Net Neutrality Outline

Net Neutrality Presentation 1. What is Net Neutrality? a. Net Neutrality is best defined as a network design principle. The idea is that a maximally useful public information network aspires to treat all content, sites, and platforms equally. This allows the network to carry every form of information and support every kind of application. The principle suggests that information networks are often more valuable when they are less specialized – when they are a platform for multiple uses, present and future. i. Basically what the Internet is today, an Open Network. i. The opposite of a Closed Network, where the provider determines content. b. Net Neutrality is a network design paradigm that argues for broadband network providers to be completely detached from what information is sent over their networks. c. What keeps the Internet open is Net Neutrality — the longstanding principle that preserves our right to communicate freely online. This is the definition of an open Int ernet. d. With Net Neutrality, the network's only job is to move data—not to choose which data to privilege with higher quality service. iii.Think of another open network like electric grid 1. Innovation-driving network 2. Why should you care? e. Censorship f. Blocking/ Discrimination iv. All data delivered at the same speed regardless of content 2. No preference to a particular service over another a. Think Skype over Facetime. v. Net neutrality also means that carriers can't tack on an extra cost for heavy users; everyone can stream and download as much content as they like. vi. No penalty fees attached to visiting different categories of websites.Devices share and share alike; carriers treat a smart phone no differently than a desktop. vii. A tiered Internet would also make it easier for content streams from corporate giants to rule the Web; without net neutrality, innovative startups like Craigslist and Google might not ever have seen enough traffic to get off the ground. g. Bandwidth Throttling viii. Bandwidth Throttling is the intentional slowing of Internet service by an Internet service provider. It is a reactive measure employed in communication networks in an apparent attempt to regulate network traffic and minimize bandwidth congestion. x. To help achieve this, if you use an extraordinary amount of data and fall within the top 5% of Verizon Wireless data users we may reduce your data throughput speeds periodically for the remainder of your then current and immediately following billing cycle to ensure high quality network performance for other users at locations and times of peak demand. Our proactive management of the Verizon Wireless network is designed to ensure that the remaining 95% of data customers aren't negatively affected by the inordinate data consumption of just a few users. . Digital rights and freedoms x. Telecommunication companies are merely a means to an end. In other words, they are merely the gateway to the Internet; they d on’t own the Internet themselves. i. Privacy xi. Wiretapping violation 3. Arguments Against Net Neutrality j. Enforcement xii. Who is supposed to regulate the internet? xiii. Spans across multiple countries k. Government Regulations xiv. Too much control for the government xv. Censorship 3. China xvi. Network Optimization 4. Greater good 5. % of users ruining network performance for 95% xvii. Antipiracy 6. Makes the ability to stop piracy 7. Shutting down â€Å"rouge† websites providing pirated content xviii. Special Services 8. Certain services that are need maybe should have first run at the network/ higher faster speeds 4. Conclusion l. Who owns the internet? xix. Telecommunication companies are merely a means to an end. In other words, they are merely the gateway to the Internet; they don’t own the Internet themselves.

Learning Team Collaboration Worksheet Essay

1. What are the advantages of having diversity in a collaborative learning environment? The point of any collaboration is to bring together different ideas for one solution. By exchanging opinions, everyone can decide what works best for the group. When too many like minded people come together, they dole out the same product. If a group contains all organizers or thinkers, they might have a 10 page paper of all conflicting ideas because they couldn’t agree on one topic. History’s bloodiest events usually started with one group of likeminded people pushing their ideas onto the rest of the world. 2. How might factors such as learning and work styles affect your team’s collaboration? Having a diverse set of people in a group can only improve it. Thinkers can look at a topic from all sides, which can help a team anticipate arguments and have an answer ready. Givers can be the voice of reason, helping the group stay on task when an organizer or thinker is stuck on a non consequential detail. Adventurers think outside the box, they may come up with the topic itself or can be counted on to liven up a stale presentation. Organizers are decisive; choosing what information stays, what gets tossed, where it fits, and how to best unify a paper. Like Henry Ford’s assembly line, each person has a role that has to be met for the product to be finished. 3. How can critical thinking improve your team’s collaboration? Being in a team can generate original and creative ideas, making for an interesting project. Critical thinking is the research and facts to uphold those ideas. This involves finding credible sources with valid facts. This question is kicking my butt! I’ll get it eventually. 4. What are methods for improving team writing? Prewriting is the longest step in the writing process, involving the overall topic of a project and all the research. This is where a team can contribute ideas and opinions, and a rough draft is formed. After this process is finished, the actual writing should be simple. The second draft could be written by one person to ensure that it stays in one voice throughout the paper. Then the team can review the draft and make changes as needed.

A Game of Thrones Chapter Forty

Pale white mists rose off Alyssa’s Tears, where the ghost waters plunged over the shoulder of the mountain to begin their long tumble down the face of the Giant’s Lance. Catelyn could feel the faint touch of spray on her face. Alyssa Arryn had seen her husband, her brothers, and all her children slain, and yet in life she had never shed a tear. So in death, the gods had decreed that she would know no rest until her weeping watered the black earth of the Vale, where the men she had loved were buried. Alyssa had been dead six thousand years now, and still no drop of the torrent had ever reached the valley floor far below. Catelyn wondered how large a waterfall her own tears would make when she died. â€Å"Tell me the rest of it,† she said. â€Å"The Kingslayer is massing a host at Casterly Rock,† Ser Rodrik Cassel answered from the room behind her. â€Å"Your brother writes that he has sent riders to the Rock, demanding that Lord Tywin proclaim his intent, but he has had no answer. Edmure has commanded Lord Vance and Lord Piper to guard the pass below the Golden Tooth. He vows to you that he will yield no foot of Tully land without first watering it with Lannister blood.† Catelyn turned away from the sunrise. Its beauty did little to lighten her mood; it seemed cruel for a day to dawn so fair and end so foul as this one promised to. â€Å"Edmure has sent riders and made vows,† she said, â€Å"but Edmure is not the Lord of Riverrun. What of my lord father?† â€Å"The message made no mention of Lord Hoster, my lady.† Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. They had grown in white as snow and bristly as a thornbush while he was recovering from his wounds; he looked almost himself again. â€Å"My father would not have given the defense of Riverrun over to Edmure unless he was very sick,† she said, worried. â€Å"I should have been woken as soon as this bird arrived.† â€Å"Your lady sister thought it better to let you sleep, Maester Colemon told me.† â€Å"I should have been woken,† she insisted. â€Å"The maester tells me your sister planned to speak with you after the combat,† Ser Rodrik said. â€Å"Then she still plans to go through with this mummer’s farce?† Catelyn grimaced. â€Å"The dwarf has played her like a set of pipes, and she is too deaf to hear the tune. Whatever happens this morning, Ser Rodrik, it is past time we took our leave. My place is at Winterfell with my sons. If you are strong enough to travel, I shall ask Lysa for an escort to see us to Gulltown. We can take ship from there.† â€Å"Another ship?† Ser Rodrik looked a shade green, yet he managed not to shudder. â€Å"As you say, my lady.† The old knight waited outside her door as Catelyn summoned the servants Lysa had given her. If she spoke to her sister before the duel, perhaps she could change her mind, she thought as they dressed her. Lysa’s policies varied with her moods, and her moods changed hourly. The shy girl she had known at Riverrun had grown into a woman who was by turns proud, fearful, cruel, dreamy, reckless, timid, stubborn, vain, and, above all, inconstant. When that vile turnkey of hers had come crawling to tell them that Tyrion Lannister wished to confess, Catelyn had urged Lysa to have the dwarf brought to them privately, but no, nothing would do but that her sister must make a show of him before half the Vale. And now this . . . â€Å"Lannister is my prisoner,† she told Ser Rodrik as they descended the tower stairs and made their way through the Eyrie’s cold white halls. Catelyn wore plain grey wool with a silvered belt. â€Å"My sister must be reminded of that.† At the doors to Lysa’s apartments, they met her uncle storming out. â€Å"Going to join the fool’s festival?† Ser Brynden snapped. â€Å"I’d tell you to slap some sense into your sister, if I thought it would do any good, but you’d only bruise your hand.† â€Å"There was a bird from Riverrun,† Catelyn began, â€Å"a letter from Edmure . . . â€Å" â€Å"I know, child.† The black fish that fastened his cloak was Brynden’s only concession to ornament. â€Å"I had to hear it from Maester Colemon. I asked your sister for leave to take a thousand seasoned men and ride for Riverrun with all haste. Do you know what she told me? The Vale cannot spare a thousand swords, nor even one, Uncle, she said. You are the Knight of the Gate. Your place is here.† A gust of childish laughter drifted through the open doors behind him, and her uncle glanced darkly over his shoulder. â€Å"Well, I told her she could bloody well find herself a new Knight of the Gate. Black fish or no, I am still a Tully. I shall leave for Riverrun by evenfall.† Catelyn could not pretend to surprise. â€Å"Alone? You know as well as I that you will never survive the high road. Ser Rodrik and I are returning to Winterfell. Come with us, Uncle. I will give you your thousand men. Riverrun will not fight alone.† Brynden thought a moment, then nodded a brusque agreement. â€Å"As you say. It’s the long way home, but I’m more like to get there. I’ll wait for you below.† He went striding off, his cloak swirling behind him. Catelyn exchanged a look with Ser Rodrik. They went through the doors to the high, nervous sound of a child’s giggles. Lysa’s apartments opened over a small garden, a circle of dirt and grass planted with blue flowers and ringed on all sides by tall white towers. The builders had intended it as a godswood, but the Eyrie rested on the hard stone of the mountain, and no matter how much soil was hauled up from the Vale, they could not get a weirwood to take root here. So the Lords of the Eyrie planted grass and scattered statuary amidst low, flowering shrubs. It was there the two champions would meet to place their lives, and that of Tyrion Lannister, into the hands of the gods. Lysa, freshly scrubbed and garbed in cream velvet with a rope of sapphires and moonstones around her milk-white neck, was holding court on the terrace overlooking the scene of the combat, surrounded by her knights, retainers, and lords high and low. Most of them still hoped to wed her, bed her, and rule the Vale of Arryn by her side. From what Catelyn had seen during her stay at the Eyrie, it was a vain hope. A wooden platform had been built to elevate Robert’s chair; there the Lord of the Eyrie sat, giggling and clapping his hands as a humpbacked puppeteer in blue-and-white motley made two wooden knights hack and slash at each other. Pitchers of thick cream and baskets of blackberries had been set out, and the guests were sipping a sweet orange-scented wine from engraved silver cups. A fool’s festival, Brynden had called it, and small wonder. Across the terrace, Lysa laughed gaily at some jest of Lord Hunter’s, and nibbled a blackberry from the point of Ser Lyn Corbray’s dagger. They were the suitors who stood highest in Lysa’s favor . . . today, at least. Catelyn would have been hard-pressed to say which man was more unsuitable. Eon Hunter was even older than Jon Arryn had been, half-crippled by gout, and cursed with three quarrelsome sons, each more grasping than the last. Ser Lyn was a different sort of folly; lean and handsome, heir to an ancient but impoverished house, but vain, reckless, hot-tempered . . . and, it was whispered, notoriously uninterested in the intimate charms of women. When Lysa espied Catelyn, she welcomed her with a sisterly embrace and a moist kiss on the cheek. â€Å"Isn’t it a lovely morning? The gods are smiling on us. Do try a cup of the wine, sweet sister. Lord Hunter was kind enough to send for it, from his own cellars.† â€Å"Thank you, no. Lysa, we must talk.† â€Å"After,† her sister promised, already beginning to turn away from her. â€Å"Now.† Catelyn spoke more loudly than she’d intended. Men were turning to look. â€Å"Lysa, you cannot mean to go ahead with this folly. Alive, the Imp has value. Dead, he is only food for crows. And if his champion should prevail here—† â€Å"Small chance of that, my lady,† Lord Hunter assured her, patting her shoulder with a liver-spotted hand. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a doughty fighter. He will make short work of the sellsword.† â€Å"Will he, my lord?† Catelyn said coolly. â€Å"I wonder.† She had seen Bronn fight on the high road; it was no accident that he had survived the journey while other men had died. He moved like a panther, and that ugly sword of his seemed a part of his arm. Lysa’s suitors were gathering around them like bees round a blossom. â€Å"Women understand little of these things,† Ser Morton Waynwood said. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a knight, sweet lady. This other fellow, well, his sort are all cowards at heart. Useful enough in a battle, with thousands of their fellows around them, but stand them up alone and the manhood leaks right out of them.† â€Å"Say you have the truth of it, then,† Catelyn said with a courtesy that made her mouth ache. â€Å"What will we gain by the dwarf’s death? Do you imagine that Jaime will care a fig that we gave his brother a trial before we flung him off a mountain?† â€Å"Behead the man,† Ser Lyn Corbray suggested. â€Å"When the Kingslayer receives the Imp’s head, it will be a warning to him,† Lysa gave an impatient shake of her waist-long auburn hair. â€Å"Lord Robert wants to see him fly,† she said, as if that settled the matter. â€Å"And the Imp has only himself to blame. It was he who demanded a trial by combat.† â€Å"Lady Lysa had no honorable way to deny him, even if she’d wished to,† Lord Hunter intoned ponderously. Ignoring them all, Catelyn turned all her force on her sister. â€Å"I remind you, Tyrion Lannister is my prisoner.† â€Å"And I remind you, the dwarf murdered my lord husband!† Her voice rose. â€Å"He poisoned the Hand of the King and left my sweet baby fatherless, and now I mean to see him pay!† Whirling, her skirts swinging around her, Lysa stalked across the terrace. Ser Lyn and Ser Morton and the other suitors excused themselves with cool nods and trailed after her. â€Å"Do you think he did?† Ser Rodrik asked her quietly when they were alone again. â€Å"Murder Lord Jon, that is? The Imp still denies it, and most fiercely . . . â€Å" â€Å"I believe the Lannisters murdered Lord Arryn,† Catelyn replied, â€Å"but whether it was Tyrion, or Ser Jaime, or the queen, or all of them together, I could not begin to say.† Lysa had named Cersei in the letter she had sent to Winterfell, but now she seemed certain that Tyrion was the killer . . . perhaps because the dwarf was here, while the queen was safe behind the walls of the Red Keep, hundreds of leagues to the south. Catelyn almost wished she had burned her sister’s letter before reading it. Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. â€Å"Poison, well . . . that could be the dwarf’s work, true enough. Or Cersei’s. It’s said poison is a woman’s weapon, begging your pardons, my lady. The Kingslayer, now . . . I have no great liking for the man, but he’s not the sort. Too fond of the sight of blood on that golden sword of his. Was it poison, my lady?† Catelyn frowned, vaguely uneasy. â€Å"How else could they make it look a natural death?† Behind her, Lord Robert shrieked with delight as one of the puppet knights sliced the other in half, spilling a flood of red sawdust onto the terrace. She glanced at her nephew and sighed. â€Å"The boy is utterly without discipline. He will never be strong enough to rule unless he is taken away from his mother for a time.† â€Å"His lord father agreed with you,† said a voice at her elbow. She turned to behold Maester Colemon, a cup of wine in his hand. â€Å"He was planning to send the boy to Dragonstone for fostering, you know . . . oh, but I’m speaking out of turn.† The apple of his throat bobbed anxiously beneath the loose maester’s chain. â€Å"I fear I’ve had too much of Lord Hunter’s excellent wine. The prospect of bloodshed has my nerves all a-fray . . . â€Å" â€Å"You are mistaken, Maester,† Catelyn said. â€Å"It was Casterly Rock, not Dragonstone, and those arrangements were made after the Hand’s death, without my sister’s consent.† The maester’s head jerked so vigorously at the end of his absurdly long neck that he looked half a puppet himself. â€Å"No, begging your forgiveness, my lady, but it was Lord Jon who—† A bell tolled loudly below them. High lords and serving girls alike broke off what they were doing and moved to the balustrade. Below, two guardsmen in sky-blue cloaks led forth Tyrion Lannister. The Eyrie’s plump septon escorted him to the statue in the center of the garden, a weeping woman carved in veined white marble, no doubt meant to be Alyssa. â€Å"The bad little man,† Lord Robert said, giggling. â€Å"Mother, can I make him fly? I want to see him fly.† â€Å"Later, my sweet baby,† Lysa promised him. â€Å"Trial first,† drawled Ser Lyn Corbray, â€Å"then execution.† A moment later the two champions appeared from opposite sides of the garden. The knight was attended by two young squires, the sellsword by the Eyrie’s master-at-arms. Ser Vardis Egen was steel from head to heel, encased in heavy plate armor over mail and padded surcoat. Large circular rondels, enameled cream-and-blue in the moon-and-falcon sigil of House Arryn, protected the vulnerable juncture of arm and breast. A skirt of lobstered metal covered him from waist to midthigh, while a solid gorget encircled his throat. Falcon’s wings sprouted from the temples of his helm, and his visor was a pointed metal beak with a narrow slit for vision. Bronn was so lightly armored he looked almost naked beside the knight. He wore only a shirt of black oiled ringmail over boiled leather, a round steel halfhelm with a noseguard, and a mail coif. High leather boots with steel shinguards gave some protection to his legs, and discs of black iron were sewn into the fingers of his gloves. Yet Catelyn noted that the sellsword stood half a hand taller than his foe, with a longer reach . . . and Bronn was fifteen years younger, if she was any judge. They knelt in the grass beneath the weeping woman, facing each other, with Lannister between them. The septon removed a faceted crystal sphere from the soft cloth bag at his waist. He lifted it high above his head, and the light shattered. Rainbows danced across the Imp’s face. In a high, solemn, singsong voice, the septon asked the gods to look down and bear witness, to find the truth in this man’s soul, to grant him life and freedom if he was innocent, death if he was guilty. His voice echoed off the surrounding towers. When the last echo had died away, the septon lowered his crystal and made a hasty departure. Tyrion leaned over and whispered something in Bronn’s ear before the guardsmen led him away. The sellsword rose laughing and brushed a blade of grass from his knee. Robert Arryn, Lord of the Eyrie and Defender of the Vale, was fidgeting impatiently in his elevated chair. â€Å"When are they going to fight?† he asked plaintively. Ser Vardis was helped back to his feet by one of his squires. The other brought him a triangular shield almost four feet tall, heavy oak dotted with iron studs. They strapped it to his left forearm. When Lysa’s master-at-arms offered Bronn a similar shield, the sellsword spat and waved it away. Three days growth of coarse black beard covered his jaw and cheeks, but if he did not shave it was not for want of a razor; the edge of his sword had the dangerous glimmer of steel that had been honed every day for hours, until it was too sharp to touch. Ser Vardis held out a gauntleted hand, and his squire placed a handsome double-edged longsword in his grasp. The blade was engraved with a delicate silver tracery of a mountain sky; its pommel was a falcon’s head, its crossguard fashioned into the shape of wings. â€Å"I had that sword crafted for Jon in King’s Landing,† Lysa told her guests proudly as they watched Ser Vardis try a practice cut. â€Å"He wore it whenever he sat the Iron Throne in King Robert’s place. Isn’t it a lovely thing? I thought it only fitting that our champion avenge Jon with his own blade.† The engraved silver blade was beautiful beyond a doubt, but it seemed to Catelyn that Ser Vardis might have been more comfortable with his own sword. Yet she said nothing; she was weary of futile arguments with her sister. â€Å"Make them fight!† Lord Robert called out. Ser Vardis faced the Lord of the Eyrie and lifted his sword in salute. â€Å"For the Eyrie and the Vale!† Tyrion Lannister had been seated on a balcony across the garden, flanked by his guards. It was to him that Bronn turned with a cursory salute. â€Å"They await your command,† Lady Lysa said to her lord son. â€Å"Fight!† the boy screamed, his arms trembling as they clutched at his chair. Ser Vardis swiveled, bringing up his heavy shield. Bronn turned to face him. Their swords rang together, once, twice, a testing. The sellsword backed off a step. The knight came after, holding his shield before him. He tried a slash, but Bronn jerked back, just out of reach, and the silver blade cut only air. Bronn circled to his right. Ser Vardis turned to follow, keeping his shield between them. The knight pressed forward, placing each foot carefully on the uneven ground. The sellsword gave way, a faint smile playing over his lips. Ser Vardis attacked, slashing, but Bronn leapt away from him, hopping lightly over a low, moss-covered stone. Now the sellsword circled left, away from the shield, toward the knight’s unprotected side. Ser Vardis tried a hack at his legs, but he did not have the reach. Bronn danced farther to his left. Ser Vardis turned in place. â€Å"The man is craven,† Lord Hunter declared. â€Å"Stand and fight, coward! † Other voices echoed the sentiment. Catelyn looked to Ser Rodrik. Her master-at-arms gave a curt shake of his head. â€Å"He wants to make Ser Vardis chase him. The weight of armor and shield will tire even the strongest man.† She had seen men practice at their swordplay near every day of her life, had viewed half a hundred tourneys in her time, but this was something different and deadlier: a dance where the smallest misstep meant death. And as she watched, the memory of another duel in another time came back to Catelyn Stark, as vivid as if it had been yesterday. They met in the lower bailey of Riverrun. When Brandon saw that Petyr wore only helm and breastplate and mail, he took off most of his armor. Petyr had begged her for a favor he might wear, but she had turned him away. Her lord father promised her to Brandon Stark, and so it was to him that she gave her token, a pale blue handscarf she had embroidered with the leaping trout of Riverrun. As she pressed it into his hand, she pleaded with him. â€Å"He is only a foolish boy, but I have loved him like a brother. It would grieve me to see him die.† And her betrothed looked at her with the cool grey eyes of a Stark and promised to spare the boy who loved her. That fight was over almost as soon as it began. Brandon was a man grown, and he drove Littlefinger all the way across the bailey and down the water stair, raining steel on him with every step, until the boy was staggering and bleeding from a dozen wounds. â€Å"Yield!† he called, more than once, but Petyr would only shake his head and fight on, grimly. When the river was lapping at their ankles, Brandon finally ended it, with a brutal backhand cut that bit through Petyr’s rings and leather into the soft flesh below the ribs, so deep that Catelyn was certain that the wound was mortal. He looked at her as he fell and murmured â€Å"Cat† as the bright blood came flowing out between his mailed fingers. She thought she had forgotten that. That was the last time she had seen his face . . . until the day she was brought before him in King’s Landing. A fortnight passed before Littlefinger was strong enough to leave Riverrun, but her lord father forbade her to visit him in the tower where he lay abed. Lysa helped their maester nurse him; she had been softer and shyer in those days. Edmure had called on him as well, but Petyr had sent him away. Her brother had acted as Brandon’s squire at the duel, and Littlefinger would not forgive that. As soon as he was strong enough to be moved, Lord Hoster Tully sent Petyr Baelish away in a closed litter, to finish his healing on the Fingers, upon the windswept jut of rock where he’d been born. The ringing clash of steel on steel jarred Catelyn back to the present. Ser Vardis was coming hard at Bronn, driving into him with shield and sword. The sellsword scrambled backward, checking each blow, stepping lithely over rock and root, his eyes never leaving his foe. He was quicker, Catelyn saw; the knight’s silvered sword never came near to touching him, but his own ugly grey blade hacked a notch from Ser Vardis’s shoulder plate. The brief flurry of fighting ended as swiftly as it had begun when Bronn sidestepped and slid behind the statue of the weeping woman. Ser Vardis lunged at where he had been, striking a spark off the pale marble of Alyssa’s thigh. â€Å"They’re not fighting good, Mother,† the Lord of the Eyrie complained. â€Å"I want them to fight.† â€Å"They will, sweet baby,† his mother soothed him. â€Å"The sellsword can’t run all day.† Some of the lords on Lysa’s terrace were making wry jests as they refilled their wine cups, but across the garden, Tyrion Lannister’s mismatched eyes watched the champions dance as if there were nothing else in the world. Bronn came out from behind the statue hard and fast, still moving left, aiming a two-handed cut at the knight’s unshielded right side. Ser Vardis blocked, but clumsily, and the sellsword’s blade flashed upward at his head. Metal rang, and a falcon’s wing collapsed with a crunch. Ser Vardis took a half step back to brace himself, raised his shield. Oak chips flew as Bronn’s sword hacked at the wooden wall. The sellsword stepped left again, away from the shield, and caught Ser Vardis across the stomach, the razor edge of his blade leaving a bright gash when it bit into the knight’s plate. Ser Vardis drove forward off his back foot, his own silver blade descending in a savage arc. Bronn slammed it aside and danced away. The knight crashed into the weeping woman, rocking her on her plinth. Staggered, he stepped backward, his head turning this way and that as he searched for his foe. The slit visor of his helm narrowed his vision. â€Å"Behind you, ser!† Lord Hunter shouted, too late. Bronn brought his sword down with both hands, catching Ser Vardis in the elbow of his sword arm. The thin lobstered metal that protected the joint crunched. The knight grunted, turning, wrenching his weapon up. This time Bronn stood his ground. The swords flew at each other, and their steel song filled the garden and rang off the white towers of the Eyrie. â€Å"Ser Vardis is hurt,† Ser Rodrik said, his voice grave. Catelyn did not need to be told; she had eyes, she could see the bright finger of blood running along the knight’s forearm, the wetness inside the elbow joint. Every parry was a little slower and a little lower than the one before. Ser Vardis turned his side to his foe, trying to use his shield to block instead, but Bronn slid around him, quick as a cat. The sellsword seemed to be getting stronger. His cuts were leaving their marks now. Deep shiny gashes gleamed all over the knight’s armor, on his right thigh, his beaked visor, crossing on his breastplate, a long one along the front of his gorget. The moon-and-falcon rondel over Ser Vardis’s right arm was sheared clean in half, hanging by its strap. They could hear his labored breath, rattling through the air holes in his visor. Blind with arrogance as they were, even the knights and lords of the Vale could see what was happening below them, yet her sister could not. â€Å"Enough, Ser Vardis!† Lady Lysa called down. â€Å"Finish him now, my baby is growing tired.† And it must be said of Ser Vardis Egen that he was true to his lady’s command, even to the last. One moment he was reeling backward, half-crouched behind his scarred shield; the next he charged. The sudden bull rush caught Bronn off balance. Ser Vardis crashed into him and slammed the lip of his shield into the sellsword’s face. Almost, almost, Bronn lost his feet . . . he staggered back, tripped over a rock, and caught hold of the weeping woman to keep his balance. Throwing aside his shield, Ser Vardis lurched after him, using both hands to raise his sword. His right arm was blood from elbow to fingers now, yet his last desperate blow would have opened Bronn from neck to navel . . . if the sellsword had stood to receive it. But Bronn jerked back. Jon Arryn’s beautiful engraved silver sword glanced off the marble elbow of the weeping woman and snapped clean a third of the way up the blade. Bronn put his shoulder into the statue’s back. The weathered likeness of Alyssa Arryn tottered and fell with a great crash, and Ser Vardis Egen went down beneath her. Bronn was on him in a heartbeat, kicking what was left of his shattered rondel aside to expose the weak spot between arm and breastplate. Ser Vardis was lying on his side, pinned beneath the broken torso of the weeping woman. Catelyn heard the knight groan as the sellsword lifted his blade with both hands and drove it down and in with all his weight behind it, under the arm and through the ribs. Ser Vardis Egen shuddered and lay still. Silence hung over the Eyrie. Bronn yanked off his halfhelm and let it fall to the grass. His lip was smashed and bloody where the shield had caught him, and his coal-black hair was soaked with sweat. He spit out a broken tooth. â€Å"Is it over, Mother?† the Lord of the Eyrie asked. No, Catelyn wanted to tell him, it’s only now beginning. â€Å"Yes,† Lysa said glumly, her voice as cold and dead as the captain of her guard. â€Å"Can I make the little man fly now?† Across the garden, Tyrion Lannister got to his feet. â€Å"Not this little man,† he said. â€Å"This little man is going down in the turnip hoist, thank you very much.† â€Å"You presume—† Lysa began. â€Å"I presume that House Arryn remembers its own words,† the Imp said. â€Å"As High as Honor.† â€Å"You promised I could make him fly,† the Lord of the Eyrie screamed at his mother. He began to shake. Lady Lysa’s face was flushed with fury. â€Å"The gods have seen fit to proclaim him innocent, child. We have no choice but to free him.† She lifted her voice. â€Å"Guards. Take my lord of Lannister and his . . . creature here out of my sight. Escort them to the Bloody Gate and set them free. See that they have horses and supplies sufficient to reach the Trident, and make certain all their goods and weapons are returned to them. They shall need them on the high road.† â€Å"The high road,† Tyrion Lannister said. Lysa allowed herself a faint, satisfied smile. It was another sort of death sentence, Catelyn realized. Tyrion Lannister must know that as well. Yet the dwarf favored Lady Arryn with a mocking bow. â€Å"As you command, my lady,† he said. â€Å"I believe we know the way.† A Game of Thrones Chapter Forty Pale white mists rose off Alyssa’s Tears, where the ghost waters plunged over the shoulder of the mountain to begin their long tumble down the face of the Giant’s Lance. Catelyn could feel the faint touch of spray on her face. Alyssa Arryn had seen her husband, her brothers, and all her children slain, and yet in life she had never shed a tear. So in death, the gods had decreed that she would know no rest until her weeping watered the black earth of the Vale, where the men she had loved were buried. Alyssa had been dead six thousand years now, and still no drop of the torrent had ever reached the valley floor far below. Catelyn wondered how large a waterfall her own tears would make when she died. â€Å"Tell me the rest of it,† she said. â€Å"The Kingslayer is massing a host at Casterly Rock,† Ser Rodrik Cassel answered from the room behind her. â€Å"Your brother writes that he has sent riders to the Rock, demanding that Lord Tywin proclaim his intent, but he has had no answer. Edmure has commanded Lord Vance and Lord Piper to guard the pass below the Golden Tooth. He vows to you that he will yield no foot of Tully land without first watering it with Lannister blood.† Catelyn turned away from the sunrise. Its beauty did little to lighten her mood; it seemed cruel for a day to dawn so fair and end so foul as this one promised to. â€Å"Edmure has sent riders and made vows,† she said, â€Å"but Edmure is not the Lord of Riverrun. What of my lord father?† â€Å"The message made no mention of Lord Hoster, my lady.† Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. They had grown in white as snow and bristly as a thornbush while he was recovering from his wounds; he looked almost himself again. â€Å"My father would not have given the defense of Riverrun over to Edmure unless he was very sick,† she said, worried. â€Å"I should have been woken as soon as this bird arrived.† â€Å"Your lady sister thought it better to let you sleep, Maester Colemon told me.† â€Å"I should have been woken,† she insisted. â€Å"The maester tells me your sister planned to speak with you after the combat,† Ser Rodrik said. â€Å"Then she still plans to go through with this mummer’s farce?† Catelyn grimaced. â€Å"The dwarf has played her like a set of pipes, and she is too deaf to hear the tune. Whatever happens this morning, Ser Rodrik, it is past time we took our leave. My place is at Winterfell with my sons. If you are strong enough to travel, I shall ask Lysa for an escort to see us to Gulltown. We can take ship from there.† â€Å"Another ship?† Ser Rodrik looked a shade green, yet he managed not to shudder. â€Å"As you say, my lady.† The old knight waited outside her door as Catelyn summoned the servants Lysa had given her. If she spoke to her sister before the duel, perhaps she could change her mind, she thought as they dressed her. Lysa’s policies varied with her moods, and her moods changed hourly. The shy girl she had known at Riverrun had grown into a woman who was by turns proud, fearful, cruel, dreamy, reckless, timid, stubborn, vain, and, above all, inconstant. When that vile turnkey of hers had come crawling to tell them that Tyrion Lannister wished to confess, Catelyn had urged Lysa to have the dwarf brought to them privately, but no, nothing would do but that her sister must make a show of him before half the Vale. And now this . . . â€Å"Lannister is my prisoner,† she told Ser Rodrik as they descended the tower stairs and made their way through the Eyrie’s cold white halls. Catelyn wore plain grey wool with a silvered belt. â€Å"My sister must be reminded of that.† At the doors to Lysa’s apartments, they met her uncle storming out. â€Å"Going to join the fool’s festival?† Ser Brynden snapped. â€Å"I’d tell you to slap some sense into your sister, if I thought it would do any good, but you’d only bruise your hand.† â€Å"There was a bird from Riverrun,† Catelyn began, â€Å"a letter from Edmure . . . â€Å" â€Å"I know, child.† The black fish that fastened his cloak was Brynden’s only concession to ornament. â€Å"I had to hear it from Maester Colemon. I asked your sister for leave to take a thousand seasoned men and ride for Riverrun with all haste. Do you know what she told me? The Vale cannot spare a thousand swords, nor even one, Uncle, she said. You are the Knight of the Gate. Your place is here.† A gust of childish laughter drifted through the open doors behind him, and her uncle glanced darkly over his shoulder. â€Å"Well, I told her she could bloody well find herself a new Knight of the Gate. Black fish or no, I am still a Tully. I shall leave for Riverrun by evenfall.† Catelyn could not pretend to surprise. â€Å"Alone? You know as well as I that you will never survive the high road. Ser Rodrik and I are returning to Winterfell. Come with us, Uncle. I will give you your thousand men. Riverrun will not fight alone.† Brynden thought a moment, then nodded a brusque agreement. â€Å"As you say. It’s the long way home, but I’m more like to get there. I’ll wait for you below.† He went striding off, his cloak swirling behind him. Catelyn exchanged a look with Ser Rodrik. They went through the doors to the high, nervous sound of a child’s giggles. Lysa’s apartments opened over a small garden, a circle of dirt and grass planted with blue flowers and ringed on all sides by tall white towers. The builders had intended it as a godswood, but the Eyrie rested on the hard stone of the mountain, and no matter how much soil was hauled up from the Vale, they could not get a weirwood to take root here. So the Lords of the Eyrie planted grass and scattered statuary amidst low, flowering shrubs. It was there the two champions would meet to place their lives, and that of Tyrion Lannister, into the hands of the gods. Lysa, freshly scrubbed and garbed in cream velvet with a rope of sapphires and moonstones around her milk-white neck, was holding court on the terrace overlooking the scene of the combat, surrounded by her knights, retainers, and lords high and low. Most of them still hoped to wed her, bed her, and rule the Vale of Arryn by her side. From what Catelyn had seen during her stay at the Eyrie, it was a vain hope. A wooden platform had been built to elevate Robert’s chair; there the Lord of the Eyrie sat, giggling and clapping his hands as a humpbacked puppeteer in blue-and-white motley made two wooden knights hack and slash at each other. Pitchers of thick cream and baskets of blackberries had been set out, and the guests were sipping a sweet orange-scented wine from engraved silver cups. A fool’s festival, Brynden had called it, and small wonder. Across the terrace, Lysa laughed gaily at some jest of Lord Hunter’s, and nibbled a blackberry from the point of Ser Lyn Corbray’s dagger. They were the suitors who stood highest in Lysa’s favor . . . today, at least. Catelyn would have been hard-pressed to say which man was more unsuitable. Eon Hunter was even older than Jon Arryn had been, half-crippled by gout, and cursed with three quarrelsome sons, each more grasping than the last. Ser Lyn was a different sort of folly; lean and handsome, heir to an ancient but impoverished house, but vain, reckless, hot-tempered . . . and, it was whispered, notoriously uninterested in the intimate charms of women. When Lysa espied Catelyn, she welcomed her with a sisterly embrace and a moist kiss on the cheek. â€Å"Isn’t it a lovely morning? The gods are smiling on us. Do try a cup of the wine, sweet sister. Lord Hunter was kind enough to send for it, from his own cellars.† â€Å"Thank you, no. Lysa, we must talk.† â€Å"After,† her sister promised, already beginning to turn away from her. â€Å"Now.† Catelyn spoke more loudly than she’d intended. Men were turning to look. â€Å"Lysa, you cannot mean to go ahead with this folly. Alive, the Imp has value. Dead, he is only food for crows. And if his champion should prevail here—† â€Å"Small chance of that, my lady,† Lord Hunter assured her, patting her shoulder with a liver-spotted hand. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a doughty fighter. He will make short work of the sellsword.† â€Å"Will he, my lord?† Catelyn said coolly. â€Å"I wonder.† She had seen Bronn fight on the high road; it was no accident that he had survived the journey while other men had died. He moved like a panther, and that ugly sword of his seemed a part of his arm. Lysa’s suitors were gathering around them like bees round a blossom. â€Å"Women understand little of these things,† Ser Morton Waynwood said. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a knight, sweet lady. This other fellow, well, his sort are all cowards at heart. Useful enough in a battle, with thousands of their fellows around them, but stand them up alone and the manhood leaks right out of them.† â€Å"Say you have the truth of it, then,† Catelyn said with a courtesy that made her mouth ache. â€Å"What will we gain by the dwarf’s death? Do you imagine that Jaime will care a fig that we gave his brother a trial before we flung him off a mountain?† â€Å"Behead the man,† Ser Lyn Corbray suggested. â€Å"When the Kingslayer receives the Imp’s head, it will be a warning to him,† Lysa gave an impatient shake of her waist-long auburn hair. â€Å"Lord Robert wants to see him fly,† she said, as if that settled the matter. â€Å"And the Imp has only himself to blame. It was he who demanded a trial by combat.† â€Å"Lady Lysa had no honorable way to deny him, even if she’d wished to,† Lord Hunter intoned ponderously. Ignoring them all, Catelyn turned all her force on her sister. â€Å"I remind you, Tyrion Lannister is my prisoner.† â€Å"And I remind you, the dwarf murdered my lord husband!† Her voice rose. â€Å"He poisoned the Hand of the King and left my sweet baby fatherless, and now I mean to see him pay!† Whirling, her skirts swinging around her, Lysa stalked across the terrace. Ser Lyn and Ser Morton and the other suitors excused themselves with cool nods and trailed after her. â€Å"Do you think he did?† Ser Rodrik asked her quietly when they were alone again. â€Å"Murder Lord Jon, that is? The Imp still denies it, and most fiercely . . . â€Å" â€Å"I believe the Lannisters murdered Lord Arryn,† Catelyn replied, â€Å"but whether it was Tyrion, or Ser Jaime, or the queen, or all of them together, I could not begin to say.† Lysa had named Cersei in the letter she had sent to Winterfell, but now she seemed certain that Tyrion was the killer . . . perhaps because the dwarf was here, while the queen was safe behind the walls of the Red Keep, hundreds of leagues to the south. Catelyn almost wished she had burned her sister’s letter before reading it. Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. â€Å"Poison, well . . . that could be the dwarf’s work, true enough. Or Cersei’s. It’s said poison is a woman’s weapon, begging your pardons, my lady. The Kingslayer, now . . . I have no great liking for the man, but he’s not the sort. Too fond of the sight of blood on that golden sword of his. Was it poison, my lady?† Catelyn frowned, vaguely uneasy. â€Å"How else could they make it look a natural death?† Behind her, Lord Robert shrieked with delight as one of the puppet knights sliced the other in half, spilling a flood of red sawdust onto the terrace. She glanced at her nephew and sighed. â€Å"The boy is utterly without discipline. He will never be strong enough to rule unless he is taken away from his mother for a time.† â€Å"His lord father agreed with you,† said a voice at her elbow. She turned to behold Maester Colemon, a cup of wine in his hand. â€Å"He was planning to send the boy to Dragonstone for fostering, you know . . . oh, but I’m speaking out of turn.† The apple of his throat bobbed anxiously beneath the loose maester’s chain. â€Å"I fear I’ve had too much of Lord Hunter’s excellent wine. The prospect of bloodshed has my nerves all a-fray . . . â€Å" â€Å"You are mistaken, Maester,† Catelyn said. â€Å"It was Casterly Rock, not Dragonstone, and those arrangements were made after the Hand’s death, without my sister’s consent.† The maester’s head jerked so vigorously at the end of his absurdly long neck that he looked half a puppet himself. â€Å"No, begging your forgiveness, my lady, but it was Lord Jon who—† A bell tolled loudly below them. High lords and serving girls alike broke off what they were doing and moved to the balustrade. Below, two guardsmen in sky-blue cloaks led forth Tyrion Lannister. The Eyrie’s plump septon escorted him to the statue in the center of the garden, a weeping woman carved in veined white marble, no doubt meant to be Alyssa. â€Å"The bad little man,† Lord Robert said, giggling. â€Å"Mother, can I make him fly? I want to see him fly.† â€Å"Later, my sweet baby,† Lysa promised him. â€Å"Trial first,† drawled Ser Lyn Corbray, â€Å"then execution.† A moment later the two champions appeared from opposite sides of the garden. The knight was attended by two young squires, the sellsword by the Eyrie’s master-at-arms. Ser Vardis Egen was steel from head to heel, encased in heavy plate armor over mail and padded surcoat. Large circular rondels, enameled cream-and-blue in the moon-and-falcon sigil of House Arryn, protected the vulnerable juncture of arm and breast. A skirt of lobstered metal covered him from waist to midthigh, while a solid gorget encircled his throat. Falcon’s wings sprouted from the temples of his helm, and his visor was a pointed metal beak with a narrow slit for vision. Bronn was so lightly armored he looked almost naked beside the knight. He wore only a shirt of black oiled ringmail over boiled leather, a round steel halfhelm with a noseguard, and a mail coif. High leather boots with steel shinguards gave some protection to his legs, and discs of black iron were sewn into the fingers of his gloves. Yet Catelyn noted that the sellsword stood half a hand taller than his foe, with a longer reach . . . and Bronn was fifteen years younger, if she was any judge. They knelt in the grass beneath the weeping woman, facing each other, with Lannister between them. The septon removed a faceted crystal sphere from the soft cloth bag at his waist. He lifted it high above his head, and the light shattered. Rainbows danced across the Imp’s face. In a high, solemn, singsong voice, the septon asked the gods to look down and bear witness, to find the truth in this man’s soul, to grant him life and freedom if he was innocent, death if he was guilty. His voice echoed off the surrounding towers. When the last echo had died away, the septon lowered his crystal and made a hasty departure. Tyrion leaned over and whispered something in Bronn’s ear before the guardsmen led him away. The sellsword rose laughing and brushed a blade of grass from his knee. Robert Arryn, Lord of the Eyrie and Defender of the Vale, was fidgeting impatiently in his elevated chair. â€Å"When are they going to fight?† he asked plaintively. Ser Vardis was helped back to his feet by one of his squires. The other brought him a triangular shield almost four feet tall, heavy oak dotted with iron studs. They strapped it to his left forearm. When Lysa’s master-at-arms offered Bronn a similar shield, the sellsword spat and waved it away. Three days growth of coarse black beard covered his jaw and cheeks, but if he did not shave it was not for want of a razor; the edge of his sword had the dangerous glimmer of steel that had been honed every day for hours, until it was too sharp to touch. Ser Vardis held out a gauntleted hand, and his squire placed a handsome double-edged longsword in his grasp. The blade was engraved with a delicate silver tracery of a mountain sky; its pommel was a falcon’s head, its crossguard fashioned into the shape of wings. â€Å"I had that sword crafted for Jon in King’s Landing,† Lysa told her guests proudly as they watched Ser Vardis try a practice cut. â€Å"He wore it whenever he sat the Iron Throne in King Robert’s place. Isn’t it a lovely thing? I thought it only fitting that our champion avenge Jon with his own blade.† The engraved silver blade was beautiful beyond a doubt, but it seemed to Catelyn that Ser Vardis might have been more comfortable with his own sword. Yet she said nothing; she was weary of futile arguments with her sister. â€Å"Make them fight!† Lord Robert called out. Ser Vardis faced the Lord of the Eyrie and lifted his sword in salute. â€Å"For the Eyrie and the Vale!† Tyrion Lannister had been seated on a balcony across the garden, flanked by his guards. It was to him that Bronn turned with a cursory salute. â€Å"They await your command,† Lady Lysa said to her lord son. â€Å"Fight!† the boy screamed, his arms trembling as they clutched at his chair. Ser Vardis swiveled, bringing up his heavy shield. Bronn turned to face him. Their swords rang together, once, twice, a testing. The sellsword backed off a step. The knight came after, holding his shield before him. He tried a slash, but Bronn jerked back, just out of reach, and the silver blade cut only air. Bronn circled to his right. Ser Vardis turned to follow, keeping his shield between them. The knight pressed forward, placing each foot carefully on the uneven ground. The sellsword gave way, a faint smile playing over his lips. Ser Vardis attacked, slashing, but Bronn leapt away from him, hopping lightly over a low, moss-covered stone. Now the sellsword circled left, away from the shield, toward the knight’s unprotected side. Ser Vardis tried a hack at his legs, but he did not have the reach. Bronn danced farther to his left. Ser Vardis turned in place. â€Å"The man is craven,† Lord Hunter declared. â€Å"Stand and fight, coward! † Other voices echoed the sentiment. Catelyn looked to Ser Rodrik. Her master-at-arms gave a curt shake of his head. â€Å"He wants to make Ser Vardis chase him. The weight of armor and shield will tire even the strongest man.† She had seen men practice at their swordplay near every day of her life, had viewed half a hundred tourneys in her time, but this was something different and deadlier: a dance where the smallest misstep meant death. And as she watched, the memory of another duel in another time came back to Catelyn Stark, as vivid as if it had been yesterday. They met in the lower bailey of Riverrun. When Brandon saw that Petyr wore only helm and breastplate and mail, he took off most of his armor. Petyr had begged her for a favor he might wear, but she had turned him away. Her lord father promised her to Brandon Stark, and so it was to him that she gave her token, a pale blue handscarf she had embroidered with the leaping trout of Riverrun. As she pressed it into his hand, she pleaded with him. â€Å"He is only a foolish boy, but I have loved him like a brother. It would grieve me to see him die.† And her betrothed looked at her with the cool grey eyes of a Stark and promised to spare the boy who loved her. That fight was over almost as soon as it began. Brandon was a man grown, and he drove Littlefinger all the way across the bailey and down the water stair, raining steel on him with every step, until the boy was staggering and bleeding from a dozen wounds. â€Å"Yield!† he called, more than once, but Petyr would only shake his head and fight on, grimly. When the river was lapping at their ankles, Brandon finally ended it, with a brutal backhand cut that bit through Petyr’s rings and leather into the soft flesh below the ribs, so deep that Catelyn was certain that the wound was mortal. He looked at her as he fell and murmured â€Å"Cat† as the bright blood came flowing out between his mailed fingers. She thought she had forgotten that. That was the last time she had seen his face . . . until the day she was brought before him in King’s Landing. A fortnight passed before Littlefinger was strong enough to leave Riverrun, but her lord father forbade her to visit him in the tower where he lay abed. Lysa helped their maester nurse him; she had been softer and shyer in those days. Edmure had called on him as well, but Petyr had sent him away. Her brother had acted as Brandon’s squire at the duel, and Littlefinger would not forgive that. As soon as he was strong enough to be moved, Lord Hoster Tully sent Petyr Baelish away in a closed litter, to finish his healing on the Fingers, upon the windswept jut of rock where he’d been born. The ringing clash of steel on steel jarred Catelyn back to the present. Ser Vardis was coming hard at Bronn, driving into him with shield and sword. The sellsword scrambled backward, checking each blow, stepping lithely over rock and root, his eyes never leaving his foe. He was quicker, Catelyn saw; the knight’s silvered sword never came near to touching him, but his own ugly grey blade hacked a notch from Ser Vardis’s shoulder plate. The brief flurry of fighting ended as swiftly as it had begun when Bronn sidestepped and slid behind the statue of the weeping woman. Ser Vardis lunged at where he had been, striking a spark off the pale marble of Alyssa’s thigh. â€Å"They’re not fighting good, Mother,† the Lord of the Eyrie complained. â€Å"I want them to fight.† â€Å"They will, sweet baby,† his mother soothed him. â€Å"The sellsword can’t run all day.† Some of the lords on Lysa’s terrace were making wry jests as they refilled their wine cups, but across the garden, Tyrion Lannister’s mismatched eyes watched the champions dance as if there were nothing else in the world. Bronn came out from behind the statue hard and fast, still moving left, aiming a two-handed cut at the knight’s unshielded right side. Ser Vardis blocked, but clumsily, and the sellsword’s blade flashed upward at his head. Metal rang, and a falcon’s wing collapsed with a crunch. Ser Vardis took a half step back to brace himself, raised his shield. Oak chips flew as Bronn’s sword hacked at the wooden wall. The sellsword stepped left again, away from the shield, and caught Ser Vardis across the stomach, the razor edge of his blade leaving a bright gash when it bit into the knight’s plate. Ser Vardis drove forward off his back foot, his own silver blade descending in a savage arc. Bronn slammed it aside and danced away. The knight crashed into the weeping woman, rocking her on her plinth. Staggered, he stepped backward, his head turning this way and that as he searched for his foe. The slit visor of his helm narrowed his vision. â€Å"Behind you, ser!† Lord Hunter shouted, too late. Bronn brought his sword down with both hands, catching Ser Vardis in the elbow of his sword arm. The thin lobstered metal that protected the joint crunched. The knight grunted, turning, wrenching his weapon up. This time Bronn stood his ground. The swords flew at each other, and their steel song filled the garden and rang off the white towers of the Eyrie. â€Å"Ser Vardis is hurt,† Ser Rodrik said, his voice grave. Catelyn did not need to be told; she had eyes, she could see the bright finger of blood running along the knight’s forearm, the wetness inside the elbow joint. Every parry was a little slower and a little lower than the one before. Ser Vardis turned his side to his foe, trying to use his shield to block instead, but Bronn slid around him, quick as a cat. The sellsword seemed to be getting stronger. His cuts were leaving their marks now. Deep shiny gashes gleamed all over the knight’s armor, on his right thigh, his beaked visor, crossing on his breastplate, a long one along the front of his gorget. The moon-and-falcon rondel over Ser Vardis’s right arm was sheared clean in half, hanging by its strap. They could hear his labored breath, rattling through the air holes in his visor. Blind with arrogance as they were, even the knights and lords of the Vale could see what was happening below them, yet her sister could not. â€Å"Enough, Ser Vardis!† Lady Lysa called down. â€Å"Finish him now, my baby is growing tired.† And it must be said of Ser Vardis Egen that he was true to his lady’s command, even to the last. One moment he was reeling backward, half-crouched behind his scarred shield; the next he charged. The sudden bull rush caught Bronn off balance. Ser Vardis crashed into him and slammed the lip of his shield into the sellsword’s face. Almost, almost, Bronn lost his feet . . . he staggered back, tripped over a rock, and caught hold of the weeping woman to keep his balance. Throwing aside his shield, Ser Vardis lurched after him, using both hands to raise his sword. His right arm was blood from elbow to fingers now, yet his last desperate blow would have opened Bronn from neck to navel . . . if the sellsword had stood to receive it. But Bronn jerked back. Jon Arryn’s beautiful engraved silver sword glanced off the marble elbow of the weeping woman and snapped clean a third of the way up the blade. Bronn put his shoulder into the statue’s back. The weathered likeness of Alyssa Arryn tottered and fell with a great crash, and Ser Vardis Egen went down beneath her. Bronn was on him in a heartbeat, kicking what was left of his shattered rondel aside to expose the weak spot between arm and breastplate. Ser Vardis was lying on his side, pinned beneath the broken torso of the weeping woman. Catelyn heard the knight groan as the sellsword lifted his blade with both hands and drove it down and in with all his weight behind it, under the arm and through the ribs. Ser Vardis Egen shuddered and lay still. Silence hung over the Eyrie. Bronn yanked off his halfhelm and let it fall to the grass. His lip was smashed and bloody where the shield had caught him, and his coal-black hair was soaked with sweat. He spit out a broken tooth. â€Å"Is it over, Mother?† the Lord of the Eyrie asked. No, Catelyn wanted to tell him, it’s only now beginning. â€Å"Yes,† Lysa said glumly, her voice as cold and dead as the captain of her guard. â€Å"Can I make the little man fly now?† Across the garden, Tyrion Lannister got to his feet. â€Å"Not this little man,† he said. â€Å"This little man is going down in the turnip hoist, thank you very much.† â€Å"You presume—† Lysa began. â€Å"I presume that House Arryn remembers its own words,† the Imp said. â€Å"As High as Honor.† â€Å"You promised I could make him fly,† the Lord of the Eyrie screamed at his mother. He began to shake. Lady Lysa’s face was flushed with fury. â€Å"The gods have seen fit to proclaim him innocent, child. We have no choice but to free him.† She lifted her voice. â€Å"Guards. Take my lord of Lannister and his . . . creature here out of my sight. Escort them to the Bloody Gate and set them free. See that they have horses and supplies sufficient to reach the Trident, and make certain all their goods and weapons are returned to them. They shall need them on the high road.† â€Å"The high road,† Tyrion Lannister said. Lysa allowed herself a faint, satisfied smile. It was another sort of death sentence, Catelyn realized. Tyrion Lannister must know that as well. Yet the dwarf favored Lady Arryn with a mocking bow. â€Å"As you command, my lady,† he said. â€Å"I believe we know the way.†

Operation Iraqi Freedom Logistics, Strategy and Support Essay

Operation Iraqi Freedom Logistics, Strategy and Support - Essay Example The  distribution  based logistics did not function smoothly, as it  was expected  when the US  group  went to Iraqi for the first time (Peltz, Halliday, and Girardini, 2005).  Variety of problems needed to be addressed and they included insufficient logistics employees, reduced asset visibility, lack of proper communication, and inadequate provision of transportation materials. Although, with time the Army has persistently continued to  change  the  supply  process  and has advanced the materials used so that the  distribution  based logistics system can  become  more successful. It was  evident  that when operation Iraqi freedom begun, the department of defense did not have the  supply  capability  to set up and  manage  the majority of  distribution  and tools in theater. The  principal  factor that led to the issues of  distribution  in the operation Iraqi freedom was insufficient war service maintaining staff in the theater. Most of the units in the  war  service  sustenance  are reserved  and, therefore, need almost 90 to 120 days to activate and  deploy  the operation Iraqi freedom. To  prevent  the  training  division over the December 2002 festive season, the  conclusion  was decided  so that there is a delay in some of the recruitment of operation Iraqi freedom (Amaal and Judi, 2007).  Because of this reason, majority of the army and the  aquatic  service logistics staff, did not  prepare  to the theater till the time when the  warfare  troops entered and the significant  warfareà ‚  operations were in progress. At the time, when the  warfare  service maintaining staffs were in the theater, defense supply of food and extra parts in  various  units  were exhausted  and meals that were  ready  for  consumption  stocks in the maintaining storehouse were not as much for the day in the operation Iraqi freedom.  This led to the crippling beginning of the  distribution  based logistics system

Collaborative Highly Effective Team Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Collaborative Highly Effective Team - Assignment Example From this paper it is clear that lack of trust – Trust is very important in any group, since if you don’t trust other members then you can’t work together since you can’t agree with their ideas because you don’t have trust in them in the first place.As the study highlights that the presence of conflicts – Where there is no agreement always leads to arising of conflicts. If they don’t respect each other as a group, then it will never work. Lack of commitment – In such a situation no one wants to be committed since they don’t agree with each other before they can do a thing. Avoidance of accountability – In a team that is ineffective everyone doesn’t want to be responsible for the consequences that arise. They don’t care what comes out of the actions. The leader ought to operate in a way that protects the vision of the team. When a conflict arises a team leader must ensure that everyone is still committ ed to the team vision. A leader must make sure that the conflicts do not interfere with the vision. A leader must make sure that there is a mutual respect between the two parties involved in the conflict after it has been resolved.  Create time for team members to appreciate each other’s skills - The team should have time to get to appreciate the work of every member by doing this it helps boost the team’s confidence.  Managing emotional concerns that can help the progress – When there is a burning issue the member should come out and express it.  

A Philosophical Understanding of Researching Gangs in the NTE Essay

A Philosophical Understanding of Researching Gangs in the NTE - Essay Example As postulated by Plato, the Greek philosopher (427-347 BC), knowledge can be distinctively considered as â€Å"Justified True Belief†. The theory encompasses major queries regarding the basis of knowledge, the methodical approach of its acquisition, people’s understanding level, and how & why is it necessary to know what one perceives. There is a subtle difference epistemologically between the theory and practical (of what is gathered by experience) aspects of knowledge. (Watson, 2004) John Locke advocates the idea of Innatism, which proposes that the knowledge accumulated in an individual through experience, is actually born of that person’s pre-existing sub-conscious knowledge base. Empiricism is a theory of knowledge that lays emphasis on the role of experience, especially the experience based on constant observations by the five senses. Some empiricists think that all the knowledge is empirical while others separate mathematics and logic from the stream. (Fum erton, 2005) The German philosopher Immanuel Kant of the 18th century states, "although all our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it arises from experience" (Taylor, 1989, p.80). From here also we get the essence of â€Å"Transcendental Absolute† as guided by the theorists of Innatism. In his works of Personal Knowledge, Michael Polanyi attempts to bring out the distinction between â€Å"knowing that† and â€Å"knowing how†. The level of consciousness is heightened through the attainments of multiple experiences and different perception levels. The epistemological approach identifies two basic types of knowledge; one is â€Å"A priori† which interprets the structure of knowledge is independent of empirical experiences and the other one â€Å"A posteriori† is justified by the experiencing through the practical way. Hume’s epistemological treatise on natural knowledge

Biochemistry - How BSE Occurs at a Molecular Level Coursework

Biochemistry - How BSE Occurs at a Molecular Level - Coursework Example Toxicity: Large amounts of phenylalanine taken in the form of nutritional supplements elevate blood pressure. Symptoms such as headaches, heartburn and nausea may be experienced. In addition, the nervous system is usually affected by the toxicity of phenylalanine. Reactivity: Phenylalanine is a hydrophobic amino acid with an aromatic side chain. Therefore, it is fairly unreactive and mostly takes place in substitution reactions where it is interchanged with amino acids of a similar nature. Consequently, it plays a key role in substrate recognition rather than in protein function. Hydrogen bonds: Hydrogen atoms from the amine groups are pulled towards the electronegative carboxyl groups leading to sharing of electrons. The repetitive nature of such attractions within the protein structure confers stability. Van der Waals forces: Interactions among induced dipoles that form from the changes in charge density that occur in adjacent atoms that do not necessarily form a bond constitute attractive van der Waals forces. Repulsive forces, on the other hand, entail interactions between atoms that come close to each other but do not form dipoles. The huge numbers of such forces within the structure of proteins affect the stability of proteins. When certain proteins fail to fold in the required way, they begin to cluster and form aggregates. These aggregates contain certain polymeric structures such as beta sheets. In BSE, these aggregates are in the form of prions, which get into the brain and cause disease. Prions are proteinaceous infectious particles that comprise aggregates of misfolded proteins. Prions alter the structure of the brain by stimulating the formation of ‘holes’ in the brain, which ultimately give the brain a spongy architecture. Consequently, the nervous system is affected making the cow behave abnormally.  Ingestion of prions present in contaminated food causes them to be taken up into the body.  Ã‚  

Leadership of the Sexes Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Leadership of the Sexes - Essay Example Men and women primarily differ due to their genetic make up and react to situations with corresponding influence from hormones. In stress and conflict, women produce the oxytocin hormone that tends to harmonize relationship while men produce testosterone which drives men to act aggressively. Scientific studies and tools emphasize on the distinction between the sexes. Using PET scan (monitors activity of neurons), MRI scan (shows flow of blood), and SPECT scan (tracks brain activity) on brain areas, it was revealed that with more activity, more blood flows in the â€Å"spatial-mechanical centers† on the right side of the male brain while for the female, blood flows more on the â€Å"verbal-emotive centers in both sides† (men tend to move around during meetings while women discuss matters); there is more gray matter on men (making them process singly and locally) while women have more of the white matter (they â€Å"process more globally† and evaluate the world reg ularly); the larger hippocampus in female brain makes them recall â€Å"more physical and situational details;† larger amygdala in females tends to resolve conflict by upward direction toward the verbal areas in the brain while for males, the direction is downward that tends to produce physical manifestation; and hormone secretion affects the thinking process of both genders differently (more testosterone and vasopressin in males makes them territorial and aggressive while more serotonin and oxytocin influence females towards calmness and bonding) (Gurian and Annis 3). Brain differences enable women to utilize participatory leadership (at ease with teamwork, value work relationships) and rationalize inductively, while men tend to use transactional leadership (testing people and ideas) and rationalize deductively. Women used to describe things, empathize with people, prefer â€Å"verbal interaction,† and capable of multitasking, while men directly tell

Are cell phones really dangerous to people Essay

Are cell phones really dangerous to people - Essay Example Are cell phones really dangerous to people? The control of the advertising of cell phones would be another important measure for preventing the extended exposure of people to the cell phones’ radiation. Cell phones should be regarded, as tools of communication and their use should be limited in cases of emergency. Otherwise, the increase of fatal incidents and diseases because of cell phones would not be controlled. Moreover, the terms under which the access to cell phones has been permitted to teenagers have been reviewed – taking into consideration the fact that people of this age are less likely to pay attention at the risks related to the use of cell phones – as highlighted in relevant academic studies. At this point, the following problem has been identified: children have often access to cell phones with the permission of their parents. This trend is extremely dangerous especially since scientists have set severe restrictions regarding the potential use of cell phones by children – but these restrictions seem to be ignored by most of people worldwide. At this point the following problem appears: are cell phones really dangerous to people? This problem has been explored through a series of relevant studies. It is proved that cell phones can actually harm the health; moreover, it seems that the risks for health can be severe for people of all ages. At the next level, it has been made clear that the ways in which cell phones can affect the health of humans can vary; the direct use of cell phone may be less harmful compared to the residence near a cell phone tower. In the article of Geoffrey, published online by the Independent, reference is made to the research of Dr Vini Khurana who studied the effects of cell phones on health; the above research led to the following findings: ‘the use of handsets for 10 years or more can double the risk of brain cancer’ (Geoffrey par.3). In the above study, emphasis is also given on the fact that certain types of cancer can take quite long to develop – even up to a decade; therefore, the above study – having lasted for such period - provides a precise estimation of the potential effects of cell phones on brain. Another important finding of the study of Khurana has been the following one: cell phones can be more dangerous from smoking (par.1); the above finding indicates the level of risk related to the use of cell phones but also the level at which cell phones intervene in daily activities having led to the development of addiction similar to smoking – as this problem is revealed through the study presented above. The various aspects of the danger of cell phones for human health are analyzed in the article of Kovach, published online by the magazine Life Extension; in the above article reference is made to the findings of the research developed by George Carlo, a medical scientist who has spent years on studying the effects of cell phones – both of handsets and cell phone towers – on health; his research lasted from 1993 up to 1999 and reveals a series of important aspects of the health risks related to the use of cell phones (par.3, 4). The key findings of his study could be summarized as follows: a) cell phones are not tested as for their risks for health; they enter the market without any testing, as a result of a legislative gap of the peri od when these devices appeared – the 1980s (par.5), b) cell phones can cause severe problems of health, even death, since they are involved in the continuous transmission of waves which can adversely affect the bio-field of humans (par.6); it is possible for this reason that cell phones have been also related to the changes in the DNA of their users –

Comparison of the TV Bra for Living Sculpture and the Olympia Essay

Comparison of the TV Bra for Living Sculpture and the Olympia - Essay Example Comparison of the TV Bra for Living Sculpture and the Olympia Art will always remain part and parcel of life. It has been there since time immemorial and there are several household names that are known for various pieces of art. The Olympia and the TV Bra for Living Sculpture are such pieces of art that have brought some form of controversy in the subject matter that they have and will be the focus of discussion in this paper. The Olympia was done by Edouard Manet, a French painter in 1863. This painting caused such uproar when it was presented at the Salon in 1865 and the authorities at the Salon were forced to put it further up and put two armed guards to prevent the painting from being damaged by the public. The painting encompasses a reclining nude woman being tended to by a black maid while a black cat is on the far right of the bed where the woman is lying gazing rather mysteriously to the viewer of the painting. The TV Bra for Living Sculpture is a piece of work done by Nam June Paik in 1969 and is found in the Walk Art Center. It is made of video tubes, television, rheostat, Plexiglas boxes, vinyl straps, foot switches, cables and copper wire. All these were connected to resemble a bra, which is a pi ece of cloth used by women to hold their breasts in place. According to Salter, p.116, it is used to portray how electronics can be humanized since it entails the use of a TV as a bra; a bra is something that is considered intimate to the female human being, and it is so unlikely that a TV can be used as a bra. That being, the idea was to stimulate the fantasy of finding a new, imaginative and humanistic use of technology. Both artists, Edouard Manet and Nam June Paik are renowned artists. This is mostly due to the style of art that they engage in, for example, Manet was known for a series of paintings featuring naked women such as the Le Dejeuner sur I'Herbe. On the same scale, Nam June Paik did a number of electronically inspired arts throughout the 1960’s such as the TV chair, Opus paintings, TV cello and TV garden among others (Smithsonian American Art Museum, p.2). All these pieces of art encompassed electronics being portrayed in a unique way. While the Olympia is made of oil paint the TV bra for living sculpture is made of various electronic devices such as copper wires, cables, switches and a TV screen. These two pieces have different materials but this does not make them any less desirable. The Olympia measures 130.5 by 190 centimeters and Manet used strong brush strokes which many people considered to be unfashionable at that moment since it was the kind of painting that little children used to practice their painting skills (Courtesans, p.1). The painting has a great contrast between the dark part that is on the background and the lighting on the foreground. The lighting gives focus to the woman lying on the bed as opposed to the other components of the painting such as the maidservant that is serving the lady as well as the cat that is on the bed (Courtesans, p.1). This serves to give the painting a desirable effect in addition to contributing to the thematic concern of the paint. The composition of the Olympia is not very different from oth er pieces of its time. However, the only unique aspect of its composition is that Manet took what was a classical composition and put it in a contemporary setting that could be referred to everyone else (Wallace, p.1). This was achieved by the use of the woman of a common origin bringing a sense of immediacy to the painting. On the other hand, the composition of the TV bra for living sculpture is rather unique since it encompasses the use of modern

Business Letter to the Editor for Western Herald Essay Example for Free

Business Letter to the Editor for Western Herald Essay Overview: With the previous unit, we explored personal writing suitable for academic audiences by reading scholarship from monographic texts and academic journals. For this unit, we’ll shift our emphasis to public writing that is also suitable for academic audiences. While we’ll plan to read academic scholarship, we’ll also explore different genres for which academic texts are suitable, including editorial publications. More specifically, we’ll look at opinions and letters to the editor published by the Western Herald. As we plan to work specifically with the letter to the editor genre, we’ll pay close attention to how argumentation styles, uses of evidence, and consultation of sources differs when writing a scholarly autobiographical academic essay. To prepare for the composition of editorials, we’ll read sample letters to the editors, and arguments pertaining to cultural diversity. The Task Your task will be to compose a letter to the editor that is suitable for publication in Western Herald. For this letter, you will select an issue that you are passionate about on Western’s Campus or the surrounding Kalamazoo area. Your letter should respond to the following questions: What specific issue matters most to me right now? Why should this issue matter to readers of Western Herald? To complete this assignment, you’ll first want to become familiar with the  editorial requirements for submitting letters to Western Herald. These requirements can be found on http://www.westernherald.com/letter-to-the-editor/ Next, you’ll want to read a few letters to the editor published by Western Herlad to get a sense of the stylistics conventions and argumentation strategies authors used to compose these editorials. Finally, you’ll consult course texts that discuss multiculturalism and diversity. You’ll also plan to locate, evaluate, and consult additional editorials and academic essays that address issues of linguistic diversity. In essence, you’ll need to reference sufficient and appropriate evidence necessary for persuading readers of your argument.

Effects of Children Essay Example for Free

Effects of Children Essay Children have a big impact on a relationship and the communication between two parents. Adding children into any relationship takes change and communication on both ends. It can be harder depending on the different relationship situations. Children change not only your personal relationship but also the relationships you have with friends and family. I asked three different parents that I know the same three questions. The questions were: 1. What change was least expected after your baby was born? 2. How did communication with your partner and others change after having a baby? . How did having a child affect your marriage or relationship? Each of the answers I received was similar. A\ll of the parents expressed that their lives and relationships changed a lot after having children. Their relationship with friends and with their partner became a challenge. Two out of the three said they expected the challenges while one said she didn’t expect so many issues to arise with her partner. A big issue that was mentioned by all three was the fact that the time between them and their partner was cut down drastically. That became a relationship breaker for one. She chose her daughters needs over the needs of her relationship. The communication patterns described by the parents did not follow the Guidelines for Effective Communication in Families. They differed because the communication and equity was not followed. One parent chose her time and energy needed to be focused on her child and put her relationship on hold. This in the end broke up her relationship. The other two followed the guidelines to an extent but not completely. Communication is tampered no matter what way you look at it. Men and woman look at parenthood different and that may be the main reason why children have such an effect on relationships. Communication is key in any relationship. There has to be a level of understanding and respect from both ends to balance any kind of friendship or intimate relationship. Children can change a lot of things in our lives. If two people are not on the same page in a relationship or about the choices that have to made with children it can ruin the relationship all together.

The Contribution Of The Chicago School Of Criminology Criminology Essay

The Contribution Of The Chicago School Of Criminology Criminology Essay To understand the contribution of the Chicago School of criminology is to understand how the confluence of geography, urbanisation, economics, immigration and the exchange of social theory between Europe and America combined to create new ways of looking at society. This essay will critically evaluate the contribution of the Chicago School, touching on these contributing factors to its development, prestige and influence. This essay will also note the limitations of the Chicago School that arise from the specificity of its location and its reliance on certain ideologies and research methods. In conclusion, this essay will argue that the same combination of factors that created the schools dominance in the field of criminology makes it vulnerable to social change. The Chicago School had its basis in the University of Chicago sociology department, which is the oldest in the United States and was established in 1892 (Lilly et al, 2007, p. 36). DEramo Thomson (2003) note this was a period of rapid social transformation. Chicago was a major railroad hub and became a huge industrial centre in its own right, notably its meat-packing industry (DEramo Thomson, 2003, p. 7). Chicago was an excellent place to carry out sociological fieldwork because it exemplified the post-industrial concentration of population in urban areas. The city grew from one million to two million people between 1890 and 1910 (Lilly et al, 2007, p. 34) providing a perfect Petri dish for the Chicago Schools study of human behaviour. The concentration of industry and therefore economic opportunity prompted an influx of immigrants and led to rapid changes in living patterns. Urbanisation was a major characteristic of the Industrial Revolution, and many cities grew very rapidly, so criminologists in other cities could easily generalise from the work of the Chicago School (Fine, 1995, p. 300). The most significant contribution of the Chicago School is the idea of social ecology. It holds that crime is a response to unstable environment and abnormal living conditions (Treadwell, 2006, p. 47). This is no longer a particularly radical idea, which is an indicator of the continued prominence of the Chicago School. For centuries, crime was viewed as a moral failure (ibid.) in the Judeo-Christian tradition. Criminals were sinners. What the Chicago School recognised was that urban life was distinct from rural life and its hectic, anonymous nature influenced peoples behaviour (Carrabine, 2004, p. 51). Chicago School criminologists were quick to draw a link between juvenile delinquency and the economic and geographic patterns of urban development. Thanks to the population boom they were able to study in detail, over a short span of time, the shifts from inner city to suburbs, and the differences in crime rates between affluent suburbs and the inner city poor (Treadwell, 2006). It is still possible to read first-hand observations in the Chicago School monographs written by sociologists such as Beirne and Thomas, on topics including hobos, prostitutes, dance halls and organised crime (Carrabine, 2004, p. 50). These books are a permanent testimony to the influence of the Chicago School, as well as offering a contemporary historical account of the development of criminology. Theories developed by the Chicago School are still central tenets of criminology whether modern researchers agree or are trying to discredit them. One of their primary assertions was that disruption, e.g. immigration, economic shifts and family instability, tends to cause crime, which has been affirmed by modern studies showing that social disorder, weak friendship networks and low community involvement produce higher crime rates (Lanier Henry, 2004, p. 214). Underlying the focus on identifying where crime is located geographically and socially is the influence of Emile Durkheim, who believed crime is an inevitable and necessary party of society (Beirne Messerschmidt, 2000, p. 97). This ideology naturally tends towards identifying crime and its causes, rather than believing it can be eliminated. The ongoing influence of the Chicago School prompted further sociological studies with a similar ethos of identifying where crime would come from. In the 1930s and 1940s sociological soc ial psychology, a study of group behaviour that emphasises group dynamics and socialisation (Siegel, 2008, p. 9), developed based in part on the Schools social ecology principles. Treadwell (2006) remarks that one of the Chicago Schools main contributions to criminology are its qualitative research methods. Robert Ezra Park, chair of the Department of Sociology, had a passion for walking the streets of the worlds great cities, observing the full range of human turbulence and triumphà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ he led a group of dedicated sociologists in direct, systematic observation of urban life (Carrabine, 2004, p. 50). Park taught his methods of direct observation to generations of students in his thirty-year career the University, ensuring the future study of criminology would be grounded in first-person observation. This seems axiomatic, however, it marked a shift from morally-determined ideas about crime that made assumptions based on belief, rather than observation. Sociologists such as Thresher and Shaw took to the streets, bars and juvenile courts of Chicago to observe people going about their daily lives (Treadwell, 2006). This pattern of study offered marginali sed people to report their own lives (ibid.). Subsequently research has tended to gravitate around methods pioneered by the Chicago School, such as direct interviews with subjects. This has also been construed as a weakness of the school, though, with critics arguing that the qualitative nature of its studies can result in the undue influence of the researchers personal bias (Fine, 1995, p. 139). While this inspired other sociologists to devote more attention to research techniques the subjectivist Chicago school method (ibid, p. 139) is still widely used in criminology. The structure of research in criminology has been shaped by the Chicago School in other ways, as well. It was home to some of the most influential voices in early criminology including urban sociologists such as W.I. Thomas, Robert Ezra Park, Ernest W. Burgess, and Louis Wirth (Siegel, 2008, p. 7) who pioneered social ecology. Significantly, Park, Burgess and Wirth were sociologists, teaching and conducting criminological research as part of the sociology department. As a result most criminologists have been trained in sociology, and many sociology departments are home to criminology courses (ibid. p. 162) This is more than an academic coincidence. To place criminology in the realm of sociology is to implicitly accept as a starting point the idea that criminal behaviour is rooted in society, not personal morality. This represents a radical shift from almost two thousand years of Judeo-Christian belief. In order to understand how important it is, imagine, for example, that criminology developed as an offshoot of economics. Not only would the style of research be vastly different, it seems likely the types of crime it studied would be different. White collar crime, such as fraud and embezzlement, might well be considered more serious and worthy of study than crimes against persons, such as assault or burglary. However, because criminology started with sociology the relationships between individuals, and between individuals and the larger culture, remain the primary subject of study. By focusing on relationships between people, and their environmental interactions, the Chicago School tended towards certain conclusions. Shaw McKay found that certain areas had consistently high delinquency rates despite rapid turnover of the population, this tended to support the idea that the environment itself was at least partly responsible for generating crime (Beirne Messerschmidt, 2000, p. 123). Furthermore, Shaw and McKay the first to identify what became known as white flight the phenomenon of well-off, well-educated (usually white) people moving out of urban centres to more affluent suburbs, leaving cities with concentrations of poor, less-educated citizens, often concentrated in ethnic or racial groups (ibid, p. 122). This pattern of movement and separation helps explain the observation that certain areas are more crime-prone. It is not the result of more criminals flocking to certain areas, but rather that the bad living conditions and poor infrastructure create barri ers community, and offer opportunities or even incentives for criminal behaviour. However, because of the sociological focus, what subsequent studies looked at were social concerns, rather than economic. Sutherland put forth the theory that criminal behaviour is learned, just like any other kind of behaviour (Hagan, 2007, p. 159). The learning takes place within groups, and includes learning how to commit criminal acts, and developing justifications for doing so (ibid.). This is based on the idea that if people are concentrated in areas with limited opportunity and/or close proximity to criminals, they are more likely to learn deviant behaviour. However, an equally valid line of reasoning would be all the people in a particular area are equally poor, so they turn to crime not as a learned behaviour but as an individual response to the economic conditions. Thanks to the Chicago School, though, the notion of learned criminal behaviour gained primacy. This can be seen in entertainment, like the film The Usual Suspects and TV drama Prison Break, whose plots involve groups of criminals brought together in prison who then plot and commit more crimes together. Despite making its main focus sociology the Chicago School does acknowledge that economics is the root of a great deal of criminal behaviour. Siegel (2008) argues the culture of poverty leads to apathy, cynicism and a sense of (p. 163) though again that is a sociological analysis of an economic situation. Nevertheless, the extensive Chicago School studies involving marginalised classes such as prostitutes and gangs (Carrabine, 2004, p. 52) offered rich data and established patterns for further study. The methodology, if not the ideological starting point, remains extremely relevant to thinking on the causes of crime. That is not to overstate the importance of the Chicago School. As previously noted, Chicago in the early twentieth century underwent rapid change thanks to a combination of geographic and economic factors that is unlikely to ever be repeated. The result is that some of the conclusions of the Chicago School, while interesting, are clearly limited in their usefulness. For example, the concentric rings theory of urban growth (Hagan, 2007, p. 154), which is based observations about Chicagos development with an industrial centre with layers of the poor, and then the increasingly affluent, around it. That development pattern applies to many American cities but, Beirne Messerschmidt note, is not equally valid in Europe (2000). Major European cities such as London, Paris, Barcelona and Amsterdam have extremely rich, desirable neighbourhoods close to the heart of the city, with poorer neighbourhoods scattered randomly around the outskirts. The Chicago School, working from its specific historical vantage point, failed to take into account different urban growth patterns. Even more critical is the consideration of innovations in technology and communications, which has important implications for how environment is defined. The Chicago School offered a strong counterpoint to explanations that blamed individuals for their criminality (Lilly et al, 2007, p. 34) and focused on the influence of environment. However, they were studying an urban area before the age of mass communication. Contemporary application of Chicago School ideas has to take into account that the nature of technology and therefore the social ecology has changed. Urbanisation is still a powerful driving force and there is still extensive economic migration, but it does not occur at the same rate as in turn-of-the-century Chicago. Modern technology allows people to constantly network and communicate with people outside their physical environment which necessarily changes the definition of what constitutes their community. A migrant living in London might be isolated from their own cult ural group which the Chicago School would argue is a risk for increased criminal behaviour but they can go to an internet cafà © and video-chat with friends in the country of origin. So in an important way they are maintaining a community bond, and they are not disrupted in the same way a 1930s immigrant would have been. Where the influence of the Chicago School can still be felt is that it continues to define terms of study, such as environment, even if the nature of what is being studied has changed. Another area where the Chicago School is less useful is in terms of drawing up plans for preventing crime. Based on the belief that crime is a learned behaviour, caused by environment, it argued that it can in large part be prevented by social programmes (Carrabine, 2004, p. 52). However, Lanier and Henry (2004) note the Chicago School observed that one of the factors in social disorganisation, and therefore crime, was a lack of respect for authority and little faith in social organisations. This presents a catch-22. Social organisations cannot effectively combat crime if people them. The Chicago School does not offer any firm solutions for this problem. Informal social organisations such as churches, parent-teacher associations and sports programmes suggest one way of reaching communities, and these groups are seen to play a major role in reducing criminal behaviour (Lanier Henry, 2004, p. 218). Lanier Henry (2004) note, however, that formal social control in the form of policing is also essential to prevent crime, however this is observational rather than prescriptive. In conclusion, Chicago was a powerhouse of social and intellectual study throughout the twentieth century. Cassidy notes Chicago thinking greatly influenced policymaking in the U.S. and many other parts of the world (Cassidy, 2008, p. 28) however he is talking about the Chicago School of economics, rather than criminology. Cassidy writes about the upheaval within the economic school due to the global recession, and the discrediting of many of the Chicago School of Economics fundamental financial beliefs (ibid). This shows that even the most respected, established schools of academic thought can be critically undermined by social changes. By definition, it is only possible to study what already exists. Though the theories drawn up by the Chicago School regarding criminology make important observations and predictions those are subject to revision based on changes in society. The usefulness of theories and ideologies is ultimately rooted in the real-life. When a culture undergoes radic al changes there are inevitably challenges to accepted ways of thinking and to long-standing academic disciplines. For almost a century the Chicago School has held its place in criminology, but as society changes and its needs change this long tradition could also be displaced.