Read the following excerpt from levitt and dubner’s freakonomics. in the beginning, feldman left behind an open basket for the cash, but too often the money vanished. then he tried a coffee can with a money slot in its plastic lid, which also proved too tempting. in the end, he resorted to making small plywood boxes with a slot cut into the top. the wooden box has worked well. each year he drops off about seven thousand boxes and loses, on average, just one to theft. this is an intriguing statistic: the same people who routinely steal more than 10 percent of his bagels almost never stoop to stealing his money box—a tribute to the nuanced social calculus of theft. from feldman’s perspective, an office worker who eats a bagel without paying is committing a crime; the office worker probably doesn’t think so. this distinction probably has less to do with the admittedly small amount of money involved (feldman’s bagels cost one dollar each, cream cheese included) than with the context of the “crime.” the same office worker who fails to pay for his bagel might also himself to a long slurp of soda while filling a glass in a self-serve restaurant, but he is very unlikely to leave the restaurant without paying. which of the following best summarizes the main idea of this paragraph? the definition of crime is objective and does not depend on who commits the crime or what type is committed. the definition of crime is subjective and depends on who commits the crime and what type is committed. the definition of a minor crime is stealing a bagel or leaving a restaurant without paying. the definition of a serious crime is stealing a money box or leaving a restaurant without paying.

The correct answer is: The definition of crime is objective and does not depend on who commits the crime or what type is committed. Taken from the book “Freakonomics” by Stephen J. Dubner and Steven Levitt (2005), the main idea of the paragraph presented above is to describe that a crime is a crime no matter who commit it or the level of the crime. In this case, Feldman argues that an office worker who eats a bagel without paying is committing a crime as well as not paying the bill when someone leaves the restaurant. Feldman argues that people may feel guilty about not paying the bill at the restaurant; however, they may think it is not a crime not paying for a bagel, when in fact crime is objective and both actions should be punished.

The definition of crime is objective and does not depend on who commits the crime and what type is committed is the answer that best summarizes the main idea of the excerpt.

Feldman's analysis shows that, although the subject involved may draw a distinction between a mischief and a crime, there is ultimately no such distinction. In this case, although the scope of the action may seem limited to a small amount of money, eating or drinking something without paying for it is, in fact, a crime.

98 points!

assignment

analyzing characters

respond to the following questions in one paragraph for each. use specific examples from the text to support your responses.

1. there is a set of twins on the island named sam and eric. however, when describing them, golding regularly refers to them as samneric. how does this way of describing the twins relate to their behavior and the way that readers understand their characters? what examples of their behavior readers see that samneric is really the appropriate way to refer to them?

2. as the boys set out to search for the beast, ralph allows jack to lead the way, and he sinks to the back of the pack, " to have escaped responsibility for a time." what does this moment lead you to infer about ralph and about his feelings about being the group’s leader? what does this moment foreshadow?

3. while part of the party searching for the beast, simon realizes that the notion of the beast that the other boys have does not make sense. a beast sitting atop a mountain with claws, a beast who did not leave tracks, could have easily caught the twins. simon has a different picture of the beast: "there rose before his inward sight the picture of a human at once heroic and sick." how does this picture relate to the beast that samneric saw? how does it relate to what simon said earlier about the beast being "only us"?

no plagarism

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