Reads!
Systemic risk and global interdependence!
Humanities 2.0 series from the NYTimes. Fascinating!
Neurotheology - studying how the human mind relates to the spiritual!
Those new service sector jobs?
6 hours ago
Friday, December 17, 2010
Tuesday, December 07, 2010
Reads!
I've been reading the Foundation series - if this paper holds up, then we really might have the beginnings of a psychohistory. Lol
Life continues to be stranger than we can expect.
Solar sail development takes another step.
Saturday, December 04, 2010
Reads!
Point-and-shoot cameras - merging with the smartphone?
Military goes green, because of greater effectiveness!
Philanthropy in an unexpected direction, still for the sake of a higher purpose. Unexpected, nonetheless.
Friday, December 03, 2010
Reads!
Ooh, arsenic-based life.. well... sort of...
And... gamers might help push the frontiers of scientific research!
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Reads!
Two articles from Seed magazine on the future of science and collaboration.
How big billion-dollar projects actually do more than just pushing the boundaries of science - they push, and develop methods of collaboration along the way. Lest we forget, it was a CERN project that led to the Web as we know it today.
Ooh, "shape-shifting" touchscreens!
This is rather heart-wrenching - to be a research of a field and your children is suffering an ailment that is related to your field...
We probably have Nintendo Wii to thank for pushing the boundaries of UI and gaming and more!
In time to time, more and more countries, at least in the developed world, will have to have more of this elderly-empathy activities.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Reads!
I think there's enough reads from the past few days for a post!
How to collaborate together to foresee and handle future challenges more effectively:
What the world needs - a consumer market in China:
Cybertherapy using augmented tech:
Mining the seafloor for minerals:
A fascinating look at the evolution of toxicity!
Monday, November 22, 2010
What are my interests? ((tags: personal, interest, passions
What are my core interests?
1. Equity - inequalities in societies, distributive justice, socio-economic-politio-structures, environment - in some sense.
2. Change - technologies and how we interact with them, anticipating and getting ready for them - across all aspects - STEEP.
It's cute that I can summarize them so neatly.
Reads!
Move over, Wiimote - the new Kinect has arrived, along with jaw-dropping hacks. Kinect more than anything else at the moment, seems to be the future-here form of UI. I would like to add it seems to beat the heck out of Minority Report.
'Arbitrarily scalable'
China burning imported coal? Don't get the logic.
Mozilla planning an App Store? WTH is going on in the tech world? Revolutions - the usual.
A drawn out Pelopponnesus War?
Very recently, I tweeted: "An imperfect analogy from history - are we in a new drawn out Peloponnesian War - Athenian America vs Spartan China?"
So now, I'm going to explain a bit of how this random blurt came about.
1. Athenian navy = American navy
Naval power does not necessarily become the determining factor in a multi-dimensional conflict.
2. Sparta = China?
Clearly, an imperfect correspondence, and perhaps as more of an analogy. The victory of Sparta over Athens was due largely to Persian support and the sponsoring of revolts in Athen's sphere of influence - (Wikipedia article).
3. Afghanistan/Iraq - 'Athenian revolts'?
In an earlier age, one would wonder if Vietnam would qualify.
4. After the defeat of Athens, an oligarchy was established, although overthrown later. One can imagine a world where Chinese military would dominate, but that American ideals of materialism and some kind of faux democracy would remain.
5. One strategy to contain China would be, to provoke the establishments of conflicts in the Chinese sphere of influence. Could N.Korea be partitioned? Could Tibet/Uighur lead to more conflicts? What about Mongolia or Siberia? Or Central Asia quagmires? Or conflicts in S.E Asia?
6. How much would the East Pacific Rim resemble the Mediterranean? US is evidently maintaining/developing the capabilities of allies - S.Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam, S.E. Asia. Either through direct partnerships, or perhaps, future arms transfers/tech transfers to the respective armed forces. Where basing is politically complicated, different kinds of military partnerships would be maintained.
7. Wild cards, external powers? In the world of the ancient Greeks, there was Persia. Doubtful if there could be, although one could argue that India, or Brazil look likely to be candidates for actors that need to be watched for. Could Brazil or Sub-Saharan Africa become the agricultural breadbaskets of the world? Could India become indispensable economically, technologically to either US, China?
8. Wilder cards - could the Indian Ocean be the real focus of conflict, involving a whole range of different actors, in an age where China's power wane? If this is true, then Robert Kaplan has one heck of a head-start already.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Cool reads!
Maxwell's demon, in an experiment!
Monitoring glacier melts and perhaps, the climb in sea levels...
For everyone concerned about the future of chocolate (and biodiversity)!
EVs!
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Of Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism
In a world of open borders, patriotism can seem unreasonable, even anachronistic. Still, we do feel obligations towards communities in the particular, to our friends, to the families that we belong to, to our local communities. As much as could be said that individual successes can be independent of the situation of nations, or even larger communities, I cannot help but feel that emotional ties remain even after spending considerable amounts of time in another country. As much as we might live in an open world, these emotional linkages inevitably remain, even if they are links associated with the family, or with institutions changed beyond the recognition of memory.
What then? To become a member of this cosmopolitan world is to have access to as wide a range of opportunities as could be imagined. Yet these emotional links remain, drawing individuals to significant places, such as those of childhood, of affections, of character formation. These ties remain nonetheless, in a cosmopolitan, open world.
Having the chance of entering into the club of cosmopolitans, I suppose that it would be all too easy for anyone to harbour the notions of leaving Singapore for good and in being based elsewhere, starting life anew. Even then, starting anew would not be completely accurate; individuals are likely to have the chance to make connections prior to decisions of emigration, especially in the context of an environment as global as NUS. Even in those circumstances, one would already have an easier path in the pursuit of success in both material and personal terms.
What then? How is anyone to make sense in an open world - being free to choose between different obligations, some asking to break with more intimate connections, often promising rewards both personally and materially?
What then, Singapore? Yes, there are constraints of attitude and openness, yes there are misdirections in how things have been done, especially with claims of being people-centredness. And mostly true as well, the claim that money-making is seemingly the main focus, all the time.
I don't think anyone can ever be completely severed from ties to Singapore (or to home countries, for that matter), even as people are able to make ties and linkages elsewhere. Then comes the question - how is anyone to proceed with choices of staying and leaving?
I don't think it's possible to be based elsewhere and then to be able to make very direct contributions to the society and polity in Singapore (or elsewhere). Or is this Singapore-centricity a mistake in the first place? I can't decide now, and I wonder if the dichotomy is a false one. Is it possible that the option be available so that one could stay and make direction contributions whilst still retaining a cosmopolitan outlook? I don't know. I suspect that the option is too simplistic, too naive.
While we find ourselves having the capacity to pursue lives of freedom, we also find ourselves to some regard, bound to to obligations which are not based on choice or contractual terms.
Still, we choose often, to destinations of opportunities, to places which provide the best outlets for our self-actualisation, often too, in arenas where we might achieve results of great impact. This is an expression of the cosmopolitan environment we find ourselves in, especially for those who have acquired a measure of skills and capabilities that are recognized at least in the societies of the richer world. We are then forced with the dichotomies as illustrated before. How are we to choose? To stay in the communities of affections in the hopes of being able to make direct contributions, or should we go into the world to pursue the opportunities that might further actualise our capabilities and worth?
There is no cost-benefit calculus here. In the final steps, questions of convictions, of belief then enter in our deliberations. The extent to which our convictions bind us, I suspect, is where our choices will be made.
Friday, November 05, 2010
A dear friend of mine working on online discourse
Jack Park, currently a PhD student at the Knowledge Media Institute at the Open University (http://kmi.open.ac.uk/people/member/jack-park), has collated the numerous arguments regarding climate change, and has put them together in an argument map. here;
This could be hugely important given the state of the discourse.
Thursday, November 04, 2010
Community, what community?
Strangely, I have not yet come across works in my sociology modules talking about the definition of a community, or any other social group!
What makes a community, why is a group of people a community rather a mere collection of people, is an interesting question, I think. Thinking about it now, Durkheim did try to provide definitions for what makes a society, and part of his response has to do with the notions of interdependence and solidarity. The only other work that I've come across that is directly related to this topic of community is the study of social networks.
The main point is that communities require people to enter into non-obligatory relationships and interactions. To be in a community is to be in interaction with other people, to be involved in the lives of others. Unless people genuinely commit themselves to the social and physical environment (yes, physical location matters as well!), initiatives about community, about cohesion are simply moot.
A lot of what I write about community also stems from my participation in an actual community.
A community is the result of social interactions sustained over time. As long as there are people coming together, and greet, and talk, and share with one another over a period of time, a community seems to form, based on the exchanges that occur. Note that in all of these, there are no ties of obligations. People are free to enter or leave in these exchanges.
Why then, relationships?
At a functional level, the creation of relationships are important for the psychological and social needs we possess as human beings. There really might not be all that much to it, really. More than that, in the creation of these relationships we find meaning, and synergies with others to converge on projects.
Then the conflict comes in...
The conflict comes in when given limited resources, deliberate efforts are made to improve the material and social conditions of this community. Social events are organised, all for mutual benefit. Having gone through many such events, everyone is supposedly more well off in terms of the aesthetic experience and the overall "utility" gained.
And then, there are different interests in the community, and eventually politics enters into the picture as potentially different groups negotiate for the limited resources, or competing for their own vision of things to borne out.
Politics in inevitable, I suppose, although it presupposes the community to exist in the first place.
Reads!
"Obi-Wan, you're my only hope" - we might see loads more of that soon enough, given the development of hologram video.
Maybe the champagne cock should not have been popped at Nagoya over the Biodiversity negotations.
The future of gaming?
Wednesday, November 03, 2010
A flurry of news!
Climate change being put into a game format! Will be cool if this validates the intuition that games can be a force for good in the world!
Spatial Intelligence a more accurate predictor of life chances?
The poker face is in reality, the ability to understand how others see you?
Drought in the Amazon! "Warning light flashes in head!"
The marvel that is the human eye!
iPad a boon to disabled children.
... and potentially, a new flavour of neutrinos!
Tuesday, November 02, 2010
Passion hurts
There are many things to be said about passion. There are several books out in the market telling people how to 'acquire' a passion on the route to success. I'm personally of the opinion that most of the stuff out there is pure BS.
I'm currently inclined to the perspective that passion hurts. Having, or living out their passions or convictions can cause one to be alienated from friends and from present circumstance. A lot of times, doing, or developing that area of intense interest causes people to suffer hurts, because the process itself is painful. Priorities become distorted, and one often has to make difficult decisions on various fronts. As is often said, passion means pain. And that resembles the everyday reality more than the stuff of rainbows and unicorns.
To live out passions and convictions can and do lead to death. Be careful what you wish for, if one is lacking in direction or purpose. To live out a passion is to embark on a journey of pain and suffering, of uncertain rewards, and unfulfilled sacrifices. Finding, and living out a passion is not a joke.
Monday, November 01, 2010
Reads!
GE orders several thousands of electric vehicles...
Let me put it this way, a lot of times, democracy in America gets bogged down due to parties with conflicting interests who are unwilling to compromise, or need a long time to reach that compromise. Then again, when the whole country moves, things inevitably get done. Perhaps this GE thing will be the start of the move.
To think of it, it does make a lot of sense, actually.
... and a new search engine!
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Reads!
Microsoft buys Canesta. This development is important as gesture-based computing becomes increasingly significant. Kinect today, who knows, Windows 10 the next?
"Genes are nature - therefore unpatentable" - that's going to be a major ruling, especially for big biotech companies.
Arctic narwhals reveal fallacies in contemporary climate model. Doesn't sound that bad until one realises that climate projections of temperature increases of the Arctic are underestimated than actual occurrence. Very, very troubling.
Cyberwarfare - amidst the hype, what's real, and what's not?
Friday, October 29, 2010
lighthearted reads
I know that my fingers sometimes have a mind of their own during typing. So when this came out, I wasn't too surprised.
On a more serious note, rare earth metal access is definitely something to watch out for, given our electronics-hungry age.
Reads!
Is Robert Kaplan anticipating the rise of the next cold war between India and China?
Chinese Supercomputer is 1.4 times faster than the previous fastest supercomputer...
and the obvious implications...
US military investing in green fuels?
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=fatted-eagle-biofuel-flight-air-force-fighter and...
China resumes rare-earth export to countries... surely other countries will start to think about resource security...
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Reads!
The media, military, and wikileaks. Arguments of free press, media bias, and the collusion with the military are apparent here in this Salon article.
And for something lighter - the brain takes very little time to decide to fall in love. Wait, who's actually doing the deciding?
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Reads!
Not much else is happening, but here are still some relatively cool reads:
Bees can solve problems faster than supercomputers?
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-10/bees-beat-computers-ability-solve-complex-math-problem
Taste receptors in the lungs?
and... Green economics policy post in the UK?
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Reads from the New York Times!
Dreams!
Soap opera and telling stories in Afghanistan!
Philanthropy!
The troubles of Julian Assange...
Microsoft's Kinect!
Teenagers shaping the media produced by companies, directly.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Reads!
Plants might have more consequences for atmospheric chemistry than previously thought!
Climate change remains a potential driver of human evolution, amongst others...
Cosmetic surgery does not look so trivial now...
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Reads!
The two articles different in that they are completely different in spirit. One is outrageously optimistic, while the other is... downright pessimistic. Is a fork in the road impending? Or will one outcome be the consequence of other? Will we be building starships to save us from... ourselves?
Drought in the next few decades, forecasted:
Starships in the next 100 years?
Reads!
I didn't get the implications of this article the first time round. Now that I do, I'll love to keep track of this development. This is an anticipated 'quantum leap' technology.
Cool meets geek:
The combination of two of my teenage impulses: theoretical physics and superconductivity. 'Nuff said.
Reads!
The MIT Media Lab - the place where the world gets changed.
Obama's presidency post-midterm elections...
How chips are made:
Reads!
What motivates people to save energy other than climate concerns (or how to get 'conservative' Americans signing up for green energy).
Kevin Kelly and Steven Johnson have just gotten their latest books published; What Technology Wants and Where Ideas Come from. I hope to have them on my book shelf very soon.
New skills for the new world, and why any education should adopt some of them (really, no kidding. MOE should take note to implement some of these suggestions)
How to really help developing countries...
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
YC at Blink Bl_nk!
To those who were at TEDxNUS, and witnessed the various creative techniques of invertebrate copulation, it might be of interest to you that YC will be presenting at Blink Bl_nk (http://blinkbl-nk.com/) on Wednesday evening 7.30pm at Blu Jazz!
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Reads!
Japan's political and economic decline?
The eradication of rinderpest!
Wow, revealing the organisational chart of the public service!
MIT creates solar-powered portable water desalination plant!
reads!
Robots to replace more low-educated people?
Adversity is important for psychological well-being?
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Reads!
Adaptation to climate change by communities...
Massive changes afoot in the solar energy industry. The US now looks like a laggard compared to the swiftness of the Chinese companies (assisted by their own government). If Chinese solar energy dominate the globe, the US will have only itself to blame for not being able to capitalise. Innovation and rapid scaling are the only cards that the US can play now.
Different approaches to gravity?
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Various links!
Keeping fit! A reminder for myself more than anything, actually!
I wonder what figures can be put into the Drake Equation...
First an open letter to the UK Treasury by science advocates to prevent cuts to science research...
Then the actual protesting by scientists outside the Treasury!
NYT's Smarter than You Think continues to be a treasure trove on developments in the field of Artificial Intelligence!
And... the colony-collapse disorder that precipitated a panic on agriculture... finally getting closer to a resolution. Just that bee research is certainly not the first place one thinks about when it comes to academia-military collaboration. Manhattan project, anyone?
Reflections from a funeral
Reflections from a funeral My grandma passed away recently. She was 96. She was a matriarch of 5 generations, and it was significant enough that a Chinese evening tabloid covered it. I have no significant memories of my grandma; I attended the funeral as a matter of custom and tradition, and for my mum. But that was it. Along the way I realized the reality of such things as tradition and custom. While often deemed as irrational or 'backward', in the face of the mystery of death, these traditions and customs have a powerful effect on worldviews. In this sense, the funeral I participated in was not so much an emotional one, but a chance to participate in the worldviews of others, and along the way, to gain other insights. There are other findings and realizations, some more urgent than others. This was an all-Chinese funeral. I saw people born in the my parents generation, those born in the 50s and 60s. I begin to realise that traditions and customs are a powerful force in their right; in that educated PMETs would even willingly conform to such worldviews. Perhaps they lived in a different Singapore, where opportunities were structured much differently than they are today. These are the people for whom education was optional, where individual intuition mattered more. As we live today, the magnitude of these changes are difficult to comprehend, but it is the recognition of these chasms that require attending to for any would-be strategist intending to change any trajectories. The people in the 18-35 age group have to attend to that worldviews chasm as they (we) live in a Singapore that will be dominated demographically by the people born in the different setting a generation ago. I realise that the family played a far greater role than today; whereas today I inhabit a friend-based networks, my parents inhabit a world where economic relations and kinship ties frequently overlapped. I am distant from my kin-contemporaries in a way that my parents would have thought anathema regarding theirs. There is also another aspect to these observations, and this pertains to the cultural aspect. I am realizing the importance of cultural and aesthetic diversity. Why should music of various Asian traditions (and I acknowledge the difficulty of such labels) be any less valued than music of european traditions? Or for that matter, why should aesthetic education be deemed less valuable than scientific knowledge? This is not being anti-science, but the recognition that the task of meaning-making takes many forms, of which scientific knowledge is but one. I've only recognized the implications of Sir Ken Robinson's TED, and so the potential of those ideas for a more enriching experience for our lives remin unfulfilled. A Malay wedding is being held across the road in the void deck of another flat - a reflection of the intersections that exist in our society. These intersections need to be attended to as well, as we proceed towards an uncertain future.
Wednesday, October 06, 2010
Linguists in India
An endangered language is probably as important as an endangered species, though I suspect the conservation biologists to have issue with this...http://www.technologyreview.com/printer_friendly_article.aspx?id=26452&channel=computing§ion=
artificial intelligence from NYT
New York Time's coverage of recent developments on AI seem to suggest that we could be at the base of a new dynamic of growth.
This is IBM's supercomputer playing Jeopardy!
and something more recent - a computer learning language by itself
then.. an AI mimicking empathy and emotions...
and Jaron Lanier's take on this
I would classify AI under a category of "existential" issues since any development in this front would post existential issues to the question of being human. The other example of an existential issue would be genomics and synthetic biology, since that again, challenges our widely held notions of our biological make-up. And nanotech, in affecting our notions of physical reality which remains involate in a common-sense way.
Then again, AI could be a DUD field for the next 50 years, especially since the past 50 years also held promises of exponential development of AI that never came into fruition. I guess this could be opinion I might come to regret in the near future, but for now, the series of NYT does seem rather serious.
Tim Jackson
I read his book, and I'm even more impressed about this TED Talk. What he seems to be doing, is to lay the ideological foundations for a genuine post-recession world. How does this differs from Natural Capitalism? I think what makes his ideas stand out from the rest is that he has truly put the human project at the centre of his concepts which intersects with the environment and the rest of economy. This differs markedly from Lovins in Natural Capitalism where the environment-economic nexus is primary, where human capital is only one chapter towards the tail end of the book, almost like an afterthought. I will be watching his work more, I guess.
Sunday, October 03, 2010
Reads!
As Singapore is one of the low-lying cities mentioned, this will certainly be interesting to note.http://www.deltacities.com/
On a related note, responding to climate change remains an issue, and the psychological aspects of it are only becoming understood in a comprehensive manner, in ways that could be relevant for policy makers, perhaps.
Rituals and traditions
Facing death, I don't think any form of rationality can help to soothe things. Thoughts about god(s) and faith arise to help us with that unknown to make sense and meaning of them, to make that unmanageable more bearable. Managing that unknown then becomes the centerpiece of our lives, since we don't know when death might take us.
Friday, October 01, 2010
Civilian vs Citizen
Somehow the question of civilian vs citizen wafted into my head as I'm now thinking about obligations anyone has towards any social institution.
And of course, this is related to a previous post on paternalistic view of persons under the charge of social institutions in Singapore.
I think the term active in active citizenry is by definition, or at least the ancient, classical Greek definition, superfluous. By definition, a citizen in ancient Greece ought to participate in political, democratic debates. Similarly, by definition a citizen ought to be contributing actively to the affairs of the local community or the nation as a whole. Governments then, from one definition, ought to be allowing these impulses of contribution - which in Singapore, they don't. Initiatives are deemed to be upsetting existing institutional orders, or subjected to tremendous bureaucratic review. This bureaucratic coddling seems paternalistic, and increases the transactional costs of wanting to do something meaningful for the local community.
I am also thinking of an "attention"-centred society. I'm not entirely sure how that works out, could be another victim of selection of ideas (in the sense of natural selection). A citizen needs to be educated on the ways to contribute. I can imagine some sort of grassroots leadership in local neighbourhoods. Politics is ultimately local - how to train local leaders assess the needs of citizens, and to think up ways to address those needs.
If followed through, a true citizenship education is one that involves hands-on work... That really is all there is to it. And the effort involved is tremendous - after all, this is about giving personal attention to the lives of people under the responsibility of the grassroots leader. In the process, one has to pay special attention to the ethical issues on going about the ways to do the right things rightly.
This is capacity-building on a nation-wide scale. As one can observe. And this about the allocation of funds, of manpower, and most importantly, a compassionate attention to the lives of ordinary people.
Reads!
Hypnosis is not balderdash after all!
*cough cough* small developed country could become carbon neutral by 2050 (and nope, it's definitely not Singapore!
Wisdom of crowds, now measurable?
"Honey, where are we going for a holiday?", asked the mistress.
"To space, darling." replied the billionaire.
Floods in Pakistan, additional reports - a reminder that technology is a privilege, not a given.
An Epiphany of sorts
Recent struggles in life have indicated to me this fact:
1. That Singapore and the various social institutions took on a paternalist view on the people under their charge. This means that NUS does not trust students to do things responsibly; and translated to as such to wider society - Singapore government and politics basically don't trust their citizens to act responsibly or intelligently.
2. The question to ask then is: why?
- We have no political education, or rather that in the education process, students (citizens-to-be) are not asked at all to discuss what it means to be a citizen.
- The political discussion that presents itself during adulthood becomes then the arguments on ad hominem and reasonable dialogue.
3. What then, is to be done?
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Morning reads!
The beginnings of a different economy?
Small town in Italy demonstrating leadership in wind energy?
The dire global water situation. India is depressing, as is the rest of Europe and east Asia.
The competition towards a greener future: Portland vs Seattle.
The importance of studying Archaea for biology:
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
TEDxNUS registration now live!
TEDxNUS registration now live! Featuring various speakers from NUS and beyond! http://tedxnus.com/
Monday, September 27, 2010
Science and community
Wow, I would really want to be in the business of studying this field, and I'm fascinated at these boundary points between science and society.http://seedmagazine.com/content/print/building_science_leaders/
Reads!
Another step towards quantum computing, perhaps?
Drug resistance pathway in bacteria identified!
Sunday, September 26, 2010
How do you compare tragedies?
I had just finished watching Schindler's List, and I went away thinking that, well, seems that the Jews were justified in having their own state of Israel. Then again, how does the Holocaust compare with decades of colonial rule/subjugation?
To compare two different kinds of sufferings seems to be like talking past each other. And it's now all too difficult to unentangle wrongs and rights.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Generational divides
Generational divides There are tremendous differences in the way people born in the 50s and those born in say the 80s. The main difference lie in how they perceive the importance of the extended family. I personally don't care much about the relevance of the extended family because my immediate family is much smaller than the family sizes of my parents and grandparents. I suspect that the increase in education levels have led to increase in career and job opportunities without the need of the clan/extended family connections. The situation of parents and grandparents are vastly different, however. Without education, and without the corresponding opportunities, parents and grandparents have had to rely precisely on those clan/extended family connections. Which explains why I'm stuck attending big family gatherings thrown by ostentatious relatives flaunting their wealth. The other thing that's very different, but less distinct, is the perception of the importance of material values. I suspect that people born in the 1980s are less status conscious than parents. That is however, just s hunch. Or rather, the benefits that come with material abundance are more equal, instead of the relatively scarcity of material accumulation in the past. The material and status consciousness that we inherit is a throwback to the past of needing to prove that we have outdone others, and in an era of relative egalitarian conditions, such differences might matter less; on the other hand, the super rich become the focus of the collective envious.
The meaning of church
It just strikes me that church is really an institution to allow
people to search for meaning (and love)i n an organized way.
Different people have different intrinsic ability to find that meaning
for that, some more than most. From this perspective, some people
might 'need' church more than others. Just a thought.
people to search for meaning (and love)i n an organized way.
Different people have different intrinsic ability to find that meaning
for that, some more than most. From this perspective, some people
might 'need' church more than others. Just a thought.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
TEDxNUS!
Registration for TEDxNUS!
Date: 16th October 2010 (Saturday)
Venue: Shaw Foundation Alumni House, NUS (details here: https://www.alumnet.nus.edu.sg/InnerPage.aspx?menuid=289)
Time: 1pm - 6pm
Overreaching of Justice, perhaps. But still, can't help thinking...
Was thinking a bit about the import of justice to the rest of academia, and I can't help but wonder if the concepts of justice actually undergirds most of social sciences or even in the humanities. I think this is in some sense, evident somewhat in some areas of sociology, where ideas of domination, exploitation and the like are explored - evidently with some relation to the issues of fairness/equitability - issue of justice, in some sense.
Reads from the Guardian!
Twitter epidemiology!
The complexity of the chocolate (well, cacao) genome!
Interview of the man who makes iPhones!
A surprise from the LHC!
2 reads on environment related stuff
Extent of Arctic ice remains a worry:
Studying the impact of deep-sea drilling on the marine environment:
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Reads
Quantum computing another step to real reality?
No, not another way for the world to end...
Clean burning stoves!
Economics and Justice
I know Amartya Sen more as an economist rather than as a moral philosopher. Yet his name pops up in discussions of justice and all the other attendant questions. So... Economics is the study of who should get what and how, whereas Justice, at some level, seems to be about why anyone should get anything at all.
If viewed from this perspective, different forms of political and economic organisation are responses to the same question, of why anyone should be getting anything at all. Why do we have rich and poor divides? Why are there laws, or money, or even codes of conduct? Why do these things arise at all? At one level, the reason for these things, are because of an economic system, but the economic system is really a means to the end for allowing people to get ... things, to fulfill needs, and perhaps, wants.
Am reading:
Quality of Life
and
The Idea of Justice
Reads!
First there was Open Data, and now UK might be moving forward to eradicating digital illiteracy within their own population.
Perhaps the soul is a united mind?
The economics of trash - nice inforgraphic!
Addicted to pain, chilis?
Saving the Russian seed bank, that was under threat from private property developers!
Using bacteria to create plastics!
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Awesome. but scary too.
Remote-control ultrasound emitter to intervene in brain functions in the soldier's helmet?
Targeted training using neuroscience:
Reads!
Wow, even cells have 'cables' that link to each other! Cool!
Bacteria from the deep (past)!
An update from a previous post on the gaming industry in Japan:
Another round of reads
Traffic lights should help with flow?
Using statistics to predict scientific discoveries? The test case being that of the rate of exoplanet discovery, but the implications to the rest of science are obvious.
The doctor's touch still matters in a tech-enabled world.
Free speech? Bomb hoax?
Food's a form of drug to the brain...
Newspaper reads
The way we live might be influenced by how the competition (indirect) between ARM and Intel play out:
New theories of consciousness, and (maybe) being able to test them out:
Have you noticed it? We are all playing games by American companies or Europe, not from Japan anymore! Whatever happened to Mario, Sonic, and *gasp* Final Fantasy?
Maybe Douglas Adams was right after all: that dolphins are actually hyper-intelligent beings -
Arrrggghh, the Pirate Party in Sweden...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/sep/20/pirate-bay-sweden
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/sep/20/pirate-bay-sweden
Monday, September 20, 2010
Readed
I know what you did... on FB - why we should be more careful in our behavior on FB.
Colour and perception.
perceptions of online retail
As per article: real world and virtual world don't always mix.http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/business/19digi.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Political Parties as the Ultimate Social Enterprise
This strange thought floated into my head (as things usually do while doing something mundane).
I had this thought about comparing MICA (for those who don't know, MICA is Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts) to any Corporate Communications department of any large company.
Following that mapping, one can imagine well, how HR is MCYS/MOM and so on.
So that was one line of thought.
The other line of thought is: if so, what makes government any different from a corporation? Then the answer seems obvious: any government would also have to deliver non-tangible goods - and I thought that nicely translates to the idea that in Social Enterprises, there are non-economic bottomlines as well, such as in the improvements of development indicators and so on.
So there you go! Perhaps this is could be a post to get people thinking about their pitches...
:)
Eddie
Saturday, September 18, 2010
A friend wrote this splendid piece
Yeap. A friend wrote this. Kudos to her. I wish I could write like that. http://theonlinecitizen.com/2010/09/when-is-the-last-leaf-falling-imagining-a-singapore-without-lee-kuan-yew/
Sorry Tumblr, but I prefer Posterous
Sorry Tumblr, but the email address you gave me to do post-by-email wasn't all that intuitive. Like my friend would say, this is about integrating design and ease-of-use from the get-go. Had to hunt around the web and the Tumblr dashboard page just to look for the email. Sorry Tumblr. That 3-minute affair was a curious one, but I'll stick to Posterous. But then again, why waste Tumblr?
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Randy Pausch's Brick Walls
In his Last Lecture, Randy Pausch says that brick walls are there to show how much you really want something. But he didn't say anything about walls made of diamond, or worse, walls made of ideologies.
Oh well.
16th September 2010
Awwh shucks!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/sep/15/price-love-close-friends-relationship Inexpensive flights to space in my lifetime?
Someone approaching Jared Diamond's Guns Germs and Steel work in a different way?
Seems to be overlapping with Jared Diamond's work except updated for a more contemporary historical era, and as an update to the Needham puzzle even.
http://www.physorg.com/news203759198.htmlBalance and Conflict
"Balance" is a euphemistic term that tries to hide or reframe the reality of conflict in the whole of life. There really is no "balance", only trade-offs and compromises.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
1 - 15-9-2010
Developments on Twitter!
On a more scarier note - the superbug coming out from cosmetic surgery in India is spreading.
3D Printing!
Wow, it's amazing to see this becoming real!http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/technology/14print.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=all
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
While USP was thinking about moving to the RC - wham!
NUS-Yale Liberal College tie-up - to paraphrase - talks have been ongoing for over a year now. Notice the absence of any reference to USP.http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_578225.html
Randoms!
This is definitely for well, geeks/nerds - if they still believe in writing, that is.
Ingenious!
Food = drugs?
Monday, September 13, 2010
Cyborgs FTW!
Cyborgs FTW!
and especially this article, by Kevin Kelly:
The latter which is tremendously insightful for my own prospects for doing science studies. :)
Just read:
The improvement of the brain sciences is simply astounding. Something to watch out for.
http://news.discovery.com/human/brain-scans-child-development.html#mkcpgn=rssnws1Reading now:
Implications for archaeology and the way history is viewed:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2010/09/the-pristine-amazon-a-zone-of-contention/Population genetics:
Gene-doping/human enhancement:
What I just read:
Is social search here to stay?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/13/technology/13search.html?partner=rss&emc=rssThe secret to the preservative-filled burger:
Wow - university does an exercise in banning social media
Algae farming?
What I just read.
Telekinesis is (sort of) real. I won't be surprised if this matures and become common place in 5 years' time. Huge consequences are coming out of this.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=mind-reading-tools-10-09-12David Attenborough and Richard Dawkins have a little chat:
The (commercial) future of the Internet?
- I'm worried, to say the least.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
On the Right, the Good, and Love
The virtuous person truly has no friend.
They might have followers, but they don't have equals, not to even another virtuous person.
The resolution I've found is a weak one, but for now, a satisfying one, and it's to be found in a divine love.
This cuts across the dimensions of the right and the good that can often be conflicting, because in Love, perhaps both the right and good can be found.
Perhaps I'll talk more about this another time, but for now, these statements will suffice.
A poem on working at night
The night is yet old,
the burdens yet ending.
Still the day will come,
and then our work might soon resolve.
Many seek hope but found despair.
Sought love, but found hate.
Thought joy, but gained tears.
We thought we knew our goal,
but we were really lost.
And piece by piece we pick,
the fragment of our dreams.
Only He remains.
Blink Bl_nk #7
To those who are wondering about the intellectual scene in Singapore, there's Blink Bl_nk.
http://blinkbl-nk.com/2010/09/10/blinkbl_nk-7/
Disclaimer: A good friend of mine is organising this event, and I owe many favours to that friend.
Communitarianism and Egalitarianism
Can I have my cake and eat it too?
Rawlsian egalitarianism and communitarianism are at odds with each other. The former says that we cannot regard histories because of their sheer arbitrariness, but the latter says they are important in forming part of our identities!
Yet, communitarianism, in a specific example by Sandel on Southern segregationist, can easily be used to justify unjustness too.
I'm conflicted. How? Is there a way out?
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Justice is the gift that keeps on giving
I have tried to apply the concepts of Justice to a community that is rather important to me, namely in the University Scholars Programme. I find that the concepts of Justice provides an excellent framework with which to tackle complicated issues, and provide a means through which the underlying assumptions are made clear and brought up for all.
I only wish for there to be a debate on some of these issues, which actually pertain to not just localised communities in NUS, but also have relevance to our everyday lives as we live making our own choices as individuals, and as with how these choices have relevance to the larger communities we live in.
As I would like to say: as it is with USP, so it is with the larger world.
Another sign in the turning of Capitalism
Capitalism is changing, or rather the method of creating value is changing, or at least that's what this article from McKinsey would have me believe.
For someone like me who's thinking about what lies after Capitalism, this is significant.
:)
E
E
Friday, September 10, 2010
The Import of Justice on the rest of life
Over the past few weeks, I have listened to the lectures of Michael Sandel on Justice, and I can safely say that I've been deeply enriched by this introductory series on moral and political philosophy.
The point now, is about how these philosophies have an impact, on the lives lived everyday. The implications of these ideas come, especially in our daily interactions in the social realm, if not political. The attitude with which we begin to treat others implicitly reflect the viewpoints that we take.
Do we treat people as means to our own ends? What are our obligations to community, and what are the justification for any various responses?
However, to think that the investigations of these philosophies would give us 'final answers' to these problems, would be an extremely misguided thought. Philosophies only grant us the frames of thought to think with. Still, the attending of problems with these philosophical perspectives is necessary, to even begin to understand our own views and the views of others. As Sandel has said, we might not even agree in the end, but the important thing was to have engaged with the topic at all in the first place.
Wednesday, September 01, 2010
Getting, really back.
So as new memories,
slowly turn to dormancy,
so old undercurrents
surge once more.
Neurons twinkle again,
synapse awaken,
old feeling a new,
enriched by experiences freshly past.
Where's the passion of old?
Where did it go?
Did it hide away,
buried in the recent past?
Was it buried,
by disappointments
or disillusionments?
Where is the fire,
that once shone brightly?
The same man truly, does not step into the same river twice,
because the man has changed, and so has the river - that much is true (from Heraclitus)
Beyond the speckled window
Beyond the speckled window,
within the layered clouds,
the sun begins to drop,
and blue skies turn to black.
A day is past once more.
The sun has dropped,
the skies, now red.
Somewhere beyond, the blue of the day
hangs on tenuously.
Yet that too, will pass.
as the earth turns, so goes life.
Surrender the day,
surrender it all.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Poem for a friend
With friends,
hurt lingers but fades,
hate has no place,
crowded out by
mutual affection and trust.
With friends,
love stays,
and that's why we're friends.
Friends are not fads nor whims,
after the initial excitement of knowing,
and nothing left to talk about,
the silence between, not silence at all,
but the comforting knowledge of a friend beside.
And I still hope to
stand beside you,
whenever I can, or need arise.
Monday, August 09, 2010
Arches and Organs
The rain falls lightly,
the organist unsure,
playing for a while,
then stops, and then resumes.
Drawing breath,
writes, tables and chairs,
protected from the grey skies.
Sleepy, drooping,
quivering hands,
tired from grasping,
a camera while the day was young.
The ending days,
the aged summer,
this time tomorrow,
aloft, above.
Above the grey dim skies,
away from childhood inspirations.
Return thence to the real, real world,
To work out an uncertain fate,
for one, for many.
A sanctuary, a refuge,
a pen, a notebook.
The day is not young,
the hand is anxious to write.
The moments slip away into the seas of memory.
I come to find peace,
to ready myself,
before this leave.
Does the future come, or wait for us?
I can't tell.
---
The tourist no longer rushes,
peace found.
Anxiety settled with the one,
who was mocked with a crown of thorns.
The tourist
(well, never really a tourist at the start)
is ready,
to fly home,
to deal with whatever,
that might come.
Because the peace found,
is greater, and still greater,
than any fear.
Saturday, August 07, 2010
My jet-lagged head still whirrs in the deep night...
Beads, with all sorts of processing capabilities. Like rosary beads, but with the interior chock full of processing capabilities.
A different set of beads, smaller, on the surface layer of the fabric. Projecting light onto any surface ahead.
Beads, on a bracelet, detecting the muscular contractions and movements on the fingers as they type on the surface, or as they gesture. So you can sign whole letters and sentences without being restricted to a surface for fingers to type.
- Was just thinking about the possibilites of wearable computing and how that might look like. Not very imaginative, I admit.
Sunday, August 01, 2010
another poem.
Dearest C. N.,
I write
to you whose heart is torn
between place and place
and time and time.
But your heart must and will be whole.
The things we did and felt,
now added, and now to neglect.
yet in time to rise again.
Still, some remembered and some forgotten.
But for now, find content,
that all we had was all there was,
enough for now,
to keep us on,
to the next day, to the next place.
To separate corners of the globe we go,
both knowing and unknowing,
what's more to come, where next to rest our hearts
Onwards, stumbling and yet running,
unsure and sure.
Perhaps then we no longer find,
forked roads and tough choices,
but finally to make our own path.
Sunset
Sunset
Tree leaves rustles,
waves of flutter.
Red, first on clouds below,
then abandons,
leaving the dull grey in its wake.
Then too, swiftly departs,
heading east.
Light was here,
a moment, now gone.
On the hill,
spires below, of which
the tops catching
the last of sunbeam.
Briefly the ray reigned in the day,
now must leave,
and let another reign.
On the eve of leaving.
this city of spires dreaming,
spent prone on the ground of sweet cool grass,
seeing the light swiftly pass.
When light reigns again,
and then to pass,
another sight will soon behold,
no spires that dream onto the light.
Monday, June 07, 2010
Renewing what needs to be renewed
There is a way to think about societies. I read about the Long Now by Steward Brand, about making things last.
And one way of making things last, is to keep renewing them, in long abstract rituals, where the meanings are always talked about, renewed to the surface of consciounsess, like the monks in Japan that construct and deconstruct an ancient temple, like the Bibles and other religious texts that are being constantly copied and re-copied.
So is the same with the values of society. It's not too hard, to connect such replication with the processes of genetic evolution - how life reproduces itself through replication with some mutation. Societies will replicate the DNA - their values, but every once in a while, 'random mutations' in the form of new ideas, enter into the value system (the DNA) of society, and drive it towards something else - not necessarily better, but definitely different. So values need to be renewed over and over again, and how that renewal is done, is through discussion, and debates, with one another...
This renewal has to be done with every generation in society... It is the task of the population to educate their youth... Which I guess, is missing in SG. There is no ownership of these values - the values taught to 'us' are no longer 'new' and become stale. Yet these ideas have to become 'new' or they lose their... place in society.
Relationship with things technological
I've always had several thoughts about people's relationship with technology. Technology, is well, 'us'. Technology would not exist without humanity, and they are not too removed from ourselves. I mean, technology might exist as disparate objects, but really, they are conceptually conjoined to us - people.
And so, we invest technological objects with our humanity, with ourselves. We leave traces of humanity in the technologies that we use.
I can't imagine how I might part with my current laptop, that stores all the IMs that are stored on the local hard disk, containing all my personal research and my personal writings. Sure - they can be stored somewhere else, but there is just this physicality involved having the memory embodied in the space of the laptop...
Friday, June 04, 2010
A mental burp.
I can imagine that long-distance runners of the future, or soldiers, will be applying thick plasters around calves, thighs and arms.
These plasters will secrete gels, or nano-agents, and they will provide performance boosts to the person, by diffusing nutrients, hormones and the like... Periodic secretions of these plasters eliminate muscle fatigue and so on...
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Not the last word. Notes on being halfway through
I first started writing the following during term time. Now I finish it.
(And a very long explanatory note: I wrote what I write here because of this longstanding struggle with this question: how to intervene in the world for the good? Answering this question, I had always thought that USP would be the best place to start doing things, which explains many of the above words and attitude. Then, reality *kinda* got in the way. I wrestled with the point of student community - what it is, how it is, and then, I got caught up in student politics. Learnt many lessons, and after some processing, came to the conclusion that my overall strategy could have been a failure.
Maybe USP wasn’t the best place that I thought it was, and maybe I was erm, ignoring the obvious realities that were going on in the lives of people in my age group. I have been quite privileged though, in that I had an earlier exploratory phase that has continued on in various forms, so I don’t exactly need undergraduate days as an exploratory phase. Rather, my time here has been spent largely on consolidating and learning in a more focused way about the things I’ve been interested in, hence I was more erm, able to push through and conceive of certain things.
Friends have *kinda* advised me to move on and really to start thinking on what’s ahead - careers at think-tanks, looking at graduate, education, taking things to a whole new level in terms of depth and breadth. If I really wanted to start learning about intervention in the world, I should be looking outwards to research and the various ways to do that, and maybe not so much inwards in the USP student community. :S
For now: Let USP be. Let friends be. Have fun. I’ll try to have fun too, but I’ll also have to wrestle with my own telos (not that I know what it is), about what I have to do (even if it makes me isolated at times).
What is USP?
This question popped up in my head for multiple reasons. I ask this because from anecdotal evidence, there have been misunderstandings about what USP is, and what USP students do. Individuals, both friends and strangers, often ask, ‘what is USP’, and ‘what do they do’, and they often do so with a few assumptions; that USP students have a scholarship; that USP students are genuises; that we are ‘atas’ and elitist, and various other claims.
I can’t address all these various claims comprehensively, and besides, I am not in the best position to explain what USP is. Why is that so? Simply because there is just so much diversity in USP. A single label, other than the ‘membership in USP’, cannot encompass the entire set of people who pass through the programme. Again, as a reminder, the standard disclaimer of non-representation must be mentioned here. I write for myself, and even if most of the things mentioned are agreeable to most, there will still be dissensions. I can only again, write for myself, based on my personal experiences thus far in the programme.
I come back to USP again - just what is? According to the vision and mission as plucked out from the website, it is:
Our Vision
To be a talent programme that produces graduates who lead in forging new insights and mindsets across disciplines and cultures.
Our Mission
To provide a unique undergraduate experience for highly talented students to realise their full potential.
To attain our Vision and Mission, we aim to:
1. Attract and develop a diverse range of talented individuals who demonstrate the potential to be leaders in intellectual, economic, cultural or social spheres in Singapore and the world.
2. Build and nurture a close-knit and vibrant community of scholars (comprising faculty, students and alumni) that is committed to excellence in their diverse interests.
3. Enable this community of scholars to be connected to the global network of scholars, through dialogues and strategic collaborations.
4. Continuously innovate to provide an enriching and globally-oriented educational programme, aimed at stretching the students’ intellectual, leadership, and personal capacities.
5. Provide students with the best of the world through tie-ups with world-leading innovative educational programmes.
I guess the vision and mission statement says a lot, but then again, doesn’t really say much. For one, the vision and mission does not reflect the emphasis on inter-disciplinary inquiry of USP. For another, statements like these can’t really seem to bring out the quality of experience of students who have been through the programme. For example, what exactly does ‘close-knit and vibrant community of scholars’ mean? And how does that square with the overall academic/intellectual focus of the programme? And for those who are end-driven, what is the outcome of the programme - what do ‘I’ get out of it after I graduate?
I can’t answer the last question that I raised, simply because I have not graduated. As for the others; again I can only answer for myself.
The experience of being in USP is one that cannot be simply described in the words or the descriptions of the module codes, nor the CVs of the instructors that form the faculty or of the administrative staff. Neither can the experience be described in the countless photos and videos and prose describing and capturing the moments of great fun. Nor the Facebook posts nor the voices of the seniors reminiscing of the moments came and past. All of that together, can only provide the barest of glimpses into what USP ‘is’.
From my perspective, USP seems to be addressing the question: what happens if you put 600+ bright, motivated students together, in a programme where ideas are flying around every second? Here, I want to qualify ‘bright’, of which intellectual capability is just one component. There is of course, the more intangible qualities of curiosity, independence, the ability to make tangential connections, etc,. There is a serious attempt to look at ideas from the perspectives of different disciplines - the philosophy and biological aspects of evolution; the mathematics of social sciences; the use of computing in the various disciplines - all of these are taught, and more. The intellectual aspects of the programme, combined with the community, makes for a potent combination in sparking connections in the minds of those who choose to participate actively.
If I may dare claim, there are a few qualities that seem to be a common thread that keeps surfacing. One of these is this plain curiosity, of wanting to know more, and going beyond the material that is given. This curiosity also manifests itself in wanting to learn more about the other disciplines, no matter how distant from one’s own. The other quality, although more enforced, is this commitment towards clarity and criticality of thought. When debating, USP students are nearly always going straight for the undeclared assumptions and implications of any statement. The two qualities, though obviously varying amongst USP students nonetheless serve as bases for a common understanding of what the experience in USP is about.
In more indirect ways, the experience of USP challenges the orthodoxy of education in Singapore, and this is where the differences between USP and non-USP students become the basis of the various claims and labels that have been put on USP.
What is this orthodoxy? The orthodoxy seems to include several points, one of which is the acceptance of the highly competitive society, where one should get distinctions at all costs, if not suffer the consequences of poor job prospects. This hyper-competitiveness leads to the tyranny of the normal curve, where the average moves towards the B/B+ region, where the student body verges towards a dog-eat-dog world. These negativities, are no doubt nearly inevitable, and I am no idealist in claiming that these negativities can be eliminated.
USP, I thought, challenges the attitude above. Curiosity and openness to new ideas are emphasized, and an exploratory attitude welcomed. In other words, USP challenges the orthodoxy of the education-economy link, and challenges too, the minds that go through the entire experience.
To those who have chosen decisively the area of their studies and future vocation, I guess that something like USP will not be able to meet their expectations, simply because the USP experience is meant to do certain things, and not other things. The keywords mentioned above - curiosity, exploratory attitude, openness - do not apply equally well to everyone. There will be people with a single-mindedness towards their field of studies - could be anywhere from the sciences to the engineers to the philosophers to the economists - and that is completely justified. USP is not an entirely open institution - no institution can be completely open to anyone. There will be parameters and requirements that individuals have to meet in order to gain entry and membership. What can change, is how the institution chooses to interact with other institutions and other groups. USP will be a perfect fit for people with certain dispositions, but a puzzle for others, and even an abomination for others still.
I am sure that a single piece of writing like this cannot make sense of the USP experience. After all, this is one author among many possible authors, and everyone has a different voice, different things to say. This, however, has been my piece, and I hope to some people, they can decide better for them whether USP is a good fit. I can’t promise anything, but the trend has been that, for those who choose to take active ownership of their education, and choose to participate in the numerous opportunities available, the time at USP will be a rewarding one. While the statement is true for any institution in general, it is especially true for the context of USP. The sheer density and quality of the intellectual exchanges; the numerous opportunities for leadership, initiative and exposure - all of these provides a compelling experience for an undergraduate who aspires to make a mark for themselves in their own lives, and maybe, for society and the world.
For the single-minded, pragmatic scholar, the immediate rewards of USP will not be so obvious. One cannot so easily make the linkage between breadth, critically and openness to an immediate job prospect compared to say, the knowledge of the civil engineer or the training of the statistician. One cannot immediately know where the jobs are in what sector - for the student in USP, the skill profile matches the requirements of many other jobs. I might go out on a limb and claim that there is an USP-edge here, that the skills acquired through the course of study at USP provides the graduate with additional skills that add value to the existing skill acquired through the major. The USP-engineer could potentially see connections than the non-USP engineer, and so on… Yet these skills are the intangibles - can’t be graded, can’t be quantified, with only the CAP being a proxy as to how well the person has acquired these skills.
I would have my own objectives about what USP is, but then again, I am only a single voice, and there will be others with competing or complementary stances towards what USP is. Beyond the education, beyond the objectives, I have always thought that USP would be the place where the world begins to get changed. The skills of critical thinking, when applied in the broadest context, leads one to begin thinking about the faults and successes of the world we are living in. Critical thinkers could examine the points of failure in the various systems of the world - not to pigeonhole, but providing examples: engineers could look at how systems are being inefficiently designed, architects looking at the aesthetics, economists could balk at the distribution of resources, and so on…
Going back, the strength of USP have always lay with the creation of a cohesive student community, both in current cohorts, and in the alumni. The alumni would probably begin to make their small impacts in the area of their profession or specialisation; the students would merely be starting to acquire these skills. Still, the whole point of a community, in a functional/instrumental sense, is to facilitate the development of these skills. Yes, community is important for its own sake of psychological, emotional and social development, but the point of that would be…? I would propose here, albeit in a slightly mechanical fashion, that the whole point of community is to enable us to make the impact that needs to be effected in the institutions that we will end up in - no matter in the academic, private or public sectors. The whole point of being in a community is to be nurtured for the things greater than ourselves. To do the things that matter. Yet, I struggle with this notion having the attitude that knowledge is important for its own sake, even if it has completely no utility value.
Arguing that the time in USP has a teleological underpinning is very contentious, I admit. I know that not everyone will agree with this, and that perhaps, people just want to be left to their own devices, making their own way through, enjoying the experiences that come along the way. Let me put it unequivocally here - there is nothing wrong, nothing morally wrong with this attitude. People will want to use the many years here as a time for experimentation, to try things they have never tried before, and it should be encouraged. After all, the years of genuine freedom will come to a close, as we become tied to deadlines and the rigours of work. Heck, I’m beginning to rethink the idea of self-actualisation even. Since self-actualisation is a verb/noun - it describes a process inasmuch as it does, a destination. People are constantly in the state of becoming and so, we have really, only some control about who we are, and who we want to be. Circumstances beyond ourselves thwart our own objectives - who is to say that we are in complete control of our own fates? Still, I would want to argue that our time in USP matters, in that the opportunities and the attitude of the programme could begin to lead us to ask these niggling questions: what’s the point of my life? and what do I do with the experiences and knowledge that I have? These are questions of Final Causes, of telos in the Aristotelean sense. Yet these questions form the basis of our angst…
In the longer and larger schemes of things, everything changes, especially human institutions. USP will continue long after I graduate - it will continue to evolve and mutate - like all human institutions will. The values will change, the culture will change, and it is in the changes that egos are bruised, feelings are hurt. And it is all inevitable. But that’s how life is - it is about change. What I write will only be relevant for the here and now; whatever happens in the future - that’s for then (and requires a separate post).
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