Myriapods The Many-Legged Arthropods

Myriapods (Myriapoda) are a group of arthropods that includes millipedes, centipedes, pauropods, and symphylans. About 15,000 species of myriapods are alive today. As their name implies, myriapods (from the Greek myriads, a myriad, plus photos, foot) are noted for having many legs, though the number varies widely from species to species. Some species have fewer than a dozen legs, while others have many hundreds of legs. The Illacme pipes, a millipede that inhabits central California, is the current record holder for myriapod leg count: This species has 750 legs, the most of all known myriapods. Oldest Evidence The earliest fossil evidence for myriads dates back to the late Silurian Period, about 420 million years ago. Molecular evidence, however, indicates that the group evolved before this, perhaps as early as the Cambrian Period, more than 485 million years ago. Some Cambrian fossils show similarities to early myriapods, indicating that their evolution could have been underway at that time. Characteristics The key characteristics of myriapods include: Many pairs of legsTwo body sections (head and trunk)One pair of antennae on the headSimple eyesMandibles (lower jaw) and maxillae (upper jaw)Respiratory exchange occurring through a tracheal system Myriapods bodies are divided into two tagmata, or body sections—a head and a trunk. The trunk is further divided into multiple segments, each having a pair of appendages, or legs. Myriapods have a pair of antennae on their head and a pair of mandibles and two pairs of maxillae (millipedes only have one pair of maxillae). Centipedes have a round, flat head with one pair of antennae, a pair of maxillae, and a pair of large mandibles. Centipedes have limited vision; some species have no eyes at all. Those that have eyes can perceive differences in light and dark but lack true vision. Millipedes have a rounded head that, unlike centipedes, is flat only on the bottom. Millipedes have a pair of large mandibles, a pair of antennae, and (like centipedes) limited vision. The body of millipedes is cylindrical. Millipedes are detritivores, feeding on detritus such as decomposing vegetation, organic material, and feces, and are prey for a variety of animals including amphibians, reptiles, mammals, birds, and other invertebrates. Millipedes lack the venomous claws of centipedes, so they must curl into a tight coil to protect themselves. Millipedes generally have 25 to 100 segments. Each thoracic segment has a pair of legs, while the abdominal segments bear two pairs of legs each. Habitat Myriapods inhabit a variety of habitats but are most abundant in forests. They also inhabit grasslands, scrublands, and deserts. Although most myriapods are detritivores, centipedes are not; they are mainly nocturnal predators. The two less familiar groups of myriapods, the sauropods and the symphylans, are small organisms (some are microscopic) that live in soil. Classification Myriapods are classified within the following taxonomic hierarchy: AnimalsInvertebratesArthropodsMyriapods Myriapods are divided into the following taxonomic groups: Centipedes (Chilopoda): There are more than 3,000 species of centipedes alive today. Members of this group include stone centipedes, tropical centipedes, soil centipedes, and house centipedes. Centipedes are carnivorous and the first segment of their body is equipped with a pair of venomous claws.Millipedes (Diplopoda): About 12,000 species of millipedes are alive today. Members of this group include  polyxenidans, chordeumatidans, platydesmidans, siphonophoridans, polydesmidans, and many others.

The World State Society - 1261 Words

Throughout the story, the characters are presented in different social classes. In this World State, society isn t broken down into race, sex, or wealth, it deals with the intelligence level of a human being. Character by character is presented with a strong detachment from reality and the lack of free will they are given. In the World State society can only exist if everyone conforms and in order to get everyone to appeal to their ideology, the Director, and everyone uses a genetic fallacy to trick the people of the New World that the reason everything functions normally and that nobody is out of place because they made them that way. Alphas and Betas remain, in incubators, until definitely bottled, while the Gammas,†¦show more content†¦This drug helps the people repress their authentic emotions and actions. In case something tragic were to happen to the people of the World State and they couldn’t be happy or anything equivalent instead of taking time to evaluate t heir feelings and find a real solution they just take soma to make those emotions go away â€Å"There s always soma to calm your anger, to reconcile you to your enemies, to make you patient and long-suffering. In the past, you could only accomplish these things by making a great effort and after years of hard moral training. Now, you swallow two or three half-gram tablets, and there you are. Anybody can be virtuous now. Christianity without tears, that s what soma is (Huxley 285). Mustapha Mond wants the people of the World State to witness and experience how easy it is to forget about old emotions that only get in the way of consuming and not producing just by taking soma and nothing more. He wants them to see that by taking soma all their problems will go away, Mond uses the idea that if it worked for a few people then it will work for everyone else and that people don’t need to pay attention to their actions or feelings if the can suppress long enough until they die. Thro ugh and through the novel people tend to make a negative comment and say next â€Å"there is always soma, delicious soma (Huxley 67). Soma is characterized as fixing something or anything that went wrong. Soma is an abused drug in

Poverty in the United States and Different Poverty Measure free essay sample

There is no universally acceptable definition of poverty, although there are several connotations and definitions in vogue. Poverty implies a condition of life characterised by deprivation some sort or the other, and perceived as undesirable by the person concerned or others. It is a multidimensional concept and phenomenon. Generally, there is a consensus among scholars about poverty being conceived and defined as absolute or relative. Absolute poverty implies a person’s lack of access to objectively determined, reasonably adequate quantities of goods and services, to satisfy his/her material and non-material basic needs. Relative poverty, on the other hand, means that a person’s access to the basic needs of life is relatively lower, as compared to some reference group of people. Between two households or two persons, one may be considered as poor, while the other in comparison may not be so, even though both may be in a position to fulfill their basic needs. Following the Office of Management and Budgets (OMB) Statistical Policy Directive 14, the Census Bureau uses a set of money income thresholds that vary by family size and composition to determine who is in poverty. If a family’s total income is less than the family’s threshold, then that family and every individual in it is considered in poverty. The official poverty thresholds do not vary geographically, but they are updated for inflation using Consumer Price Index (CPI-U). The official poverty definition uses money income before taxes and does not include capital gains or noncash benefits (such as public housing, Medicaid, and food stamps). Income used to compute poverty status: Money income Includes earnings, unemployment compensation, workers’ compensation, Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, public assistance, veterans’ payments, survivor benefits, pension or retirement income, interest, dividends, rents, royalties, income from estates, trusts, educational assistance, alimony, child support, assistance from outside the household, and other miscellaneous sources. Noncash benefits (such as food stamps and housing subsidies) do not count. Before taxes. Excludes capital gains or losses. If a person lives with a family, add up the incomeof all family members. (Non-relatives, such as housemates, do not count. ) Measure of need (poverty thresholds): Poverty thresholds are the dollar amounts used to determine poverty status Each person or family is assigned one out of 48 possible poverty thresholds Thresholds vary according to: Size of the family Ages of the members The same thresholds are used throughout the United States(do not vary geographically) Updated annually for inflation using the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U). Although the thresholds in some sense reflect families needs, they are intended for use as a statistical yardstick, not as a complete description of what people and families need to live many government aid programs use a different poverty measure, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) poverty guidelines, or multiples thereof Poverty thresholds were originally derived in 1963-1964, using: U. S. Department of Agriculture food budgets designed for families under economic stress Data about what portion of their income families spent on food Computation: If total family income is less than the threshold appropriate for that family, the family is in poverty all family members have the same poverty status for individuals who do not live with family members,their own income is compared with the appropriate threshold If total family income equals or is greater than the threshold,the family (or unrelated individual) is not in poverty Example: Family A has five members: two children, their mother, father, and great-aunt. Their threshold was $26,338 dollars in 2008. (See poverty thresholds for 2008) Suppose the members incomes in 2008 were: Mother: $10,000 Father: 7,000 Great-aunt: 10,000 First child: 0 Second child: 0 Total family income: $27,000 Compare total family income with their familys threshold. Income / Threshold = $27,000 / $26,338 = 1. 03 Since their income was greater than their threshold, Family A is not in poverty according to the official definition. The income divided by the threshold is called the Ratio of Income to Poverty. Family As ratio of income to poverty was 1. 03. The difference in dollars between family income and the familys poverty threshold is called the Income Deficit (for families in poverty) or Income Surplus (for families above poverty) Family A’s income surplus was $663 (or $27,000 $26,338). People whose poverty status cannot be determined: Unrelated individuals under age 15 (such as foster children) income questions are asked of people age 15 and older if someone is under age 15 and not living with a family member, we do not know their income since we cannot determine their poverty status, they are excluded from the â€Å"poverty universe† (table totals) People in: institutional group quarters (such as prisons or nursing homes) college dormitories military barracks living situations without conventional housing (and who are not in shelters) Authority behind official poverty measure: The official measure of poverty was established by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in Statistical Policy Directive 14. To be used by federal agencies in their statistical work. Government aid programs do not have to use the official poverty measure as eligibility criteria. Many government aid programs use a different poverty measure, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) poverty guidelines, or variants thereof Each aid program may define eligibility differently Official poverty data come from the Current Population Survey (CPS) Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC), formerly called the Annual Demographic Supplement or simplythe March Supplement. SELECTED CONCEPT ON POVERTY OF BANGLADESH 1. Poor Household: A household which has below poverty line expenditure. 2. Poverty-CBN (Cost of Basic Needs): Poverty is the degree of poorness. It refers to various forms of economic, social and psychological deprivation among the people who lack adequate ownership, control or access to resources for achieving a minimum level of living. It is a multidimensional problem involving income, consumption, nutrition, health, education, housing, crisis coping capacity, access to credit and other aspects of living. 3. Poverty-Absolute: The minimum level of income that is needed in physical survival. 4. Poverty-DCI (Direct Calorie Intake), absolute: For measuring the degree of poverty in DCI method, a person whose daily calorie intake is lower than 2122k. cal is considered in the absolute poverty. 5. Poverty-DCI, Hard-core: For measuring the degree of poverty in DCI method, a person whose daily calorie intake is lower than 1805 k. cal is considered in the hard-core poverty. 6. Poverty-DCI, Hard ultra: For measuring the degree of poverty in DCI method, a person whose daily calorie intake is lower than1600 k. cal is considered in the ultra poverty. 7. Poverty Line Calorie Intake: Is defined as being the amount of calorie intake which satisfies minimum nutritional requirement from foods consumed. For urban areas, it is 2112 k. cal per person per day and for rural people, it is 2122k per person per day. 8. Poverty Line: The minimum level of household income that can purchase a bundle of goods and services to satisfy the basic needs of household. 9. Poverty Line Expenditure: Is defined as monthly per capita expenditure on both food non-food combined at the poverty line calorie intake 2112/2122 k. cal per capita per day. SOME COMMON MEASURES AND INDICATORS OF POVERTY We now indicate some commonly used measures/indicators of poverty. These are given below: a. Poverty Ratio or Head Count: This is the most commonly used single measures of poverty. This measure estimates the percentage of population below a specified poverty line. To compute this measure, it is necessary to define and determine a poverty line. Figure: Some Common Measures and Indicators of Poverty Besides per capita income/consumption expenditure, there are quite a few other commonly used single variant measures of poverty or human development. They include- (a) Life expectancy at birth (b) Literacy rate (c) Birth rate (d) Death rate; and (e) Infant mortality rate. b. Housing Index: Gibbons (1997) proposed this index as a cost-effective measure/tool for identifying the poor. He asserts that index has been found to be valid and useful in a number of countries, such as China, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, India and Bangladesh, and that the index can experienced field assistant to use the index properly. The Housing Index has three components, namely; (a) The size of the house; (b) The physical condition of the house, as reflected in the materials used in its construction; and (c) The type of materials used for making the roof of the house c. Human Poverty Index (HPI): The Human Development Report 1997 (UNDP 1997) presents a Human Poverty Index (HPI) and ranks 78 poor countries using it. The report asserts that poverty is multidimensional, and poverty measures based on the income criterion do not capture deprivation of many kinds. The HPI is based on the following three different types of deprivation (UNDP 1997: 17-23). (a) Survival deprivation, as measured by the percentage of people (in a given country) not expected to survive to age years (P1) (b) Deprivation in education and knowledge, as measured by the adult literacy rate (P2) (c) Deprivation in economic provisioning (P3), which is compute as the mean of three variables:- ?Population without access to safe water (P31), ?People without access to health services (P32), and ?Underweight children under the age of 5 years (P33) All three expressed in percentages.