Acid Rain

Acid rain:

·      pH of normal rain is 5.6

·      pH of rainfall in north eastern areas of North America is 3.9 to 4.3.

·      It is 10 to 100 times more acidic than normal. This is „acid rain‟.

·      Snowmelt into water releases huge amount of acid which got frozen during winter.

Effects:

·      „Acid shock‟ from snowmelt causes mass destruction of fish. On long term it also harms fish eggs and sources of food.

·      Thousands of lakes were killed by acid rain in Scandinavia and North America.

·      The causes are burning of fossil fuels leading to release of SO₂ in particular and Nitrogen oxides.

·      Problems of Sweden caused by Industrial plants in England and North Europe.

·      Problems of North America caused by utilities in Ohio valley, the largest polluter of SO₂ in USA.

·      Some of the potential changes are still unknown

^§         Micro organisms in soil are being affected

^§         Groundwater is polluted but its ultimate effects are not known

^§         The effects may be known only after another 100 years

·      Effect on food sources are also unclear

Multi National corporations

Benefits to MNCs:

·       Inexpensive labour

·       Availability of natural resources

·       Favourable tax conditions

·       Fresh markets for products

Benefits to developing host countries:

  New jobs

 Greater pay and greater challenge  Transfer of advanced technology  Social benefits from sharing wealth

3. What are the three senses of relative values?

3.1. Ethical Relativism

• Actions are morally right in a particular society if they are approved by law, custom, or other conventions of the society.

3.2. Descriptive Relativism

•     Value beliefs and attitudes differ from culture to culture and this is a fact.

3.3. Moral Relationalism or Contextualism (Ethical pluralism)

• Moral judgements should be made in relation to factors that vary between issues. Hence it is not possible to formulate rules that are simple and applicably to all situations.

Bhopal Gas Tragedy

On December 3, 1984, Union Carbide's pesticide-manufacturing plant in Bhopal, India leaked 40 tons of the deadly gas, methyl isocyanate into a sleeping, impoverished community - killing 2,500 within a few days, 10000 permanently disabled and injuring 100,000 people. Ten years later, it increased to 4000 to 7000 deaths and injuries to 600,000.

Risks taken:

·      Storage tank of Methyl Isocyanate gas was filled to more than 75% capacity as against Union Carbide‟s spec. that it should never be more than 60% full.

·      The company‟s West Virginia plant was controlling the safety systems and detected leakages thro‟ computers but the Bhopal plant only used manual labour for control and leak detection.

·      The Methyl Isocyanate gas, being highly concentrated, burns parts of body with which it comes into contact, even blinding eyes and destroying lungs.

Causal Factors:

•         Three protective systems out of service

•         Plant was understaffed due to costs.

•         Very high inventory of MIC, an extremely toxic material.

•         The accident occurred in the early morning.

•         Most of the people killed lived in a shanty (poorly built) town located very close to the plant fence.

Workers made the following attempts to save the plant:

•          They tried to turn on the plant refrigeration system to cool down the environment and slow the reaction. (The refrigeration system had been drained of coolant weeks before and never refilled -- it cost too much.)

•          They tried to route expanding gases to a neighboring tank. (The tank's pressure gauge was broken and indicated the tank was full when it was really empty.)

•          They tried to purge the gases through a scrubber. (The scrubber was designed for flow rates, temperatures and pressures that were a fraction of what was by this time escaping from the tank. The scrubber was as a result ineffective.)

Intellectual Property Rights

Intellectual Property is a product of the human intellect that has commercial value

      Many of the rights of the ownership common to real and personal property are also common         

      to Intellectual Property

Intellectual Property can be bought, sold, and licensed

Similarly it can be protected against theft and infringement by others

Patent, Design & Trademark together with Copyright form TOTAL INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

Patent

1.      Derived from the Latin word „LITTERAE PATENTES‟ which means „Open Letters‟ or „Open Documents‟ to confer rights and privileges.

2.      A contract between an Inventor and the Government

3.      An exclusive privilege monopoly right granted by the Government to the Inventor

4.      Invention may be of an Industrial product or process of manufacture

5.      Invention should be new, non-obvious, useful and patentable as per Patents Act

6.      The right to the inventor is for limited period of time and valid only within the territorial limits of a country of grant.

Examples: a drug compound, a tool, maybe software effects

DESIGN

^Ø        Meant for beautifying an industrial product to attract the consumer public

^Ø        Shaping, Configuration or Ornamentation of a vendible Industrial product

^Ø        Exclusive „Design Rights‟ to the originator for a limited term

^ Patents & design embrace the production stage of an industrial activity

TRADE MARK

^Ø        Trade Mark is a name or symbol adopted for identifying goods

^Ø        Public can identify from the Trade Mark from whom the product is emanating

^Ø        Trade Marks protection is given for an industrial product by the Government

Examples: Channel No.5‟s smell, Jacque Villeneuve‟s face!

COPY RIGHTS

^v                    The right to original literary and artistic works

•         Literary, written material

•         Dramatic, musical or artistic works

•         Films and audio-visual materials

•         Sound recordings

•         Computer Programmes/software

•         SOME databases

Example: Picasso‟s Guernica, Microsoft code, Lord of the Rings