Utopia by Thomas More and The Prince by Machiavelli Essay -- More Utop

Utopia by Thomas More and The Prince by Machiavelli Thomas More’s Utopia and Machiavelli’s The Prince both concern themselves with the fundamental issues of how a society works and maintains itself. The goals behind the two works, however, differ considerably. The goal of Utopia is to illustrate the maintenance of an â€Å"ideal† society and the goal of The Prince is to instruct a prince, or ruler, on how to maintain his state. On the surface these two goals may seem similar but the difference lies in the way the authors handle the subject of power. As a manual, or handbook if you will, Prince treats power as a necessity, a goal, to be worked towards and maintained, almost at all costs. Utopia, a fantasy, treats power as something all individuals have; rather, they are empowered. By comparing the way both works use and treat point of view and form, governmental systems and ideals the differences in perspective on power becomes clearer. Ideas are brought forth differently in both works through narrative point of view and style. These two different ways reflect the views of power the authors hold. The Prince is told in a matter of fact tone, its purpose being to inform a prince on how to run his kingdom. Inherent in this purpose is a key to Mach’s view of power. Because it was written for the use of one man to dominate over and control his kingdom/state, it was obviously not meant for lesser mortals. It in itself is a tool of power which could be used for only the good of the prince who uses it. Whether or not the people are empowered does not matter, it is irrelevant. It only matters that the prince uses it to maintain his own power. In contrast, Utopia is a fanta... ... word ‘virtu’ over and over again, it is made clear that his virtue is not that of More’s. Power is implied in the very essence of Machiavelli’s writing. It is tied in with the greed, selfishness, and his â€Å"do anything to maintain the state† attitude. Even though Machiavelli passionately invokes the idea of his Italy brought back to life in the Exhortation, his motives are still selfish in nature; to look at an even broader term, his motives are nationalistic which is the idea of a nation being egocentric. In this respect he is also contradictory to More in that More’s ideas are for the good of human kind, not just for one nation. Ideals like justice and truth, which are the basis for More’s invention, make it impossible for him to do anything but claim power as the source of corruption in society while Machiavelli praises it.

Koyal – a Multi-Purpose Expert System – Md-Cob-Coa Knowledge Representation Using Prolog in J2Se

Koyal – A Multi-purpose Expert System – MD-CoB-CoA Knowledge Representation Using PROLOG in J2SE Prof. Sreedhar Babu Department of Electrical Engineering Amrita Viswa Vidyapeetham Amritapuri, Kerala [email  protected] com Archana, Vineeth & Veena Department of Computer Science & Applications Amrita Viswa Vidyapeetham Amritapuri, Kerala [email  protected] com Abstract— Expert systems are AI? s greatest commercial success. It is a research-oriented application area of AI. An expert system uses knowledge specific to a problem domain to provide â€Å"expert quality† performance. Predicate logic is being used for knowledge representation which is further programmed using PROLOG inference engine for deriving intelligent conclusions. The current research paper introduces a rule-based expert system that provides a medical diagnosis for determining the health problems and classification of birds and animals. The user has to have some knowledge about these topics so that he can query the system. Three knowledge bases are provided for each domain. The specialized computer language PROLOG embedded into J2SE is used to develop this system. Keywords-component: Expert System; Knowledge-base; Medical Diagnosis, Rule-based ES, Knowledge representation PROLOG; J2SE. 1. INTRODUCTION : THE KOYAL EXPERT SYSTEM The current paper of Koyal has mainly two modules: 1. 1. Knowledge Base 1. 2. User Interface 1. 1 Knowledge Base [1 & 2] Mainly, three knowledge bases are required for the system. They are bird? s knowledge base for identifying a bird, animal knowledge base for identifying an animal and a disease knowledge base for medical diagnose. The system uses this knowledge base for finding solutions. Knowledge is represented in rule-based format. The rule of the system is in the form of: IF first premise and second premise, and †¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. THEN conclusion This is semantically same as a Prolog rule: conclusion:first_ premise, second_ premise, †¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ Premises are written as attribute-value pair. The attribute is represented as a predicate and the value as the argument to the predicate. Each knowledge base will have to have a high-level goal, which calls the sub goals to be satisfied. When all the premises are satisfied, then the final conclusion is obtained. . 2. User Interface The user interface is the Prolog interpreter? s interface, and the input data is stored directly in the program. It is implemented in Java by loading the prolog inference engine into the java program. The prolog program itself will provide a user interface. The predicate ask and menuask will provide these functions. The ask is responsible is for getting the information from t he user and remembering the user? s response. The ask predicate will have to determine from the user whether or not a given attribute-value pair is true. The ask prompts the user with the requested attribute and value and seeks confirmation or denial of the proposed information. The ask is represented as object-attribute-value triples where the attribute values are tied to various objects in the system. The menuask will further improve the user interface by adding a menu capability which gives the user a list of possible values for an attribute. The main precondition of our Koyal System is that a common user who has no knowledge about the specialized „domain? annot interact with the system and in such a situation the output accuracy will depend on the user inputs. 2. Description of the System Flow The system flow chart represented in the figure 2 displays the flow of the information from one process to another . We can say that it is a detailed representation of the structured chart in the Fig. 2. 1. 2. 1. User The user will enter the text and this text is passed to the inference engine. 2. 2. Inference Engine A rule-based syste m requires some kind of program to manipulate the rules – for example to decide which ones are ready to fire. (i. . which ones have conditions that match the contents of working memory). The program that does this is called an inference engine, because in many rule-based systems, the task of the system is to infer something from knowledge base. This inference engine will prove or disprove the goal/rules in the knowledge base and used to derive conclusions. e. g. a diagnosis, from the data using the rules. 2. 3. Knowledge base The knowledge base contains rules which describe general knowledge about a particular problem domain. 2. 4. User Interface The User Interface will interact with the user i. e. it will query the user for getting information to satisfy goals inside knowledge base. The predicates ask and menuask works here to gather information from user. 2. 5. Working Memory The working memory of a rule-based system is a store of information used by the system to decide wh ich of the condition-action rules in the knowledge base is able to be fire. It might be used to store intermediate conclusions i. e. the satisfied goals and any other information inferred by the system from the data (using the condition-action rules). Finally the inference engine will infer the working memory more solution. . Knowledge Representation Using PL [4 & 5] Since Predicate Logic is one of the oldest and most important logistical approach for reasoning, primarily developed and used in the area of mathematics by logicians as a means of formal reasoning and now it is vastly being used by the programmers for expert systems for its flexibility of accurate natural language representation, this paper also includes the various methods of knowledge representation supported by Predicate Logic that can be conveniently programmed with the PROLOG programming language. The major predicates that are being used in the paper include: The following symbols will be used for logical connectives. ~ not or negation & and or conjunction V or or disjunction ? if †¦ then or implication ? If and only if or double implication Valid statements or sentences in PL are determined according to the rules of propositional syntax. For the estimated validity of uncertainties, heuristics based on either fuzzy or neural network or neuro-fuzzy can be implemented. Let the predicate function B(X) be a bird with a particular name X, then the composite predicate B(X) which needs various functional variables to be satisfied type of family, color, head, voice, flight type, throat, type of food it eats, country, region, tail, size etc. †¦ Fig. 3. 1 represents the associate network for the classification of birds. For X = albatross, the functional variables are family type, color, size etc. are indicated, i. e. , if N1(F), N3(C) and N9(S) are the predicate functions with variables, family type, color and size of birds etc. , then the w. f. f. (well-formed formulae) can be written as follows, E1: ? X BIRD(X) E2: B (N1(F) & N2(O) & N4(N) & N5 (L) & N6(Bi) & N9(S) & N10(W) & N3(C) ) E3: B (N1 (albatross) & N2 (tubenose) & N4 (external_tubular) & N5(at_sea) & N6(hooked) & N9(large) & N10(long_narrow) & N3(white) ) E1 > E2 The various predicates for E2 are defined in E3 ? X B(X) > E3 resulting in X = laysan_albatross The various functional predicates of the composite predicate expression E1 specified in E2 as B (N1(F) & N2(O) & N4(N) & N5 (L) & N6(Bi) & N9(S) & N10(W) & N3(C) ) where F indicated family, O indicates order, N indicates nostrils, L indicates live at, Bi indicates bill, S indicates size, W indicates wings, C indicates color . . Working of the System: [6] †¢ User enters the problem which he wants to know about the particular domain. †¢ The entered query is analyzed and a keyword is extracted depending on the â€Å"domains†. †¢ The keyword is passed to the inference engine. †¢ The inference engine will call the high level goal of the knowledge base that starts the program. †¢ ask/2 and menuask/3 predicate will poses questions to the users and get enough information which is used to satisfy the sub-goals. †¢ Known/3 predicate is used to remember the answer entered by the user. The built-in predicate „asserta? stores the satisfied goals dynamically in the working memory. †¢ Another built-in predicate retractall/1 is used to delete clauses dynamically from the prolog internal database during the execution of a goal thus backtracking can be avoided. †¢ Finally the inference engine will retrieve the final goal from the working memory and provide solution to the user problem. Fig 4. 2 describes the various major predicate functions implemented in Koyal J2SE with PROLOG as supportive declarative language. 5. SYSTEM IMPLEMENTATION AND TESTING [3 & 7] 5. Introduction to System Implementation Implementation is the stage of project. When the theoretical design is turned into a working system. At this stage the main work load, the greatest upheaval and the major impact on the existing practices shifts to the user department. Prolog files include knowledge base and user interface. The size of the knowledge depends on the awareness of the creator about the domain. By referring theses knowledge base the system will derive solution for the problems. Knowledge base is one factor which determines the expertness of a system. It defines a common vocabulary for researchers who need to share information about the domain. It includes machine-interpretable definitions of basic concepts in the domain and relationship among them. 5. 3 TESTING Testing methodologies are adopted in the course of any system development. Any systems performance is based on testing that it follows. Some of the most prominent methods are: †¢ White Box †¢ Black Box 5. 3. 1 White Box Under white box testing the modules were tested individually and all the bugs were eliminated. This testing method has been of little influence to the whole project since most of the modules have to be integrated for well functioning. 5. 3. 2 Black Box The core testing was undertaken under this testing. Once all the modules were integrated the whole system was tested to ensure that it matches with the specification. 6. THE CONSTRAINTS OF KOYAL EXPERT SYSTEM: 1. The knowledge of the Koyal expert system is domain specific. 2 . Identification of the keyword is critical 3. The user should have some knowledge about the domain otherwise the system will respond with less accuracy. ACKNOWLEDGMENT We humbly express our gratitude to Sri Mata Amritanandamayi, the Chancellor of Amrita Visva Vidya Peettam and the fellow faculty and student members of computer science for the successful completion in the prototype design and implementation phases. REFERENCES Websites: ? ? ? ? http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Expert_system http://www. wtec. org/loyola/kb/c1_s1. htm http://www. aaai. org/aitopics/pmwiki/pmwiki. php/AIT opics/ExpertSystems http://www. paine. org/students/lectures/lect3/node7. ht ml Fig. 5. is the architectural flow diagram of Koyal for the classification of birds, animals and the medical diagnosis. If the implementation stage is not carefully planned and controlled, it can cause chaos. Implementation involves careful planning, investigation of the current system and its constraints on implementation, design of methods to achieve the changeover, training of staff in the changeover procedure and evaluation of changeover methods. This phase of implementation has allowed us to integrate various cutting edge technologies in the project which involves the implementation of Prolog and Java. Testing phase included white box testing and black box testing thought most of the testing was performed as system testing. 5. 2 IMPLEMENTATION The implementation phase of software development is concerned with the translation of the structural design specification into source code. The primary goal is to write source code and internal documentation. Testing, Debugging and modification are performed in this phase also. The first step in developing an expert system has been the creation of a Prototype model of the actual system on the basis of the reference model available. In case of an expert system each system? s knowledge is domain specific so every system has its own advantage and disadvantage. We cannot consider the system as expert in every aspect. This will require time and much effort to develop such a spool proof system. After testing the prototype further modification were incorporated in it by including extra features and implementing the knowledge base part of our system. The prototype is then tested. After the user is satisfied with the function of the prototype the actual system is developed. JPL is a library using the SWI-Prolog foreign interface and the Java jni interface providing a bidirectional interface between Java and Prolog that can be used to embed Prolog in Java as well as for embedding Java in Prolog. In both setups it provides a reentrant bidirectional interface. jpl allows the loading of prolog engine to Java. Thereby we can load the prolog files which contain knowledge regarding the domains. ? Books: http://www. primenet. com/pcai/New_Home_Page/ai_in fo/expert_systems. html A Guide to Expert Systems by Donald A. Waterman Ist Edition, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company. [2] Russell, S. and P. Norvig, 2002. Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, Prentice Hall, Second Edition. [3] Analysis and design of information systems by V. Rajaraman, 5th print, PH [1] Introduction to Artificial Intelligence and Expert Systems by Dan W. Patternson, PHI Pvt. Limited, Eighth Reprint 2000. [5] Expert Systems Theoty and Practices by Jean-Louis Ermine, PHp Publications, 2007 [6] Introduction to Expert Systems by Peter Jackson, Addison-Wesley, Pearson Education Asia ltd. , Reprint 2000 [7] Foundation of Artificial Intelligences and Expert Systems† by V S Janakiraman, K Sarukesi, P Gopalakrishnan, Macmillan Series in Computed Science, Reprint 2001. [4]

The Crusade: Unjustified Attack on Muslims

The Crusade, or the â€Å"Holy War† was a medieval military expedition between the Europeans and the Muslims. Their main goal was to conquer the Holy Land, as it will give the conqueror prosperity. Pope Urban II was known for starting the First Crusade which begun in 1096 and lasted till 1099. Within this period of time, chaos and destruction was unavoidable. With both sides having their own schemes of conquer, this resulted to be an endless blood striving battle for control. Despite the clever tactics of the Christians, their attacks toward the Muslims were unjustified. Christians believed that the Crusades were justified because of multiple reasons. Being one of the most powerful religions back then and today, they were well known for their strong devout beliefs. They believed that it was God’s will and their duty to attack the Muslims (Crusaders Capture). This leaded into a more in depth theory that the Crusaders took caution of. Those who failed to achieve their duties serving God, â€Å"He will condemn [you]† (Muslim Belief). Furthermore, the Crusades believed Pope Urban II’s speech. All who die by the way, whether by land or sea, on in battle against the pagans, shall have immediate remission of sins. †(Littell). In exchange for their faith, â€Å"†¦in your coming you will find your reward in heaven. † (Littell) Thus, this convinced them to believe and become attentive to all their activities so they will not displease God for they did not want to face any consequences. It was also an encouragement for Chr istians to confirm their decisions of battling against the Muslims since it gave them hope to think for all that is worth, it was a justifiable action. The Muslims believed that the Christians were unjustified. Firstly, Jerusalem was a holy land to the Muslims, for Muhammad visited a temple that was located there. Their main goal was to protect their land from barbaric vengeances. As for Muslims, they also had their own God. Following the same concepts as the Christians, they relied and trusted the one and only God, Allah. â€Å"There is no god but He, the Living, the Self-subsisting, Eternal. † (Juma) For those who disbelieve God, their punishment will be to receive devastation as well as to fail their mission, returning home defeated and worthless. If a Muslim monarch failed to please their people, they were sentenced for slavery (Beha-ed-Din). People were punished if they did not succeed their commission towards warfare. Convinced by this conjecture, the Muslims were cruel towards the Christians. Their religious beliefs were the main reasons for the Crusades. Both parties, especially the Muslims, had confidence towards their God and it angered the Muslims that the Christians did not believe their one and only Allah. For those who believed in Allah: â€Å"He will help you firm your feet†(Translation). The Muslims trusted these messages therefore it motivated them into satisfying both their nation and religion but left them unjustified due to the Christians. Following this premise, the Crusades were inequitable. By considering the concepts above, it clearly shows that both had different intentions from its many viewing points. However, Muslims tend to show an unrighteous side towards the affects that the Christians had constructed. The Muslims indicated a strong will of unjustification towards its attacks. In 1187, Saladin once more triumphed Jerusalem and most of the Holy Land. Hearing its news, Richard the Lion Heart began the Third Crusade to vanquish the city once and for all. Arriving in 1191, he massacres and held the Muslims as prisoners. Saladin feared that his approaching plans of conquer would definitely cause his empire to collapse therefore, he offered agreements. Nonetheless, Richard stated an execution to be held for the Muslim defenders. Their agreement never worked out accordingly. Richard) In addition, the Muslims had a better rebuttal for ruling Jerusalem. Muhammad had conquered the â€Å"Holy Land. † The Christian power was being dissolved at that time and the Muslims had a period of peace. This is significant because it explains how the Muslims came to occupy the land before the Christians had. They later came back and declared war to regain the city they thought to be theirs also intended to weaken Muslim forces. (Translation) Lastly, the Western scholars in dicated bias towards the Christians leaving this unjust to the Muslims to a greater extent. They â€Å"highlighted the Christian desire to rule the Holy Lands† (Juma). This clearly proves that the Muslims were unsatisfied with this situation. To conclude this, the statements and opinions declared in the previous paragraphs are all debatable from both sides. It is agreeable that they have influential arguments that can take place. The Christian had their own purposes of attacking while Muslim’s motives were to keep the land. To come to a respectable factor, both sides had the same ideal objective. To make what they believe in that was right just. Muslims believed that it was an injustice act that the Christians did. During the period of time, many events occurred that obstructed and caused hardship towards the unlucky. Today, this phenomenon has struck the society into an influence of warfare. This is important because we are able to take notices of what the history had left us either benefiting us in either a positive or negative way. Humans can easily use this as an advantage as well as a weapon towards today’s society.

How Positive Were the Experiences of Black People During the 1920s Essay

For black people in the 1920s the experience was cruel and horrible that we dared to think of it happening today. After slavery was abolished in the nineteenth century there were more black people that white people so the white people needed to control the black people after fearing that the black people would take over the USA. So the white government at the time set up new laws and regulations to control the freedom of black people. Some laws were that black people couldn’t vote, they weren’t allowed good jobs that were highly paid and no education that would have been useful to them. This meant that most black people suffered greatly in poverty in the twentieth century. There were also various anti-black people groups such as the Ku Klux Klan. The group was set up in the 1850s with the only aim of keeping the white people in control instead of the black. But the group became unpopular after a while as not many people took notice of their views as people at the time wanted to get on with their daily life. But after ‘The Birth of a Nation’ a film that was made in 1915 people started to favour the group as the film showed how the Ku Klux Klan upheld the American values against renegade black people and corrupt white businessmen. By 1924 the group had at least 4. 5 million members all targeted at black people with one mission of disintegrating the black population of America. The black people of America at the time were targeted for crimes that they didn’t commit. This may have included suspicion of black people murdering white people, or raping white women. The only punishment that was given to black people was lynching, which meant hanging them without facing a trial to clear them. Many people attended these including families with young children. This was America at its worst in treating others with respect. The lynching at the time has been described as shameful to the pride of America as many young white children clapped and cheered people that were hanged. Any and every black person was accused and they all faced lynching no matter if they were a young child to a full grown adult. Racism, discrimination and prejudice was still high in America at the time with the blacks ending up at the bottom. The White Government did everything at the time to separate blacks from whites. This included having separate toilets and sinks from the whites, where the blacks had the filthy facilities to live with, separate education for black children, which was deemed as being fair to them; however the amount of facilities such as books and equipment were poor. Discrimination was so outrageous at the time that the black population had to live in poorer housing than the whites and still pay higher rents. However in North America at the time the conditions weren’t as bad. Black Americans at the time had a better chance of getting a better job and education than those living in the South. In Chicago and New York the small black population was growing and encouraging black people to set up businesses and in the end they were successful. This was the beginning of the Harlem Renaissance, the birth of Jazz Music. As more black Americans took up these social opportunities of going to clubs and bars in Harlem, there were more talented black Americans that played a smooth music called Jazz. Jazz music created many famous black Americans such as Louis Armstrong as the black Americans were the best at playing and understanding the composition of Jazz music. In a way Jazz music bought the two races together as more black Americans went to speakeasies where white people drank alcohol. The whites enjoyed the Jazz music and started to favour the blacks but it wasn’t enough to get the lives of black people out of the murk of racism, discrimination and prejudice in order to rebuild up their lives.

Is Freudian theory falsifiable (by Popper's criteria) Essay

Is Freudian theory falsifiable (by Popper's criteria) - Essay Example The matter is the fact that at those times there was a strong belief that works of these scientists are absolutely scientific. But Popper had different point of view. According to him Einstein’s theory was distinguished from theories of Freud, Adler and Marx due to its openness to be falsifiable, i.e. to criticism. Popper considered that Freud, Marx, and Adler gave some true and important issues, despite he thought their theories to be unscientific. In general our intellectual culture has been largely influenced by Popper’s criticism of Freudian theory and his castigation of inductivism. Thus, Frederick Crews, the literary critic states that Popper has proved his own denial of Freudian explanations and Peter Medawar, biologists, has approved both of Karl Popper’s complaints with gusto. In 1935 in the philosophical analysis of the scientific method Karl Popper represented his famous criterion of falsifiability, which is now considered to be an important concept of science as well as of philosophy of science. According to this criterion any theory, proposition or hypothesis can be considered â€Å"scientific† only when it is falsifiable. Thus, Popper’s criterion is necessary but not sufficient for evaluation of any ideas claiming to be scientific (Sokal, 1998). Any theory satisfies Popper’s criterion (i.e. it is falsifiable and therefore scientific) in the event that there is a methodological opportunity to refute it by setting one or another experiment, even if such an experiment has not yet been delivered. According to this criterion, a statement, or system of statements contain information about the empirical world only if it is able to come into collision with the experience, or more accurately - if it can be systematically checked, that is subjected to (according to some â€Å"methodological solutions†) checks, which may result in its denial. In other words, according to Popper's criterion, a scientific theory cannot be fundamentally unassailable. Thus, according to this doctrine, the problem of demarcation (i.e. separation of scientific knowledge from the unscientific) is solved. Popper called this unequal "power" and role in the verification of meaning and truth of scientific theories inherent in confirming and refuting factors â€Å"cognitive asymmetry†. Based on this â€Å"asymmetry† Popper proclaimed the replacement of the â€Å"principle of verification† (i.e. a positive or confirmed check), used by logical empiricists, with the principle of â€Å"falsification† (that is the principle of reliable denial). It means that the verification of scientific essence, and then of the truth of scientific theories must be carried out not through their confirmation, but mainly (or exclusively) through their denial. Popper's criterion requires that a theory or hypothesis should not be fundamentally unassailable. According to Popper a theory cannot be considered scient ific only on the grounds that there is one, several or infinitely many experiments, confirming it. Since almost any theory, formed on the basis of at least some of the experimental data, permits the conducting of a large number of supporting experiments, the existence of confirmation cannot be considered a token of scientific theory. According to Popper, theories differ with respect to the possibility of setting up an experiment able, at least in principle, give a

Outsourcing - Joint venture, Nearshore, back source and switch vendor Essay

Outsourcing - Joint venture, Nearshore, back source and switch vendor - Essay Example In fact, Whitten and Leidner point out that outsourcing can determine the â€Å"product quality, service quality, relationship quality and the switching costs† of a company’s products (2006). As such, outsourcing is generally an important strategy that can determine the success of an organization. Essentially, due to the development or organizational skills and technological developments, the competition among organizations has increased significantly. To avoid losses, many companies have opted to enter in to contracts and partnerships through the act of outsourcing. Generally, to enter these contracts, there are various costs that each organization has to cater for. These costs generally arise due to the payments made in respect to offshore government policies, agreements and negotiations as well as legal aspect matters among others. Notably important, in many instances, the costs of the partnership contract will be lower in huge and established corporations such as GlobShop, and higher in smaller organizations. Generally speaking, established organizations such as GlobShop are usually offered better investment programs and incentives as compared to the less established ones. Equally important, the monitoring and evaluation of performance in any organization helps in the acknowledgement of ambiguities that may lead to failure of the outsourcing. To ensure that an outsourcing venture is successful, organizations should consistently conduct meetings to discuss and review the set goals and targets. These meetings will also ensure that the organizations keep a consistent work towards attaining specific objectives thus enabling employees and managers to consistently keep track of their performance. Furthermore, joint venture outsourcing enables the organizations under partnership to increase returns and reduce costs significantly. However, lack of

Risk Management and asset allocation Research Proposal

Risk Management and asset allocation - Research Proposal Example According to The New York Times (2011), â€Å"Asset allocation† describes dividing one's investments among the various types of asset classes. This is like saying putting one’s eggs in different baskets. Pietersz (2005) observes that asset allocation â€Å"helps ensure that investments are spread out across a wide range of markets and securities.† They do so because asset allocation does not have a one-off surety for success – it may either succeed or backfire, depending on who is handling the asset. Grange (2010) relates exposure management to the nature of product being invested in. He recognizes two major products, which are those â€Å"made up of those products that start with a balance equal to their limit and where, over time, the balance decreases away from the limit† and those which â€Å"start with a zero balance and some higher limit and where, over time, the balance increases towards the limit†. Generally, in the first instance, ex posure created is classified as productive whereas in the second instance, all exposure created is classified as unproductive. ... some who believe that much of a success in asset allocation should be looked at in terms of who handles which venture rather than the type of equity or portfolio it is. Such an argument gives operators of private equity some hope of competition in asset allocation. 1.2 Hypothesis The type of equity; be is private or public does not have significant influence on the rate of success in asset allocation. Private equity can perform as creditably well as a public equity. Public equity is not a guaranteed choice for asset allocation. Success in asset allocation is influenced by several managerial factors including exposure management. 1.3 Research Questions 1. Which factors inform the choice of a particular venture for asset allocation? 2. Why has private equity investment become so popular? 3. What is the most favorable private equity share in a general asset allocation? 4. To what extent does private equity expose investors? 5. How can a private equity exposure be derived? 6. What are th e risks in overrunning a specific allocation and how can it be reduced? 7. Which model can be used to appraise the future of asset allocated in private equity? 1.4 Objectives 1.4.1 Main Objective To find the relationship between private equity, their exposure management practice and the degree of success in investing in private equity as an option for asset allocation 1.4.2 Specific Objectives 1. Identify the basis upon which private equities operate. 2. Explore the exposure management practices of private equities. 3. Find out from investors, why they choose and prefer private equities for asset allocation. 4. Find authentication or otherwise to claims that asset allocation in private equity is risky due to poor exposure management. 5. Prescribe models that can best be used to appraise