How far from the sun should a planet be placed so that you celebrate your birthday twice as often? Between which planets would this hypothetical...

Hello!

To find the desirable distance from the Sun, we should use Kepler's Third law (in the simplified form, when the mass of a planet is negligible with respect to the mass of the Sun):

`P^2 / a^3 = P_2^2 / a_2^3.`

Here `P` is the current orbital period, `P_2 = P/2` is the desired period, `a` is the current distance between Earth and the Sun and `a_2` is the new distance to find.

From  `P^2 / a^3 = (P/2)^2 / a_2^3`  we easily obtain that  `a_2 = a / root(3)(4).`

Now we have to use table data about the distances between the Sun and the planets. For Earth, it is about 150 millions km and the new distance will be about 94 millions km. This orbit would be between Mercury (46-70 millions km) and Venus (107-109 millions km).

What does a comparison of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and John Grisham's A Time to Kill reveal about norms and values in society? Are...

Dynamic values are values that change over time, whereas static values remain the same. John Grisham uses his story of racism and vendetta killings in A Time To Kill to show that values certainly are dynamic.

Vendetta killings are a very morally complex issue. Though in general our society deems murder wrong, when it comes to matters of justice, the rightfulness or wrongfulness of murder falls into a shady gray area. After Carl Lee Haily's daughter is severely abused by two white men, Carl goes to see Jake Brigance, who is a good friend of his and a lawyer. Jake recalls a similar case in a similar town in which the two white men were released from prison, having been accused of a similar crime. Due to racism, knowing it is unlikely his daughter will receive deserved justice, Carl decides to take matters into his own hands by murdering the two white men. Though Jake warns Carl not to do anything foolish, Jake agrees he would have done the exact same thing in his situation and further agrees to defend him of his first-degree capital murder charge. Jake's reaction to Carl's vengeful actions to seek justice show us that our values certainly are dynamic. Our value of preserving life changes with respect to our perceptions of justice.

Jake decided to defend Carl based on a plea of temporary insanity because he knows the intense emotions Carl experienced due to the suffering of his daughter can be likened to insanity. In addition, he knows that a white man with a similar plea in a similar case would be acquitted. Jake further shows the evolution of values in the final line of his closing remarks to the jury in which he asks the jury to imagine the sufferings of Carl's daughter: "Now imagine she's white." Jake's statement indicates that Carl and his daughter are receiving unequal shares of justice simply because they are black; the inequality of justice indicates that people's values change as their perceptions change. Racial prejudices cloud our perceptions; therefore, what the racist person values on behalf of the white man, such as the just treatment of his daughter, is completely different from what the racist person values on behalf of the black man.

Harper Lee shows the exact same changes in values through Atticus's actions in To Kill a Mockingbird. Just like Jake, Atticus strives to defend Tom Robinson against injustice. Atticus also makes a very similar remark in his own closing statements that indicates justice is not equally distributed to all people. He informs the jury that "a court is only as sound as its jury, and a jury is only as sound as the men who make it up" (Ch. 20). In other words, so long as a jury is clouded by prejudices, justice will not be distributed evenly, and the prejudices of a jury reflects the values of the jury.

If The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass is used as a historical source, what information does the narrative provide about the...

The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass provides information about the ways in which slaves' families were broken up. Douglass writes, "I never saw my mother, to know her as such, more than four or five times in my life" (page 2 in the Dover edition). As a result of being taken away from their families, slaves developed close relationships with other slaves who they regarded as extended family, even if they weren't actually related. The book also provides insight into the lives of urban slaves, as Douglass was sent to Baltimore to work with his master's family. Later, he worked as a caulker on boats, earning wages. This type of slavery was different than the traditional rural slavery on plantations, and it provided Douglass with skills he could use after he escaped north. The book also shows the capriciousness and cruelty of slave masters, who entice their slaves to get drunk on holidays (so that the slaves will associated freedom with sickness) and who prevent Douglass from setting up a Sunday school.

The narrative shows the degrading effects of slavery on southerners, white and black, and the ways in which laws were created to keep slaves in bondage. For example, Douglass's slave mistress, Mrs. Auld, attempts to teach him to read, but she is castigated for doing so by her husband, who says that a slave who can read is no longer fit for slavery. Douglass says of Mrs. Auld, "Slavery proved as injurious to her as it did to me" (page 22). She has been dehumanized and her naturally good instincts quashed by the institution of slavery. In addition, slavery imposed perverted political and legal realities on white and black southerners, as slaves could be killed with no justification (though, as they were property, masters did not want them killed). Slavery is above all degrading for blacks, who, Douglass says, learn to state they are happy when they aren't in fear of their masters.

The style is told in a kind of format that resembles the popular Christian conversion novels of the day. Douglass's conversion is his turn towards hating slavery and fighting to free himself. His conversion allows the reader to understand and sympathize with his desire to be free. One critical moment in his conversion is when his fellow slave, Sandy, gives him a root. Douglass says that he begins "to think that there was something in the root" (page 42). His possession of the root inspires him to fight against his slave overseer, and he eventually has the confidence to escape northward. 

What are some ideas for thesis statements that are arguable in F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby?

Of the many fascinating questions that come to mind regarding The Great Gatsby, one of the most central questions is whether or not Gatsby is "good." 

Is Jay Gatsby a good person because he believes in himself, stands faithful to his dreams, seems to believe in love, remains behind to protect Daisy when she has already abandoned him, and acts kindly toward Nick most of the time? Do these positive qualities tip the balance and outweigh his criminal pursuits (as a bootlegger), his profound and pervasive tendency toward deceit, and his willingness to ruin a marriage (wherein there is a child involved)?

Gatsby is enigmatic — and not just as a mystery for Nick to solve. He is a complex figure, combining qualities of immorality with those of personal strength and integrity. Nick suggests that Gatsby is "worth the whole damn bunch put together" and in saying this invites us to contrast Gatsby's virtues to the moral corruption and flaws of Daisy, Tom, and Jordan. Gatsby is not without his own flaws, however, and Nick lets us know this in the opening pages of the novel. Thus, the issue of Gatsby's relative goodness is a debatable, interesting, and central question in the text.

Another question that arises in the novel concerns the affair between Gatsby and Daisy. Should we see this affair as a true romance in the sense that it is a sincere relationship predicated on feelings of love and affection? Or is the relationship perhaps too fraught and freighted with abstraction? Is Gatsby interested in Daisy as an individual or interested in what she represents?

Gatsby acknowledges that Daisy represents wealth to him, at one point saying, "Her voice is full of money," and thereby identifying her voice as part of a personification of financial bounty.  

Gatsby was overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves, of the freshness of many clothes, and of Daisy, gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor.

Wealth is only a part of Gatsby's personal vision, but it is an important part. In wooing Daisy, we might ask if Gatsby is seeking love or perhaps a more categorical or material achievement. 

Alternatively, we might wonder if Daisy represents the past and so, in marrying Daisy, Gatsby is seeking an achievement of redemption of a promise he felt was made in the past. In other words, Daisy might not be an individual for Gatsby, but rather a sign of his failure and his means of correcting that failure. She may be a way for him to finally and completely redefine his past so that it becomes, retroactively, the perfection of his dreams. 

Daisy's motives are also questionable. She may be simply having a dalliance with Gatsby. When pressed to break with Tom, she refuses. She also has potential motivations to get revenge on Tom for his own cheating.

From both sides, then, the motives of Gatsby and Daisy's affair are open to debate. Is it for love that they come together, for a mutual willingness to revive and redeem the past? Or are they working out their own agendas and not actually pursuing a true romance?

We can also debate Nick's performance of identity and his self-proclamations in the novel. He claims to refrain from judgment and, in the end, finds a way to resist condemning Gatsby. Yet, Nick also judges Tom and Gatsby consistently (and often harshly) throughout the narrative. Nick's moral standing ends up being almost as fuzzy as Gatsby's. 

As a result, when Nick seems to side with Gatsby in the end we might wonder if he is also letting himself get away with something. We have seen Nick go along with so much in the novel — acting as liaison to Tom's affair with Myrtle and acting as liaison to Daisy's affair with Gatsby. Readers might find reason to start judging Nick if he did not make his final commentary on Gatsby with the poetic generosity of spirit that he ultimately does.  

How complicit is Nick in the deceptions and the moral quagmires that appear throughout the novel? How honest is Nick, really? Is he telling the truth about himself? If he is being dishonest, is he fundamentally linked to our questions about Gatsby's potential to be dishonest and good at the same time?

Other points of argument could include:

• Is Wilson's act of murder justified (in some way, since Gatsby was far from innocent vis a vis the circle of affairs that led to Myrtle's death)? Would it be potentially more or less justified if Tom were killed instead of Gatsby? 


• Is Daisy best seen as a victim, struggling to attain some modicum of power over her own life? 


• Is Nick drawn to Jordan because of her tendency to cheat, lie, and gossip? 


• Is it wealth that corrupts people in the novel or is it instead a deeper character flaw that allows people to become corrupted by wealth? If so, what is it in Daisy and Tom that allows corruption and what is it about Gatsby that resists?


• Is Gatsby actually morally corrupt? 

If you pose an answer to any of these questions or take a side on any of these issues, you will have a thesis argument on a debatable issue in The Great Gatsby.

The Scarlet Letter - Why is the "witch" tolerated and Hester is punished? What does this say about the kinds of sins that bother us the most?

In this novel, the witch, Mistress Hibbins, is tolerated because she is the sister of a prominent politician in the colony, Governor Bellingham.  I'm not sure that we can, with total accuracy, say that her activities are tolerated much better than Hester's because the narrator does tell us that she was "executed as a witch" a few years after the bulk of this story takes place.  But it is possible that she is also tolerated for as long as she is because people are afraid of her: she does seem to have a lot of knowledge about individuals' private conversations and whereabouts as well as admitting to meeting with the Devil in the woods.  However, the fact that Hester's sins are punished so swiftly may indicate that sexual sinfulness, especially in a woman, is considered to be the most egregious type of sinfulness. 

How long can germs stay on paper?

That depends! Some bacteria and viruses can survive for weeks (like MRSA) or even months (like Mycobacterim tuberculosis) in the right conditions. Most germs you're likely to encounter do not survive longer than 24 hours, though.

Viruses which cause colds, flus, and stomach trouble generally will not survive longer than 24 hours on paper or hard surfaces. 

If you're concerned about handling paper that someone sick has touched, or if you yourself are worried about passing on an illness, you may wish to set the paper aside for a day or two in a clean place. Unfortunately, paper with ink on it can't really be disinfected like a hard surface. 

If you are handling paper a sick person has touched, be sure to wash your hands after touching the paper and avoid touching your nose or mouth until your hands are clean. If you yourself are sick, wash your hands before touching paper you plan to give to someone else.

In The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne, how did Shmuel feel when he had to move from his house?

In Chapter 12, Shmuel tells Bruno about his old life in Poland and describes the events that led him to Auschwitz. Shmuel tells Bruno that things started to change at his old home when his mother told him that he needed to wear an armband with the Star of David on it every time he left the house. Shmuel then tells Bruno that one day he came home and his mother told him that they had to move. He was both confused and upset at the situation because he enjoyed his house and life in Poland. Shmuel's family was told they had to move to Cracow where they were forced to live in a one room home with another family. Shmuel mentions that the other family was continually fighting, and their son used to beat him up. Bruno doesn't believe Shmuel's story when he says that eleven of them had to live in one room. Shmuel continues to tell Bruno that there was one small window in the home and when he looked out of it, he could only see a wall. Shmuel tells Bruno that he hated his new home and begins to discuss how the soldiers told them they had to leave Cracow, and made them walk onto crowded train cars which took them Auschwitz.