3Qblog08

EL blog post

2008-09-02T01:03:00.001-07:00

For today’s blog post, I would like to talk about our world’s current environmental practices and demonstrate how poor they are.

For millions of years, man has always been a pre-industrial society, using inefficient manual methods of doing things, that emitted nothing nor produced or consumed harmful products, and hence had nearly no harm on our environment. However, ever since the Industrial Revolution, our technology has improved by quantum leaps. After millions of years of hunting animals, within a few centuries we have split the atom, invented the microchip, and cloned a living being. However, all these scientific developments have also had a major downside, which is the damage they do to the environment. The damage we have done within 200 years has been more than we ever did for the previous few millennia. Below, I will show examples and will convince you, the reader, that our world has poor environmental practices.

Firstly, many of our practices are environmental harmful as they emit harmful gases such as carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, or hydrogen sulphide. These activities include the usage of cars, the generation of electricity using fossil fuels, and the mass production of goods at factories. All these activities are harmful to the environment, as the gases they emit are not only harmful to animals, but also to plants. These gases condense in clouds and cause acid rain to fall, killing countless trees and poisoning rivers. These gases build up in the atmosphere, contributing to the notorious greenhouse effect, which is slowly but surely strangling our earth. We, as humans, have not done much to stop this. Our car usage continues to grow, with the majority of car manufacturers not aiming for fuel efficiency, but rather aim to make faster, more powerful cars with larger engine capacities, resulting in cars that do not emit less, but rather emit even more carbon dioxide. This should not be the case, as the greenhouse effect has been worsened by us so much that even if we were to stop emitting greenhouse gases right this second, the effects would still need hundreds of years to go away, and we should be limiting our emissions as much as we can, not increasing them. Humans have emitted hundreds of billions of tons of carbon dioxide; to not stop this emission would be tantamount to suicide, which is exactly what we do with our current practices, which are totally poor environmental practices.

Secondly, we carry out wanton destruction of our planet’s forests, chopping them down to make wood and burning them down to clear land. We not only destroy what has been bestowed upon us, but also take away what can help remove carbon dioxide--- trees. We have burnt down millions of acres of trees, and logging companies continue to do so without abandon. These acts result in much damage to the ecosystem, taking away the food and homes of many animals, and also upset the natural balance, as the only living beings that can remove harmful carbon dioxide and release important oxygen into the air, plants, are burnt to their roots. It is quite clear from this that out world does have poor environmental practices.

Now some may say that our world in recent years has implemented many environmental policies to try to repair whatever damage we have done to our environment. This however, is almost entirely not true. Oil companies trot out entirely false statistics, claiming that they are putting the environment ahead of their profits, that they invest their earnings in renewable energies. This is almost entirely false. The truth is, even after these “investments” by oil companies, renewable energies only supply 4% of the world’s total energy, a very small percentage compared to the world’s total energy consumption. Many corporations claim that they follow environmental laws that are setup by governments to control environmental damage; the truth however is much harsher. Factories in many parts of the world circumvent environmental policies by bribing environmental inspectors, exploiting loopholes in environmental laws, or ignore these laws altogether. They do not aim for environmental friendliness, but rather aim for the cheapest production of goods, no matter the environmental cost. In many cities around the world, a thick cloud of smog permanently engulfs the once blue sky, a telling effect of the wanton ignorance of environmental policies by corporations all around the world. Furthermore, even after all this blatant damage, companies trot out more statistics claiming that the environment has not sustained much damage, ranging from fake statistics claiming that forests have grown rather than shrunk, to “studies” claiming that sea levels have gone down rather than risen. These “studies”, purported to be by prominent organizations with fancy names, are but shams sponsored by corporations to fabricate these statistics. This is an obvious example of how we have poor environmental practices.

In conclusion, it is very obvious that our world does have poor environmental practices. Our current practices damage the environment, while not much action has been taken to limit it. Furthermore, the current pro-environmental policies, which are still insufficient, are circumvented or ignored completely by companies. The clock continues to tick, and we must improve our environmental practices before it is too late. Otherwise, the human race will be doomed to extinction.

Does democracy create stablility in a society?

2008-07-10T08:35:00.000-07:00

I disagree that democracy creates stability in a society to a large extent.

To determine the stability of a society, we must look at it from multiple view points. Hence, let us start with a political view point. From a political point of view, democracy does not create stability in a society. Unlike in authoritarian regimes, democratic societies place much importance on multi-party politics. Multi party politics may result in pressure on the ruling party to produce results, but ultimately create much political turmoil. This turmoil shows up especially during the period of elections. Ultimately, human nature dictates that humans crave power and position. Therefore, the various political parties during elections often fight hard for the votes of citizens. However, often, they resort to dirty politics that disrupt the political stability of the society, take the recent riots in Mongolia for example. Mongolians took to the streets and rioted after the opposition parties accused the ruling party of rigging the elections. Political parties may also decide to be sore losers, such as in Malaysia, where the Penang UMNO, which was voted out of the state, suggested to the Federal government to scrap all outstanding development projects in the state, saying that “It is the new government’s responsibility to bring development to the state.” From this, we can tell that democracy does not create stability from a political standpoint.

From a social point of view, a democracy may or may not create stability in a society. The social stability of a country depends on the leaders that the people elect, and the leaders elected depend on the peoples’ mindset, attitudes and ideology. For example, a society where the majority are xenophobic and do not want foreigners entering their country, they may elect leaders who push for clampdowns on illegal immigrants or discrimination against non-native or minority racial groups, such as in several European countries, where the wearing of the Hijab is banned. Another example would be the United States, where racial discrimination used to happen. The racial discrimination happened as the blacks the minority, and the whites, as they were the majority, had the power to elect leaders they thought would carry on the policy of racial discrimination. The result of these acts was that those discriminated against were not happy, and in the Black’s case, resorted to violence, creating much social instability. However, if the population votes responsibly for a competent government, the government via implementing fair policies will be able to maintain social stability.

From an economic point of view, democracy does create stability in a society. No matter what, foreign investors favor democracies to authoritarian regimes. Authoritarian leaders could take over a business without opposition, and do many other acts that would not be fair from an economic standpoint. However, democratic governments have to answer to their people, and removing businesses that sell cheap goods, or implementing policies that are detrimental to the people from an economic standpoint, will invoke anger in the people of a society. Unlike from a social standpoint, where people have different points of view, most people like money, and hence crave economic stability, as it would better their standard of living, improving their lives. Hence, the government would have pressure to ensure economic stability.

After examining the issue from 3 viewpoints, we must now pass judgment on the motion. In my opinion, political stability is the most important factor among the 3. The political stability of a society affects the government, as the presence of political turmoil would turn its attention away from more important issues, as it fights for its political survival. This would result in social and economic issues being neglected, hence causing instability as living standards drop and the people suffer. With political stability, a government would be able to run efficiently and implement policies, without needing to worry about its survival. However, as I have argued, democracy does not create political stability, due to the element of multi-party politics. Very few countries in the world have sufficiently politically mature parties, as no matter what humans still work for their own benefit, and it is this element of human nature that generates political instability. Furthermore, democracy is just a system of government, not an ideology that defines the policies the government makes. In the end the most important factor is not the form of government, but rather the competency of the government, and in the case of democracy, the competency of the people to elect good leaders. A communist government can implement policies that support racial harmony, and a democratic society can implement xenophobic policies detrimental to the social stability of a country. Hence, I believe that democracy does not create stability in a society.

Term 1 Blog post

2008-03-06T04:52:00.000-08:00

Title of article: Engaging students beyond the classroom
Author: Jane Ng
Publisher: The Straits Times
Date: 3 March 2008

This article is about how teachers are now attempting to connect better with thier students by taking up students' favourite hobbies such as playing computer games. They try and make themselves "cool" in order to bond better with thier students, and thus have the ability to teach thier students better.

I feel that teachers doing such is a good thing, as now times have changed, and teachers cannot be conservatives who root themselves firmly in the past, as they will be unable to connect with thier student,s and hence will not be able to teach them well. If a teacher is able to relate well to his students, and share the same common interests as them, the students will like the teacher, and pay attention to him, hence learning more. The teacher can also use this oppurtunity to continue teaching them outside the classroom, by interacting with them more, and doing activities that students like together.

As of now, times have changed. No longer does information take hours to travel, as we now have instant messenging and email. As a result, teachers need to keep up with the trends, or risk losing touch with the present generation of teenagers, who lead very fast paced and hectic lives, saved partly by technology, as they save time in thier busy schedules via fast communication. If teachers lose touch with thier students, and stubbornly refuse to embrace technology and the present culture, they will be unable to teach students well. Furthermore, teenagers now are getting more rebellious, and not finding ways to communicate with them will render practically any teaching method useless.

However, I feel teachers shoukd not over do it. If teachers overzealously try to up thier cool factor, they may end up looking foolish if they emulate teen culture blindly, without learning about it first. Furthermore, teachers must still draw a line between them and thier students, as no matter what there still must be a proper line drawn between students and teachers, as otherwise students will become too friendly with thier teachers, and as a result may not pay attention during class, as they may engage in non work related banter during class.

In conclusion, I feel that teachers trying to engage students beyond the classroom is a good thing, but must no over do it. They must embrace the new culture and new technology, but at the same time there is still a firm line of respect drawn between them and thier students.

First post

2008-03-01T22:21:00.001-08:00

Testing testing