Yes, I am committed:

Of course, this question strikes several times to me from my friends when we used to talk about our past life. However, I tried to shirk such a question for long time, today I am trying to clarify to them about my thoughts and my life style. Yes, I am single but it doesn’t mean that I am lonely, miserable and drifter. Of course, I need somebody whom I can trust and share my thoughts but it doesn’t mean that I should be committed to somebody or should have girl friend whom I can share my thoughts. I can remember one of my friend who is separated and now single in the age of 55 years and still searching somebody whose life moves at the craze of every beautiful female. He goes every Friday and Saturday night out, hanging around the female and asks for dating who choose to do so. When I see such a behaviour of men then I started to imagine and ponder in this matter that should I have to change my status into COMMITTED? However, I can't simply discard myself with a 'single' status. Of course, there is a difference between someone 'single and desperately looking for' and someone 'single by choice'. The crucial question arise how do I change my status if I don’t have whom I looking for?
Yes, I have dream and she is more beautiful than an angel. Then why don’t I commit to my dream? I don’t want to commit for any alluring beauty of female. How do I trust a female whom I always endeavour to realize? How do I trust her amiable face with elusive smile that made me to fascinate towards her? I do believe that commitment to a girl makes our commitment for other things stronger and perfect. Because such a commitment makes us feel responsible. We wouldn't want to hurt our prospects, would we? Commitment to an amiable face with elusive smile and taunts will get us a fleeting material pleasure, but that will soon fade away. I should rather commit to a girl who reciprocates what I stand for, who complements me, and gets complemented in return. I think it is necessary for everyone to understand the other more deeply and to actually "feel" the other person in us. These needs to be a constant flow of love, trust and commitment to keep it smooth. It is a happy and positive emotion after all (the emotion of committing someone) so it is hard to understand why there is a hesitation to express?
Obviously, it is human nature that every opposite sex attracts each other so I was. Every men dream to share his thoughts, pain and everything to her whom he want to commit. But if she takes me in different way that I am coward and manoeuvre to face problem, then what can I say to her? I can delineate myself that I am a soft approach person who doesn’t want to dictate anybody “I like this and I don’t like this”. It is more of an occasional desire that other feels so I am feeling today, like I have to pander to her. But after a while of not hearing anything from her side, the question did come up in my mind again and again - if she is feeling bizarre about me, why won't she say about it? That in turn gradually led to me in doubts about the sincerity of the emotion about her and found that may be she started snubbing and humiliating me. I tried to be honest to her and told her everything about me. May be this took me far from her. I tried to explain her but she didn’t give me a chance. It made me embarrassed and started asking myself: What I have done to her that she despises me? When I didn’t have contemplation about her, at that time I was alone but I wasn’t that much lonely. Every success is based on commitment but my dreams of commitment altered without any reason.
Now I have to compromise my dreams and move towards the success. I have a dream to do something in this life which I have committed. I think a person can commit only one thing at a time to achieve something “success”. I shouldn’t barter this valuable time just mourning which I didn’t achieve. I should try to achieve my dreams which I used to see that I want to something. I do believe in fate as well so I am pretty sure that my fate will not be cruel to me. I can only put effort and I am pretty sure that success will be decided by my fate. So, I don’t want to comformise with this commitment to anybody. Nothing is important and valuable than my childhood dream.
Last but not the least, I would always want to commit my life to my dreams, which indeed I have. But yes, in some corner, in some hide-out, there does linger a dream in which I am committed to someone inwardly beautiful. Someone I would want to spend my every moment of life with her, someone whose presence can be comforting enough (and my presence for her) for me to accomplish my other commitments in a better manner than I would have to without her.

AIC Power in religions:

The AIC power pattern in the major religions:

Nepal can be a global hub:

Today, In Nepal illiteracy is reducing only at the rate of 1.3 percent per annuam. At this rate, Nepal will need another 50 years to attain a literacy rate of 95 percent. Hopefully, Development in India and China's technologies can speed up in this progress in Nepal. Science too has its role to play. We cannot be industrially and economically advanced and we cannot be technologically advanced unless we are scientifically advanced. One of the critical issues facing Nepal is the gulf between the academic world and industry. The notion that scientific ideas lead to technology and from there to wealth is not widespread. Nepal needs economic liberalisation and competition between Nepalese companies which is being tamed, so they are under no pressure to come up with new ideas, nor did academics promote their ideas to industry.
Today, In real life most of the people are leaving country because of Nepal’s political instability and lack of opportunity for employment and government’s future policy. People are going for employment at India, Arab countries and western countries. Some of them are attempting to gain illegal passage to developed countries like European countries, USA and Australia by holding false passport and documents. Most of the people in Nepal dream of being overseas so that they are watching foreign channel rather Nepal TV, are also the main source of aspiring to be somewhere else for better future and employment. The fact that so many Nepalese dream of leaving significantly threatens Nepal's economic development, social well-being, and political stability. Every year Nepal loses two to three percent of its GNP to brain drain. Every year Nepal loses between 1,000 and 2,000 professors, doctors, and engineers annually. This loss means fewer well-educated, ambitious citizens who could help lead our country. However there is an irony here, for if through immigration Nepal loses capital in some forms, it gains it through the money its immigrants send back to their families.
Rich country like United Kingdom wants migrants' labour, but do not want to look after these newcomers when they grow old. Ideally, rich countries would like a constant rotation of workers, arriving while they are young and active, leaving before they grow old and dependent. For its part, the commission argues that “temporary and circular migration” is also better for poor country like Nepal. One reason is remittances: the longer an immigrant stays away from home, the smaller the share of his wages he sends back.
Nepali households invest more than half of their savings in physical ones such as land, houses, cattle, and gold instead of putting money into financial assets. In rural areas, the proportion is even higher. This fact shows that Nepal's people mistrust of banks and are the world's largest consumers of gold. They possess billion of dollars, equal to nearly half of the country's bank deposits, and last year bought $1 billion worth, nearly five times the amount of the foreign direct investment which Nepal received. Households could earn higher returns by investing in financial assets, and the country would be better off if savings were pooled to finance more productive investments.
This dilemma may help explain why the Nepalese government can seem unsure about its policy. There is war between three parties government, political parties and Communist follower “Moist”. If we ask about the current situation to them, they give a very simple answer without taking any responsibility that we don’t have a lot of resources like India and China. Now, our greatest resource and valuable export is our human potential. We Nepalese have been working in India and United Kingdom’s defence since more than century as Gorkha Army and now it has become a tradition to become Lahure (Army) in those countries.
When we talk about civilisations, there is always rise and fall. One thing prominently comes to light that is the cycle of growth and demise is similar to the law of Diminishing returns. When a civilisation is in the establishing mode then there would need to create newer standards which are epochal. This accelerates the creative spirit of the surrounding environment and the fervent desire to contribute to the growth drives this creative spirit. However once certain exceptional standards are achieved which one may look back upon as catalytic to the growth of the society. The collective psyche tends to stagnate and basking in the glory of its achievements.

Nepali folk song:

Nepal can be a global hub:

Nepal is small Himalayan kingdom situated between two future superpower China and India which will be world’s 2nd and 3rd leading economic countries respectively after USA by 2050. Nepal could take advantage from the international investment community where Western press rarely mentions that certified miracle that very large amount of global trade with China and India instead of adding “China”, “India” and “Nepal”. Let us take very simple example which I can admit that it is unscientific test-Google search about Nepal. Google search reveals over 10 times more reference linking “Nepal” and “India” than “Nepal” and “China” and 100 times more than “Nepal”, “Gorkha Army” and “Himalayan”. It is well worth to asking whether Nepal is really ready to take advantage in the regional and global economy. However, we can focus on country’s strengths and weaknesses, it would be useful to raise the question in different way “Does Nepal have the mind-set it needs to be a player in regional and global integrated economy?”
It is difficult to talk about mind-set even more difficult to talk about a nation’s mind-set. However it does seem that there are a time comes when a nation feels confident that it can take on the world, achieve any dream and meet any challenge. If we maintain this spirit, it can be an enormous aid to growth and development of our nation. The main challenge is to properly channel by government bodies, politicians, public sectors, private sectors and even every individual, as a result such spirit can be an enormous aid for development and growth of our nation. However some sociologists have criticised this argument such a spirit of nation’s atma vishwas (self confidence), we can take several examples a kind of substantial growth seen in Japan in the 1950s and 1960s, South Korea in the 1970s and, China and India today.
The economics miracle of our age has been the strength with which previously vanquished economics of Japan and West Germany have risen from the ashes of war to become two of the wealthiest societies in the world. They have achieved this result through the execution of sound manufacturing strategies clearly invented to produce high quality technology products requiring substantial research and development (R&D) expenditure and massive investment in new capital plant and machinery. China’s vast manufacturing base is raising its GDP by around 9 percent a year as a result of poorly endowed with natural resources and massive manpower.
In real life,the changes in India and China have been more profound than this suggests.Over the past few years alone, more than 100 IT and science based firms have located R&D labs in India. These are not drudge jobs: high-tech companies are coming to India to find innovators whose ideas will take the world by storm. Their recruits are young graduates, straight from India's universities and elite technology institutes, or expats who are streaming back because they see India as the place to be- better than Europe and the US. This knowlodge revoluation has begun.
This is the great opportunity for Nepal being situated between two future Superpower countries. Nepal's foreign policy is also good between both countries. There is more influence of India than China because of open border, culture, climate and so on. Today,In India high-tech is not the sole perserve of the rich. Autorickshaw drivers began using mobile phone so that customers can call for a ride. Technology companies are extending internet connections to the remote locations. Small,renewable electricity generators are appearing in villages, and the government is using home- grown space technology to improve literatecy skills and education in far flung areas.

Common Sense:

We are undoubtedly heard comment 'It's just common sense' when we are trying to justify an idea or give creeping to our viewpoint. However, In practice the claim that someone is 'common sense' is often used by people who do not wish to, or cannot explain their reasoning. There are two main dangers of saying 'it's common sense' which I have tried to explain by taking in social scientist's viewpoint.

1. It is not always common: When we describe an idea, issue, theory or whatever as common sense we often mean that it fits with our own understanding of the world. However, other people from different social backgrounds, ethnic groups, age groups, and so on might not share the same understanding. In other words, the idea, issue or theory is not common to them. Just because something is sensible that does not automatically make it common.

2. It is not always sense: Albert Eisten described common sense as 'the collective of prejudices we have acquired by the age of 18'. In other words, common sense explanations often close our minds to other possibilities. Just because something is common that does not automatically make it sensible. Some sense understandings are later proven by rational, logical enquiry and experience to be misguided and ill-informed.

Therefore, social scientists rarely justify something as common sense. They are always seeking to prove their claims and justify their theories and ideas.

Lateral and Vertical thinking:

Every individual owes his/her success to his/her creativity. It is most useful in goodtime and essential in bad time as well. The main and crucial question arises that how can one achieve it? It is regarded as a magic gift of divine flash of inspiration, a chance coming together of extraordinary circumstances. It seems that one can do nothing about creativity except await it passively. It usually does come about in this passive manner-but only because we have never developed the type of thinking that encourages it.
Creativity is a “lateral thinking” type of thinking and it has been difficult to develop because in many ways, it is contrary to the traditional habits of logical thinking which we find very useful. The essential step is to understand the processes involved in creativity, escape from attitudes which inhibit these processes and to use methods for encouraging them. This is the purpose of lateral thinking, which can be learned as a skill and then used in a deliberate manner in order to achieve creativity.
Creativity is not only concerned with generating new ideas but with escaping from old ones. Continuity is the reason for the survival of most ideas, not a repeated assessment of their value. Such continuity can trap one into gross inefficiency. Freed from the prison of an obsolescent idea, one can move ahead. Furthermore, ideas (like organisations) which develop slowly over period of time tend to be cumbersome. With creativity restructing, one can slice through the inefficiency and put things together in a much simpler and more effective manner.
The huge effectiveness of mind arises directly from the way it organises information into patterns. The more firmly a pattern is established the more useful it becomes. But creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way. Thus the very effectiveness of mind in establishing fixed patterns makes creativity very difficult. It is like having a filing system set up to store data in a particular way. In order to pursuer cross references in such a filing system, one would have to develop new ways of using it.
When creativity is regarded as a magic gift, there is nothing that can be done about it if we are not lucky enough to have the gift. But everyone can develop some skill in lateral thinking and those who develop most skill will be most creative.
An understanding of the creative process is based on the way the mind handles information. The achievement of creativity involves: an attitude of mind, an escape from traditional thinking habits specific formats and techniques, and the use of a new functional word. All these combine to give the skill of lateral thinking. This skill can be learned, practiced and used. With practice and confidence lateral thinking can become so natural a part of thinking that no special effort is required.

Work skills:

Skill is generally considered to be a possession of the individual. It can take numerous forms-for example, knowledge, dexterity, judgement, linguistic ability-however the assumption is that it accrued by the individual as a product of accumulated education, training and experience. In survey (Francis and Penn, 1994) respondents reported over 16 different definitions when asked the question ‘What do you think is meant by the term skilled job?’. However, there was some convergence around five main characteristics: training, qualifications, apprenticeship, experience and high abilities. Francis and Penn conclude that different occupational groups will categorise skill in different ways, which suggests that person’s conception of skill is largely based on his or her own experiences of employment.

Cockburn (1983: 113) suggests that person, job and setting all three aspects need to be taken into account. In her study of (male) printworkers she argues that:
There is the skill that resides in the man himself, accumulated over time, each new experience adding something to total ability. There is the skill demanded by the job-which may not match the skill in the worker. And there is the political definition of skill: that which a group of workers or a trade union can successfully defend against the challenge of employers and other groups of workers. Cockburn has divided the skills in to three categories because each suggests a different approach to examining skill.
1) Skill in the person: Any analysis that concentrates on the person is likely to attempt to identify individual attributes and qualities, and seek to measure these through, for example, and aptitude test under experimental conditions; typically this approach has been taken by psychologists. Similarly, a questionnaire might be administrated to assess the individual’s education, training and experience, which could then be proxy for skill-a method frequently adopted by economists.
2) skill in the job: If the analytical focus is the job then the concern is less with the person performing the task than with the requirements embedded in the task itself. In this case, attention would be turned towards the complexity of the tasks required to perform the job competently- an approach typically taken by management theorists. It would also include the extent of discretion over the work-an issue of particular interest to industrial/employment relations theorists.
3) skill in the setting: if the focus is on the political and historical setting, an analysis would be assessing the way skill has developed over time and has been ‘constructed’ by different interest groups, rather than being a feature of the person or the job-an approach pursued by some sociologists, but more usually by historians.
These differences in approach to analysing skill are summarised in following table: (Click on diagram to enlarge.)
The approach of Human Capital theorists (Becker, 1964) who argue that in market economy, a person’s human capital will determine their value as an employee. For Human Capital theorist, responsibility for success in work clearly lies with the individual; they invoke the notion of the notion of a meritrocratic society, where individual endeavour is rewarded. There are three problems recognise with the human capital approach:
1) Inequality of opportunity: The approach assumes that everyone has the same opportunity of access to the activities that improve human capital. For example, a person has to be offered a job in order to gain work experience however when there are high rates of unemployment allowing employers to pick and choose, a person with no work experience is less likely to be offered a job, they are consequently unable to gain work experience.
2) Validity of the skill measures: A general problem is whether the variables of education, training and experience are valid measures of skill. The number of years of a person spends in formal education is linked to qualifications attained, but even then it does not necessarily mean that skills learned will be appropriate or transferable to the work setting. Similarly, while the measurement of training may be a better indicator of industry-specific knowledge and aptitude, it does not take into account the applicability of the training to the current context.
3) Use value of the skill: Measurement should include those attributes that have a current value-in other words the measurement of ‘skill in use’ rather than skill possessed. For example, if person learns to speak Nepali and gain qualification proving their competence, does this constitute a skill? If it has some market value, human capital theorists would say yes, but if few employers require Nepali speakers, it value is severely reduced. In other words, skill is not a fixed concept, but it is relative to its market value. In this sense, all knowledge and abilities can be seen as potential skills, but it is the demand for them and their supply that give them value. Therefore, measuring the skills possessed by the person can be misleading without exploring the labour market context.

The approach of assessing skill in the person tends to view skill as an attribute possessed by an individual, and sometimes described as a person’s human capital. While this appears to be a relativity simple way of assessing skill, the problems lie in the methods of measurement and then putting these in to practice.

knowledge

British Universities losing allure with overseas students:

According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development that Britain’s share of the productive market in overseas students has declined sharply as Australia and other competitors countries attract more Asians students on degree programmes. However, there are number of foreign students are coming to study in the UK, its market share is falling faster than any other developed countries and, threatening its position as the second most popular undergraduate destination after the US.
Australia has been the biggest beneficiary,making progress particularly in attracting students from China, the largest and rapidly growing source of new business. Andereas Schleicher, head of analysis at the OECD said " The advantage that the UK has traditionally had is getting smaller,". He also warned that the other countries, particularly in the Nordic area, were introducing courses taught in English, threatening to erode further the dominance of universities in English speaking countries.
Mindful of the £1.25 bn a year revenues earned from foreign students' fees, ministers are struggling to balance the need to promote and support British university courses aboard with concerns about security and illegal immigrantion. Under a Home Office pilot scheme, colleges are being asked to report back when enrolled students disappear or accepted candidates fail to turn up.

Mr. Schleicher said " In higher education there is fundamental change going on in many countries and a lot of investments being made." He predicated that greater internationalisation of education would have a growing impact on countries' balance of payments. There was also a burgeoning market for cross broder programmes delivered electronically.

"The strength of the pound is hurting UK, the Americans are coming back into the market after staying away for a few years after 9/11, and now the prime minister, who had highly successful strategy to increase the number of foreign students, has let the Home Ofice sabotage everything."

The meaning of work:

Children are frequently asked the question, ‘What do you want to be when you grow up? My Mother and Father used to ask me same type of questions when I was child. I used to reply very eagerly that I want to be Pilot. When I completed my higher secondary level course, I tried to choose medical field. Because of time, situation and different circumstance I had to change my field in business studies in graduation level. When I got an opportunity for further study at UK, I continued my further study in Advance Manufacturing and MIS (Hybrid Manager) which was funded by EEC Union for Air Bus UK. As time passed and I am adult now, if the question is rephrased to me ‘What do you do?’ It is more likely now to mutter that I am qualified to work in strategic level in an organisation rather than any particular profession like Pilot, Doctor, Charter Accountant, Human Resource Manager, Marketing Manager and Industrial Engineer.
These two common questions are significant because both underline the fact that paid employment is generally considered to be a central defining feature of ourselves as individuals. As children we are being judged in terms of our employment aspirations and, as adults we are being assessed in terms of our employment status. In summary, paid work is one of the principle means by which we evaluate other people.
An individual experiences work as the meaning of work in terms of the economic necessity to work and moral necessity to work. In terms of the economic necessity includes the material reasons for work and raise the question of whether people would carry on some form of work even if they had no financial need to do so. In terms of the moral necessity includes the concept of a ‘work ethic’ and assess its various elements that are supposedly encouraging people to work irrespectively of any economic necessity.
It is a common sense view is that people work simply for money. However, research always revels that the actual reasons why people work are far more complex. Certainly, it is true that money is important, but employees tend also to give a range of other reasons for working. To illustrate this point, let’s take a research question done at Swan Hunter Shipbuilder in UK by Erickson, Stephenson and Williams (2000: 180-1). The research question was ‘Why do you work?’
‘I want to provide for my family, but I enjoy the trade union side of my work. I like going to meetings, negotiation and helping people.’ (Design engineer)
‘To keep my family. But I think it’s important to do something you enjoy.’ (Draughtsman)
‘The pay packet. But work is a necessary ethic when you work all your life- it governs your existence.’ (Welder)
‘For self-respect-I don’t want to become a social parasite. And I don’t want to be bored. It’s good for meeting people and I get a lot of job satisfaction, and for the money too.’ (Steel-metal worker)
‘Making a living and getting the self-respect of doing something productive. It gives me peace of mind.’ (Driller)
‘To exist. I like the job. I come to work to use my skill and to make enough money to have a decent way of life.’ (Planter/foreman)
‘It’s all I know.’ (Caulker/burner)
Now, I want to move my topic to evaluate the importance of the economic need to work. From the earlier discussion about the work, we roughly know that people work in order to earn money to live; it is through paid work that basic needs are satisfied because it provides money for subsistence (food, housing, clothes, and so on). However, it is hard to accept blindly this argument as it stands: can we really talk about the need to work for the purpose of subsistence when most developed societies provide welfare system that prevents people from falling below the basic level of subsistence?

Blauner’s version of alienation:

Blauner suggested an alternative way of looking at alienation that starts from two assumptions which is different from Marx’s suggested alienation.
Assumption 1: alienation is not unavoidable under capitalism.
Assumption 2: work has different meaning for different people.
Both of these assumptions suggest that it is insufficient to view alienation as an objective condition (the same for all employees under capitalism) however, alienation should be considered as a subjective experience (differing from situation to situation, and person to person). Blauner (1964) has undertaken in this manner to explore the concept. Blauner (1964) begins from the proposition that ‘alienation is a general syndrome made up of a number of different objective conditions and subjective feelings-states which emerge from certain relationships between workers and sociotechnical settings of employment’. He also stresses that alienation should be divided into four dimensions, each of which can be investigated for different workers to enable a profile of alienation to be drawn up which are summarised as following table. (Click on diagram to enlarge.)

There is … no simple answer to the question: Is the factory worker of today an alienated worker? Inherent in the techniques of modern manufacturing and the principles of bureaucratic industrial organisation are general alienation tendencies. But in some cases the distinctive technology, division of labour, economic structure, and social organisation-in other words, the factor that differentiate individual industries-intensify these general tendencies, producing a high degree of alienation; in other cases they minimize and counteract them, resulting instead in control, meaning, and integration. (Blauner, 1964: 166-7)
Eventually, this leads Blauner to a position of technological determinism: he suggests that greater automation will free workers from drudgery of assembly-lines and machine-minding and will result in decreasing alienation for employees (Blauner, 1964: 182-2). This is an optimistic projection that suggests the problem of alienation will be resolved within the capitalist framework- a position which was passionately challenged by Braveman (1974) and subsequent labour process theorists.

Alienation:

The word ‘alienation’ mostly used in the media (especially in serious late night TV talk shows and Sunday newspapers) and arises in everyday conversation. Yet it remains one of the consented terms in the academic study of work. Alienation is an objective state and builds on concepts originally defined by Karl Marx, while Robert Blauner introduces elements of subjectivity into the analysis. It illustrates the importance of viewing work as a rich and varied domain of human activity. It is concerned with the ways in which employees get through their working day: how they survive the boredom, tedium, monotony, drudgery and powerlessness that characterise many jobs. There is one central principle around which the discussion is organised: the notion that in order to ‘survive’ work, people are obliged to become resourceful and creative in developing strategies that allow them to assert some control over, and construct meaning for, the work activities they are directed by managers to undertake.
In dynamic world where the subjective experiences of individuals are collectively constructed and reconstructed to create shared understandings and develop norms that guide and pattern behaviour. In real scenario, it is also a regulated world where the structural constraints imposed by power holders (especially managers) limit the actions of individuals and workgroups. The result is a curious mixture of consent and resistance to work.
Marx argues that alienation is an intrinsic part of the capitalist labour process and therefore is an unavoidable objective state in which all workers find themselves. It apparent itself because in selling their labour power, employees are surrendering the right to control their labour, how and when work should be undertaken becomes the prerogative of employers.
According to Karl Marx (1930:713) under capitalism all the means for developing production are transformed into means of domination over and exploitation of the producer; that they mutilate the worker into a fragment of human being, degrade him to become a mere appurtenance, make his work such a torment that its essential meaning is destroyed. (quoted in Fox, 1974: 224)
According to Marx, employees experience four types of estrangement as a result of this relationship:
1) self-estarangement: According to capitalism, work is merely the means for people to acquire money to satisfy their needs out-side of working hours however work ought to be a source of satisfaction in its own right. As a result, employees experience a sense of ‘self-estrangement’ because while they are in work undertaking the activities as instructed by their managers, they cannot be themselves (separate from their true selves) which make them to experience a sense of alienation.
2) estrangement from the product of their labour: Marx labels a process as ‘objectification’ that the output (the product or object) of one’s labour is the physical expression of the effort that has been undertaken and the skills that have used. However, the product of a person’s labour is not owned by the employee; it becomes the property of the capitalist. Therefore the product becomes an alien object. Marx states it:
The alienation of the worker in his product means not only that his labour becomes an object, an external existence, but that it exists outside him, independently, as something alien to him, and that it becomes a power on its own confronting him; it means that the life which he has conferred on the object confronts him as something hostile and alien. (Marx, 1969: 97)
3) estrangement from their species being: The alienation caused by self-estrangement and estrangement from the product has wider repercussions for humankind. Marx argues that through work, people express their creativity, produce the means of their own existence and hence realise their humanity. This free, creativity endeavour is the very purpose of life, but under capitalism work becomes coercion: forced labour. This means that people become estranged from their very nature; they are left alienation from their ‘species being’.
4) estrangement from others: People are left estranged from each other due to estrangement from their essential nature. Marx argues that human beings are distinct from animal due to their self-awareness. So that a person can understand the world through his/her own actions and behaviour, and by appreciating the role and estrangement combine to create conditions in which the unique qualities of humankind are diminished. Under forced labour, people are owned and controlled. They experience this directly and also recognise this estrangement in other people. As a result, they are both alienated from their own humanity and from others. (Click on diagram to enlarge.)

Non-alienation conditions:
The bottom half of the diagram suggests how under non-capitalist conditions the problem of alienation might be avoided. In both diagram, it is clear that there are similarities, the difference is that the person undertaking the work remains in control of both their labour and the product of their labour. The consequence of self-control over one’s labour is that a person is more likely to derive intrinsic meaning from the work being undertaken, rather than only seeing it as a means of getting money. In turn, this might mean that a person’s self-esteem and feelings of worth are enhanced- therefore it contributes to their self-identity. Overall, there is no alienation because the four features of separation do not occur.
References:
Marx, K. (1930) Capital, London: Dent.
Marx, K. (1969) ‘Alienated labour’, in T. Burns (ed) Industrial Man: Selected readings, Harmondsworth: Penguin, pp. 95-109.
Marx, K. (1976) Capital, Vol. 1, Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Noon, M. and, Blyton, P. (2002) The realities of work: Palgrave, pp. 228-232.

Love, Attraction and Loneliness:

Am I really lonely? If I ask same question to others I will get simple answer: No, you are absolutely not lonely. This is a part of life and we need change sometime. What sort of change do I need? Now, at last I can assume that I need somebody or partner. Am I attracted with somebody? Have I met my dream girl? I am not quite sure where my dream girl is?
What produces attraction may change with time and circumstance? If I am feeling bad about myself, I may be attracted to a person who is complimentary and supportive. If I am feeling bored with daily events, I may be attracted to someone who promises change and excitement. Attraction has no single cause.
Loneliness is to make a self-defeating attribution. The individual is saying, “I am too uninterested and unattractive for anyone to care about.” The depression and inactivity then reduce the likelihood of the individual seeking new relationships. We are only human beings who have different skills, experiences and knowledge however all of us are not psychologists and do not know different psychological aspects happen in our daily life. Most of the people love their near and dear ones. They would not knowingly do anything to damage the self-esteem of their loved ones. Sometimes they do not say exactly what they mean. For example, sometime our loved one may say, "I did not like you very much when you told me this". We may take it to mean that he/she does not like us at all. It would be better if he/she had said, "I get scared and nervous when you shout". This is the way, an individual can make clear that it is the behaviour that is beings criticized, not the worth of the person. The same applies also in interpersonal relationships at workplace, play-ground and so on. (Click on diagram to enlarge.)
The odds are that most of the people are not aware that their words are so harsh. Most peers and friends honestly want to support and encourage their peers and subordinates and help them feel loved. They try but they may not do everything perfectly. Self-esteem is a pride and acceptance of our self. It is our sense of personal worth. When we feel worthwhile we are able to make good decision, experience acceptance from others and give and receive love. Loneliness increases to the people who are in Love however love often causes pain.
· Depend on each other
· Want very much to help each other
· Want an exclusive relationship.
There are various reasons which individuals are attracted to each other:
Familiarity and proximity: - They must have some form of regular contact or association. This includes such situations as attending the same class, working in the same office, and living in the same apartment building.
Personal needs: -We are attracted to individuals who satisfy our needs and desires. These include the need for love, emotional support, and the desire for financial status and attractive physical appearance.
Similarity: -Similar in terms of socio-economic level, race, religions, beliefs, and education level. e.g. in a study with students.
Reinforcement: -Individual tend to attracted to individuals who reinforce and support their own opinions, values and ideas or who share similar interests, such as hobbies and activities.
Parental models: - It is sometimes suggested we are attracted to individuals who possess the trail of our theory, females are oedipal attracted to males who possess the trails of their fathers, male are attracted to female who have the trails of their mothers.
I have tried to explain the psychological aspects how the attraction develops from love to hate which has been tried to explain as following figure. (Click on diagram to enlarge.)
Deep relationships between people in western culture usually progress through a regular series of stages. Starting with zero contact, mutual awareness develops as a result of proximity, repeated exposure, or a positive response to physical appearance. At the level, that of surface contact, mutual interests and attitudes may be explored. If relations continue to be rewarding couple may move to the level of maturity.Matuality increases to the extent that the participants reveal themselves to one another, accept each other, and complement each other’s needs. Marriage and friendship is depending on person’s sacrifice and loyalty. (Click on diagram to enlarge.)

The three most important of target dependent variables: propinquity (The more I see you, the more I like you) or physical closeness, the emotions of feeling that an individual happens to be experiencing, and the level of that person’s need for affiliation. We can take reinforcement theory about the conditioned feeling based on psychological theory as follows: (Click on diagram to enlarge.)

References:

http://www.csicop.org/si/2000-11/beliefs.html

http://www.webbrain.com/html/default_win.html

How The Brain Works:

Few days ago there was a documentary on BBC "How The Brain Works: why Kevin cannot help being an outsider". I found a commentary article by Clive Cookson in Science & Technology column in Financial Times which made me to write something about this topic as well. I love psychology and, to do research on human behaviour is being my passion since my dissertation research. Such topic always attracts me, so I thought it would be useful to make a note for future reference.
The discovery of brief but marked deterioration at puberty in the ability to recognise some emotions was the by product of a large study taken at the institute of Child Health, looking at different in social intelligence between boys and girls. It was designed to investigate the causes of autism and its milder manifestation Asperger's syndrome, represent extreme forms of normal male brains.
The temporary dip in social intelligence "followed by recovery and acceleration to adult levels of achievement", turned out to affect both sexes. The loss of ability to detect emotions in other people was most marked for anger and sadness. Prof. Skuse said the Kevin phenomenon "probably reflects the rewiring of the brain that occurs due to genetic and hormonal changes" during puberty.
Nine out of 10 people with autism and Asperger's are male. According to the popular "extreme male brain" theory, promoted particularly by Simon Baron-Cohen at Cambridge University, the reason boys are so vulnerable is simply that syndrome represents the extreme form of male (as opposed to female). As prof Baron-Cohen said in his recent book "The essential Difference", "the female brain is predominantly hard-wired for empathy. The male brain........... for understanding and building systems."
Inability to decipher facial expressions is characteristic of autistic disorders. Autism also impairs the ability to remember faces and to work out which way people are looking. If extreme male brain theory is correct, boys as a whole should be significantly worse than girls at recognising emotion, prof Skuse believes.
Prof Skuse said that the results of study did not strongly support the extreme male brain hypothesis. He began by supporting the theory however he also stressed that he is very sceptical at this moment. A lot of evidence for it comes from questionnaire-based methods, which may jut be reflecting cultural expectations.
At the age of six, female performance was indeed significantly better: 70 percent of boys were worse than the average for girls at recognising emotion. But the differences diminished with the age and by lat adolescence boys and girls were very similar, although a small female advantage persisted for some emotions (recognition of disgust, for example). The overlap between the sexes is more than 90 percent by t he age of 17.
Prof Skuse stress his view that whatever the ultimate "cause" of autism, the male preponderance "must implicate the sex chromosome, directly or indirectly," Females may be protected in some way from the complex risk factors by the fact that they have two X-chromosomes while male have only one.
Prof Skuse is beginning to think that the hunt for causes of autism in the way people handle social information may be misguided: "There may be something else going on" he says.
So autism remains mysterious, but the scientific drive to explain it is throwing up fascinating observations-such as insights into the teenage mind.

Case study:

Case study is used to research few objects for numerous considerations. A case study is an empirical study that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context when the boundaries between the phenomenon and context are not clearly evident and are used multiple sources of evidence. An important advantage with case study research is the opportunity for a holistic view of a process (Gummesson, 1991). That is to enable the researcher to study many different aspects, examine them in relation to each other, view the process within its total environment and also utilise the researcher’s theoretical knowledge and understanding. The case studies are the preferred strategy when
(1) “how” or “why” questions are being posed,
(2) when the investigator has little control over events and
(3) when the focus is on a contemporary phenomenon within some real life context (Yin, 1994).
Sources to a case study are not limited to qualitative research, quantitative methods could be used as well (Yin, 1994). The nature of a case study could also be of either quantitative or qualitative nature. A quantitative case study tests a theory while a qualitative case study creates theories (Merriam, 1994). Main sources of information in the case studies should be documentation (research papers, books, manuals, internal reports etc), interviews (with technical and management personnel) and direct observations (industrial studies).

Jagjit's song

Today,while I was on my way to University,I had downloaded few Jagjit's song in my mp3 player that I was listening. I found this song absolutely fantastic. I am not very good in Hindi translation but it is my small try,hope it would be all right. Any volunteer to help,would be warm welcome.

Lyricist: Atal Behari Vajpayee Artist and Music director: Jagjit Singh

Kay khooya kaya paya jagmee, Milte aaur bhechadte nagmee,
Majhee kise se nahi sikayaat, Yaadapi chala gayaa pag pag me,
Yak dhristee biti par daali, Yadoo ki woo taali tatoolee,
Apnee he manse kuchha bole, Apnee he manse kuchha bole,

Prithibi lakhoo anssa purani, Jivan yak annanta kahani,
Par tanki apni semayee, yaadapi sauoo sabda ki baani,
Yetana kafee hai antima dastak paar darbaja kholee,
Apnee he manse kuchha bole, Apnee he manse kuchha bole,

Janam maran ka avirat phera, Jivan banjaroo ka deera,
Aaj yaha kaal kaha puch hai, kauna janata kidheer sabera,
Addheeyara aakash asimita, prana ki pankkha ko tolee,
Apnee he manse kuchha bole, Apnee he manse kuchha bole.

The Economics of Manufacturing:

The economics miracle of our age has been the strength with which previously vanquished economics of Japan and West Germany have risen from the ashes of war to become two of the wealthiest societies in the world. They have achieved this result through the execution of sound manufacturing strategies clearly invented to produce high quality technology products requiring substantial research and development (R&D) expenditure and massive investment in new capital plant and machinery. China’s vast manufacturing base is raising its GDP by around 9 percent a year as a result of poorly endowed with natural resources and massive manpower. China will have the second largest economy in the world by 2050, after US. As a result of the growing tended to increase the proportion of manufacturing products both exported and imported by industrial nation like the US, EEC nations and Asian countries (Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, India and so on), China is being more successful and better equipped for this competitive rivalry than others.
A nation’s ability to capture and retain a consistent or increasing share of the world market for manufactured products has considerable economic implication. In the first place it means it means that the largest economic sizes of plant incorporating the best technologies can be employed in the confidence that their capacities will be filled, yielding ‘technical benefits of scale’ and providing the user with cost advantages. Secondly, such investments permit productivity gains to be realized by replacing or supplementing human effort with machine power and artificial intelligence.
Productivity improvements can be made in the face of dwindling profits providing there exists the human will to realize such improvements. To achieve this end it is necessary for pride (in the product being manufactured) and total commitment of the workforce (to make products better than those of competitors) to predominate over entrenched restrictive working practices and antipathy or even suspicion of technological and organisational change. Therefore, a Luddite mentality must not prevail if a nation’s workforce is to prosper in the long run but instead it must be fired by the passion to excel in the manufacture of products which it must carefully select and fund accordingly.
Manufacturing organisations have to accommodate the inevitable obsolescence of products and processes, by anticipating and meeting market change. They can achieve this in three ways:
Through incremental improvements to their products, plants, processes and working methods;
By exploiting their expertise in different marketing areas; and
Through radical innovations incorporating new technologies, processes and products.
Technological innovation requires a commitment both at the national and corporate level for innovation requires a commitment both at the national and corporate level for invention and development of innovations which then become the nation’s ‘seed corn’ for its future prosperity. A definitive policy towards technological innovation is required for another major reason. The major industrial nations compete for markets against each other but also to an ever increasing extent with manufacturers from developing nations. The industrialized nations have moral obligation to ensure that the living standards of the poorer nations are raised substantially anyway but, as manufacturing processes and techniques become standardized, these nations will implement these schemes and with modern plants and cheap labour they will posses a comparative cost advantage permitting them to take market share where conventional products are concerned. To contain this change at a rate which is politically acceptable to those involved, the developed nations have to invent and exploit new products and processes which involve high levels of human skill, knowledge and inventiveness: in other words they have to innovate to survive.
Mao Tse Tung (1950) explained his view in his book "The Little Red Book" that to this day many of comrades still do not understand that they must attend to the quantitative aspects of things-the basic statistics. They have no figure in their heads, and, as a result, cannot help making mistakes. From this argument, we can figure out that eventually most of the companies need to invest in new, more productive assets if that wish to survive and prosper.

Discrimination:

Every organisation’s management is seeking to discriminate between people on the basis of whether or not they have the appropriate attributes to carry out the job. The main issue is not whether discrimination is occurring however discrimination as based on fair criteria. The word ‘discrimination’ has lost its literal meaning and is more normally used to imply criticism. There have been identified six criteria that represent the main bases of discrimination and lead to accusations of unfairness:
Sex/gender;
Race/ethnicity;
Disability;
Sexual orientation;
Religion;
Age;
These are not limited categories so that people find themselves experiencing unfair discrimination from several different directions. It depends upon individuals who experience one or several sources of disadvantage based on work experience or expertise. The experience of discrimination also has some common manifestations which transcend these individual categories.

Decision:

It is true that many decisions we make subconsciously arise out of our physical and biological needs and derive from the pressure to survive physically. We also make decisions in developing skills like swimming, riding. What we learn to do continiously with frequent repetiton becomes habit and we do it without thinking about it. An automatic decision is a decision that made intuitively and subconsciously. It is automatic when it is repeated as habit either mentally or physically as a result of learning. It is known through it is difficult to draw a sharp distinction between the two. When we fall short in our physical habit.
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