Session 5

This session's topic was about ICT and world change, and prof mentioned this quote which was really interesting:

"The most exciting breakthroughs of the 21st century will not occur because of technology, but because of an expanding concept of what it means to be human." - John Naisbitt

People used to define themselves by what they can or cannot do, but with greater applications of our knowledge taking place now, we are constantly pushing boundaries, and we are able to make use of our creations to do things that we never thought possible before.

We then discussed about how gaming technology can have medical benefits. For example, people suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and those with phobias have been know to benefit from games that simulate real life. I also have a friend who did an internship with a company that was trying to develop games that would help to track the progress of stroke patients who were partially paralyzed by making use of the accuracy that computers have to measure the extent of movement that a patient has. Perhaps, computers will be the physiotherapists of the future, if they can accurately record the progress that the patients have made and make recommendations.

There was also discussion on Project Natal, which is an amazing technology that allows a virtual character to interact with people just as normal humans would. This opens up a world of possibilities for people who are unable to communicate well with other people, because they would be able to build up their confidence by playing with the virtual people. However, this technology is also dangerous because people who use it too often may get caught up in the virtual world and forget how to communicate with real people. They might completely disregard all the real friendships and interactions that can happen in the real world, and instead, be overly reliant on the virtual world.

One of the interesting presentation was done by Charis, about cloud computing. She thought that the term 'cloud computing' was misleading because it gave people the impression that the data stored in clouds are actually not stored in a physical place, and that a large amount of data centers and servers that are still required to store all these information. I agree with her that some people actually have the misconception that the information stored on clouds seem to go nowhere, some people do not know that the data is really physically stored somewhere. She is also right to say that the number of data centers needed to store information is huge, but actually, cloud computing really reduces the wastage of space on the servers. Companies used to buy their own servers to host their data, but more often than not, they only use a fraction of the memory space their servers offer. On the other hand, in cloud computing, companies such as Amazon will buy the servers, use the space that they need, and allow others to store information on their servers as well. A lot more servers are hence fully utilized, which reduces the wastage of resources and fewer data centers would be needed. Therefore, I think that while it is true that a large number of data centers are still needed when cloud computing is used, I believe that that number is still much lower than the traditional way of data storage.

Rating: 8.5/10
The applications of technology in our lives present exciting new possibilities

Individual Report Outline

Cloning and its Impacts on Endangered Species

Intro

Cloning has a great potential to solve many issues that the world faces right now. If we were to fully decode the genome of an organism, we would be able to clone organs, or even the whole organism. The implication of this process in profound, and with future developments, there may be a lot more uses that we can only dream of now.

History

It is not clear when cloning actually started, but there was a series of events that happened in the past that led to the concept of cloning. The most significant developments were probably the understanding of the cell cycle and the realization that the genetic information of an organism is stored in the nucleus of a cell.

Present Situation

1. John Gurdon of Oxford University cloned South African frogs from the nucleus of fully differentiated adult intestinal cells in 1962.
2. F.E. Steward of Cornell University grew a complete carrot plant from a fully differentiated carrot root cell in 1964.
3. Karl Illmensee cloned three mice in 1979
4. The first mammalian cloning occurred in 1984 when Steen Willadsen cloned a sheep from embryonic cells.
5. Steen Willadsen and Neal First, Randal Prather and Willard Eyestone cloned a cows from embryonic cells in separate events in 1986.
6. Two sheep, Megan and Morag were cloned from cells extracted from differentiated embryos by Ian Wilmut and Keith Campbell in 1995.
7. Dolly the sheep was cloned from adult cells, and Polly, a lamb, was cloned from skin cells by Ian Walmut and Keith Campbell in 1996.
8. Two Rhesus monkeys cloned at the Oregan Regional Primate Research Center in 1997.
9. President Clinton barred the use of federal funds for human cloning in 1997.
10. Ryuzo Yanagimachi cloned fifty mice from adult cells using "The Honolulu Technique" in 1998.
11. First endangered animal, Noah the bull gaur was cloned at the Advanced Cell Technology, Inc. It died from an infection in 2001.
12. Dolly the sheep was put to sleep after suffering from lung cancer and arthritis in 2003.

Source: https://bsp.med.harvard.edu/?q=node/18

Future Considerations

Many ethical issues have been brought to light with increased developments in cloning. There will possibly be heated debates on what regulations should be put in place for plant, animal and human cloning. Manbe assess if there are any other possible use of cloning in the future.

Conclusion

Summarize the report, and maybe include suggestions on who cloning should be regulated by, what can be done and how these regulations might be enforced.

Session 4

This lesson, Prof brought up this quote which is actually related to last lesson's topic:

“We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children”
-Chief Seattle

This quote brings about an entirely new way of looking at how people should use the world's resources. In contrast to the traditional view of claiming ownership on the resources available, Chief Seattle suggests that these resources are not ours to use, that we have to preserve the Earth for future generations and that this responsibility lies on our shoulders. It made me realize that often, it is our perspective on things that shape the way we do things. In this example, a person who subscribes to the traditional way of thinking would feel that he has every right to use any resource available, whether it is of limited supply or not, to produce whatever he wants. A person who holds the same view as Chief Seattle, on the other hand, would first contemplate the impact of their decision on future generations before using up the resources. And as the world enters a time when the oil reserves are depleting and a new source of energy is required, I think that the we need more people who think as responsibly as Chief Seattle. 

Which brings us to today's topic of the Drivers of World Change. Vanessa's presentation was about the difference in expectations that the modern greens and traditional conservatives have of the future. The modern greens believe that although the oil reserves we have are depleting, human kind would be able to find alternative sources of energy to sustain the use of technology in the future, and are hence less worried. The traditional conservatives on the other hand, foresee a bleak future where there will be insufficient oil for our future use with no other energy sources available. I find that I identify more with the modern greens, because as of now, there is already a lot of research done in the field of renewable energy, even though there is no source that is currently dominant. In fact, it is entirely possible that the energy that we use in the future will not come from one main source, but a combination of many sources. 

The next presentation by Ivan was about how Youtube is able to reach audience on a global scale, and the impacts that it will have on the world. I think that Ivan brought up many good discussion questions. Because Youtube allows anyone to upload videos, and because it has the ability to share this information with people around the world, it raises the question of whether the content on Youtube should be censored, and by whom. Someone suggested that different countries should form a council and decide which videos should not be made public. However, Qi Wen brought up a good point that countries would just ban videos that embarrass them. It is also important to note that Youtube is popular because many people are using it and anyone can upload videos. If restrictions were imposed on the type of videos that people can upload, less people might be inclined to use the website, and videos that make a positive impact on society, such as Kony 2012, would have far less reach. I feel that in addressing this problem, education is the way to go. Users should be taught to be discerning and not believe every video that they watch. I feel that this skill is especially useful since anyone is able to post any sort of content online, and viewers should be discerning everytime they view information on the internet. 

The second part of the class was on the theme of Change Management and Change Leadership. We learnt the difference between leaders and managers, and how leaders would usually not make good managers. The main difference between leaders and managers is that the conceptual framework is created by the leader, while the manager works within the framework to get others to follow. We also learnt how some countries adopted the freeze-unfreeze-refreeze model of goal setting, while others are continuously changing their aims. I think that the freeze-unfreeze-refreeze model used to work well in the past because change was not as rapid then as it is now. For countries, organisations and businesses to survive well now, they have to be adaptable to current situations and change continuously. 

Rating: 8/10

Some of the topics discussed were really interesting.

Session 3

This week we talked about how the manufacturing process of good should not be a linear model, but a cyclical one. After watching the video "Story of Stuff", it was obvious to everyone that there are many inefficiencies and wastage created by the manufacturing processes in place right now. The main processes involved in manufacturing are extraction, production, distribution, consumption and disposal, but the presenter in the video reveals that there are many more effects on the people and environment involved in the process that are not taken into account. There were many statistics being used in the video, and many of them were shocking. 

In the part where the process of extraction was discussed, there was a claim made that if everyone consumed at the US rates, the resources of 5 Earths would be required to sustain us. However, according to economic principles, the limited resources of the Earth would actually cause the prices of goods to go up, hence only the wealthy will be able to consume so much. This increase in price would cause a fall in the demand for the goods, hence the consumption levels of the world would fall. It is therefore unlikely at this point in time that we will ever reach a point where the consumption of the world would be so high. If people around the world become equally affluent,  I think that it might happen in the future, since the spending power of people will be almost equal. However, production technology may be improved by then and the world would move towards sustainable development. 

The second half of the lesson was spent on how innovation depended on having smart people, smart ideas, smart money and smart partnerships. These four factors work in tandem for innovation to occur, but another important factor to consider is the environment. If the generation of revolutionary ideas from great people who have the capital to invest in the idea takes place in an environment on which the creativity of people is suppressed, the ideas that people have may still only remain a dream. However, in places like Singapore, where entrepreneurship is encouraged, people are given the chance to further explore their ideas, and people are allowed room for error. As such, there are new markets created for products and services that were just created.

Rating: 7.5

I thought that some of the presentations this week were really interesting.

Session 2

This week's lesson was on the topic of global dominance and human development.

For the session on global dominance, we studied the characteristics of countries that are rising and falling, and the main difference was that the countries that are rising tend to be more open to new ideas and humble enough to recognise that they needed to keep learning from others, while the opposite is true for the falling countries. These qualities are important because a willingness to learn from others will allow a country to make better use of her resources, and the citizens will benefit as a result. The country's economy will then be dominant. However, I feel that there are other factors that play a role in allowing a country global dominance. Singapore has been trying to establish itself as an education and knowledge hub, and some of the brightest minds can be found here. The Biopolis, Fusionopolis and A*Star have also helped in reinforcing Singapore's position as a knowledge-based economy. While Singapore's economy has come a long way since more than 40 years ago, I do not feel that Singapore's economy is anywhere close to global dominance. The Chinese economy used to be driven by the export and manufacturing industries, but is moving towards a knowledge-based industry. Yet, China is clearly more dominant than Singapore is. Hence I feel that the people in a country is also an important factor for the success of a country, and a country cannot be dominant without people or knowledge.

I found Ke Ming's presentation really interesting, it was about how robots will be able to do the jobs that people do now. Robots are more efficient, more accurate and less easily distracted than humans can ever be. And many people fear that they may become dispensable in future because companies can simply buy or design robots to do the jobs that humans do, with more accuracy and in less time. I agree that this will eventually happen, but I do not think that this development is necessarily a bad thing. Because the robots are able to do the jobs efficiently, people will now have more time on their hands to do other things. I believe that because of the existence of these robots, there will be other interesting and more exciting jobs being created in the future that we cannot conceive of now. These robots are not robbing us of jobs, they are actually providing us the opportunity to be more innovative and change the world like never before.

Jenny's presentation on human development through E-learning also caught my attention. There are many websites now that provide free online courses that are actually conducted by many reputable and prestigious universities. This open university concept seems to be gaining popularity rather quickly, and some less well-known universities have also started offering some courses on the iTunes store. People now have access to reliable information that was once only available to those who were formally enrolled in a university. This system may one day replace the current system of formal education, since it provides one with quality education while still allowing students to be more flexible with their time. The video lectures will also help students to absorb more information since they are able to review the entire lecture if they have problems understanding, which makes teaching more effective. Students of the future may no longer be conferred a degree from a single instituition, they can choose courses that interest them and earn certificates of completion from multiple schools instead. Learning will then be less rigid and more personlised. Such online courses also have the potential to close the income gap between the rich and the poor in a society, since those who could never afford to pay tuition fees can now learn for free, and still receive credits for their effort, and I feel that the transition to a web-based approach is a giant step towards equal opportunity and free education for everyone.

Rating: 7.75
This lesson was interesting, but I felt that more time should have been dedicated to the discussion of the presentation topics.

Session 1

We started off the fist lesson with a round of introductions and an overview of the what TWC is about. I thought the introduction part was really fun because we learnt something interesting everyone, whether we have met them before or not.

In the next half of the class, we watched the video 'Shift Happens', which brought to our attention how drastically the world has changed through the rapid advancement of new technology. This brought to mind another video that I have watched previously, titled 'Andrew McAfee: Are droids taking our jobs?' In this video, McAfee raised a question: "What have been the most important developments in human history?", and goes on to show us that the most important development was neither religion or empires, even though they still have an impact on the world today. Rather, the most important development was the use and advancement of technology. As a student studying Information Systems, this is quite worrying to me since these technological developments will render my knowledge useless in  just a few years. The implication of this is that schools now should focus less on teaching students the technical knowledge required to find jobs next time, and focus more on allowing students to be adaptable and to be independent learners. I think that these two skills would be the most important in the ever-changing world that we now live in. 

After watching the video, there was some discussion in class about whether computers can ever be more intelligent than humans in the future. Some people believe that the computers will never surpass human capabilities, because information that is found in a computer originally came from people. However, I feel that the increase in research done in the field of artificial intelligence will one day allow computers to imitate the emotions and thoughts of a person, and as prof mentioned, with the amount of data that a computer can store, it will definitely be more intelligent than a person, since people tend to forget things. The question that will have to be answered in the future will then be "How can we harness the power of technology to best serve our needs?" 

Rating for this lesson: 8.25/10

I felt that this was a good introduction to TWC