racial harmony in Singapore

i agree more with Singer's viewpoint and believe that Singapore should adopt a more unrestricted freedom of expression.

however, i do still agree that social responsibility is critical and must not be compromised to ensure a peaceful democracy.

Singer defended the freedom of speech by quoting John Stuart Mill that if a view is not "fully, frequently. and fearlessly discussed,"it will become "a dead dogma, not a living truth." i fully agreed with this statement.

it will be counter-productive for the administration to ban us from breaching topics regarding races so vitally relevant for the society especially the multi-racial Singapore.

also as a student taking general paper, a necessary subject for junior college student in Singapore, we are required to acquire the skill of critical thinking. we are expected to evaluate and criticize on ideas, not just merely accept them as truth. it will be illogical to teach us to question yet deny us the right to question.

it is a matter of time before such topics will be broached and instead of waiting for such literature to explode suddenly and uncontrollably, we should as well actively discuss them in an open-minded forum.

Singapore leaders have been planning such forums in recent years like the online 'Your Discussion Corner' in REACH government website that allows public discussion of issues like homosexuality and establishing the Speaker's Corner in Hong Lim Park.

Criticisms of such forum are varied, like one may have the same worries with Szilagyi that the free speech made may infringe upon the sensitivities of other people and cause conflicts. such worries are not unwarranted with a prominent example of the Danish offensive cartoon.

with considerations to such incidents, there is no doubt that we need to balance free speech and sensitivities of people.

however, i sided more to a more liberal society. overconsideration of sensitivities will hinder progress. for example, if Galileo Galilei back in 1615 had considered the Church sensitivities and never published his theories that the Earth revolves around the Sun, much scientific discoveries may not have been made now and mankind would not have progressed as far as it is today. consideration of sensitivities is necessary for a peaceful society but not so much that progress is impeded.

in the discussion of racial harmony, we should have more leeway to say about racial issues. Singapore is no longer as volatile as in the past where the nation had just been born and we have more troubles to worry about. now, after 40 years of rapid progress, we have ascended from a third world country to a first world country. many Singaporeans are educated, with 61.1% of the population achieving at least secondary qualifications in 2006.

with higher education levels, people will be less easily manipulated and have the capacity to think about the moral implications. although discussing racial issues is bound to ruffle up some feathers, with an open-mind kept, conflicts would be reduced.

Racial harmony

There is heavy emphasis on racial harmony these days as threat of terrorism grew more likely with each passing day. Our leaders warned us that terrorists seek to segregate us by driving a wedge along religious and racial lines. With massive loss of lives that comes along with terrorist activities like Madrid bombing and Bali bombing, we knew that the stakes are high in this war against terror. We must not let the terrorist gain a single foothold in our nation. United we stand, divided we fall; this maxim is engraved since our childhood with stories like the Ten Brothers.
To those who believed that such incidents are distant to us and exaggerated, we are reminded that we came so close to suffering such terror ourselves, as close as Yishun Mrt getting targeted, a mere five minutes walk from my house. Should they succeed, i would have difficulty getting back from school. it is near indeed, so near that i would have heard the bang.
With foolishness and callousness, i once wondered how exciting it would be should the perpetrators were not stopped. Schools will be on hold, security checks everywhere and probably a rush to buy necessary supplies. it would be like in the movies, like doomsday is coming, like all we had worked for, studied for no longer means anything.

I tried so hard

And got so far

But in the end

It doesn even matter

I had to fall

To lose it all

But in the end

It doesnt even matter

with our efficient security forces, we have hold out so far, yet ...

woo

i hypothesize that ants need mineral salts to breed
i found some ants in my bottle of mineral nutrients solution, not just any ants, a colony...
its ants mating season a few days ago, and seems that a couple had settled on my bottle
theres eggs....
eew, so i destroyed the eggs and drowned the ants
then i regret, seems that the new ant colony is helping to kill the original small irritating ant colony...
eggs!, its nice to have an ant army haha

theory of evolution

the topic i had chosen are rise of Christianity and theory of evolution of which i am supposed to do on the latter
theory of evolution is a widely accepted explantion for the diversity of life on Earth mainly due to natural selection, although there is some objections to this theory, i shall not go too much into details about that as they are slightly sensitive
however, i will still mention certain parts interesting about the debate
source of information came mainly from wikipedia with note that wikipedia may not be fully reliable, raise mainly views from America and seems to me, biased against anything against the theory
also, the book Sophie's World helps to understand the theory from a philosophical angle (its a philosophy book that deals with ideas that affect the world and mentioned much about how the theory shapes how people thinks)
Who are you? How did you came about? Why do you look thisugly?
these questions are in the minds of many people and theory of evolution came about to serves to answer a part of these questions
lets start with a little history of the theory
The theory of evolution by natural selection was first proposed by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace and set out in detail in Darwin's 1859 book On the Origin of Species
the full title is On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life, and it summarizes the theory pretty well
the book propose that life descends from a primitive lifeform by evolution and evolution is brought about due to natural selection
the idea of biological evolution came about as early as 1800s with the leading spokesman was a French zoologist Lamarck but it wasnt widely accepted due to the lack of acceptable explanation as to how evolution is brought forth
Darwin was influenced by idea of English biologist Sir Charles Lyell that present geology of the earth is the result of long and gradual evolution as small changes over large period of time can bring about huge geological upheaval
also, from this, it hints that the Earth is much much older than 6000 years old widely believed at that time
Darwin was recommaned by his friend John Steven Henslows to be a naturalist abroad the vessel HMS Beagle commissioned to survey the southern coasts of South America
the supposedly 2 years voyage was initially opposed by his parents but eventually persuaded to let Charles go and even finance it ( as you see, the financial side is conspiciously left blank in the invitation dont know if its by accident)
to get as much bang for buck the 2years journey is happily extended to 5 and quite literally sailed around the world to as far as New Zealand (they were at England), happily off the initial course to South America, eventually they still did arrive at South America though and thats where Galapagos Islands are located and where he made his decisive observations to support the theory
basically he found out that many finches and lizards in the island chain are very similiar yet dissimilar enough to be seperate species
weird, he thought, surely theres an explanation for this?
he found a logical explanation for the phenonamen that the finches may descend from the same species of finches in long past and adapted to their environment and Voila!, evolution!
thats when he was convinced of biological evolution and yet thats a major obstacle still standing in his way, the one mentioned earlier
how does evolution worked?
Lamarck's explanation is the giraffes stretch stretch till neck long long acquired characteristics but that is not accepted as there is no proof
imagine you are a farmer and which cows would you breed?
good milker or bad milker?
with cows domesticated a long long time ago, theres plenty of proof for that, artificial selection
next, remove humans out of the equation and replace with predators and nature
Voila! Natural Selection!
with hindsight, that seems pretty obvious but Charles isnt fully convinced yet until he read An Essay on the Principle of Population by Thomas Malthus who got that idea from Benjamin Franklin (in case you are wondering, Franklin is that psychoman who plays with lightning and invent lightning rod)
Franklin believes that if there is no limiting factors in nature, a single species of plants or animals would spread over the world but the numerous species of life keeps each other in balance
from this, Malthus proposed that since human procreate in a geometric progression whereas food production increase in arithmetic progression (that guy mentioned in the gp ap maths notes, woo, Maths!), humans will eventually had to fight for survival ove rthe dwindling food supply, struggle for survival
Darwin had yet to answer another question to though, that is how did the first cell came about?
“If (and O, what an if!) we could picture some hot little pool in which all manner of ammoniacal and phosphorous salts, light, heat, electricity and so forth were present, and that a protein compound were to be chemically formed in it, ready to undergo even more complicated changes...”
thats what he wrote


slightly off-topic interesting fact
dominant lifeform on Earth is aerobic and need Oxygen
most lifeform is vulnerable to cosmic radiation
life requires energy input to increase entrophy
and yet for life to begin, Oxygen has to be absent to prevent oxidation of pre-DNA molecule AND cosmic radiation to provide energy
yet life eventually creates oxygen gas
yet ultraviolet radiation forms ozone from oxygen gas that blocks radiation
life is self-organising and reduces entrophy
the world is thus changed from a reducing environment to oxidising environment
how intriguing that life itself changes the environment
to this, some propose the gaia hypothesis
it states that the Earth itself is evolving along with its lifeform
Evolution in a Macro-sense!
zoom in and you see your own body cells evolve to be immune to toxins by bacteria
zoom out a little and you see your descendants different from you
zoom out and see the human race is different from your generation
zoom out and you see all lifeforms different from the previous generation
then you see gaia changes
note that gaia arent actually alive in the sense of a hivemind, rather metaphorically and changes mainly due to homeostatic feedback

another concept to explore spiritually and philosophically is the idea of spirit of the world
we change and the world changes with us, we are 1 entity and as we bettered ourselves we better everything, the all-sparks of transformers, the origins, the various things, philosopher's stone, where copper eventually becomes life and gold
like Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within


and how eyeballs or brains evolved?
it seems simple concept of evolution cannot explain how such complex organs derived as whats the use of half a eyeball?
for your information, eyeball evolution now has an explanation and is pretty strong, with references to eyes of other animals, basically light sensitive organs slowly evolved to cup-shaped to focus light and transparent liquid slowly evolved to crystal or lens but yet more complex structures and responses like immuno-responses is yet to be explained

'As Faust dies and looks back on his life's work, he says in triumph:

Then to the moment could I say:
Linger you now, you are so fair!
Now records of my earthly day
No flights of aeons cam impair-
Foreknowledge comes, and fills me with such bliss,
I take my joy, my highest moment this.'

'But then it's the Devil's turn. As soon as Faust dies, he exclaims:

A foolish word, bygone.
How so then, gone?
Gone, to sheer Nothing, past with null made one!
What maters creative endless toil?
When, at a snatch, oblivion ends the coil?
"It is bygone"- How shall this riddle run?
As good as if things never had begun,
Yet circle back, existence to possess:
I'd rather have Eternal Emptiness.'


thats food for thought about the wonders of life
how odd life should evolve and you shall came about (and how i spent 2 hours blogging)

Objection to Evolution
there is plenty of objections
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objections_to_evolution
but one i would like to focus on, the concept of altruism, human behaviour
its nice to know that animals also showed these characteristic, that dogs will adopt other baby animals like tiger cubs, cats
dophin would help other marine animals or even human divers in distress to surface to breath
altruism is thus not a human-only behaviour and thats an explanation for this seemingly irrational and noble act
game theory of prisoner's dilemma
the scenerio goes like this, 3 people are trapped in an enclosed room
1 is found dead later
there is evidence that the deceased is killed but nothing to point out which of the remaining 2 is the culprit
there is evidence that they did some other minor crimes
either 1 or both may be the killer
as you know, laws of certain countries protects the prosecuted and no questionable points must exist, thus effectively it means that if
both remain silent, that are charged with other crimes for 6 months jail
1 accuse the other of murder while other remain silent, accuser is set free while accused suffers 10 years jail
both accuse each other and both suffers 5 years jail
they may not contact each other in anyway
2 choices of each prisoner with 4 possible outcome
accuse---1)5years 2)scot-free
silent---1)10years 2)6months
thus naturally rational people would see accusing as a better way out
yet there exist 2 equilibrium, the rational choice doesnt give rise to the better equilibrium of 6months
so comes superrationality
a super-rational individuals will understand that remaining silent will have the better equilibrium for both of them and choose to risk it instead
super-rationality is not a rational decision but one that have the best benefit if one sees beyond their own good, in a way altruistic
out of this prison environment, one can communicate, that allows both to make choices better and thus fully logical for altruism to arise through communication and cooperate to obtain as much benefit mutually
its interesting to know how nylon-eating bacteria has been discovered with nylonase to breakdown a nearly synthesized compound or Radiotrophic fungus that use melanin to convert radiation from defunct nuclear reactor in Chernobyl into useful energy

prejudice is a disease we can never get rid of

according to http://www.thefreedictionary.com/disease disease is defined as : 'condition or tendency, as of society, regarded as abnormal and harmful' while prejudice is 'Detriment or injury caused to a person by the preconceived, unfavorable conviction of another or others'with prejudice being 'detriment caused by preconceived conviction' it certainly classify it as a 'harmful' disease of the society.i believe that prejudice is a disease that can never be gotten rid of and will forever stays with mankind. Throughout the history, Mankind has been plagued by many fightings like the ancient Crusades, World War 2 that affected the world and recent Iraq conflict. Most of these have something in common, that is they were started by people with prejudice against each other.14th century Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus derided Islam, saying 'Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.', believing that Muslims are violent. World War 2 is partially started as Nazis believed that other races are inferior and wanted to rule over them. Conflicts in Iraq is continuing to this day as Sunnis and Shi'ites believed that they will be oppressed by the other party should they take over the leadership position. These are just some example of conflicts caused by prejudices.Thus as seen from the example, prejudice is a ancient problem that have troubled the world till today and the root of it lies in nearly everyone. Everyone on Earth, past, present and future is unique and have different ideas, being exposed to a variety of ideologies, cultures and experiences. Being different, it is not possible for someone to fully understand someone else, thus we will assume some ideas about each other, it simply not possible to wait to know someone adequately before doing something.These assumptions are the predecessor to prejudices. Through certain experience we had, we associate these with people. Some are positive while others may be negative. Prejudices are negative preconceived impression we had and we may spread such ideas to others around us as shown in Behind the Sunni-Shi'ite Divide article by Time.With bad impression of people, its not difficult to have misunderstanding and this just worsened the impression we had. Sunni may believed that the hanging of Saddam is deliberately scheduled to coincide with their holy day whereas the reason may just be the current government of Iraq wanted to boost morale of their people, this leads to the belief that Shi'ite will oppressed them.Therefore prejudice are deeply rooted in the world as people are lazy to find out more about others and have misunderstanding. Some people may argue that misunderstanding can be solved over time and prejudice can be exterminated. Citing examples like Germany had repented and apologies for the war, revising their view of other races, they claimed that prejudice can be vanquished from the world given time and efforts.However, i beg to differ. Although Germany had repented, the Holocaust is still generating prejudice in other parts of the world. Some people like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,current president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, is convinced that Holocaust is exaggerated as a plot by some people against Iran. This highlighted the ability of events in the past to cause more prejudices even when it has been resolved.Thus, i do not believe that prejudice can ever be eradicated because as old misunderstanding is resolved, new misunderstanding with arise, without a fundamental change in the way we think, we will continue to have negative preconceived convictions.

seperate topic newspaper review

(argh!!...haiz...) i found several very nice interesting articles closely related to gp topics but unfortunately i do not need to do reviews, only find words and their meaning to improve my English. What a waste of good articles. One is about organ donation, another about internet influence, through years of experience, i can say that such articles do not come by often, they are seasonal. It may appear that these articles is very common but that is simply due to the recent events that happened, regarding internet influence, this rarely come outside of election period in other countries and elections in internet-savvy countries do not come by frequently do they?
if doing the dict-ionary thing is the point, there is always a article on Saturday or Sunday, i cant remember which that the author will define certain words that have been appearing often in the news like 'governance' in last week article concerning with the ministers' pay
i personally do not like the article but still it is interesting sometimes like 'politicians' used to mean schemer, crafty and cunning individuals
how, ironic
its seems that i have to find other mundane articles for words, but that means EXTRA WORK!!! and i do not like to do extra work. (who does?)(as you can see, they are extra, redundant, unnecessary)

youtube blog

i am in the aj library right now and its raining, and that has nothing to do with the post.
i feel a need to mention that the articles attached to the questions are very long, though i still finished reading it!
regarding the 2 questions given as gp topic, i didnt like either but the first one comes closest to what i wanted to blog about, so first question it is
“YouTube has no ethics, it's been created for the sole purpose of entertainment and money.” Do you agree?
by the way, i may do the second question too as youtube is a great role model to starting up a business later.
i did my research as the articles reminds me of what i had read in wikipedia regarding Thepiratebay but unfortunately the school computers blocked my access to the website http://thepiratebay.org/ with the following reason:
Forbidden.
You were denied access because:
Access denied by BlueCoat WebFilter content category. The requested URL belongs to the following category: Criminal Skills
(woah, criminal skills, i think i shall try to visit at home, maybe through a proxy server)
anyway, the reason i want to go to this website is that there is an interesting if not cheeky letter reply by the piratebay to the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA)
the content is more or less about the piratebay denying all responsibility to monitor the contents of the bittorrent they provided access to regardless of whether the contents are copyrighted on the argument that they are merely the middleman, just providing access to the files and not actually hosting it. they however still will comply with MPAA demand to remove certain materials that are copyrighted. this effectively means that they wanted MPAA to sift through the millions of files provided access to by the piratebay which MPAA argued is impossible, which this reason is exactly what piratebay used to counter back. so it goes on arguing who should have responsibility to monitor the contents. MPAA says its piratebay who caused this problem at first while piratebay says the only one who have problems with this is MPAA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Association_of_America
so this incident is similiar to Viacom and Google dispute (by the way, piratebay seems to have lost, so things arent looking good for Google based on this case-study)
linking back to the question, the ethics in question would be whether Youtube should defend the copyright law and remove copyrighted materials in its servers completely instead of ignoring the law and earn revenue from the visiting of copyrighted materials by millions of users, in turn costing the actors, producers and people associated with the show industry their revenue.
i do not agree that Youtube is an unethical business as can be seen by how active Youtube remove contents like child pornography.
Youtube is mostly police by its users and a small part by the employees due to the sheer number of videos contained within their servers, it is near impossible for their employees to monitor the contents by themselves
-to be continued (i am tired and hungry, i shall continue at home)
well, i am back, had tom yam instant noodle just now, spicy.
may i appeal to whoever bothered to read this blog to post comments, especially teachers. (just a 'hi, nice blog','i like the way you type this, uniquely me style' or 'this is a fabulous post' only compliments are accepted, sarcasm shall be deleted
Youtube is quite different from most other businesses as they uses a 'free labour' phenonmen that is people will do things for good of something if they like it. In this case, they like Youtube and will help to maintain the integerity of Youtube by helping to flag offensive or unsuitable content to be removed. However, sad to say, people like free stuff, thats why they visit Youtube as its free to view, they would not dislike copyrighted contents posted free, thus only certain individuals like copyright activist or a absolute moral uprightist would be flagging the illegal copyrighted contents.
With the drastic decrease in free labour to remove copyrighted contents, Youtube cannot react fast and remove such contents faster then they are put up, thus this explains the persistence of the videos on Youtube. However, Youtube have been trying hard to remove the illegal contents as seen in the sudden disappearance of many videos recently. Therefore, it is not due to lack of policing, defending copyright laws on part of Youtube that causes copyrighted materials to remain within public access, rather it is due to the format of Youtube that have open access to users that makes it near impossible to fully comply by copyright laws, thus Youtube is not without ethics but its hard to uphold the ethics in its totality.