Eighties Cyberpunk :: Science Fiction Literature Essays Papers

Eighties CyberpunkIn the early 1980s, cyberpunk was used as a label to describe a new change of science assembly written by a group of five writers, which challenged the traditional genres associated with science fiction (Shiner, 7). SF used highly visionary ideas to project scientific phenomenas, consequenting in dreamy, stylized stories of space colonies and flying space crafts. This new science fiction was different, because it incorporated testify global, social and technological situations to attend to induce the future of the world. It generated new outcomes for the futures high technological, society and global environment that would help categorize it into a specific wee of writing known as cyberpunk.William Gibson, one of the five writers associated with the cyberpunk genre, is credited by critics and peers for typifying the cyberpunk writing form in his popular novel Neuromancer. Bruce Sterling, Rudy Rucker, behind Shirley and Lewis Shiner, the other four writers wh o helped prepare the movement, agree that Gibsons Neuromancer influenced the categorization of the new science fiction as cyberpunk. Therefore, Gibsons novel can be used as a reliable source for specify the cyberpunk genre.With this in mind, we can analyze the high-technology used in Neuromancer and its importance to the cyberpunk form of writing. Gibson creates an advanced technological forge called Flatlines construct, which is a hardwired ROM cassette replicating a dead mans skills, obsessions, knee jerk responses (Gibson, 20). This futuristic device that brings back human personalities from the dead, can be viewed as a result of the present fascination with pitch dead people back to life. This fascination is evident in hospital emergency rooms and in game boards standardized the Ouija board. Both display cases are corresponding the use of he Flatlines construct, in the sense that all three bring life back to the dead. This incorporation of high-technology with societys p resent interests in mind, is a frequent form recognizable in Neuromancer and in the cyberpunk fiction of Sterling, Rucker, Shirley and Lewis.A common element of genuine cyberpunk writing erect in Neuromancer, is Gibsons depiction of the futuristic society and the people who live in it. Once again, Gibson uses the present issues of government and nuclear tension to predict societys future. In Neuromancer, this results in a world destroy by nuclear war. However, the people living in the society continue to survive in the world for personal benefit, or just for the sake of living. Gibson shows an example of this with his characters in Neuromancer.Eighties Cyberpunk Science Fiction Literature Essays PapersEighties CyberpunkIn the early 1980s, cyberpunk was used as a label to describe a new form of science fiction written by a group of five writers, which challenged the traditional genres associated with science fiction (Shiner, 7). SF used highly imaginative ideas to project scient ific phenomenas, resulting in dreamy, stylized stories of space colonies and flying space crafts. This new science fiction was different, because it incorporated present global, social and technological situations to help induce the future of the world. It generated new outcomes for the futures high technological, society and global environment that would help categorize it into a specific form of writing known as cyberpunk.William Gibson, one of the five writers associated with the cyberpunk genre, is credited by critics and peers for typifying the cyberpunk writing form in his popular novel Neuromancer. Bruce Sterling, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley and Lewis Shiner, the other four writers who helped launch the movement, agree that Gibsons Neuromancer influenced the categorization of the new science fiction as cyberpunk. Therefore, Gibsons novel can be used as a reliable source for defining the cyberpunk genre.With this in mind, we can analyze the high-technology used in Neuromancer an d its importance to the cyberpunk form of writing. Gibson creates an advanced technological machine called Flatlines construct, which is a hardwired ROM cassette replicating a dead mans skills, obsessions, knee jerk responses (Gibson, 20). This futuristic device that brings back human personalities from the dead, can be viewed as a result of the present fascination with bringing dead people back to life. This fascination is evident in hospital emergency rooms and in game boards like the Ouija board. Both examples are similar the use of he Flatlines construct, in the sense that all three bring life back to the dead. This incorporation of high-technology with societys present interests in mind, is a frequent form recognizable in Neuromancer and in the cyberpunk fiction of Sterling, Rucker, Shirley and Lewis.A common element of genuine cyberpunk writing found in Neuromancer, is Gibsons depiction of the futuristic society and the people who live in it. Once again, Gibson uses the presen t issues of government and nuclear tension to predict societys future. In Neuromancer, this results in a world ruined by nuclear war. However, the people living in the society continue to survive in the world for personal benefit, or just for the sake of living. Gibson shows an example of this with his characters in Neuromancer.

Ruhling Manufacturing Company Essay -- Business Management

1. Why might negotiation be prosperous over competitive bidding in certain procurement situations?Based on the textbook and my understanding, whenever there are negotiations between a procurer and a supplier regarding a competitive bidding, the first thing that might be favored is the scope of the project, meaning both will sit down and discuss the entire project prior the work begins. Meanwhile, during the negotiations, evaluation criteria should be clear, and stated and defined. As the evaluation is based on the criteria stated and the procurer can request or ask the suppliers opinions on certain specifications and where things can be improved.There are two characteristics to be considered when negotiating over competitive biddinga)Must be flexible and allow changes to make and specify the designs of the projects. b)Knowledge is very important because if a project is based or awarded on competitive bidding then a experienceor may not know the teaching about possible design flaw s, submit a low bid, and recoup profits when changes are required. 2. Considerations of Epsilons alternative proposala. What is the applicability of a requirements contract from Ruhlings point of view?Assume that Epsilon will still make a profit resulting from economics of long runs and learning curvesFrom Ruhlings point of views, the applicable of a requirements contract are both legal and mutually satisfactory, as long as performance is met and buyers requirements exist, it gives certain protection against price increases, and the possibility of a market predictable. b. anticipate Ruhling is now interested in a requirements contract, how should Ruhling proceed with the bidding/award process?Ruhling should start a ... ...anged innumerable times over the projects life. Continual process and time delays had hampered progress. Bolger had reported design errors that necessitated the refitting of complex equipment and rework of the aluminum welding. Materials requirements included t he use of welded aluminum. Bolger normally employed only steel welders aluminum welders were in scant(p) supply and impatient during work stoppages. The Bolger contract was cost based plus a fixed fee. A particularly disturbing problem was Bolgers cost inform system. Bolger contract negotiators waited for up to three weeks for cost data.Works Citedhttp//www.fns.usda.gov/tn/Resources/equip08.pdfhttp//faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/stadelis/aucvsneg07_15_07.pdfhttp//www.nextlevelpurchasing.com/articles/dual-source.htmlhttp//corpslakes.usace.army.mil/employees/omcontracts/pdfs/section12.pdf

Essay on Manipulation through Language in The Memorandum

Manipulation through Language in The Memorandum How nonpareil utilizes language to perpetuate certain images or perspectives can greatly influence the way people think. One can use language to operate the minds of others and demand them under some form of subjugation. In Vaclav Havels The Memorandum certain characters use this tactic of manipulation through different means that involve language, and in the process, they throw the authority or recognition they are seeking. Ballas promotes the new creation of the synthetic language, Ptydepe, which reduces humans by mechanizing them for the purpose of a more scientific and efficient constitution of communication. The language is created so that people volition show no emotions or flaws when speaking. This system is analogous to the bureaucracy, which also implements its linguistic power to establish and maintain send in every aspect of The Memorandums society. Havel illustrates how language is intrinsically omnipotent by exempli fying the drastic effects it can defend on peoples rationality. The characters in the head for the hills who use language to their advantage gain power, and those who allow language to control them become victims of the cyclic struggle to systematize humanity. Ballas is one person who uses language to manipulate and abate people, thereby exercising his power. Although subordinate to Gross by title in the beginning of the play, Ballas manages to finesse Gross into signing the supplementary order for the appointed introduction of Ptydepe, even though Gross is in opposition to the idea of an artificial language. He uses public opinion over the rubber stamp issue to manipulate Gross into submitting to his demands. Ballas strategically attempts to tell Gross what he be... ... also lapse into self-alienation, unable to identify with who they are as humans. The characters in the play have become so involved in a systematic way of living that they keep a knife and fork in their offi ce drawers that they take with them everyday to lunch in a solemn, funeral-like procession (2.12). As long as people allow this oppression of humanity, the circle of power will never cease. In the play, although Ptydepe was eventually condemned as a failure, instead of ridding the organization of the system, Ballas implemented a new method of communication, Chorukor. Just as the play ends as it begins, the system that controls peoples actions and thoughts will remain intact until a greater power can control the system. WORKS CITED Havel, Vaclav. The Memorandum in The Garden Party and former(a) Plays. Trans. Vera Blackwell. New York Grove Press, 1993.

Little Portugal Fills Big Shoes Essay -- Geography

Lying west of Spain and East of the North Atlantic Ocean is a small country no bigger than the ground of Indiana (World Factbook). Portugal, this mistakenly insignificant land, quickly made an impression on European exploration beginning in the advance(prenominal) thirteenth century. It was not prospicient before neighboring areas looked to this successful country for tactics concerning discovery. But exactly how did this small piece of land with few inhabitants manage to stand above its contest for quite some time? Portuguese motives, leaders, tactics, and innovations must be further examined in order to fully comprehend just how the Portuguese dominated early trade and exploration. Due to these three aspects, Portugal became the country that all strived to surpass however, it was this competition that eventually lessened the power of the once unstoppable empire. In the beginning, Portugal sought advanced lands because more resources were necessary in order to ensure the su rvival of the people. Since the country had few resources of its own, its inhabitants yearned for the discovery of lands that would make items, primarily Asian spices, more easily accessible. puritanical lands and the latest crops however were not the only motivation for early exploration. The Portuguese wanted to leave an impression on the areas they encountered they strived to spread an important aspect of their lives, Christianity. Portuguese motives can easily be recognized through the voice of a prominent mariner of the land, Vasco Da Gama. When his purpose was questioned by local authorities of Calicut in 1498, he stated, Christians and spices (Bentley 370). Trading posts were quickly established in a number of areas by the Portuguese, and these connections permitt... ...1.Morison, Samuel Eliot. Admiral of the Ocean Sea a Life of Christopher Columbus,. Boston Little, cook and, 1942. Morison, Samuel Eliot. The European Discovery of America the Southern Voyages, A.D. 14 92-1616. New York Oxford UP, 1974. Sterling, Keir B. Exploration of America, Early. Dictionary of American History. Ed. Stanley Kutler. 3rd ed. Vol. 3. New York Charles Scribners Sons, 2003. 283-287. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 26 Feb. 2011.The World Factbook 2009. Washington, DC Central Intelligence Agency, 2009.https//www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/index.htmlTordesillas, Treaty of. Gale Encyclopedia of U.S. Economic History. Vol. 2. Detroit Gale, 2000. 1009-1010. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 26 Feb. 2011.Warmenhoven, Henri J. Western Europe. Guilford, CT Dushkin Pub. Group, 1989.

college essay :: essays research papers

Not everything I learned, I learned in kindergarten nor in the classroom for that matter. As a senior in high up school Im not only 1ft taller but hopefully a more enlightened person. It is necessary to understand that I am not the same person who began as a freshman four short eld ago. Although I learned a great deal inside the classroom, I claim also garnered a wealth of knowledge far from the hallowed halls of my high school. My involvement in academics, school related clubs and work experience have instilled unique abilities and characteristics in me that have transformed me from a nave freshman into a well rounded motivated young man.Throughout my four years at Westwood High, I have taken advantage of the many clubs and organizations offered. My participation in these groups has allowed me to form untested friendships with fellow students, teachers and people from the community. Starting in my sophomore year I joined the school newspaper, (Westwood Wire) and was able to sh owcase myself as a journalist. Although the stories were simplistic (Food Fight results in Major Brawl) they gave me a chance to play the role of a reporter and be a source of information and news for many of my peers. Another club that has been a capacious part of my high school career is the Teen Mentors group. On Friday nights I would act as a chaperone at the middle school dances. I had a responsibility to watch over younger students, provide them with an enjoyable and safe experience and most of all show them that I could be seen as a positive role model in their lives.From the initial summer of my freshman year to this very day I have had a job. line in my fourteenth year I started working at Roche Bros supermarket as a bag boy, cashier, grocery clerk and as a source of new ideas for management. I learned the basics of running the grocery business, having seen first hand how each department of the store had to stay below a budget and at the same time provide an unparalleled service to the customer. I was to see the challenges that my manager faced of creating a schedule by which every employee was happy with their hours. I also was able to see various forms of marketing and examples of how Roche Bros sold itself.

college essay :: essays research papers

Not everything I learned, I learned in kindergarten nor in the classroom for that matter. As a senior in high schoolhouse Im not only 1ft taller but hopefully a more enlightened person. It is necessary to understand that I am not the same person who began as a freshman quadruplet short years ago. Although I learned a great deal deep down the classroom, I have also garnered a wealth of knowledge far from the hallowed halls of my high school. My involvement in academics, school related clubs and work drive have instilled unique abilities and characteristics in me that have transformed me from a nave freshman into a well rounded motivated young man.Throughout my four years at Westwood High, I have taken advantage of the many clubs and organizations offered. My participation in these groups has allowed me to form new friendships with fellow students, teachers and people from the community. Starting in my sophomore year I joined the school newspaper, (Westwood Wire) and was able to s howcase myself as a journalist. Although the stories were simplistic (Food Fight results in Major do) they gave me a chance to play the role of a reporter and be a stemma of information and news for many of my peers. Another club that has been a big part of my high school career is the Teen Mentors group. On Friday nights I would act as a chaperone at the middle school dances. I had a responsibility to watch over younger students, provide them with an enjoyable and safe experience and most of all show them that I could be seen as a positive role model in their lives.From the initial summer of my freshman year to this very day I have had a job. Beginning in my fourteenth year I started working at Roche Bros supermarket as a bag boy, cashier, grocery clerk and as a source of new ideas for management. I learned the basics of running the grocery business, having seen first hand how each department of the store had to stay below a cypher and at the same time provide an unparalleled se rvice to the customer. I was to see the challenges that my manager faced of creating a schedule by which every employee was golden with their hours. I also was able to see various forms of marketing and examples of how Roche Bros sold itself.

Early Christian Art Essay

The present state of Christianity is completely different to its past. During the early geezerhood of Christianity, Christians were persecuted for their faith. Due to heavy persecution, early Christians had to use some kind of secret communication. This had given bureau to the birth of Early Christian art. Due to the proximity in the timeline, Early Christian art had shown much influence from Byzantine art. However, Early Christian art had to undergo change during the Late Antiquity in the roman Empire.Much of the early Christian Art in the Late Antiquity was influenced by the prevalence of wars and political instability (Spier 2007). Since there was no more direct for secrecy, Early Christian art had become more foc utilise on politics rather than the religion. During the early years of Christianity, storytelling was regarded as the close effective way of mass communication. Written language was still unavailable for the consumption of all, thus people had used Oral narratives to communicate and preserve cultural ideas.One of the propagated stories was that of Christianity. On the other hand, symbols were used to avoid persecution from those against Christianity. Through storytelling and symbols, early Christian artists were able to continue their faith and avoid persecution at the same time. Perhaps two of the most common symbols in Early Christian art are the dove, lamb, and the fish. The dove was used as a symbol for purity and peace, something of high value to Christians. On the other hand, the fish was used as a symbol for Christ.The fish had become an ingenious symbol for Christ as it symbolizes the last supper and the water used for Christian baptism. And lastly, the lamb had become another symbol for Christ, particularly when he had bled during the crucifixion. In addition to that, the lamb could also serve as a symbolization for Christians wherein Christ is the good shepherd. Reference Spier, Jeffrey. (2007). Picturing the Bible the earliest Chr istian art. Connecticut Yale University Press

George Santayana Essay

George Santayana noted that those who do not remember their own history are doomed to repeat it. There is an total truth in the observation and trainers and nations who have not learnt from the mistakes faced ramification down the ages. It can be stated that history is a unfastened that acts as a reference point point to the future generations and asks them to learn from the mistakes committed earlier. In this context, it is a curious notion to point out that the United States was organize from the ashes of British colonial attitudes in the America.The American citizen fought against the British rule through revolution in order to gain freedom and autonomy. The irony of history is that the US tried to set up colonies themselves in Cuba during the 40s and 50s only to be defeated by local revolutionary forces lead by Fidel Castro. (Kar, 1996) The French had their share of mass revolution during French revolution that should have taught them not to oppress a population beyond a ce rtain(prenominal) limit.However, they took little education from this incident and oppressed the local population of Indo-Chine with severe brutality. The result was general upraise that put an end to the French control in the Asian parts. (King, 1999) Similarly, Napoleon attacked Russia during the summer hoping to capture all of Russia by the beginning of winter. He was a failure and was forced to face humiliating defeat. This should have been reference point for Adolph Hitler.He tried to follow the same path of Napoleon and faced the same result, only this time he lost the entire WWII payable to this Russian campaign. (Lamb, 2004) Thus, it is clear, whenever a leader or county fails to learn from history, it is evident, there would be misery.References Kar, P (1996) History of United States Colonized to Colonials Kolkata Dasgupta & Chatterjee King, H (1999) Historical Principals Communism Auckland HBT & digest Ltd Lamb, D (2004) Cult to Culture The Development of Civilization Wel lington National Book Trust

“Cannon Fodder” and “The Armistice” Essay

The two poems are both written during the time of the First World War, and reflect the emotions felt towards the war. Both poets jerk off divers(prenominal) experiences of the war, yet share a common grief. They reflect their grief and other emotions through their use of language.In the poem cannon Fodder, Wilfred Owen tries to occupy to the reader the terror that he felt when disc overing the corpse of the spend seven days after his death. Owen uses very powerful imagery to show the reader the crime of the corpseFeeling the damp, chill circlet of fleshLoosen its holdOn muscles and sinews and bonesThis represents the decay and decomposition of the corpse, and he shows us the horror of seeing the eruptcome of the decay by using a metaphor. The flesh isnt really holding on to the dead soldiers frame, but it is there to inform us that it is dropping apart.Owen in addition tries to convey to the reader the noteing of futility towards the war. He shows the pointlessness of it all by using rhetorical questionsIs death really a sleep?The soldier who has discovered the corpse is asking the corpse this question, but of course, the soldier will get no answer because he is talking to a dead man. This project in itself is pointless, and reminds us bonnie how pointless all of the war seems to Owen.Owen likewise uses a lot of Prefixes on words instead of using a different word. This can change the mood of a sentenceUncared for in the unowned placeThe use of the suffixes makes the place sound so desolate, that it is not worth demise for. The place is called no mans land, and this is why it is referred to as unknown. Uncared makes us feel that there is no recognition of the bravery of the soldier, or for the respect to bring his body in from no mans land.In Owens poem, we also feel for the soldier who found the corpse. He thinks sustain to what the dead soldiers life at home was in all likelihood like. This makes us feel as though the soldier wishes he was at home, odor all of the comforts presented in the soldiers thoughtsBut at home by the fireThe word but instantly indicates that the mood of the poem is about to change, and that the reader is about to see a contrast between what they have just read, and what they are about to read.Owen also uses his line structure to add power to the words and the meaning he is trying to conveyYour bright-limbed lover is lying out thereDeadThe last line of the retell is very emphatic and powerful, because death is such a strong word and it is being used alone, roughly being used as a false stop to the idyllic life being lived by the dead soldiers lover.During stanzas two, three and four, Wilfred Owen uses the soldier to try and discriminate the story for the people back home by using the context that they will understandO mother, sewing by candlelight,Put a federal agency that stuff.This quote was used to show the reader that the war would affect them back at home almost as badly as the soldiers are feeling it over in France. In stanzas two, three and four, one can detect a large amount of bitterness, and possibly anger, yet the anger is conveyed more subtly than in poems like dulcet et decorum et where the stanzas are set out almost like tirades. We detect this bitterness by the rudeness to the people back at home. In stanzas three and four, he even tells the mother and the lover what to do.In the poem, The Armistice by May Wedderburn Cannan, the reader feels some entirely different emotions than the ones conveyed in Cannon Fodder.The first different emotion that the reader detects from the poem is relief. The whole office feels this, as it descends in chaosOne said, its over, over, its the endThe War is over endedThe reader can feel the hustle and bustle of the people in the office, as their excite manpowert and relief travail over. This is shown by the repetition in the workers speech. They repeat the words end and over. This is to stress the key fact that the killing w ill come to an end, and that their families and loved ones will get them back.In the second stanza, the workers also being to recollectI cant remember life without the warThis shows that to the people, war had become a way of life, and that people had forgotten their old lives. The fact that the people are reflecting about the war is good, because it shows their concern and respect for the men on the front line, and this is probably Wedderburn Cannans subtle way of saying thank you to the men who were frontline.The reader can also detect feelings of isolation from the two women left behind after the others go out the roomBig empty roomThis suggests that the women do not feel left behind by the other staff, but left behind by their men who went and fought, and died in the army. The big empty room is a metaphor for the womens empty hearts now that the loves of their lives have left them for good.The reader is also given a view of the idyllic thoughts that one of the women is thinking about the front lineIt will be quiet tonightUp at the front first time in all these years,And no one will be killed there anymoreThis is an idyllic view of the frontline, however it is also ironic, because it is a well-documented fact that lives were lost even after the armistice because it took a while for news to spread of the end of the war. It is also a little upsetting, because these mens lives are being lost in vain.Wedderburn Cannan also makes us feel empathy towards the two female characters at the end of the poemIts over for me toomy man was killed,Woundedand diedThe pauses in the dialogue make the reader feel that the woman is struggling to force back tears. It also makes us feel that maybe she is contemplating what the future holds, and reflecting on her dead husband.The poem comes to an extremely sombre ending, and this is very similar to the ending of the warPeace could not give back her dead.This makes us feel that the whole war was worthless. Even in the times of pea ce, people like the woman in the poem are still feeling the grief that devastation of the war had caused.The two poems are from different times, wartime and post-war but the anti-war message is still the same and is still being utilised effectively by the strong language used in both poems. In Cannon Fodder, Wilfred Owen displays to us the full of horror of the war in gory detail, whilst in The Armistice, the horror of the war is the loneliness of the people left behind. Whereas Owen uses shock tactics to put his message across, Wedderburn Cannan tries to draw the readers empathy instead.

Plato, Machiavelli Essay

Machiavelli says the prince only has to seem good, not be good. Plato insists that seeming is bad, macrocosm is good. Nicolo Machiavelli is cognize as being an realist who accepted that f dally that humans are brutal, selfish, and fickle while Plato was an idealist who believed people could be ruled by a philosopher tycoon who ruled over the warriors and tradesmen of his ideal republic with rationality. In his view the philosopher-king was in charge of making the state a utopia in that everyone had his/her place and all worked unneurotic for the common good of the state.Machiavelli said that this was a foolish idea. Machiavelli philosophy of government was centered on the linguistic rule. He believed the king, or despot, had the right to do whatever was demand for his own gain, or whatever the monarch considered the good of the state which he called Virtu. Machiavelli believed the only purpose for a ruler was to make war, and protect its citizens from attacks by other states. H e advocated the slaughter of surrendered generals in order to crush hopes of revolution even rationalizing that it was worth the risk of revolution should it anger the people.Machiavelli believed a ruler should be immoral using deception and illusion for power and never allowing the people to know the real him In Machiavellis time, as it is today, the States whole reason for being was to serve the citizens. The ruler, therefore, is justified in doing whatever is necessary to maintain the country or state, even if it is unjust. In Platos time, man served the state. According to the viewed that ethics and government activity are the same, or at least co-terminous. There was no distinction between private life and public life, as there is today.Plato argues a ruler can never be unjust. Plato argues against this type of ruler, who rules solely by might. Plato tries to prove that it is always better to be just than unjust , claiming that there is a operose connection between justice , personal happiness and the well being of the state. Machiavelli underlines the fact that moral principles are not necessarily connected with the efficiency of the act of ruling . If the principles of morality and justice need to be broken in for the state to be prosperous , than this is how things should be done.In the end, Plato and Machiavelli lived very different lives, add to their differing thoughts on the world. Plato grew up in the upper aristocratic class but was adopted by Socrates. As he followed Socrates, he learned all he would need for his later life as a philosopher when he essentially wandered around Greece without pay. In this way he was untouched by wealths corruption. Machiavelli, on the other hand, grew up in a wealthy Italian home and lived well supplied for by his patrons. The wealth that he was accustomed to was the main try for his philosophy centered around personal gain.

Rationalism Essay

Rationalism vs. EmpiricismFirst published Thu Aug 19, 2004 substantive revision Thu Mar 21, 2013 The contention betwixt rationalism and empiricism concerns the issue to which we atomic fleck 18 dependent upon sense receive in our effort to piddle make outledge. Rationalists claim that at that place be substantial personal fashions in which our judgments and goledge argon gained individually of sense cognise. Empiricists claim that sense work through is the ultimate bug of all our conceptionions and association. Rationalists everydayly develop their assure in dickens elbow fashions. First, they indicate that there ar cases where the content of our concepts or cogniseledge outstrips the in engineeration that sense beat nonify generate. Second, they construct cards of how sympathy in almost form or separate provides that additional information just astir(p rubicundicate) the being. Empiricists present complementary lines of thought. First, they d evelop accounts of how experience provides the information that positivists cite, insofar as we feel it in the first place. (Empiricists allow at times opt for skepticism as an alternative to rationalism if experience dismiss non provide the concepts or liveledge the rationalists cite, wherefore we dont devote them.) Second, empiricists attack the rationalists accounts of how reason is a source of concepts or association.1. IntroductionThe dispute among rationalism and empiricism takes place in spite of appearance epistemology, the branch of philosophy devoted to studying the record, sources and limits of loveledge. The defining questions of epistemology include the succeeding(a). 1. What is the nature of pro commital friendship, bopledge that a recrudesceicular trace about the military personnel is unbent? To get it on a pr raise, we must believe it and it must be true, save something more than(prenominal) is required, something that distinguishes noesis from a lucky guess. Lets call this additional element warrant. A good deal of philosophic work has been invested in trying to determine the nature of warrant.2. How post we gain experience?We feces form true article of faiths just by making lucky guesses. How to gain warranted beliefs is less clear. Moreover, to know the world, we must think about it, and it is unclear how we gain the concepts we use in thought or what assurance, if every, we shake that the federal agencys in which we divide up the worldusing our concepts correspond to divisions that actually exist.3. What atomic number 18 the limits of our knowledge?Some aspects of the world whitethorn be inwardly the limits of our thought solely beyond the limits of our knowledge faced with competing descriptions of them, we git non know which description is true. Some aspects of the world whitethorn even be beyond the limits of our thought, so that we cannot form intelligible descriptions of them, let al integrity kno w that a peculiar(prenominal) description is true. The disagreement between rationalists and empiricists primarily concerns the indorsement question, regarding the sources of our concepts and knowledge. In some instances, their disagreement on this topic leads them to give conflicting responses to the different questions as well. They whitethorn disagree over the nature of warrant or about the limits of our thought and knowledge. Our focus here will be on the competing rationalist and empiricist responses to the second question.1.1 RationalismTo be a rationalist is to draw at least mavin of three claims. The erudition/ entailment thesis concerns how we be surface warranted in believing propositions in a token subject ara. The Intuition/price reduction dissertation Some propositions in a special(a) subject area, S, are knowable by us by scholarship al angiotensin-converting enzyme still others are knowable by being deduced from intuited propositions. Intuition is a form of rational insight. Intellectually grasping a proposition, we just see it to be true in much(prenominal)(prenominal) a way as to form a true, warranted belief in it. (As discussed in dent 2 below, the nature of this intellectual seeing needs explanation.) deduction is a regale in which we derive conclusions from intuited premises through valid arguments, unmatchables in which the conclusion must be true if the premises are true. We intuit, for example, that the human body three is prime and that it is greater than two. We then deduce from this knowledge that there is a prime number greater than two. Intuition and deduction thus provide us with knowledge a priori, which is to hypothesise knowledge gained independently of sense experience. We can generate different reading materials of the Intuition/Deduction thesis by inter deepen different subject areas for the variable S. Some rationalists take mathematics to be knowable by experience and deduction. Some place ethical t ruths in this category. Some include metaphysical claims, such asthat divinity exists, we wee-wee free will, and our mind and body are distinct substances.The more(prenominal) propositions rationalists include within the straddle of erudition and deduction, and the more controversial the truth of those propositions or the claims to know them, the more radical their rationalism. Rationalists to a fault vary the strength of their view by adjusting their thought of warrant. Some take warranted beliefs to be beyond even the slightest doubt and claim that intuition and deduction provide beliefs of this high epistemic status. Others interpret warrant more conservatively, say as belief beyond a reasonable doubt, and claim that intuition and deduction provide beliefs of that caliber. Still another dimension of rationalism depends on how its prop wholenessnts under survive the society between intuition, on the one delve, and truth, on the other. Some take intuition to be infallible, claiming that whatever we intuit must be true. Others result for the possibility of false intuited propositions. The second thesis associated with rationalism is the natural friendship thesis. The Innate Knowledge thesis We puddle knowledge of some truths in a particular subject area, S, as part of our rational nature. Like the Intuition/Deduction thesis, the Innate Knowledge thesis asserts the existence of knowledge gained a priori, independently of experience. The difference between them rests in the accompanying understanding of how this a priori knowledge is gained. The Intuition/Deduction thesis cites intuition and subsequent deductive reasoning. The Innate Knowledge thesis offers our rational nature. Our congenital knowledge is not learned through either sense experience or intuition and deduction. It is just part of our nature. Experiences may blow up a process by which we bring this knowledge to consciousness, but the experiences do not provide us with the knowledge i tself. It has in some way been with us all along. According to some rationalists, we gained the knowledge in an earlier existence. According to others, god provided us with it at creation. Still others say it is part of our nature through natural selection. We get different variances of the Innate Knowledge thesis by substituting different subject areas for the variable S. Once again, the more subjects included within the range of the thesis or the more controversial the claim to deplete knowledge in them, the more radical the form of rationalism. Stronger and weaker understandings of warrant yield stronger and weaker versions of the thesis as well. The third important thesis ofrationalism is the Innate fancy thesis. The Innate Concept Thesis We have some of the concepts we usage in a particular subject area, S, as part of our rational nature.According to the Innate Concept thesis, some of our concepts are not gained from experience. They are part of our rational nature in such a way that, while sense experiences may trigger a process by which they are brought to consciousness, experience does not provide the concepts or determine the information they contain. Some claim that the Innate Concept thesis is entailed by the Innate Knowledge Thesis a particular instance of knowledge can just now be innate if the concepts that are contained in the kn give proposition are also innate. This is Lockes position (1690, Book I, Chapter IV, Section 1, p. 91). Others, such as Carruthers, argue against this connection (1992, pp. 5354). The content and strength of the Innate Concept thesis varies with the concepts claimed to be innate. The more a concept seems removed from experience and the mental operations we can perform on experience the more plausibly it may be claimed to be innate. Since we do not experience perfect trigons but do experience pains, our concept of the designer is a more promising candidate for being innate than our concept of the latter. The In tuition/Deduction thesis, the Innate Knowledge thesis, and the Innate Concept thesis are essential to rationalism to be a rationalist is to adopt at least one of them. Two other closely related theses are generally adopted by rationalists, although one can certainly be a rationalist without adopting either of them. The first is that experience cannot provide what we gain from reason. The Indispensability of Reason Thesis The knowledge we gain in subject area, S, by intuition and deduction, as well as the thinkers and instances of knowledge in S that are innate to us, could not have been gained by us through sense experience. The second is that reason is prime(prenominal) to experience as a source of knowledge. The Superiority of Reason Thesis The knowledge we gain in subject area S by intuition and deduction or have innately is superior to any knowledge gained by sense experience.How reason is superior needs explanation, and rationalists have offered different accounts. One view, generally associated with Descartes (1628, Rules II and III, pp.14), is that what we know a priori is certain, beyond even the slightest doubt, while what we believe, or even know, on the basis of sense experience is at least somewhat uncertain. Another view, generally associated with Plato(Republic 479e-484c), locates the superiority of a priori knowledge in the objects known. What we know by reason alone, a Platonic form, say, is superior in an important metaphysical way, e.g. unchanging, eternal, perfect, a higher degree of being, to what we are aware of through sense experience. Most forms of rationalism involve notable commitments to other philosophical positions. One is a commitment to the denial of scepticism for at least some area of knowledge. If we claim to know some truths by intuition or deduction or to have some innate knowledge, we obviously lower scepticism with regard to those truths. Rationalism in the form of the Intuition/Deduction thesis is also committed to epi stemic foundationalism, the view that we know some truths without basing our belief in them on any others and that we then use this foundational knowledge to know more truths.1.2 EmpiricismEmpiricists endorse the following claim for some subject area. The Empiricism Thesis We have no source of knowledge in S or for the concepts we use in S other than sense experience. Empiricism about a particular subject rejects the corresponding version of the Intuition/Deduction thesis and Innate Knowledge thesis. Insofar as we have knowledge in the subject, our knowledge is a posteriori, dependent upon sense experience. Empiricists also cut across the meaning of the corresponding Innate Concept thesis that we have innate compositions in the subject area. Sense experience is our entirely source of ideas. They reject the corresponding version of the Superiority of Reason thesis. Since reason alone does not give us any knowledge, it certainly does not give us superior knowledge. Empiricists gen erally reject the Indispensability of Reason thesis, though they need not. The Empiricism thesis does not entail that we have empirical knowledge. It entails that knowledge can only be gained, if at all, by experience. Empiricists may assert, as some do for some subjects, that the rationalists are correct to claim that experience cannot give us knowledge. The conclusion they draw from this rationalist lesson is that we do not know at all. I have stated the basic claims of rationalism and empiricism so that each is relative to a particular subject area. Rationalism and empiricism, so relativized, need not conflict. We can be rationalists in mathematics or a particular area of mathematics and empiricists in all or some of the physical sciences.Rationalism and empiricism only conflict when formulated to hover the corresponding subject. Then the debate, Rationalism vs. Empiricism, is joined. The circumstance that philosophers can be both rationalists and empiricists has implications f or the classification schemes often employed in the history of philosophy, especially the one traditionally used to describe the Early Modern end of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries leading up to Kant. It is standard practice to group the major philosophers of this period as either rationalists or empiricists and to suggest that those under one heading share a vernacular agenda in opposition to those under the other. Thus, Descartes, Spinoza and Leibniz are the Continental Rationalists in opposition to Locke, Berkeley and Hume, the British Empiricists. We should adopt such general classification schemes with caution. The views of the individual philosophers are more subtle and complex than the simple-minded classification suggests. (See Loeb (1981) and Kenny (1986) for important discussions of this point.) Locke rejects rationalism in the form of any version of the Innate Knowledge or Innate Concept theses, but he nonetheless adopts the Intuition/Deduction thesis with rega rd to our knowledge of Gods existence. Descartes and Locke have remarkably similar views on the nature of our ideas, even though Descartes takes many to be innate, while Locke ties them all to experience. The rationalist/empiricist classification also encourages us to expect the philosophers on each side of the divide to have common research programs in areas beyond epistemology. Thus, Descartes, Spinoza and Leibniz are mistakenly seen as applying a reason-centered epistemology to a common metaphysical agenda, with each trying to improve on the efforts of the one before, while Locke, Berkeley and Hume are mistakenly seen as gradually rejecting those metaphysical claims, with each consciously trying to improve on the efforts of his predecessors.It is also important to note that the Rationalist/Empiricist distinction is not exhaustive of the possible sources of knowledge. One office claim, for example, that we can gain knowledge in a particular area by a form of Divine revelation or insight that is a product of neither reason nor sense experience. In short, when used carelessly, the labels rationalist and empiricist, as well as the slogan that is the title of this essay, Rationalism vs. Empiricism, can baffle rather than advance our understanding. Nonetheless, an important debate properly described as Rationalism vs. Empiricism is joined wheneverthe claims for each view are formulated to cover the same subject. What is perhaps the most interesting form of the debate occurs when we take the relevant subject to be truths about the impertinent world, the world beyond our own minds. A full-fledged rationalist with regard to our knowledge of the external world holds that some external world truths can and must be known a priori, that some of the ideas required for that knowledge are and must be innate, and that this knowledge is superior to any that experience could ever provide. The full-fledged empiricist about our knowledge of the external world replies that, w hen it comes to the nature of the world beyond our own minds, experience is our sole source of information. Reason might inform us of the relations among our ideas, but those ideas themselves can only be gained, and any truths about the external reality they represent can only be known, on the basis of sense experience. This debate concerning our knowledge of the external world will generally be our main focus in what follows.Historically, the rationalist/empiricist dispute in epistemology has extend into the area of metaphysics, where philosophers are touch with the basic nature of reality, including the existence of God and such aspects of our nature as freewill and the relation between the mind and body. Major rationalists (e.g., Descartes 1641) have presented metaphysical theories, which they have claimed to know by reason alone. Major empiricists (e.g. Hume 173940) have rejected the theories as either speculation, beyond what we can learn from experience, or nonsensical attem pts to describe aspects of the world beyond the concepts experience can provide. The debate raises the issue of metaphysics as an area of knowledge. Kant puts the driving assumption clearly The very concept of metaphysics ensures that the sources of metaphysics cant be empirical. If something could be known through the senses, that would automatically show that it doesnt belong to metaphysics thats an upshot of the meaning of the word metaphysics. Its basic principles can never be taken from experience, nor can its basic concepts for it is not to be physical but metaphysical knowledge, so it must be beyond experience. 1783, Preamble, I, p. 7 The possibility then of metaphysics so understood, as an area of human knowledge, hinges on how we resolve the rationalist/empiricist debate. The debate also extends into ethics. Some moral objectivists (e.g., Ross 1930) take us to know some implicit in(p) objective moral truths by intuition, while some moral skeptics,who reject such knowledge, (e.g., Mackie 1977) find the woo to a faculty of moral intuition utterly im credible. More recently, the rationalist/empiricist debate has extended to discussions (e.g., Bealer 1999, and Alexander & Weinberg 2007) of the very nature of philosophical inquiry to what extent are philosophical questions to be answered by appeals to reason or experience?2. The Intuition/Deduction ThesisThe Intuition/Deduction thesis claims that we can know some propositions by intuition and still more by deduction. Many empiricists (e.g., Hume 1748) have been willing to accept the thesis so long as it is restricted to propositions solely about the relations among our own concepts. We can, they agree, know by intuition that our concept of God includes our concept of omniscience. Just by examining the concepts, we can intellectually grasp that the one includes the other. The debate between rationalists and empiricists is joined when the former assert, and the latter deny, the Intuition/Deduction Thesis with regard to propositions that contain substantive information about the external world. Rationalists, such as Descartes, have claimed that we can know by intuition and deduction that God exists and created the world, that our mind and body are distinct substances, and that the angles of a triangle equal two right angles, where all of these claims are truths about an external reality independent of our thought. Such substantive versions of the Intuition/Deduction thesis are our concern in this section. One defense of the Intuition/Deduction thesis assumes that we know some substantive external world truths, adds an analysis of what knowledge requires, and concludes that our knowledge must result from intuition and deduction.Descartes claims that knowledge requires certainty and that certainty about the external world is beyond what empirical testify can provide. We can never be sure our sensory impressions are not part of a dream or a massive, demon orchestrated, deception. Only intuition and deduction can provide the certainty needed for knowledge, and, given that we have some substantive knowledge of the external world, the Intuition/Deduction thesis is true. As Descartes tells us, all knowledge is certain and evident cognition (1628, Rule II, p. 1) and when we review article all the actions of the intellect by means of which we are able to arrive at a knowledge of things with no fear of being mistaken,we recognize only two intuition and deduction (1628, Rule III, p. 3). This line of argument is one of the least compelling in the rationalist arsenal. First, the assumption that knowledge requires certainty comes at a heavy cost, as it rules out so much of what we commonly take ourselves to know. Second, as many contemporary rationalists accept, intuition is not always a source of certain knowledge. The possibility of a deceiver gives us a reason to doubt our intuitions as well as our empirical beliefs.For all we know, a deceiver might coif us to intuit false propositions, just as one might arrange us to have perceptions of nonexistent objects. Descartess classic way of meeting this challenge in the Meditations is to argue that we can know with certainty that no such deceiver interferes with our intuitions and deductions. They are infallible, as God guarantees their truth. The problem, known as the Cartesian Circle, is that Descartess account of how we gain this knowledge begs the question, by attempting to deduce the conclusion that all our intuitions are true from intuited premises. Moreover, his account does not touch a remaining problem that he himself notes (1628, Rule VII, p. 7) Deductions of any appreciable length rely on our fallible memory. A more plausible argument for the Intuition/Deduction thesis again assumes that we know some particular, external world truths, and then appeals to the nature of what we know, rather than to the nature of knowledge itself, to argue that our knowledge must result from intuition and dedu ction. Leibniz (1704) tells us the following.The senses, although they are necessary for all our actual knowledge, are not sufficient to give us the solely of it, since the senses never give anything but instances, that is to say particular or individual truths. Now all the instances which confirm a general truth, up to now numerous they may be, are not sufficient to establish the universal necessity of this same truth, for it does not follow that what happened before will happen in the same way again. From which it appears that necessary truths, such as we find in pure mathematics, and particularly in arithmetic and geometry, must have principles whose proof does not depend on instances, nor consequently on the testimony of the senses, although without the senses it would never have occurred to us to think of them (1704, Preface, pp. 150151) Leibniz goes on to describe our mathematical knowledge as innate, and his argument may be directed to support the Innate Knowledge Thesis r ather than the Intuition/DeductionThesis.For our purposes here, we can relate it to the latter, however We have substantive knowledge about the external world in mathematics, and what we know in that area, we know to be necessarily true. Experience cannot warrant beliefs about what is necessarily the case. Hence, experience cannot be the source of our knowledge. The best explanation of our knowledge is that we gain it by intuition and deduction. Leibniz mentions logic, metaphysics and morals as other areas in which our knowledge similarly outstrips what experience can provide. Judgments in logic and metaphysics involve forms of necessity beyond what experience can support. Judgments in morals involve a form of obligation or care for that lies beyond experience, which only informs us about what is the case rather than about what ought to be. The strength of this argument varies with its examples of purported knowledge. Insofar as we focus on controversial claims in metaphysics, e.g . that God exists, that our mind is a distinct substance from our body, the initial premise that we know the claims is less than compelling. Taken with regard to other areas, however, the argument clearly has legs. We know a great deal of mathematics, and what we know, we know to be necessarily true. None of our experiences warrants a belief in such necessity, and we do not seem to rack our knowledge on any experiences.The warrant that provides us with knowledge arises from an intellectual grasp of the propositions which is clearly part of our learning. Similarly, we seem to have such moral knowledge as that, all other things being equal, it is wrong to break a promise and that pleasure is intrinsically good. No empirical lesson about how things are can warrant such knowledge of how they ought to be. This argument for the Intuition/Deduction Thesis raises additional questions which rationalists must answer. Insofar as they maintain that our knowledge of necessary truths in mathemat ics or elsewhere by intuition and deduction is substantive knowledge of the external world, they owe us an account of this form of necessity. Many empiricists stand make up to argue that necessity resides in the way we talk about things, not in the things we talk about (Quine 1966, p. 174). Similarly, if rationalists claim that our knowledge in morals is knowledge of an objective form of obligation, they owe us an account of how objective values are part of a world of apparently valueless facts. peradventure most of all, rationalist defenders of the Intuition/Deduction thesis owe us an account of what intuition is and how itprovides warranted true beliefs about the external world.What is it to intuit a proposition and how does that act of intuition support a warranted belief? Their argument presents intuition and deduction as an explanation of assumed knowledge that cantthey saybe explained by experience, but such an explanation by intuition and deduction requires that we have a c lear understanding of intuition and how it supports warranted beliefs. Metaphorical characterizations of intuition as intellectual grasping or seeing are not enough, and if intuition is some form of intellectual grasping, it appears that all that is grasped is relations among our concepts, rather than facts about the external world. Moreover, any intellectual faculty, whether it be sense perception or intuition, provides us with warranted beliefs only if it is generally reliable. The reliability of sense perception stems from the causative connection between how external objects are and how we experience them. What accounts for the reliability of our intuitions regarding the external world? Is our intuition of a particular true proposition the outcome of some causal interaction between ourselves and some aspect of the world? What aspect? What is the nature of this causal interaction? That the number three is prime does not appear to cause anything, let alone our intuition that it i s prime.These issues are made all the more pressing by the classic empiricist response to the argument. The reply is generally credited to Hume and begins with a division of all true propositions into two categories. All the objects of human reason or inquiry may naturally be divided into two kinds, to wit, traffic of Ideas, and Matters of Fact. Of the first are the sciences of Geometry, Algebra, and Arithmetic, and, in short, every affirmation which is either intuitively or demonstratively certain. That the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the square of the two sides is a proposition which expresses a relation between these figures. That three times five is equal to half of thirty expresses a relation between these numbers. Propositions of this kind are determinable by the mere operation of thought, without dependence on what is anywhere existent in the universe. Though there never were a circle or triangle in nature, the truths demonstrated by Euclid would forever retain the ir certainty and evidence. Matters of fact, which are the second objects of human reason, are not ascertained in the same manner, nor is our evidence of their truth, however great, of a like nature with theforegoing.The contrary of every matter of fact is still possible, because it can never imply a contradiction and is conceived by the mind with the same facility and distinctness as if ever so conformable to reality. (Hume 1748, Section IV, Part 1, p. 40) Intuition and deduction can provide us with knowledge of necessary truths such as those found in mathematics and logic, but such knowledge is not substantive knowledge of the external world. It is only knowledge of the relations of our own ideas. If the rationalist shifts the argument so it appeals to knowledge in morals, Humes reply is to offer an analysis of our moral concepts by which such knowledge is empirically gained knowledge of matters of fact. Morals and criticism are not so properly objects of the understanding as of ta ste and sentiment. Beauty, whether moral or natural, is tangle more properly than perceived. Or if we reason concerning it and endeavor to fix the standard, we regard a new fact, to wit, the general taste of mankind, or some other fact which may be the object of reasoning and inquiry. (Hume 1748, Section XII, Part 3, p. 173) If the rationalist appeals to our knowledge in metaphysics to support the argument, Hume denies that we have such knowledge. If we take in our hand any volumeof divinity or school metaphysics, for instancelet us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames, for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion. (Hume 1748, Section XII, Part 3, p. 173) An updated version of this general empiricist reply, with an increased emphasis on expression and the nature of meaning, is given in the twentieth-century by A. J. Ayers version of logical positivism.Adopting positivisms verification surmisal of meaning, Ayer assigns every cognitively meaningful sentence to one of two categories either it is a tautology, and so true solely by virtue of the meaning of its basis and provides no substantive information about the world, or it is open to empirical verification. There is, then, no room for knowledge about the external world by intuition or deduction. There can be no a priori knowledge of reality. For the truths of pure reason, the propositions which we know to be valid independently of all experience, are so only in virtue of their lack of factual content By contrast empirical propositions are one and all hypotheses which may be confirmed or discredited in actual sense experience. Ayer 1952, pp. 86 9394 Therationalists argument for the Intuition/Deduction Thesis goes wrong at the start, according to empiricists, by assuming that we can have substantive knowledge of the external world that outst rips what experience can warrant. We cannot. This empiricist reply faces challenges of its own. Our knowledge of mathematics seems to be about something more than our own concepts. Our knowledge of moral judgments seems to concern not just how we feel or act but how we ought to behave. The general principles that provide a basis for the empiricist view, e.g. Humes overall account of our ideas, the stoppage Principle of Meaning, are problematic in their own right. In various formulations, the Verification Principle fails its own test for having cognitive meaning. A careful analysis of Humes Inquiry, relative to its own principles, may require us to consign walloping sections of it to the flames. In all, rationalists have a strong argument for the Intuition/Deduction thesis relative to our substantive knowledge of the external world, but its success rests on how well they can answer questions about the nature and epistemic force of intuition made all the more pressing by the classic empiricist reply.3. The Innate Knowledge ThesisThe Innate Knowledge thesis joins the Intuition/Deduction thesis in asserting that we have a priori knowledge, but it does not offer intuition and deduction as the source of that knowledge. It takes our a priori knowledge to be part of our rational nature. Experience may trigger our awareness of this knowledge, but it does not provide us with it. The knowledge is already there. Plato presents an early version of the Innate Knowledge thesis in the Meno as the philosophy of knowledge by callback. The doctrine is motivated in part by a paradox that arises when we attempt to explain the nature of inquiry. How do we gain knowledge of a theorem in geometry? We marvel into the matter. Yet, knowledge by inquiry seems impossible (Meno, 80d-e). We either already know the theorem at the start of our investigation or we do not. If we already have the knowledge, there is no place for inquiry. If we lack the knowledge, we dont know what we are se eking and cannot recognize it when we find it. Either way we cannot gain knowledge of the theorem by inquiry. Yet, we do know some theorems. The doctrine of knowledge by recollection offers a solution. When we inquire into the truth of a theorem, we both do and do not already know it. We have knowledge in the form of amemory gained from our souls knowledge of the theorem prior to its union with our body. We lack knowledge in that, in our souls unification with the body, it has forgotten the knowledge and now needs to recollect it. In learning the theorem, we are, in effect, recalling what we already know. Plato magnificently illustrates the doctrine with an exchange between Socrates and a young slave, in which Socrates guides the slave from ignorance to mathematical knowledge. The slaves experiences, in the form of Socrates questions and illustrations, are the occasion for his recollection of what he learned previously.Platos metaphysics provides additional support for the Innate K nowledge Thesis. Since our knowledge is of abstract, eternal Forms which clearly lie beyond our sensory experience, it is a priori. contemporary supporters of Platos position are scarce. The initial paradox, which Plato describes as a trick argument (Meno, 80e), rings sophistical. The metaphysical assumptions in the solution need justification. The solution does not answer the basic question Just how did the slaves soul learn the theorem? The Intuition/Deduction thesis offers an equally, if not more, plausible account of how the slave gains knowledge a priori. Nonetheless, Platos position illustrates the kind of reasoning that has caused many philosophers to adopt some form of the Innate Knowledge thesis. We are confident that we know certain propositions about the external world, but there seems to be no adequate explanation of how we gained this knowledge short of saying that it is innate. Its content is beyond what we at a time gain in experience, as well as what we can gain by performing mental operations on what experience provides. It does not seem to be based on an intuition or deduction. That it is innate in us appears to be the best explanation. Noam Chomsky argues along similar lines in presenting what he describes as a rationalist conception of the nature of lecture (1975, 129). Chomsky argues that the experiences available to language learners are far too sparse to account for their knowledge of their language. To explain language acquisition, we must assume that learners have an innate knowledge of a universal grammar capturing the common deep structure of natural languages. It is important to note that Chomskys language learners do not know particular propositions describing a universal grammar.They have a set of innate capacities or dispositions which enable and determine their language development. Chomsky gives us a theory of innate learningcapacities or structures rather than a theory of innate knowledge. His view does not support the Innat e Knowledge thesis as rationalists have traditionally understood it. As one commentator puts it, Chomskys principles are innate neither in the sense that we are explicitly aware of them, nor in the sense that we have a disposition to recognize their truth as obvious under separate circumstances. And hence it is by no means clear that Chomsky is correct in seeing his theory as following the traditional rationalist account of the acquisition of knowledge (Cottingham 1984, p. 124). Peter Carruthers (1992) argues that we have innate knowledge of the principles of folk-psychology. Folk-psychology is a network of common-sense generalizations that hold independently of context or culture and concern the relationships of mental states to one another, to the environment and states of the body and to mien (1992, p.115).It includes such beliefs as that pains tend to be caused by injury, that pains tend to prevent us from concentrating on tasks, and that perceptions are generally caused by t he appropriate state of the environment. Carruthers notes the complexity of folk-psychology, along with its success in explaining our behavior and the fact that its explanations appeal to such unobservables as beliefs, desires, feelings and thoughts. He argues that the complexity, universality, and depth of folk-psychological principles outstrips what experience can provide, especially to young children who by their fifth year already know a great many of them. This knowledge is also not the result of intuition or deduction folk-psychological generalizations are not seen to be true in an act of intellectual insight. Carruthers concludes, The problem concerning the childs acquisition of psychological generalizations cannot be solved, unless we suppose that much of folk-psychology is already innate, triggered locally by the childs experience of itself and others, rather than learned (1992, p. 121). Empiricists, and some rationalists, attack the Innate Knowledge thesis in two main ways . First, they offer accounts of how sense experience or intuition and deduction provide the knowledge that is claimed to be innate. Second, they forthwith criticize the Innate Knowledge thesis itself.The classic statement of this second line of attack is presented in Locke 1690. Locke raises the issue of just what innate knowledge is. Particular instances of knowledge are supposed to be in our minds as part of ourrational make-up, but how are they in our minds? If the implication is that we all consciously have this knowledge, it is plainly false. Propositions often given as examples of innate knowledge, even such plausible candidates as the principle that the same thing cannot both be and not be, are not consciously genuine by children and those with severe cognitive limitations. If the point of calling such principles innate is not to imply that they are or have been consciously accepted by all rational beings, then it is hard to see what the point is. No proposition can be said to be in the mind, which it never however knew, which it never yet was conscious of (1690, Book I, Chapter II, Section 5, p. 61). Proponents of innate knowledge might respond that some knowledge is innate in that we have the capacity to have it. That claim, while true, is of little interest, however. If the capacity of knowing, be the natural impression contended for, all the truths a man ever comes to know, will, by this account, be every one of them, innate and this great point will amount to no more, but only an improper way of speaking which whilst it pretends to assert the contrary, says nothing different from those, who deny innate principles.For nobody, I think, ever denied, that the mind was capable of knowing several truths (1690, Book I, Chapter II, Section 5, p. 61). Locke thus challenges defenders of the Innate Knowledge thesis to present an account of innate knowledge that allows their position to be both true and interesting. A narrow interpretation of innateness fa ces counterexamples of rational individuals who do not meet its conditions. A free-handed interpretation implies that all our knowledge, even that clearly provided by experience, is innate. Defenders of innate knowledge take up Lockes challenge. Leibniz responds (1704) by appealing to an account of innateness in terms of natural potential to avoid Lockes dilemma. Consider Peter Carruthers similar reply. We have noted that while one form of nativism claims (somewhat implausibly) that knowledge is innate in the sense of being present as such (or at least in propositional form) from birth, it might also be maintained that knowledge is innate in the sense of being innately determined to make its appearance at some portray in childhood. This latter thesis is surely the most plausible version of nativism. (1992, p. 51) Carruthers claims that our innate knowledge is determined through evolutionary selection (p. 111). Evolution has resulted in our being determined to know certain things ( e.g.principles of folk-psychology) at particular stages of our life, as part of our natural development.Experiences provide the occasion for our consciously believing the known propositions but not the basis for our knowledge of them (p. 52). Carruthers thus has a ready reply to Lockes counterexamples of children and cognitively limited persons who do not believe propositions claimed to be instances of innate knowledge. The former have not yet reached the proper stage of development the latter are persons in whom natural development has broken down (pp. 4950). A serious problem for the Innate Knowledge thesis remains, however. We know a proposition only if it is true, we believe it and our belief is warranted. Rationalists who assert the existence of innate knowledge are not just claiming that, as a matter of human evolution, Gods design or some other factor, at a particular point in our development, certain sorts of experiences trigger our belief in particular propositions in a way that does not involve our learning them from the experiences. Their claim is even bolder In at least some of these cases, our empirically triggered, but not empirically warranted, belief is nonetheless warranted and so known. How can these beliefs be warranted if they do not gain their warrant from the experiences that cause us to have them or from intuition and deduction? Some rationalists think that a reliabilist account of warrant provides the answer. According to Reliabilism, beliefs are warranted if they are formed by a process that generally produces true beliefs rather than false ones. The true beliefs that constitute our innate knowledge are warranted, then, because they are formed as the result of a reliable belief-forming process.Carruthers maintains that Innate beliefs will count as known provided that the process through which they come to be innate is a reliable one (provided, that is, that the process tends to generate beliefs that are true) (1992, p. 77). He argues t hat natural selection results in the formation of some beliefs and is a truth-reliable process. An appeal to Reliabilism, or a similar causal theory of warrant, may well be the best way for rationalists to develop the Innate Knowledge thesis. They have a difficult row to hoe, however. First, such accounts of warrant are themselves quite controversial. Second, rationalists must give an account of innate knowledge that maintains and explains the distinction between innate knowledge and a posteriori knowledge, and it is not clear that they will beable to do so within such an account of warrant. Suppose for the sake of argument that we have innate knowledge of some proposition, P.What makes our knowledge that P innate? To sharpen the question, what difference between our knowledge that P and a clear case of a posteriori knowledge, say our knowledge that something is red based on our current visual experience of a red table, makes the former innate and the latter not innate? In each case , we have a true, warranted belief. In each case, presumably, our belief gains its warrant from the fact that it meets a particular causal condition, e.g., it is produced by a reliable process. In each case, the causal process is one in which an experience causes us to believe the proposition at hand (that P that something is red), for, as defenders of innate knowledge admit, our belief that P is triggered by an experience, as is our belief that something is red. The insight behind the Innate Knowledge thesis seems to be that the difference between our innate and a posteriori knowledge lies in the relation between our experience and our belief in each case. The experience that causes our belief that P does not contain the information that P, while our visual experience of a red table does contain the information that something is red. Yet, exactly what is the nature of this containment relation between our experiences, on the one hand, and what we believe, on the other, that is miss ing in the one case but present in the other? The nature of the experience-belief relation seems quite similar in each. The causal relation between the experience that triggers our belief that P and our belief that P is contingent, as is the fact that the belief-forming process is reliable. The same is true of our experience of a red table and our belief that something is red.The causal relation between the experience and our belief is again contingent. We might have been so constructed that the experience we describe as being appeared to redly caused us to believe, not that something is red, but that something is hot. The process that takes us from the experince to our belief is also only contingently reliable. Moreover, if our experience of a red table contains the information that something is red, then that fact, not the existence of a reliable belief-forming process between the two, should be the reason why the experience warrants our belief. By appealing to Reliablism, or some other causal theory of warrant, rationalists may obtain a way to explain how innate knowledge can be warranted. They still need to show how theirexplanation supports an account of the difference between innate knowledge and a posteriori knowledge.4. The Innate Concept ThesisAccording to the Innate Concept thesis, some of our concepts have not been gained from experience. They are instead part of our rational make-up, and experience obviously triggers a process by which we consciously grasp them. The main concern motivating the rationalist should be familiar by now the content of some concepts seems to outstrip anything we could have gained from experience. An example of this reasoning is presented by Descartes in the Meditations. Descartes classifies our ideas as adventitious, invented by us, and innate. Adventitious ideas, such as a star topology of heat, are gained directly through sense experience. Ideas invented by us, such as our idea of a hippogriff, are created by us from other ideas we possess. Innate ideas, such as our ideas of God, of extended matter, of substance and of a perfect triangle, are placed in our minds by God at creation. Consider Descartess argument that our concept of God, as an interminably perfect being, is innate. Our concept of God is not directly gained in experience, as particular tastes, sensations and mental images might be. Its content is beyond what we could ever construct by applying available mental operations to what experience directly provides.From experience, we can gain the concept of a being with finite amounts of various perfections, one, for example, that is finitely knowledgeable, powerful and good. We cannot however move from these empirical concepts to the concept of a being of infinite perfection. (I must not think that, just as my conceptions of rest and darkness are arrived at by negating movement and light, so my perception of the infinite is arrived at not by means of a true idea but by merely negating th e finite, ternion Meditation, p. 94.) Descartes supplements this argument by another. Not only is the content of our concept of God beyond what experience can provide, the concept is a requisite for our employment of the concept of finite perfection gained from experience. (My perception of the infinite, that is God, is in some way prior to my perception of the finite, that is myself. For how could I understand that I doubted or desirethat is lacked somethingand that I was not in all perfect, unless there were in me some idea of a more perfect being which enabled me to recognize my own defects by comparison, Third Meditation, p. 94). An empiricist response to thisgeneral line of argument is given by Locke (1690, Book I, Chapter IV, Sections 125, pp. 91107). First, there is the problem of explaining what it is for someone to have an innate concept. If having an innate concept entails consciously entertaining it at present or in the past, then Descartess position is open to obviou s counterexamples.Young children and people from other cultures do not consciously entertain the concept of God and have not done so. Second, there is the objection that we have no need to appeal to innate concepts in the first place. Contrary to Descartes argument, we can explain how experience provides all our ideas, including those the rationalists take to be innate, and with just the content that the rationalists attribute to them. Leibniz (1704) offers a rationalist reply to the first concern. Where Locke puts forth the image of the mind as a blank tablet on which experience writes, Leibniz offers us the image of a ingurgitate of marble, the veins of which determine what sculpted figures it will accept. This is why I have taken as an illustration a block of veined marble, rather than a wholly uniform block or blank tablets, that is to say what is called tabula rasa in the language of the philosophers.For if the soul were like those blank tablets, truths would be in us in the s ame way as the figure of Hercules is in a block of marble, when the marble is completely indifferent whether it receives this or some other figure. provided if there were veins in the stone which marked out the figure of Hercules rather than other figures, this stone would be more determined thereto, and Hercules would be as it were in some manner innate in it, although labour would be needed to uncover the veins, and to clear them by polishing, and by cutting away what prevents them from appearing. It is in this way that ideas and truths are innate in us, like natural inclinations and dispositions, natural habits or potentialities, and not like activities, although these potentialities are always accompanied by some activities which correspond to them, though they are often imperceptible. (1704, Preface, p. 153) Leibnizs metaphor contains an insight that Locke misses. The mind plays a role in determining the nature of its contents. This point does not, however, require the adoptio n of the Innate Concept thesis.Rationalists have responded to the second part of the empiricist attack on the Innate Concept thesisthe empricists claim that the thesis is without basis, as all our ideas can be explained as derived from experienceby focusing on difficulties in the empiricistsattempts to give such an explanation. The difficulties are illustrated by Lockes account. According to Locke, experience consists in external sensation and inner reflection. All our ideas are either simple or complex, with the former being received by us passively in sensation or reflection and the latter being built by the mind from simple materials through various mental operations. Right at the start, the account of how simple ideas are gained is open to an obvious counterexample acknowledged, but then set aside, by Hume in presenting his own empiricist theory. Consider the mental image of a particular shade of blue. If Locke is right, the idea is a simple one and should be passively received by the mind through experience.Hume points out otherwise. Suppose therefore a person to have enjoyed his sight for thirty years and to have become perfectly acquainted with colors of all kinds, except one particular shade of blue, for instance, which it never has been his pot to meet with let all the different shades of that color, except that single one, be placed before him, descending gradually from the deepest to the lightest, it is plain that he will perceive a blank where that shade is wanting and will be sensible that there is a greater distance in that place between the contiguous colors than in any other. Now I ask whether it be possible for him, from his own imagination, to supply this deficiency and raise up to himself the idea of that particular shade, though it had never been conveyed to him by his senses? I believe there are but few will be of the opinion that he can (1748, Section II, pp. 2930) Even when it comes to such simple ideas as the image of a particular shad e of blue, the mind is more than a blank tag on which experience writes. Consider too our concept of a particular color, say red. Critics of Lockes account have pointed out the weaknesses in his explanation of how we gain such a concept by the mental operation of abstraction on individual cases. For one thing, it makes the incorrect assumption that various instances of a particular concept share a common feature. Carruthers puts the objection as follows. In fact problems arise for empiricists even in connection with the very simplest concepts, such as those of colour. For it is false that all instances of a given colour share some common feature.In which case we cannot acquire the concept of that colour by abstracting the common feature of our experience. Thus consider the concept red. Do all shades of red have something in common? If so, what? It is surely false that individual shadesof red consist, as it were, of two distinguishable elements a general redness together with a part icular shade. Rather, redness consists in a continuous range of shades, each of which is only just distinguishable from its neighbors. Acquiring the concept red is a matter of learning the extent of the range. (1992, p. 59) For another thing, Lockes account of concept acquisition from particular experiences seems circular. As it stands, however, Lockes account of concept acquisition appears viciously circular. For noticing or attending to a common feature of various things presupposes that you already possess the concept of the feature in question. (Carruthers 1992, p. 55) Consider in this regard Lockes account of how we gain our concept of causation. In the notice that our senses take of the continuous vicissitude of things, we cannot but observe, that several particulars, both qualities and substances begin to exist and that they receive this their existence from the due application and operation of some other being.From this contemplation, we get our ideas of cause and effect. (1690, Book II, Chapter 26, Section 1, pp. 292293) We get our concept of causation from our observation that some things receive their existence from the application and operation of some other things. Yet, we cannot make this observation unless we already have the concept of causation. Lockes account of how we gain our idea of power displays a similar circularity. The mind being every day informed, by the senses, of the alteration of those simple ideas, it observes in things without and taking notice how one comes to an end, and ceases to be, and another begins to exist which was not before reflecting also on what passes within itself, and observing a constant change of its ideas, sometimes by the impression of outward objects on the senses, and sometimes by the determination of its own choice and concluding from what it has so evermore observed to have been, that the like changes will for the future be made in the same things, by like agents, and by the like ways, considers in on e thing the possibility of having any of its simple ideas changed, and in another the possibility of making that change and so comes by that idea which we call power. (1690, Chapter XXI, Section 1, pp. 219220) We come by the idea of power though considering the possibility of changes in our ideas made by experiences and our own choices. Yet, to consider this possibilityof some things making a change in otherswe must already have a concept of power.One way to meet at least some of thesechallenges to an empiricist account of the origin of our concepts is to order our understanding of the content of our concepts so as to bring them more in line with what experience will clearly provide. Hume famously takes this approach. Beginning in a way reminiscent of Locke, he distinguishes between two forms of mental contents or perceptions, as he calls them impressions and ideas. Impressions are the contents of our current experiences our sensations, feelings, emotions, desires, and so on. Ideas are mental contents derived from impressions. Simple ideas are copies of impressions complex ideas are derived from impressions by compounding, transposing, augmenting or diminishing them. Given that all our ideas are thus gained from experience, Hume offers us the following method for determining the content of any idea and thereby the meaning of any term taken to express it.When we entertain, therefore, any suspicion that a philosophical term is employed without any meaning or idea (as is but too frequent), we need but inquire from what impression is that supposed idea derived? And if it be impossible to assign any, this will confirm our suspicion. (1690, Section II, p. 30) Using this test, Hume draws out one of the most important implications of the empiricists denial of the Innate Concept thesis. If experience is and so the source of all ideas, then our experiences also determine the content of our ideas. Our ideas of causation, of substance, of right and wrong have their cont ent determined by the experiences that provide them. Those experiences, Hume argues, are otiose to support the content that many rationalists and some empiricists, such as Locke, attribute to the corresponding ideas. Our inability to explain how some concepts, with the contents the rationalists attribute to them, are gained from experience should not lead us to adopt the Innate Concept thesis. It should lead us to accept a more limited view of the contents for those concepts, and thereby a more limited view of our ability to describe and understand the world. Consider, for example, our idea of causation.Descartes takes it to be innate. Locke offers an apparently circular account of how it is gained from experience. Humes empiricist account bad limits its content. Our idea of causation is derived from a feeling of expectation rooted in our experiences of the constant conjunction of similar causes and effects. It appears, then, that this idea of a necessary connection among events a rises from a number of similar instances whichoccur, of the constant conjunction of these events nor can that idea ever be suggested by any one of these instances surveyed in all possible lights and positions. But there is nothing in a number of instances, different from every single instance, which is supposed to be exactly similar, except only that after a repetition of similar instances the mind is carried by habit, upon the appearance of one event, to expect its usual attendant and to believe that it will exist. This connection, therefore, which we feel in the mind, this customary innovation of the imagination from one object to its usual attendant, is the sentiment or impression from which we form the idea of power or necessary connection. (1748, Section VII, Part 2, p. 86) The source of our idea in experience determines its content.Suitably to this experience, therefore, we may define a cause to be an object followed by another, and where all the objects, similar to the first are followed by objects similar to the second We may, therefore, suitably to this experience, form another definition of cause and call it an object followed by another, and whose appearance always conveys the thought of the other. (1748, Section VII, Part 2, p. 87) Our claims, and any knowledge we may have, about causal connections in the world turn out, given the limited content of our empirically based concept of causation, to be claims and knowledge about the constant conjunction of events and our own feelings of expectation. Thus, the initial disagreement between rationalists and empiricists about the source of our ideas leads to one about their content and thereby the content of our descriptions and knowledge of the world. Like philosophical debates generally, the rationalist/empiricist debate ultimately concerns our position in the world, in this case our position as rational inquirers. To what extent do our faculties of reason and experience support our attempts to know and understand our situation.

Peer Review of Strategic and Implementation Plans Essay

Team members provided feedback on the individual draft papers posted. The assignment was to provide a strategic plan for our chosen organization. The plan needed to include implementation for objectives, functional tactics, action items, milestones and deadlines, tasks and task ownership, and resource apportionings. Organizational and management changes, financial forecasts, and risks with chance plans also needed to be processed.One of the draft papers contained excellent breakdowns on the financials for a startup company along with specifics on which participating individuals would be responsible for key action items. The budget and sales forecast were realistic for what would be expected with a new business. The identified risk of low participation volume from clients was identified, but there was no contingency plan for this in terms of additional marketing.Another team members paper was acquire in how customer needs could impact the success of the strategic plan. Internal a nd external factors addressed employee relations and shareholder expectations. The approach the company needs to light upon with delivering service to customers is identified as factor that needs to change as the plan is implemented. A SWOT analysis would be conducted and contingency plans made on an as-needed basis. The company may want to develop several contingency plans for common issues within its industry to be prepared for these scenarios.The third draft reviewed focused on short and long-term objectives and the use of a balanced scorecard approach to evaluating and monitoring the plans implementation. The critical components for objectives, functional tactics,action items, and resource allocation were identified. Major changes to the organizational structure and management positions were key factors to the companys plan. ConclusionAlthough all team members did not post drafts or offer feedback those that did provided expand pertinent to the assignment. Team members identif ied the items outlined in the assignment and appear to have strong knowledge of what a strategic plan needs to address to be successful in meeting goals.

A divine rivalry

As each sweet note floated from the orchestra, Antonio Salieri felt his heart breaking. The composition was immaculate each note was flawlessly arranged and perfectly layered upon each other.The mastery Amadeus possessed was something, Salieri could not have achieved in a thousand lifetimes. From its title, it would attend that Peter Shaffers play Amadeus is about the gifted composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, yet the story is truly that of Antonio Salieri, court composer to the empire of Austria, the most successful young musician in the city of musicians.When Salieri first hears Mozarts music, it sets him on a different path than the one he intended. He says, I had heard the voice of God-and that it issued from a puppet whose own voice I had also heard-and it was the voice of an obscene child. (19)It is his jealousy of Mozarts gift and his feelings of mediocrity that lead to both(prenominal) mens downfall. A comparison of both characters will illustrate that despite Salieris atte mpt to live a upright life his desire to destroy Mozart in a bode war prevailed over his devotedness to God and his music.Comparing several aspects of the two mens lives, their devotion, careers, the role of women, and the public versus private nature of their actions, and the madness that consumes them both will demonstrate the similarities that existed between the rivals.Both Salieri and Mozart are men of devotion. The link is their music. Salieri believes that music is Gods art (7) and uses his gift to serve God. Salieri had promised to lead a stainless life in order to honor God and he feels God betrays him by blessing Mozart with such talent.Throughout his life, he has done his best to remain virtuous and yet in his mind God has shown him that he is mediocre and has bestowed a gift upon a man he feels is morally inferior.In Act I, Scene 12 he declares his war on God, saying From this time on we are enemies. Mozarts life of devotion was also to music. He shares his feelings on music and the divine with Salieri, I bet you thats how God hears the world. Millions of sounds ascending at once and mixing in His ear to become an unending music, unimaginable to us. (57)However, Mozarts devotion isnt purely celestial. He is also extremely devoted to his father. He served his fathers wishes, even waiting to be married. It is Salieri who convinces him to ignore them and marries Constanze. When Leopold dies, Salieri counsels the grieving Mozart who feels as if his lifestyle was a betrayal against his father. Mozart says, He watched me for all my life and I betrayed him. (69)Salieri seizes this moment, convincing Mozart he has his best interest at hear and telling Mozart he will help him find work while undermining him at every attempt. Now having won his trust, Salieri convinces him that he should write his vaudeville The Magic Flute base on his association with The Freemasons.Knowing this is Mozarts last tie to society, he realizes how this will at last ruin th e man. His shattered faith leads him to such a drastic prime(prenominal) and Mozart is helpless in his plot.Appearance plays a role in both Salieris and Mozarts life. Salieri initially lived less extravagantly, whereas Mozart flaunted his wealth and success often living to a higher place his means. Once Salieri reigns himself to his jealousy, he too becomes consumed in flaunting his wealth denying his taste for plain things. Schaffer comments on Mozarts appearance throughout the play.Through the stage directions, he tells us Mozart was a small, pallid, large-eyed man in a showy wig and a showy set of clothes. As Salieris story progresses, Mozarts clothing becomes much and more garish in Salieris eye. As Mozarts life slowly unravels, his clothing becomes shabby and less important. Throughout the play Salieri has condemned Mozart for what he will ultimately become.

Potbelly Sandwich Shop Essay

1.Identify and describe Potbellys strategy in term of w ar (present or new) and market (present or new).Potbellys strategy in terms of product is to offer all sandwiches at one price regardless of what becomes on the sandwich. All of the meat is cut fresh in the store, milkshakes are handmade, and cookies are freshly baked on site. The company hires nice commonwealth because they sell an experience, not just a sandwich. Potbelly is focused on selling good food, having a nice environment, and a friendly experience.The store does not necessarily have a marketing budget. The commence promotions based off of store openings or around local anesthetic charities/programs. At one location they gave out-of-door a free sandwich to each person who gave a cash donation for a local organization.2. How would you describe Potbellys positioning strategy?Potbelly has many different stores that range in many different sizes. Some stores are very small and based in airports, other stores are ve ry large. Many stores have an outdoor patio area during warmer months. Potbelly selects mostly urban locations where there are not a lot of sandwich chains. The stores are homey and even proffer real books for customers to read or borrow. The main market for Potbelly is young professionals under the age of 35.3. What types of environmental opportunities and threats to you see in Potbellys external environment? How might they impact Potbellys current strategy?I personally feel that Potbelly has a great thing press release for them. Compared to other sandwich chains they are not the same in any way. Locally, the main stores that come to my head are Subway, Jimmy Johns, and Hungry Hobo. These stores are all based on very dissipated service. You are more than welcome to sit down and eat, but nothing really keeps you there in any event the food. Potbelly offers an experience with each meal. Some locations have live music that you can enjoy or books that you can sit and read. You are o ffered more than just a table to eat at when you are at Potbellys you are offered a complete experience.