Time For More On The CD Essays - Audio Storage, Compact Disc

Time For More On The CD The music business is experiencing a recession where record sales are reaching all-time lows. All record companies have in the last few years experienced a considerable decrease in sales. Finding the cause or causes of this has naturally become a major concern for all of them. Some blame the recession in the West in general, but that can hardly explain why one industry is losing out so much more than others. Music today is less from the heart than it used to be only ten years ago. It is mostly a purely commercial product to be used up and thrown away. A lot of modern music has a short but intense life span. People are not prepared to pay as much for a 'disposable' product as they are for a 'reusable'. The hit song of the week is fed to us all through radio and TV so intensely that we need not buy the record. And when it is no longer broadcasted no one remembers it. Attempts to change this and promote more quality, depth and originality in music have not been very successful. The whole entertainment business is ruled by trends and, quality seems to have gone out of style To simply lower the price of a CD is a commonly suggested solution, naturally advocated by the buyers. But no business favors such a remedy. Not only since it reduces their income but also because it sends out the wrong signals to people. It gives the impression that the product is worth less and that the customers have been charged too much before. And if the price can drop by ten per cent this year people might expect it to drop another ten per cent next year. A better settlement could be enhancing the product and giving people more for their money. Thanks to modern technology there can be so much more included on a CD than just music. A computer with a CD-ROM drive, which is becoming quite common, allows us to read several different kinds of information off a CD. A short interview with the artist or 'behind the scenes' features can be included as so called 'Quicktime movies'. Lyric sheets, discographies, extensive biographies and even sheet music can also be added easily. Text files have such small memory requirements compared to sound that the Bible can be stored in less space than a normal length song! There have already been several Cds released which include a lot of this, maybe it is time to make it a standard feature. Since the Internet is also becoming more available to the public several artists have got their own homepage with news and up to date information. These homepages could be elaborated considerably and come to include games and interactive programs. Such programs may let you make your own mix of your favorite song and you could also download sound samples, or MIDI files which will play on a keyboard plugged into your computer. The most interesting parts of these homepages could be made available to 'fans only'. To access it you would need an application program or hard disk authorization available only on the CD. If the customers start visiting the home page more frequently the record companies also have an excellent opportunity to market miscellaneous merchandise and even other artists. That would be extremely desirable in times of a decreasing market. If people feel they are paying too much for a CD and the price cannot be lowered there is only one solution: the product must be enhanced! In order for record companies to survive into the next century it is time for them to evolve.

Definition and Examples of Feghoots

Definition and Examples of Feghoots A feghoot is a narrative (usually  an anecdote or short story) that concludes with an elaborate pun. Also called  a shaggy dog story. The term feghoot is derived from Ferdinand Feghoot, the title character in a series of science fiction stories by Reginald Bretnor (1911-1992), who wrote under the anagrammatic pen name Grendel Briarton. Observation A Feghoot is  supposed to make you moan... Feghoots arent the most useful form of pun: but they can help you end a story- a big problem for many of us. We tell a great anecdote to our friends, get some  laughs, and things are going well until we realize we have no clue how to bring the thing to a close. What do  you do? Give it a moral? An alternative, the Feghoot ending, summarizes your story in a way that makes people laugh- or even more satisfying, groan appreciatively.   (Jay Heinrichs,  Word Hero: A Fiendishly Clever Guide to Crafting the Lines That Get Laughs, Go Viral, and Live Forever. Three Rivers Press, 2011) Feghoot and the Courts The planet of Lockmania, inhabited though it was by intelligent beings that looked like large wombats, had adopted the American legal system, and Ferdinand Feghoot had been sent there by the Earth Confederation to study the results.Feghoot watched with interest as a husband and wife were brought in, charged with disturbing the peace. During a religious observation, when for twenty minutes the congregation was supposed to maintain silence, while concentrating on their sins and visualizing them as melting away, the woman had suddenly risen from her squatting position and screamed loudly. When someone rose to object, the man had pushed him forcefully.The judge listened solemnly, fined the woman a silver dollar and the man a twenty-dollar gold piece.Almost immediately afterward, seventeen men and women were brought in. They had been ringleaders of a crowd that had demonstrated for better quality meat at a supermarket. They had torn the supermarket apart and inflicted various bruises and lacerations on eight of the employees of the establishment. Again the judge listened solemnly and fined the seventeen a silver dollar apiece.Afterward, Feghoot said to the chief judge, I approved of your handling of the man and woman who disturbed the peace.It was a simple case, said the judge. We have a legal maxim that goes, Screech is silver, but violence is golden.In that case, said Feghoot, why did you fine the group of seventeen a silver dollar apiece when they had committed far worse violence?Oh, thats another legal maxim, said the judge. Every crowd has a silver fining.(Isaac Asimov, Feghoot and the Courts. Gold: The Final Science Fiction Collection. HarperCollins, 1995) Pynchons Feghoot: Forty Million Frenchmen Cant Be Wrong Thomas Pynchon, in his 1973 novel Gravitys Rainbow, creates a convoluted setup for a feghoot in the character of Chiclitz, who deals in furs, which are delivered to his storehouse by a group of youngsters. Chiclitz confides to his guest Marvy that he hopes one day to take these boys to Hollywood, where Cecil B. DeMille will use them as singers. Marvy points out that its more likely that DeMille will want to use them as galley slaves in an epic film about the Greeks or Persians. Chiclitz is outraged: Galley slaves?... Never, by God. For DeMille, young fur-henchmen cant be rowing!* (Jim Bernhard, Words Gone Wild: Fun and Games for Language Lovers. Skyhorse, 2010) * A play on the World War I expression, Forty million Frenchmen cant be wrong.Note that Pynchon has fashioned an entire  narrative digression about illicit trading in furs, oarsmen in boats, fur henchmen, and DeMille- all of it in order to launch this pun.(Steven C. Weisenburger,  A Gravitys Rainbow Companion. University of Georgia Press,  2006) My Word! There is a round in the...popular BBC radio panel game My Word! [1956-1990] in which scriptwriters Frank Muir and Denis Norden tell tall stories and funny anecdotes. The essence of one round revolves around a well-known saying or quotation. The participants are asked to tell a story allegedly to illustrate or explain the origin of the given phrase. Inevitably the unlikely stories end in partial, homophonic puns. Frank Muir takes Samuel Pepys And so to bed and makes And saw Tibet out of it. While Denis Norden transforms the proverb Where theres a will theres a way into Where theres a whale theres a Y.(Richard Alexander, Aspects of Verbal Humor in English. Gunter Narr Verlag, 1997)

Team meeting and thair role Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Team meeting and thair role - Essay Example The process architecture, as described by Sammie, is where the direct invoice process precisely positioned. The direct invoicing process falls within its value chain. The modelling conventions was adopted and a justification for the choice given. Second, the business process modelling described in a structured manner, together with any of the assumptions related to the process modelled. The process models were presented in a direct invoicing process. It comprised of the value chain of the SSP where the direct invoicing process belongs. By Allen/Vision, the choreography diagram for the direct invoicing process layered a collaboration diagram for the direct invoicing process. The processes were as per the refinement of the choreography and they pertained; central process model by Nicole and the detailed sub-process models by Ibrahim. The processes and the sub-processes presented were sufficiently

Reproduction Of Poetry Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Reproduction Of Poetry - Essay Example However, the major challenge that has raised controversy is reproduction of art. There are different views on whether art should be reproduced. While some views are in support of reproduction of art, others have sharply criticised it. Nonetheless, with regard to poetry, reproduction of poetry holds many benefits, and these are in relation to reaching mass audiences, as well as maintaining the aura and originality of the original work. Many writers have written different articles to express their views and arguments on reproduction of art. This paper bases on a major work of Davis Douglas, â€Å"The Work of Art in the Age of Digital Reproduction,† that was published in 1995. This is the primary source in this paper. The views of Davis are analysed, and by use of a secondary source; â€Å"Sona Books,† by Magi Jill, it will be possible to determine ways through which reproduction of poetry benefits the authors and audiences without distorting the original work. While Davis in his article supports reproduction of art, Mag focuses on the challenges of publishing poetry, and the overall low popularity of the literature genre. Davis supports reproduction of art by basing on important aspects of art, which he proves that reproduction does not influence them in any adverse manner. For instance, Davis focuses on the aura of the work. He argues that reproduction does not betray the aura of the original work, but instead, it enhances it (381). Therefore, the same applies to poetry, as it is an art form. When poems are reproduced, slight changes might be made to the original work. However, this does destroy the quality of the original work. Instead the quality is enhanced, as sometimes reproduced works might be better than original works. It is also possible to argue that the aura of an art work does not lie in the art work, but is determined by the audience. Therefore, the aura and uniqueness of an art work is determined by the art world and its critiques of the art

African American Literature Essay Example for Free

African American Literature Essay African American literature has a strong deeply rooted background in the history of America, thus giving the writers categorized in this genre a strong message to convey in any story they chose to tell. From tragic life moments to happy life moments, the writers have the ability to tell their story in a variety of methods. This canon of literature serves as a diary for the African American community. All of the literary works that compile this genre reflect the many twists and turns a collective group of persons must endure while struggling to achieve a place in history. The following discussion of three historically significant African American stories reflects the struggles one race of persons had to endure on their journey throughout various time periods in America. The Short Stories In the short story, My White Folks Treated us Good by Mariah Hines the author describes in first person account of a situation when African American slaves were treated well in comparison to the stories of abuse, rape, and neglect most persons are accustom to reading from this era. The slaves never went hungry, always had clothes to wear, were able to work under their own accord, always treated with respect, and were told to take Sundays off while also being encouraged to attend church on Sundays. The slaves were in fact treated so well that when they were free to leave, they choose to remain at their former master’s farm and continued working for him. Hines concluded the Master continued to support his former slaves. Hines stated â€Å"Master helped us much as he could. Some of us he gave a cow or mule or anything he could spare to help us (p. 34). † Moving forward in time, the short story Sweat by Zora Neale Hurston describes a situation of domestic abuse in a long term relationship between a wife, Delia Jones, and her husband, Sykes Jones. Sykes enjoyed torturing Delia, he would find ways to make her job as a washwoman more difficult by kicking the clothes across the room or by scaring her with ways related to her fear of snakes. Sykes enjoyed fighting; he in fact enjoyed it so much so that he intentionally picked fights with Delia. This type of torture strained their marriage to the point of near silence on a daily basis. Sykes thought it to be a good idea to bring a rattlesnake into their home. The rattlesnake got lose in the home, Delia was able to get outside the home but Sykes remained in the home and was attacked in their bedroom. Sykes yelled to Delia for help and comfort, but she was unable to come to him related to fear. Delia finally walked to the door, but due to the nature of his injuries and the distance to the doctor she understood he would not make it through this attack, therefore she allowed him to pass in their backyard. â€Å"She could scarcely reach the chinaberry tree, where she waited in the growing heat while inside she knew the cold river was creeping up and up to extinguish that eye which much known by now that she knew (p. 108). † This story shows how those who choose to abuse others always pay for those actions in the end. Alice Walker wrote the story Nineteen Fifty-Five, about a young white singer, Traynor, who purchased a song from a young African American woman, Gracie Mae, and went on to become famous after recording and releasing his own version. His version of Gracie Mae’s song continued to eat away at Gracie Mae for the rest of her life. It did not have the same meaning, nor was it loved by his fans for the same reasons she hoped it would be. The fans loved Traynor, not the song. Traynor continued to keep in contact with Gracie Mae throughout his time in the army, touring, marriages, and divorces. Then towards after many years, contact stopped and Traynor was found dead after 15 wives and a troubled road in the end. Gracie Mae lived vicariously through Traynor and his portrayal of her song. Gracie Mae herself lived quite happily through the birth of many children, the divorce and/or death of three husbands, the showering of gifts from Traynor, and his ultimate death. Gracie Mae did have a connection to Traynor that flowed deeper than her song. â€Å"One night I dreamed Traynor has split up with his fifteenth wife p. 297). † Due to the stereotypes and prejudices of this time period Gracie Mae and Traynor were never able to express the emotional connection they felt between each other. Common Literary Conventions Literary conventions and themes were similar in the stories; connotations, culture, undertones, and main characters were alike. The three stories were written in first person and portrayed a personal struggle endured by each main character. The main character was always female, strong, and independent in different way. The stories span three different periods of time, yet still reflecting similar struggles in very different settings. These conventions are important when connecting the messages of these stories. Each has a story of struggle, some are internal while others are outward, and each woman must find inner strength to change or cope with their situations. Beginning with My White Folks Treated us Good, this story was historically important in relation to conveying the happiness that could be found in such a dire situation as slavery. Hines showed not all slavery conditions were adverse or abusive; there was still the possibility of enjoying life, and gaining independence by getting the break needed, such as the freeing of all slaves, to make one’s own life better. In Sweat, Hurstson was able write a story about a woman able to persevere in a dreadful situation of both mental and physical abuse. During this time in history, women were not able to be independent and outspoken due to a fear of judgment or increased abuse. Delia was given the chance to be free from the abuses of Sykes and took that chance by allowing him to die from his injuries, thus resulting in her freedom. Following in the same suit, Nineteen Fifty-Five expressed the internal struggle of a woman’s desire to be understood and independent. Gracie Mae wanted to sing her own song and live her own life, without connection to a version of her song that did not represent the original intent. Gracie Mae was happy with her life, but was never free from what the release of her song brought to her life. Conclusion Culturally, these stories are important to all American’s. The historical significance of these stories and the emphasis on equality places a connotation of acceptance and availability of equal opportunity to all persons regardless of color, social class, age, race, gender, or personal situation. African Americans are able to tell their personal stories of struggles and triumphs through literature. This literature is a valuable tool for all persons wanting to educate themselves about significant times in American history. References Young, A. (1996). African American Literature: A brief Introduction and Anthology. New York, New York: HarperCollins College Publishers.

The Work and Skills of Managers within the Organization Essay -- GCSE

The Work and Skills of Managers within the Organization ABSTRACT The aim of this essay is to investigate whether the work and skills of a manager are the same regardless of the level of their position within the organization. Through research conducted into three main theorists namely Henri Fayol, Henry Mintzberg and Robert L. Katz it is concluded that the core work functions a manager does are the same irrespective of position. The work roles in which a manager occupies within the organization are dependent upon the organization and their position within the organization. The skills that are needed by managers are universal to all managers but the composition of these skills is largely dependent upon the manager's position. The work and skills of managers are the same irrespective of the level of their position within the organization. Introduction A manager's job is essential to the smooth operation and profitability of an organization. Can we say that the work and skills that managers need are the same irrespective of their level within the organization? The short answer to the question posed above is yes and no. The long answer is that managers of all levels will perform the same basic management work functions. The role and consequently the type of work the manager does will be dictated by the level of their position within the organization and the type of organization. To accomplish these work functions the manager needs core sets of skills, however the composition of these core sets of skills is dependent upon their level within the organisation. Work Functions of Management Henri Fayol (1841-1925) first proposed the ideas of an ordered set of management functions (Robbins, Bergman, Stagg, Coulter 2003, p. 41). Through Fayol ¡Ã‚ ¯s involvement as managing director of a large French coal-mining firm he developed a framework of management activities (Robbins, et al., 2003, p. 41). The functions of management that Fayol devised included planning, organising, commanding, co-ordinating and controlling (Lamond 1998, p. 6). The idea of core functions that pervades every level of management was revolutionary when Fayol first wrote it and is still used as a framework for many textbooks (Robbins, et al., 2003, p. 9). Through refinement of Fayol ¡Ã‚ ¯s five management functions it is now recognised that there are four distinct management function... ...n be seen that the work of management of all levels consists of the four main management functions, namely planning, organizing, leading and controlling. Works Cited: Carroll, S. & Gillen, D. (1987),  ¡Ã‚ °Are the classical management functions useful in describing managerial work? ¡Ã‚ ±, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 12, No. 1, pp. 38-51. Koontz, H., O ¡Ã‚ ¯Donnell, C. & Weihrich, H. (1982), Essentials of Management, (3rd edn), McGraw-Hill Inc., Sydney. Lamond, D. (1998),  ¡Ã‚ °Back to the future: Lessons from the past for a new management era ¡Ã‚ ±. In G. Griffin (Ed.), Management Theory and Practice: Moving to a New Era, Macmillan. McKenna, S. (2004),  ¡Ã‚ °Predispositions and context in the development of managerial skills ¡Ã‚ ±, Management Decision, Vol. 23, No. 7, pp. 664-677. Mintzberg, H. (1975), The Manager ¡Ã‚ ¯s Job: Folklaw and Fact, Harvard Business Review, July-August, pp49-61. Peterson, T. & Van Fleet, D. (2004),  ¡Ã‚ °The ongoing legacy of R.L. Katz An updated typology of management skills ¡Ã‚ ±, Management Decision, Vol. 42, No. 10, pp. 1297-1308. Robbins, S., Bergman, R., Stagg, I. & Coulter, M. (2003), Management, (3rd edn.), Pearson Education Australia, Frenchs Forest.

Application of Epidemiology to Obesity Essay

Obesity has been defined as a condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to an extent that health may be adversely affected. The classification of overweight and obesity allows the identification of individuals and groups at increased risk of morbidity and premature mortality. 1.Analyze the obesity problem in the U.S. as compared to another developed country in which the obesity problem is not as significant. Include factors such as age, gender, race, socioeconomic status, and marital status in your analysis. Hypothesize the reason why the rate of obesity is higher in the U.S. than the other country. Obesity has been such a struggle for Americans since the early 1980s. According to Fleming, major effort to reduce the proportion of members who are overweight or obesity involves a strategic plan (Fleming, 2008). Obesity varies by age, gender, and by race-ethnic groups. A higher body weight is associated with an increased incidence of a number of conditions, including diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular disease, and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, and with an increased risk of disability. Obesity is associated with a modestly increased risk of all-cause mortality. However, the net effect of overweight and obesity on morbidity and mortality is difficult to quantify. It is likely that a gene-environment interaction, in which genetically susceptible individuals respond to an environment with increased availability of palatable energy-dense foods and reduced opportunities for energy expenditure, contributes to the current high prevalence of obesity (The Epidemiology of Obesity, 2007). The United States is not alone in experiencing increases in the prevalence of obesity. Similar increases have been reported from a number of other countries and regions of the world. For example, in England, the prevalence of obesity (BMI is greater than or equal to 30) among women 25–34 years of age increased from 12% to 24% in only 9 years between 1993 and 2002. In Portugal, increases in overweight among school-age children also have been found. Less-developed countries also have seen increases in obesity (The Epidemiology of Obesity, 2007). Among preschool-age children in urban areas of China, the prevalence of obesity increased from 1.5% in 1989 to 12.6% in 1997(The Epidemiology of Obesity, 2007). Differences in the prevalence of obesity between countries in Europe or between race-ethnic groups in the United States tend to be more pronounced for women than for men. For example, in Europe, the WHO Multinational Monitoring of trends and determinants in cardiovascular disease study, which gathered data from 39 sites in 18 countries, found the prevalence of obesity was similar for men across all sites (The Epidemiology of Obesity, 2007). For women, however, there were marked differences in prevalence between sites, with higher values for women from Eastern Europe. Similarly, in the United States, there are marked differences in the prevalence of obesity by race-ethnic group for women but not for men. According to the U.S. obesity trend, the southern states have the highest prevalence of obesity out of all the fifty states. The CDC stated that more than one-third of U.S. adults (35.7%) are obese. Approximately 17% (or 12.5 million) of children and adolescents aged 2-19 years are obese (Overweight and Obesity, 2011). 2.Compare obesity rates and obesity-related health care costs in your state to all of the U.S. Recommend how your state can treat obesity as a threat to public health. As stated above, Georgia is one of the southern states that have a high prevalence mortality rate. The greatest problem with the statistical linkages between body mass and mortality is that other confounding factors are not considered, leaving little basis for drawing causal inferences. Most epidemiological studies estimating the relationship between body weight and mortality do not control for fitness, exercise, diet quality, weight cycling, diet drug use, economic status, or family history. Furthermore, in studies that control for some of these factors, the data are usually self-reported and thus of extremely questionable reliability. Georgia ranks seventeenth most obese state in the nation. Obesity is one of the biggest public health challenges. Millions of Americans still face barriers like the high cost of healthy foods and lack of access to safe places to be physically active. There has been a significant increase in health care cost in accordance to obesity. The annual cost of obesity in Georgia is estimated at $2.1 billion ($250 per Georgian each year), which includes direct health care costs and lost productivity from disease, disability, and death (indirect costs) (Georgia Data Summary, 2008). Treatment of this epidemic would be rather difficult. At a federal level, the new health reform law, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, has the potential to address the obesity epidemic through a number of prevention and wellness provisions, expand coverage to millions of uninsured Americans, and create a reliable funding stream through the creation of the Prevention and Public Health Fund. People who are overweight or obese have a higher risk for death than people of optimal (normal) weight. An estimate of excess mortality is called the population attributable risk (PAR). PAR is an estimate of the proportion of deaths caused by a particular risk factor, in this case, overweight and obesity. The PAR represents the proportion of deaths in a population that would be eliminated if the risk factor were removed from the population. The PAR for overweight and obesity is the fraction of all deaths that would not occur if everyone were of optimal (normal) weight. The PAR from overweight and obesity is estimated using the prevalence of overweight and obesity in Georgia and the relative risk for dying among overweight and obese persons compared with normal weight persons. The risk varies by age and sex. In Georgia, approximately 10% of the total number of deaths each year is attributable to overweight or obesity, indicating that about 6,700 Georgians dies annually because they are overweight or obese. About 1,500 (22%) of the excess deaths occur among people who are overweight, and 5,200 (78%) occur among those who are obese (Georgia Data Summary, 2008). 3.Suggest how politics of this issue will hinder your ability as an epidemiologist to help your community and / or state deal with the issue of obesity. The medical costs of obesity in the U.S. have been estimated at $75 – $100 billion a year. The estimate for Georgia is about $2.1 billion per year, or $250 per Georgian per year. Excess body fat is associated with both direct costs such as diagnostic and treatment services related to overweight and obesity, and indirect costs such as lost wages and reduced productivity due to illness, disability, and premature death (Georgia Data Summary, 2008). As an epidemiologist, the extra funds would not be available to help those individuals that are obese and want to lose the weight. The U.S. is already spending a large amount of money through medical cost for those obese individuals. A government grant to help individuals may even get refused because again, the funding is coming from the government. Politics would not want to provide funding for a start of a program because it is cost efficient and could be expensive. We are now at a point where governments are belatedly aware of the threat that rising obesity poses to population health as well as to society’s economic well-being and the natural environment. The awareness of the size and complexity of the problem is also evolving into an awareness of the need for multiple actions to achieve a high enough ‘dose of solutions’. There is widespread agreement that a multi-sectorial response will be needed from governments, the private sector, civil society and the public. 4.Propose four (4) new policies or laws that the government can implement to address the obesity problem in the U.S. Include the implications of those policies or laws on people, health insurance, health care providers, businesses, and the food industry. In an ideal world, governments would have been monitoring population obesity trends and have acted early to implement the actions needed to halt and reverse the obesity epidemic. However, this is not the common reality and, indeed, only a handful of countries have monitoring systems in place to detect changes in the prevalence of obesity and its risk factors. As stated above in question number two a new health reform law has to address the obesity epidemic through different wellness, and providing coverage to the millions of Americans. Government could also issue a community transformation grant to individuals that have transformed their obese bodies into healthy balanced bodies. Policies to reduce greenhouse emissions, such as corporate and individual carbon trading, would be powerful stealth interventions for obesity prevention. Congestion taxes, car-free cities, public transport growth and other urban planning options will have increased physical activity as a beneficial side effect and thus contribute to obesity prevention. Reducing the carbon cost of food could also have an effect on energy intake since many of the energy dense foods which promote obesity tend to be more processed, packaged foods in other words, higher in carbon costs. 5.Assess and address the causes which have made obesity rates increase for the past decade. Over the past three decades, obesity has increase significantly. While the exact reasons for increased global obesity were still undetermined, experts said changing habits were likely contributors. Diets are different than they were 30 years ago, and modern technology has decreased physical activity. Developing countries now have a lot of the conveniences that are commonplace in wealthier nations. There are also an increase of automobile, which we are widely dependent on and less walking or bicycling. In conclusion, the drivers of this pandemic that is now affecting rich and poor countries alike must be global in nature and relatively recent in onset. While biological hard-wiring explains the potential for the development of obesity, it cannot explain the secular trends in obesity prevalence. Humans have, for good survival reasons, evolved a biology that is designed to maximize energy intake and minimize physical activity. We seek and enjoy good tasting food (especially sweet, fatty and salty foods) and we seek to reduce the effort needed to do work (by designing machines and technology to do it for us). While these are powerful factors, our biology has not changed over the last 30 years. What has changed dramatically is the environment around us – especially the easy availability of foods and energy-saving machines that feed those biological desires. It is the increasingly obesogenic environments which are promoting especially excessive energy intake but also reduced physical exertion that are driving secular trends.