IH 0852 Lecture Notes - Lecture 14: Immanuel Kant

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sapphiregiraffe230

29 Jan 2018

School

Temple University

Department

Intellectual Heritage

Course

IH 0852

Professor

David E.Racker

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Document Summary

What is completely is completely an object o knowledge . The power that deals with the object that is between what purely is and what in every way is not, and that neither knowledge nor ignorance would deal with . What is in no way at all is an object of complete ignorance . To know what in no way is . That which completely is or always is . That which is in no way at all what in no way is . In being- in the form of the thing rather than in the things themselves. A lover of seeing the truth (philosophers) Believes in the beautiful itself, is able to observe both it and the things that participate in it, and does not think the participants are it or. Passionately devoted to beautiful sound, colors and shapes and everything fashioned out of such things.

Related Questions

Question 1

Evolutionary algorithms are used:

In engineering, to arrive at solutions by going through many permutations of possible solutions and allowing them to evolve.

A genetic feature of complex organisms.

A process undergone by the human brain, which is similar to evolution by natural selection.

Another term used for a computer algorithm in general.

Question 2

Human literature and languages can be studied using methods similar to those used for constructing phylogenies because:

There is no other way of studying these things.

Languages evolve roughly along the lines of species, with mutations (changes in words and pronunciation), descent with modification (languages becoming more different along the way), and branching of languages (languages giving rise to other languages that are similar to them).

Because literature and languages are constructed by organisms (human beings), so what applies to one must apply to the other.

Languages undergo a process of word swapping, which is analogous to horizontal gene transfer.

Question 3

The degree to which horizontal gene transfer occurs in eukaryotes is:

Something upon which the entire validity of evolutionary biology hinges.

A mystery that may or may not disprove evolution, but we simply don't know enough about it at this point.

Something that would overthrow the notion that this phenomenon is important in bacteria.

An interesting and potentially important aspect of biology with relevance for how evolution occurs, but not something that would call it into question one way or the other.

Question 4

Learning about the history of scientific theories and the reasons for why they are initially accepted or rejected is important mostly because:

It makes for exciting story telling, and this is very much needed to get people interested in science.

It teaches us about the process of science as it actually occurs, which is somewhat different to the idealized notion of a purely objective undertaking.

It tells us which theories are definitely true or false.

It tells us that science is actually a totally subjective process that tries to present itself as objective. In reality, personal subjective factors are the only relevant factors that really matter in science.

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What valuable company is nobody building? This question is harder than it looks, because your company could create a lot of value without becoming very valuable itself. Creating value isn't enough -- you also need to capture some of the value you create. This means that even very big businesses can be bad businesses. For example, U.S. airline companies serve millions of passengers and create hundreds of billions of dollars of value each year. But in 2012, when the average airfare each way was $178, the airlines made only 37 cents per passenger trip. Compare them to Google, which creates less value but captures far more. Google brought in $50 billion in 2012 (versus $160 billion for the airlines), but it kept 21% of those revenues as profits -- more than 100 times the airline industry's profit margin that year. Google makes so much money that it is now worth three times more than every U.S. airline combined. The airlines compete with each other, but Google stands alone. Economists use two simplified models to explain the difference: perfect competition and monopoly. "Perfect competition" is considered both the ideal and the default state in Economics 101. So-called perfectly competitive markets achieve equilibrium when producer supply meets consumer demand. Every firm in a competitive market is undifferentiated and sells the same homogeneous products. Since no firm has any market power, they must all sell at whatever price the market determines. If there is money to be made, new firms will enter the market, increase supply, drive prices down and thereby eliminate the profits that attracted them in the first place. If too many firms enter the market, they'll suffer losses, some will fold, and prices will rise back to sustainable levels. Under perfect competition, in the long run no company makes an economic profit. The opposite of perfect competition is monopoly. Whereas a competitive firm must sell at the market price, a monopoly owns its market, so it can set its own prices. Since it has no competition, it produces at the quantity and price combination that maximizes its profits. To an economist, every monopoly looks the same, whether it deviously eliminates rivals, secures a license from the state or innovates its way to the top. I'm not interested in illegal bullies or government favorites: By "monopoly," I mean the kind of company that is so good at what it does that no other firm can offer a close substitute. Google is a good example of a company that went from 0 to 1: It hasn't competed in search since the early 2000s, when it definitively distanced itself from Microsoft and Yahoo! Americans mythologize competition and credit it with saving us from socialist bread lines. Actually, capitalism and competition are opposites. Capitalism is premised on the accumulation of capital, but under perfect competition, all profits get competed away. The lesson for entrepreneurs is clear: If you want to create and capture lasting value, don't build an undifferentiated commodity business. How much of the world is actually monopolistic? How much is truly competitive? It is hard to say because our common conversation about these matters is so confused. To the outside observer, all businesses can seem reasonably alike, so it is easy to perceive only small differences between them. But the reality is much more binary than that. There is an enormous difference between perfect competition and monopoly, and most businesses are much closer to one extreme than we commonly realize. The confusion comes from a universal bias for describing market conditions in self-serving ways: Both monopolists and competitors are incentivized to bend the truth. Monopolists lie to protect themselves. They know that bragging about their great monopoly invites being audited, scrutinized and attacked. Since they very much want their monopoly profits to continue unmolested, they tend to do whatever they can to conceal their monopoly -- usually by exaggerating the power of their (nonexistent) competition. Think about how Google talks about its business. It certainly doesn't claim to be a monopoly. But is it one? Well, it depends: a monopoly in what? Let's say that Google is primarily a search engine. As of May 2014, it owns about 68% of the search market. (Its closest competitors, Microsoft and Yahoo!, have about 19% and 10%, respectively.) If that doesn't seem dominant enough, consider the fact that the word "google" is now an official entry in the Oxford English Dictionary -- as a verb. Don't hold your breath waiting for that to happen to Bing. But suppose we say that Google is primarily an advertising company. That changes things. The U.S. search-engine advertising market is $17 billion annually. Online advertising is $37 billion annually. The entire U.S. advertising market is $150 billion. And global advertising is a $495 billion market. So even if Google completely monopolized U.S. search-engine advertising, it would own just 3.4% of the global advertising market. From this angle, Google looks like a small player in a competitive world. What if we frame Google as a multifaceted technology company instead? This seems reasonable enough; in addition to its search engine, Google makes dozens of other software products, not to mention robotic cars, Android phones and wearable computers. But 95% of Google's revenue comes from search advertising; its other products generated just $2.35 billion in 2012 and its consumer-tech products a mere fraction of that. Since consumer tech is a $964 billion market globally, Google owns less than 0.24% of it -- a far cry from relevance, let alone monopoly. Framing itself as just another tech company allows Google to escape all sorts of unwanted attention. Non-monopolists tell the opposite lie: "We're in a league of our own." Entrepreneurs are always biased to understate the scale of competition, but that is the biggest mistake a startup can make. The fatal temptation is to describe your market extremely narrowly so that you dominate it by definition. Suppose you want to start a restaurant in Palo Alto that serves British food. "No one else is doing it," you might reason. "We'll own the entire market." But that is only true if the relevant market is the market for British food specifically. What if the actual market is the Palo Alto restaurant market in general? And what if all the restaurants in nearby towns are part of the relevant market as well? These are hard questions, but the bigger problem is that you have an incentive not to ask them at all. When you hear that most new restaurants fail within one or two years, your instinct will be to come up with a story about how yours is different. You'll spend time trying to convince people that you are exceptional instead of seriously considering whether that is true. It would be better to pause and consider whether there are people in Palo Alto who would rather eat British food above all else. They may well not exist. In 2001, my co-workers at PayPal and I would often get lunch on Castro Street in Mountain View, Calif. We had our pick of restaurants, starting with obvious categories like Indian, sushi and burgers. There were more options once we settled on a type: North Indian or South Indian, cheaper or fancier, and so on. In contrast to the competitive local restaurant market, PayPal was then the only email-based payments company in the world. We employed fewer people than the restaurants on Castro Street did, but our business was much more valuable than all those restaurants combined. Starting a new South Indian restaurant is a really hard way to make money. If you lose sight of competitive reality and focus on trivial differentiating factors -- maybe you think your naan is superior because of your great-grandmother's recipe -- your business is unlikely to survive. The problem with a competitive business goes beyond lack of profits. Imagine you're running one of those restaurants in Mountain View. You're not that different from dozens of your competitors, so you've got to fight hard to survive. If you offer affordable food with low margins, you can probably pay employees only minimum wage. And you'll need to squeeze out every efficiency: That is why small restaurants put Grandma to work at the register and make the kids wash dishes in the back. A monopoly like Google is different. Since it doesn't have to worry about competing with anyone, it has wider latitude to care about its workers, its products and its impact on the wider world. Google's motto -- "Don't be evil" -- is in part a branding ploy, but it is also characteristic of a kind of business that is successful enough to take ethics seriously without jeopardizing its own existence. In business, money is either an important thing or it is everything. Monopolists can afford to think about things other than making money; non-monopolists can't. In perfect competition, a business is so focused on today's margins that it can't possibly plan for a long-term future. Only one thing can allow a business to transcend the daily brute struggle for survival: monopoly profits. So a monopoly is good for everyone on the inside, but what about everyone on the outside? Do outsize profits come at the expense of the rest of society? Actually, yes: Profits come out of customers' wallets, and monopolies deserve their bad reputation -- but only in a world where nothing changes. In a static world, a monopolist is just a rent collector. If you corner the market for something, you can jack up the price; others will have no choice but to buy from you. Think of the famous board game: Deeds are shuffled around from player to player, but the board never changes. There is no way to win by inventing a better kind of real-estate development. The relative values of the properties are fixed for all time, so all you can do is try to buy them up. But the world we live in is dynamic: We can invent new and better things. Creative monopolists give customers more choices by adding entirely new categories of abundance to the world. Creative monopolies aren't just good for the rest of society; they're powerful engines for making it better. Even the government knows this: That is why one of its departments works hard to create monopolies (by granting patents to new inventions) even though another part hunts them down (by prosecuting antitrust cases). It is possible to question whether anyone should really be awarded a monopoly simply for having been the first to think of something like a mobile software design. But something like Apple's monopoly profits from designing, producing and marketing the iPhone were clearly the reward for creating greater abundance, not artificial scarcity: Customers were happy to finally have the choice of paying high prices to get a smartphone that actually works. The dynamism of new monopolies itself explains why old monopolies don't strangle innovation. With Apple's iOS at the forefront, the rise of mobile computing has dramatically reduced Microsoft's decadeslong operating system dominance. Before that, IBM's hardware monopoly of the 1960s and '70s was overtaken by Microsoft's software monopoly. AT&T had a monopoly on telephone service for most of the 20th century, but now anyone can get a cheap cellphone plan from any number of providers. If the tendency of monopoly businesses was to hold back progress, they would be dangerous, and we'd be right to oppose them. But the history of progress is a history of better monopoly businesses replacing incumbents. Monopolies drive progress because the promise of years or even decades of monopoly profits provides a powerful incentive to innovate. Then monopolies can keep innovating because profits enable them to make the long-term plans and finance the ambitious research projects that firms locked in competition can't dream of. So why are economists obsessed with competition as an ideal state? It is a relic of history. Economists copied their mathematics from the work of 19th-century physicists: They see individuals and businesses as interchangeable atoms, not as unique creators. Their theories describe an equilibrium state of perfect competition because that is what's easy to model, not because it represents the best of business. But the long-run equilibrium predicted by 19th-century physics was a state in which all energy is evenly distributed and everything comes to rest -- also known as the heat death of the universe. Whatever your views on thermodynamics, it is a powerful metaphor. In business, equilibrium means stasis, and stasis means death. If your industry is in a competitive equilibrium, the death of your business won't matter to the world; some other undifferentiated competitor will always be ready to take your place. Perfect equilibrium may describe the void that is most of the universe. It may even characterize many businesses. But every new creation takes place far from equilibrium. In the real world outside economic theory, every business is successful exactly to the extent that it does something others cannot. Monopoly is therefore not a pathology or an exception. Monopoly is the condition of every successful business. Tolstoy famously opens "Anna Karenina" by observing: "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Business is the opposite. All happy companies are different: Each one earns a monopoly by solving a unique problem. All failed companies are the same: They failed to escape competition.

According to the article above by Peter Thiel do you think perfect competition is best for the economy and for consumers? Why or why not? What does Peter Thiel think about perfect competition versus monopolies?

What's your feed back after reading this article "Voices: So youâre ready to be an accountant"?

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Voices: So youâre ready to be an accountant?

Welcome to the accounting profession! As you take your first steps on your hopefully long, prosperous and rewarding career journey, there are some things you should know. Things that are contrary to the lackluster stereotype of CPAs!

Truth be told, accountants are often the most trusted advisors in business, tax and wealth planning. We are the professionals whom leaders of industry turn to for assistance in guiding their businesses through a maze of regulatory issues to profitability; the ones high-net-worth families rely on to develop strategies that create and preserve wealth; and the ones whose knowledge and problem-solving abilities help individuals and organizations realize their goals.

Having spent more than three decades interviewing hundreds of campus recruits and watching young CPAs develop and grow into trusted advisors, I want to share with you 10 truths to guide you on your path to success in the accounting profession.

(For a slideshow version of this,click here (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site..)

Be inquisitive. As a recent graduate, you are not expected to know how to put your knowledge into practice. In fact, most of your new colleagues expect that you will rely on them to learn the ropes. If you have a question, ask it, whether it is how to complete a task, how the laws have changed or how to handle a client challenge. It is better to ask a question and potentially appear uninformed than it is to take action without having the right information. You must still perform research to learn, but do not be afraid to ask for help. Being vulnerable is an essential component to becoming a caring professional with an arsenal of knowledge to advise clients.

Commit the effort to hone your skills. Your education provided you with a solid base upon which you can build a rewarding career in accounting, but there is so much more to learn. Roll up your sleeves and take advantage of every opportunity to acquire knowledge. Enhance both your technical and leadership skills and become a proficient advisor in a practice area or industry where your passion and leadership can shine. The more you learn, the more you increase your chances of becoming a valued and trusted advisor.

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Get out of your comfort zone and take risks. Avoid complacency and the risk of falling into a routine that keeps you stagnant and impedes your ability to achieve the career you desire. Be open to new people, new ideas and new experiences; share your curiosity; and have fun. You may have planned to be an auditor, but if you are tapped for a valuation project, go with it and see what you can learn. By taking risks, you can step into new opportunities and grow in the process. You have chosen a profession where constant change and challenge are the norm. Embrace every new experience to enhance your career.

Be honest and accountable.As a new professional, you are bound to make mistakes. We will never expose you to more risk than you can handle. If you never make a mistake, you will never learn. Be accountable for your actions and immediately let someone know to help you mitigate any damages. If you attempt to hide the mistake, you compound the problem. Every mistake is an opportunity for you to learn something that ultimately supports your long-term success.

Understand and adapt to the seasons of an accountantâs life. Accountants live and breathe by deadlines. Unlike your time in college, when you could cram a semester of knowledge into a few days before a final exam, you cannot build a career as an accountant by pulling all-nighters. Deadline season is a known factor that you can count on and prepare for in advance. Learn how to smooth out your workflow by taking advantage of non-deadline times to get work done prior to delivery dates. We want you to have a quality life outside the office where personal matters may pop up just when youâre working on deadline. Get it done early.

Collaborate and make friends with your coworkers. With so much of our day spent at work, it is important to develop and nurture relationships with your colleagues. Take advantage of every opportunity to socialize with the people in your office, at every level and in every department. Learn to leverage their expertise to help you with client issues. Introduce them to others at every opportunity. Professionally, your coworkers play a strategic role in moving the firm forward and supporting your development. At all times, treat others with dignity and respect. On a personal level, you may be surprised to find how much you have in common with your coworkers, many of whom will become your closest friends and loudest cheerleaders.

Build your network and cultivate relationships with mentors. Accounting is an apprenticeship profession in which people develop people. Seek out and develop relationships with professionals you admire and who understand this concept. Ask questions and acquire knowledge that will empower you and support your ongoing professional development. We are invested in your ultimate success.

Based on surveys of Accounting Today readers, this web seminar will identify some of their favorite apps from the QB ecosystem, and share how they use them to boost productivity.

Get out of the office and make community a priority. Expanding your network of contacts and experiences outside of the firm is vital in your development as a professional accountant and as a leader. Be strategic in deciding which community, civic and charitable organizations align with your passions, your available time and your goals. Giving back to the community means more than opening your wallet. Give your time, your expertise, your leadership. Start with your network of fellow graduates and make a concerted effort to establish meaningful relationships with professional and community organization where your knowledge and leadership can make an impact.

Build and protect your personal brand.Your personal brand is the reputation you create for yourself based on the things you do and say, both at work and in your personal life. It is how others perceive you, how they remember you and why they should seek you out. Building your personal brand is a deliberate process that occurs over the course of your career. Demonstrating your technical skills will not be enough; you must learn all you can about your clients, their industries and their challenges, and you must demonstrate that you provide the value, attention and nurturing they expect and deserve from a trusted consultant.

Discover your passion and pursue it relentlessly. Keep exploring until you find what you love to do and then do it relentlessly. If you are able to discover what you are passionate about, work will become your calling. Your career will be dedicated to pursuing an expertise that will result in others seeking your counsel. Persevere until you discover your passion, and then just have fun!

IH 0852 Lecture Notes - Lecture 14: Immanuel Kant

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