Friday, January 12, 2007

Haha i know it's kinda late but welcome back to school!
well the work is kinda piling up yeh, so good luck!

Sunday, October 22, 2006

Hey everyone!
Well this is the last week of this term, and we won't see each other for quite a while.
For me, it has been great being in this class, and i hope that this kind of unity can last.
anyways anyone know what stuff we are bringing for the Oktoberfest thingy on thurs? cos we're gonna need to start ordering that soon
kk see ya!

Monday, September 18, 2006

rachel: nothing but a short battle

So the end of the year draws nigh unto us again bringing in a breeze of nostalgia. Once again, we see ourselves turn to the religion of studying, paying much obeisance to the books on our table. I believe we are all praying creatures, and certainly the Divine Power has received more whispers from down below than usual, but when I picture myself praying, I somehow get the impression that I'm praying to my books instead.

For me, its been a weird ride the first week of school. The hols were a good time for me to catch up on my work. Not all though. But I must say, it was a wonderful week what with the IMF-World Bank Youth Opened Space Dialogue that I participated in which, for all those who went, provided the much needed platform to test our faith in the things we learnt at school, particularly the humanities.

That aside, I'm feeling a certain tension in the air nowadays due to everyone panicking about the promotionals. Nonetheless, I somehow feel that its just a vibe thing, its cool to panic. Whatever it is, I just want remind everyone that studying is our battle-whether we like it or not. There's the System and its ways which we may not be too pleased about, but let's just stop complaining and work within the confines of what we have.

More spiritually for me, I feel that this battle is not a battle of grades where the outcome concludes everything but as the old cliched idea: the process. I'm not about to sacrifice a night-worth's of sleep to finish what I have to do for the day and sacrifice the alertness I need tomorrow. I guess we are all different and our pleasure and victories arise from different things. For those out there who belief in a God, perhaps its time we included Him in the battle.

Personally, I've had difficulties putting up with that commitment. Its easy to sin when you're busy and tired for you impute Christ more magnanimity than He has for sin. For us who pray, let us pray earnestly and sincerely, for the devil delights in empty prayer and for him who prays to think he is doing OK.

On a happier note: Happy studying.

Saturday, September 02, 2006

rachel: why are jews so powerful?

By: Dr Farrukh Saleem
(The writer is an Islamabad-based freelance columnist)
Taken from a website: http://www.americancongressfortruth.com

Why are Jews so powerful?
There are only 14 million Jews in the world; seven million in the Americas, five million in Asia, two million in Europe and 100,000 in Africa. For every single Jew in the world there are 100 Muslims. Yet, Jews are more than a hundred times more powerful than all the Muslims put together. Ever wondered why?

Jesus of Nazareth was Jewish. Albert Einstein, the most influential scientist of all time and TIME magazine's 'Person of the Century', was a Jew. Sigmund Freud -- id, ego, superego -- the father of psychoanalysis was a Jew. So were Karl Marx, Paul Samuelson and Milton Friedman. Here are a few other Jews whose intellectual output has enriched the whole humanity: Benjamin Rubin gave humanity the vaccinating needle. Jonas Salk developed the first polio vaccine. Alert Sabin developed the improved live polio vaccine. Gertrude Elion gave us a leukaemia fighting drug. Baruch Blumberg developed the vaccination for Hepatitis B. Paul Ehrlich discovered a treatment for syphilis (a sexually transmitted disease). Elie Metchnikoff won a Nobel Prize in infectious diseases. Bernard Katz won a Nobel Prize in neuromuscular transmission. Andrew Schally won a Nobel in endocrinology (disorders of the endocrine system; diabetes, hyperthyroidism). Aaron Beck founded Cognitive Therapy (psychotherapy to treat mental disorders, depression and phobias). Gregory Pincus developed the first oral contraceptive pill. George Wald won a Nobel for furthering our understanding of the human eye. Stanley Cohen won a Nobel in embryology (study of embryos and their development). Willem Kolff came up with the kidney dialysis machine. Over the past 105 years, 14 million Jews have won 15-dozen Nobel Prizes while only three Nobel Prizes have been won by 1.4 billion Muslims (other than Peace Prizes). Why are Jews so powerful?

Stanley Mezor invented the first micro-processing chip. Leo Szilard developed the first nuclear chain reactor. Peter Schultz, optical fibre cable; Charles Adler, traffic lights; Benno Strauss, Stainless steel; Isador Kisee, sound movies; Emile Berliner, telephone microphone and Charles Ginsburg, videotape recorder.

Famous financiers in the business world who belong to Jewish faith include Ralph Lauren (Polo), Levis Strauss (Levi's Jeans), Howard Schultz (Starbuck's), Sergey Brin (Google), Michael Dell (Dell Computers), Larry Ellison (Oracle), Donna Karan (DKNY), Irv Robbins (Baskins & Robbins) and Bill Rosenberg (Dunkin Donuts).

Richard Levin, President of Yale University, is a Jew. So are Henry Kissinger (American secretary of state), Alan Greenspan (fed chairman under Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush), Joseph Lieberman, Madeleine Albright (American secretary of state), Casper Weinberger (American secretary of defence), Maxim Litvinov (USSR foreign Minister), David Marshal (Singapore's first chief minister), Issac Isaacs (governor-general of Australia), Benjamin Disraeli (British statesman and author), Yevgeny Primakov (Russian PM), Barry Goldwater, Jorge Sampaio (president of Portugal), John Deutsch (CIA director), Herb Gray (Canadian deputy PM), Pierre Mendes (French PM), Michael Howard (British home secretary), Bruno Kreisky (chancellor of Austria) and Robert Rubin (American secretary of treasury). In the media, famous Jews include Wolf Blitzer (CNN), Barbara Walters (ABC News), Eugene Meyer (Washington Post), Henry Grunwald (editor-in-chief Time), Katherine Graham (publisher of The Washington Post), Joseph Lelyyeld (Executive editor, The New York Times), and Max Frankel (New York Times).

Can you name the most beneficent philanthropist in the history of the world? The name is George Soros, a Jew, who has so far donated a colossal $4 billion most of which has gone as aid to scientists and universities around the world. Second to George Soros is Walter Annenberg, another Jew, who has built a hundred libraries by donating an estimated $2 billion.

At the Olympics, Mark Spitz set a record of sorts by wining seven gold medals. Lenny Krayzelburg is a three-time Olympic gold medalist. Spitz, Krayzelburg and Boris Becker are all Jewish.

Did you know that Harrison Ford, George Burns, Tony Curtis, Charles Bronson, Sandra Bullock, Billy Crystal, Woody Allen, Paul Newman, Peter Sellers, Dustin Hoffman, Michael Douglas, Ben Kingsley, Kirk Douglas, Goldie Hawn, Cary Grant, William Shatner, Jerry Lewis and Peter Falk are all Jewish? As a matter of fact, Hollywood itself was founded by a Jew. Among directors and producers, Steven Spielberg, Mel Brooks, Oliver Stone, Aaron Spelling (Beverly Hills 90210), Neil Simon (The Odd Couple), Andrew Vaina (Rambo 1/2/3), Michael Man (Starsky and Hutch), Milos Forman (One flew over the Cuckoo's Nest), Douglas Fairbanks (The thief of Baghdad) and Ivan Reitman (Ghostbusters) are all Jewish. To be certain, Washington is the capital that matters and in Washington the lobby that matters is The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC. Washington knows that if PM Ehud Olmert were to discover that the earth is flat, AIPAC will make the 109th Congress pass a resolution congratulating Olmert on his discovery.

William James Sidis, with an IQ of 250-300, is the brightest human who ever existed. Guess what faith did he belong to? Question: So, why are Jews so powerful? Answer: Education. ?

Why are Muslims so powerless? There are an estimated 1,476,233,470 Muslims on the face of the planet: one billion in Asia, 400 million in Africa, 44 million in Europe and six million in the Americas. Every fifth human being is a Muslim; for every single Hindu there are two Muslims, for every Buddhist there are two Muslims and for every Jew there are one hundred Muslims. Ever wondered why Muslims are so powerless?

Here is why: There are 57 member-countries of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC), and all of them put together have around 500 universities; one university for every three million Muslims. The United States has 5,758 universities and India has 8,407. In 2004, Shanghai Jiao Tong University compiled an 'Academic Ranking of World Universities', and intriguingly, not one university from Muslim-majority states was in the top-500. As per data collected by the UNDP, literacy in the Christian world stands at nearly 90 per cent and 15 Christian-majority states have a literacy rate of 100 per cent. A Muslim-majority state, as a sharp contrast, has an average literacy rate of around 40 per cent and there is no Muslim-majority state with a literacy rate of 100 per cent. Some 98 per cent of the 'literates' in the Christian world had completed primary school, while less than 50 per cent of the 'literates' in the Muslim world did the same. Around 40 per cent of the 'literates' in the Christian world attended university while no more than two per cent of the 'literates' in the Muslim world did the same. Muslim-majority countries have 230 scientists per one million Muslims. The US has 4,000 scientists per million and Japan has 5,000 per million. In the entire Arab world, the total number of full-time researchers is 35,000 and there are only 50 technicians per one million Arabs (in the Christian world there are up to 1,000 technicians per one million). Furthermore, the Muslim world spends 0.2 per cent of its GDP on research and development, while the Christian world spends around five per cent of its GDP. Conclusion: The Muslim world lacks the capacity to produce knowledge. Daily newspapers per 1,000 people and number of book titles per million are two indicators of whether knowledge is being diffused in a society. In Pakistan, there are 23 daily newspapers per 1,000 Pakistanis while the same ratio in Singapore is 360. In the UK, the number of book titles per million stands at 2,000 while the same in Egypt is 20.

Conclusion: The Muslim world is failing to diffuse knowledge. Exports of high technology products as a percentage of total exports are an important indicator of knowledge application. Pakistan's exports of high technology products as a percentage of total exports stands at one per cent. The same for Saudi Arabia is 0.3 per cent; Kuwait, Morocco, and Algeria are all at 0.3 per cent while Singapore is at 58 per cent. Conclusion: The Muslim world is failing to apply knowledge. Why are Muslims powerless? Because we aren't producing knowledge. Why are Muslims powerless? Because we aren't diffusing knowledge. Why are Muslims powerless? Because we aren't applying knowledge. And, the future belongs to knowledge-based societies. Interestingly, the combined annual GDP of 57 OIC-countries is under $2 trillion. America, just by herself, produces goods and services worth $12 trillion; China $8 trillion, Japan $3.8 trillion and Germany $2.4 trillion (purchasing power parity basis). Oil rich Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait and Qatar collectively produce goods and services (mostly oil) worth $500 billion; Spain alone produces goods and services worth over $1 trillion, Catholic Poland $489 billion and Buddhist Thailand $545 billion (Muslim GDP as a percentage of world GDP is fast declining). So, why are Muslims so powerless?

Answer: Lack of education.

Source:Sangkancil

I found this article rather amusing. It was one of the few emails my dad has ever sent me, probably because we live in the same house. Nonetheless, when I read it, I really wondered what his intention was in doing so. Its a lengthy piece and blatantly biased but seems to have a reliable enough provenance if we were to believe the site from which it was quoted from existed.

Now that I've put it here, and forwarded it to all of you, you too must be wondering. Ashley replied promptly. And yes I agree, it is biased. And that's really the whole point.

But this issue of biasness is something that puzzles me. What really is biased of the whole issue? I think for one, apart from the fact that the jews are recognized as a great contributor to the world and victim to a certain instant of genocide, and apart from the fact that the media constantly focuses on the strife going on in Arab countries due to Islamist Extremists, the article seems to lack a certain impartiality in its argument [is there an argument?]. Sure, the article does not state its purpose in presenting us an avalanche of facts but logically speaking, one would say that the fella is out to demean muslims[funny how language works]. So assuming, like most of us did, that that was the main purpose of the article, we begin to see that from the very beginning, the argument already falls flat.

For one, muslims and jews are 2 quite different entities. The former refers to a group of people who belong to a certain religion. Under this umbrella, comes Chinese, Caucasians, Chileans and so on. The former refers to a group of people who share the same race, who are descendants of father Abraham.

Well, then you may, trying to be clever, say that the writer may have been using the term "jews" as a general name for practicers of Judaism, he assuming that all Jews were practicers of Judaism [what are they called anyway? Judaists?] thus comparing religion with religion, nonetheless, being, or aspiring to be a noteworthy columnists, he should have known better. Shall we give him then the benefit of the doubt?

Secondly, I think the problem lies with a sort of inherent biasedness as opposed to a presented biasedness[a presented biasedness, I feel, is one where the view is presented, with deliberately chosen facts that favour the writer's stance]. There are some issues that are biased in themselves regardless to the persepctives we take. If we were to assume that he was referring to 'judaists' and muslims and that the facts he presented were 100% true, then the comparison, now being fair, would just be a matter of fact. A mere stating of certain realities. There are some truths, which due to their nature, are better left unsaid. And if we were to give the writer the benefit of the doubt in his comparison with judaism and islam or whatever pair he intended to
compare [assuming they be entities of the same 'category']. Then we may perhaps say that the issue is inherently biased and better left unmention in the name of religious/racial harmony or if mentioned, taken with grace by both parties.

One more thing, that makes the whole thing slightly incredulous may be the grammatical error I found somewhere.

Then again all that is my take. And my fault for just sending out the email without any explaination on my part. So if all this is true? What then? If not, then of course we have the right to incur any feelings of disgust.

This brings me to a rather philosophical point: What makes us go squeamish, to say the very least, when we read an article like that? Would it make a difference if it were true or not?

what do you I think?

Sunday, August 20, 2006

rachel: math portfolio

There are some things that fuel you to live from day to day despite it meaning a sorrowful existence. The first is probably religion, along with your responsibility to Higher Power.The second is the IB math portfolio and fellow members of its brotherhood like IOP, TOK pres. and IAs. The past few days, I think, have been rather complexed for a few reasons.

Firstly, friday was a holiday. Most of us didn't know whether to be happy or not. Of course there are always those few buggers who whoop at anything that dr. ong says (oh, did anyone notice the ripple of excitement towards tomorrow's public caning...I especially am, its my first...as in my first time viewing one) and then of course theres the group of people who are cursed with long-sightedness and would have realised that an extra holiday would mean no collaboration over how to attempt the math PF. Oh well, I just said it. Well, I guess all teachers know its true. Well, its just seeps into our daily conversations things like that, of course we don't purposely go to each other's houses and sit down with mugs of coke blatantly engaging ourselves in acts of collusion. But really, where do we draw the line? And are we disciplined enough to keep from that limit? Are we even aware. Everyone goes around talking about plagiarism and stuff but its really hard to tell sometimes. Turn-it-in sounds like a very interesting programme to me, maybe they could come up with one for criminal suspects next time.

Anyway, its just seems so uncannily cursed that math PF should be due on my birthday(the only present i want is a set of earplugs which zaw says she will get for me...how about vacuum ones?) oh yes, and for sarinder, its a double curse because he's having his IOP. People have this weird syndrome of smsing someone for the first time without an introduction.

Well, the only thing about the math portfolio is that I can't seem to find the arithmetic in it. Seriously, I see myself, half the time, trying either to work with a computer programme, grasping new jargon, or drawing straight lines to construct a table. Must have been 20 I drew since 2 days ago. And the last straw came when I started asking my mom whether the tiles on the floor were quite perfectly straight so that I could align the table along them and then carefully align my paper along the now straight edge of the table, but I figured that the tiles where slanted. Sigh. I ended up watching The Wicker Man which was a 'wickerdly' good cult film. Now what is a cult film? Ha. Also, what defines a neighbourhood school?PM Lee said GMSS was a neighbourhood school which was rather contrary to what I supposed.