes of strangers who come to the Olympic Games. The lowest consists of those who come to buy and sell, and next above them are those who come to compete. Best of all are those who simply come to look on. Men may be classified accordingly as lovers of wisdom, lovers of honor, and lovers of gain. That seems to imply the doctrine of the tripartite soul, which is also attributed to the early Pythagoreans on good authority, though it is common now to ascribe it to Plato. There are, however, clear references to it before his time, and it agrees much better with the general outlook of the Pythagoreans. The comparison of human life to a gathering like the Games was often repeated in later days. Pythagoras also taught the doctrine of Rebirth or transmigration, which we may have learned from the contemporary Orphics. Xenophanes made fun of him for pretending to recognize the voice of a departed friend in the howls of a beaten dog. Empedocles seems to be referring to him when he speaks of a man who could remember what happened ten or twenty generations before. It was on this that the doctrine of Recollection, which plays so great a part in Plato, was based. The things we perceive with the senses, Plato argues, remind us of things we knew when the soul was out of the body and could perceive reality directly. There is more difficulty about the cosmology of Pythagoras. Hardly any school ever professed such reverence for its founder’s authority as the Pythagoreans. ‘The Master said so’ was their watchword. On the other hand, few schools have shown so much capacity for progress and for adapting themselves to new conditions. Pythagoras started from the cosmical system of Anaximenes. Aristotle tells us that the Pythagoreans represented the world as inhaling ‘air’ form the boundless mass outside it, and this ‘air’ is identified with ‘the unlimited’. When, however, we come to the process by which things are developed out of the ‘unlimited’, we observe a great change. We hear nothing more of ‘separating out’ or even of rarefaction and condensation. Instead of that we have the theory that what gives form to the  Unlimited is the Limit. That is the great contribution of Pythagoras to philosophy, and we must try to understand it. Now the function of the Limit is usually illustrated from the arts of music and medicine, and we have seen how important these two arts were for Pythagoreans, so it is natural to infer that the key to its meaning is to be found in them. It may be taken as certain that Pythagoras himself discovered the numerical ratios which determine the concordant intervals of the musical scale. Similar to musical intervals, in medicine there are opposites, such as the hot and the cold, the wet and the dry, and it is the business of the physician to produce a proper ‘blend’ of these in the human body. In a well-known passage of Plato’s Phaedo (86 b) we are told by Simmias that the Pythagoreans held the body to be strung like an instrument to a certain pitch, hot and cold, wet and dry taking the place of high and low in music. Musical tuning and health are alike means arising from the application of Limit to the Unlimited. It was natural for Pythagoras to look for something of the same kind in the world at large. Briefly stated, the doctrine of Pythagoras was that all things are numbers. In certain fundamental cases, the early Pythagoreans represented numbers and explained their properties by means of dots arrang ed in certain ‘figures’ or patterns. Zeno’s Paradoxes In the fifth century B.C.E., Zeno of Elea offered arguments that led to conclusions contradicting what we all know from our physical experience–that runners run, that arrows fly, and that there are many different things in the world. The arguments were paradoxes for the ancient Greek philosophers. Because most of the arguments turn crucially on the notion that space and time are infinitely divisible—for example, that for any distance there is such a thing as half that distance, and so on—Zeno was the first person in history to show that the concept of infinity is problematical. In his Achilles Paradox, Achilles races to catch a slower runner–for example, a tortoise that is crawling away from him. The tortoise has a head start, so if Achilles hopes to overtake it, he must run at least to the place where the tortoise presently is, but by the time he arrives there, it will have crawled to a new place, so then Achilles must run to this new place, but the  tortoise meanwhile will have crawled on, and so forth. Achilles will never catch the tortoise, says Zeno. Therefore, good reasoning shows that fast runners never can catch slow ones. So much the worse for the claim that motion really occurs, Zeno says in defense of his mentor Parmenides who had argued that motion is an illusion. Although practically no scholars today would agree with Zeno’s conclusion, we can not escape the paradox by jumping up from our seat and chasing down a tortoise, nor by saying Achilles should run to some other target place ahead of where the tortoise is at the moment. What is required is an analysis of Zeno’s own argument that does not get us embroiled in new paradoxes nor impoverish our mathematics and science. This article explains his ten known paradoxes and considers the treatments that have been offered. Zeno assumed distances and durations can be divided into an actual infinity (what we now call a transfinite infinity) of indivisible parts, and he assumed these are too many for the runner to complete. Aristotle‘s treatment said Zeno should have assumed there are only potential infinities, and that neither places nor times divide into indivisible parts. His treatment became the generally accepted solution until the late 19th century. The current standard treatment says Zeno was right to conclude that a runner’s path contains an actual infinity of parts, but he was mistaken to assume this is too many. This treatment employs the apparatus of calculus which has proved its indispensability for the development of modern science. In the twentieth century it finally became clear that disallowing actual infinities, as Aristotle wanted, hampers the growth of set theory and ultimately of mathematics and physics. This standard treatment took hundreds of years to perfect and was due to the flexibility of intellectuals who were willing to replace old theories and their concepts with more fruitful ones, despite the damage done to common sense and our naive intuitions. The article ends by exploring newer treatments of the paradoxes—and related paradoxes such as Thomson’s Lamp Paradox—that were developed since the 1950s. Parmenides (b. 510 BCE) Parmenides was a Greek philosopher and poet, born of an illustrious family about BCE. 510, at Elea in Lower Italy, and is is the chief representative of the Eleatic philosophy. He was held in high esteem by his fellow-citizens for his excellent legislation, to which they ascribed the prosperity and wealth of the town. He was also admired for his exemplary life. A â€Å"Parmenidean life† was proverbial among the Greeks. He is commonly represented as a disciple of Xenophanes. Parmenides wrote after Heraclitus, and in conscious opposition to him, given the evident allusion to Hericlitus: â€Å"for whom it is and is not, the same and not the same, and all things travel in opposite directions† (fr. 6, 8). Little more is known of his biography than that he stopped at Athens on a journey in his sixty-fifth year, and there became acquainted with the youthful Socrates. That must have been in the middle of the fifth century BCE., or shortly after it. Parmenides broke with the older Ionic prose tradition by writing in hexameter verse. His didactic poem, called On Nature, survives in fragments, although the Proem (or introductory discourse) of the work has been preserved. Parmenides was a young man when he wrote it, for the goddess who reveals the truth to him addresses him as â€Å"youth.† The work is considered inartistic. Its Hesiodic style was appropriate for the cosmogony he describes in the second part, but is unsuited to the arid dialectic of the first. Parmenides was no born poet, and we must ask what led him to take this new departure. The example of Xenophanes’ poetic writings is not a complete explanation; for the poetry of Parmenides is as unlike that of Xenophanes as it well can be, and his style is more like Hesiod and the Orphics. In the Proem Parmenides describes his ascent to the home of the goddess who is supposed to speak the remainder of the verses; this is a reflexion of the conventional ascents i nto heaven which were almost as common as descents into hell in the apocalyptic literature of those days. The Proem opens with Parmenides representing himself as borne on a chariot and attended by the Sunmaidens who have quitted the Halls of Night to guide him on his journey. They pass along the highway till they come to the Gate of Night and Day, which is locked and barred. The key is in the keeping of Dike (Right), the Avenger, who is persuaded to unlock it by the Sunmaidens.  They pass in through the gate and are now, of course, in the realms of Day. The goal of the journey is the palace of a goddess who welcomes Parmenides and instructs him in the two ways, that of Truth and the deceptive way of Belief, in which is no truth at all. All this is described without inspiration and in a purely conventional manner, so it must be interpreted by the canons of the apocalyptic style. It is clearly meant to indicate that Parmenides had been converted, that he had passed from error (night) to truth (day), and the Two Ways must represent his former error and the truth which is now revealed to h im. There is reason to believe that the Way of Belief is an account of Pythagorean cosmology. In any case, it is surely impossible to regard it as anything else than a description of some error. The goddess says so in words that cannot be explained away. Further, this erroneous belief is not the ordinary man’s view of the world, but an elaborate system, which seems to be a natural development the Ionian cosmology on certain lines, and there is no other system but the Pythagorean that fulfils this requirement. To this it has been objected that Parmenides would not have taken the trouble to expound in detail a system he had altogether rejected, but that is to mistake the character of the apocalyptic convention. It is not Parmenides, but the goddess, that expounds the system, and it is for this reason that the beliefs described are said to be those of ‘mortals’. Now a description of the ascent of the soul would be quite incomplete without a picture of the region from which it had escaped. The goddess must reveal the two ways at the parting of which Parmenides stands, and bid him choose the better. The rise of mathematics in the Pythagorean school had revealed for the first time the power of thought. To the mathematician of all men it is the same thing that can be thought and that can be, and this is the principle from which Parmenides starts. It is impossible to think what is not, and it is impossible for what cannot be thought to be. The great question, Is it or is it not? is therefore equivalent to the question, Can it be thought or not? In any case, the work thus has two divisions. The first discusses the truth, and the second the world of illusion — that is, the world of the senses and the erroneous opinions of mankind founded upon them. In his opinion truth  lies in the perception that existence is, and error in the idea that non-existence also can be. Nothing can have real existence but what is conceivable; therefore to be imagined and to be able to exist are the same thing, and there is no development. The essence of what is conceivable is incapable of development, imperishable, immutable, unbounded, and indivisible. What is various and mutable, all development, is a delusive phantom. Perception is thought directed to the pure essence of being; the phenomenal world is a delusion, and the opinions formed concerning it can only be improbable. Parmenides goes on to consider in the light of this principle the consequences of saying that anything is. In the first place, it cannot have come into being. If it had, it must have arisen from nothing or from something. It cannot have arisen from nothing; for there is no nothing. It cannot have arisen from something; for here is nothing else than what is. Nor can anything else besides itself come into being; for there can be no empty space in which it could do so. Is it or is it not? If it is, then it is now, all at once. In this way Parmenides refutes all accounts of the origin of the world. Ex nihilo nihil fit. Further, if it is, it simply is, and it cannot be more or less. There is, therefore, as much of it in one place as in another. (That makes rarefaction and condensation impossible.) it is continuous and indivisible; for there is nothing but itself which could prevent its parts being in contact with one another. It is therefore full, a continuous indivisible plenum. (That is directed against the Pythagorean theory of a discontinuous reality.) Further, it is immovable. If it moved, it must move into empty space, and empty space is nothing, and there is no nothing. Also it is finite and spherical; for it cannot be in one direction any more than in another, and the sphere is the only figure of which this can be said. What is, therefore a finite, spherical, motionless, continuous plenum, and there is nothing beyond it. Coming into being and ceasing to be are mere ‘names’, and so is motion, and still more color and the like. They are not even thoughts; for a thought must be a thought of something that is, and none of these can be. Such is the conclusion to which the view of the real as a single body inevitably leads, and there is no escape from it. The ‘matter’ of our physical text-books is just the real of Parmenides; and, unless we can find room for something else than matter, we are shut up into his account of reality. No subsequent system could afford to ignore this, but of course it was impossible to acquiesce permanently in a doctrine like that of Parmenides. It deprives the world we know of all claim to existence, and reduces it to something which is hardly even an illusion. If we are to give an intelligible account of the world, we must certainly introduce motion again somehow. That can never be taken for granted any more, as it was by the early cosmologists; we must attempt to explain it if we are to escape from the conclusions of Parmenides. Heraclitus (fl. c.500 BCE) A Greek philosopher of the late 6th century BCE, Heraclitus criticizes his predecessors and contemporaries for their failure to see the unity in experience. He claims to announce an everlasting Word (Logos) according to which all things are one, in some sense. Opposites are necessary for life, but they are unified in a system of balanced exchanges. The world itself consists of a law-like interchange of elements, symbolized by fire. Thus the world is not to be identified with any particular substance, but rather with an ongoing process governed by a law of change. The underlying law of nature also manifests itself as a moral law for human beings. Heraclitus is the first Western philosopher to go beyond physical theory in search of metaphysical foundations and moral applications. Anaxagoras (c.500—428 BCE) Anaxagoras of Clazomenae was an important Presocratic natural philosopher and scientist who lived and taught in Athens for approximately thirty years. He gained notoriety for his materialistic views, particularly his contention that the sun was a fiery rock. This led to charges of impiety, and he was sentenced to death by the Athenian court. He avoided this penalty by leaving Athens, and he spent his remaining years in exile. While Anaxagoras proposed theories on a variety of subjects, he is most noted for two theories. First, he speculated that in the physical world everything contains a portion of everything else. His observation of how nutrition works in animals led him to conclude that in order for the food an animal eats to turn into bone,  hair, flesh, and so forth, it must already contain all of those constituents within it. The second theory of significance is Anaxagoras’ postulation of Mind (Nous) as the initiating and governing principle of the cosmos. Democritus ( 460—370 BCE) Democritus was born at Abdera, about 460 BCE, although according to some 490. His father was from a noble family and of great wealth, and contributed largely towards the entertainment of the army of Xerxes on his return to Asia. As a reward for this service the Persian monarch gave and other Abderites presents and left among them several Magi. Democritus, according to Diogenes Laertius, was instructed by these Magi in astronomy and theology. After the death of his father he traveled in search of wisdom, and devoted his inheritance to this purpose, amounting to one hundred talents. He is said to have visited Egypt, Ethiopia, Persia, and India. Whether, in the course of his travels, he visited Athens or studied under Anaxagoras is uncertain. During some part of his life he was instructed in Pythagoreanism, and was a disciple of Leucippus. After several years of traveling, Democritus returned to Abdera, with no means of subsistence. His brother Damosis, however, took him in. According to the law of Abdera, whoever wasted his patrimony would be deprived of the rites of burial. Democritus, hoping to avoid this disgrace, gave public lectures. Petronius relates that he was acquainted with the virtues of herbs, plants, and stones, and that he spent his life in making experiments upon natural bodies. He acquired fame with his knowledge of natural phenomena, and predicted changes in the weather. He used this ability to make people believe that he could predict future events. They not only viewed him as something more than mortal, but even proposed to put him in control of their public affairs. He preferred a contemplative to an active life, and therefore declined these public honors and passed the remainder of his days in solitude. Credit cannot be given to the tale that Democritus spent his leisure hours in chemical researches after the philosopher’s stone — the dream of a later age; or to the story of his conversation with Hippocrates concerning Democritus’s supposed madness, as based on spurious letters. Democritus has been commonly known as â€Å"The Laughing Philosopher,† and it is gravely related  by Seneca that he never appeared in public with out expressing his contempt of human follies while laughing. Accordingly, we find that among his fellow-citizens he had the name of â€Å"the mocker†. He died at more than a hundred years of age. It is said that from then on he spent his days and nights in caverns and sepulchers, and that, in order to master his intellectual faculties, he blinded himself with burning glass. This story, however, is discredited by the writers who mention it insofar as they say he wrote books and dissected animals, neither of which could be done we ll without eyes. Democritus expanded the atomic theory of Leucippus. He maintained the impossibility of dividing things ad infinitum. From the difficulty of assigning a beginning of time, he argued the eternity of existing nature, of void space, and of motion. He supposed the atoms, which are originally similar, to be impenetrable and have a density proportionate to their volume. All motions are the result of active and passive affection. He drew a distinction between primary motion and its secondary effects, that is, impulse and reaction. This is the basis of the law of necessity, by which all things in nature are ruled. The worlds which we see — with all their properties of immensity, resemblance, and dissimilitude — result from the endless multiplicity of falling atoms. The human soul consists of globular atoms of fire, which impart movement to the body. Maintaining his atomic theory throughout, Democritus introduced the hypothesis of images or idols (eidola), a kind of emanation from external objects, which make an impression on our senses, and from the influence of which he deduced sensation (aesthesis) and thought (noesis). He distinguished between a rude, imperfect, and therefore false perception and a true one. In the same manner, consistent with this theory, he accounted for the popular notions of Deity; partly through our incapacity to understand fully the phenomena of which we are witnesses, and partly from the impressions communicated by certain beings (eidola) of enormous stature and resembling the human figure which inhabit the air. We know these from dreams and the causes of divination. He carried his theory into practical philosophy also, laying down that happiness consisted in an even temperament. From this he deduced his moral principles and prudential maxims. It was from Democritus that  Epicurus borrowed the princi pal features of his philosophy. Empedocles (c.492—432 BCE) Empedocles (of Acagras in Sicily) was a philosopher and poet: one of the most important of the philosophers working before Socrates (the Presocratics), and a poet of outstanding ability and of great influence upon later poets such as Lucretius. His works On Nature and Purifications (whether they are two poems or only one – see below) exist in more than 150 fragments. He has been regarded variously as a materialist physicist, a shamanic magician, a mystical theologian, a healer, a democratic politician, a living god, and a fraud. To him is attributed the invention of the four-element theory of matter (earth, air, fire, and water), one of the earliest theories of particle physics, put forward seemingly to rescue the phenomenal world from the static monism of Parmenides. Empedocles’ world-view is of a cosmic cycle of eternal change, growth and decay, in which two personified cosmic forces, Love and Strife, engage in an eternal battle for supremacy. In psychology and ethics Empedocles was a follower of Pythagoras, hence a believer in the transmigration of souls, and hence also a vegetarian. He claims to be a daimà ´n, a divine or potentially divine being, who, having been banished from the immortals gods for ‘three times countless years’ for committing the sin of meat-eating and forced to suffer successive reincarnations in an purificatory journey through the different orders of nature and elements of the cosmos, has now achieved the most perfect of human states and will be reborn as an immortal. He also claims seemingly magical powers including the ability to revive the dead and to control the winds and rains.

Acquiring the Human Language-Playing the Language Game

1.What arguments in support of language as an innate ability are brought up in the film? This video is about a great mystery; how do children acquire language without seeming to learn it and how do they do so many things with so little life experience. 2.Explain the ambiguity of the question asked by Jill de Villiers to both children and graduate students: â€Å"When did the boy say he hurt himself?† Why is this question ambiguous and why is it interesting to note that this question is ambiguous? Question was â€Å"When did the boy say he hurt himself?† and there are 2 answers to this question. If focus on When said, the answer is â€Å"in the bathtub.† However when it focus on When fallen, the answer is â€Å"climbing the tree† And it is very interesting because they found that children will give only 1 answer when given unambiguous sentence â€Å"When did the boy say HOW he hurt himself†, â€Å"in the bathtub.† By this experiment, we can conclude that a child must have some kind of knowledge of syntactic structure because nobody had ever taught the child about this. 3.List some of the fundamental questions regarding language learning/language acquisition that are discussed in the film and explain how are linguists trying to answer these questions. (What questions do linguists ask and what kind of evidence do they look for to answer them?) The original theory on how languages are learned was it is learned by imitation. However, linguists found that child not only imitate adult but produces brand-new sentences. And the fundamental questions were raised, if we don’t learn by imitation, how do we learn? So linguists try to prove that acquiring language is different from learning other things by some experiments. 4.Mention some of the evidence in the film presented as evidence AGAINST the imitation theory of language learning. Child can produce brand-new sentence and they make errors. They can understand quite complex sentence in early age. 5.The film (Chomsky) claim that acquiring language is different from kinds of learning. What does he mean? It means we seem to learn language with different say from leaning other difficult things such as playing the trumpet and riding bicycle. It is not learned by practice, or by imitation. 6.What proof is there that analogy is not the explanation for first language learning? With the sentence â€Å"I painted the red barn†, we can substitute color word, and it is acceptable. If we switch the last two words, it is still acceptable. So by analogy, child will extend this to other verb â€Å"see† and create new sentence. â€Å"I saw a read barn.† And a concept of analogy doesn’t work for switching last two words, since I saw a bard red is broken sentence. And also, with sentence â€Å"Taro ate† it means he ate something but this something is not his shoes or hat. Another proof that analogy is not the explanation of first language learning is the verb â€Å"grow† can mean differently in the sentence such as â€Å"John grows tomatoes† and â€Å"John grows.† Analogy is wildly broken and cannot explain first language learning. 7.Observe the details of the experiment with the 16-month old babies who are shown Cookie Monster and Big Bird. Explain the experiment’s design, including the question posed by the researchers and the conclusions they reach regarding children’s acquisition of syntax based on the results of this study. The experiment design is showing two films simultaneously to babies. And asks to find the same scene with the explanation, Cookie monster washing Big Bird and Big Bird feeding Cookie Monster. The questions behind the study was will the child look more at the screen that matches the language that they are hearing. And the result surprisingly show that they understand the order of the information. 8.An extended section of the film discusses how children learn new words. Explain the point(s) illustrated by the following examples: -The child who calls his own dog â€Å"Nunu†, then applies the word Nunu to several other things (another dog, cow, slippers, salad) : Overgeneralization – â€Å"The Gavagai Problem† (the big rabbit on a billboard) : Assumption – Child labeling an item a flimmick, a closed flimmick and a spud : Child expects object labels to refer to the whole object – Children discussing the meaning of the word â€Å"alive† and the one child deciding that a car must be â€Å"alive† A child picks out a category that is relevantly alike 9. The film moves to Papua New Guinea (home of 750 languages spoken by 3,000,000 people) and discusses language universals and then Universal Grammar. -What aspects of language are candidates for language universals? Subject, Object, Verb – What are examples are presented in the film as evidence of Universal Grammar? There are certain kinds of mistake that children never seem to make. (ex. What did you eat your egg and?) 10. Explain what Chomsky means when he says that â€Å"all children are pre-programmed in advance of experience; they know fixed, invariant structural principles of language†. Capacity to learn language is deeply engraved in the mind and children are not taught language, they just do it.

The Recent Turn to Intersectionality In Feminist Theory Essay

The Recent Turn to Intersectionality In Feminist Theory - Essay Example Her academic work is undoubtedly the most prominent and well-known on the topic of intersectionality that at present received the substantial number of both critiques and appreciations primarily from the academe. Hence, the scholarly work of Kimberle Crenshaw will take a crucial part of this essay as shown in my argument. In this paper, I will take the standpoint of Crenshaw and argue that gender and race are overlapping characteristics of humans, whereby one cannot be separated from the other. Gender and race are the significant components of the multi-layered facets of life. Therefore, I will argue that women of colour are marginalised within both feminist theory and anti-racist policies, as both groups have their own strict set of ideas, from which black women are often left out, hence their experiences, are overthrown. I will start the essay with a critique of second-wave feminism, with relation to black women, who were throughout left out of its agenda. Afterwards, I will move o n to talk about how racism is a gendered process, hence women who are black or blacks who are women should not be excluded from these groups. Throughout the essay, I will include recent examples of the treatment of intersectionality in mainstream media to support my argument that while feminist academia has recently turned to intersectionality, there has still not been an understanding on what intersectionality actually is. Therefore, this remarkably must be the ultimate source of confusion regarding the existence of intersectionality as a concept, allowing women of colour in the societies today to be still highly disregarded at some point. First of all, I believe, a critical examination of the second wave feminism is necessary in order to establish the circumstances and treatment of black women from around the 1960’s up until the 1980’s, which consequently led to and had a great influence in creating feminist multiculturalism and later intersectionality per se.

Ethnics studies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Ethnics studies - Essay Example r mentions that â€Å"the cover of National Review featured President William Jefferson Clinton, first Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and vice president Al Gore, all in yellowface† (Hwang). He further explains that this paints the fact that the political leaders have been greatly blinded by Asia’s wealth so that America is now losing its identity as a nation. Such circumstance is also reflected in the character of Terrence Granville who was poisoned by the evil doctor. Consequently, the young man goes to his team and encourages his girlfriend to unearth the real sword and mask to give to Manchu. Like the yellow-faced politicians, Granville, a representation of American leaders, is pushed blindly to bring his team to the dangers of Manchu’s evil plans. World power is one of the great desires of leaders that led to various wars and killed many people. The movie mentioned above also portrays this theme. Dr. Manchu wanted Genghis Khan’s armor and mask because he wanted to dominate the world. However, the English Nayland Smith and Sir Lionel Barton are determined to stop him from his evil plans. Therefore, they need to get to the tomb of the fallen great Mongolian leader before Manchu does. This event reflects the idea of Hwang’s representation of Asians as pollutants (p. 9). As such, they should be minimized if not extinguished. The world domination of Dr. Manchu represents the scattering of Asians who are thriving wherever they go. For instance, during the gold rush, many Chinese migrated to America. However, they are often suppressed by the Whites because they obviously have leadership capabilities. A time finally came when the Chinese had to serve in American homes. This mixing of races in one environment allowed int ermarriages. The lovable characteristics of the Asians attracted them to the Americans nevertheless there has always been that fear of their ethnicity. Again, this could be seen in the lives of Granville and Manchu’s daughter, Fah Lo See. When

Denver founder network Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Denver founder network - Essay Example The meeting proceeded on 26th of February and the events conducted at Galvanize office, which is a local incubator for entrepreneurship situated at 1062 Delaware St., Denver, 80204(10th & Speer Blvd.). The events started at 6:00 pm and went up to at least 8:00 pm, hosted by Chris Franks and Josh Churlik. The first part of the meet- up included an informal networking session that consists of the opportunity to interact with the members of Denvers’entrepreneurial community. The attendance was about one hundred people, most of them entrepreneurs and people with business ideas to present in the market( Wasserman 23-160) Tom Bulk was the guest speaker and a partial investor of Zynga game Aug 2007. He is a benefactor of social games services that invented on July 2007 whose headquarters are in Francisco. Tom Bulk did an apps, games for the smart phones which included Iphones and he started with online casino. The eight people in Zynga lacked a disk, however, they farm Ville game that became booster in the business world became profitable after three months of lunch. They had a market target age between 25 to 45 years old, most of the being housewives. Farm Ville generates one million daily from the sell of cherry to gamers (Wasserman 47-190). The name Farmville originated accidentally from the candy crash game. Attendance of the meeting, commonly known as meet-ups, are of great experience due to the casual atmosphere, attendees tend to be supportive, engaging, friendly and fun to talk with. Galvanize provides a good and an enabling environment for people to explore and develop their business ideas (Wasserman 67-210). An incubator creates a friendly and helps those presenting their business ideas generate and acquire more knowledge on the subject in place. Incubation grows the busine ss idea into a real and profitable business, thus the incubates gets a chance to expand their innovative

Data Mining for Auditing Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Data Mining for Auditing - Essay Example However, with increased use of databases, comes a new challenge: how to make sense of the abundant data Auditors are overwhelmed with massive collection of data. Omnipresent personal computers, low cost multi-gigabyte disks, ubiquitous electronics and new generation database languages have made it very simple for companies to capture data and save it without any worries of loss of space, time or computing power. This benefit of databases to companies is also the bane to auditors. However, the effective utilisation of one robust technology will bring sense to the chaos generated by databases: Data Mining. Data Mining aims at converting data to sensible information. It intends to extract information from the data repositories in a manner as needed by the auditor. The auditors, with the help of data mining techniques can 'mine' for the relevant information needed to perform their assessment without having to bother about the irrelevant data. This report aims at analysing the benefits brought about by applying data mining technologies to auditing. As a part of the process of analysing the benefits, the paper also presents the technological overview of data mining, the problem faced by auditors and the tools and techniques data mining provides to alleviate the problems. Auditing: An Introduction to the Problem Domain Auditing is commonly defined as the process of accumulating and analysing information to detect the degree of conformance of the information with the pre-set criteria (Arens & Loebbecke, 2000). During its inception, auditing was an activity performed only to check financial compliance with the goals set. However today, it is an activity that is carried rigorously across all the domains of an enterprise. Auditing involves analysing the information from all departments including manufacturing, operations, human resource, finance and other verticals. Generally, companies hire independent auditors from outside the company to ascertain whether the statements of the company are in conformity with the generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). However auditing is facing very tough challenges. The demise of major companies such as Enron and Anderson are live examples to limn the depth of negative impact that can be brought about by improper auditing. The complexity of business transactions coupled with investor's complex business practises to gain more profits makes the job of an auditor very challenging (Vijayalakshmi, 2003). To ensure that an objective assessment is reached, an auditor must be presented with data at all levels. The company creates huge databases of statements, records and other data that an auditor is expected to analyse. However due to timing and cost constraints, auditors can not examine every detail behind the stacks of records. With massive improvements in technology such as the development of Supply Chain Management Systems and Enterprise Resource Planning applications, the amount of business transactions performed everyday has grown exponentially. Since, in most cases, a company hires an

Study Skills Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 1

Study Skills - Essay Example Study skills are never attained fully formed, any more than a grown man pops out of his mother’s womb. According to Cottrell(2003 p3)They evolve and mature through repetition, trial and error, critique from others and continued reflection as you progress through your individual journey as a learner The purpose of this module is to provide the opportunity to acquire and develop the study skills that will be necessary to successfully complete this course to a standard that I am aiming for. Being a competent independent learner is derived from being self motivated, being able to manage personal learning processes, good time management skills and continually reflecting on what and how you learn best and tailoring your energies to suit. Within this portfolio I will examine the development of learner independence, time management, self evaluation of personal learning, production of an action plan and improving my essay writing skills. If as anticipated this is completed successfully it will add additional skills to my current ones and aide me in my current quest to secure a higher second grade result on this degree course. Learner independence or autonomy can be defined as â€Å"capacity to take responsibility for, and control of, your own learning, whether in an institutionalised context, or completely independent of a teacher or institution† (Thornbury, 2006). Learner independence is the ability of the learners to control their learning process (Holec, 1981). In the present age, when knowledge is growing at very fast pace because of the ongoing research work and rapid advancements in technology, the importance of independent learning cannot be overemphasized. Learners must understand that the education they are provided with at institutions is time-constrained, and what they need to learn is not limited to what they are taught in schools. Most learners used to learning in

The Rococo Style of Art Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

The Rococo Style of Art - Essay Example Pope uses satire in his literature to express a certain perspective. He reveals the ludicrousness and unsuitable behavior that the 18th century people of England had towards fashion. The woman Belinda symbolizes the kind of women busy indulging and competing for fashion, which can be slightly term as an act of stupidity. The satire is edifying and aloof. He does not directly attack a particular person but points out the moral infidelity in the society. The society in context is the 18th century aristocratic era of the rise in the fashion industry. Although he also tackles other relevant topics whereby he continues the use of his satirical prose (Levey 45-70). An illustration is the case of the judge where he criticizes him for making rushed rulings in a ridiculous manner. The Rape of the Lock incorporates the masterful traits of a laudable blockbuster, nevertheless is used sarcastically to an apparently trivial narcissistic exclusive squabble. It eventually achieves a fanciful ridicu le epic by combining the petty and unchanging. This piece of literature presents a humorous and light tone. This consequentially elucidates the eccentric kind of the poem’s vital quarrel. The atrocities done by Baron like â€Å"raping† or stealing and the memorable hair style of Belinda are some of the issues of conflict. â€Å"The meeting points the sacred hair dissever from the fair head, forever and forever! Then flashed the living lightning from her eyes, and screams of horror rend the affrighted skies†.

Wal-Mart vs Target Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

Wal-Mart vs Target - Assignment Example Wal-Mart strives to operate under the premise of advocating for low prices while Target simply operates under the premise of focusing on style and fashion (Steverman 12). There are many brands that one can choose to shop in America, but based on their efficiency and affordability of their products, Wal-Mart and Target are the preferred brands. Most of the college students can associate with such brands because they can only afford to shop at stores that are pocket-friendly thus the reason as to why we proposed this project. However, despite the fact that both Wal-Mart and Target are known for their efficiency and affordability, customers can only be loyal to one of them. Wal-Mart and Target have over the decades grown to establish their brands in the market and as a result, both have used different techniques and strategies to propel their growth (Bickle 21). The birth of discount retailing is traced back to the year 1962, which was the first year for operation of Wal-Mart and Target. It is during this period that Sam Walton’s small chain variety of stores was engulfed in competition from other discount chains. As a result, Sam traveled all over the country to study more about the new form of retail concept and based on his vision that most of the American consumers were shifting to a new form of general store he decided to put up the first ever Wal-Mart store. Together with his wife Helen, they both put in approximately 95% into the first Wal-Mart store, which was located at Rogers, Arkansas. Wal-Mart goals ever since its inception has been to provide great value as well as great customer service (Barstow 32). Walton’s vision was focused on establishing the brand at all cost with an aim of improving the lives of the people. During the same year, George Dayton launched the first ever discount Target chain store in Roseville, Minnesota. The two brands henceforth set to become the largest retail chain stores in America attracting larger customer base and  giving their competitors a challenging ground.