Monday, December 13, 2010

The Strange Tales of Liaozhai and the movie of Stardust.


http://www.wellbeing.com.au/article/Features/Wisdom/What-is-Relationship-Astrology_681

I'm on school vacation now and I've read some of the books of The Strange Tales of Liaozhai and "coincidentally" watched the movie of Stardust by a local channel before the party of ZoukOut. The origin of The Strange Tales of Liaozhai consists of 409 short stories and a lot of the stories are about love of a couple. So, it is not hard to find the similarities between The Strange Tales and the movie of Stardust. Both are about the hardships that the couple has be through and thus earned their eternal love for each other and being together happily ever after.

Fairy tales of eternal love seem to be impossible to happen in my era of time. In fact most of the people would think it is not real and thus decided to forget it and "wake up" for the "reality". But I believe that everybody, including myself of course, wants it and so lots and lots of this kind of movies had been produced and attracted millions of crowd to watch it. Similarly, I also believe that one of the reasons that The Strange Tales can ever exist until now, either in literature or drama series, for more than 250 years is because of the same elements: most of the people would like to have eternal love.

So now arises a question that a lot of people would like to ask and trying to search for the answer: Can eternal love be gained without any hardships?

I think eternal love would not come for free. There is a price that the couple have to pay in order to gain it: they have to go through some hardships just like The Strange Tales as well as the movie of Stardust. Nothing is free. If it is free, it would have no value and the couple may break easily.

So, people who is living in a peace era like now in Singapore, London, Tokyo etc would means that eternal love will never exist? Frankly, I don't know but I suppose so.

----------

This year marks the fifth year of the break-up between me and my ex-girlfriend and I can still remember that the way we got together was far too easy and without any hardships and obstacles. Now, when I look back at the relationship (after reading The Strange Tale as well as watching the movie), I'm lost and confused. My experience of "easy-come-easy-go" (can I apply this idiom to relationship?) agrees with The Strange Tale and the movie and thus I think I can safely conclude that no eternal love without hardships. But in reality, how am I suppose to "mix" hardships into a relationships if I ever have a chance to "fall" again?

Maybe it is a curse that come with a peace society. Maybe I'm talking "false dilemma" or maybe I'm thinking too much again (damnit!). Whatever will be will be and I shouldn't worry too much.

Lastly, a small request: please don't laugh at me if I happened to be single for the rest of my life.

Monday, December 6, 2010

Finally..AY10/11 Sem 1 is over (II)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/digbyross/2505974224/

Now back to the sad part.

Sad, because I don't think I did well for PC2131 (E and M). All along, I heard people says Study Smart. Well, sometimes I wonder: What is study smart? How to study smart? Study smart means simply study for exam and test? Study those will only come out in the exam and test? I don't know and apparently it is the case.

I am used to "study all" and neglected "study smart" as I always think that the exam and test question is simply unpredictable and the lecturer can always change his style now and then. But, I've changed my strategy this semester simply because, judged by my current overall performance (CAP), "study all"--or rather Study Hard-- is not going to work for me. To me, the biggest difference between study smart and study hard is that study smart is only study for whatever that will come out in the exam or test and study hard would be study everything (is it a correct "definition"? Again, I don't know..). Now, let me ask you some questions. If you were decided to study smart, were you look back and study the mid term tests? Were you look back at the tutorial and study all the tutorial questions again? Or you would look at the "potential" questions which you think would come out in the final exam? Well, you can simply say "both" but don't forget that you don't have the luxury of time to do both as you have other exams to take care of. Maybe I am stupid or something, I've decided to give up on the revision of the mid term tests as well as the tutorial question. Guess what, in the final exam, 2 mid term test questions and a tutorial question (90% similar and exact) came out in the final exam. My face turned to red and blue on the spot and immediately I'd like to scream my lung out: "WHAT THE FU*******************K!!!!!"

Who would expect this? I know that the lecturer is being kind and would like to help the student but it turned out that his "favor" is killing me and I'm in hot soup now. I expected the opposite and studied those that have not come out in the mid term tests and tutorial.

Now, I'm really confuse with study smart and study hard. If I were to stick with study hard, my situation now won't be that bad as I would study the mid term tests and tutorial questions.

有早知,冇乞兒 (Cantonese slang: if "predictable" exists, beggar will not exist)...

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Finally..AY10/11 Sem 1 is over

My QM I, II and III "guardians". (1927, Solvay Conference)

http://regnirts.blogspot.com/2008_04_01_archive.html


(Taking a very deep breath and sigh...)

Well, AY10/11 Sem 1 is over and I have just finished the final exam of PC2131 (E and M) 1 hour ago and PC4130 QMIII 5 hours ago. It was really fast and so does this semester.

While writhing this post, I am happy and sad. Happy, because I have finally completed the most important courses for this undergraduate study: Quantum Mechanics I, II and III. Seriously, I consider myself has graduated as physics graduate because, in my point of view, QM is the most important training that I must complete and QM is far more important than the rest of the module like E and M, Classical Mechanics, Mathematical method etc. I cannot imagine myself graduate without QM I, II and III. Why QM is so important to me? Well, honestly, it is a matter of pride as well as because it is very cool, interesting ( I still cannot accept Schrodinger's Cat and quantum entanglement) and yet to be fully understand by human being. Pride, you say? What pride? Well, just like the old good Chinese proverb says (translate by me): It is better to have a very sharp knife (only one) than having a lot of "normal" knife. As you may aware, I am pretty weak in physics (in fact very weak) and I really cannot give up my pride and just let people think that I am "nobody". Now, with these three QM modules under my belt, at least, I think, I am "somebody" because not much people can "stand" QM very long and very often people just switch their mind off when they heard someone talking about QM. On the other hand, seriously, I have think this over and over again: is this a correct attitude and mindset towards learning? I seriously don't know. Is it correct to think yourself as "somebody" and put your pride as high as your nose? My faith is shaking because this is really heavy and very often I have consider giving up and live my life an enjoyable one. No stress, just study whatever that is easy and able to graduate. You may confuse now and think that QM I, II and III are core module and compulsory to go through. As the matter of fact, only QM I and QM II are core and compulsory for normal degree undergraduate. QM III will only become core and compulsory for those are taking Honors degree. In my case, I am most probably graduate without Honors simply because of my poor and lousy CAP (a measure of overall performance) and it is up to me to choose to study QM III or not. So what the big deal since a lot of honors students are also "equip" with QM III? Well, the big deal is that I am the only non-honors student who dare to compete with the honors student in this "sounds difficult" subject! I must admit that it is really disputable and up to individual's point of view to think "I'm daring or not", but seriously it is really extremely rare to find a student like me who dare to do this and most of my senior who graduate without honors would have no QM III in their transcript.

Well, let's get back to the initial "discussion" now: Am I right to lift my pride as high as my nose but yet get myself very tired and sad very often? Tired and sad because physics is just not my field and my knowledge of physics is very fragile. I can easily forget what I have learnt over night and repeat all the mistake again and again during mid term test, final exam and even tutorial sessions.

On the other hand, it may be true to think that life is about a battle. In that sense, maybe I am right and I should continue this "battle" of challenging myself and hopefully it would lead me to somewhere better. If it eventually lead me to somewhere worse and stuck in a one way street (undergraduate degree is one of the most important factor that determine my career and it may have a huge ill-effect if i have selected it wrongly), well, I may as well just take it as another battle.

Maybe I just shouldn't take it too seriously and think too much about it because, better or worse, I will learn and grow and eventually nothing to lose. So what if people laugh at me and think that I am not realistic (keep doing something that you are not good at ) and deserve a failure? Well, I guess I have to just let them laugh but tell myself that at least I have tried my best to earn myself a pride.

Who knows? Maybe life without pride would be the worst failure after all...

(to be continued...)

Monday, August 9, 2010

Germany Immersion Trip 2010 (020510~220510)


Today is the Singapore National Day (happy birthday!) and also the last day of my school holiday for AY10/09 Sem 2(sob...).

By looking back, it was a very very fun and unforgettable school holiday. Night Safari, diving, studying Electromagnetism 1, Singapore Zoo and NUS Rag Day aside, the most memorable program that I had during the holiday was this wonderful Germany Immersion Trip (GIT).

If I were to talk about the programs and places that I have visited during GIT, it would take me at least one week to complete the job because it was a 20 days trip!

In fact, I just want to share with you what I have learnt and perceived during the trip.

As you may aware that I would be alone most of the time: I signed up the diving course alone; I prefer to watch movie alone; I went to Japan for backpacking alone; and, of course, I signed up this GIT alone, too. The idea of "to-be-alone-throughout-the-GIT-trip" has rooted in my mind long before I sign up for the trip and I am "well-prepared" for it: I had borrowed the "Munich and the Bavaria Alps" and downloaded all the traveling information from Wikitravel for Munich and Gottingen. All this information and travel guide are essential when you are traveling alone. I guess I am the only one in the group who brought all this information along and none of the members ever consider to be alone throughout the GIT. To me, the real freedom has to be alone. It is because by being alone than you can go wherever that interested you immediately and change the traveling plan anytime you want- no strings attached. By being alone, you can also do whatever you want without any "restriction" from your friends. Example, smoking. Your friend may ask you to "go away" when you wanted to smoke and complain that you smell awful when you get close to your friend. Therefore, I have perceived that "the real freedom has to be alone" due to the fact that human is no Buddha and there is always something that we cannot tolerate form each other no matter how close we are.

Nevertheless, after the trip, I realized that a total freedom can never guarantee all the happiness: it can never provide you the joy of sharing, especially the "photo sharing" after the trip. Sometimes, taking a photo with somebodies is really much better than just taking the photo alone or just the scenery alone. By looking back at the photos after awhile (the longer the better i guess; say, 10 years later) the mixing "feeling" that "erupt" in our heart is something really different as we compare with the "lonely-self" photos. A "lonely-self" photos may taste like Coke but a photo with somebodies may taste like coffee Latte.

I guess, in order to have the "total happiness" for a trip as well as after the trip, sometimes we really have to be alone and sometimes not to be alone. And of course, do not take this favor (from your friends) for granted and we should possess the correct attitude towards your friends.

Last but not least, thank you Lynette, Shi Hua, Yong Wai, Da Yang, Jun Kai, Alvin and the rest of the folks from GIT for your "enlightenment" as well as your patient, especially when I lose my temper when I wanted something fast, with me throughout the trip.

What a meaningful, memorable and precious once-in-my-lifetime GIT 2010.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

流星。


photo source: touch4health

喜欢一个人看电影,因为可以省很多时间和麻烦。

因为很喜欢日本,所以喜欢一个人去日本,因为觉得这样才是二人世界。


很希望每年的
秋天,可以 在火红枫叶下的京都,古老的寺廟前,一个人静静的坐着,听着风和叶的声音,看看眼前的情侣,陌生人祈福。

吸一口气,想想未来的路,细细体会寂寞,失落,优愁的感觉。

也不知道为什么,就是很喜欢这种感
觉。也许这样才是体会人生。

离开前,再回味过去人生的酸,甜,苦,辣,也希望可以掌握短暂的未来。

伤的秋天,失落红叶,千年的古寺,刹那的人 生。


Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Diving


Before the holiday of AY09/10 Sem 2, I signed up a diving course: PADI Open Water which allow me to dive (with a buddy) with the maximum depth of 18m without any supervision. It took me to go through 1 theory session with test, 2 pool session and 4 final evaluation dives at Pulau Aur. It all went well for the theory session, the pool sessions as well as the first 3 evaluation dives but, unfortunately (sighhhhhhh...) due to the buoyancy issue when I fin as well as my breathing problem (mainly due to my nervousness of the weakness, I guess) which lead me to left only 5 bar of the air pressure in the cylinder (the average was 60 bar and above), my instructor has to fail me for Open Water and I only certified for PADI SCUBA Diver which only allow me to dive with maximum depth of 12m with the supervision of a Dive Master. As the matter of fact, I think there were 12 student signing up for the course and I am the only one who failed for Open Water (sighhhhhhh...).

Frankly, not so long ago, I had failed my Class 2 motorbike test TWICE and I decided to give up by "lying" to myself: I failed it twice because my "destiny" wanted to prevent me from having deadly accident with a Class 2 bike. Can I lie to myself again with a similar excuse again: I failed it because it will prevent me from drown or attack by jelly fish or even shark?

Sometimes I wonder: why do I have so many failure throughout my life? I failed my Malay in my UPSR (PSLE in Singapore) and it leads me to take 6 years for my secondary education. I failed my Malay again for my O-level and it leads me to take up the diploma study in Nanyang Polytechnics (I wanted to study Malaysia A-level (STPM) at the first place as this is the cheapest way of approaching higher education). I failed more than 15 times, so far, for wooing a girl. I failed all the quizzes (except one and details are written at my another entry named "Naruto") and mid term test for my physics modules as well (eventually I still able to pass all these physics modules. If God or Buddha really exists, thank God or Buddha!)

The only reason that keep me from being sorrow (but still quite sad) from all this failures are: at least I did not failed any of my physics modules. This is my "bottom line" and the only "strength" that I left in order to push me through all this "minor" failure. Again, if God or Buddha really exists, I beg and beg and beg you all please don't let me loose my only "strength" or knock me down lower than my "bottom line". Maybe people like me really need a "strength" to live on and to "beat" another "minor" failure. Am I being too weak? If I were strong enough, I shouldn't need this "strength" and I would always say: "Just bring it on! No big deal." I really don't know. What I knew is that I don't want to have any failure anymore because the feeling is really hard and quite "unbearable" and I really don't know how much more failure I can "accept" but, in reality, can I really "achieve" no more failure from now onwards?

Please, please, please, if God or Buddha really exists, please bless this little and weak fellow--Liew Sing.

Friday, May 7, 2010

Finally.. AY09/10 Sem 2 is over.. part 2


If you remember "Finally..AY09/10 Sem 1 is over", I did mentioned "how much effort I have put in". Looking back, by judging myself, I think I have only put 50% of my effort into study for AY09/10 Sem 1. Likewise, I think I have "improved" by putting 75% of my effort into study for AY09/10 Sem 2. You may ask how come I can "improved dramatically"? Interested into QM2 as well as MPF asides, the real reason that forces me to increase my concentration on study is simply study with my Mac shutting down. Since all the lecture notes are in ppt or pdf format, I used to study with my Mac on because I neglected to print out all the lecture notes in order to save money as well as trees. In fact, by having posted "Finally..AY09/10 Sem 1 is over", I have started to think about the "root-cause" that reduced my "productivity" about study and I realized that indeed it is my Mac that draw most of my concentration from study.

As we all knew, WWW is full of useful as well as junk information and website. The temptation of surfing the junk website is just a-click away. With my Mac on, psychologically I will be tempted to surf something that will waste my time like Facebook. In fact, I have told myself that I'm only allow to surf Wikipedia in order to clear my doubt regarding physics but I always break the rule. Therefore, I have decided to print out all the lectures note (pardon me, trees) and keep my Mac at bay as much as possible started from AY09/10 Sem 2.

As mentioned earlier, I can only increased 25% of the effort (it should be at least 30% I think) and I still prefer to have my Mac around when I am studying. Am I addicted to WWW? If I really do addicted to WWW, how to get rid of it? Or it is normal to addicted to WWW since everyone is doing the same?

I think I really can't blame my Mac or WWW for distraction. If I were to have strong determination, I guess nothing can move me. It is myself to be blamed and I shall keep this in mind at all times.

Well, I think I have to apologize to the earth in advance as I am going to use a lot of paper for lecture notes the following semester, too but I promise that I will definitely recycle all the paper.

Long live our Gaia.

Monday, May 3, 2010

Finally.. AY09/10 Sem 2 is over..

Prof. Oh and Mr. Nerney



"May I have your attention, please", Prof. Ng Ser Choon from PC 2230 Statistical Mechanics continues: " stop writing..."

The long await moment has finally come and the curtain of my AY09/10 Sem 2 has officially falls. Frankly, it was by far the most interesting semester for me because of Quantum Mechanics 2 (QM2) as well as Expository writing: Model of Press Freedom (MPF).

I found QM2 interesting because, frankly again, of Prof. Oh Choo Hiap. Prof. Oh was such a great lecturer. To him, the content of QM2 is just like at his fingertips. He managed to teach the module "fluently", in the sense that, I believe, most of the student understood the reasons behind all the mathematical structures that described the physical phenomenons about the hydrogen atom, boson, fermion, etc. Thus the students also understood the importance of the mathematical structures and started to appreciate the work that our good-old physicists like Prof. Dirac and Prof. Pauli, put in. Also, Prof. Oh's explanations is by far much better that reading the text book. I think I can safely say that the lectures is much more rigorous than the text book, too. Basically, by purely understanding the lectures will help to understand the text book but not vice versa. As I was doing my final revision for the exam, I found that the outline of the lectures are so "smooth and elegant" that I can answer myself that "because of this (previous theorem, "classical law" or the 7 postulates for QM), we have to do this (new mathematical structures like "hermition" the new "operator" ) and thus it enable us to solve the hydrogen atom problem and allow us to understand it. I think this way of learning by questioning and answering is very rigorous and fascinating and I really enjoyed the module. It is really "intelligently delicious"! Also, Prof. Oh is very passionate about teaching, too. If I were to ask the class what is Prof. Oh's "favorite quote", I believe most of the students would answer: "Do you have any question?" Prof. Oh is such a lovely lecturer that he would like to walk around the theater before the lesson starts or during the break and asked student this question:" Do you have any question?" I was moved by his passion of teaching-even when I just pop up and knock his office's door for consultation, he always smile and welcome me when he sees me. If I were to teach one day, Prof. Oh would definitely be my role model and he will be remembered when I think of hydrogen atom, boson, fermion, etc.

If I were to tell you that Mr. Paul Nerney was my first Caucasian-no offensive meaning- teacher/lecturer, you would see my point as why MPF was such an interesting module for me. Yes, I have a very difficult time during the first few seminar with Mr. Nerney and my head was "spinning around" after the seminar ended. As you may aware that my English is really bad, I have a lot of difficulties of catching what Mr. Nerney said during the seminar and I hardly come out with a good question or answer in order to keep the seminar engaging. As the seminar consisted of only 8 students, interacting with Mr. Nerney seems to be cannot be avoided but unfortunately I have to keep quite and "act interested" most of the time. However, I did learnt a lot from Mr. Nerney, especially the way he looks at the issues regarding press freedom and the way of writing persuasive articles. It helps me broaden my horizon as well as the way that I used to think about certain issues. In fact, before the seminar, I thought that I am able to think critically and fundamentally but, after few seminars, actually I am not- not even close to that! I remember my first lesson was defining "model of press freedom" and I spent more than 2 hours to look for the answer after class, despite the fact that the definition of "model", "press" and "freedom" were provided from a dictionary. These questions pull me down to the ground and forces me to think about the fundamental meaning of "model of press freedom", which I took for granted. By knowing the truth that I am actually lacking the skill of thinking critically and my mistake of "take thing for granted", this module makes me more interested into it and I would like to thank Mr. Nerney for his patient as well as his helpful suggestions/explanations.

Well, the 3-months-summer holidays has started and I really hope that I would have an even better and fruitful semester for AY10/11 Sem 1 (I can't wait!) and I would also like to wish Prof. Oh and Mr. Nerney all the best and good health.

Happy holidays!

Friday, April 9, 2010

Failed work.

I was asked to write a draft for one of my module but eventually the lecturer rejected it and asked me to rewrite due to out of topic. I had spent more than 24 hrs on writhing this "piece of trash" and one of my friends had helped me to correct most of the errors (thanks!) and I just cannot, you know, dump it into "Trash" and pretend nothing happened. Well, here it goes...


Writing Assignment 3

Lule claims that journalists form the narrative line of news articles around seven specific myths. From this, what problem could you raise to test the model’s descriptive adequacy?


An Acceptable Scapegoat

Jack Lule’s “Seven Master Myths in the News”[1] claims that there is always seven specific myths, not always all but at least one which govern the narrative line of news articles. These specific myths are “The Victim” (e.g. a victim from a robbery), “The Scapegoat” (e.g. same-sex marriage), “The Hero” (e.g. a world champion of a sport), “The Good Mother” (e.g. Mother Teresa), “The Trickster” (e.g. Osama Bin Laden), “The Other World” (e.g. western society, from the point of view of an African) and “The Flood” (e.g. Haiti earthquake in the early 2010).

Having said “The Scapegoat”, I would like to take this opportunity to further elaborate the meaning of “The Scapegoat” based upon the essay’s model. “The Scapegoat” would represent a figure who personifies “guilt and evil”. It is because they are seen as deviating from a community’s social values and sense of best practice. As such, “The Scapegoat” is regarded as a potential agent of change of the community’s values and beliefs. To prevent unfavorable changes, the scapegoat is publicly humiliated and either socially marginalized or expelled from the community. One more example would be beauty pageant in the Arabic world. Despite the fact that same-sex marriage and beauty pageant in the Arabic world would be regarded as “guilt and evil”, the population that embraces these ideas is gradually increasing and thus challenges the core values and beliefs of “The Scapegoat”. For simplicity, I would like to take homosexuality and same-sex marriage as the fundamental platform and thus study the acceptability of “The Scapegoat” in the community, which is in contrast with the core belief of “The Scapegoat” will be expelled from the community. These works are based upon the stories of legalization of the same-sex marriage in Washington D.C at the late 2000s from journalist Ian Urbina of The New York Times.

Why homosexuality and same-sex marriage considered “The Scapegoat”? It is because homosexuality is prohibited by one of the largest youth charity organization in US-the Boy Scouts[2], object by Congressional Republicans and conservative Democrats[3] and same-sex marriage is unacceptable by one of the largest religion in the world, the Roman Catholic.[4] To them, homosexuality and same-sex marriage are “guilt and evil”. Homosexuality in the Boy Scouts is prohibited because it is inconsistent with the tradition values which instill correct behavior in scouts and help all the individuals scouts to make correct decision over their lifetimes.[5] On the other hand, same-sex marriage is unacceptable in the Roman Catholic because same-sex marriage is not a “correct path toward holiness”.[6] It would ruin the holinesses of human being as well as the beliefs of the religion. Because the numbers of people who is either scouts or believes in Roman Catholic or both are large and object by the congressional Republicans and conservative Democrats, it is understandable that homosexuality and same-sex marriage are “The Scapegoat” in the community.

In 2000, a scout was barred from serving the public due to involve into a gay incident.[7] In 2003, the Boy Scouts chapter in Philadelphia dismissed a devoted member due to openly challenged the organization’s policy by announcing on television that he was gay.[8] We can see that “The Scapegoat” will be expelled from the community which will prevent similar incident from happening again in order to keep the values, beliefs and practice of the organization on the track.

However, as more and more people would like to “define” human rights are the fundamental civic right of freedom and equality, the Boy Scouts in Philadelphia is in hot water. On late 2007, as Philadelphia’s City Council endorsed the gay-right, it declared that it would stop the lease of the Beaux Arts building to the Boy Scout for $1 annually if the charity organization remains its stand.[9] Not long after the incident of the Boy Scouts in Philadelphia, the fight between the gay-right and the religion of the Roman Catholic has finally begun in the capital of the US. On October 6, 2009, the council of Washington D.C announced officially that they would consider same-sex marriage despite the protest of the Roman Catholic and the harsh criticism from the conservative Democrats and Congressional Republicans[10]. As the Roman Catholic cannot tolerate with same-sex marriage, the Catholic Charities which serves 68,000 local residents and received $8.2 million in city contract in 2008, would stop its social service program that help residents with health care, homelessness and adoption. It may even shut down the partnership with the city in these social services.[11] In addition, the Roman Catholic will not take part in same-sex marriage ceremony or give use of their church hall.[12]

On December 15, 2009, the Washington D.C Council approved same-sex marriage. Under the bill, all religions reserve the right to take part in same-sex marriage or not.[13] Ironically in fact, some religions support same-sex marriage as they embrace social equality and justice.[14] Some economists from Los Angeles claimed that same-sex marriage could even give the capital’s economics a boost as it would bring $5 million in tax revenue and create 700 jobs: based on the estimation that more than 14,000 same-sex couple, in three years, would sign the marriage registration form once same-sex marriage is legalized in the capital.[15] However the Roman Catholic remains their stand and refuses to accept the civic rights bill.

On March 3, 2010, the long awaited dream for the same-sex couple in the capital had finally come true. Gay and lesbian marriage is legal in Washington D.C. The Roman Catholic had declared to limit its health care benefits to avoid coverage of same-sex couples to against the new legislation.[16]

In conclusion, it was the perception of the civic right for human freedom and equality, the comparatively large number of population (28,000 in this case) who is homosexual and the economics’ prospect that embrace “The Scapegoat”. Although “The Scapegoat” perceived as “socially marginalized or expelled from the community”, it was not the case in the US in homosexuality and same-sex marriage. “The Scapegoat” will evolve in time and “grow” with other factors and elements. Indeed, it is very hard to judge “The Scapegoat” like same-sex marriage in a democratic society (due to the nature of the voting system). “The Scapegoat” might be wrong and has no room for tolerance today but it might become acceptable in the near future. Nevertheless, one thing we can be certain is that “The Scapegoat” does exist in journalism and journalists play an important role in judging “The Scapegoat” under their pen. Through their pen, they can convey the ideology to the community and influence the community and thus make “An Acceptable Scapegoat” possible.

Reference:

Lule, Jack. 2001. Seven Master Myths in the News. In Daily News, Eternal stories: The Mythological Role of Journalism, 11-26. The Guilford Press.

Urbina, Ian. December 6, 2007. Boy Scouts Lose Philadelphia Lease in Gay-Rights Fight. In The New York Times.

Urbina, Ian. October 6, 2009. Washington Council to Consider Same-Sex Marriage. In The New York Times.

Urbina, Ian. November 12, 2009. New Turn in Debate Over Law on Marriage. In The New York Times.

Urbina, Ian. December 15, 2009. D.C Council Approves Gay Marriage. In The New York Times.

Urbina, Ian. March 3, 2010. Gay Marriage Is Legal in U.S Capital. In The New York Times.

[1] Lule, Jack. 2001. Seven Master Myths in the News. In Daily News, Eternal stories: The Mythological Role of Journalism, 11-26. The Guilford Press.

[2]Urbina, Ian. December 6, 2007. Boy Scouts Lose Philadelphia Lease in Gay-Rights Fight. In The New York Times.

[3]Urbina, Ian. October 6, 2009. Washington Council to Consider Same-Sex Marriage. In The New York Times.

[4]Ibid.

[5]Urbina, Ian. December 6, 2007. Boy Scouts Lose Philadelphia Lease in Gay-Rights Fight. In The New York Times.

[6]Urbina, Ian. October 6, 2009. Washington Council to Consider Same-Sex Marriage. In The New York Times.

[7]Urbina, Ian. December 6, 2007. Boy Scouts Lose Philadelphia Lease in Gay-Rights Fight. In The New York Times.

[8] Ibid.

[9] Ibid.

[10]Urbina, Ian. October 6, 2009. Washington Council to Consider Same-Sex Marriage. In The New York Times.

[11]Urbina, Ian. November 12, 2009. New Turn in Debate Over Law on Marriage. In The New York Times.

[12]Ibid.

[13]Urbina, Ian. December 15, 2009. D.C Council Approves Gay Marriage. In The New York Times.

[14]Ibid.

[15]Urbina, Ian. March 3, 2010. Gay Marriage Is Legal in U.S Capital. In The New York Times.

[16]Ibid.

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

My 2 cents' worth of opinion of our world.

photo source: openthefuture.com

After watching the movie "Avatar", I agree that there is a "hidden" massage that the director wanted to bring across to the world. But, right now, human just cant stop the emission of greenhouse gases soon simply because it will crash with the economy and billions of people will lose their job. And then, a lot of people will starve to death.

I believe that the root-cause is simply because of the Industrial Revolution, which designed to turn energy to become economy. Back to 18th to 19th century, before the Industrial Revolution, people do not aware of the greenhouse gases as well as global warming. The benefits that the Industrial Revolution brought us are tremendous and human, with sufficient job opportunities and income, start to "breed".

Right now, the earth has to "feed" 6.69 billions of human being (if each person take 25 cm, the queue is much longer than the distance between the moon and the earth!) and if we human really wanted to reduce greenhouse gases, we have to control the population. It is the huge population that consume so much energy causing the problem. But, by controlling the population, some downfall will surface. Some of the small countries will lose their competitive to the rest of the countries simply due to aging population as well as lacking the human resource to run the country. Some of the big countries, like India and Brazil, will think that it is unfair to their own government because their main income- tax, have to be reduce due to lower population of the country. Therefore, i suggest to have a "one world one nation" policy: there will be only one government in the world, which choose by the citizen of the world. By having only one government, it will save us a lot of resources as well as unnecessary problem. Example, our passport and the "white card" we use for traveling. In order to produce our passport and the white card, millions of trees have to be sacrifice. In addition, this policy will also erase the unnecessary competition between nations, create no war and allow the government to control the population effectively. Just like the "government" for the "blue people" in the planet of "Avatar".

But racism and greed are in most of the human blood. My suggestion will only be practical if most of the human being can get rid of these and instead, fill with the spirit of, which is common in Mother Teresa, Jesus Christ, Buddha, and etc, love.

Monday, January 4, 2010

My T-shirt design.


"The true beauty that will last forever. Physics." These are the words behind the t-shirt.

Well, here is my design and I'm going to submit it to Physics Society NUS in order to participate the annual t-shirt design competition.

For those are not physics major, I think they will not understand the meaning of the design. Well (I hope you are interested in my design), in order to understand/appreciate (it's an art, right?) the design, firstly you have to know who these gentlemen are. From the far left, he is Mr. Maxwell and he's the one who "combined" Gauss's law, Gauss's law for magnetism, Ampere's law and Faraday's law to became Maxwell's equations (creative, huh?). Guess what, Mr. Santa was his idol (just kidding). Right beside Mr. Maxwell, he was once Mr. Santa's best friend (again, just kidding) and his name is Ludwig Boltzmann. Mr. Boltzmann was one of the founders who created Statistical Mechanics (in short, SM) and he is also very famous for philosophy.

After Mr. Boltzmann, here we have the hero who has ended WWII "indirectly" by being one of the head consultants for The Manhattan Project. His name is Enrico Fermi and Mr. Fermi is also one of the greatest scientist and teacher ever. Right after Mr. Fermi, here he comes, Mr. Dirac. Mr. Dirac don't smoke and drink and his works for Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Field Theory (relativistic quantum mechanics) are tremendous. He is also regarded as one for the greatest physicist ever (both in personality and his works).

Hmm.. Who is this gentleman beside Mr. Dirac? Well, his name is Satyendra Nath Bose. Ring a bell? Boson was named after this gentleman (such a big honor!) and guess what, he has no Ph.D throughout his life! This is really amazing and I think we should set him as our role model! Lastly, needless to tell, everybody knows him and his theories are "unbelievable"!

So, together, they are "Maxwell-Boltzmann statistic", "Fermi-Dirac statistic" and "Bose-Einstein statistic" (just google one of these and you'll find a lot of information about these statistics"). Their theories are very important in physics because without these statistics, human being will not able to explain "black body radiation" and we will not be able to understand the universe further.

Well, as long as the universe and human being are exist, these theories will exist, too. Therefore, don't you agree with me that "Physics. The true beauty that will last forever."?