The biblical worldview

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How would the worldview that you selected ( ISLAM )answer these 5 worldview questions:

  1. The Question of Origin – (What is the origin of the universe etc.? How did humanity come into existence?)
    i. How would your selected worldview answer this question?
    ii. Compare and contrast this with how the biblical worldview would answer this question.
  2. The Question of Identity – (What does it mean to be human? Are humans more important than other living things?)
    i. How would your selected worldview answer this question?
    ii. Compare and contrast this with how the biblical worldview would answer this question.
  3. The Question of Meaning/Purpose – (What is humanity’s purpose?)
    i. How would your selected worldview answer this question?
    ii. Compare and contrast this with how the biblical worldview would answer this question.
  4. The Question of Morality – (What is meant by right and wrong? How is morality determined?)
    i. How would your selected worldview answer this question?
    ii. Compare and contrast this with how the biblical worldview would answer this question.
  5. The Question of Destiny – (What happens when a person dies?)
    i. How would your selected worldview answer this question?
    ii. Compare and contrast this with how the biblical worldview would answer this question.

Sample Solution

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writing assignment

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Students are required to write a formal paper on the question: Should the international community adopt and implement a global ban on nuclear weapons?  The paper should be at least 12 full pages, not including the cover page (title of the paper, student name, course name, and date) and references page (list of sources cited in parenthetical citations in the paper).  None of the information required on the cover page should be included on any other page of the paper.  The paper should be double-spaced (2.0), Times New Roman 12 pt. font, and one inch margins on all sides (top, bottom, left, and right).  The sections of the paper may be separated by one line space, but there should be no extra line-spacing between paragraphs within a section.  Please make sure to check the line-spacing, font type and size, and margins on your document before submitting the first and final versions of the paper.  Other paper guidelines are provided below.  The first version of the paper is due on Thursday, March 11, 2021, and the final version of the paper is due on Thursday, April 29, 2021.  The instructor will provide feedback on the first version of the paper.  The paper is worth up to 100 points, including 50 points for the first version and 50 points for the final version.  Scores for the paper will be posted in MyGrades on Blackboard.  Two points per day are deducted for late submissions of the first and final versions of the paper.  The paper is evaluated on the basis of the writing assignment scoring rubric.  The paper should include the following five sections, each of which should be clearly labeled in the paper:

I.  Introduction (2 to 3 pages) –  Your introduction to the topic of the paper, including background information regarding the origins and evolution of the development, testing, and use of nuclear weapons by states since 1945; the international efforts to regulate the development, testing, and possession of nuclear weapons since the end of the Second World War; and the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which was adopted in July 2017.  Please properly cite all appropriate sources of information use in this section of the paper.  At least three different professional sources must be used in this section of the paper.  Do not refer to the names of scholars or summarize scholarly articles or other sources in this section of the paper.  You should not give your opinion about nuclear weapons in this section of the paper.

II.  Literature Review (3 to 4 pages) – A summary of the main points, themes, or arguments made by three or more scholars regarding the possibility of adopting and implementing a global ban on nuclear weapons at some point in the future.  The summaries must be based on scholarly articles published in peer-reviewed academic journals.  After summarizing the main points or arguments made by the scholars, please discuss the areas of agreement and/or disagreement among the scholars.  Please do not mention the titles of articles or the publications in the text of this section of the paper.  This information should be provided on the References page.  At the start of each summary, you should directly refer to the full name of the scholar (and the year in which the scholarly article was published in parentheses).  After you have referred to the full name of the author and the publication year at the start of each summary, you do not need to further cite the scholarly article.  In other words, parenthetical citations are not necessary in this section of the paper.  You shold not give your opinion about the main points or arguments made by the scholars.

III.  Positions (3 to 4 pages) – A detailed description of the official positions held by at least three different countries from three different regions of the world regarding the TPNW, including an explanation of the official positions expressed by the government or government officials of those countries regarding the treaty.  Please use and properly cite at least six different sources of information used in this section of the paper, including government documents and official statements, academic articles, news articles, and other professional sources of information.  Do not refer to the names of scholars or summarize scholarly articles in this section of the paper.  You should not give your opinion about the official positions of the countries in this section of the paper.

IV.  Critical Analysis (3 to 4 pages) – Your critical analysis (critique) of the official positions held by governments and government officials regardiing the TPNW, as well as an explanation of your informed perspective about the proposed global ban on nulear weapons.  Please properly cite all appropriate sources of information used in this section of the paper.  Do not refer to the names of scholars or summarize scholarly articles in this section of the paper.

V.  Conclusions (1 to 2 pages) – You summary of what you learned in the writing assignment, and some final thoughts regarding the topic of nuclear weapons.

Paper Guidelines

1.  Quotations Students may not insert unattributed quoted sentences or paragraphs (including block quotes) from sources into their papers.  The only permissible quotations are those sentences or words that are directly attributed to a person.  All attributed quotations in the paper, which must be properly cited, should be limited to a sentence or a partial sentence.  Quotations of a person that are more than one sentence long are not permitted in the paper.

2.  Sources:  Students should use at least twelve different professional sources of information, including academic articles and books, news articles, governmental and non-governmental reports, and documents published online or elsewhere by the United Nations and other international organizations.  Among other locations, students should use the UCA Librarys article databases for obtaining sources of information for this paper.  Secondary sources may be used in the writing assignment if they have an identifiable author (John Smith) and publication year (2015) or an identifiable organization (BBC News) and publication date (December 15, 2015).  Primary sources of information, such as international treaties, government documents, and organizational reports, may also be used in the writing assignment.  Students should not cite information from online d ictionaries or encyclopedia, such as Wikipedia.com, in this writing assignment.  Random webpages and other undated sources should not be cited in this writing assignment.  Similarly, students should not cite online reference sources such as History.com in this writing assignment.

3.  Plagiarism:  Students will receive zero [0] points if any one or more sentences in the paper are copied-and-pasted from a source on the Internet or elsewhere.  Students will also receive zero [0] points if the paper contains one or more sentences that are largely copied from a source with some of the words changed.  There is no excuse for plagiarism, and therefore, students who plagiarize will not be given the opportunity to resubmit the paper.

4.  Proof-Reading All papers, including the first version and final version, should be proof-read for writing errors by the student prior to submitting it to the instructor.  The writing style should be formal and professional throughout the paper.  Among other informal writing practices, please do not use contractions such as dont or doesnt in this paper.  Please refer to the Second World War as the Second World War rather than World War II or WWII.  Please do not refer to nuclear weapons as nukes in this paper.  After the first mention of the United States or United States of America, please use the abbreviated term U.S.  Same for the United Kingdom (U.K.).  Points will be deducted from papers that contain grammar, punctuation, spelling, and other writing errors.  After the first mention of treaties such as the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, please use the abbreviated term for that treaty (e.g. TPNW).

5.  Citations All sources should be properly cited at the end of a sentence or the paragraph in which information from the source is referenced using parenthetical citations.  The Political Science Style Manual, which is similar to Chicago Style Manual, is the recommended citation style in this writing assignment (see pages 37-40 in the Political Science Style Manual).  Students may not use Modern Language Association (MLA) citation style in this paper since it is primarily used in the humanities, not the social sciences.  Parenthetical citations should only contain the authors last name and publication year (Johnson 2015) or the name of an organization and publication date (UN News Centre, June 15, 2015).  A parenthetical citation should also contain page numbers if the sentence includes quoted words.  Under no circumstances should an internet address be inserted into a parenthetical citation.  Citations of primary sources, such as international treaties, government documents, and organizational reports, should generally be cited using footnotes, especially if there is no identifiable author or authors.  For footnotes, all of the information regarding the source should be provided in the footnote the first time that the source is cited in the paper.  Each subsequent time the source is cited, only some information regarding the source needs to be provided in the footnote.  If a sources date includes a month/day and year, the full date should be included in the footnote.  As an example, a footnote containing the citation of an international agreement should include the name of the treaty or document (italicized), the date on which the treaty or document was adopted or entered into force, the organization responsible for publishing the treaty or document, the location (city/state or country) of the organization, and the online location of the source, if applicable (see below):

Footnote:
(1) Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, March 5, 1970, United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs – UNODA, New York, NY, https://www.un.org/disarmament/wmd/nuclear/npt/).

6.  References – At the end of the paper, all sources of information cited in parenthetical citations should be listed in alphabetical order on the References page, including the authors full last name/first name or the formal name of the organization, publication year or date of the source, the title of the article or document, the name of the publication, and page numbers (see pages 41-55 in the Political Science Style Manual).  For scholarly articles obtained from the internet, a short version of the URL (uniform resource locater) or the DOI (digital object identifier) may be included on the References page.  If you provide a hyperlink to a web address, make sure that the hyperlink goes directly to the source and make sure that the hyperlink works.  If a hyperlink does not go directly to the source or cannot be accessed without having to sign into an account, please do not include those types of hyperlinks on the References page.  Please do not use the phrase Retrieved from on the References page in this paper.  It is not necessary to indicate the date on which you retrieved a source.  For sources that do not have a publication date, you should indicate the date on which you accessed the source.  Sources of information, such as an international treaty, cited in endnotes or footnotes do not need to be listed on the References page.  Please do not refer to the References page as Works Cited.

Firms Growth Prediction

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This project is an analysis of fast growing firms in a European country. Using data that was collected,
maintained and cleaned by Bisnode that contains data about 19,036 firms. This project is leveraged to
predict the probability of fast growing firms, and classify firms of prospective fast growth and no fast
growth. Fast growth can be defined in many ways. In this project, growth will be defined over 50% annual
growth in revenues. I will use companies data in 2014 to predict probability of firms growing fast in 2015, and
classifying them accordingly. To define fast growth for this project, I consider revenue as a main determinant
of growth. Firms that have a 50% increase in annual revenues are considered fast growing.
Data
The bisnode-firms is a panel dataset that contains information about firms in a European country. In this
project, I use the cleaned dataset that was maintained by Bisnode. As an initial step, the data was filtered to
include observations between 2010 to 2015. The dataset originially contained data on 19,036 firms; 287,829
observations and 48 variables. Each observation corresponds to a firms in a specific year. Some of the variable
that could be useful predictors of firms growth, for instance, financial data, data on the management, region
etc are included.
Data Preparation

  1. Dataset was limited to include the panel from 2010-2015.
  2. Variables with many missing values, such as COGS, finished_prod, net_dom_sales, net_exp_sales,
    and wages were dropped.
    Label Engineering
    Growth rate, as a variable, was not provided in the dataset. However, related financial data were, which
    made it simple to measure it. For this paper, we can consider a firm as fast growing if it had a 50% increase
    in revenues in the consecutive year. Fast growth, as a binary, is the y variable and all other variables
    are considered potential predictors and screened by different methods to pick the likely predictive ones.
    Therefore, fast growth, can be defined as 1 if the company is fast growing in 1 year, and 0 otherwise.
  3. Impute the sales variable with 1 if the value is below 0.
  4. Create variables for sales in million Euro, and log transformed sales in million
  5. Created variable growth_rate; which is annual sales growth rate.
  6. Observations that had a negative growth rate or infinite growth rate were dropped since they dont fit
    our scope.
  7. Created a binary variable, fast growth, that captures if there was fast growth; over 50% annual growth
    in revenues.
  8. Created variables d1_sales_mil_log, first difference in natural log sales in million, and age
    1
    Sample Design
    The sample was limited to the cross-section of firms in 2014. Observation that has sales below the 5th
    percentile or above the 95th percentile were excluded. These included firms that either very high or very
    low sales. As a result, the cleaned dataset consist of 47 variables and 5,737 observations.
    Feature Engineering
    In order to have some insight about the data and prior to building the models, we inspect the functional
    forms of the variables. Obvious errors such negative current assets or current liabilities, were imputed with
    0 instead of the negative value, a binary variable to flag the error was created. Created a new variable for
    total assets. Unreasonable age values were imputed with the minimum age of 25 and maximum of 75 years.
    Moreover, financial variable, for example, annual profit & loss and income before tax, were standarized by
    sales, and winsorized. Variable to flag error or extreme values were also created. Quadratic terms were
    added to some financial terms to capture non-linearity.
    The final dataset, after cleaning and screening for potential predictors, is composed of 5453 observations and
    110 variables. As a robustness check, the dataset will be split into 80% work set, and 20% holdout set.
    Explaratory Data Analysis
    The target variable is fast growth, expressed as a binary. As a first step, I’ll check the potential predictor
    variables
    0.00
    0.25
    0.50
    0.75
    1.00
    −1.0 −0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0
    Standardized Annual Profit/Loss
    Fast Growth
    Fast growth probability distribution across standardized profit/loss
    0.00
    0.25
    0.50
    0.75
    1.00
    −1.0 −0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0
    Standardized Income before Tax
    Fast Growth
    Growth Probability Distribution Across Standardized Profit/Loss
    0.00
    0.25
    0.50
    0.75
    1.00
    −4 −2 0
    sales_mil_log
    growth
    Figure 1: Probability Distribution of Predictor Variables
    We can observe that probability of fast growth tends to decrease as sales decreases. Steep drops could be
    due to low number of observations in a specific interval. The same pattern applies for the distribution of
    probability across income before tax.
    Table 1 shows us the descriptive statistics of price for property type.
    Modeling
    In order to begin building the models, the variables should be defined. Predictors were grouped into 4 main
    variable categories: Firm, Quality variables, Financial, HR, as well as a separate group for interactions. I
    will consider 4 models for probability prediction with logit of increasing complexity.
  9. Model 1 includes log sales_mill, squared log sales_mil, d1_sales_mil_log_mod, profit_loss_year_pl,
    fixed_assets_bs, curr_liab_bs, curr_liab_bs_flag_high, curr_liab_bs_flag_error,age, foreign_management.
    2
  10. Model 2 includes log sales_mill, squared log sales_mil, firm, engvar, d1.
  11. Model 3 includes log sales_mill, squared log sales_mil, and all variables, but no interactions.
  12. Logit LASSO model, most of the predictors are included as well as the set of potential interactions.
  13. Random Forest: sales in millions, log 1st difference of sales in millions, Firm, Quality variables, Financial, HR; no interactions, no modified features
    Cross Validation Prediction
    I prepared 4 logit models to examine with OLS. The best performing model will be selected using crossvalidation, and prediction will be evaluated on that model using the holdout set. The work sample consists
    of 4362 observation, of which 3856 fast growths, and the holdout sample has 1089 observations, of which 963
    fast growths.
    Table 2 shows the number of variables, R-squared, BIC and cross-validated training set and test set RMSE
    for the eight regressions. The table shows us two statistics for the entire work set: R-squared and BIC.
    First we estimated all regressions using all observations in the work set. Then, we estimated models by
    using 5-fold cross-validation. For each fold we estimated the regression using the training set, and used it for
    prediction not only on the training set but also in the corresponding test set. For this the Training RMSE
    and Test RMSE were calculated as the square root of the average MSE on the five training sets and the five
    test sets.
    From R-squared we could say that it is improving as more variables are added. In our case the most complex
    model explains 37% of the variation in prices. As for BIC it should be decreasing with more complex models,
    however, after a certain point it increases. But in our case the differences are relatively small. According to
    BIC in our case the best model is model number 6 as the more complex models have a risk of overfitting the
    data.
    The RMSE in the training set is improving as the model is getting more complex. In the test set it improves
    until model 7, after it is significantly worse. Model 7 has the lowest test RMSE with 45.95. This model
    includes all the variables except for the interactions in X3. Model 7 is significantly more complex than Model
    5, which was deemed as best by BIC. Model 6 contained the interactions of property type and the additional
    interactions, meanwhile model 7 included amenities as well.
    RMSE suggests that the typical size of the prediction error in the test set is 45.95 euros for model 7,
    meanwhile it is 46.07 euro for model 6. From a statistical point of view it might be interesting, but if we
    would look only from business point of view it could be deemed insignificant.
    If we have conflict between BIC and cross-validation, cross-validation result should be chosen as it is not
    based on auxiliary assumptions.

user system elapsed

61.973 0.408 62.424

Table 1: Logit Summary
Number of predictors CV RMSE CV AUC
X1 4 0.314 0.701
X2 39 0.316 0.698
X3 79 0.318 0.689
LASSO 1 0.322 0.677
3
0.0
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.5
0.6
0.7
0.8
0.9
1.0
0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
False positive rate (1 − Specificity)
True positive rate (Sensitivity)
0.2
0.4
0.6
threshold
Figure 2: Training and test RMSE for the models
4

Sample Solution

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Producer surplus before and after trade

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  1. Use the following figure to answer to the questions:
    a. Using the figure above determine the value of the following for the importing country:
    -Producer surplus before and after trade
    -Consumer surplus before and after trade
    -Net changes in producer and consumer surplus
    -Net changes in total surplus
    b. Using the figure above determine the value of the following for the exporting country:
    -Producer surplus before and after trade
    -Consumer surplus before and after trade
    -Net changes in producer and consumer surplus
    -Net changes in total surplus
  2. Consider the following Ricardian example, using standard Ricardian assumption:
    Vintland Moonited
    Labour hours per bottle of wine 5 7.5
    Labour hours per kg of cheese 2 5
    a) Which country has an absolute advantage in wine? In Cheese?
    b) Which country has a comparative advantage in wine? Cheese? (Calculate the opportunity
    cost of wine and cheese in each country.) Put the numbers in the following table:
    Vintland Moonited
    Wine price
    Cheese price
    c) Suppose that Vintland has 10 million hours of labour and Moonited has 15 million hours
    of labour. Graph each country’s production possibilities curve. If Vintland produces 3
    million cheese and Moonited produces 1.5 million kilos of cheese, how much wine is
    produced by each country? Show all on graph.
    d) When trade opened which country exports which good? Suppose the international price is
    ½ bottle of wine per kilo of cheese, what happens to production in each country (in terms
    of specialization of goods)?
    e) In this free-trade equilibrium, 2 million kilos of cheese and 1 million bottle of wine are
    traded. What is the consumption point in each country with free trade? Show this
    graphically. Also show vertical and horizontal intercepts of the trade lines for each
    country.
    f) Does each country gain from trade? Explain, referring to your graphs as is appropriate.
  3. Use the following figure to answer to the questions:
    a. Suppose that the international relative price of cloth goes up. How will this affect
    the trade line and optimal level of consumption in the cloth exporting country? How
    would this impact the production in the exporting country? Show on the graph and
    explain (don’t worry about numbers).
    b. Is this change in the international relative price an improvement or deterioration in
    the terms of trade of the rest of the world? According to your graph, does the rest of
    the world gain or lose well-being? Explain!
  4. The country A has an endowment (total supply) of 160 units of labor and 14 units of
    land, whereas country B has 40 units of labor and 6 units of land. Is country B labor or
    land abundant? If wheat is land-intensive and cloth is labor-intensive, what is the
    Heckscher-Ohlin prediction for the pattern of trade between country A and country B?

Sample Solution

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