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Self-licking Ice Cream Cone
In political jargon, a self-licking ice cream cone is a wiktionary:self-perpetuating, self-perpetuating system that has no purpose other than to sustain itself. The phrase appeared to have been first used in 1991–1992, in a book about Gulf War weapons systems by Norman Friedman, and ''On Self-Licking Ice Cream Cones'', a paper by Pete Worden about NASA's bureaucracy, to describe the relationship between the Space Shuttle and Space Station. Since then, the term has been used to describe the habit of government-funded organisations and programs spending taxpayer money to lobby for more funding from the taxpayer. Other things compared have included financial bubbles, chatshows and reality television. In ''The Irish Times'', Kevin Courtney observed that "many organisations are also stuck in limbo, destined to keep lurching on without ever achieving their stated goal. That’s because their real goal is simply to carry on regardless." The Cold War infrastructure has also been compare ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Self-perpetuating
Self-perpetuation, the capability of something to cause itself to continue to existence, exist, is one of the main characteristics of life. Organisms' capability of reproduction leads to self-perpetuation of the species, if not to the individual. Populations self-perpetuate and grow. Entire ecosystems show homeostasis, and thus perpetuate themselves. The slow modifying effect of succession (ecology), succession and similar shifts in the composition of the system can, however, not be neglected in the long run. Overall, life's object's capabilities of self-perpetuation are always accompanied by evolution, a perfect steady state of the biological system is never reached. Sexual reproduction is also a form of imperfect self-replication and thus imperfect self-perpetuation because of Genetic recombination, recombination and mutation. Organisms are not like self-replicating machine but amass random modifications from generation to generation. The property of self-perpetuation in the strict ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Hoggart
Herbert Richard Hoggart (24 September 1918 – 10 April 2014) was a British academic whose career covered the fields of sociology, English literature and cultural studies, with emphasis on British popular culture. Early life Hoggart was born in the Potternewton area of Leeds, one of three children in an impoverished family. His father, Tom Longfellow Hoggart (1880–1922), the son of a boilermaker, was a regular infantry soldier and housepainter who died of brucellosis when Hoggart was a year old, and his mother Adeline died of a chest illness when he was eight. He grew up with his grandmother in Hunslet, and was encouraged in his education by an aunt. Emulating his elder brother, Tom, the first of the family to go to a grammar school, he gained a place at Cockburn High School which was a grammar school, after his headmaster requested that the education authority reread his scholarship examination essay. He then won a scholarship to study English at the University of Leeds, w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arms Race
An arms race occurs when two or more groups compete in military superiority. It consists of a competition between two or more states to have superior armed forces; a competition concerning production of weapons, the growth of a military, and the aim of superior military technology, the term is also used to describe any long-term escalating competitive situation where each competitor or competitive group focuses on out-doing others. Unlike a sporting race, which constitutes a specific event with winning interpretable as the outcome of a singular project, arms races constitute spiralling systems of on-going and potentially open-ended behavior. The existing scholarly literature is divided as to whether arms races correlate with war. International-relations scholars explain arms races in terms of the security dilemma, rationalist spiral models, states with revisionist aims, and deterrence models. Examples Pre-First World War naval arms race From 1897 to 1914, a nav ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boondoggle
A boondoggle is a project that is considered a waste of both time and money, yet is often continued due to extraneous policy or political motivations. Etymology "Boondoggle" was the name of the newspaper of the Roosevelt Troop of the Boy Scouts, based in Rochester, New York, and it first appeared in print in 1927. From there it passed into general use in scouting in the 1930s. It was attributed to a boy scout from Rochester who coined the term to describe "a new type of uniform decoration". After the presentation of honorific boondoggles at a World Jamboree, the use of the word spread to other troops and branches. An Oakland scout troop presented a "boondoggle" as an award for attendees who spent seven days and nights at Camp Dimond. That boondoggle was described as a "red leather strip which terminates in a red wooden diamond on which is painted the number 1930." The "boondoggle" was described in the Ogden ''Standard-Examiner'' in 1930 as a hand-made item crafted from brigh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Virtuous Circle And Vicious Circle
A vicious circle (or cycle) is a complex chain of events that reinforces itself through a feedback loop, with detrimental results. It is a system with no tendency toward equilibrium (social, economic, ecological, etc.), at least in the short run. Each iteration of the cycle reinforces the previous one, in an example of positive feedback. A vicious circle will continue in the direction of its momentum until an external factor intervenes to break the cycle. A well-known example of a vicious circle in economics is hyperinflation. A virtuous circle is an equivalent system with a favorable outcome. Examples Vicious circles in the subprime mortgage crisis The contemporary subprime mortgage crisis is a complex group of vicious circles, both in its genesis and in its manifold outcomes, most notably the late 2000s recession. A specific example is the circle related to housing. As housing prices decline, more homeowners go " underwater", when the market value of a home drops below ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ultimate Machine
A useless machine or useless box is a device which has a function but its direct purpose is deliberately unknown. The best-known useless machines are those inspired by Marvin Minsky's design, in which the device's sole function is to switch itself off by operating its own "off" switch. Such machines were popularised commercially in the 1960s, sold as an amusing engineering hack, or as a joke. More elaborate devices and some novelty toys, which have a more obvious function or entertainment value, have been based on these simple useless machines. History The Italian artist Bruno Munari began building "useless machines" (''macchine inutili'') in the 1930s. He was a "third generation" Futurist and did not share the first generation's boundless enthusiasm for technology, but sought to counter the threats of a world under machine rule by building machines that were artistic and unproductive. The version of the useless machine that became famous in information theory (basically a b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Self-fulfilling Prophecy
A self-fulfilling prophecy is a prediction that comes true at least in part as a result of a person's or group of persons' belief or expectation that said prediction would come true. This suggests that people's beliefs influence their actions. The principle behind this phenomenon is that people create consequences regarding people or events, based on previous knowledge of the subject. There are three factors within an environment that can come together to influence the likelihood of a self-fulfilling prophecy becoming a reality: appearance, perception, and belief. When a phenomenon cannot be seen, appearance is what we rely upon when a self-fulfilling prophecy is in place. When it comes to a self-fulfilling prophecy there also must be a distinction "between 'brute and institutional' facts". The philosopher John Searle states the difference as "facts hatexist independently of any human institutions; institutional facts can only exist within institutions." There is an inability of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bowl Alliance
The Bowl Alliance was an agreement among college football bowl games (specifically the Sugar, Orange, and Fiesta Bowls) for the purpose of trying to match the top two teams in a national championship game and to provide quality bowl game matchups for the champions of its member conferences. The agreement was in place for the 1995, 1996, and 1997 seasons and had replaced the Bowl Coalition. Each participating team in the Bowl Alliance Championship received $8.5 million from the television sponsors. Background In its beginnings, the Bowl Alliance involved the SEC, Big Eight, SWC, ACC, and Big East conference champions, as well as independent Notre Dame. Because of this, only one at-large slot was available for teams to vie for. With the disbanding of the Big Eight and SWC following the 1995 football season and the formation of the Big 12 Conference in its wake, an additional at-large bid became available. The Alliance bowls were held on three successive days in each of the three ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Military–industrial Complex
The expression military–industrial complex (MIC) describes the relationship between a country's military and the defense industry that supplies it, seen together as a vested interest which influences public policy. A driving factor behind the relationship between the military and the defense-minded corporations is that both sides benefit—one side from obtaining war weapons, and the other from being paid to supply them. The term is most often used in reference to the system behind the armed forces of the United States, where the relationship is most prevalent due to close links among defense contractors, the Pentagon, and politicians. The expression gained popularity after a warning of the relationship's detrimental effects, in the farewell address of President Dwight D. Eisenhower on January 17, 1961. In the context of the United States, the appellation is sometimes extended to military–industrial–congressional complex (MICC), adding the U.S. Congress to form a three-sid ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Franklin C
Franklin may refer to: People * Franklin (given name) * Franklin (surname) * Franklin (class), a member of a historical English social class Places Australia * Franklin, Tasmania, a township * Division of Franklin, federal electoral division in Tasmania * Division of Franklin (state), state electoral division in Tasmania * Franklin, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb in the Canberra district of Gungahlin * Franklin River, river of Tasmania * Franklin Sound, waterway of Tasmania Canada * District of Franklin, a former district of the Northwest Territories * Franklin, Quebec, a municipality in the Montérégie region * Rural Municipality of Franklin, Manitoba * Franklin, Manitoba, an unincorporated community in the Rural Municipality of Rosedale, Manitoba * Franklin Glacier Complex, a volcano in southwestern British Columbia * Franklin Range, a mountain range on Vancouver Island, British Columbia * Franklin River (Vancouver Island), British Columbia * Franklin Strait ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United Nations
The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations. It is the world's largest and most familiar international organization. The UN is headquarters of the United Nations, headquartered on extraterritoriality, international territory in New York City, and has other main offices in United Nations Office at Geneva, Geneva, United Nations Office at Nairobi, Nairobi, United Nations Office at Vienna, Vienna, and Peace Palace, The Hague (home to the International Court of Justice). The UN was established after World War II with Dumbarton Oaks Conference, the aim of preventing future world wars, succeeding the League of Nations, which was characterized as ineffective. On 25 April 1945, 50 governments met in San Francisco for United Nations Conference ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because there was no large-scale fighting directly between the two superpowers, but they each supported major regional conflicts known as proxy wars. The conflict was based around the ideological and geopolitical struggle for global influence by these two superpowers, following their temporary alliance and victory against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in 1945. Aside from the nuclear arsenal development and conventional military deployment, the struggle for dominance was expressed via indirect means such as psychological warfare, propaganda campaigns, espionage, far-reaching embargoes, rivalry at sports events, and technological competitions such as the Space Race. The Western Bloc was led by the United States as well as a number of other First W ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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