Category: Rants

Daily Discourse – Eugenics (II)

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The following excerpts should sum up my objection to the MinisterMonkey Mentor’s views on Eugenics, and also the use of academic achievements or knowledge as a measure of intelligence. In fact, it is also the basis of my argument against IQ tests as a means of measuring intelligence, my stand that there are no evidence to determine that intelligence can be passed genetically and thus my answer to iantimothy‘s question on Plurk: ‘So you think genes aren’t important?’

First, even our cognitive abilities as adults are heavily influenced during childhood, making it hard to discern any influence of preexisting genetic differences. Second, tests of cognitive abilities (like IQ tests) tend to measure cultural learning and not pure innate intelligence, whatever that is.

– Guns, Germs and Steel, Prologue: Yali’s Questions [p. 20]

… One day, when my companions of the Foré tribe and I were starving in the jungle because another tribe was blocking our return to the supply base, a Foré man returned to camp with a large rucksack full of mushrooms he had found, and started to roast them. Dinner at last! But then I had an unsettling thought: what if the mushrooms were poisonous?

I patiently explained to me Foré companions that I had read about some mushrooms’ being poisonous, that I had heard of even expert American mushroom collectors’ dying because of our difficulty in distinguishing safe from dangerous mushrooms, and that although we were all hungry, it just wasn’t worth the risk. At that point one of my companions got angry and told me to shut up and listen while they explained some things to me. After I had been quizzing them for years about names of hundreds of trees and birds, how could I insult them by assuming they didn’t have names for different mushrooms? Only Americans could be so stupid as to confuse poisonous mushrooms with safe ones. They went on to lecture me about 29 types of mushroom species, each species in the Foré language, and where in the forest one should look for it. This one, the tánti, grew on trees, and it was delicious and perfectly edible.

– Guns, Germs and Steel, Chapter 8: Apples or Indians [p. 143 – 144]

Thinking back, I would admit I had argued like a fool when I disagreed with iantimothy. I should have simply said when you point out my ignorance, would you not be kind enough to show me what I am ignorant about? instead of saying I don’t need to show you nothing to show there is nothing.. Thus, I will now revisit this matter and put it down on a blog post. That way, if iantimothy need to further elaborate on the matter in a blog post of his own, he will not have to guess or speculate on why I so violently object to the Monkey Mentor’s views.

In summary, my entire premise is simply built upon these points – i.e. there is no sure method to measure intelligence (be it an IQ test or academic achievements), and that any research purportedly proving the link between genes and intelligence are questionable as a result of our cognitive abilities being heavily influenced during childhood.

I am not an expert in the field of intelligence studies so I do not know what is the best method to measure intelligence nor am I in the position to propose another. Talent and aptitude may somewhat prove intelligence, but where Xiang Yu (项羽) and Mark Anthony are talents when it comes to matters of conducting war, they definitely showed a lack of aptitude in matters political. In short, by saying that only graduates should marry graduates or else you should fear that your own offspring might not get to university is erroneous and myopic. What is the point of producing certain talented people whose aptitude is limited to specific fields? That is hardly going to give us an intelligent people as some freak occurrence in nature or rapid changing circumstances might render such talents and aptitude a handicap, much like a person who is nimble may become completely clumsy in the absence of light, where a blind man would out manoeuvre him. Would you thus consider blindness a positive trait and thus have them breed like wild rabbits?

Other than talent and aptitude, how fast a person learn a completely new skill and then put it to use to deal with the problems he face may also show how intelligent that person is… so does how one use his existing and even limited abilities to survive in the face of adversity may also prove it. And when we put all of these together, a person possessing all of these capabilities are far and few in between. In other words, the Monkey Mentor’s version of Eugenics may breed one kind with just a limited set of capabilities that he consider as being intelligent, while breeding out the rest of the ‘intelligent traits’ which are also useful.

And based on the above I object to the Monkey Mentor’s comments. And I reiterate, Eugenics is just plain dead wrong.

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集结号 (Assembly):

冯小刚导演的一部电影。画面的真实性和拍摄手法可以媲美好莱坞的《雷霆救兵》[Saving Private Ryan]。故事的背景是中国内战时期在汶河一带共军华中野战军 (中野) 对抗国民党军的一场战役。故事主角连长谷之地奉团长之命死守汶河一侧的阵地，主要目的是阻碍国民党军的进攻，让在华北的中野的主力能够有次序的撤退，不至于全军覆没。

结果是谷的部队完全被敌人全部歼灭，连发命令死守阵地的团长也战死。从昏迷中清醒的谷，由于身上穿着敌军的军服而无法证明他的身份。而且瞬息万变的战事以及部队不断的改编，使到上级无法证实谷的部队编号是否存在。唯一存活的谷由于无法证明部下的英勇牺牲和让他们得到应得的奖赏和追思感到的悲愤莫名、无奈和懊恼。无助的谷只好继续活下去，加入了援朝的自愿部队，希望他的忠诚能让上级调查他的背景来为他的部队平反。

虽然这换来了和他一起作战的部队的军官对他的信任和赏识，但这并没有令共党政治部撇开谷是穿着敌军的军服被发现的过去而给予他应得的礼遇。谷认为除非部队的遗骸被发现，过去的部下将永远得不到到应得的礼遇。所以谷回到了汶河，企图从记忆里找出当年埋葬部队尸骸的煤矿入口，把部队的遗骸挖出来证明他的过去…

《集结号》和《雷霆救兵》有许多相同之处。里面有面对战斗恐惧的指导员，有反对射杀战俘的士兵，有血淋淋的伤者和被炮弹轰掉了半身但还奄奄一息的士兵。电影的画面让人看到了战争丑陋的一面。但是谷的遭遇也让我们看到中国一贯对为国牺牲的人民如何的不重视。谷的遭遇让我想起了，过去几十年来大陆方面如何抹杀了抗日战争时期国民党部队的事迹。难道就因为政见不同，别人为国家为民族的牺牲就不算数了吧？国民党新一军阵亡战士的公坟今天被如何的糟蹋，让人痛心。

看看日本吧。就算战败，也虽败犹荣。当年的日本皇军今天还在靖国神社里被供奉为神呢。如果做不到对为国捐躯的死者尊敬，那么又让将来的国民为了什么来为他们的祖国上战场呢？

Daily Discourse – Eugenics

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What is the measure of intelligence? Is it by your academic achievements?

It is truly sad today that academic achievement has become a measurement of intelligence to some when its original function should be a measurement of knowledge, if not of competence. Simply put, just because you know does not make you intelligent. It simply means you have the necessary knowledge required to deal with the tasks where those without the knowledge cannot. Above which, there are many kinds of knowledge, and certain knowledge may not be at all applicable to the problems at hand. For e.g. knowing your OSI model maybe useful in understanding networking and network data transmission, but that is completely useless in helping you identify whether a fungus is poisonous and thus edible or not.

Unfortunately, such common sense appears to have escaped even men such as the MinisterMonkey Mentor. He has recently sprouted his elitist and eugenics nonsense again. He seems to believe that if you are not a graduate, then you do not even have the right to breed, even if you marry a graduate.

Graduates… mix non-graduates… bad… very bad… for society.. no good…… must remember.. very important!

This news must have made diploma holders, the Ah Beng towkay who drove his a BMW 9-series, or the Ah Lian mamasan who earns even more money a year than some fresh graduate so sad. And this brings me to my second point: Is not the ability to effectively and efficiently use one’s available knowledge and resources, a better measure of success than academic achievements?

First, let me point out an example of 读死书 (literally: study dead books – which means having learnt something but not know how to apply) people. An IT entrepreneur friend of mine hired this girl, who is also among the top of her class as a temp during her holidays. One day, one of the IT engineers took a SCSI hard disk to her and asked her to configure it as device 6. He explained to her that there are 3 sets of pins and by shorting them with jumpers in binary code, it would determine which device it will be. It was an easy task – all you need to do is know what is binary code and the binary code for 6 (110) and short the respective jumpers.

The girl then took out a piece of paper, and started drawing out each and every position from 0 to 6. The IT engineer was in shock that she need to do this because in binary, each position represent 2 to its respective power. In other words, the leftmost set of pins will be 22, the centre set 21, and the last set 20. In other words, shorting all 3 pins will give you device 7 as 22 + 21 + 20 = 4 + 2 + 1 = 7. To put it to device 6, you simply just short the leftmost and center set of pins. Now how difficult is that and why is there a need to draw out each position in binary?!

In another incident, the engineer had asked the same girl during a meal break if she can name forms of wireless communications in ancient times. The girl without thinking told him that such communication does not exist in ancient times. He then pointed out that smoke and fire signals (such as those you see in Lord of the Rings Part II), flag signals, and even hand signals are other forms of wireless communications and it is not limited to just Wifi. In fact, way back in the Zhou Dynasty in probably 12th Century BC, the Chinese military is already using smoke signals by day, and fire signals by night as a means of long range wireless communications.

The point I am trying to make is this, knowledge in your own field, which can be proven by your academic achievements proves nothing about intelligence. Had I even been a believer of Eugenics, I would rather not have this person contribute her genes into the gene pool!

Now, contrast that with the hypothetical Ah Lian mamasan. She might not even have completed her GCE ‘O’ level education, but she has manage to adapt and make use of what is available to her – her ability as a woman to charm, and her talent in swaying customers in the night club to spent money on the girls and alcohol so she can earn her keep – to attain a living standard even some graduates cannot afford. Is that not a sign of intelligence? Note, I am not glamorising this trade here but just pointing out the facts as they are.

Unfortunately, by the Monkey Mentor’s definition, she is definitely an undesirable whose genes should have no part in the gene pool. And I can’t help but wonder if that is the reason why Singapore is so ordinary that there is nothing inspiring. Even if you happened to be the rare few examples of rags to riches stories in Tali-PAP Singapore, remember this, you shouldn’t breed as long as you are a non graduate. And don’t even try and get around that by breeding with a graduate because your partner would worry if your offspring would even made it to university!

And this form part of the basis of my objection as to why academic achievements is in my opinion completely inappropriate, if not insufficient, to determine who qualifies to have an offspring. And note that this is not my complete argument why Eugenics is an obsolete idea.

Meantime, blogger friend Mintea who is in the field of genetics, pointed out that graduate women is not some breeding cow (or something to that effect). She further point out that Gregor Mendel never intended his findings on genetics to be a selective mechanism for who has the right to breed or not. Being someone who is more qualified than me to talk about genetics, I take Mintea’s comment to mean that even genetics does not support Eugenics. In short, not only is it an repulsive idea, it is just plain dead wrong.

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Disgusting Commuter Award Corner

This photo was taken on the way from Jurong East MRT station to Chinese Garden MRT station. The empty seat between this scum with the PSP was previously occupied by me. (Note the position he is sitting and also the distance the guy next to him has kept.)

I do not know where this scum boarded. But at Clementi MRT station, I was jarred awake when this sack of human excrement dropped into the seat with a part of him crushing my left arm. Throughout the trip from Clementi to MRT, this guy was rocking his thighs left and right as he enthusiastically continue with his game on his infernal device, oblivious to the rest of the people around him.

I am adding the PSP to the list of infernal devices I think should all be burnt in a pyre along with Sony and Samsung ‘walkman phones’.

Daily Discourse – Agnes Lin

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One of the most talked about person these days – other than Barack Obama – must be Agnes Lin. She gained notoriety because of an infamous Straits Stooge Times report on how unaffected she might be by the recession and how she unabashedly continue her alleged extravagant lifestyle in spite of it while spending her parents’ money. In the report, she allegedly called one of her less fortunate classmate – silly. (You can find the reproduced Stooge Times article in Xtraliciou’s blog post here..

Really, it is good enough to either make you weep or see red after reading the Stooge Times report. And like DK, I had wondered just where on earth did they managed to find this kind of people?!

This, is not yet another post to bash Agnes Lin, since there are already enough people bashing her. It is merely necessary to report that the girl herself has written on her blog that she was misquoted. This is not an attempt to takes sides with her, but rather to present what may not be widely known so everyone can draw their own conclusion whether Agnes Lin is really as hopeless as the Stooge Times has portrayed her to be and whether her parents has spoiled their child by failing to teach her the value of money.

Anyway, if it is true Miss Lin is misquoted, it really came as no surprise. This has happened before to an online friend of mine. Read about Xtralicious’ own experience here.

In Xtralicious’ case, it is a case of omission resulting in her being misquoted. Somehow, I also suspect to a certain extent the same happened to Miss Loi too, in which a detailed explanation on what she meant when she said she would ‘sack’ students from her tuition classes, might have also been removed resulting in that little annoyance on the Stomp forum which was reported here. (Miss Loi has declined to confirm my suspicions, and she mentioned that she did not want more publicity on this matter. I believe she might be concerned that if expressed badly in my writing, it might sour her relations with the reporter in question and also the Stooge Times.)

But Agnes Lin’s case is different. It was not a case of omission. If what she wrote on her blog is true, this is a case of putting words in her mouth. In fact, she claimed that she didn’t even say her classmate was silly!

This is not any worse or better compared to what happened to Xtralicious. However, when I consider that there are many whose only source of information is the Stooge Times, and even Yahoo Singapore would publish some of these articles, I shudder to think of the impact if the credibility of the report is questionable. Consider first the image of our youths presented to foreigners after they read the Stooge Times article about Miss Lin, if it was reproduced on Yahoo Singapore. We can only speculate about the damage this report has done to our national image.

Then, consider the hypothetical situation in which a political figure – especially an opposition one – ends up with words put in his mouth during our General Election and as a result caused him to lose votes or even his parliamentary seat.

Seriously, something has to be done to deal with the apparently rampant misquoting by the Stooge Times. Or will they only do something when people start avoiding an interview by the Stooge Times, or when it turns into permanent damage to Stooge Times’ reputation?

As for the matter of the young taking money from their parents, it is my considered opinion that there is no reasons whatsoever why anyone should be mad with anyone spending their parents’ money. Just because you may not be doing it or having received lesser from your own doesn’t earn you the right to bash anyone. As a Cantonese saying goes: 牛耕田，马食毂。老豆揾钱，仔享福。[Translation: As the cow tills the land and the horse eats the grains from the harvest, thus the father earns the money for his descendants to enjoy life.], it is thus the natural order of things as long as she didn’t threaten them with her life or at gunpoint for them to give her that money.

On top of which, as long as she spends money in Singapore, she will be contributing to GST, and thus our government’s gahmen’s so-called plan to help those in need. On top of which, someone has to paid into the state coffers so some of us can enjoy any gahmen credits there is.

The only sensible thing we should do about this is to find a way to earn the easy money off the ‘Agnes Lin’ reported on the Stooge Times if she truly exists. In fact, the more of them the merrier so some of that wealth can be redistributed. If you feel sorry for her parents, then you can buy something with the money you earn from her and contribute to GST because when the gahmen gives out goodies, they will get something back too.

In other words, stop being self-righteous and stop justifying your indignation already! Just come up with a brilliant business plan to earn that money. And I don’t mind if you share it with me so I can invest in your business too – as it is [allegedly] recession proof as long as the likes of the ‘Agnes Lin’ reported on the Stooge Times really exists.

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Random Discourse

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The only constants these days appear to be the beating the financial market is taking almost daily, the news barrage of jobs cuts in every sector and economic slowdown in every country. It is clear that economic conditions will continue to deteriorate at least until the end of the year. In fact, the Singapore government’s gahmen’s amendment of the constitution allowing it to draw on more returns from investing the reserves says a lot of what is ahead. Is this going to be the worst economic recession this country will face since Aug 9, 1965? And how long will it last? When companies downsize to stay lean, will jobs created by this country stay with the more capable citizens and not the cheaper economic refugees aka foreign ‘fallen talents’? Certainly, when our own people are qualified for these jobs, why should these jobs be given to foreigners? After all, unemployed locals is Singapore’s problem while unemployment of these foreigners should be their own country’s problem!

Anyway, it is reported the extra funds would be spent on research and development projects and medical care for the aged, will all of these funds truly just come from the returns on investing the reserves, or will there be yet another GST raise? If that happens, it will only add on to the burden of those who becomes unemployed and even an income tax cut will be meaningless because when you have no income, income tax is the least of your worries. Unfortunately, you still need to spend money on utilities and certain daily necessities which are all subjected to GST.

The only good news to come of this entire mess is that DBS has finally agreed that it will now buy back all that High Notes 5 shit from those who are more than 62-year-old, having less than a primary school education when they * erhem * so-call invested their money into that junk. (Though I didn’t know if that’s going to be a 100% refund or a 50% – 80% thingie).

Frankly, it doesn’t require too much brains to determine that as far as this particular group of is concerned, they possibly won’t understand the possible risks and my suspicion is that they aren’t even told! In fact, I would dare challenge any of DBS’ branch managers to read all the clauses, and then explain to me in simple English what they all really meant. I won’t be surprised even they would be stumped by all that lawyer-like mumbo-jumbo. And if they passed this test, they can then translate that into the dialect these old people understands and explain one more time. Game?

Next, there is a report that firms are studying the feasibility of very large floating structures such as floating dormitories for foreign workers. In a casual discussion I joked with a friend that the best thing to built will be a floating boot camp for our army recruits. After that we can take Pulau Tekong back and let the PSA develop it into a port. Following that, whether Malaysia wants to build a straight bridge or a crooked one wouldn’t be a matter of concern to us anymore. As a second best alternative, we can also build dormitories for foreign workers all along the Straits of Johor on our side of the border or high tech kelongs to ensure a steady supply of fish!

Finally, it is clear that some of our men-in-white has a lot to work to wash away their out-of-touch image. Start off with Lim Swee Say Shee-Shee who says that he is happy looking at his monthly CPF statement, and then to Senior Senile Mini$ter Goh – also MAS Chairman’s – insensitive c’est la vie statement below:

“That’s life, if you want good rewards, you have to take risks. Otherwise, leave your money with the CPF.”

Wow! That sure beats the one made by some other person that TT Durai’s pay is peanuts. Were they related? * snickers *

But let me first talk about Lim Shee Shee’s comment. I have definitely never receive a monthly CPF statement from the CPF board. If I do, being the usual whiny and complaining Singaporean, I would have protested the waste of money and paper. Perhaps Shee Shee checked it online using his Singpass account and then make a printout every month to look at all those numbers? Makes me wonder why he is so happy about some numbers he can’t touch until 55.

Now on to Senile Goh. I wondered whether he is even aware the conditions in which some of the people – especially senior citizens who are enticed to commit their entirey life-savings – are even clear about what they are getting into. This is not like me punting on a stock using my CPF monies and then losing it alright?

Seriously, you two ‘cocksters’ should either be replaced by some new blood unless you get down from the ivory tower and find out what real life as a common Singaporean is really like. While the Tali-PAP gahmen is doing most things right, Singaporeans still don’t appreciate such insensitive – if not foolish and uninformed – comments. Yes, not when you take 3-million dollars of pay a year! You can fxxking do better than that or gracefully say – next better player, please!

I would expect the opposition to take note of all these gaffes and remind the electorate in the next election. At least even if they end up losing the contest, that would probably help reduce the majority votes, and hopefully wake up these ‘cocksters’ and cause them to be a little more down to earth.

Comics:

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Good reads:
Xtralicious: The Degree Obsession
Cobalt Paladin: Diary of an Entrepreneur

Christianity Today:
Word And Verse: Ten Indictments (A Historical 21st Century Message)
Paul Washer: Regeneration vs The Idolatry of Decisional ‘Evangelism’

The Melamine Contamination Issue:
It’s safe to eat! – Hong Kong Health Secretary cornered on TV

The Lehman Brothers ‘Implosion’:
C’est la Vie? – See Hong Kong’s Equivalent of MAS Chairman grilled in Legislative Council

The American Presidential Elections 2008:
Gutter Politics: The Lies of John McCain

Commentary: Career Guidance

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While browsing the articles on The Singapore Daily I come across an article titled ‘Lack of Career Guidance in the Singapore Education System’. The blogger basically lamented about the lack of guidance given to young students as far as their career path is concerned after they complete their secondary school education – which generally means obtaining a good enough pass in their GCE ‘O’ Level exams to either proceed to Junior College or to enter the specialisation stage of their education in the Polytechnics. She pointed out the usual factors driving a student’s choice and what are some of the outcome on making the wrong choice. She then claim that those who end up hating their course is proof that students lacks career and education guidance.

I too have my gripes about the education system. Basically, they are mostly about the lack of choices. I felt it concentrates too much on the science and technical fields, with too little on the humanities and the arts. As a result, we have a well-trained and possibly well-qualified workforce, without anyone particularly outstanding. To put it in an analogy, Singapore’s Education System is like a PC manufacturer, which will ensure that its products are competitive. That means it will attempt to produce hardware with the latest CPUs, the best RAM etc. Unfortunately, Singapore’s Education System does not ‘preload’ these computers with software, and you are left to ‘install’ them on your own.

The other thing I am also unhappy about is with the streaming system. While I can understand resource constraint means putting all the ‘bright sparks’ at one place would be a more effective use of resources, the streaming system makes our Education System very unforgiving to late boomers. And that is the very reason why a brother of a good friend of mine has remained in the U.S. to this day, even after a close shave with the collapsing WTC in New York City back in 2001.

However, while I resent the system, I could not find fault with it. A well-trained and qualified workforce is what I considered a pillar of Singapore’s economy. The government gahmen ensures there will be a ready pool of trained manpower for companies encouraged to set up shop here and also fulfill their promise of creating job opportunities for the citizens. Otherwise, the jobs will end up going to foreigners like the very blogger who wrote I am talking about. Thus, it is natural the gahmen actively promotes certain courses from time to time (e.g. Mechatronics in the 80s, IT in the 90s and Life Sciences in the early 21st Century).

Anyway, one must always remember that ultimately, no one is forced into taking up the course they have chosen. If they end up disliking their choice, is it really a lack of career guidance? It would be rather natural that one would pick up course which enhances their chance of future employment. Just who would want to be left out of where the gahmen is taking the nation’s economy? And which agencies are to take up the effort to give advice to the teenager, and be responsible for the advice which might affect their lives forever? No matter how neutral such an agency, I would find it unlikely it would be giving an advice different from what their parents or peers are giving. In fact, at the tender age of 16 or 17 (depending on whether you are ‘Express’ or ‘Normal’ stream), it would take a partial genius to take the risk in going down a path less trodden.

On top of that the economy is never static, and changes happens pretty rapidly once it pushes past a certain point. Back in mid-1988 when I was entered the Polytechnic, the choice of that time was Mechatronics – which generally deals with automated production. I repeated one semester and by the end of 1994 when I entered the workforce, certain companies have started to move their production lines to Johor, Batam and by the start of 1997 to Suzhou in China. In short, it has become a sunset industry in Singapore, production facilities are moving out of Singapore and unless you are in the management or R&D level, a particularly sought out individual, or you are willing to work overseas, there’s basically not much of a prospect left in this line.

Now, this change didn’t happen rapidly and it took almost a decade. By then everyone I knew have either shifted to doing sales of products for the company they already worked for, or they have changed line entirely. I changed line in 1998 to work for my friend who is dealing primarily with network and computer setup. None of us would have expected this, and I doubt anyone who happens to be giving career guidance would have expected this back then either.

Either way, it is not entirely true that there is no career guidance given. My mei xinyun did a quick search and came up with the following links:

NJC Career Guidance
MoE Guidance Branch: Career and Educational Guidance

Do also note that it wasn’t so long that IT, and then Life Sciences was the in-thing. But with the coming IR, it is now all about Entertainment and Services!

So I must ask, was it ever the responsibility of the Education System to ensure everyone have a successful career? In fact, is it even relevant or necessary to offer career guidance when the nature of Singapore economy changes ever so rapidly? Or are we just finding it convenient to blame someone or some perceived lack when conditions in life don’t go the way we want? How are we to expect our very own Bill Gates or Steve Jobs when we expect everything to be spoon-fed?

Sure, I would really like to blame my current employer too. The wise guys with coats and ties in the Head Office making the decisions thought it would be better to sell the entire firm to a competitor. Ya right… and no one advised me this was coming.

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