Control Mechanisms of Wal-Mart Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Control Mechanisms of Wal-Mart - Case Study Example This made the role of middle men in supply chain activities, as an employee in Wal-mart. After that Wal-mart brought a far larger group of potential consumers within reach of the small commercial centers. This resulted in the control mechanism of building the efficient warehouses necessary for discount operations as part of transactional strategic investments. This can be termed as the control mechanism of buying products from producers directly as the warehousing involves storing the goods economically. (Nelson Lichtenstein, 2005) The control mechanisms that implement the aspects mentioned in part A can be divided into price, integration, contract and trust developed with communication. These involve internal audit, external audit, market control and financial control. The internal audit of the Wal-mart involves asset protection. The auditors concentrate on making inventory process efficient in and over the USA. The loss due to shrink, theft and any types of losses or damages are calculated and communicated to the store management to minimize the problems. There are 11 locations of internal audit in USA. (http://walmart.feedroom.com/fr_story=FEEDROOM119269&rf=rss) The external audit of Wal-mart is responsible for consolidated annual financial statements and so the external auditor. This financial reporting will be according to legally accepted accounting standards. The observation process involves the closed door meetings of the management with external auditors. The external auditors have reasonable independence on preparing the financial statements to make company's transactions transparent. The financial statements prepared by external auditors will be presented to shareholders. (Hector M, 2002) The market control mechanisms of Wal-mart involve the cost cuts and global supply chain. It controls the market by opening large scale supermarkets that sell at low cost and by partnering with local retailers. It establishes its presence in the large retail markets by opening stores that sell the products less than the prevailing prices. It concentrates on increasing profit and sales by decreasing the purchasing costs and profit percentage. In every location the gigantic stores of Wal-mart are a success. (http://i.walmart.com/maint/) The financial control of Wal-mart involves reducing organizational debt and in course of time making the organization debt free. This is possible by maintaining enough cash flows for short term debts and partnering with local partners to establish new stores in new locations that minimize the credit taken from financial organizations. (http://i.walmart.com/maint/) Part C The above mentioned execution of control mechanisms shows effect on planning, organizing, controlling and leading of Wal-mart in its activities. These activities are concentrated in enhancing the exploration of supply chain management by using information systems. This resulted in application of information systems to support supply chain management in order to strengthen the control mechanisms. In the course of implementation only the information systems are being reengineered but not the business processes. This means the business processes dictate the information systems to be used. The business processes are planned keeping in view satisfaction of end user and the relationship of retailer with supplier. By focusing on developing adaptive networks the customer

Critical Review of Entre le chien et le loup Essay

Critical Review of Entre le chien et le loup - Essay Example The exhibition’s title â€Å"entre chien et loup† refers to daytime just before the onset of night when light is minimized so that visual distinction is not really possible. The title of the exhibition itself reveals much about the artist’s intentions that are focused on interplaying contrasts so that contrasts are developed and downplayed throughout the exhibition. Critique The most noticeable contrast in Harper’s work lies in the use of color – while Harper’s embroidery is colored richly, his sculptures are done in a few colors only. The artist’s piece titled â€Å"I tried, I tried, and I tried† is essentially a reproduction of â€Å"Napoleon Crossing the Alps† by Jacques Louis David where he uses rich colors to depict a historical event. In contrast, other works from Harper espouse a seemingly small range of colors that can be segregated as white, black, shades of grey and shades of blue. The contrast between the use o f colors in these pieces can be traced to the historical foundation of Harper’s work. The artist tends to use a rich variety of colors for the historical piece but uses seemingly few colors for pieces that represent contemporary issues including the artist’s personal history in pieces such as â€Å"Then We are Lost Forever in the Gloaming†. This clearly represents the artist’s unconscious perspective on modern life being dull and composed of a few colors in contrast to his conception of the past as being richly colored. In addition, the artist tends to associate closely with historical painters such as Jacques Louis David and their works. â€Å"I tried, I tried, and I tried† seems to depict a historical event even though Napoleon’s actual march through the Alps was not as brilliant as portrayed. (Harvey, 2006). Harper has changed the color of the horse noticeably, providing it with strong shades of black and grey. This could be considered tantamount to rewriting history from the perspective of the artist using embroidery. Harper seems to be embedded into historical events to the extent that he tries to rewrite them, in an effort to become part of such glorious history. In contrast to Harper’s historical works, his works associated with the contemporary realm offer interesting perspectives on contrast, making it both sharp and gradual. Harper’s piece titled â€Å"To Remind, or to Warn† is the most glaring example on stark contrast presented by the artist. The piece is deceitfully simple and presents two wolves, one purely white and the other purely black, placed on cubical foundations. Interestingly, the foundations for the pieces are constructed of three bricks composed along the length and the breadth that provide for pure equality in both foundations. Built on top of these equal foundations are a white wolf, that is perched higher than the black wolf, on pieces of rock. While the white wolf glares down with a neutral design, the black wolf is shown howling up in the air with signs of aggression. The foundations it seems represent man’s birth – everyone is born equally, neither good nor bad. The wolves on top seem to represent good and evil. Traditional association dictates that the white wolf stands for good and so is perched higher and in a neutral posture. In contrast, the black wolf represents evil and is perched

Do Political Parties Help or Hurt America Essay Example for Free

Do Political Parties Help or Hurt America Essay Political parties have been in America since the very inception of the country. Political parties were originally designed to give voice to a group of peoples interests. But as the time has passed, the ideas being presented has been growing less about the people and more about the power and the longevity of the party and the people controlling it. The people are not voting for the candidate that they think will represent them the best but for the D or the R that appears on the side of the name. Should this be the main thing we look to when deciding the leaders of our government? The issue that people take with the concept and general structure of the modern day political parties is the reality of its inability to effectively govern with its supporters. The state must not be usurped by side interests or used as a means of dictating unpopular or even popular laws. In todays parliamentary and representative republics, it is the power behind the party, not necessarily the party itself that decides policy. The question is, in todays capitalistic world, will it be the people or the economic and financial advisers that hold the Party keys? Undoubtedly, it must be the people. However, here we encounter the question of how large a role any particular political party must take within the ideally reconstructed and redefined state. Lets not forget: the state is but a temporary structure devised and built by Man. It is little more than the regulatory body that encompasses the concept of the political party. As such, it stands to be reformed or, in certain cases, overhauled by the parties that reside within it. What the people behind the Party must do, is make sure that their needs and necessary wants be taken up by the Party itself. This is but one aspect of the political party; my concern lies in the eventual and it would happen eventually fostering of a broader party cult of personality. Examples of this can be seen from the U. S. to Asia, from Europe to S. America and Africa. When the people begin to support the idealized face of party politics more so than the spirit of the individual, they resign themselves to the dictatorship of the governmental coalition. Instances of these can be seen in Americas dual-party political system, as well as in certain European states. In essence, the Party becomes little more than a modified form of political and social dictatorship. I would argue that while political parties have their place within society, their role and importance should be greatly isolated and/or minimalized. They should be nothing more than mouthpieces for the people who make up their constituency; as a legislative and governing body, their role must be subjected to the democratic will of the people they represent. I would propose a Democracy from the bottom up instead of the more recognized Democracy from the top down. Because living in a government with no freedom, is a fate worse than death!

Factors for MRI Image Quality

Factors for MRI Image Quality Title: MRI Image Quality TABLE OF CONTENTS 1.0 INTRODUCTION 2.0 SIGNAL TO NOISE RATIO (SNR) Figure 1 3.0 CONTRAST TO NOISE RATIO (CNR) 4.0 RESOLUTION AND SCAN TIME 5.0 THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MRI PARAMETERS AND IMAGE QUALITY Table 1: MRI parameters trade-offs (Proprofs.com, 2015) 6.0 CONCLUSION REFERENCES 1.0 INTRODUCTION Image quality is the most important element in imaging radiography. According to Courses Washington Education, (2015) image quality must be assessed on the basis of average performance of some task of interest by some observer or decision maker. It was stated that image quality must be defined in terms of a task on what information to be retrieved from an image; and the observer on how the information will be extracted from the image. Since MRI image is a digital image, it is greatly depends on image contrast and its spatial characteristics. Nevertheless, one of the disadvantages of this flexibility is a greater difficulty in terms of the choice of scanning parameters. In general scan times are not negligible and there is a certain tendency towards artefact. However, the most fundamental limitation in MRI is the signal-to noise ratio (SNR) which is dependent upon the hardware, mostly the main field strength and radiofrequency (RF) coils, upon the relaxation properties of tissue and upon the choice of sequence parameters. Good image quality depends upon making good scanning parameter choices (McRobbie, 2007). 2.0 SIGNAL TO NOISE RATIO (SNR) The signal to noise ratio can be defined as the ratio of the amplitude of the signal received to the average amplitude of the noise whereas the signal is the voltage induced in the receiver coil by the precession of the net magnetic vector in the transverse plane (Westbrook et al. 2011, pp.104). Noise can be defined as an undesirable backgroundinterferenceor disturbance that affects image quality (Mr-tip.com, 2015). According to Weber (2015), noise is caused by two factors which are the electromagnetic noise in the body due to movement of charged particles; and small anomalies in the measurement electronics, which depends on the size of the RF coil and the bandwidth of the pulse sequence. In addition, noise occurs at all frequencies and is also random in time and space. On the other hand, the signal is cumulative, and occurs at time TE, depends on many factors and it can be altered. The signal is therefore can be changed in relation to the noise. Increasing the signal increases the SNR, while decreasing the signal decreases the SNR. Therefore, any factor that affects the signal amplitude in gives effect to the SNR. The factors that affect the SNR include magnetic field strength, the proton density, voxel volume, repetition time (TR), echo time (TE), flip angle, number of excitations (NEX), receive bandwidth and coil type (Westbrook et al. 2011, pp.104). According to McRobbie in his book, MRI from Picture to Proton (2007), images with a poor SNR will appear fuzzy. An important aspect of image optimization is to certify that there is a high enough SNR for the images to be diagnostically valuable yet low SNR may result in losing small details or the obscuring of subtle contrast changes. Therefore, contrast to noise ratio (CNR) is always taken into consideration in the aspect of image quality. Figure 1: Increasing the basic resolution will increase the image quality. However, increasing the resolution more than the acceptable range will produce grains in the image due to low SNR and reducing it will produce a blurry image due to high SNR. Increasing basic resolution will result in prolonged time. (Image adapted from Mrimaster.com, 2015) 3.0 CONTRAST TO NOISE RATIO (CNR) CNR can be defined as a measure to assess the ability of an imaging procedure to generate clinically useful image contrast. However, the image contrast itself is not precise enough to qualify an image, because in a noisy image it is uncertain where the contrast originates. It depends on two factors either due true tissue contrast, or it may be due to noise fluctuations. The human ability to distinguish between objects is proportional to contrast, and it decreases linearly with noise (KTH, 2015). By improving CNR the perception of the distinct differences between two clinical areas of interest will be increased. In a simple word, acontrasttonoiseratio is a summary ofSNRandcontrast. It is the difference inSNRbetween two relevant tissue types (Mr-tip.com, 2015). CNR is controlled by the same factors that affect SNR. However, it is considered as the most critical factor affecting image quality (scrsl.weebly.com, 2015). 4.0 RESOLUTION AND SCAN TIME In MRI imaging, the scan time is advisable to be as short as possible. This is because the longer the patient lies on the table; the more likely it is that they will move. Moreover, if the patient has moved during the scan, the image produced will have a great SNR (Westbrook et al. 2011). The minimum scan time in MRI imaging is affected by TR, matrix size and NEX while the spatial resolution is determined by matrix size, FOV and slice thickness. By increasing matrix size or decreasing FOV and slice thickness increases spatial resolution at the expense of either decreased signal-to-noise or increased scan time. In order to obtain images of high resolution with high signal-to-noise requires longer scan times. All of the scan parameters affect signal-to-noise ratio. However, the signal within an image can be enhanced either by increasing TR, FOV, slice thickness and NEX or by decreasing TE and matrix size. The most direct way to increase signal is by increasing NEX, but increasing NEX from two to four which doubles the scan time, increases the signal by only the square root of two. Lastly, TE does not affect scan time; however, it does determine the maximum number of slices in multi-slice mode. Increasing the TE or shortening TR decreases the number of slices that can be obtained with one pulse sequence (Spinwarp.ucsd.edu, 2015). 5.0 THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MRI PARAMETERS AND IMAGE QUALITY An image that is obtained in a short scan time, with a good spatial resolution and high SNR is preferable yet is hardly to achieve as increasing one factor certainly reduces one or both of the other two (Westbrook et. al, 2011). Trade-offsexists when changing imaging parameters to obtain the best images possible. For instance, the SNR, resolution, and acquisition time, are all interconnected. Changing one will affect the others. It is important to decide what factors are more important for an examination of a particular body part, patient and suspected abnormality. For example, when looking at the pituitary or cranial nerves, some SNR may need to be less considered or use longer acquisition time to improve the spatial resolution. However, in a claustrophobic of patient in pain who may be moving around, both resolution and SNR for the shortest possible examination time need to be considered to produce better image quality and preventing motion artefact (Ballinger, 2015). Thetable below summarizes the trade-offs in MRI between SNR, resolution, time, maximum number of slices and distance covered. Table 1: MRI parameters trade-offs (Proprofs.com, 2015) 6.0CONCLUSION In conclusion, the quality of an MR image depends on several factors which include the spatial resolution and image contrast, SNR and CNR and also artefacts. An MR examination is cooperation between scan time and image quality and its sequence parameters will have to be optimized in function of the organs and pathology. Moreover, the signal intensities and contrast are determined by the timing parameters TR and TE and also the flip angle. Besides, to produce a good image in MRI the scan time should always be as short as possible to avoid patient movement by using the shortest TR possible, select the coarse matrix possible and reduce the NEX to a minimum. REFERENCES Ballinger, J. (2015).Trade offs | Radiology Reference Article | Radiopaedia.org. [online] Radiopaedia.org. Available at: http://radiopaedia.org/articles/trade-offs [Accessed 3 May 2015]. Barrett, H. and Myers, K. (2004).Foundations of image science. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Interscience. Courses Washington Education, (2015).Image Quality. [online] Available at: http://courses.washington.edu/bioen508/Lecture1_partC.pdf [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. KTH, (2015).Point Spread Function. [online] Available at: http://medim.sth.kth.se/6l2872/F/F9.pdf [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. McRobbie, D. (2007).MRI from picture to proton. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Mrimaster.com, (2015). MRI resolution and image quality | how to manipulate mri scan parameters. [online] Available at: https://mrimaster.com/index.4.html [Accessed 4 May 2015]. Mr-tip.com, (2015).MRI Database : Contrast to Noise Ratio. [online] Available at: http://www.mr-tip.com/serv1.php?type=db1dbs=Contrast+to+Noise+Ratio [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. Mr-tip.com, (2015).MRI Database : Magnetic Resonance Imaging MRI. [online] Available at: http://www.mr-tip.com/serv1.php?type=db1dbs=Magnetic Resonance Imaging MRI [Accessed 28 Apr. 2015]. Mr-tip.com, (2015).MRI Database : Noise. [online] Available at: http://www.mr-tip.com/serv1.php?type=db1dbs=Noise [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. Nde-ed.org, (2015).Image Considerations. [online] Available at: https://www.nde-ed.org/EducationResources/CommunityCollege/Radiography/TechCalibrations/imageconsiderations.htm [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. Proprofs.com, (2015).Flashcards Table on MRIImaging Parameters. [online] Available at: http://www.proprofs.com/flashcards/tableview.php?title=mriimaging-parameters [Accessed 3 May 2015]. scrsl.weebly.com, (2015).Parameters and Trade-offs. [online] Available at: http://scrsl.weebly.com/uploads/5/1/3/0/5130772/magnetic_resonance_imaging_6parameters__trade_offs.ppt [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. Spinwarp.ucsd.edu, (2015). [online] Available at: http://spinwarp.ucsd.edu/neuroweb/Text/br-100.htm [Accessed 3 May 2015]. Spinwarp.ucsd.edu, (2015). [online] Available at: http://spinwarp.ucsd.edu/neuroweb/Text/br-100.htm [Accessed 3 May 2015]. UChicago, (2015).How does MRI work?. [online] Available at: http://wiki.ci.uchicago.edu/pub/HNL/DifficultQuestion/howdoesmriwork.pdf [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. University of Bergen, (2015).Contrast (CNR) in MRI. [online] Available at: https://wikihost.uib.no/mriwiki/images/5/5c/MRCourseLectures_Oct2011_ContrastTheory.pdf [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. Weber, D. (2015).MRI Quality. [online] Psdlw.users.sourceforge.net. Available at: http://psdlw.users.sourceforge.net/career/dweber_docs/mri_quality.html [Accessed 30 Apr. 2015]. Westbrook, C. and Kaut-Roth, C. (2011).MRI in practice. Oxford: Blackwell Science. 1

David Fincher’s Fight Club Essay -- David Fincher’s Fight Club

David Fincher’s â€Å"Fight Club† In David Fincher’s â€Å"Fight Club† a man battles within himself to live a life he has always dared to live, but in the end when everything is taken to the extreme, he realizes it’s too late to change what he has done. He struggles with the social structure due to his realization that he is in fact powerless in today’s society. He is constantly fighting his alter personality Tyler Durden for control of not only himself but also the world around them. He sees Marla as the lie that exists within himself and despises her for it. Fincher implies that sometimes people have to completely free themselves of their materialistic ideals in order to truly be free. Fincher also suggests that in some cases the absence of a male father figure have lead to instability and the creation of Mr. Hyde. The setting is one marked with desire for an awakening to the world around us. The fact that the protagonist does not have a name is because he represents anyone and everyone in today’s society he could even be named Jack. The opening views inside Jack’s brain are dark with flashes of fear for his very existence. The city view at night is the dark materialistic civilization in which we live. Bob (the man with breasts) is his missing family that isn’t there to hold him. The wet face on Bob’s shirt resembling a face is Jack, giving himself and opening up to Bob. In the beginning, there are several subliminal images of Tyler; this is in fact a manifestation of his subc... David Fincher’s Fight Club Essay -- David Fincher’s Fight Club David Fincher’s â€Å"Fight Club† In David Fincher’s â€Å"Fight Club† a man battles within himself to live a life he has always dared to live, but in the end when everything is taken to the extreme, he realizes it’s too late to change what he has done. He struggles with the social structure due to his realization that he is in fact powerless in today’s society. He is constantly fighting his alter personality Tyler Durden for control of not only himself but also the world around them. He sees Marla as the lie that exists within himself and despises her for it. Fincher implies that sometimes people have to completely free themselves of their materialistic ideals in order to truly be free. Fincher also suggests that in some cases the absence of a male father figure have lead to instability and the creation of Mr. Hyde. The setting is one marked with desire for an awakening to the world around us. The fact that the protagonist does not have a name is because he represents anyone and everyone in today’s society he could even be named Jack. The opening views inside Jack’s brain are dark with flashes of fear for his very existence. The city view at night is the dark materialistic civilization in which we live. Bob (the man with breasts) is his missing family that isn’t there to hold him. The wet face on Bob’s shirt resembling a face is Jack, giving himself and opening up to Bob. In the beginning, there are several subliminal images of Tyler; this is in fact a manifestation of his subc...

No More Hiroshima and Slough Poem Comparision Essay

There can be no doubt that â€Å"Slough† and â€Å"No More Hiroshima’s† share a large collection of differences. However, they additionally have similarities. The poem â€Å"Slough† written by John Betjeman and is expressing his hatred for the place. This becomes apparent from the beginning when he ask for â€Å"friendly bombs, come fall on slough. † The satirical humour and juxtaposition of â€Å"friendly† and â€Å"bomb† are ironic and portray a dark image of the place, and this is continued throughout the poem with words such as â€Å"Death†, and â€Å"Hell†. Moreover, the imagery of the poem is ferocious and ghastly which greats a sense of negativity towards Slough. The poem â€Å"No More Hiroshima’s† by James Kirkup shares a similarity with Slough due to the aspect of war. No More Hiroshima’s is constructed around the reconstruction of the city Hiroshima’s after having nuclear bombs released on it. Furthermore, both poets are infuriated by the cities. No More Hiroshima’s begins with the tourist arriving at the station, â€Å"At the station exit, my bundle in hand† this already creates a sense of the poet coming off the train being confused at how busy the station is and how he was expecting to see huge inspirational memorials, however he was astonished and disappointed to see no memorials and compares it to any ordinary Japanese town. The poet in Slough wishes for slough to be obliterated as it says â€Å"come bombs, and blow to smithereens† whereas the No More Hiroshima’s poem doesn’t wish for the place to be wounded as the poet still sees Hiroshima as a precious place but it has just been used in the erroneous way due to commercialization of the demolished city. Consequently I believe this portrays a sense of negativity and is extremely idiosyncratic from the poet Betjeman and this continues throughout the whole poem. In the poem No More Hiroshima’s the poet doesn’t present any characters In a clear manner. Therefore he can talk about the place in a more general manner. Conversely in Slough the poet introduces characters as he feels he has to take his emotions out on the people not the city as it says for example â€Å" and get that man with double chin, who’ll always cheat and always win, who washes his repulsive skin In women’s tears,† the poet here is vehement that the people are additionally a cause for the failure of Slough whereas the in No More Hiroshima’s there isn’t blame on the people.

Islamic scholars Essay

Western philosophy of religion, as the basic ancestor of modern religious studies, is differentiated from theology and the many Eastern philosophical traditions by generally being written from a third party perspective. â€Å"Islamicization of the West†, is the diffusion and assimilation of Islamic culture in the West. This is distinct from Islamization that means the conscious acceptance and implementation of the ideal Islamic cultural patterns by non-Muslims and nominal Muslims. Islamicization is sociologically similar to, though not identical with, Westernization subject to the limits and conditions of imitative- innovative social change. The Islamicization of the Medieval West, occurred, first, during the period ending around the middle of the eleventh century before systematic translations from Arabic into Western languages began; secondly during the age of Arabic translations coinciding with the little Renaissance of the twelfth to the seventeenth centuries; and third, during the Catholic-Protestant Reformation and Renaissance of the fourteenth to the sixteenth centuries. The transformation of the West during these centuries until the sixteenth, passed through several stages of contact and conflict with Islamic culture. The West resorted to various strategies. Until about the end of the eleventh century, the Western views of ideal Islam and its cultural and military triumphant civilization were fostered by sheer ignorance, fanaticism, hatred toward Islam and the Muslims, Biblical exegesis, and relative intellectual and physical isolation. This led to the expected apogee of Western Zealot type response: the Crusades of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The extensive contacts with the superior Islamic culture and Muslims during the Crusades ushered in a new era in Western self-consciousness, and awakened responses to Islamic culture. The highest intellectual achievements of the West during these two centuries, twelfth and thirteenth comprised the imitation of Islamic science and learning. Universities were found in the West patterned on the Muslim universities to assimilate the new knowledge made available by translations of the works in Arabic and, to a lesser extent, of Greek classics, which have been superseded by the Muslims. The main philosophical influence on the Christian thought at this period was Avicenna and Averroes, the two Muslim philosophers commenting Aristotle and building their philosophical systems on or against the Greek philosopher. Aristotle presented to the Christian scholars the opportunity to escape from the Muslim thought as such. Aristotle belonging to the classical past (Greek and Roman) of Europe was a positive complement to the Muslim sciences towards which the Christian scholars had turned to acquire their knowledge. He began a new era by pointing inwards at Christians and their own deficiencies as an explanation for their lack of success compared to the Muslims’ one. He believed the cause of Muslims’ success was their religion, which sanctioned worldly pursuits, self-will and secular dominion. How Islamic scholars first translated Aristotle and then how Western Christians came into possession of them. Muslim philosophy influenced Western thought in several ways, it initiated in the West the humanistic movement; introduced the historical sciences and the scientific method; helped the Western scholastics in harmonizing philosophy with faith; stimulated Western mysticism; laid the foundations of Italian Renaissance and, to a degree, moulded the modem European . The Muslims were the first humanists and they gave a humanist bend to the Western mind. They were the first to reveal to the West that outside the prevailing Catholic Church it was not all darkness and barbarism but untold wealth of knowledge. They captured and further developed all the intellectual achievements of Greece and transmitted them to the West before any direct contact between the Greek intellect and the Western mind was established. It was through their influence that ancient and contemporary men outside the Christian West also began to be looked upon as human and even possessed of higher civilizations. To the Arabians, Aristotle represented and summed up Greek philosophy. They adopted the doctrine and system, which the progress of human affairs had made the intellectual aliment of their Syrian guides. It was a matter of historical necessity, and not an act of deliberate choice. When the need of scientific culture awoke amongst them, they accepted Aristotle. From first to last Arabian philosophers made no claim to originally, their aim was merely to propagate the truth of Peripateticism as it had been delivered to them. In medicine and astronomy, as well as in philosophy, they entertained an almost superstitious reverence for their Greek teachers. It was with them that the deification of Aristotle began. And from them the belief that in him human intelligence had reached its limit passed. Abul Walid Mohammad Ibn Rushd was the ultimate rationalist, the Aristotelian heretic of the medieval Islam and Christianity. His singular influence in stimulating the Western Renaissance is acknowledged as the landmark in the history of Western civilization. Along with Ibn Sina, he is the greatest name in Arabian philosophy whose influence spread, in many directions, through the duration of the Middle Ages, then in the epoch of the Renaissance up to the very threshold of modern times. Indeed, he was the greatest Muslim philosophers of the West, and one of the greatest of medieval times. Ibn Rushd came from a family of Cordoban scholars and was a trained lawyer and a physician; his role initiated him into philosophy. He wrote extensive commentaries on Aristotle, and others. His philosophy was in the tradition of prevailing Islamic scholasticism, with attempts to synthesize Islamic faith and reason in light of the available Greek heritage. His Commentaries on Aristotle were translated into Latin and Hebrew. The works of Aristotle and Ibn Rushd in their Latin translations were used not only in the curriculum at Naples, but were also sent to the Universities of Paris and Bologna. Once the rediscovery of Aristotle through Ibn Rushd’s writings was complete, the philosophers and theologians alike found themselves in possession of the greatest intellectual reservoir ever developed up to that time. Ibn Rushd â€Å"the Great Commentator. Influenced by his writings, philosophers and theologians split into two major groups; the liberal, with Siger of Brabant at their head, and the conservative, with St. Thomas Aquinas of the Dominician Monks at their head. The issues for the split where metaphysical, philosophical, and practical. However his critics, did not escape his influence, and their understanding of Aristotle was conditioned. When Ibn Rushd died in 1198, he bequeathed to his successors the ideal of a purely rational philosophy, an ideal whose influence was to be such that, by it, even the evolution of Christian philosophy was to be deeply modified. Gilson attributes to Ibn Rushd the recognition, which became pivotal to St. Thomas’ own philosophy, that nothing should enter the texture of metaphysical knowledge save only rational and necessary demonstrations. However, unlike some of his adversarial Latin Averroists, St. Thomas was not willing to concede that either Aristotle or Ibn Rushd were infallible. The enthusiasm in Paris during the thirteenth century for Ibn Rushd’s Aristotelian Commentaries brought serious questions as to the compatibility of Ibn Rushd’s Aristotelianism with the Christian doctrine. In the thirteenth century, Papal Inquisition against the Christian heretics came under condemnations with the focus mainly on Latin Averroists, led by Siger of Brabant, who was suspected of subscribing to the double-truth doctrine. Ibn Rushd himself did not subscribe to such a thesis, it is doubtful, according to Gilson, and other medievalists that even Siger himself did so. This doctrine, however, was a godsend for the scientifically minded people in the West, who were condemned and persecuted by the Church and the State. They found their best support in this and other â€Å"Averroisms†. The Ibn Rushd’s Aristotelian commentaries and his own contributions rapidly became the ruling mode of social thought in the West. Scholars of medieval Europe were provoked and inspired by Ibn Rushd’s writings. Whereas some Muslim scholastics and their Latin successors tried to â€Å"Islamise† and â€Å"Christianise† Hellenism, Ibn Rushd’s commentaries and rationalism seemed to excessively â€Å"Hellenise† Islam and Christianity. Thus, his Muslim contemporaries persecuted him while Muslim posterity almost ignored him, allowing his works to be lost. However, Jews preserved many of them. In Latin Christianity, the commentaries were translated into Latin from the Hebrew, fed the heresies of Siger of Brabant and the rationalism of the Italian school of Padua, and threatened the foundations of Christianity. St. Thomas recognized that some parts of religion were beyond reason and must be accepted by faith alone. The aim of his life was to reconcile Aristotelianism and Muslim knowledge with Christian theology and Thomas Aquinas was led to write his document to halt the threatened liquidation of Christian theology by Arabic interpretations of Aristotle. During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, Latin orientated-Averroism had far-reaching consequences for medieval and modern social thought, hardly foreseeable by the medieval scholastics. It established a tradition in which it became possible to question the status of religion and from the end of the twelfth century to the end of the sixteenth century Averroism remained the dominant school of thought, in spite of the orthodox reaction it created first among the Muslims in Spain and then among the Talmudists, and finally, among the Christian clergy. These centuries witnessed revolutions in the evolution of social thought, with medieval Islamic sources always providing the background. As the Greek heritage â€Å"had aroused the great age of Arabic science and philosophy, so now it would excite the European mind and inquiry and speculation would crack stone after stone of that majestic edifice to bring this collapse of the medieval system in the fourteenth century, and the beginnings of modern philosophy in the ardor of the Renaissance . The results were monumental in Western history. It is suggested that Harold Nebelsick puts it well. He discusses the achievements of the Arab-Islamic scholars and how they appropriated, appreciated and preserved Greek classical learning and built upon it and thus, laid the foundations for a quite unprecedented revival of learning in Europe, and the results were the Renaissance in the thirteenth century, the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century, and eventually the rise of modern science in the seventeenth. Even in our own time the contributions of those scholars, in the world of Islam and in the Christian West, represent the source of the most beneficent form of intellectual enlightenment. For Ibn Rushd, the primacy of reason is unquestioned but compatible with faith, and for this Gilson regards him as the herald of rationalism long before the Renaissance. In his Harmony of Philosophy and Religion, which was not available to St. Thomas, Siger of Brabant or their contemporaries in Latin, Ibn Rushd maintains a position which may be called the harmony of truth, philosophical and theological. Thus, philosophical truth, although superior to religious truth, is not really incompatible with, or even different, from it. The only difference is the path to truth philosophical and the theological. The Islamicisation of intellectual culture in Spain as early as the ninth century was described by Alvaro, a contemporary Cordovian bishop, the Christians loved to read the poems and romances of the Arabs, theologians and philosophers. Young Christians read and studied with enthusiasm the Arab books, and gathered immense libraries at great expense and despised the Christian literature as unworthy of attention. This refinement of life gradually spread northwards from Spain and Sicily. The experiences of the Crusaders in Islamic lands doubtless contributed something to the spread of Arab culture in Western Europe. The notion of â€Å"the miracle of Arabic science† circulated most unfortunately by Sarton, the Historian of medieval science, is false. The explanation of the â€Å"phenomenon† of the sudden birth of Islamic science lays down in the living Islamic ethos of those times; its dogmas and its gamut of culture; the all- pervading Islamic law which forged strong bonds of social co-operation among the Muslims, and between the Muslims and non-Muslims, citizens and resident aliens of the vast Islamic society of bewildering religious, ideological, national, racial and linguistic diversity. This Islamic ethos in action rekindled the dying members of the pre-Quranic ancient sciences and worldwide civilization. These mechanisms operate only in a cultural and political milieu of propitious dogmas, laws, values, cosmological doctrines, attitudes and efforts, all of which existed in the progressive period of medieval Islamic civilization. Conclusion Muslims gave a humanist bend to the Western mind. They revealed to the West that outside the prevailing catholic church it was not all darkness and barbarism but immense wealth of knowledge. Before any direct contact between the Greek intellect and the Western mind was established, Arabs had captured and further developed all the intellectual achievements of Greece. It was also due to their influence that men outside the Christian West began to be considered as human and even possessors of higher civilizations. The Muslims absorbed the best in the existing sciences and civilizations consistent with Islam and developed them, thanks to the intensely developed Islamic consciousness and conditioning, based on a remarkable Islamic system of education. There was great flexibility in horizontal and vertical mobility of people as nationalistic and hedonistic evils were held in check. Prerequisites for science and civilization were there: invention and innovation based on original thought; social mindedness and utilitarianism of individual efforts as well as in the organization of state and its educational and other programs; political stability, the rule of law and constitutionalism. All these mechanisms and conditions are necessary for the genesis, development, diffusion and application of science and technology. This fact of medieval Islamicization of the West needs to be fully researched, accepted and incorporated in specialized works and in the teaching materials of schools and colleges around the world. The consequences of this will be far reaching in understanding the socio-cultural rejuvenation and modernization of the developing nations, in building up a genuine and universally acceptable theory of social action, and in ridding sociology of ethnocentrism; in removing the burdens of historical romanticism and apologetics imposed upon the underdeveloped nations and suppressed minorities as a reaction to the cultural arrogance of nations and ethnic groups which are highly developed today but had their own dark ages at some other time and in promoting international understanding and co-operation for development and world peace. As a whole, various possible relationships between ideas of Muslim scholars, Greek philosophy and Christianity hence scholastics’ stand towards borrowing without acknowledgement or rejection Muslim scholars tried to interpret Greek ideas to establish a synthesis if possible. Otherwise, they criticized and refuted them. Since Christianity also faced the same problems, scholastic scholars borrowed those arguments, if they found them favorable in their case also, without acknowledgement. In this category generally come philosophical and metaphysical ideas Thomas Aquinas was led to write his Summa to halt the threatened liquidation of Christian theology by Arabic interpretations of Aristotle’ ‘Indeed the industry of Aquinas was due not to love of Aristotle but to fear of Averroes’. . It was an acknowledgement but with ill intention. Such references are not uncommon even in the contemporary texts that fully ignore Muslim scholars’ contributions to economic thought; scholastics borrowed without hesitation and preferred to refer to Greek scholars if they felt such a need. There was a spontaneous and determined general agreement about what to take and what to reject; what was taken was always either culturally common, or culturally neutral. The body of scientific knowledge was culturally neutral. Its cultural bearings were easily absorbed, because they were part of the common inheritance of the Arab world and of Europe. In times that are more recent a large number of Western scholars, together with Muslim scholars writing in Western languages, have been bringing out the diffusion of Islamic science, philosophy, and other aspects of Islamic culture in medieval West. However, such researches have not been incorporated in the Western education system and culture, in the manner and to the extent necessary for fostering the proper appreciation of the ideal and historical patterns of Islamic culture. Therefore, the West portends and strives for Westernization of the Muslim world because of what is considered to be the backwardness of contemporary Muslim behavioral culture pattern and the denial of the existence and validity of ideal Islamic culture pattern. Therefore, we can see the reactionary Muslim responses through polemics, xenophobia, historical romanticism, zealotism, fanaticism, extremism, even terrorism. This is in fact very different from the creative adaptation indispensable for contemporary rejuvenation. The consequences of the denial, falsification and neglect of this historical fact have been extremely serious: the denigration of Islam in the eyes of Muslims and non-Muslims; the identification of Islam and its culture with ignorance and backwardness and of â€Å"modernity† and progress with Western civilization; the creation of xenophobia and arrogance in Western mind, and the perpetration of ideological and politico- economic. Western imperialism against Muslim people; the imposition of an inferiority complex among Western educated â€Å"modern† Muslims, and the bitter social and political cleavages between the â€Å"modern† and the â€Å"traditional† Muslim elites. Reference http://www. accesstoinsight. org/lib/authors/bodhi/wheel282. html. http://www. accesstoinsight. org/ptf/dhamma/sila/pancasila. html. www. lssu. edu/faculty/jswedene/FULBRIGHT_FILES/Islamic%20Contributions%20to%20the %20West. doc http://www. aina. org/article/greek2. html library. csun. edu/mbarrett/religiousstudies. html www. lib. utk. edu/diversity/culturecorner/spring04/reference_spring_04. pdf