Week 7 -Futures Week Critical Question

 

 

 

 

 

 

At my point of view, ‘the future’ means the unknown coming days. It can be very close, like tomorrow or next week, or it can be far away to 10 years or even 100 years later.

Though it is impossible for us to foresee what exact future is, we can predict. Future is based on the present. From what I have least last week, I believe that the people of Melbourne can feel confident about what the future holds.

On the trail we went to Melbourne uni and had a chance getting to know the new technology, Graphene and 3D printing. Graphene is a form of carbon consisting of planar sheets which are one atom thick, but extremely strong. The next step of smartphones may be using this type of material to produce flexible phone which will be able for us to fold it into different sizes fitting in our pockets or bags. At the lab of 3D printing, I had an unbelievable experience. I didn’t know that these days we people are able to print things in 3D! Maybe in 10 years, it is possible that people can print gif or moving things out on paper. Maybe when our kids are born, they can watch video on newspaper.

Robot is going to be a huge part of our future as well. Some of the roles that robots are expected to play are because we cannot do them as humans – for example, to explore outer space. Space exploration is an area where robots are helpful. Now robots are already able to win people on chess, it won’t be hard for them to beat us on other subjects. However, I don’t agree that robots will replace of human. Human had feelings and emotion, and that makes human stronger than metals.

As what I mentioned before, no one will know how tomorrow will be like. Today we calculate our future with much confidence, maybe tomorrow the future would make a joke on us. Who knows?

Week 7 – Reflection

Before week 7, i ve never had a think of the future of out planet in 50 years, 100 years, or more. There are so many possibilities and unknowns. I’m hoping that people can live longer and have a happier life. 

there is surely a worry about robots. Well- developed countries, especially Japan. They have already developed robots working in hospitals. Will robots take the place of humans? We will know after years and years.

During last week we did a great job on both our options trail and action project. For the options trail, we are planning to interview a professor from RMIT. He sounds like a pretty nice guy on email which reduced our stress. I’m looking forward to get more information from him.

Week 6 – Our lives today demand that we face and respond to ethical dilemmas. Do you agree or disagree?

 

Our lives today demand that we face and respond to ethical dilemmas. Do you agree or disagree?

 

To answer this question, I would like to give ethical dilemmas a definition first. Wikipedia says that an ethical dilemma is a complex situation that often involves an apparent mental conflict between moral imperatives, in which to obey one would result in transgressing another.  What I believe is that in our lives today, we always have to face situations which may involve a conflict between different morals. It is hard to determine which course of action is right or wrong in ethical dilemmas.

At this point, I agree that our society demands us to face and respond to ethical dilemmas and we people are getting used to it.

The first example I’m providing is dirty sports plays, which we had a discussion in class. The web definition of ‘dirty players’ are those sportsmen who is a cheater in a sense that he goes out of his way to purposely deceive referees. They may take pills such as amphetamine pills before the game to get a better score, or even lose the game on purpose to earn money from the rival team. Why? Why do they do this? Personally I think this kind of behavior all comes out from the point of money. When we, students and amateurs play sport games, our will to win is natural and emotional. We want to win because of our passion and enthusiasm to sports and win which is pretty simple and we even have no need to have a think about why I want to win. However, once the game become occupational, winning a game starts to relate to ‘money’. Player gets paid from win. That means you are paid more when you win more. You lose your money as soon as you lose the game. That’s why dirty players are mainly plays who attend Olympics games, NBAs or World Cups. Factors which make them thirst to win are not only personally feeling or having a chance to enjoy the game. Money become an importance, even more important that morals.

Another example is killing animals for products. Every day we consume innumerable pork, beef, and chickens as food. Just now I’ve read the news about the reputation of UGG. As one of the most popular and fashionable brands in the world, people don’t really know how the boots are made. In fact, UGGs aren’t removing the wool from the sheep humanely. They are actually removing the skin with the wool. Just have a think of waxing. Those sheep have had 10000 times more painful than that! In the past years I had also read about the cruelty of getting duck livers, ivories, and shark’s fin as products trading from people to people. To the Earth, all living things are equal, including human. We can say we are smarter than most of other beings, but that doesn’t mean we have the rights to kill them to be cruel to them. However, we were doing that, and we are now still. As myself loves having beef and fish, and bought two pairs of UGGs last year. More than 95% of the world population lives on meat. Though we know that killing pigs, cows, sheep are cruel (and some people may say it is unfair), it is possible for us to stop that kind of cruelty happens.

These show why I agree that our lives today demand that we face and respond to ethical dilemmas. Somehow if you have a strong belief of your own moral, those two examples above may not make sense at all. It really depends on us.

 

 

 Bibliography

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethical_dilemma

http://www.complex.com/sports/2013/05/the-dirtiest-players-in-nba-history/kenyon-martin

http://www.debate.org/opinions/should-humans-stop-eating-animals-and-become-vegetarians

http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/advisor/uggs-uggly-reputation-214515845.html

Week 6 – Reflection

On Thursday we played a game as we are all on a lifeboat which is sinking as different characters, so we need to decide who is going to jump off. In my group there are two teachers, an old man and a lawyer(me). It was not so hard for us to make the decision as we all agreed that the more you do to the society the more you are worth to stay. 

On Friday Michael gave us a lesson of is fair play more important than winning. At fist my answer was ‘no’, cause im not a big fan of sports so it is hard for me to understand the enjoyment of fair playing. But I really did agree the importance of fairness after last week.

Camping – Reflection

What i did while camping would be one of the most unbelievable experience I had in my life!!

The weather was good, fist day it was extremely hot, even at night. The information I got before camp from mates in other classes are “it is really cold at night, bring more cloths” “remember to pack your gloves or you will be freezing cold”. What I experienced is that there is no need for either coats or gloves or even the sleeping bag at the first night! Im that kind of person who can not get asleep if it is too hot. That night, I fall asleep around 12 and woke up 3 times before six. Luckily, the coming two days and a night is cooler, which means i had a better sleep.

Though my goals are not so related to the camping but i did get a chance improving my force and teamwork. Things such as cooking or putting up a tent is impossible for me to make them individually (thanks to the guys who ever helped me).

The highlight of camp must be  the hiking part on the second day. The afternoon part is just frightening!!! The down hills and the up hills are nearly vertical. Caz( im not sure if im spelling her name right) is so great that she was always encouraging us. When we finally got to where our car was parking, I was like “oh i finished that? you kidding me right how can i did that?”. So unbelievable!!

I really had a great time there. The games we played are great, the food prepared by the teachers are just so delicious, it was a shame that i had a poor appetite, I had very little things those three days.  

 

 

Week 4 – Is Melbourne Fair?

Is Melbourne Fair?

To answer this question, it is necessary for us to have a clear understanding of fairness. I personally would define a fair city as a city which can give all citizens same rights. We were born in different families, with different backgrounds, or even languages, cultures, color of skin andn level of financial capacities. However, a fair city is able to give all different people their own rights which have no difference to others. 

The rights we are given include varity. Melbournians are lucky to have most of them from the government. For the most common example, every one of us has the same chance to be educated well. Melbourne has a world class education with high quality teaching staff, facilities and services and highly regarded courses, there is something to suit all your education needs. You can choose the school you would like to be in. For students who don’t have a will continue their study after high school, there are vocational collages for skilled trades.  If the payments of education in private school are not so suitable for your family, good public schools provide the same level of education but with less payments. 

Another factor proving the fairness of Melbourne is the justice. As a man sows, he reap. If you did something against the law, you would be punished. When there is a grey area that you want to self-defend, you have the right  to appeal to a higher court. The court will make its ruling on the case fairly. Before the trail we went to the court, i have no idea why the court is open to public and how would it be like. What I had experienced there is  a hushed courtroom listened to anyone who is talking. It did gave me a feeling of solemn, justice and fairness. I understand that the open door of the court means there is no need to hide. All the court decision they made inside is evenhanded. 

So far, I really appreciate that Melbourne provides such a fair environment for us. But there are still unfairness appearing everyday, such as unfair dismissal, racial discrimination, etc. I believe that there is no countries, or cities or social groups that are completely fair. Since we are totally not the same, it is impossible for us to be treated in a same way. But surely Melbourne is trying to make itself fairer by giving all of us the better same rights.

Bibliography 

http://www.studymelbourne.vic.gov.au/study-options/the-education-system

http://reason.com/archives/2012/03/22/what-is-fair

Week 4 – Reflection

Week four was a great week. On Monday our group did our presentation of mini trail. It was prefect! Everyone in my group has done a very good job. Though i did feel nervous before the presentation, this kind of feeling just flew away when i stepped on the stage (i mean in the front, but stage sounds cool). 

On Friday we got to know our tent group and walking group, not surprised to be in the same group with Qi and Sophie but satisfied. It seemed like my back pack is gonna be really heavy after we finished packing the food for cooking.  Anyway Im looking forward to camping.

Week 3 – “The subjects we learn in school provide the most effective tools with which to understand the world around us.” Do you agree or disagree?

“The subjects we learn in school provide the most effective tools with which to understand the world around us.” Do you agree or disagree?

I do agree strongly.

Firstly, I want to define what traditional learning environment is. Students attend classes at school with classmates around their age, are taught different subjects by specific teachers. Commonly, students can have chances to learn English, a second language, Math, Science, History, Health and Arts.

Out of school, these situations are not rare: we wondering why sun set and rise, we want to discover more about cultures, we can’t finger out what the expenses is, we find our self over weight but don’t know how to adjust our diet… That’s when we need the knowledge from those subjects we learn from schools! The subjects explain our questions, or even teach us the theory before we meet the situations above.  

Sometimes students complain about the subjects because they are ‘useless’. The one I’ve heard the most often is Math. “Do we need to use square root while shopping?” “When can we use the Pythagorean Proposition?” I had been confused about that as well, honestly. However, now I found the answer. When we are learning the math theorems, we are not only trying to solve the exercises from text books, we are improving our thinking of logic, our decisiveness and judgement. Those skills are what we will always use in the rest of our lives, anywhere anytime.

So are the other subjects. We learn English for our daily talking skills. We learn second languages to have a better memory and language ability. We learn Science to understand more about the natural environment. We learn History to learn from others’ experiences and failures. We learn Health to improve our diet. We learn Arts to have a better sense of beauty.

All in all, though non-traditional learning environment provides more unusual study experience, I’m still agree with we can understand our world we learn in school.