Utility of Domesticated Animals Essay Example for Free

Utility of Domesticated Animals Essay The biosphere around us comprises of plants, animals and humans. Each has its own role and part to play. They contribute immensely to make it functional and viable for each other. It is indeed true that it would not be full circle if one part or whole would be missing. Man however has utilized his supreme intelligence to extract the best from plants and animals for his very existence and to lead a luxurious lifestyle. Man has domesticated animals since times immemorial. It is man who has used camels, horses, cows, sheep, goat and dogs for his own needs. A camel is an amazing animal inhabitant to the dry desert. The shorter, two-humped Bactrian camels are cold climate camels while the Arabian camels having a single hump live in hot deserts. Camels provide transport, shade, milk, meat, wool and hides. Their gait like a rolling boat has earned it the adage of being the ship of the desert. Camel has a large mouth with sharp teeth to eat thorny bushes, grass, grains, seeds and dates. Long eyelashes, ear hair and sealable nostrils protect it from sand. Camels have long, thin legs with powerful muscles which carry heavy loads over long distances. Camels milk is more nutritious than cows milk; low in fat and is sweet. Young male camels have the best camel meat and its hump is a delicacy. Camels hair makes high quality coats, artists brushes and garments. a camel draws energy from its hump fat during its long and tedious journeys. the God gifted camel is the symbol of adaptability and toughness. A cow is a gentle animal. It is revered as the second mother to millions for its milk. They are found in herds on farms. They are raised for milk, meat and leather. They graze on grass and feed on grains, crops and legumes. India has the largest number of cattle in the world followed by Brazil and China. Its milk is used to make cheese, butter, ghee, cottage cheese, curd, whey, sweets and ice-cream. Its hide is used for leather to make shoes and clothing. Combs are made from its horns. The small, honey-brown Jersey cow is famous for the high butterfat in its milk and its genial disposition. In Hinduism the cow is a symbol of wealth, strength, abundance and selfless giving. A horse is a noble animal. It has four strong legs, a stout body and a short tail. The mane on its shoulders makes it look magnificently powerful. Arabian horses are the best in the world. In old days horses were used for traveling and in wars and games. Later they were harnessed to carts and carriages to pull goods. Now-a-days horses are seen in cavalry, circuses and race courses. Horses feed on grass and lentils. Horse is the symbol of power and courage for its great speed and splendid look.

Synthetic A Priori Knowledge And Judgment Philosophy Essay

Synthetic A Priori Knowledge And Judgment Philosophy Essay It is common knowledge that we all make judgments. Judgments about people we meet, what we or others should look like, or even judgments about world affairs and nature. Yet what knowledge do we have instilled in us or how is knowledge presented to us that allow us to make the judgments we make. With that in mind, the followed text is comparing analytic and synthetic judgments while holding emphasis on synthetic a priori knowledge as reflected in Kants Critique of Pure Reason. I will then take these ideas a step further by comparing Kants ideas and arguments against Humes as it was he who interrupted his dogmatic slumbers and gave his investigations in the field of speculative philosophy a quite new direction. (Critique of Pure Reason) To begin, Kant had a few issues with the way previous philosophers used the term analytic and synthetic judgment. Based on their use of the terms, he can to the conclusion that they failed to differentiate between the judgments in a way that justifies their use. As defined by Wikipedia, An analytic judgment is a proposition whose predicate concept is contained in its subject concept. While a synthetic judgment, is a proposition whose predicate concept is not contained in its subject concept. While these two definitions of the judgments have been used in philosophy in many different ways to justify many philosophical arguments or ideas, Kant believed the two judgments were not coextensive so he gave four other logical combinations that he felt should be examined while defining analytic and synthetic judgments. Analytic a posteriori judgments cannot arise, since there is never any need to appeal to experience in support of a purely explicative assertion. Synthetic a posteriori judgments are the relatively uncontroversial matters of fact that we come to know by means of our sensory experience (though Wolff had tried to derive even these from the principle of contradiction). Analytic a priori judgments, everyone agrees, include all merely logical truths and straightforward matters of definition; they are necessarily true. Synthetic a priori judgments are the crucial case, since only they could provide new information that is necessarily true. But neither Leibniz nor Hume considered the possibility of any such case (Kemerling 2). With the definitions and formulations of the judgments aside, Kant believed that it was possible to synthetic a priori judgments because these types of judgments are what most of human knowledge is based from. With Hume in mind, Kant generally believed that Humes view on arithmetic and geometry could be used as the building blocks for natural science. Once the foundations for natural science have been laid, you can then use that information to explain certain events or predict what the future holds in respect to natural science. Hume derived this line of thinking from two different explanations. He believed that ideas come from impressions and relations of ideas which can be shown through mathematics. These impressions and relations of ideas then lay the ground work or foundation for the natural sciences. With the foundation of natural sciences being formed through impressions and relation of ideas, Hume also believed cause and effect played a role, but that experience can never be a source of any of the ideas for natural science. The reason for this is that experience is the clear example of the constant conjunction between cause and effect and it is above all clear that we cannot have knowledge without cause and effect. Thus, cause and effect gives us our impressions and relations of ideas which help form knowledge. The negative portion of Humes analysis-his demonstration that matters of fact rest upon an unjustifiable belief that there is a necessary connection between the causes and their effects-was entirely correct. (Kemerling 2) Humes rationality of cause and effect forces his conclusion that induction has no logical force. That causes have explanations behind them that could be traced back to natural reasons and are above all determined by nature. Kants Critique of Pure Reason shows how reason determines the conditions under which experience and knowledge are based. (Kemerling 1) This means that if I want to buy a car, I must have money and knowledge of what it will cost to buy a car. Without money, I cannot buy a new car or without the knowledge of where to buy a car, I would not know of a car to buy. This is where we take our experience and knowledge and combine them to give us cause and effect as above. When we have concepts of understanding, those ideas will provide us with the ability to connect knowledge together to create a synthetic a priori judgment. Kant believes that all of our knowledge stems from experience, but that our knowledge does not have to stem out of the experience. In other words a priori knowledge is independent of our experiences and senses. With that said, Kant believed that philosophy must stand in the need of a science that will determine the extent of all of it. Mathematics is an example of how far, independently of experience, we can progress in a priori knowledge. (Kemerling 3) So in conclusion, natural science contains a priori synthetic judgments and metaphysics contains a priori synthetic knowledge. Kant believes that pure reason is, That which contains the principles whereby we know anything absolutely a priori. (Critique of Pure Reason) Its like adding and subtracting which brings about a priori answers, once we do that our judgments and concepts stem from an a priori origin. For the analysis, that is, mere dissection of concepts, contained in this or that, is not the aim of, but only a preparation for metaphysics proper, which has its object the extension, by means of synthesis of prior knowledge. For Humes analysis by Kant he stated that all things ultimately exist in space, a priori, before we can sense. The priori of an object is their concept of it. It is more than showing these concepts, but containing a knowledge of their concepts and how it can be arrived as a synthesis, of a priori knowledge. (Jones 2) Overall, both Hume and Kant came to agree that all theoretical sciences of reason have synthetic a priori judgments and are followed in these principles; All knowledge begins with an experience. A priori knowledge is independent of experiences. If we understand and adapt to these principles of synthetic a priori judgment, we may begin to understand everything within a better light especially cause and effect. In respect to both Hume and Kant, I must say I agree with their definitive choices for use of the judgments. While pushing aside analytic judgments, both Kant and Hume make strong arguments for why synthetic a priori judgments are not only the foundation for natural science, but also for the definitive source of almost all human knowledge. I agree with Kant in saying that we can have an idea or impression of something which knowledge can be stemmed from, but I genuinely dont believe we can know something without having experience of it. You can have an idea of something, but not knowledge of something and those two ideals are drastically different in my mind. Overall, Kant does a great job at conforming and revamping Humes ideas on synthetic a priori judgment and without synthetic a priori knowledge, we would defiantly be lacking much knowledge in the human culture.

Euthanasia Essay - The Need for Physician Assisted Suicide :: Free Euthanasia Essay

The Need for Physician Assisted Suicide Man is born with death in his hand. We all will die. We may be able to postpone death but we cannot avoid it. We all die of something, somewhere, somehow. Although we cannot avoid death, we can control the death caused by a terminal illness. We can determine how, when, where, and with whom we die. Right now at this time, there are over 10,000 patients in the United States that are in a permanent vegetative state. Also there are thousands of handicapped infants born each year. With the technology we have today, we are able to help people survive for long periods. About two million Americans die every year. About 85% of them are in an institution. 80% involve a decision by someone to try to prolong life or to let it go. It is estimated that around four of every five Americans will die of lingering, chronic illness, which cannot be cured but can be artificially prolonged. Odds are not in your favor to die naturally at home. The following are some thing to clear up any confusion about assisted suicide and euthanasia. Euthanasia is act of mercifully ending the life of a hopelessly suffering patient; taken from a similar Greek word meaning "easy or good death" Physician-Assisted Suicide - assisted by a qualified medical practitioner in fulfilling the wishes of a competent, terminally-ill patient to end his/her own life, usually by means of lethal injections. The difference between the two is during euthanasia is when death itself occurs, it's carried out by the doctor but in doctor-assisted suicides, the patient fulfills the final step of terminating his/her own life. "Passive" Euthanasia is ending a patient's life by withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining treatments, and "Active" Euthanasia is causing a virtually painless death by means without which life would continue naturally, usually referring to lethal injections and lastly, suicide is the act of taking one's own life voluntarily and intentionally. A very well talked about doctor who assists in suicide is Dr. Jack Kevorkian. He has pointed out the benefits of assisted suicide. Some of those are that it reduces patient's suffering family and friends of patient. Dr. Kevorkian also asks his own patients to donate vital organs or undergo a critical medical experiment, which helps science, medicine, society, and the lives of others.

The Importance of Physical Exercise Essay -- Workout Programs Exercis

The Importance of Physical Exercise What is exercise? The actual definition of exercise is; to use repeatedly in order to strengthen or develop, but to make it simpler, exercise is doing programs and workouts to keep fit, for example, running, hiking, bicycling, and any active sport. Most Americans do little or no exercise during work or rest hours. Today there aren't many jobs requiring intense physical activity. Instead of walking, people use automobiles or public transportation. Instead of being physically active, people usually watch TV in their free time. Some sports such as bowling, golf, and tennis (doubles) provide some exercise, but do not provide as much exercise as other more vigorous sports. Exercise is very important and is beneficial both physically and mentally. When you exercise, you feel better about yourself because you are fit or your getting fit and you feel that you have accomplished something that was hard to strive for. The benefits of physical activity is it gives you more energy, it helps you in coping with stress, it improves self-image, and it increases resistance of tiredness. Exercise does not only keep you fit, it also reduces your chance of heart attack. Various studies have shown that the chance of heart attack is two times more likely to happen to an inactive person than a more active person. It really all adds up because with exercising, you burn off calories, which keeps you at your desirable weight, which lowers your risk of he...

The Unknown Prevalence of Youth Gambling Essay -- Gamble Winning Win E

The Unknown Prevalence of Youth Gambling A child’s motivation to begin gambling is obvious. Even at an early age children are trained to idolize winning. They are taught the tortoise is the best because he wins the race. From this elementary lesson, children develop a tendency to idolize the winners and discount the losers. Children observe gambling and have an inclination to see the player raking in armfuls of chips, not the player across the table slowly losing a week’s pay at the black jack tables. They see Las Vegas portrayed in the media as a place to go to win money. They do not see the gamblers who leave the town with an empty bank account and a potential inability to provide for their families. By looking at the gambling culture in this idealized way, children are inclined to gamble when the opportunity presents itself. They may begin innocently by entering into their father’s office pool or wagering on baseball games with their friends, but the fact is many of these children will find t hemselves facing a gambling problem in years to come. I began gambling when I was thirteen with sports pools and friendly wagers with friends. Only four years later I found myself immersed in the culture of gambling; risking my money four nights a week in poker games. When I had started gambling, the stakes were only fifty cents, but now thirty and forty dollars were up for grabs. By the time I was eighteen, even these stakes were no longer enough for me. I decided that the casinos in Atlantic City were the only venues with payoffs large enough to satiate my hunger for gambling. On nothing more than an impulse I set off on a three hour drive, bound for certain victory. I found a seat at the black jack tables in Bally... ...tions. However, the nation will not take action any time soon, not without a push. As members of a society we must do our part to increase awareness about this issue. We must make an effort today to see the adolescents don’t gamble their tomorrow away. Works Cited Eckart, Dennis. Advancement of an Emerging Science. 2003. National Center for Responsible Gaming. 10 Sept. 2003 . Moiduddin, Adil. Gambling Impact and Behavior Study. 2003. The National Opinion Research Center. 10 Sept. 2003 . Willenz, Pamela. Pathological Gambling More Prevalent Among Youths Than Adults, Study Finds. 2003. American Psychological Association. 11 Sept. 2003 .

Modernism, Erich Heckel and Primitive Art Essay

The names Erich Heckel and Die Brucke are inseparable in the world of art. It is not without a fair amount of controversy that this artistic movement is regarded though. Heckel, and others were more interested in the primitive form of art which they thought to be purer than the more modern realistic style that had evolved in Europe at the time. But how did the ‘primitive’ art of Africa and other areas affect the style of this movement during a particularly restless political climate in Europe? We will discuss this with reference to the work of Erich Heckel, one of the artists who contributed to the movement greatly during its short life. Die Brucke (The Bridge) was an artistic movement that congregated before the first World War. It was founded by four architecture students in Dresden. Together with Die Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider), Die Brucke represented German Expressionism which later was banned by the Nazi’s as ‘degenerate’ art [1]. It was the national equivalent of the French Fauves who wished to present a more modernistic and free form of art. It was in early Nazi Germany that degenerate art or ‘entartete kunst’ made Die Brucke a ridiculed artistic movement. Some of the artists banned from activity included Marc Chagall, Max Ernst and Wassily Kandinsky who were all particular members of the then German Expressionist movement [2]. The primary reason for this banning had been due to one aspect in its entirety: primitivism. In the case of Marc Chagall, his inspiration came from a certain spirituality that was involved in the process of creating art and primitive symbolism gave him just that link to spirituality he needed to express himself [2]. Chagall, as one of the modernist painters had been born in Russia into a Jewish family and even though he was not German, he was exiled to the United States after Germany occupied France. Paul Klee was another of the German Expressionist who was ridiculed as an artist because of the primitive nature of his work. Klee was a Swiss born artist who was extremely serious about pushing the boundaries of art, something Nazi Germany definitely did not encourage. The primitive symbolism is particularly visible in paintings such as Fish Magic (1925), oil and aquarelle color [4: p 2834]. Klee uses the heavy stylization and cubism to convey an environment that is much more complicated in its meaning than its composition. There is an element of surrealism also conveyed in this piece, where a clock is displayed amidst the floating fish and cubist inspired people. A conjugation of cubism and surrealism is visible but there is also an aspect of Cezanne with the conical vases suspended around the picture. Death and Fire (1940) is another extremely primitive piece and has elements of the South American Indians such as the Inca [4: p 2841]. Franc Marc melded primitive figures with cubism and bright colors. Tower of Blue Horses (1913), revealed a recurring theme in his work. For Marc, the color blue was a deep spiritual color while horses were a Biblical symbol of the apocalypse [5]. As a member of Die Blaue Reiter, his consciousness was fixated on animalistic painting which he believed depicted the organic structure of the world [5: p 2985]. Despite being declined as an artist in Germany, his work is extremely beautiful. Edvard Munch shifted from Norway to Germany but his exhibition was quickly shut down in Berlin. He could be seen as one of the forerunners to primitivism in art and therefore not popular in Germany. Munch’s best known work is possibly The Scream (1893) whose primitive nature is extremely evident not only in the brushstrokes but also in the treatment of the subject itself [6: p 2352]. Some of his work, as opposed to Marc, is not beautiful, but grotesque and indicative of the tormented self. Wassily Kandinsky is possibly the most interesting of the ‘degenerate’ artists. He was not only affected by the Russian revolution, but later also the Nazi invasion. His version of primitivism came in his obsession with geometry, similar to Marc. Composition VIII (1923), is literally a composition of geometric shapes. The colors are bright and dispersed around the entire picture. Some blocks of color are textured, but most of it is matte and smooth color. Erich Heckel, as a founder member of Die Brucke was born in Dobeln in 1883. Most of Heckel’s figures were in fact two dimensional versions of African sculptures. From equatorial Africa, down towards Southern Africa, sculptures was used symbolically most often for religious purposes. Heckel had been very interested in one particular room at the Brucke studio which was filled with cloths, wood-carvings and furniture obtained in Africa and the ‘South Seas’. He began studying at the Museum of Ethnology in Dresden to increase his understanding of the ‘primitive’ art [9]. His woodcut entitled Women (1913), has traditional colors of red, white and black. The chiseled features are geometrically shaped and stylized to give the cut the same angularity of the carvings that originated in Africa. The same print style is visible in cloth artifacts that were also imported from the African areas and so-called primitive countries. Part of the rationale behind the primitivism work was an almost communist stance against the bourgeois sector of society [8]. There had been an increased interest in ‘visual metaphor’, pictures that expressed something from the inside: an innate spirituality. At this stage, modern art became profoundly political, shifting the meaning of art from simple decorative and esthetics to a complex vessel for expounding social interests. The modern world took on a different color during the early 1900’s, which led to the increased darkening of themes and images, but Heckel was a little different. The Expressionists, including Heckel drew inspiration from ‘primitive’ art for various reasons. These reasons included: counter-revolutionary reasons; new found freedom of thought; anti-capitalist protest; seeking the purest, most honest depiction of spirituality; fascination with ‘otherness’; exploration of the spontaneous; external expression of the inner emotion and philosophical creativity. The Art Nouveau movement had taken its expression from the decadent nature of estheticism. It was art for arts sake and had been a depiction of the environment at the time, but Expressionism behaved as a counter-revolutionary protest against the capitalist or ‘bourgeois’ society [10]. The Expressionists felt that materialistic society had degraded spirituality and inner connection in people in general. Together with a new found freedom of expression introduced by the likes of Picasso and Miro, Dali and even Duchamps, the Expressionists now felt that they could express their own opinions via art. As a result, there was an increased need for internal examination that stripped away the ostentatious outer layer of the Baroque and Romantic era. Primitive cultures had been particularly interested in the spiritual and found this spirituality in the simplest forms of art [10]. Arguably, the many layers humanity had added to themselves through material possession and fashion hid the inner emotional volcano the Expressionists wanted to uncover. The ‘primitive’ was largely unaffected by the material practices and therefore appeared to be a more honest way of expressing the suppressed emotion. It was also more based on instinct then on rationality [10]. The other key interest is in the concept of ‘otherness’. The fact that this particular form of art was largely unknown to the ‘civilized’ world was a curious thing for Europeans to acknowledge [10]. It added a freshness or ‘newness’ to the high-browed European art world. Modern artist Shastri Maharaj describes the obsession with primitiveness as being an interest in the bold colors and sharp outlines usually associated with the tools used to form the images. Artists such as Modigliani were particularly interested in Polynesian images, while Heckel was interested in the so-called ‘Bantu’ style of woodcarving. Either way they were both inspired by something that was new and unexplored [11]. Masks such as ‘death masks’ were images used in works that explored the nature of life and death, due in part to their austere beauty and also because they were unafraid of facing the inevitable. At this stage, psychiatry had also made a huge influence on society, with Sigmund Freud’s encouragement to face inner demons that include man’s inherent fear of death. What was termed ‘funerary’ art created a stir around the unknown and facing the unknown [11]. Ancestral worship had been an aspect of primitive art that was also seen as relatively unacceptable to Christian Europe. Robert Goldwater spent his life studying traditional art and the relationship between modern artists and their anthropological fascination with tribal and ancestral art. Even if one was to consider Salvador Dali’s depictions of animals and people with exaggerated limbs, we see an influence that it not unlike the North Eastern sculptures of Africa. Together with the Metropolitan Museum, they created an extensive resource of primitive art. A closer look at ritual art reveals at the Metropolitan Museum reveals that the ancient work was either of stone, wood or precious metals were richly patterned and elaborately colored. The relationship therefore between the modernist painters and the ancient world is visible in the brightly colored depictions of the artists such as Marc and Chagall. That Heckel took his inspiration from the African component of primitive art is evident since the majority of African art was produced in wood and ivory as opposed to the gold that is associated with the South American Indians. Some of the art was also indicative of the caste or rank of the people within the civilization and this proved to be a great difference in the material that was used by the individual artist during that time [12]. Ceremony was an integral part of their belief structure and could not be separated from their daily life in much the same way as the Greeks could not separate their idol-worship from their mere existence. It was this factor of belonging and having a purpose to life that the Expressionists found to be the missing link in European art. This was the factor they believed had distanced them from their own inner glory. As the Metropolitan Museum also reveals there was a heightened collectivity about these primitive artists, that they functioned in some form of hierarchal unity that no longer existed in, for instance, Nazi dominated Europe [12]. Da Vinci had been responsible for exploring the inner functioning of the human body, its bones and muscles, but prior to that, the human body was depicted in much the same way the African sculptures portrayed it to be: relatively shapeless. Women appeared however to always be portrayed as nubile, voluptuous and well-endowed, which is probably the archetype but not indicative of the average woman. These ‘fertility’ goddesses were presumed to bring good-fortune to child-bearing women and Heckel produced a number of lino and wood cuts bearing the semblance of these fecund women. As it can be perceived, the primitive world was one in which survival of a race, tribe of civilization was dependant on the amount of children born and even then, on how many survived. In modern Europe, the ‘race’ had already been established and the need to breed was not as great as the need to supplicate the need for material wealth. Cultural difference therefore lay in the status of the country at the time and although many of the works that inspired the likes of Heckel are form the Sudanese area, it is also the area of Africa which is still fighting the oldest war in Africa. The survival instinct is still as alive as it had been in ‘primitive’ times. The Indian component of ‘primitive art’ is visible in almost all of the Expressionist work, particularly that of Klee, whose aforementioned piece called Death and Fire, reveals the common obsession with death and the possibility of life thereafter. The Peruvian tribes such as the Moche provided artists with a clear glimpse into their entire grotesque world of death, burial and the afterlife. The Inca too, had profound images of death as well as the most famous sarcophagi of Egypt. The masks were meant to be a motif of the victim, but since the skill of copying the dead person was not quite as practiced as, Gainsborough or Lely, they were heavily stylized. Klee saw no reason to attempt to glamorize the process of death and going to hell in the way that perhaps Blake would have, but instead brought it down to what it really was: a primal fear. Modigliani’s work is well known to have been influenced by the Polynesian realms, and this is also seen not only in his subject matter but also in his cubist approach to the subject matter. A cotemporary of Picasso, he did not quite stylize his subject to the point of pure abstraction but used brightly colored flowers and luscious physical arrangements in a time when that was considered not only ‘kitsch’ but also inappropriate. The question was, did it make any difference when compared to the works of the also ridiculed Goya or even further back to Rubens? No, the problem was no the nude, but the nationality of the nude. The ‘otherness’ of the subject made them appear to be crude, basic and uncivilized to the Western eye, which of course, as they were not understood, could not have been the case. Similarly the work of Munch and Chagall were both based on religious iconography that was exhibited in the same way as perhaps the Bushmen cave paintings of Southern Africa. The pictures were bland except for the raw emotion that obviously courses through the paintings into the viewer. Whether of not you like The Scream or not makes not difference when you look at it because it affects you regardless of whether you see it as a ‘master’ work or not. This was the point of Expressionism and indeed of all Modern Art, the inner connection and ability to feel emotion whether it was anguish, fear, love or lust. These are all very basic emotions and basic feelings. If one looks a step further at the Impressionists, the same volatility of nature was the expressive part of the movement itself. It was beyond the self-obsessed need for fickle and wanton things, it was about capturing something; a time; a place that could never be seen in that way again. If we consider the art of ancient Greece, which could also be termed ‘primitive’, the effects it has had on modern art has been immense. It has not stopped instilling awe and wonder on the modern world, by its sheer ingenuity. Also obsessed with basic emotions, it made them not very different at all to the Aztecs of the Mayan empires, other than that it has been more widely preserved. Apart from the philosophical arguments regarding modern arts fascination with the primitive, it also gives us a sense of preserving what we have been given in knowledge and heritage from whatever angle we approach it. The primitive has always been with us, right down to our involuntary fight-or-flight reaction that we can never ignore. The basis for survival was very different and the means of producing the works we call ‘primitive’ today, was not purely for decorative or entertainment value. It had a specific purpose and part to play. As the modern human has become more in love with its own intelligence and more obsessed with its produce, it has begun to forget why it was put on earth in the first place. Artists, it could be argued are generally of the introverted, self-analyzing type and it could be that what modern art wanted to do, was to free them of the burden of emptiness. No doubt, the primitive instinct we find necessary for basic survival would kick in at some stage, but it doesn’t seem to be inherent anymore. It can be concluded that the ostentatious lifestyles modern man had created over the years for himself had gradually dug him into a pit of artistic stagnation and the meaning of art itself changed completely. Picasso had stood up against the Nazi’s in 1933 at the Paris Universal Exhibition when he painted the anti-Franco/Hitler painting Geurnica (1933) and the sensitive artist suddenly became the political activist. This is why, in art, music, literature, philosophy and even in science, we will always come back to the same conclusion and to the same means: we think therefore we are.

How Far Was World War One Responsible for the Overthrow of Nicholas II, 1917 Essay

The First World War was indeed a major cause of the Tsar’s overthrow in the February Revolution. However, it was not the sole factor – rather, it was a catalyst and a focus that allowed all the other preexisting factors to boil over into revolution. The First World War caused a multitude of problems for the peasants of Russia, both at home and on the front. The vast majority of conscripts were from farming villages, meaning that less men were at home to till the soil and produce food – it also meant a general slump in food production as a whole, resulting in a shortage of grain to feed the hungry industrial workers in the cities. As the death toll of the backwards, ill-equipped Russian Army was devastatingly high, this meant that virtually everyone in Russia would lose someone they knew, regardless of social status. The lack of reliable supplies of food and basic commodities such as coal (most of it was going to the front) further crippled the economy, especially during the harsh Russian winter. This caused riots and protests to break out, ones that the once-Royalist troops were now unwilling to curb. Economic problems aside, the Tsar also made several extremely misguided decisions that further damaged his reign. While he intended to use the Great War to secure his status as Father of the People, Nicholas failed utterly in two respects. Firstly, he left directly to command the front – this meant that all the blame for every military defeat fell on his shoulders and not some scapegoat commander. He would no longer be able to divert the illwill of the people should defeats occur, and they did indeed. Secondly, he left the Tsarina in charge of running the Empire while he was away, and this was a disasterous choice on many levels. Tsarina Alexandra was a German-born princess, which naturally aroused severe animosity on the part of the people who were actually fighting the Germans. Even worse, she listened to Rasputin in everything, sacking many loyal ministers and replacing them with his incompetent cronies. This threw the already-disorganised Russia into even greater disarray, preventing supplies from getting through to the hungry workers and wrecking the economy even further. The Russians called her a spy and accused her of conducting an affair with Rasputin, whom they loathed. They could not fathom why an uncouth, dirty peasant would find so much favor in the eyes of their monarch. The status of the Royal Family was at an all-time low in the eyes of the people, and everyone began to talk about how they should be disposed of – in every class of society, no less. Further compounding the problem was the fact that the vast majority of the Russian Army was at the front. Unlike the 1905 Revolution, where the Tsar could quickly sign a peace treaty with Japan and get his soldiers’ loyalty with generous payments to crush the revolution, the First World War showed no signs of ending. The army’s morale was incredibly low. With mass desertions almost every day due to the obsolete nature of both Russian millitary tactics and equipment, many soldiers had gone back to the cities of Petrograd and Moscow to live with their families. This meant that when the tide of public sentiment finally broke out against the Tsar in another revolution, these soldiers turned in support of the revolutionary cause. Because of the poverty and chaos caused to civilians by the war, the loss of millitary support and disasterous handling of the army, and finally the Tsar’s own mistakes, the Romanov Dynasty was at an end. That being said, there were other factors that stemmed from before the Great War. After the 1905 Revolution, the Tsar had promised to make his rule more constitutional. These token promises were shown in the October Manifesto, his abolition of redemption payments and the creation of the Duma, an elected parliament who in theory would help him run the empire. However, these were merely halfhearted, hollow words. The Tsar practically ignored the Duma, dashing the hopes of the middle class and destroying their trust in him. In addition, he released the 1906 Fundamental Laws, which shrewdly reestablished his sovereign authority by stating that everything in the October Manifesto was permissible – but only in the limits of the law, which naturally the Tsar still controlled. Additionally, the Tsar had his new Chief Minister Stolypin carry out land reforms. He allowed the more capable peasants to accumulate the holdings of their neighbours, creating a prosperous class of ‘kulaks’ or wealthy peasants. It was hoped that this would both stabilise food prices and create a ‘barrier to revolution’, a lower-middle class that would be loyal to the Tsar and unwilling to upset the favorable status quo. It mostly worked. However, what Stolypin had overlooked was the fact that many peasants would be displaced by this new mini-elite. Evicted from their homes and encouraged by the government to settle on the Trans-Siberian Railway, they traveled many miles in cramped and cold conditions only to find that all the prime land had already been bought up by wealthy capitalists. Feeling cheated and betrayed by their Tsar, these peasants drifted into the city and found meager work in the factories. When the time came for a second revolution, they were ready. Stolypin himself was assassinated in 1911, leaving Russia a disorganised mess. No other statesman of his caliber would ever step up again in the Tsarist regime. The First World War was a major cause of the 1917 Revolution, but not the sole one. Rather, it was a climax that focused and pushed all previous elements over the edge.