Thursday, October 31, 2019

Managed health care Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

Managed health care - Essay Example her medical related problems in terms of cost are thought to be handled by Managed health care organizations, yet it has become controversial as the defined tasks are not properly done. Physicians, surgical equipment companies, pharmacies are considered for taking high costs and incentives as their commission. If managed care is to be associated with health care as a compulsion, all such activities should be taken under observations so as to provide proper and adequate medical facilities to the patients, which are of comparatively lower cost so that maximum number of people can benefit from it (Managed health care, Tobin 2012). No doubt managed health care provides enough benefit when the services are taken in bulk; it prominently reduces the total cost of equipments. Moreover, when managed health care organizations provide choice amongst physicians, labs and hospitals, it also becomes highly cost reducing for them as well as for the patient. But one who thinks that limiting choice is a bad option; he/she should have more money to spend in order to consult with other doctors. The delivery system by such organizations should be fair and cost-effective, i.e., all hospitals, physicians, nurses, Para-medical staff who are affiliated with managed health care organizations should be provided timely and at proper and needed place. In these areas, somehow managed health care is earning good points. But on the other hand, if the commission set by the elements of the delivery system rates too high, or they are less effective than the cost, the system starts to decline and the opponents get something to argue upon (D onohue 2008). Before managed health care was introduced, there was fee-for-service method in which doctors were paid every time they provide some service. Their services can be limitless and thus they earn a lot by this method. They themselves were the ones who decide how much to be charged for a particular service. Managed health care organizations convince

Tuesday, October 29, 2019

External Assignment Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

External Assignment - Research Paper Example Simpson was taken into custody suspected as a murderer (Associated Newspapers Ltd., 2012). The prime objective of this research paper is to review the above described case. Moreover, the research paper will also analyze about how the criminalist in this case handled the evidences and determine whether these were positively or negatively involved in the outcome of the case. In relation to the case of "People of the State of California vs. Orenthal James Simpson,† the forensic experts along with the criminalists gathered evidences specifically through DNA analysis techniques. During those days, DNA evidencing technique was quite popular and regarded as effective tool for law enforcement investigation departments in solving murder related crimes (Saferstein, 2010). The concept of DNA evidencing emerge with the idea that every individual possesses unique DNA structures except in the case of identical twins. DNA evidences can be extracted from multiple sources that include bones of victims, hair strands, teeth, blood and saliva sampling (James, 2012). During the trial of the ‘Orenthal James Simpson’ murder case, the first type of evidence, which came forward was about the DNA fingerprinting. This evidence was brought forward almost a year after the death of ‘Nicole Brown’ and ‘Ronald Goldman’ (Fingerprinting, 20 14). Another law ignorance instance came up in front when Simpson refused to turn himself or surrender as per demanded by the local police forces (Hunt, n. d.). Moreover, through DNA analysis, the blood traces found in the crime scene were also confirmed to be similar to the blood traces found on the door of Simpson’s car (Associated Newspapers Ltd., 2012). Apart from these, the blood on the footprints matched with the shoe size of Mr. Simpson and on other articles found at the crime scene. Adding to this, the prosecution also brought forward the case evidence of a 9-1-1 call made by Simpson’s ex-wife as she

Sunday, October 27, 2019

Factors Affecting The Weight a Column Can Withstand

Factors Affecting The Weight a Column Can Withstand Matthew Keeley   Physics EEI This extended experimental investigation explores the weight a paper column can withstand before it buckles and how changing the diameter, length and thickness of a column affects its critical load. Multiple columns with varying diameters, lengths and thicknesses were constructed and each one had masses added to it until it buckled. The hypotheses If the diameter of a paper column is increased, then the weight the paper column can withstand before buckling will also increase exponentially and If the length of a paper column is decreased, then the weight the paper column can withstand before buckling will increase exponentially were not supported while the hypothesis If the thickness of a paper column is increased, then the weight the paper column can withstand will also increase proportionally was supported. Columns are used in architecture and structural engineering, in the walls of houses and buildings, to transmit weight through compression from the structure above the column to the structural elements beneath (Merriam-webster.com, 2017). Objects are only referred to as columns when the force is applied axially; they are referred to as beams otherwise (Waddell, 1925). Column buckling is likely the only area of structural mechanics where failure is not due to the strength of the material, but the stiffness of the material and the shape of the column instead (McGinty, 2017). Buckling occurs in a column when its critical load is reached and this value can be determined by the Euler column formula, which is as follows: Where is the critical load (), is the modulus of elasticity (), is the area moment of inertia (, is the length of the column () and is the column effective length factor (Engineeringtoolbox.com, 2017). Engineers commonly use mm instead of regular SI unit, examples of the formula being used use mm (Critical Buckling Load (Example 1) Mechanics of Materials, 2013). This formula is used mainly to calculate the buckling load of steel and wooden columns so its application in the buckling of paper columns is questionable although it is the only method available. There are some unknown values in the equation without researching them using other sources, the value, the value and the value. The value, the modulus of elasticity (also known as youngs modulus, the elastic modulus or the tensile modulus) is a constant that is a measure of the stiffness of a material (Askeland et al., 1996). It is the slope of the stress-strain curve in the elastic region given by: A relationship known as Hookes Law, Hookes law states that the strain in a solid is proportional to the applied stress within the elastic limit of that solid (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2017). For example, if an object with a high modulus of elasticity had the same force applied to it as an object with a low modulus of elasticity there would be a greater change in dimension in the object with the smaller modulus of elasticity. The modulus of elasticity is represented in pascals () but the value is usually very large so it is found in gigapascals instead (. When calculating theoretical data to keep the units the same the modulus of elasticity was represented in as. The modulus of elasticity for paper is 2 (www-materials.eng.cam.ac.uk, 2017). The value represents area moment of inertia (also known as second moment of area). It is a geometrical property of an area representing how its points are distributed regarding an axis within the object (Beer and Johnston, 1990). It is calculated using multiple integral over the columns cross-section, but its easier to utilise an already existing formula for the second moment of area of the column in question. Since the column that will be used in the experiment is rolled up paper it will have a hollow cylindrical cross-section which will appear as: The formula for second moment of area for a hollow cylindrical cross-section is as follows: Where is the radius of the outside circle and is the radius of the inside circle (Efunda.com, 2017). The second moment of area also determines the way a column is most likely to buckle (towards the plane or the plane). Usually there would be multiple formulae for the second moment of area, one for buckling towards the plane and one for buckling toward the plane, but since the cross section in question is hollow cylindrical and the axis (where the weight will be applied) is in the centre of the cross-section the formulae are identical. If the cross section was a filled rectangular area, for instance, and appeared as: Then the formulae for second moment of area are as follows: One would have to solve for both and and find out on which plane the column is most likely to buckle along and use that value as the second moment of area in the Euler column formula (What is second moment of area?, 2015). The units for second moment of area are metres to the fourth power (, but since the units need to be kept the same and the radius will be represented in millimetres when doing theoretical data, it will be in millimetres to the fourth power () instead. The last unknown value is which is the column effective length factor (Wai-Fah and Duan, 1999). It is determined by the boundary conditions. The value changes depending on if the column is fixed on both ends, hinged on both ends, fixed on one end free on another, etc. The columns used in the experiment are free on both ends so the theoretical value is 1, but the actual value derived from various other experiments is 1.2, so that value will be used in theoretical data (Efunda.com, 2017). For this experiment to be a success many variables must be remain the same that were quite difficult to control. To attempt to control these variables some precautions were taken. For example, to keep the distribution of weight the same a transparent board was used so the weight could be placed in the centre of the column and distributed evenly. Also, the paper columns need to be made carefully so that there are no weaknesses in the column because weaknesses in the column arent factored into Eulers column formula. The dimensions for paper are 29.7mm x 21mm x 0.1mm (for 80gsm A4 paper). Theoretical Data Calculating second moment of area (). Substituting into Eulers column formula and solving to find critical load. Calculating the mass the column could withstand using . This value is very large and a paper column of the dimension used in the calculations would certainly crumble under this amount of force in real life applications, but this may be due to all the other variables that are difficult to control at play, such as weaknesses in the column geometrically and weight distribution rather than the formula being incorrect. Theoretical data results tables and graphs Changing Columns diameter Columns diameter (mm) Mass before column buckles (kg) 95 1063.45 90 904.06 85 761.45 80 634.69 75 522.84 70 424.96 65 340.14 60 267.42 55 205.89 50 154.60 Changing Column Length Column thickness (mm) Mass before column buckles (kg) 0.1 934.57 0.2 1862.98 0.3 2785.27 0.4 3701.46 0.5 4611.57 0.6 5515.63 0.7 6413.67 0.8 7305.72 0.9 8191.81 1.0 9071.95 Changing Columns Thickness Columns Length (mm) Mass before column buckles (kg) 210 934.56 200 1030.36 190 1141.68 180 1272.05 170 1426.11 160 1609.94 150 1831.76 140 2102.78 130 2438.73 120 2862.12 The following hypotheses that were prompted due to the background research are as follows: Changing Columns Diameter If the diameter of a paper column is increased, then the weight the paper column can withstand before buckling will also increase exponentially. Changing Columns Length If the length of a paper column is decreased, then the weight the paper column can withstand before buckling will increase exponentially. Changing Columns Thickness If the thickness of a paper column is increased, then the weight the paper column can withstand will also increase proportionally. Changing Columns Diameter Various paper columns were constructed carefully (as to reduce weak points in the column) with different diameters, starting at 9.5cm diameters reducing the diameter by 0.5cm for every column until 10 columns had been made, so that there was enough variation in the data to develop more accurate results. The column with the smallest diameter had a diameter of 5cm. The experiment was then set up like the diagram on the previous (without the weights). The board on the bottom of the column was set up to protect the bench from damage from the falling weights and a small transparent board was placed on top of the column so that the weights could be accurately placed in the centre of the column to keep the distribution of weight even.   50g masses were then added to the column until it buckled and the mass that is buckled at was graphed for later analysis. This process was completed for all the columns made beforehand and the experiment was repeated until 3 trials had been completed so the data discovered was more accurate. Changing Columns Length Paper columns with various lengths were constructed carefully, starting at a length of 21cm and reducing by 1cm until 10 columns had been made, so there was enough variation in the data to provide more accurate results. The column with the smallest length had a length of 12cm. The experiment was then set up like the diagram (without the weights). The board on the bottom of the column was set up to protect the bench from damage from the falling weights and a small transparent board was placed on top of the column so that the weights could be accurately placed in the centre of the column to keep the distribution of weight even.   50g masses were then added to the column until it buckled and the mass that is buckled at was graphed for later analysis. This process was completed for all the columns made beforehand and the experiment was repeated until 3 trials had been completed so the data discovered was more accurate. Changing Columns Thickness Paper columns with varying thicknesses were constructed by taping pieces of paper together (1 piece of paper has a thickness of 0.1mm, 2 taped together 0.2mm, etc.) until 10 columns had been made, so there was enough variation in the data to provide more accurate results. The experiment was then set up like the diagram (without the weights). The board on the bottom of the column was set up to protect the bench from damage from the falling weights and a small transparent board was placed on top of the column so that the weights could be accurately placed in the centre of the column to keep the distribution of weight even.   50g masses were then added to the column until it buckled and the mass that is buckled at was graphed for later analysis. This process was completed for all the columns made beforehand and the experiment was repeated until 3 trials had been completed so the data was more accurate. Variables Dependent Variable The independent variable is the mass the column can withstand before it buckles, as this is what the experiment is testing and what changes when the independent variables are manipulated. Independent Variables The independent variables in this experiment are the ones that get changed, the diameter, the length and the thickness. Changing these will affect the dependent variable. Controlled Variables The controlled variables are everything that was kept the same during the experiment, although these may have changed regardless of efforts to keep them the same during the experiment. They include: the temperature and pressure, brand of paper, consistency of columns, distribution of weight, wind conditions, material of column, weights that were used, elevation and the material experiment was performed on. Safety When the column buckles, the weights will fall off the column and potentially an injury could occur. To deal with this the falling weights must be avoided and people entering the area of the experiment should be careful walking through. A mechanism to catch the board so the weights dont fall could also be constructed. Scissors could potentially be used to cut someone. To deal with this the scissors were treated with caution and used appropriately. Wearing goggles will also protect the eyes. Changing Columns Diameter Diameter (mm) Mass before column buckled (kg) Trial 1 Trial 2 Trial 3 Average 95 2.0 1.4 1.7 1.7 90 1.7 1.6 2.0 1.8 85 1.7 1.1 1.5 1.4 80 1.2 1.8 2.0 1.7 75 1.3 2.4 1.5 1.7 70 1.5 1.4 2.0 1.6 65 1.5 1.5 1.6 1.5 60 1.2 1.6 1.7 1.5 55 0.9 1.3 1.0 1.1 50 0.8 1.0 0.6 0.8 Changing Columns Length Length (mm) Mass before column buckled (kg) Trial 1 Trial 2 Trial 3 Average 210 2.0 1.4 1.7 1.7 200 1.2 1.5 1.6 1.4 190 1.1 1.0 1.2 1.1 180 1.5 0.9 1.0 1.1 170 1.0 2.0 1.7 1.6 160 1.6 2.0 2.1 1.9 150 1.6 2.0 1.9 1.8 140 1.0 1.8 2.3 1.7 130 1.4 1.5 1.7 1.5 120 1.7 2.1 1.8 1.9 Changing Columns Thickness Thickness (mm) Mass before column buckled (kg) Trial 1 Trial 2 Trial 3 Average 0.1 2.0 1.4 1.7 1.7 0.2 2.1 1.8 2.3 2.1 0.3 2.8 3.0 1.7 2.5 0.4 3.3 4.2 2.6 3.4 0.5 4.2 3.4 4.8 4.1 0.6 5.1 5.4 4.5 5.0 0.7 5.9 6.3 5.7 6.0 0.8 7.6 6.6 7.8 7.3 0.9 8.0 8.5 9.0 8.5 1.0 10.0 9.0 8.9 9.3 The results for changing column diameter seem to have a pattern to them, the weight that the column can support increases with diameter, but while the mass the column could withstand changed with diameter the increments in which the value changed reduced every time the diameter increased (logarithmic relationship). The results for changing the length of the column provided results that were expected, the weight the column could withstand decreased as the length of the column was decreased though a proper relationship between the points was underivable. The results for the thickness of the column were as expected, the mass the column could withstand increased proportionally with the thickness of column. As evident by the graphs above the theoretical data differs greatly to the empirical data. The theoretical data shows an exponential relationship between the mass withstood and the diameter of the paper column while the empirical data shows a more logarithmic relationship (if the experiment was continued further the mass withstood would have continued to increase with diameter). The mass the column can withstand is also much larger in the theoretical data than the empirical data. This is because the theoretical calculations dont factor in the weaknesses in the column geometrically and its extremely unlikely that the distribution of mass was perfect, even if the mass was placed a millimetre off the axis the mass the column could withstand would decrease drastically. Therefore, it would be difficult to get empirical results the same as the theoretical data due to many variables that are nearly impossible to control when dealing with paper columns. As shown in the graphs above the mass the column can withstand does decrease as length increases in the empirical data but is hard to decipher a relationship when looking at the empirical data due to anomalies. These anomalies would yet again be caused by variables that are too difficult to control within the experiment and for the same reasons the mass the column can withstand in the theoretical data is much greater than the mass the column could withstand in reality. The relationship between these two sets of data is identical (both increasing proportionally) although the mass the column could withstand theoretically is much greater than the mass it could withstand empirically. A possible reason that the relationship was evident in the empirical data for changing the thickness of the column and not for changing the diameter and length could be that changing the thickness affects the mass the column can withstand much more than changing either the length of the column or its diameter (reducing anomalies), this is evident when comparing the theoretical data for the three variables. Due to the varying relationships found in the empirical data and the complexity of the formula used it is difficult to relate Eulers column formula to existing mathematical models when looking at changing the columns diameter or length because the relationship is either exponential () or logarithmic (). Eulers column formula can be related to the linear function that is found when changing the columns thickness though. because a column with 0 length, diameter or thickness

Friday, October 25, 2019

Willa Cathers Death Comes for the Archbishop Essay -- Willa Cather De

Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop Upon reading and reflecting on Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop, I have a hard time classifying this piece of literature as a novel. Indeed, Death Comes for the Archbishop seems more like a collection of anecdotal stories than a novel of conventional form. Harmon and Holman's A Handbook to Literature says the term novel, is "used in its broadest sense to designate any extended fictional narrative" (350). While DCA certainly fits this most general of definitions, its unconventional structure -- the seeming lack of a general plot and obvious climax, its continual digressions from Bishop Latour's present to the anecdotal episodes of his, as well as, others' pasts, along with the method of Cather's presentation, leads one inclined to label this piece more as a narrative, a simple "account of events," as The American Heritage Dictionary describes the term. DCA doesn't seem to be driven by a plot so much as by the stream of consciousness of the narrator. Much the way the mind will jump from thought to thought or memory to memory, Cather's narrator tells the story of Bishop Latour's life through contrasting, non-chronological stories. For example, in Chapter 1, Book 4, the narrator has Latour waking to the sound of a bell which then leads Fathers Latour and Vaillant into a discussion of its history as well as, the history of silver work in general. Directly from this discussion, comes the request by Vaillant that Latour give audience to a man who had just been on a pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and from there, we are told the story of Juan Diego in the year 1531. This type of jumping around on the narrator's part, not only lends a sense of a more ... ... of the people and land encountered within her writing. "Cather has come to the point where she can do two or three things at once which a novelist must do. She can evoke by a few characteristic touches and by subtle suggestion a scene and a society without producing merely a 'document' "(Joseph Wood Cruch). "She has a faculty of seeing people with sympathy but without sentiment, of exactly telling their experiences, of emphasizing neither the good nor the bad, of changing nothing to meet popular taste" (Cowley). In summary, Willa Cather is a remarkable writer. She uses not only past experiences, but her remarkable talents to write fiction that is not only narrative in telling, but also includes a great deal of description. Whether her writing is regarded as a novel by some, or as a narrative herself, it has elements of both in Death Comes for the Archbishop.

Thursday, October 24, 2019

Glaser Health Products Essay

Glaser Health Products of Ranier Falls, Georgia needs assistance in evaluating and classifying costs in order to implement an activity-based costing system. As stated in the case, these costs will be used for planning and control decisions rather than inventory valuation. The activity-based costing system will provide better allocation of Glaser’s overhead costs rather than a system to look at the cost drivers or the activities that their overhead costs comprise. Glaser’s general structure of an activity-based costing model should consist of cost objects, activities, consumption of resources, and cost. Activity-based costing changes â€Å"the rules of the game† since it changes some of the key measures that manager’s use for their decision making and for evaluating individuals’ performance (Accounting4management.com). In order for Glaser to implement a successful activity-based costing system management must take a look at their overhead costs and j ustify whether or not they have enough overhead to be worrying about. While we do not know Glaser’s monetary value of their overhead costs, it seems that they have several divisions with a large amount of cost categories management must consider. The three main divisions of Glaser Health Products are Operations, Sales, and Administrative. Under each division are costs categories that have been divided up to help management determine where they belong. (Appendix A identifies each of the costs with the appropriate division). Next, management must identify the big overhead cost in order to determine whether or not they want to allocate some or a bunch of overhead using the activity-based costing system. I suggest that Glaser creates an activity-based costing system that allocates, with a minimal amount of effort, a large portion of their overhead. For instance, management is correct in identifying each of the costs using four different activities. These include unit-level activities, batch-level activities, product-level activities, and facility-level activities. This is a great system because the fewer activities Glaser can use to do this, the easier the accounting will be for management. These four activities will allow  Glaser to fairly and accurately allocate overhead to product lines. (Appendix B illustrates each of the costs under one of the four activities and also classifies the four activities under one of the three divisions). After Glaser management has identified the handful of the activities that connect overhead expenses to products, they must use the appropriate measure (the cost driver) to tie the overhead expenses to the product lines or service lines. To achieve this management must specify an appropriate cost driver for tracing costs associated with the various levels of activities to the next cost objective or products. The cost drivers can include a number of things such as direct labor hours, number of batches, or number of employees. (Appendix C shows the appropriate cost driver with the various levels of activities). Under the Activity-based costing system, Glaser will use preliminary stage cost drivers to link costs of resources consumed in one activity center to other activity centers. Some costs, such as batch-level activity center costs are initially assigned to a primary stage activity center and only need a single assignment process, and are traceable to specific products but often use a cost driver. Product-level activity center costs may be related to a specific product or grouped by activities before being assigned to products at the primary stage. Facility-level activity center costs may go through multiple preliminary stages before being assigned to products (Schneider, 2012). It is necessary to use a preliminary stage cost driver because this system assigns costs from activities to other activities. On the other hand, primary stage cost drivers is used to assign costs from activities to the cost objectives. This process eliminates distortions in cost allocations to products that result from production complexity (Schneider, 2012). Actually sitting down and laying out an activity-based costing system for a real company is much more difficult than a typical textbook ABC problem. Determining what causes a cost to occur is much more difficult than it originally might seem (Krupnicki & Tyson, 1997). Overall, I think that management’s decision to implement an activity-based costing system is going to work in their favor. The decision to implement ABC is often driven by the need to improve customer profitability analysis, to gain more accurate cost information for pricing or to prepare relevant budgets (Cohen, Venieris, & Kaimenaki, 2005). In this case, Glaser wants to identify costs used for planning and control  decisions rather than for inventory valuation. Glaser is likely to see many benefits from implementing an activity-based costing system such as better profitability measures, better decision-making, process improvement, cost estimation, and cost of unused capacity. The activity-based costing system will provide better allocation of Glaser’s overhead costs rather than a system to look at the cost drivers or the activities that their overhead costs comprise. References http://www.accounting4management.com/implementing_activity_based_costing.htm Schneider, A. (Ed.). (2012). Managerial Accounting: Decision Making for the Service And Manufacturing Sectors. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education. Krupnicki, M., & Tyson, T. (1997). Using ABC to Determine the Cost of Servicing Customers. Management Accounting, 79(6), 40-46. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/229739140?accountid=32521 Cohen, S., Venieris, G., & Kaimenaki, E. (2005). ABC: Adopters, Supporters, and Deniers And Unawares. Managerial Auditing Journal, 20(8), 981-1000. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/27453714?accountid=32521

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

Development of Transcendentalism

The resistance of some ministers and congregations in Boston and eastern Massachusetts to key doctrines of Calvinism started to divide the New England Puritan churches during the mid-1700s. Calvinism centered on the doctrines of John Calvin whose theology emphasized the absolute nature of sovereignty of God and the certainty of human depravity (Robinson). The religious divisions became significant because they resulted to the establishment of a religious liberalism movement that eventually called Unitarianism (Robinson).The Unitarianism movement became the center of various well-established churches in Boston and at Harvard College. It allowed the liberals to achieve cultural and intellectual influence that exceeded their small numbers and played a significant role in the formation of a powerful American liberal tradition in literature, education, politics, and the arts (Robinson). The political and literary movement of transcendentalism was formed in the 1830s and 1840s because of t he movement of liberal theology in Boston (Robinson).The goal of the Unitarianism was to spread its message of human capability and positive spiritual development even though it continued to be in conflict with its Calvinist opponents (Robinson). However, several younger Unitarian ministers started to take a different approach to the problem concerning religious knowledge, including Ralph Waldo Emerson (Robinson). Emerson, who was the leader of the Transcendentalist movement, considered that the transcendental law was the moral law through which people discovered the living spirit of God (â€Å"Transcendentalism†).He published his book, titled â€Å"Nature† in 1836, which formed a novel way of intellectual thinking in the United States (â€Å"Transcendentalism†). He suggested a theory of religion based on intuition instead of empirical evidence, which explains that the religious sentiment is deeply rooted into the nature of mind itself (Robinson). He insisted th e relation between mind and nature because both were instruments of a divine energy that formed reality and provided value and significance (Robinson).Emerson shifted into the role of freelance lecturer and followed his book â€Å"Nature† with two lectures at Harvard: â€Å"The American Scholar† and the â€Å"Divinity School Address† (Robinson). He also published two books about his developing philosophy, â€Å"Essays† (1841) and â€Å"Essays: Second Series (1844) (Robinson). In the â€Å"Divinity School Address,† Emerson pointed out the criticism of the traditional preaching during Emerson’s time and its consideration of a universally available capability of the religious sentiment rather than mediated by the church or by the supernatural intervention of Jesus (Robinson).The transcendentalist philosophy of Emerson is a religion of the spiritually liberated heart and mind, unbounded by party or church (Erickson viii). Emerson urged in his l ecture, titled â€Å"The American Scholar,† to remove America’s two-hundred-year-long reliance on European thought and to realize oneself as a civilization who can think his or her own thought and can create his or her own philosophy, poetry and vision of life (Ericson viii). His religion is described as a metaphysical idealism in which the material universe is only the appearance of underlying divine unity expressed in various individuals (Ericson x).He also visualized religions as an emotional interaction between the unitary spiritual power of goodness called â€Å"Oversoul† and an individual soul (â€Å"Transcendentalism†). Emerson also referred â€Å"Oversoul† to spirit of God as the most significant thing in the world (â€Å"Transcendentalism†). Several works by other individuals who believed in transcendentalist movement were also published in 1836, the year when the book â€Å"Nature† was also published.These included William H enry Furness’ â€Å"Remarks of the Four Gospels,† Convers Francis’ â€Å"Christianity as a Purely Internal Principle,† and Amos Bronson Alcott’s â€Å"Conversations with Children on the Gospels† (Robinson). One of the key legacies of Transcendentalism is the â€Å"The Dial,† a journal edited by Emerson and Margaret Fuller to offer a venue of expression for transcendental writing (Robinson). â€Å"The Dial† published poetry, book reviews and fiction as well as preaching and theological writings and commentary about social and political reform (Robinson).It also provided a chance for transcendentalists such as Emerson, Theodore Parker, Fuller, Amos Bronson Alcott, Christopher Pearse Cranch, Jones Very, and Henry David Thoreau to have a place in the literary movement in New England (Robinson). Thoreau often helped Emerson in copyediting and preparing the publication of â€Å"The Dial† magazine (Robinson). His involvement in â€Å"The Dial† magazine provided him a chance to know every detail of publishing operations and an exposure to the writing of his contemporaries (Robinson).Emerson and Thoreau played an important role in the emergence of New England Transcendentalism by representing it in the United States. They influenced other writers to apply transcendental ideas in their works (â€Å"Transcendentalism†). Thoreau’s book, titled â€Å"Walden,† or â€Å"Life in the Woods,† published in 1845 turned out to be a literary and environmental classic. It reflected on the dual identity of Thoreau as a poet-seer and a skillfull and grounded realist (Robinson). In addition to â€Å"Walden†, Thoreau published his â€Å"Journal† and various key nature essays such as â€Å"Walking,† â€Å"Wild Apples,† and â€Å"Autumnal Tints† in 1862.These publications focused on Emerson’s characterization of the spiritual importance of the natural world and the preservation of nature (Robinson). Thoreau became the original literary voice in a significant tradition of environmental writing and American nature (Robinson). He represented an American culture’s longing for the simpler life, symbolizing an increasing collective desire for a freedom from a society described as meaningless work and full of material consumption (Robinson).His writings during the 1960s and 1970s focused on the enhancement of the environmental ethic during that time (Robinson). According to Reuben, the basic premises of Transcendentalism are that: an individual is the spiritual center of the universe, acceptance of the neo-Platonic conception of nature as a living mystery, similarity between the structure of the universe and the structure of the individual self, and the belief that individual virtue and happiness rely on self-realization.The author also mentions the reasons behind the emergence of American Transcendentalism, which include the co ntinuous decline in Calvinism, the impact of science and technology on the advancement of secularization of modern thought, the rise of a Unitarian intellectual elite with the means and training to continue literature and scholarship, the growing irrelevance of liberal religion, the effect of European ideas on Americans traveling abroad, and the appearance of talented individuals such as Emerson, Fuller and Thoreau on the scene.The significance of the Transcendentalism is the manifestation of a romantic movement in philosophy and literature (â€Å"Transcendentalism†). Transcendentalism became an ethical guide to positive life and focused on the positive side of human nature. Moreover, it emphasized the tolerance of difference in religious belief and asserted on the importance of dignity and worth of the individual as a powerful tool for democracy (â€Å"Transcendentalism†).The transcendentalists played an important role in giving American culture its first distinctive voice in literature, bringing artistic undertaking and aesthetic appreciation in culture and providing advancement on several issues such as the cause of social justice and human rights (Robinson).