What stereotypes of women are present in The Canterbury Tales?Are female characters oversimplified? Weak? Foolish? Excessively Naive?

Chaucer presents a wide variety of female types.  We have,
for instance, many stories concerning the most beautiful girl around.  The wondrous
beauty can be seen in the Knight's Tale, the Miller's Tale, and the Franklin's Tale.  In
many of the stories we have the young and lustful woman--The Miller's Tale, the Reeve's
Tale, the Merchant's Tale.  In some we have the wise old woman:  The Wife of Bath's
Tale.  In other tales we see women who are virtuous to a fault:  The Man of Law's Tale,
the Physician's Tale, the Franklin's Tale.

Yes, the women
are exaggerations of the women of the time.  These stereotypes serve to enhance the
humor of the work.  Yet, the women are hardly the butt of the humor.  More often the
male characters are the ones who appear more foolish. The women often make the male
characters look foolish.  Allison in The Miller's Tale, for example, cheats on her
husband and gives a would-be suitor her bottom to kiss.  Yet, it is her husband who is
deemed a fool.  In the Reeve's Tale, the miller's wife and daughter unknowingly sleep
with the two clerics, but it is the miller who is knocked over the head by his wife and
the two women have more fun than they ever had.

Patient
Griselda and faithful Constance in the Clerk's  Tale and the Man of Law's Tale are so
virtuous that the men around them are seen as evil.

In
other words, yes the women are stereotypes.  Yes they are naive in some of the stories
and experienced and cunning in others.  Yet, the male characters do not fare any better.
 They are just as naive, foolish, petty, and lustful-perhaps even more so, and they, in
most stories, suffer more for their foibles than the women do for
theirs.

I need a thesis/concept sentence and a topic sentence on the theme 'power and passion of young love'.

I think that with the construction of any thesis
statement, you would have to go back to the original task or writing assignment and see
if there are certain elements that have to be integrated within it before you start
composing your statement.  Once you have done this, I think you should be able to
proceed away.  From a general standpoint, you could probably go in a variety of
directions with the idea of young people in love.  I think that you need to define what
you consider to be "power" and "passion."  In defining these terms in more specific
contexts, textual support can be used in explaining their implications.  An argument can
be made that it is the youthful zeal of both of them that ends up bringing the families
together at the end or that causes them to break family convention and seek to be with
one another in the first place.  An argument could also be made that the feelings of
love that both youths share does not really solve anything, as Romeo still kills even
though he is supposedly in love with Juliet.  He might feel awful about it, but the fact
remains, at that moment, familial bonds trumped young love.  I think that assessing what
is needed from the original assignment and then defining some of the terms in the thesis
in clearer contexts will help in constructing a solid thesis
statement.

In "A Hunger Artist," suggest reasons why Kafka selected an expert in fasting and not a priest or a singer as the central figure in the story.

Franz Kafka's "A Hunger Artist" is a metaphor for the
yearning and alienation we all experience, to some extent.  A priest or a singer or a
painter or a sculptor or an author might just as easily have worked for the theme;
however, those professions would probably not have carried the metaphor as well as does
a hunger artist.  He is both something rare (an artist) and something familiar (one who
does and then doesn't eat).  He is like the rest of us yet separated from us.  The
metaphor is complete when, as he is dying, the Hunger Artist explains his consistent
dissatisfaction and alienation from life:

readability="9">

I have to fast, I can’t help it...because I
couldn’t find the food I liked. If I had found it, believe me, I should have made no
fuss and stuffed myself like you or anyone
else.

I just don't see how
that works with a priest or a singer--who might not find a song he likes but can then
make up his own song--because food is something the human body needs for sustenance.  By
cutting himself off from the life-giving substance, the Hunger Artist lives in
alienation, yearning, and dissatisfaction.

What happens during a Stroke?

The authors above have described the stroke.  The effects
of a stroke can be mild, severe, or fatal; if the person survives, he can show mild to
severe disability, or perhaps none at all.

A stroke can
occur anywhere in the brain, so any bodily function can be affected by the death of the
part of the brain responsible for it.  For instance, one entire side of the body can be
completely or partly paralyzed, while the rest of the body is healthy.  Or, the person's
speech can be damaged -- in a variety of ways -- while his movement is unimpaired.
 Similarly for vision: the sight of one eye can be destroyed, or the ability to
recognize an object (for example, to read) can be
damaged.

Often, a stroke can damage areas of the brain
responsible for cognition,  The person might be unable to talk, or unable to understand
speech, or unable to recognize faces, or unable to remember the names of
things.

Psychologists and neurologists can (and do) use
strokes as "probes" of how the brain functions.  If a person is unable to recognize
faces, but is otherwise healthy, and if the location of the damaged brain tissue can be
determined, the investigator can infer that that specific area of the brain is involved
in that specific part of cognition.

Sometimes the
neurological damage done by a stroke can be ameliorated using "neural plasticity":  the
ability of the nervous system to find a way around a difficulty.  This requires a good
therapist, a lot of practice by the person, and a great deal of
patience.

For more information, you might see the reference
below.

In Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist, what does Santiago's recurring dream symbolise?

In Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist,
Santiago (the boy) has a recurring dream. He believes it is a dream that portends his
eventual discovery of a great treasure, especially after speaking to the gypsy in
Tarifa. Santiago assumes (with good reason) that he will find treasure at the pyramids
in Egypt (which is the place he sees in his dream). When the young man visits the gypsy,
he does not yet know about his Personal Legend, watching for omens or speaking the
Language of the Universe. He thinks of the treasure only in terms of financial
gain.

However, when Melchizedek (the King of Salem) visits
Santiago and explains the concept of one's Personal Legend, the boy begins a journey
that he does not quite understand. Santiago believes that he will be wealthy in a
worldly way, but the dream symbolizes something much greater: it
represents the reward that Santiago will receive if he will stick to his goal to realize
his Personal Legend, which will involve watching for omens, understanding the natural
world around him (speaking the Language of the Universe) and even connecting with the
Soul of the World. While Santiago will eventually find a long-lost treasure, he will
find his real reward when he finally understands his place in the world, and falls in
love.

The dream symbolizes what we can achieve if we don't
lose sight of our hopes and if we don't give up, even when we are tempted to. If a
person gives himself (or herself) to the universe, he will be rewarded in enormously
significant ways—and financial gain will become secondary.

At what points does the curve defined by y = x^3 – 3x + 3 have horizontal tangents.

To find the points at which the curve y = x^3 – 3x + 3
have the horizontal tangents.

If the tangents are
horizontal, then the slope dy/dx at that point is
zero.

=> dy/dx = (x^3-3x+3)' =
0.

=> 3x^2-3 =
0.

=> 3x^2=
3.

=> x^2 = 3/3 =
1.

=> x1= sqrt1, or x2=
-sqrt1.

So x1=1 , or x2 =
-1.

Put x= x1  in y= x^3-3x+3 to get
y1.

When x= x1 = 1, y1 = 1^3-3*1+3 =
1.

When x= x2 = -1, y2 = (-1)^3-3(-1)+3 =
5.

Therefore (x1,y1) = (1,1)
and (x2,y2) = (-1, 5) , dy/dx = 0 and the tangents are ||
to x axis or horizontal.

Calculate the price for a T-bill with a face value of $10,000, 153 days to maturity, and a discount yield of 1.74 percent.

T-bills are sold at a discount to the face value and the
person buying the T-bill makes a profit equal to the difference between the face value
and the market price.

The discount yield of a T-bill is the
percentage profit that a person buying the T-bill at the present market price would be
able to make at expiration.

In the problem given, the time
to expiry is 153 days. As the face value of the T-bill is $10,000, an investor gets
$10,000 after 153 days. For these problems the year is usually taken to have 360
days.

So the annual discount yield of the T-bill is given
by [(10000 – Price) / 10000]*(360 / 153)

This is given to
us as 1.74% or 0.0174.

So [(10000 – Price) / 10000]*(360 /
153) = 0.0174

=> [(10000 – Price) / 10000] = 0.0174*
(153 / 360)

=> (10000 – Price) = .0174* (153 / 360)*
10000

=> (10000 – Price) =
73.95

=> Price = 10000-
73.95

=> Price =
9926.05

Therefore a T-bill of face value
$10,000 bought at $9926.05, gives a discount yield of 1.74% in 153
days.