Know-Nothings

Examples of Know-Nothings in the following topics:

• The Know-Nothings and Democrats

  • As a political faction, the Know-Nothings strove to curb immigration and naturalization.
  • However, the Know-Nothings were not an uncontested party.
  • Officially, the Know-Nothings dissolved in 1856.
  • Uncle Sam's youngest son, Citizen Know-Nothing.
  • Examine the political and social issues that gave rise to the Know-Nothing Party

• Nativism

  • Members became known as the "Know-Nothings" because, if asked in public, they claimed to know nothing about the secret society.
  • The anti-Catholic Know-Nothings wanted to extend the amount of time it took immigrants to become citizens and voters; they also wanted to prevent foreign-born people from ever holding public office.
  • The Know-Nothing Party's platform included the repeal of all naturalization laws and a prohibition against immigrants holding public office.

• Tailor Complexity to Your Audience

  • An important component of effective informative speaking is knowing how to tailor the complexity of the speech to the audience.
  • Never presume that your audience has a lot of background knowledge on your subject, but also don't assume they know nothing.

• Knowledge of the Audience About Your Topic

  • The audience may know more about one topic and less about another.
  • The types of knowledge are also different--the audience may know about something but not know how to use the know to actually do something.
  • If your idea or concept is unfamiliar to the audience you may assume that they know nothing and start from the very beginning.
  • How much does your audience already know about about your topic?
  • Do they know more or can they do something which they could not do before the speech?

• Your Areas of Expertise

  • Do not expect to speak fluently on a subject that you know little or nothing about.
  • Your fluency will be in direct ratio to two important conditions: your knowledge of what you are going to say, and your being accustomed to telling what you know to an audience.

• Introduction to Contributor Agreements

  • The other developers would simply start a fork based on the latest free copy of the code, and continue as if nothing had happened.
  • Because they know they can do this, most contributors cooperate when asked to sign a CLA or an assignment of copyright.

• Using Pointing Words

  • Example with Pointing Words: "There is nothing overtly deviant about the poem's formal elements.
  • Example without Pointing Words: "There is nothing overtly deviant about the poem's formal elements.
  • The phrase "those intricacies of form" lets the reader know that the writer is referring to the same specific instances of metrical variation that were discussed earlier in the poem.
  • Example with Pointing Words: "There is nothing overtly deviant about the poem's formal elements.
  • Example without Pointing Words: "There is nothing overtly deviant about the poem's formal elements.

• Profitability analyses (e.g. by customer, product, region)

  • Managers, know, intuitively, that some customers are more profitable than others, that they make more gross margins on some products than others, and if the business has more than just local coverage, that some geographical regions are more profitable than others.
  • While it is good to know such things intuitively, it is better to know them for sure.
  • And knowing them for sure requires that systematic analyses be prepared.
  • "Although CP is nothing more than the result of applying the business concept of profit to a customer relationship, measuring the profitability of a firm's customers or customer groups can often deliver useful business insights.
  • Although this is a natural consequence of variability in profitability across customers, firms benefit from knowing exactly who the best customers are and how much they contribute to firm profit.

• What to do when efforts slow

  • Additional examples include the development of a ‘committee mentality' where ‘too much analysis leads to paralysis' and nothing gets done.
  • Make sure that everyone knows what is expected of him or her and what needs to be done.
  • Let employees know that you're taking this seriously and that they're being watched.

• Degrees of Freedom

  • Knowing all the parameters, you can accurately describe the data.
  • The more known (fixed) parameters you know, the fewer samples fit this model of the data.
  • However, if you know the mean and the standard deviation, fewer possible sets of data fit this model.
  • If there is nothing that can vary once our parameter is fixed (because we have so very few data points, maybe just one) then there is nothing to investigate.
  • If one knows the values of any n − 1 of the residuals, one can thus find the last one.