Economics

Economics is a social science seeking to analyze and describe the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. Economics studies how individuals and societies seek to satisfy needs and wants. Alfred Marshall in the late 19th century informally described economics as "the study of man in the ordinary business of life"; the vast number of topics to which the methods of economic theory have been applied suggests to some that economics is simply "that which economists do."

Economics has two broad branches: microeconomics, where the unit of analysis is the individual agent, such as a household or firm, and macroeconomics, where the focus is on aggregates, the sum of the supply and demand in an economy, or the total net result of buying and selling. Another division of the subject distinguishes positive economics, which seeks to predict and explain economic phenomena, from normative economics, which orders choices and actions by some criterion; such orderings necessarily involve subjective value judgments.

Evolution

In biology, evolution is the change in the heritable traits of a population over succeeding generations, as determined by shifts in the allele frequencies of genes. Through the course of time, this process results in the origin of new species from existing ones . All contemporary organisms are related to each other through regular descent, the products of cumulative evolutionary changes over billions of years. Evolution is the source of the huge diversity of extant and extinct life on Earth.

The basic mechanisms that produce evolutionary change are natural selection and genetic drift; these two mechanisms act on the genetic variation created by transformation, genetic recombination and gene flow. Natural selection is the process by which individual organisms with favorable traits are more likely to survive and reproduce. If those traits are heritable, they are passed to succeeding generations, with the result that beneficial heritable traits become more common in the next generation. Given enough time, this inactive process can result in varied adaptations to changing environmental conditions.

Mythology

The word mythology literally means the retelling of myths stories that a particular culture believes to be true and that use supernatural events or characters to explain the nature of the universe and humanity. In modern usage, mythology is either the body of myths from a particular culture or religion or the branch of knowledge dealing with the collection, study and interpretation of myths.

In common usage, myth means a falsehood a story which many believe to be based on fact, but proves to be fictional. The field of mythology does not use this definition.Myths are generally narratives about divine or heroic beings, arranged in a coherent system, passed down traditionally, and linked to the spiritual or religious life of a community, endorsed by rulers or priests. Once this link to the spiritual leadership of society is broken, they lose their mythological qualities and evolve into folk or fairy tales. Not every religious narrative is a myth however; unless it is deeply rooted in tradition, it may also be trivial pious anecdote or legend.

Minicomic

A minicomic is a small, creator-published comic book, often photocopied and stapled or with a handmade requisite. These are a common inexpensive way for those who want to make their own comics on a very small financial plan, with mostly informal means of distribution. A number of cartoonists have started this way and gone on to more conventional types of publishing, while other more established artists continue to produce minicomics on the side. Minicomics are even less main stream than optional comics.

The term was initially used in the United States and has a somewhat confusing history. Originally, it referred only to size: a digest comic measured 5.5 inches wide by 8.5 inches tall, while a minicomic was 5.5 inches by 4.25 inches. These sizes were convenient for artists using standard office supplies: a US letter page could be folded in half to make a digest or in quarters for a minicomic. These comics were generally photocopied, although some that were produced in larger quantities used offset printing. An early and unusually popular example of this minicomic format was Matt Feazell's Cynicalman, which began in 1980.