Saturday, January 25, 2020

The Message Of Islam Theology

The Message Of Islam Theology The word Islam is derived from the root word salaama means peace, obedience, purity, and submissions. Islam means abiding peace and obedience to the will of God. While other religions derive their name from either a tribe, or a geographical area or a founder, and Islam derives its name from the central ides of peace and submission to god. The followers of Islam call them as Muslims or Musalmans. The word Hindu is derived from the Sanskrit root word Sindhu and used by Persians, ancient Greeks and many foreigners to denote the people who lived beyond the river Indus. The word Hinduism was invented by the british scholars in 1830s to denote the religious traditions of the native Indians to distinguish them from the other recognized religions. The message of Islam came to Muhammad for the first time through the angel Gabriel in 610 A.D., in a cave on Mount Hira. He kept on receiving the answers to his questions rest of his life and then he put all together in the book called Quran, which is the only holy book of Islam. Quran is the only book in the world which cannot be ever translated. Hinduism considers Vedas as their teachings of God. The Vedas are the earliest sacred books of Hinduism. The end part of Upanishads, which constitutes the philosophical base of Hinduism known as Vedanta and contains the elements of monotheism and description of God as the supreme deity of universe. Other important sources of Hinduism are the Vedantas, the Puranas, the Bhagavad Gita, Tantric texts, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. As Aldous Huxley once said The Bhagavad-Gita is the most systematic statement of spiritual evolution of endowing value to mankind. It is one of the most clear and comprehensive summaries of perennial philosophy ev er revealed; hence its enduring value is subject not only to India but to all of humanity. The muslims practices the following so called Five Pillars, which are mentioned in the Quran. Shahadah is also known as the daily recitation of There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger (Quran). Salat is the rituals performed Five times a day: dawn, at midday, mid afternoon, sunset, and nighttime. Zakat which is the amount of money from a persons total income donated to the poor and the needy. Sawn which is a period of fasting from dawn to dusk in the ninth month of muslim calendar. During this fasting muslims avoid all food, liquid, sex and tobacco. The final pillar is called Hajj which is the pilgrimage to a sacred city of Mecca once in their lifetime. In Hinduism God is worshipped in many different ways. The daily rituals are performed by an individual several times a day in which offerings are made to gods, the elements, ancestors, animals and the humans. Many people also worship by visiting the temple everyday in the morning. Ramayana states that Wealth springs fr om dharma, from dharma comes happiness and one gets everything from dharma. Dharma is the essence of this world(Valmiki). Pooja is the popular form of worship in which prayers, chants, flowers, incense sticks, and others things are offered to gods, like said in Ramayana Whatever is ones food, the same food shall be offered to ones gods (Valmiki 2.103.30)Some Hindus also participate in satsangs or religious gatherings and perform the singing and chanting of the names of gods. Many Hindus practice fasting on specific days of the weeks or on some festivals. Hindus also visits certain sacred places and temples for their own beings. A visit to Varanasi for a dip in Ganges is considered very purifying and spiritual uplifting. There are many festivals celebrated by hindus out of which some are Diwali, Navaratri, Uttarayan, Ganesh Chaturthi and many more. Muslims deny believing or worshiping any other god but Allah, who is their almighty. He is not only the highest god of muslims, but also of all the people in the world. He is close to his loyal worshippers, whom he forgives their sins and blesses them with peace and happiness. They believe in free will and fate. According to muslims, Allah knows everything that happened, that has been happening and that will happen. He made humans responsible for their actions and choices. Anyone can convert to Islam easily. According to their traditions, anyone who follows Allah and takes Muhammad as his messenger becomes a muslim because Quran says that He who obeys the Messenger has indeed obeyed Allah (al-Nisa 4.80). Hinduism believes in existence of Brahman, the supreme Lord of the universe who is eternal and stable. Three gods Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva are his three main forms which are endowed with their work of creation, preservation and destruction. According to Hindus, god can be worshipped in too many different ways. Many Hindus worship gods into their personal forms chosen by themselves. Hinduism believes in worshipping god as in the image or the statue or an object. They also believe in peaceful life lived with truth and honor, like once said in Mahabharata, Should even ones enemy arrive at the doorstep, he should be attended upon with respect. A tree does not withdraw its cooling shade even from the one who has come to cut it (12.146.5). And Mahatma Gandhi also said I have no other wish in this world but to find light and joy and peace through Hinduism. Hinduism and Islam believe in the God as a supreme Lord of the universe, and as a creator of the whole system. Both religions believe that god has blessed humans with free will which make themselves responsible for their actions and choices. Allah is known by 99 names and the person who learns them all by heart goes in the heaven. The Brahman of Hinduism also has many names and by chanting them a person can attain him. Both believe that god responds to all the people who worship him and blesses them. Hinduism believes in karma. Islam believes that good rewards for good deeds and punishment for bad dreams. And Quran states Whoever does good deed, he shall be repaid ten-fold; and whoever does evil, and he shall be repaid with evil (5.32). Both religions believe in non-violence and killing no human life. In Hinduism the path of truth is far more important than the belief or disbelief in god. Islam does not recognize any other religions other than they are specifically mentioned in Quran . We believe in that which has been revealed to us and revealed to you, and our God and your God is One, and to him do we submit (29.46). Muslims believe that they in something that is been revealed to them and believe that everybodys god is same. Both religions believe in praying gods and reciting their name and ask for gods forgiveness. Muslims believe in praying only one god Allah, where as Hindus pray to one god but in different forms and incarnations. A person can be converted to Islam by praying to Allah or by taking Muhammad as their own messenger. Whereas in Hinduism a person becomes a Hindu by birth or by personal choice, without taking any messenger or following particular god permanently. Islam does not accept anyone between humans and god and in Hinduism there is a presence of priest for the right directions. Islam does not have any high priest or gurus, whereas Hindus has like the highly respected gurus who people follow and seek for more knowledge from them. Islam does not believe in rebirth. Hindus believe going in heaven or hell but they believe that the soul gets its freedom back through rebirth. Hinduism does not have the concept of messengers like Muslims have Muhammad as their messengers to god. Muslims laws are well versed in Quran as to punish the one who oppose the commands of Allah, and in Hind uism the laws are not imposed by the religious groups or people but are through the government. Islam does not accepts god as his own creation where as Hindus accept that god is a supreme Lord of his creation and also as an individual as atman in every human-being as it is stated in The Bhagwad Gita, The power of God is with you at all times; through the activities of mind, senses, breathing, and emotions; and is constantly doing all the work using you as a mere instrument. Hinduism does not see any difference between god and other living beings. In Islam man can only be the true follower of god and the others are made just to benefit man. In Islam there is no concept of Trinity. They believe that god is one and only. Hinduism has three highest forms of god known as Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. The belief system in Hinduism and Islam has a great effect on the present day society. There is a great development and change in Hinduism over the centuries and has spread all over the world. Islam has also spread over the years and has mostly spread by trade and the people conquered by them. Hinduism and Islam are two major religions in modern world with a great amount of people following in the various parts of the world. Work Cited Huxley, Aldous. Quotes About Hinduism. (30 Quotes). Goodreads Inc., n.d. Web. 04 Oct. 2012. . Gandhi, Mahatma. Hinduism Quotes. Refspace.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Oct. 2012. . MuhÃÅ'Â £ammad, ZÃÅ'Â £afr-AllaÃÅ'„h H. The Quran. London: Curzon, 1978. Print VaÃÅ'„lmiÃÅ'„ki, , and Ramesh Menon. The Ramayana. New York: North Point Press, 2003. Print. PrataÃÅ'„pachandra, RaÃÅ'„ya, and Mohan G. Kisari. The Mahabharata. Calcutta: Bharata Press, 1884. Print. Gupta, Prashant, M D. Gupta, and N K. Vikram. Bhagwad Gita. New Delhi: Dreamland Books, 1996. Print.

Friday, January 17, 2020

Crowd Behaviour Essay

People are likely to act in bizarre ways in a crowd compared to as an individual. A crowd can be defined as a set of individuals who share a common social identification of themselves in terms of that crowd. Crowd members should also share common goals and act in a coherent member (Reicher, 2008). There have been extensive amounts of research into crowd psychology, investigating the apparent causes and reasons for such behaviour to occur. Many different theories exist to attempt to explain why people fall into this interesting state of social influence when they are in crowds. This essay will attempt to investigate how we might best explain crowd behaviour. Le Bon’s (1896) early attempt to explain this phenomenon suggested that crowd behaviours are pathological and abnormal, where people are reduced to a primitive or instinctive mode of behaviour. This theory proposes that feelings of anonymity cause people in a crowd to lose their sense of self and responsibility and act in ways that stem from a ‘group mind’. Through this group mind people are freed from social norms and natural animal instincts are released causing riots and irrational violence. However, since the initial suggestion of the ‘group mind’, this theory has been largely rejected. The main reasoning for this being that the theory does not acknowledge the importance of power in crowd behaviours, which appears to be a key factor in collective behaviour. One speculation that remains important from Le Bon’s group mind theory is that the feeling of crowd anonymity appears to be influential in creating various subsequent theories to explain crowd behaviour, such as the theory of deindividuation. However, the rejection of the group mind does not mean that we should then reject the study of group processes as groups have distinctive properties from individual behaviour. Instead, we should begin to look at group processes with a different perspective. Tajfel (1970) claims that all social behaviour falls on a continuum that spans from interpersonal to intergroup behaviour. Intergroup behaviour is defined with these three criteria: the presence of two distinct groups, low variability in attitudes and behaviour of group members, and low variability in one person’s attitudes to group members.  This helps to explain this readiness in which a person can switch from one view of someone to another (e.g. saying all catholics are bad people, and then going on to say the neighbor (who is a catholic) is such a lovely person). This can arise because when you become part of a group you start to see people as a category not as individuals. The theory of Deindividuation (Deiner, 1976; and Zimbardo, 2007) followed on to these early speculations. The model states that when surrounded by others in a crowd people lose self-awareness. Consequently, people become more susceptible to external cues and to the groups motives and emotions. Ultimately, these factors may lead group members to engage in unsocial and possibly antisocial behaviours. According to Zimbardo, being part of a large group can create a sense of anonymity and diffuses personal responsibility throughout the group for the consequences of one’s actions. This can lead to the loss of identity and a reduced concern for social evaluation. Behaviour resulting can then be impulsive and irrational as there are different set ‘normal’ social and personal norms. Zimbardo’s electric shock experiment gives support to the deindividuation theory, providing evidence that the mean duration of the shock administered by deindividuated participants (they were wearing a coat and a hood to increase anonymity) was nearly twice as long than that of the people who retained their individual identities. Further research also suggests that this sense of anonymity is increased as the size of the group increases and also increases in darker conditions. For example: the violent crowd in the Bristol riots, as darkness fell, violence escalated thus increasing the anonymity of the crowd members. Research by Jaffe and Yinon (1979) compared the mean intensity of shock administered by individuals with that administered by participants in groups of three. As they predicted, those who participated in groups consistently gave much stronger ‘shocks’ than those acting on their own giving evidence for the idea that the sense of anonymity increases with the size of the group. However, some research disagrees that increased anonymity leads to increases antisocial and aggressive behaviour. Some argue that deindividuation and anonymity may in fact result in decreased aggression and improved group relations, indicating that these antisocial behaviours may not be automatic or inevitable consequences of anonymity. Despite much of the early literature proposing that deindividuation factors such as anonymity, loss of self-awareness and group size are associated with antisocial and aggressive behaviours, some more recent findings suggest that deindividuation influences are often sometimes related to increases in pro-social normative behaviour. Zimbardo (1969) provides support for this criticism of the deindividuation theory, having participants either dress in KKK cloaks, or a nurse uniform in an electric shock learning experiment. Results showed that those wearing the nurse uniform chose to reduce the level of shocks administered, and especially in the deindividuated conditions – the person wearing no name tag. In fact, deindividuation by itself did not increase aggression significantly, even for those wearing the KKK outfit. These findings have an influential effect on the understanding of group behaviour as they show that being in a group does not necessarily lead to destructive, antiso cial behaviour as Zimbardo implied. It seems that crowd behaviour often tends to depend on the situation and how salient the norms are. Given the previous literature, Diener (1980) argues that the main factor in crowd behaviour is determined by a loss of self-awareness. He then suggests that factors present in crowd situations such as cohesion and anonymity, can lead people to focus their attention outwards and less on themselves and on personal standards. As a result, people’s behaviour becomes less self-regulated and more determined by immediate cues and norms present in groups around them. Subsequently, these cues will not always direct violence, but will vary across different situations. The literature also fails to consider the context of behaviour or to distinguish anonymity when someone is in a group from anonymity when they are alone. In addition, members of a crowd are barely ever truly anonymous; as individuals identities are often known to other members of the crowd, and they therefore only will appear anonymous to outsiders of the crowd. People often gain a sense of pride rioting together in a group, such as supporters of the same team at a football match, which is far from losing their identities. All of the previous models focus on what is lost when part of a crowd – loss of identity, loss of individuality, and loss of self-awareness. This perspective of understanding group behaviour is a negative and highly  unproductive way to think about collective behaviour; it would be much more productive to think about change (Reicher et al., 1995). Reicher’s research into crowd behaviour has come up with three important features of crowd situations. Firstly, crowds nearly always involve more than one group. This intergroup factor has been essentially ignored in the previous literature for crowd behaviour since the group mind fallacy. Secondly, he suggests that people do not become anonymous, but take on a new identity in a crowd. Reicher (1984) studied vivosection attitudes in Science and Social Science students, with science students generally being more PRO and social sciences students more ANTI. In each category, half of the students were made aware of group membership (e.g. seated together, reffered to as groups, wore KKK membership clothing, etc). Attitudes of Science students became more pro-vivosection and social science students become more anti-vivosection. These findings oppose Deiners theory that deindividuation leads to a loss of self-regulation and gives support to Reicher’s view that you don’t lose your identity in a group based situation, but your identity changes to fall in line with group norms. This follows on from Turners (1983) suggestion of the distinction between personal and social aspects of the self. There is a shift along the interpersonal group continuum from personal identity to social identity. There is then a change in what is seen as the appropriate standard of behaviour. These standards of behaviour and norms are now determined by the group’s social identity rather than by personal or environmental factors. This can help to understand why the behaviour of rioters and police can be so different, when they are exposed to the same stimuli, for when they adopt their respective identities they become influenced by very different goals and social norms. This shows that when a person becomes part of a crowd or group, their social identity as a group member becomes more important and their individual identity becomes less important. Although people may sometimes lose some sense of their identity at times, they will often adopt a stronger sense of their social identity as a member of that particular group. Crowd behaviour, according to Reicher, therefore involves a change rather than a loss of identity. Reicher’s new theory of  crowd behaviour raised four issues that do not fall in line with Deiner’s deindividuation theory. 1. Although crowd behaviour is violent, it is often under control at the same time. 2. Crowds are not always anonymous. 3. Though people are previously suggested to lose self-awareness in crowds and thus respond to cues in particular situations, how come people will respond differently? 4. If crowd behaviour leads to a loss in identity, how come a sense of pride often results from crowd interaction? When Reicher (1987) interviewed people who were part of the St Paul’s riots he received some interesting feedback such as â€Å"we feel great, we feel confident it was a vic tory† and â€Å"You were grinning at everybody, because everyone was from St Paul’s†. These statements provide evidence that those feelings of anonymity and a suggested loss of identity in groups are not present when people are successful in their groups perhaps gaining a sense of pride in their group and coming together to celebrate. To conclude, there are three important points that I would like to reiterate. Firstly, Zimbardo’s pessimism about groups is seemingly unjustified with much evidence pointing in the opposite direction. Depending on each particular situation and the norms that are important in each, behaviour can become either pro-social or anti-social in crowd environments. Though where Zimbardo does seem to be right is that people’s behaviour in a group situation can become much more extreme than how they would behave on their own. The second point is that people’s behaviour in crowds does not always worsen. Support from both Zimbardo and Deiner suggest that in groups people are subjected to a loss of identity and loss of control. However, Reicher’s more recent research into crowd behaviour suggests that this idea is mistaken. It has been shown that people’s behaviour is still in control, yet by different psychological processes. Groups seem to have a common goal in mind in acting as they do, and also that their actions are often motivated by identification with some group. Finally, when viewing group behaviour from an intergroup perspective, the goal and identity directed aspects of collective behaviour are more evident. In almost every situation of crowd behaviour, it is possible to determine an out-group, which will play an important role in the actions of the crowd. Overall, there are many different crowd psychology theories, some of which explain different aspects of crowd behaviour. However, research gives much support to the use of intergroup perspective rather than interpersonal theories to explain this phenomenon. References Diener, E. (1976). Effects of prior destructive behavior, anonymity, an group presence on deindividuation and aggression. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 33, 497-507. Diener, E. (1980). Deindividuation, self-awareness, and disinhibition. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 37, 1160-1171. Le Bon, G. (1947). The Crowd: a study of the popular mind. London: Ernest Benn. Reicher, S. D., Spears, R. and Postmes, T. (1995). A social identity model of deindividuation phenomena. European Review of Social Psychology, 6, 161-198. Reicher, S. D. (1984b). The St. Pauls’ Riot: An explanation of the limits of crowd action in terms of a social identity model. European Journal of Social Psychology, 14, 1-21. Reicher, S. D. (2008). The Psychology of Crowd Dynamics. Blackwell Handbook of Social Psychology: Group Processess, 9, 151-168 Tafjel, H. (1970). Experiments in intergroup discrimination. Scientijic American, 223, 96102. Turner, J. C. (1983). Some comments on ‘the measurement of social orientations in the minimal group paradigm’. European Journal of Social Psychology, 13, 351-368 Zimbardo, P. G. (1969). The Human Choice: Individuation, reason, and order versus Deindividuation, impulse and chaos. Nebraska Symposium on Motivation, 17, 237-307

Thursday, January 9, 2020

Introduction Opening Entrepreneurs play a very important...

Introduction Opening Entrepreneurs play a very important role in the economy as they are the building blocks for a country by providing job opportunities, producing goods and rendering services to consumers. An entrepreneur is an individual or group of people (entrepreneurs’) that identify a business opportunity in a particular market and then provide a product or render a service that will satisfy the needs and wants of the consumers. In my opinion entrepreneurship should be promoted more and thought to the younger generations as it has lots of different advantages to it such as providing job opportunities which will lead to combating socio-economic problems such as poverty and unemployment which in turn will reduce crime levels because†¦show more content†¦This did not stop Maponya from making a contribution to Soweto’s township economic development, instead he started a service rendering business, â€Å"the Dube Hygenic Dairy† which was a business whe re a fleet of boys were employed to ride bicycles and deliver milk to customers in Soweto who had no access to refrigeration or even electricity (during apartheid times) this was a great business idea that people really needed at the time. By the 1970’s Maponya’s businesses included a chain of general stores , a butcher shop, a coca-cola plant, filling stations, a restaurant and a GM and BMW car dealership. Richard Maponya’s success was increasing at a fast rate, but he also committed unethical behaviour by funding the truth just to stay on the right side of the law. He was also arrested on suspicion of funding ANC student fighters and was guilty for doing so. He escaped the sentence by claiming that he made payments under duress. Maponya used the apartheid system to his advantage, while Nelson Mandela and other freedom fighters gave everything for our freedom, he made it work for him and Soweto, he was undermining the regime by exposing the ANC. He wanted to ma ke the statement that â€Å" given a chance, a black man could become asShow MoreRelatedThe Relationship Between Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Economic Development and the Role of Creativity and Problem Solving in This Relationship2015 Words   |  9 Pagesfirst six months of 2008 established in the UK (BBC, 2010). 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