Character Changes Involving Antigone And Creon Essays -

Character Changes Involving Antigone and Creon In Sophocles' Greek tragedy, Antigone, two characters undergo character changes. During the play the audience sees these two characters' attitudes change from close minded to open-minded. It is their close minded, stubborn attitudes, which lead to their decline in the play, and ultimately to a series of deaths. In the beginning Antigone is a close minded character who later becomes open minded. After the death of her brothers, Eteocles and Polyneices, Creon becomes the ruler of Thebes. He decides that Eteocles will receive a funeral with military honors because he fought for his country. However, Polyneices, who broke his exile to " spill the blood of his father and sell his own people into slavery", will have no burial. Antigone disagrees with Creon's unjust actions and says, " Creon is not strong enough to stand in my way." She vows to bury her brother so that his soul may gain the peace of the underworld. Antigone is torn between the law placed against burying her brother and her own thoughts of doing what she feels should be done for her family. Her intent is simply to give her brother, Polyneices, a proper burial so that she will follow "the laws of the gods." Antigone knows that she is in danger of being killed for her actions and she says, "I say that this crime is holy: I shall lie down with him in death, and I shall be as dear to him as he to me." Her own laws, or morals, drive her to break Creon's law placed against Polyneices burial. Even after she realizes that she will have to bury Polyneices without the help of her sister, Ismene, she says: Go away, Ismene: I shall be hating you soon, and the dead will too, For your words are hateful. Leave me my foolish plan: I am not afraid of the danger; if it means death, It will not be the worst of deaths-death without honor. Here Ismene is trying to reason with Antigone by saying that she cannot disobey the law because of the consequences. Antigone is close-minded when she immediately tells her to go away and refuses to listen to her. Later in the play, Antigone is sorrowful for her actions and the consequences yet she is not regretful for her crime. She says her crime is just, yet she does regret being forced to commit it. Antigone now has the ability to consider her consequences because her action of burying her brother is complete. She knows her crime is justified, but her new open-mindedness leads her to consider the alternative. Even though she knows she will die with honor she is grieving for the way she was forced to commit a crime to take an action she believes is justifiable. This is seem when Antigone says: Soon I shall be with my own again . .. To me, since it was my hand That washed him clean and poured the ritual wine: And my reward is death before my time! And yet, as men's hearts knows, I have done no wrong, I have not sinned before God. Or if I have, I shall know the truth in death. But if the guilt Lies upon Creon who judged me, then, I pray, May his punishment equal my own. Antigone's statement shows open-mindedness because she says she does not believe she has sinned but if she has she will know in death. Before Antigone believed that her actions were not sinful, but how she shows an open mind. She is also saying if it is Creon's fault that she will die then may he die also for sending her unjustly to her death. Antigone says: Thebes, and you my father's gods, And rulers of Thebes, you see me now, the last Unhappy daughter of a line of kings, Your kings, led away to death. You will remember What things I suffer, and at what men's hands Because I would not transgress the laws of heaven Come: let us wait no longer. She comes from a long line of kings that were fated to die because of a curse placed on them. She willingly leaves to die knowing that it is an honorable death. Antigone hangs herself, in the tomb she was placed in by Creon, using a noose of her fine

Data Integration and Data Quality

Data Integration and Data Quality Data is very crucial to organizations because it is the major reference tool that can be used when decisions are to be made. There are two elements of data that go hand in hand and they are namely data integration and data quality. Data integration involves merging information from various sources to make a single pile of information that can be understood by users.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Data Integration and Data Quality specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More This is because when a user has to extract information from different sources it might be confusing to him/her hence may not be helpful. On the other hand, data quality entails accuracy and appropriateness of the information obtained from databases. This paper focuses on the differences between the two aspects of data and reviews their importance to companies. Most people think that data quality and integration is one and the same thing but this perception i s only from the perspective of a lay man. The two elements of data, that is, integration and quality are different but we need them both hence we cannot ignore either of them because they are equally important to companies and individuals. In this age of electronic transactions we need to make sure that we minimize errors and also make it simple for our consumers to grasp something from the information that they get while interacting with our systems in their day to day operations. Imhoff (2005) argues that failure to emphasize on quality and integration can lead to decline in business because customers will opt to revert to old manual techniques. Most people emphasize quality more than integration. In the final end the latest developments in technology will loose its importance if the systems are not user friendly. The systems that most companies and other institutions have rolled out were meant to make work easier both to consumers and companies’ staff. They were invented w ith the aim of improving company’s’ performance and productivity but the improvements cannot be realized if the systems don’t work as they were designed to perform. This refers to the way they process information that is input by the users. When system errors occur it is the software developers who bear the most burdens. It should be known that erroneous transactions and information occur when users don’t provide the correct details as required by the system. For instance, when one is making cash withdrawal from an automatic teller machine he/she is responsible of the response that will be provided by the ATM machine. If the customer does not enter the correct pin number, the transaction will not take place and the ATM card will not be dispensed by the machine. This is one of the best examples of how systems can be designed to deal with data quality.Advertising Looking for essay on it? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OF F Learn More Data quality is one of the protective measures that is highly valued by most companies because the records that are stored in databases can be used to trace events and for the referencing to be useful the data has to be free from errors. The data must be encoded appropriately because data can have common characters such as customer names which can be shared by various people. According to findings by META Group (2004), in data quality the main areas that attract attention are correctness, accuracy, completeness, and relevance. The correctness bit of data has been covered in the previous paragraphs. For data to be of good quality it must be complete because if some bits are missing the systems may encounter errors and fail to process the provided data. For instance, if customer’s date of birth is missing in its respective field, we can say that the data is not complete because the system cannot generate such information on its own unless it is prov ided by the user. Most of the time the missing bits could have been omitted erroneously when the data base was being developed. At times some bits of data are erased by mistake hence the ones that are left don’t make sense. In such cases the lost or missing data has to be recovered using the relevant technologies. This is because companies cannot make important decisions when the data they are referring to is incomplete and incase a company goes ahead to make decisions without complete data the company could incur losses owed to poor strategies which are caused by misleading information (Barney, 2004). We know that records are used when making budgets and can also be referenced in future while making decisions hence companies of these days don’t compromise on data quality. In fact there are software programs that can be very useful in tracking events leading to data loss. Moreover, data should be backed up and stored in a different location so that incase a fire destro ys the company premises its data will remain intact. Data should also be updated regularly for it to retain its quality. This is because outdated data can not be useful when making decisions. It is therefore recommended that data should be updated with change of events. For instance, in health records the data should incorporate current events in the patients’ data such as the medical procedures and health developments that have been reported by the patient such as number of births. In addition, it would be best to include new items that have been introduced by the company in the data base. When this information is not added to the existing information concerning a particular patient it might be difficult for medical personnel to make decisions concerning that patient and problems can occur due to lack of certain information. Besides, the information in the database needs to be correct for it to be useful because if it is based on estimation it could be misleading.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Data Integration and Data Quality specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More This implies that the figures and other characters should be exact. For instance, the age of the customer should be accurate and this accurateness should also be applied in company information such as location. This is because sometimes the customers want to visit the company premises but then when they access the site map of the company location it does not reflect what is on the ground (Pipino, Lee, Wang, 2002). Data integration incorporates data from other records to make a comprehensive data depending on who will need that data and how it will be used. Integrating data saves both time and money that would be spent viewing individual records. It comes with convenience for the company and its clients. The information can be arranged in a way that only data within a specific range is available to the user instead of availing a ll the data while the majority of data is irrelevant to the user (Berson Dubov, 2007). Before data can be integrated, it is important to focus on how the data is laid out in their respective sources. This means that experts have to analyze the structure of data and design a newer structure based on the compatibility of data from various foundations. This is because there are some fields which do not match and hence they may cause the data to loose its relevance to the user. For instance, in institutional records the data fields about lecturer’s date of birth may not match with students records hence the person who is deriving the integration should incorporate data based on the relationship between the data fields. Data integration is useful while making decisions because it allows the users to make comparisons of various departments in their companies. For instance, for a company to make decisions regarding loss and profits it has to focus on the records from purchases and compare the information provided to that of sales records. Data integration fosters reliable presentations because repetitions are avoided hence the system is able to deliver the required results and thus achieve customer satisfaction (META Group, 2004). For instance, when a customer is opening a new account in a company’s website if she/he enters a username that already exists, the system will notify him/her and will probably provide suggestions. When data from various databases is merged it is easy for administrators of a company to foresee events before they take place. These events include decline in sales and other disciplines that are linked to company performance.Advertising Looking for essay on it? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More For instance, if the performance from a particular department starts to fall the management will realize in good time and thus take the best action to caution the company. When data is not integrated risk management can be difficult to analyze because people would access the records that are relevant to them and ignore the rest. Data integration promotes simplicity because processes take a shorter time to be completed unlike when data is stored separately. When data is stored separately systems are forced to check for information from every individual database which takes a lot of time. This is because it has to select the data that is required from a huge amount of data. When data is integrated the required information is already grouped in one category hence processing it becomes easier. In conclusion, data quality and data integration are two different aspects but they are related because they belong to the same entity which is data. The two aspects are very important and thus sh ould be given appropriate importance because they are the elements of reliable data. Organizations such as IBM have been able to develop applications that help companies to integrate their data from different sources. This fosters data quality and thus improves productivity. Therefore, companies should manage their data well without compromising the two aspects of data. References Barney, B. (2004, June 18). Put your faith in CRM’s stewards. TechTarget. Retrieved from searchcrm.techtarget.com/news/970869/put-your-faith-in-CRMs-data-stewards Berson, A. Dubov, L. (2007). Master Data Management and Customer Data Integration for a Global Enterprise. New York: McGraw-Hill Professional. Imhoff, C. (2005). Data quality or integration-which is more difficult?. BeyeNetwork. Retrieved from b-eye-network.com/blogs/imhoff/archives/2005/04/data_quality_or.php META Group (2004) The future of data integration technologies. sunopsis. Retrieved from https://portal.erp-link.com/C10/Whitepaper s/Document%20Library/The%20Future%20of%20Data%20Integration%20Technologies.pdf Pipino, L., Lee, Y., and Wang, R. (2002). Data Quality Assessment. Communications of the ACM. 45(4ve): 211-218. Retrieved from http://web.mit.edu/tdqm/www/tdqmpub/PipinoLeeWangCACMApr02.pdf