I very strongly feel that calculators should NOT be allowed in the Primary School Leaving Examinations (PSLE).

As quoted from the press release, “The calculator is a tool to help pupils with their computations. There will be no change in the question types, the number of questions for each type, or the level of difficulty of the questions.” This means that the questions would be simple enough to be done without a calculator as the many generations have done before them. It is this simplicity that allows for training to be fast and accurate when it comes to mathematics, a skill that is critical as one move up the education pathway in Singapore. If a primary school kid is to move to secondary school without a strong foundation in this skill, it would be really difficult for him to survive, as speed and accuracy is essential in all the subjects, not just mathematics up in further education.

Also, introduction of calculators may also mean over-reliance on these machines. No more memorizing of time-tables, no more familiarization of the common numbers that aids in increasing the reaction speed of people when it comes to daily arithmetic. This over-reliance would instill a mentality in the children that the answer is as such because the calculator said so, mathematics exists because of the calculator, which is not true! The calculator only exists because mathematics exists. With this new mentality, the essence of mathematics would be lost by this over-reliance on calculators, mathematics would be taken for granted.

Lastly, the introduction of calculators may bring a negative attitude in the students. Whenever a student is unable to calculate a sum, he consults the calculator; it is a simple task to do. This constant consultation may bring about the idea that everything in life would work out, which is not true about life. Life brings about challenges and obstacles that do not just work out this simply. This constant reminder of convenience may cause the students to feel despair easily later on in life, when they face much bigger problems. This is due to the fact that they have not gone through many hardships in their course of learning as they were taught to find the “easy way out” but consulting machines. 0 comments

Alcohol and tobacco are generally considered socially undesirable products in the society today. However, I feel that alcohol and tobacco companies should not be deprived of their existing rights to advertise their products. I do acknowledge that alcohol and tobacco are harmful to the body, however, this is an issue on whether alcohol and tobacco companies should be allowed to advertise, not on the detriments of such products.

For a new policy to be introduced, and in this case, the banning of advertisements of alcohol and tobacco products, three criteria must be fulfilled before it can be implemented. Firstly, there must be a significant need for the policy. Secondly, the current status quo should be proven detrimental and lastly that it must be highly practical for the policy to be implemented.

Coming to my first point of argument, on why it is unnecessary to not allow alcohol and tobacco advertisements.

Society at large is already aware of the negative effects of alcohol and tobacco. This general knowledge provides people with the ability to protect themselves from the detriments of alcohol and tobacco consumption by making an appropriate choice with regards to these products. For those people who have been living in an ivory tower, the government does play a part in educating and informing the general public of these detriments through anti-smoking campaigns and advertisements that feature parts of the body that has deteriorated due to excessive smoking.

Once education has been carried out, it is no longer the responsibility of the government to be further protective of its people and prevent them from consuming or using alcohol or tobacco if they want to. Indeed, the government has fulfilled all the responsibility it holds to the people, and has no further part to play in the people’s choices, which is not THEIR responsibility. Therefore, with the people being informed consumers, there is no need for us to not allow alcohol and tobacco advertisements.

Furthermore, advertising is not going to alter the mindset of consumers about the benefits and drawbacks of alcohol and tobacco itself.

According to a study published in the Fall 1995 Journal of Marketing, most 6 years-olds were able to associate “Joe Camel”, which is a carton version of the dromedary that has appeared on packages of Camel cigarettes, to cigarettes. However, 85% of these kids had a negative attitude towards cigarettes. Even children at age 6 are able to recognize that cigarettes are harmful, and thus, expressed a negative attitude towards it, much less teens and adults who have been educated and informed. This shows that an advertisement, even when often viewed, have very little effect on the desire of these people to consume tobacco products, once they are educated to the effected of tobacco.

Adding on, not only are these advertisements a negligible factor in deciding the choice of people to use tobacco or alcohol products, they can also be used to push forward positive messages. Observe the advertisements for beer during festive seasons that often end with a message to avoid drink driving.

Also, since smoking and drinking has no real health benefits, there are limits to how much one can exaggerate when advertising. Thus, the advertisements will not be misleading to the people. To quote an example, Tiger beer cannot call beer beneficial to our health; what they do instead is to merely say that there are special occasions in which drinking is a good idea. Hence the popular phrase, “It’s Tiger Time”.

Hence, I strongly feel that it is unnecessary to ban alcohol and tobacco companies from advertising their products. 0 comments

I agree with the legalizing of abortion in Mexico. Mexico City previously allowed abortion only in the cases of rape, if the woman’s life was at risk or if there were signs of severe defects in the foetus. Even though that was the case, many victims of rape were actually denied access to legal abortion. Mexico is the world’s second largest Roman Catholic country. Following their religious beliefs, they do not feel that abortion is the right thing to do.

There was an estimated 200, 000 illegal abortions in Mexico each year. Of these women, at least 1500 of them die during the botched operations performed in unhygienic backstreet clinics. Which is the worse scenario? To lose both the mother and the child through illegal abortion, or to only lose a child through legal abortion? Indeed the best way would be to have both stay healthy and alive. But will they be happy? There must be reasons for one to choose to abort one’s child. If the reasons are not addressed adequately, chances are the lives of the mother and the child would not be very good. For example, family violence may be present in a family, without solving the problem, it would not just be the mother suffering but the child as well. Also, rape victims, after being traumatized by the experience, would probably not want to keep the child. Keeping the child would very much remind them of the experience which would then follow them through the rest of their lives.

Admittedly, even through legal abortions, there are risks and negative after-effects of abortion. However, these would be the same risks faced, if not of a greater risk for mothers who may opt for illegal abortion. Also, these effects are the responsibility of the mother, not of the country, hence the country should not have a limitations to whether abortion should be banned, just like people are informed of the negative effects of smoking but smoking is not totally banned, this would mean that the responsibility lies on the consumers.

Also, the safety of the mother has already been put into consideration. The longer a pregnancy lasts, the more dangerous would abortion be. Hence the lawmakers in Mexico have decided only to permit abortions of pregnancies in the first 12 weeks. Hence, there would be a greater reduction of risks when it comes to this legal abortion. 0 comments

With astronomers discovering a planet that is potentially habitable, I personally do not feel a need to spend so much money on finding out more about the existence of extraterrestrial life.

What exactly is the point of finding out whether extraterrestrial life exists? Even if it exists, having lived harmoniously with humans inhabiting the Earth for millions of years would mean that they would not have much impact on us. Their existence would not change much about the daily lives of people here down on Earth. The only possible impact may be paranoia in the people, since extraterrestrial may mean threats from outer space, as many current movies on screen would like to show us. Why disrupt humans’ lives with such discovery?

Also, the millions of bucks spent on space discoveries can actually be put into better use. Starvation in developing countries is a serious problem. Instead of spending the money on space discovery, it should be used to relieve the starvation in the developing countries. Why are developed countries wasting resources to find out things that would not affect much of the world when the truth is, there are people out there in need of just a fraction of that amount of money to stay alive. In addition, starvation is actually getting worse in the developing countries because of the developed countries. Global warming is causing much damage to the world, impacting the developing countries the most with droughts and other natural disasters. Who is the main cause of global warming? Is it not these same people focusing so much on space discovery?

While people may argue the impossible possibility of moving people up into space because the other planets are habitable, my opinion is that it is not feasible at all. Yes, the Earth is so depleted, it is dying soon, but it is not possible to move the whole of Earth up into space. The world has a current population of 6 billion people, which is heavily reliant on technologies and conveniences, things that will take a lot of time to develop in space. Also, this planet, Gliese 581, is 20 lightyears away from Earth. That is effectively 200 trillion kilometers, try moving the population up, impossible isn’t it?

With that, there is no substantial need to find out so much about space. Whether extraterrestrial exist or not, whether planets are habitable or not does not affect us humans, as it has never affected us these many years. Why not channel energy into the major problems now? Like energy shortage, global warming, starvation, there are problems we can help ease. So why not solve these problems instead of finding out more and possibly creating more problems? 0 comments

context: http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/2489

I do agree with the author that major powers contributing the most to global warming are not taking actions, when ironically, ordinary citizens are left to feel guilty for wasting small amounts of electricity.

In big cities at night, office buildings are lit up, streetlights are on and advertisements flashing. Is there really a need for the city to be this well-lit dead in the night? Perhaps there can be timings at night, probably between 2am to 5pm in mornings, where they are the least number on cars on the streets, where lights excluding streetlamps would be switched off. Also, not all streetlamps need to be lit, perhaps lighting on in ever two streetlamps? With this consistent effort every night, much energy would be saved.

Also, the government is not putting in an adequate amount of effort to solve the problem of global warming. Choosing to fill the countryside with windmills is not sufficient as that only produces a fraction of what is needed. Turning down a more efficient energy source – the nuclear energy, thinking that it is politically unacceptable, and instead choosing an inefficient energy source makes the government appear as if their efforts are just for show. The government wants to show that they are helping the situation and hence, came up with an idea that does not help the situation much.

In my opinion, contrary to the author’s, the public should not stop their efforts in trying to fix the problem of global warming. Even if big organizations and countries continue to waste large amounts of energy, the public should stick to trying their best to help the problem. The combined effort may be limited but there is still an impact, the energy consumption would go down if everyone, personally, is willing to make an effort.

Also, I feel that major organizations should play their part in this global effort. These are the people most influential in the midst of everyone and they are, at he same time, the major energy-wasters. If these organizations and the governments are wiling to promote energy conservation and to do what they preach, the energy consumption level would have a significant drop and hence, help “save the world”. One example would be the lights out night in Sydney earlier this year where the government plays a part in raising awareness in its people of the global problem, and is willing to lead the people in conserving energy. 0 comments

I feel that the results of talent contests should not be decided by the general public but instead, by specially selected judges. ‘Talent’ is defined as the skill at something significantly above the rest and specially selected judges is defined as people particularly chosen with the required skills to decide on the winner of the talent contest. Also, I will only be touching on contests with subjective results like figure skating and singing, not on contests with clear results like running or swimming.

Firstly, I would like to show the benefits that using specially selected judges have in the long run. Letting the audience decide on the winner of talent contests dilutes the standard of competition. This can be observed when two very different but significant contests are contrasted; the Olympics and the American Idol series.

In the Olympics, the panel of judges comprise of retired athletes who have been very well-trained in the field of expertise. The judging by this panel is so critical and precise that the score goes into the two decimals. This evidently raises the standard of competition, as athletes perform with such professionalism that no one hardly ever smiles while participating in the event, because they recognize that they have to put all their efforts into perfecting their craft and not into thinking up strategies on how to please the crowd. The American Idol series, on the other hand, lets people decide on the finalists and the result of this is competitors focusing more on homing their charisma, personality and looks, rather than their pure talent of singing.

This comes back to my point because from what I mentioned above, when these highly experienced and highly successful retirees judge, they expect the best from the competitors, and thus the long term benefits of having specially selected judges will be the very obvious raising of standard of talents; pushing competitors to their highest potential, and in doing so sieve the very talented, from the mediocre.

Moreover, the very fact that they are specially selected means that only the best, most experienced and most successful are chosen to be a judge, and thus in summary, this point is that the best judges are critical and that this will raise the standard of competition to make contestants continuously work harder, so that the most talented are the winners in the talent contest of any nature.

On to my second argument, which is on the professionalism of the specially selected judges. The judges have significant experiences and many of them have qualifications in the particular field, showing us that the judges know what is talent and what is the correct attitude required in the area. Hence, the judges will decide on a winner who will be able to survive and sustain in the field, be it in sports, music or even in having a flair for writing.

Judges have adequate experience and skills that puts them a notch higher than any average Tom, Dick or Harry. Besides, it would be practically impossible to ask the major population to tabulate the verdicts of whether someone ought to qualify for the next round. Therefore, a couple of well certified judges would easily fill the shoes of the preponderant crowd as they are the best representation to say someone is hot, or not. There is a vital need for these judges because there is no straight forward judging.

The point is, if 3 judges do the scoring and scandalous controversies can rise up, what more can thousands of untrained ears that can actually send infinite messages in less than 4 minutes? How less corrupted is that? 0 comments

"The visual environment for the young has become confused, fragmented, and
unstable. Students now understand moving but not still images. The long, dreamy,
contemplative takes of classic Hollywood studio movies or postwar European art
films are long gone. Today, rapid-fire editing is the norm in commercials, music
videos, and independent films. Education must slow the images down to provide a
clear space for the eye. It must strengthen and discipline the process of visual
attention."

I feel that students now indeed understand moving but not still images. “Think out of the box” is one phrase students are getting a lot recently, as innovation and creativity are the keys to the 21st century. So what exactly is the box? In my opinion, the box would be the television, or the theatre screen.

Through the watching of programs, we are often supplied with the plot, the climax and all other details nicely laid out for us. In that case, we become “vegetative receptors” not thinking much about the program. When the whole story is put into a painting or a picture, we are often unable to get the details out. We do not have the ability to think deep into the picture to get the message, while on the other hand, the message is clearly given to us in television programs.

Another point to whether one can understand still images is how much one can see the details in the images. The details are things often thrown away by students now as we focus just on the big picture without observing the small details. Our observational skills are not good enough for us to observe a still image and be able to see the big picture. We’re all seeing but not observing these days. For example, how many people remember the colours and the details of Ms Wu’s clothes on Friday? I admit that I do not. We've been looking at her during lessons on Friday but we weren't observing her, were we? At the same time. I believe the people of older generations have this ability to see, observe and are able to list details of objects and people and most definitely, images.

Thinking out of the box… I believe that students nowadays should think more about just what they see in the box, the box is just a comfort zone that do not bring us far in the 21st century. Maybe students can turn to images, instead of just watching moving pictures, and try to understand them rather than to read the description first. Descriptions beside art works limits our imagination as we will be set just to think along that line, and in this case, the line becomes the box we must step out of. 0 comments