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The Impact of Immigration on the Populations of the Developed World and their Ethnic Composition
by David Coleman
International migration is now the dominant driver of population increase in most Western European countries and in the English-speaking world, exceeding natural increase considerably and in some cases approaching the annual total addition to population from births. If current trends persist those populations will become "super diverse" with today's 'majority' population no longer numerically dominant.
Figure 1. Rate of natural change and rate of net migration, selected European countries, 2010
Birth rates in developed countries are relatively low, equivalent to a family size (total fertility) of no more than two and much lower in some Southern and Eastern European countries. Population change is thus driven primarily by international migration, not natural change (the difference between the number of births and deaths). In some NW European countries population growth has been raised to levels not seen since the early 1970s (as in the US Australia and New Zealand). Rates of natural increase in European countries are nowhere over 0.4 per thousand; many are negative. Net immigration, however, approached 9 per thousand in some in 2010 (Figure 1).
Table 1. Comparison between natural increase and net migration in selected European countries.
In some countries (Table 1) the annual contribution of migrants to population growth (net of emigration) has been almost as great as the annual number of births (Switzerland, Italy), including births to immigrants. But migration can swing from one extreme to another in times of economic crisis.
The cumulative effects of immigration since the 1960s have been to raise the proportion of immigrants in national populations from (usually) small single figures to around 10% or more (Table 2). The number of immigrants is often substantially greater than the number of foreigners in any given year. Some countries turn foreigners into citizens almost as fast as they arrive in (e.g. France and the Netherlands) through rapid naturalisation.
Table 2. Number of foreign citizens and immigrants in selected European countries.
Distinctive cultural patterns and needs, residential segregation and socio-economic and other forms of disadvantage have persisted among many immigrant populations. Accordingly, some countries estimate populations of foreign origin beyond the 'first (immigrant)' generation. Countries of the English – speaking world ask individuals to specify their 'ethnic origin' or 'ancestry' in census or survey questions. In continental European countries with population registers, parallel estimates are made through registration data on nationality and birthplace of individuals and of their parents. In the former, the ethnic ascriptions extend potentially over an unlimited number of generations. In the latter, the 'third generation' is assumed to have become 'native' (i.e. 'Danish', 'Dutch', etc.) and casino online disappears from statistical view. According to these estimates the population online pokies of 'foreign origin' or 'foreign background' had increased to about 20% of the national total by 2010.
In the US, the non-European racial diversity represented by the US black population was is not of recent immigrant origin. Usually the major national origin components – Moroccans, Turks, Somalis, etc. are projected separately, and broadly grouped into 'Western' or 'High Human Development Index (HDI)' (people mostly of European origin) or non-Western (people of non-European origin) from countries of middle or low HDI.
Figure 2 shows an approximately linear increase of the minority groups to between 20% and over 30% of the national population by the end of the projection period (usually 2050 or 2060). The level of net migration is usually assumed to remain constant, given the difficulty of predicting migration. Those for Norway and The Netherlands are exceptions. In the UK, the favoured variant projection by Rees and his colleagues assumes that dgfev online casino return migration will increase pro rata with growing minority numbers, leading to markedly slower projected growth of the minority populations compared with the highest variant from this author. Later projections for Denmark and The Netherlands in the last decade indicate more modest minority growth than earlier ones, following reductions in immigration partly following restrictive policy initiatives.
Figure 2. Projection of immigrant population by region.
The continuation of these trends online casino in low-fertility countries would eventually lead to the numerical eclipse of the former majority population, assuming that the defined groups remain discrete. The latest US projections assume that the US will become the first industrial country to have a 'majority minority' population in about 2043, although there the black population Whereas the opposition to Neptune suggests attraction to illicit drugs, it also heralds artistic talents, which are efficient because they are indefinable or even magnetic (Taurus- scorpio love horoscope axis). is not, for the most part, of recent immigrant origin. Excitable and unscientific projections apart, few projections of European populations have extended far enough into the future to reach a similar outcome. One projection for the UK (assuming the continuation of recent migration and fertility levels) indicates that all ethnic minority populations together would exceed the number of 'White British' at around 2070.
A comprehensive analysis made on a common methodology for all the EU countries was published by Eurostat in 2010, on four different scenarios. The most conservative of these estimated that 26.5% of the EU population would be of 'foreign background' by 2061, the highest model being 34.6%. Among larger countries, the lowest estimate overall was for Bulgaria (7%); the highest for Belgium, Germany, Spain and Austria, all around 50%.
However, 60 years is a long time in demography and these projections can only illustrate the consequences of specified assumptions. Migration can, and does, go down as well as up- notably in Germany, The Netherlands and Spain in the last few years, and recently from Mexico into the United States. Populations of mixed origins are increasing fast and will have a profound effect on the social scene and on concepts of ethic identity and categorisation.
But none of this is graven in stone. Most depends on migration rates. While their high level may seem inexorable, international migration is the most volatile of demographic components, subject to multiple economic and political uncertainties, and at least in theory subject to policy control. The magnitude of the challenges presented by these trends is very great – to society, national identity, domestic and foreign policy.
David Coleman is Professor of Demography in the Department of Social Policy and Intervention at Oxford University.
References Cited.
Caldwell, C. (2009). Reflections on the Revolution in Europe. Immigration, Islam and the West. London, Allen Lane.
Coleman, D. A. (2006). "Immigration and ethnic change in low-fertility countries: a third demographic transition." Population and Development Review 32(3): 401 – 446.
Coleman, D. A. (2009). "Divergent patterns in the ethnic transformation of societies." Population and Development Review 35(3): 449 – 478.
Coleman, D. A. (2010). "Projections of the Ethnic Minority Populations of the UK, 2006 – 2056."Population and Development Review 36(3): 441 – 486.
Lanzieri, G. (2011). Fewer, older and multicultural? Projections of the EU populations by foreign/national background Luxemburg, Eurostat. http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_OFFPUB/KS-RA-11-019/EN/KS-RA-11-019-EN.PDF
Steinmann, G. and M. Jaeger (2000). "Immigration and Integration: Non-linear Dynamics of Minorities."Journal of Mathematical Population Studies 9(1): 65 – 82.
United Nations (2000). Replacement Migration: Is it a Solution to Declining and Ageing Populations?New York, United Nations.
Wohland, Pia , Phil Rees, Paul Norman, Peter Boden and Martyna Jasinska (2010) Ethnic population projections for the UK and local areas, 2001-2051. Working Paper 10/02, School of Geography, University of Leeds. http://www.geog.leeds.ac.uk/research/wpapers
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Filed under: GT2030 | Tagged as: Europe, immigrants, immigration, population aging, Western Europe
Urbanization and American National Security
By Kori Schake
It has long been the case that American foreign policy is most successful when it reaches beyond governments to societies (think Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin shaping French attitudes). The diversification of major power centers in other countries will require our government to shift its focus away from making policy in capitols, simply because capitols will no longer be the place where decisions get made in other countries. We are ourselves emblematic of this diversification, the separation of our seat of government from our financial capital having been a conscious one to prevent centralization of power. Natural forces further diversified the geography of American society: entertainment centered in Hollywood; literature in Boston and New York; manufacturing in what is now, sadly, the rust belt; computers in silicon valley and Redmond, Washington.
But our foreign policies have not yet adapted to these changes. It will not be adequate to talk to government ministers, yet that remains predominantly how we conduct our foreign policy. There are over twenty cities of more than a million people in which our State Department has no representation; where there are Embassies, they are literal bastions of American power inhospitable (because of security precautions) to engagement with civic groups. The Foreign Service spends nearly all of its resources on language training, yet the overwhelming majority of our diplomats lack the facility to participate in live debates in the native languages of the countries in which they are posted. This is the result of a system that prizes generalists; the nature of change in the international order demands specialist skills that we neither recruit or develop in our diplomats.
While the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review acknowledges these shortcomings (even if it is somewhat breathless about the newness of developments that are not really new), State has not followed through with spending and managerial effort to redress them. Moreover, State still treats shaping attitudes in other countries as a special skill — "public diplomacy" — rather than the most important reason for posting diplomats abroad. As a society, we are predisposed to understand messy, small-ball mosaics of power and organization; as a government, we are typically too lazy or ignorant to operate that way. That must change. We must understand the complexity of other societies and navigate them effectively to build public support, not just engage the governments in power, if we want to remain successful in the international order Global Trends 2030 identifies.
A second major effect of urbanization for American national security will be in the area If you cancel yourappointment more than twice the driving permit fee will be forfeited. of immigration. We have long been the beneficiary of other countries' deficiencies, drawing their talent. Richard Rosecrance identified in the mid-1990s the importance amidst globalization of winning the competition for talent. Rosecrance argued that the online casino's traditional elements of state power shifted with a country's level of development, from controlling territory that produced commodities, to controlling trade that created wealth from manufactured goods, to enabling virtual corporations focused on product design, marketing, and financing (Rosecrance, The Rise of the Virtual State, Foreign Affairs, July/August 1996). States with the highest level of development would compete for intellectual capital, a factor of production that cannot be compelled by force but must be attracted by opportunity and incentive.
Marx famously said that religion is the opiate of the masses; suburban life as practiced by Americans may likewise be an opiate of the masses. That is, what most people in the world want is the boring pleasantness of their own house, spending their time taking kids to sports practice and discussing traffic or a local eyesore with their neighbors. It has a pacifying tendency on behavior, but it is predicated on a standard of living, societal and governmental infrastructure that has been beyond the reach of most countries. If people don't need to leave other online casino canada countries to enjoy the benefits we have, we will get less of the world's intellectual and entrepreneurial talent coming to us.
And immigration has been the way America compensates for our incapacities. We import much of our scientific and technical expertise, overcoming the paucity of science education in our own children with the attractiveness of our higher education systems and job opportunities. As the Economist cautioned in its reporting on London, so here: we are making policy choices that disincline people to choose us, whether because of our homeland security policies or nativist "lump of labor" ideas that jobs are limited and must be preserved from export. As the rest of the world comes to have the urban and suburban advantages we enjoy, we need to end our complacency and get serious about competing for the world's talent. And we need to strengthen our own domestic base, most especially in education.
The third effect of urbanization I would note for American national security results from is who is modernizing: it is the so-called developing world. As Amartya Sen has put it, the greatest beneficiaries of globalization are the world's poor. Countries that are urbanizing are those that have been poor and are growing wealthy. This is to be applauded, not only as a moral good, but as an expansion of opportunity for countries that may take a greater interest in global issues and have the resources to participate in shaping them. The United States needs more countries to share the burden of sustaining the global order that has served and the world so well. In the 1940s and 1950s, America believed decolonization would produce a wave of new allies for our policies. On that basis, we refused Churchill's pleas to sustain their empire, refused to support our closest allies in a war against Nasserite Egypt. If we welcome the arrival of countries that have pulled themselves out of poverty, remain a voice for the truths we hold to be self-evident, and emphasize accountable governance, the international order of 2030 has the potential to be even more beneficial to American interests than the one we now enjoy.
Kori Schake is a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution. She has served in a variety of positions with the U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of State, and the National Security Council staff. Her recent publications include State of Disrepair: Fixing the Culture and Practices of the State Department(Hoover Institution Press, 2012) and Managing American Hegemony: Essays on Power in a Time of Dominance (Hoover Institution Press, 2009).
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Filed under: GT2030, Megatrends | Tagged as: Department of State, diplomacy, immigration, national security, Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review, United States, urbanization


Horst Seehofer has been fond of saying lately that the asylum process shouldn't work on the principle that "those who are truthful are taken for idiots." His sentence refers to the fact that sometimes those who are truthful about where they come from are getting sent back or refused asylum quicker than those who have managed to lie their way through the system and pass themselves off as coming from a country to which it is not safe to be returned. Seehofer wants things to change, as of April, and wants to start managing the asylum process more closely.
In the new law proposal, he wants all adult asylum seekers to spend 18 months in asylum centers if they haven't yet received any kind of protection status. Families and minors are expected to stay in centers for a maximum of six months. Anyone who is found to have lied about their identity or is seen to be hindering the administration process, for instance by not providing the documents that the administrators request or refusing to disclose information, will be kept in the centers. The aim is to make it easier for these people to be sent back to where they came from.
Recently, the German government has allowed for those who already have a job, even when they have not received any kind of protection, to stay in the country longer. These kinds of rights will be removed from those who are found to have lied, explained Seehofer.
Normally those who live in centers of first reception are not allowed to work. This too will change if the government hasn't made a decision over the applicant's asylum status after nine months. If the asylum seeker has cooperated with the administrators, they should be allowed to work. This will not apply to people who come from designated "safe countries" like Serbia or Ghana, to where people can be easily sent back.
Currently, refugee claims are reassessed every three years to see if people still qualify for refugee protection. In order to avoid an administrative backlog when checking the estimated 700,000 people who arrived between 2015 and 2017 which are now due for reassessment, the government is proposing extending the deadline from currently three years to five years. They say this will avoid the delays which happened when they tried to process the large numbers of people who arrived in 2015. The Left party, Die Linke say that this shouldn't even be necessary since very few people's asylum status has actually changed in that short time.
Information based on a report from the German news agency dpa.


What does a Mine Cutting and Channeling Machine Operator do?
home / occupations / What does a Mine Cutting and Channeling Machine Operator do?
Position jacks, timbers, or roof supports, and install casings, to prevent cave-ins.
Reposition machines and move controls to make additional holes or cuts.
Cut entries between rooms and haulage ways.
Observe indicator lights and gauges, and listen to machine operation to detect binding or stoppage of tools or other equipment problems.
Replace worn or broken tools and machine bits and parts, using wrenches, pry bars, and other hand tools, and lubricate machines, using grease guns.
Press buttons to activate conveyor belts, and push or pull chain handles to regulate conveyor movement so that material can be moved or loaded into dinkey cars or dump trucks.
Move planer levers to control and adjust the movement of equipment, the speed, height, and depth of cuts, and to rotate swivel cutting booms.
Cut slots along working faces of coal, salt, or other non-metal deposits to facilitate blasting, by moving levers to start the machine, and to control the vertical reciprocating drills.
Signal that machine plow blades are properly positioned, using electronic buzzers or two-way radios.
Cut and move shale from open pits.
Drive mobile, truck-mounted, or track-mounted drilling or cutting machine in mines and quarries or on construction sites.
Move controls to start and position drill cutters or torches and advance tools into mines or quarry faces to complete horizontal or vertical cuts.
Advance plow blades through coal strata by remote control, according to electronic or radio signals from the tailer.
Determine locations, boundaries, and depths of holes or channels to be cut.
Signal crew members to adjust the speed of equipment to the rate of installation of roof supports, and to adjust the speed of conveyors to the volume of coal.
Remove debris such as loose shale from channels and planer travel areas.
Charge and set off explosives in blasting holes.
Signal truck drivers to position their vehicles for receiving shale from planer hoppers.
Monitor movement of shale along conveyors from hoppers to trucks or railcars.
Guide and assist crews in laying track for machines and resetting planer rails, supports, and blocking, using jacks, shovels, sledges, picks, and pinch bars.
Free jams in planer hoppers, using metal pinch bars.


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/*
===================================================================================
The real deal
===================================================================================
*/
html { height:100%; }

body {}

h1 a, h2 a, h3 a, h4 a, h5 a, h6 a { text-decoration:none; }

/* special */

.titleCase { text-transform: capitalize; }

.alignCenter { text-align: center; }
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}

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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Q: Dynamically show/hide the pagination option in the react ag-grid I am using the react ag-grid in one of my react example. I want to show/hide the pagination panel on button click once ag-grid is loaded.
<div className="ag-theme-alpine">
      <button onClick={e => setPagination(!pagination)}>Show/Hide Pagination</button>

      <AgGridReact
        pagination={pagination}
        ...
        ...
      >
        <AgGridColumn field="name" />
        <AgGridColumn field="year" />
      </AgGridReact>
    </div>

Look at the above sample code. When I am trying to log the pagination value then it is become true/false but it's not reflected on ag-grid.
Can you please help me how to change the grid options and refresh the react ag-grid again?

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
helpme@satrixnow.co.za
Solution home SatrixNOW Privacy, Trust and Tax info Updates to SatrixNOW Terms and Conditions
Update to SatrixNOW Terms and Conditions - 3 Nov 2016 - Recurring Investment, Debit order functionality
Modified on: Wed, 21 Feb, 2018 at 11:53 AM
Our new Recurring Investments functionality allows clients to give us an instruction to take funds from their bank account on a regular basis (monthly, quarterly, annually) and then invest those funds in a particular ETF of their choice.
And clients can set this up quickly and easily on the SatrixNOW platform.
Certain new functionality requires us to update our Terms and Conditions, so please consult the Summary of amendments to our SatrixNOW Terms and Conditions ( detailed below ), and the full Terms and Conditions if need be.
To view the full Terms and Conditions please click HERE.
Summary of amendments to SatrixNOW Terms and Conditions
1 Our SatrixNOW Terms and Conditions (the Contract) have been amended. This notice contains a summary of the material changes to the Contract to provide for the introduction of Recurring Investments and Debit Orders on the SatrixNOW Platform.
2 The definitions used in the explanations of the material amendments below are the same definitions used in the Contract.
Material amendments made to the Contract
3 Recurring Investments and Debit Orders
3.1 The Contract has been amended by inserting a new clause 13 entitled "RECURRING INVESTMENTS AND DEBIT ORDERS", which sets out the terms and conditions applicable to Recurring Investments and Debit Orders. Under this new clause, you will be able set up a Recurring Investment which will enable you to purchase a pre-determined Rand value of Issuer Securities at multiple future dates, for example, monthly, quarterly or yearly on the SatrixNOW Platform.
3.2 You must ensure that you always have enough Free Money in your Account to pay for your Recurring Investments. You will be liable to pay for your Recurring Investments by means of a debit against the positive balance of the Free Money in your Account. You will also be able to set up a periodic Debit Order to pay an amount of money into your Account for any purpose in terms of the contract, including for purposes of paying for your Recurring Investments.
3.3 As a result of this new functionality we have had to amend certain definitions and add new definitions to clause 2.1 of the Contract, and update clause 8 (Account Types), clause 19 (Charges) and clause 23 (Payments) in order to cater for Recurring Investments and payments by means of Debit Order.
3.4 In addition, Clause 14.3 dealing with the removal of Issuer Securities from a Basket has been amended to provide you with the option to (either for a time period or indefinitely) block investments in certain Issuer Securities on the Settings Page. In doing so, the Issuer Securities which you have blocked will automatically be excluded from any Baskets which you may purchase in future.
3.5 An additional Recurring Investment Fee will be payable for each one of your Recurring Investment Orders in accordance with clause 13.8 of the amended Contract. If you set up a Debit Order, then an additional Debit Order Fee will be payable for the processing of each one of your Debit Orders in accordance with clause 13.8 of the amended contract. If you have elected to set up a Debit Order and your Debit Order fails for any reason, a Debit Order Failure Charge will be payable for each unsuccessful Debit Order in accordance with clause 13.8 of the amended contract.
4 Other amendments
4.1 Clause 2.1(6) has been added to include a definition of "Annual Debit Order Increase" so that you can understand that you may elect to increase your Debit Order amount yearly by a certain percentage.
4.2 Clause 2.1(7) has been added to include a definition of "Annual Recurring Investment Increase" so that you can understand that you may elect to increase your Recurring Investment Amount yearly by a certain percentage.
4.3 Clause 2.1(25) has been added to include a definition of "Debit Order Failure Charge" so that you can understand that you will be liable to pay a charge for each unsuccessful Debit Order, and how that fee will be disclosed to you.
4.4 Clause 2.1(26) has been added to include a definition of "Debit Order Fee" so that you can understand that you will be liable to pay a charge for each Debit Order, and how that fee will be disclosed to you.
4.5 Clause 2.1(32) has been added to include a definition of "Execution Queue" so that you can understand that your Recurring Investment Orders will be executed in a system generated random order and as a result, your Recurring Investment Order(s) may be delayed.
4.6 Clause 2.1(35) has been added to include a definition of "Free Money" so that you can understand what it means to have Free Money reflecting in your Account.
4.7 Clause 2.1(53) has been added to include a definition of "Pending Transactions" so that you can understand that once your Recurring Investment Order has been accepted and raised on the Platform, it may not for certain reasons, be immediately executed on the SatrixNOW Platform and could remain in the Execution Queue for a period of time.
4.8 Clause 2.1(58) has been added to include a definition of "Recurring Investment" so that you can understand what a Recurring Investment is in terms of clause 13 of the Contract.
4.9 Clause 2.1(59) has been added to include a definition of "Recurring Investment Amount" so that you can understand that you may select the amount which you intend to invest periodically in a Recurring Investment.
4.10 Clause 2.1(60) has been added to include a definition of "Recurring Investment Fee" so that you can understand that the Recurring Investment option is provided to you at a fee, and how that fee will be disclosed to you.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The screen saver got off to a rocky start, and has continued to be a computer program that generates as many screams as it does screens. The controversy has returned.
Novelist Bob Heinlein got this great idea for a screen saver. Unfortunately, it came 20 years before it was needed. Computers lacked screens in 1961.
That was the rocky start of a computer program that would generate as many screams as it did screens. The controversy has returned.
Screen savers saved monitors. The phosphors in the old cathode-ray monitors over years burned a permanent image into the screen. The program you used most often appeared in a gray shadow, called ghosting.
When Windows arrived, whole desktops would ghost. How aggravating.
The fix was a screen saver that switched on after the system sensed it was idle. They displayed a moving image that neatly prevented burn in.
Early ones were quite fascinating, turning your monitor into an art frame. Soon came problems.
Some users accused their savers of triggering seizures. Savers often were sloppy programs, causing RAM memory to drain and eventually lock up the system.
HP's latest guidance is to turn off the saver, period. Modern LCD screens don't need them, and that includes all laptops.
The only other reason to have one is for the pretty pictures, but the rush to save energy dashed that.
HP says screen savers do more harm than good, prematurely wearing out monitors. That's understandable. There's a lot going on to power those graphics.
The problem with LCD monitors is the background fluorescent light. It's usually the first thing to blow. It stays on all the time with a screen saver, shortening its life.
All computers now come with a government-mandated power saving feature that, like a screensaver, senses user inactivity.
Instead of launching the saver, it shuts down the monitor and hard drive and puts the system into sleep mode. This saves energy and wear on the system.
Make sure your monitor isn't running a screen saver. It's in the Display portion of Control Panel or in Mac's System Preferences. Don't bypass sleep mode. Your monitor sheds contrast, up to 50 percent over its lifetime. Screensavers speed up this process.
Legendary programs die hard. Screen savers tempting us to turn our monitors into art will be around for many more years. You're not saving anything with them, so don't believe the name. They come with heavy baggage.


text:
Q: Need a list previous quarters based on current date My requirement is simple, I need to show newsletters for last 3 quarters in the screen.
For this I'll have to set the news letter pdf links in session.
So if the user logs in on Feb 2013, he should see 3 links namely
'Newsletter Q1 2013'
'Newsletter Q4 2012'
'Newsletter Q3 2012'

Here is the code so far,
        String newsLetter1 = null;
        String newsLetter2 = null;
        String newsLetter3 = null;
           Date date  = new Date();
           Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance(Locale.US);
           cal.setTime(date);
           int month = cal.get(Calendar.MONTH);
           int quarter = (month / 3) + 1;
    //Do something here to populate newsLetter1, newsLetter2 , newsLetter3
      variables based on current date
           session.setAttribute("newsLetter1", "Newsletter  "+newsLetter1 );
           session.setAttribute("newsLetter2", "Newsletter  "+newsLetter2);
           session.setAttribute("newsLetter3", "Newsletter  "+newsLetter3);

I've given it a good thought, but couldn't think of any possible solutions. Please help.

A: In every iteration you can sub 3 monthes from current date and calculate quarter by the formula you already have.
int newsLetters = 3;
final Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance(Locale.US);
for (int i = 0; i < newsLetters; i++) {
  cal.add(Calendar.MONTH, -3);
  int quarter = (cal.get(Calendar.MONTH) / 3) + 1;
  System.out.println("Newsletter Q" + quarter + " " + cal.get(Calendar.YEAR));
}

The output:
Newsletter Q2 2013
Newsletter Q1 2013
Newsletter Q4 2012

A: You can find quarter as follows
 Calendar cal=Calendar.getInstance();
    int month = cal.get(Calendar.MONTH);
    int quarter=0;
    if(month<5){
        quarter=1;
        // news letter belongs to quarter 1
    }else if(month<9){
       quarter=2;
       // news letter belongs to quarter 2
    }else {
        quarter=3;
       // news letter belongs to quarter 3
    }

If you want to year with quarter use following
 Calendar cal=Calendar.getInstance();
    int month = cal.get(Calendar.MONTH);
    int year =cal.get(Calendar.YEAR);
    if(month<5){
        System.out.println(year+" "+"quarter "+1);
    }else if(month<9){
        System.out.println(year+" "+"quarter "+2);
    }else {
        System.out.println(year+" "+"quarter "+3);
    }

A: I would do it like this
    Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance();
    int month = cal.get(Calendar.MONTH);
    int q1 = (month / 3) + 1;
    int q2 = q1 == 1 ? 4 : q1 - 1;
    int q3 = q2 == 1 ? 4 : q2 - 1;
    session.setAttribute("newsLetter1", "Newsletter  " + q1);
    session.setAttribute("newsLetter2", "Newsletter  " + q2);
    session.setAttribute("newsLetter3", "Newsletter  " + q3);

notes
1) Locale is not relevant in this case
2) cal.setTime(date) is not needed, Calendar.getInstance already returns an instance based on the current time


text:
edyong
Unconscious brain activity shapes our decisions
By edyong on April 13, 2008.
Our brains are shaping our decisions long before we become consciously aware of them. That's the conclusion of a remarkable new study which shows that patterns of activity in certain parts of our brain can predict the outcome of a decision seconds before we're even aware that we're making one.
It seems natural to think that we carry out actions after consciously deciding to do so. I decide to start typing and as a result, my hands move around a keyboard. But according to modern neuroscience, that feeling of free will may be an illusion. For over twenty years, experiments have suggested that, unbeknownst to us, a large amount of mental processing goes on in unconsciously before we become aware that we intend to act.
The first such study was done by Benjamin Libet in 1983. Libet asked volunteers to press a button at a time of their choice, and to remember the position of the second hand of a wristwatch when they first felt the urge to move. While this happened, Libet measured the activity of their supplementary motor area (SMA), a part of the brain involved in planning movements. Astonishingly, he found that the SMA became active about half a second before the volunteer felt a conscious desire to press the button.
The seminal experiment suggested that the brain makes decisions on a subconscious level and that people only believe that they consciously drove their actions in hindsight. The experiment seemed to put a dent in beliefs about free will and understandably, it has proved to be controversial. Some have criticised the techniques that Libet used, claiming that inaccurate measurements could explain that the small gap between brain activity and conscious awareness.
For those who were convinced by the experiment's results, a slew of important questions remained. Is the SMA the source of the decision, or is it responding to other parts of the brain even higher up the chain of command? And is this unconscious activity a sign that the relevant areas of the brain are revving into readiness, or does it actually predict the action that is eventually taken? Now, Chong Siong Soon and colleagues from the Max Planck Institute have addressed these queries with an elegant update of Libet's work.
Pick a button, any button
Soon asked 36 volunteers to watch a letter in the centre of a computer screen, that changed every half-second. As the letters streamed by, the volunteers had to press one of two buttons, whenever they felt like it. When that happened, they were given a choice of four letters and had to choose the one that was up when they made their button-pressing decision.
As they did this, Soon measured their brain activity using a scanning technique called functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). He then used a statistical technique called pattern recognition to see if he could match the patterns of activity in different parts of the brain at different times with the choice to press the right or left button.
On average, the volunteers took about 22 seconds to press the button and felt that they consciously decided to do so about a second or less before they made the movement. But the fMRI data told a much different story. Two parts of the brain - the frontopolar cortex and the precuneus -showed activity that predicted the choices that the volunteers made and in the frontopolar cortex, this activity happened a whopping 7 seconds before the subjects were consciously aware of their decisions.
These astonishing results suggest that by the time we become consciously aware of a decision to move, our choices have already been influenced for several seconds by the actions of the frontopolar cortex. The study goes well beyond Libet's original work. It shows that this preliminary activity is far from a general and non-specific curiosity, but can actually predict a decision. Nor can it be explained away by inaccuracies in measurement - the timescales involved were far too long for that.
These associations have never been seen until now because neither the frontopolar cortex not the precuneus were more active in total in the time leading up to the button press. Instead, it was the pattern of firing neurons within these areas that predicted the final decision, and it took the use of pattern recognition techniques for this effect come to light.
The involvement of the frontopolar cortex isn't surprising. It fulfils the role of an executive manager and is involved in retrieving memories and controlling other high-level parts in the brain. Soon thinks that it is the source of the decision itself, with the precuneus simply storing the decision until it reaches a conscious level. When he changed his experiment so that volunteers were shown a cue to tell them when to make their choice, the frontopolar cortex still showed predictive activity before the signal, but the precuneus only did so in the time between signal and action.
Soon found, as Libet did, that the SMA was also active before the volunteers became conscious about their intentions. But he also showed that its pattern of activity can predict when the final decision is made. Again, this information is available at an unconscious level about 5 seconds before the volunteers actually move. The frontopolar and parietal cortex aren't involved in timing until the few milliseconds before the movement, so it seems that the two parts of the brain have different and complementary duties. One shapes the outcome of a choice and the other affects its timing.
Soon tentatively suggests that the sparks of a decision begin in the frontopolar cortex. From there, the decision is 'prepared' by the buildup of activity in the precuneus and later, the SMA. It is held there for a short while before we become consciously aware of it and act. This unconscious part of the decision-making process may be for our own good. At least one experiment showed that people with damage to the relevant parts of the brain don't show any signs of unconscious preparation and make poorer decisions in a gambling experiment.
Studies like these have important philosophical implications. If our brains unconsciously make our decisions for us, is there any room for free will? Libet himself thinks so, but only in a restricted way. He asserts that for all the brain's unconscious preparation, people can still consciously decide to stop performing an action in the final milliseconds before thought becomes deed. In this view, it's more a case of "free won't" than free will.
Reference: Soon, C.S., Brass, M., Heinze, H., Haynes, J. (2008). Unconscious determinants of free decisions in the human brain. Nature Neuroscience DOI: 10.1038/nn.2112
Images: Thinker photo by Satyakamk
There's no reason to assume we don't have free will just because we aren't conscious of the decision making process. There's still a decision process that our brains are just as free, or not free, to make one way or the other (assuming they were at all free to make decisions to begin with). The ability to consciously choose what information to look at, that then becomes part of the basis for making unconscious inferences, is where the nexus of the free will dilemma sits. Are those conscious choices predetermined, or at least an inevitable consequence of physical laws governing cause and effect? That's the real question, and there has so far been no reliable answer except that on balance we can expect to be better off by acting as if we have free will, regardless of our philosophies.
By royniles (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
I'd actually be interested in experiments as to whether people can stop a decision that's be unconsciously prepared. I've long wondered if my decisions were made unconsciously and only rationalized afterward, but I can also think of times when I had decided to do something and then stopped myself -- but it's equivocal as sometimes I only stopped myself a few seconds after I started. Perhaps researchers could assign a task, and then ask people to decide when to stop performing that task.
By GAC (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
But royniles, there's no reason to assume we *do* have free will, either. Certainly not in the classic sense of a conscious, independent, decision-making unmoved mover.
And we must not confuse "determined" with "predetermined"--quite a lot of what shapes our behavior is selection by consequences of actions, not a billiard-ball determinism. Evolution by natural selection is determined, but it is certainly not predetermined. The consequences of our actions increase or decrease the probability of those actions in the future in a deterministic and lawful manner.
Acting *as if* we have free will is useful because it does highlight the consequences of our actions rather than the antecedents. I would argue, though, that planning a society is best served by assuming we *do not* have free will, and that our environments shape our behavior. Build schools now, and you won't have to spend as much on prisons later.
By Anon (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
It's hard to see why we should have a consciousness at all, if the conscious decision is delayed in time this way.
There's another possibility, which could explain why we have a consciousness. Unfortunately this seems to be a violation of physics: That consciousness have a limited capability to influence the past!
1) An unconscious process prepares the decision in one part of the brain.
2) The decision becomes conscious.
3) Consciousness somehow determine or change the pattern of activity in another part of the brain - a few seconds back in time!
4) This activity determine the act.
Sounds crazy, but wouldn't it have a clear survival value in nature?
By mogmich (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
That's one heck of a lot for a "somehow" to do in step three, mogmich. There are other theories of consciousness that don't require backward causation. The only trick is, none of the logically coherent ones allow for a causal conscious free will in the classic sense.
This has nothing to do with free will. You "choose" to respond to your urges. And many times, you choose not to.
In my humble opinion, the debate between free will and determinism is just semantic trickery. We confuse the rules that govern language with an all-pervasive reality. Pffft. Or maybe the term "free will" is just vague, ill-conceived, and entirely misapplied.
We neither have nor do not have free will.
By Sean Nicolle (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
There are two free will versus determinism debates. One determinism definition is "hard" determinism, which is AFAICT, that the equations of physics describe a unique solution from a given initial condition. This is the one I find interesting.
Then there's "soft" determinism, which is something for which I don't know exactly what the term means, but it seems to be kind of just the question of whether we're at the mercy of circumstance and the situations that we find ourselves in. Not too interesting to me.
Discussions of free will tend to have the trouble of coming up with a satisfactory definition. The definition I like is in terms of the uniqueness of solutions to an initial value problem.
Another point that always comes up and is worth emphasizing, is that the existence of a decision-making process is not the same as "free will" (under some definitions, anyway). There is no reason why a deterministically operating machine can't make decisions -- computers do it all the time. So it's certainly true that our brains make decisions and a choice-making process exists, but if the brain is operating deterministically (i.e. if given sufficient information about the initial conditions some time in the past, we could predict with certainty what the outcome will be up to some specified time in the future) then it would not mean that we have "free" will (again, depending on the definition you like). That is, choice may exist, but that doesn't mean it's necessarily a "free" choice.
It seems that often what people mean when they say "free" will could best be described as "endogenous" will i.e. is the decision coming from "within" us? That relates more to the "soft determinism" definition of free will, it seems to me.
Note that, at least in the "hard determinism" sense, free will has much the same status as God: there are no observations that require it in order to be explained, it doesn't fit well into the current picture of the universe we have, if it does exist then it's lurking in one of the few remaining corners we don't fully understand yet (such as the quantum measurement process, in the case of "free will"), and the main reason people believe in it seems to be for their own personal emotional reasons.
By El Christador (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
Anon: I'm not clear on the difference between "determined" and "predetermined" according to your definitions.
Thanks for the link to
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/275/5304/1293
and its wonderful collection of citations; following that work forward through the past decade, we've learned a lot.
Including a lot about why it's easier to cheat old people, when those unconscious evaluation processes have started to get unreliable with increasing age in some people.
Let's just hope nobody tells the mortgage brokers and check cashing shops about this.
Oh, wait ...
By Hank Roberts (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
I agree with royniles here. I don't see why the unconsciousness of a decision would exclude having a free will about that very - unless anyone every thought that free will is detached from brain function. If you accept that even free will is a complicated form of brain function, then whether that decision is conscious or unconscious is not so important.
By raiko (not verified) on 13 Apr 2008 #permalink
seven seconds is longer than we often have to make decisions --- snap judgments about how to navigate a vehicle in traffic often have to be made and executed based on information more recent than that, just for the obvious example. could this experiment be highlighting a special case of cognition?
also, i'm wary of speaking about "the unconscious" as if it were some alien homunculus with a personality all its own pulling the strings of my brain when i'm not watching. what's being seen on these fMRI's could just as easily be the infrastructures that generate consciousness at work, in my opinion.
By Nomen Nescio (not verified) on 14 Apr 2008 #permalink
The post and comments are all referring to normal subjects, but perhaps this finding's chief benefit may be in studying abnormal subjects. Maybe the amount of time between subconscious and conscious decision would be a useful parameter for diagnosing and studying people who aren't functioning as well as others. (I'm grabbing this a bit from an odd little scifi paper by Isaac Asimov on Thiotimolene from at least 25 years ago)
By BAllanJ (not verified) on 14 Apr 2008 #permalink
Your lucid discussion of Soon's powerful empirical update of Libet's earlier revelations is as good as it gets.
Your love of science and your ability to share that love shines through.
Are you sure that you aren't Italian?
By gerald spezio (not verified) on 14 Apr 2008 #permalink
But he also showed that its pattern of activity can predict when the final decision is made. Again, this information is available at an unconscious level about 5 seconds before the volunteers actually move.
No, it isn't. Unfortunately you forgot to mention the actual prediction rates: 60% before the conscious decision and 75% after conscious decision when SMA peaks activity.
To sell 60% in contrast to a random 50% chance as "prediction" is spin, not science.
And Libet's did not just "think". It is frustating that every time people come up with Libets experiments to "prove"
the non-existence of free will that they convieniently forget the last experiment: Libet asked the participants to reverse their decision on a signal. So he found out that the point of no return is actually 0,1-0,2 seconds before the final action, the observed increase in SMA is therefore the preparation of movement, not a valid predictor of the outcome.
By TSK (not verified) on 14 Apr 2008 #permalink
Great comments everyone - I've certainly learnt a lot from them. I'm pretty sure I'm not Italian unless my parents aren't telling me something. The 60% prediction rate is low, but from the paper, it was also statistically significant. For readers wanting more on this, have a look at Steven Novella's excellent write-up at NeuroLogica.
By Ed Yong (not verified) on 15 Apr 2008 #permalink
Nope, you're not Italian unless my parents aren't telling me something! - Mummy.
By Alice Yong (not verified) on 15 Apr 2008 #permalink
First of all, it seems all scientific research has problems in their core, if seen from the point of view of autonomist epistemology. That is, the possibility to know anything at all (through senses and properly working cognition) relies on the presumption of the validity of sense perception and cognition of the perceiver. These has to be justified on the basis of themselves. This is circular reasoning.
Secondly, and very interestingly, in some India books, written in sanksrit, the problem of free will is explained in a way, that bears similarities with these neuroscientific explanations presented by researchers.
In short, according to these scriptures the feeling (illusion) of free will happens due to the identification of consciousness (or maybe more precisely consciouss awareness) to the body-mind. Scriptures bring forth, that body-mind in under total conduction of the gunas, which are basic principles constructing the whole of the manifested universe (prakrti).
Of course the language of used in this books and in their translations is somewhat different comparing to neuroscientifical language, but the ideas seem really similar. Except, that these neuroscientific explanation can, very understandingly, deal only with the so called natural world due to the theoretical and empirical resctrictions of natural sciences.
In these sanskrit books supernatural realms are presupposed. And supernatural means, according to present understanding observable in the body-mind of the writer of this text, something that is beyond the capabilities of human sense perceptions and cognitive capacities.
Here's a link to one verse:
http://www.bhagavad-gita.org/Gita/verse-03-27.html
By Toni Honkala (not verified) on 16 Apr 2008 #permalink
The study has appeared on a number of blogs in a number of different contexts but always making the same point - that imaging can detect activity which suggests the decision to press a left or right button is made a number of milliseconds BEFORE we are consciously aware of having made the decision. The accuracy of the prediction based on imaging has been reported at approximately 60% if I recall correctly.
Whilst this accuracy is greater than chance, meaning the prediction has some validity, I think that the conclusion that humans only have an illusion of free will is a very poor one. The decision to press a left or right button is essentially a "random" decision, as random as choosing A or B can ever be from within your own mind, rather than flipping a coin. My point is that, in a "random" decision such as this, is it really surprising that micropatterns in neural activity, which could easily be described as neural "noise" give the person a subconcious inclination to chose one button over another? As the person may feel they are choosing the button "at random" using their own "free will" this is not surprising at all.
Now, if we consider a "reasoned" as opposed to "random" use of free will, the pattern might be very different. Consider quitting smoking cigarettes, which is a hard act of free will, requiring "willpower". In this case, although it is not yet possible to detect this, we could hypothesize that there would be micropatterns in neural activity relating to dopamine activation of synapses following nicotine inhalation, that give the person a subconcious craving to continue smoking. If an MRI scanner could detect this activity, we might be able to predict if a person would find it easier or harder to quit smoking, with say, 60% accuracy.
Whilst it is arguable that a person might not be able to quit cigarettes if the addiction and craving exceeds their "willpower" it is ridiculous to argue that the person in the study above would not have been able to change their mind and press a different button, should they so wish. This ability, to inhibit our actions and responses, is tested by neuropsychological tests such as the Stroop Test. I would argue that the ability to inhibit our actions and/or change our minds, examples of Executive Function, are an example of a limited capacity for "Free Will" or "Willpower". The fact that we might chose button A randomly over button B and that this random decision is influenced by neural noise of which we are not conscious does nothing to disprove the concept of Free Will.
PS: I work with patients with Frontal Lobe brain injuries (Dysexecutive Syndrome) who show problems in decision making, planning and inhibition of behaviour. They are, in short, driven much more by environmental stimuli and much less by internal willpower. One could even go so far as to suggest that they have a willpower deficit or damage.
The philosophical and spiritual points raised above are interesting, but until you meet someone who is unable to inhibit their behaviour (even to the point of aggression or inappropriate sexual behaviour) due to brain damage, you really can't "say" how the brain "works" in terms of Free Will. Neither can I by the way, I just think I've observed this kind of thing a little more than many...
By Tom Michael (not verified) on 02 May 2008 #permalink
I'm a little late into the fray, but...
If consciousness is an after the fact phenomenon as Libet and Soon seem to have established, then our consciousness is never involved in the "decision." In this instance, the use of the word, "decision," is thoroughly misleading. Our natural, intuition-based, proclivity is to comprehend the word, "decision," in terms of a conscious manipulation of data. Soon and Libet pretty well put the cabbosh on that. I believe it is more accurate to use the terms "effect," or "response," as in, cause and effect, or stimuli and response. The quantum level activity within the brain is copious with an exponent somewhere in the millions! This almost instantaneous storage and retrieval, cross referencing and catagorizing, weighting and analyzing, manipulating and rationalizing, using the massive amounts of incoming data experienced in the conscious hours of our day is beyond man's ability to imagine, much less devise and construct mathematic models which explain it! This is no reason to deny that brain activity is a result of the mathematic laws of physics given meaning through the cause and effect continuum. As is so often the case, man has a rather elevated perception of himself. Sure, the physics of the human brain is preposterously complex, but so is a galaxy, a super nova, or even a cloud formation. Yet, self-aggrandizingly we assume man makes decisions, but galaxies, super novas and clouds do not.
I would also like to energetically suggest that living in a determined universe as if it were a free-will universe is akin to breathing water as if it were air! If Soon and Libet have put free-will on life support, then the history of mankind has nailed the lid on free-will's coffin! From the insertion of mankind into the evolutionary continuum, it has tried its damnedest to make this free-will thing work. For all of mankind's noble efforts, civilization after civilization after civilization rises and falls, rises and falls, rises and falls. So powerful is this free-will intuition, each of these attempts at civilization have gone to their graves embracing the traitorous assassin within their hearts and minds; the free-will mindset. Mankind is now to the point of causing its own extinction along with the extinction of much of the life having the misfortune of living on the same planet, simply because mankind thinks it is special.
Certainly, there are psychological, social, and spiritual ramifications. Just as certain is mankind's aversion to change. But equally certain is the reality that whatever it is we have done in the past to get us where we are today, if we keep doing it, fairly soon there will be an unbelievably large pile of rotting flesh at the bottom of the cliff, and it won't just be buffalo meat!
If this tweaks your curiosity, log on to: www.beneficentparentalism.com. Free-will isn't all it's cracked up to be, and determinism is a whole lot warmer than you might think.
By Ronald K. Olson (not verified) on 21 Sep 2008 #permalink
Metamorphosis - Not Exactly Rocket Science moves to Discover Blogs
I've been teasing a big announcement for a couple of days now, and after a technical delay, here it is - the death of Not Exactly Rocket Science. And the birth of Not Exactly Rocket Science ;-) After two brilliant years at ScienceBlogs, I'm evolving, migrating, metastasising, metamorphosing, (…
Ahem. A slight delay.
Er, yeah. Sorry. Hit a slight glitch. Big news TOMORROW (as in Friday 26th), probably in the early afternoon. Look, it's not like I've discovered the Higgs Boson...
Another teaser...
"Exactly, Ed Yong" - an interview by Dave Munger
To tie in with this week's Research Blogging Awards announcement, I spent an enjoyable half-hour on Monday being interviewed by Dave Munger, who organised the awards. The interview is now up on the SEED website, with a title that made me smile. In it, I talk to Dave about winning the award, why…
Research Blog of the Year
Image, ironically, from FailBlog Warning: this post contains sentiment. If you are cynical and/or British, you might want to avert your eyes. Alternatively, read this and then go watch some Charlie Brooker. For those of you still around, bear with me. It is really hard to write something like this…


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Discussion in 'Games' started by ictiosapiens, May 9, 2006.
What if apple, made a shrinked up version of Mac OS, which didn't load up any unnecessary programs on ram, or any fancy graphics interface. So basicaly a really simple iterface, with only drivers loaded up and network support and whatever else is necessary to optimally run games. It would be like a game launcher OS. Wouldn't this release enough resources to essentially turning the computer into a gaming console. It sounds feasible specially with bootcamp available. With the multi core processors being used and the ati 1600 card, an imac wouldn't be to far behind an xbox 360. If this was possible, it could even use a partition on the hardrive for game saves, and all the things normal consoles use.
Uh.. I'm not sure what one would gain from this? Why would a stripped down version of OS X be good as a console OS? If it's about resources "wasted", then simply having more RAM will mitigate this issue. Ultimately, it'll still be about the lack of games for Mac OS X.
There is just no market for it. No one with a Mac is going to purchase a stripped down version of something they already have. No one without a Mac is going to even consider a Mac for gaming. Plus, the software is not the most expensive part of the computer. Even if they could knock off $200 for the computer, would it be worth it? Probably not.
The full OS doesn't only waste resources on ram, but processot cycles in computer maintanance, programs updating themselves, and all sorts.
By having a simple os with which to start up the computer just to run games, would put the computer hardware wise at the near/same level of a 360, so the potential is huge.
If any of the rumors are true about apple looking into the console market, I don't see it so farfetched for them to start publishing games for their computers, so why not make the most of the hardware? This striped down version of the OS would probably be distributed for free... Most consoles are subsidised or make low to nil profits, so its obvious that the money is in the games.
Sorry, I just don't see it happening. The processor cycles used in "computer maintanance, programs updating themselves, and all sorts" just really doesn't amount to all that much in the base OS. As for the apps/services, if one doesn't start them, they don't becomes resources to waste CPU cycles.
Ultimately, there simply aren't the games available for the Mac to warrant this. And it would not be financially responsible for Apple to invest it's hard earned cash into propping up porting houses to do so. There's simply too much money involved in getting a license and paying a coder to reinvent the wheel to get GameX running on Mac OS X, not to mention the $ invested in support down the road. Remember, PC games still cannot be run without running Windows, and then the 'stripped down' Mac OS X has nothing to do with it.