State what is meant by:
i) An ideal gas.
Oh, what an easy question!
I thought; it can kiss my ass.
But some are not easy,
because lying makes me queasy.
Maybe it’s ‘cos of my memory,
but nevertheless this drives me crazy.
I’m not typing this because I’m mad,
nor is it ‘cos I’m sad.
But because studying makes me hazy,
or to put it plainly, I’m
lazy.
I guess it’s proven true,
that the more I study, the more I do,
such that I fufill my dilgence’s due,
the more I will lose my clue.
Boo! Hoo! Life is poo.
That I study and yet can’t do.
That I don’t study and blanks are few.
The more I study, the less I can do
And now I’m in such a blue!
Much worse then when I had a flu!
My life is now in the loo,
I wonder when can I say phew!
But even after I’ll be due.
For national service and for U.
Shit then will not be few.
Oh! I am losing my cue!
And all these will end when I am,
due.
I was looking for a book. A plain, old book that used to come with a jacket. But the jacket was lost and what’s left is the dull amber cover and red spine.
Any old and lost would naturally reside in the storeroom. And so I went to the storeroom to try my luck. My storeroom was a narrow one. Its width was comfortably wide enough actually, but the steel rack-shelves my dad installed made it a claustrophilic’s breeding ground.
I opened its door and stood at the step of my storeroom. Its stale yet musty smell smacked my nostrils in the face. If I could describe the smell with a colour it would be yellow. Dirty yellow. I took a step into the storeroom, and something shook. Very minutely, and very silently also. Fear engulfed the place.
Not my fear of course, I was neither a paranoic nor an over-imaginator. But it was a fear from something foreign, something not humanlike at all. It was an instinctive fear, a fear that could have helped a species outlive the dinosaurs, and perhaps even survive a nuclear war. Instantly, I felt as if a thousand pairs of eyes were alerted. These eyes hid in one of the dark crevices between the shelves. No, there weren’t a thousand things looking at me. The eyes just belonged to one thing, which had at least a hundred eyes staring at me, monitoring my every move.
I shrugged off all of such thoughts and went on with my search. After scanning for areas where my book could possibly be, I decided to check out the box right in front of me.
The box felt suspicious. It was almost like a bomb- not the bomb which explodes and kills people, but the kind that releases something really nasty when detonated- Like the Pandora’s box. Exactly like the Pandora’s box! Just without the little hope at the end. I nonchalantly bent down to pry its flaps open… “Mein Gott!” I exclaimed as I jumped in shock and horror!
There were creatures! Tiny, little, but nevertheless disgusting creatures crawling all about! They were dark, dirty, and had devilishly many legs! Though horrendous as they were, they were still infants. I then heard the dreaded clicking-scratching sound of the adults stomping to the scene.
I immediately sprang out of the room and slammed the door shut. Even till this very moment, the thought of their quivering antennas sends shivers down my spine. What horrifying aliens!
I recall narrative writing in secondary school. I would have loved it if there were no time constraints and dogmatic teachers teaching language as though it was math. (Even math was more fluid then)
During my secondary two year, I had tuition for english. My tutor was a very interesting person, and that translated into interesting essays from me.
One such essay was titled “My Journey”. NOTE THIS WAS WRITTEN IN SEC 2. don’t fault me for my language!
“This is the captain speaking here. I want all passengers to head for the nearest evacuation station immediately.” a voice projected it self in the midst of a watery situation as I recalled the blurred events of the last three hours, while struggling to keep afloat.
I was on a ferry ride to Port Nivek (Kevin was the name of my tutor), a port in the peaceful town of Tosnatha (a reference to Thanathos). Tosnatha was famous for its history, where in local mythology it was said to be the ‘Gate of Heaven’. Flipping through the brochures, I checked into the ferry terminal.
The amenities the ferry had were comparable to those in a cruise. There was a swimming pool, an underwater gallery, and also a snack bar. I was helping myself to the snack bar when the ship swayed slightly to the left, then to the right. The swaying continued and then an announcement was made. “This is the captain speaking here. Please do not be alarmed by the swaying as it is merely due to the choppy waters.”
There was definitely nothing to be alarmed of at that time, but there is now. The swaying worsened, I started getting seasick. I headed to the toilet not knowing of what dangers lay ahead of me.
“Bang!” the door closed behind me with a dreaded clicking sound. Water began to seep in, and as I have a fear for both water and confined spaces, I shrieked in agony as the water level rose, as if it was trying to swallow me like a blood-thirsty eel (LOL). I tried to escape, like a pathetic little fly, trapped in a pitcher plant.
The water level soon rose to such that there was no space below the ceiling for my head. I reflected on my life, as my senses dulled, sight blurring, and consciousness slipping away.
I came back to my senses after a minute of two. I was back at my seat, and the ferry lights were pearly white radiating heavenly warmth. I felt light and weightless, like a feathery soul floating in mid-air, as I heard a voice “This is the captain speaking here, we are now alighting at Tosnatha, the Gate of Heaven.”
End
P.S: Of course I did edited a few grammar and punctuation here and there. I also omitted long, nasty, pointless descriptions all secondary 2 writers were guilty of. Rearranged the paragraphing, throw in one or two extra vocab, but the plot remains entirely untouched.
My prelim’s general paper is in 11 days time.
I’ve always thought that blogging is good practice for GP. And I still think that way. Thus, I’m going to blog about something today- Regarding GP.
I’ve always hated GP.
It’s subject thats neither here nor there. Neither detailed nor abstract, empirical nor rational, factual nor expressive.
You see, to me, all subjects or mind-ly pursuits are tripolar. Art, science, and philosophy.
Art governs all forms expression of senses/emotions/ideas. Wiki-Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items (often with symbolic significance) in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect.
Science for all factual statements regarding natural phenomena.
And philosophy is the logical critique and analysis of the assumptions/ basis of everything.
These three can sort of form the corners of a triangle. Therefore it such that a subject can be two of the three at the same time, but not all three at once.
Art and philosphy is the most common blend- Nausea by Satre
Philosophy and science- Quantum metaphysics
Art and science are rather rare, but they’re still there- Dali’s clocks
Of course there are stupid attempts to mix all three together, example – back to topic- GP.
GP requires you to express your ideas clearly, effectively, and flair-fully (art), and also to support your arguments with empirical facts and details (science). Moreover, to question and critique the basis,motive,assumptions of current affairs/ideologies.
And since GP requires you to master the impossible trinity of knowledge, it is impossible to present a perfect GP essay.
Just imagine- an essay filled with brilliant literary devices, metaphors etc. Backed with accurate facts and reasoning (perhaps math too), yet questioning every bit of information to the scrutiny of epistemology.
It would be so long, not to mention confusing too, that it’ll be longer and more confusing (IMO) than the bible!
And certainly it’ll be longer than the bible, since it would encompass every single issue raised in the bible! (origin of life, problem of suffering, morality etc etc)
Of course, you can argue its alright to compromise abit of the three, Dali’s painting don’t have relativity equations fancifully painted on them, But look-
Compromising linguistic flair is perfectly alright- so long you get the message across its fine.
Compromising scientific knowledge is still OK- you don’t have to present the equations of malthusian theory in your argument.
Compromising philosophical reasoning is an ABSOLUTE no NO!
You never question and evaluate something halfway. You don’t think about morality and ethics and say ‘Alright. It’s too deep already. I guess and should stop now.’
But GP requires you to do that. Example? ‘Should genetic testing be legalised in the future?’
This is a question on bioethics. Bioethics -> ethics, purpose of humanity, civilisation and life. People have written BOOKS over ethics, so I’m supposed to wrap a book into one paragraph?
You may say I’m being too extreme, but look! If you don’t go to such extremes, you’ll have to assume. Assume that this is true, utilitarianism is good blah blah, and this isn’t good logic.
But of course, being a JC student in SG, I’ll have no choice but to write a essay of compromising logic. Studying various examples of ‘good’ essays, I’ve condensed all you need to do in GP into one short list.
1) THE PEACOCK TRUMPS THE SWAN
Use attention seeking, cheem words like realpolitik, lackadaisical, to impress your examiners. The less known the word is, the better it is. Best is to use some foreign language to add depth to your essay. (WordPress doesn’t even recognise realpolitik as a legitimate english word) Your language should not be like a graceful dancer weaving through the melodies of rhetoric. It should be a freaking rich tai tai showing off the number of sparkling diamonds on her feet.
2) GIVE THE READER MOUTH CRAMPS
Similar to commandment no. 1, you should use cheem words that are really a mouthful. They exude an aura of intelligence around your essay. You can even use difficult pronouncing names and terms, like ‘Clausewitzian’, ‘surreptitiously’, ‘Ubermensch’ to tell your examiner you’re smarter than him/her.
3) APPEAL TO THE HEART, NOT THE MIND
It is pointless in GP to argue why racism is logically inconsistent. You should just argue with things like ‘Hitler commisioned the Holocaust out of racist motivation…’ without arguing why killing six million Jews is wrong. Use stuff that involve lots of people dying, handicapped, or children getting raped to invoke the examiner’s sympathy, thus giving you more marks.
4) HITCH HIKE ON OTHERS’
Unless you’ve obeyed commandments 1 and 2 religiously for the whole of your essay, AVOID coming up with novel arguments. Examiners would normal credit you with more marks for your novelties, but the problem is they hardly recognise your novelties. And even if they do, they’ll think you aren’t smart enough to come up with such stuff and dismiss it as stuff taken from someone else.
I once came up with an entirely new point in my GP essay. The stupid marker only commented ‘Did you take this from an online essay?’
So, always use arguments from others. Best if they’re from your teacher. Also, you can add in cheem quotes and ghostwrite the argument, attributing them to the author of the quote.
All these I have kept since the youth of my essay. What do I still lack to enter the Kingdom of As?
As the Son of your Teacher’s father says, ‘Go sell away all your belongings and wealth. Then follow me and complete 1000 essays, memorise 1000000 vocab words, then you’ll enter the Kingdom of As.‘
Saint Andrew’s Junior College (and every other institution in Singapore) is equipped with a conducive environment for learning.
Not only are there qualified teachers, there are qualified teachers in a wide diversity of disciplines. Science, math, music or literature, the school is fitted with the means to satisfy your insatiable hunger for knowledge. (contradiction intended)
But we do not learn in school. We memorise, swallow, and download information in school.
We are not expected to digest what we’ve been taught. We are expected and conditioned to preserve the knowledge within our stomachs, to vomit and regurgitate them as and when required.
We have thus become intellectual bulimics. Vomiting out the fruits of knowledge we hardly consumed. And this is worse than the actual bulimics, at least they get to enjoy their food.
Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating but you get the idea. Singapore’s education system not only sucks for the curious, it also sucks the curiosity out of them. Yes, I know it produces efficient workers, but it doesn’t change the fact that it is pissing me off!
My subject combination is PCMe- Physics, chemistry, mathematics, economics, general paper and project work. (chinese is insignificant) Of all subjects, the most destestable is H2 PHYSICS.
I love physics. Its my passion and interest. But I HATE H2 physics. Yes, I mean those capitals. I hate how I always have to memorise ill-defined definitions and how I always get marked down for giving ACCURATE explanations. YES! I’m penalised for accuracy!
Example-
Q: State the principle of conservation of momentum.
A: The net sum of momentum in an isolated system is always constant.
WRONG! I need to write momentum OF BODIES. WOW!
Let’s take a look at NASA’s answer
“ The conservation of momentum states that, within some problem domain, the amount of momentum remains constant; momentum is neither created nor destroyed, but only changed through the action of forces as described by Newton’s laws of motion.”
http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/k-12/airplane/conmo.html
Do I see momentum of BODIES? NO! OH NO! NASA IS WRONG!!!
Anyway, using the term ‘ momentum of bodies’ further complicates things. What are bodies? Can I define bodies as objects of mass? If that’s the case, how do we consider the momentum of massless photons flying around?
The example mentioned is not fiction. I did get that question wrong for the very same reason. To sajc physics teachers who are reading this- Its ok, its not your fault that education is so screwed up.
So, the million dollar question is: Who is to blame? Not the teachers, not the school, and also not MOE, they’re just trying to produce workers to sustain our economy. I reckon we can only blame ourselves. It is our fault that we are curious, our fault that we are such demanding children. Our intellectual anarchy has no place in the society, it is best that we resign to this fate.
p.s. i’m obviously not going to ‘resign to this fate’
Hi.
“Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right.” Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov, one of my favourite authors. This line came from his brilliant novel Foundation, an extremely intelligent science fiction classic. This agrees with the view on ethics I hold, called Situational Ethics(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situational_ethics), although I am starting to sway away already.
“To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.” Thomas Aquinas
Beautiful. Aquinas neatly sums up the nature of faith and divine revelation in one short-sweet phrase.
“Doubt is the origin of wisdom.” Rene Descartes
This is my arrow towards people who choose blind faith. However…
“A witty saying proves nothing.” Voltaire
And yes! Very clever and ironically, witty line. I always say this to myself when reading flamboyant GP essays filled with quotes and air. Also very interesting of me to end off my post with this quote!
Being young means you’re immature.
It means you are unwise, foolhardy, arrogant and stupid.
It means you’re an idiot.
It means your thoughts are undeveloped, your opinions underexamined, your mental faculties unevolved.
Whatever deep thoughts a young man might have, will only disproved by his older self.
This means that most of my opinions are wrong now, all will eventually be shot down by the bullets of wisdom.
Perhaps I will miss my crazy youthhood in the future, but that doesn’t the fact that youth is still a period of immense stupidity.
On a lighter note, I realised that lately all my posts are of a rather depressing flavour. Well its certainly not cause I’m in emo phase or what. Perhaps its just that I’ve gotten more comfortable with blogging and thus more willing to share some of my less cheerful thoughts online
its quite depressing when no one comments on your post. Please start commenting on my wordpress and my tumblr http://ockphotos.tumblr.com/
Have a nice day 
If we are free, and God is omnipotent, omniscient, omni-benevolent, then perhaps:
The world is bittersweet.
Like fine chocolate and coffee.
And for the whole of our lives we partake only of the bittersweet.
We imagine- How great would it be if coffee tasted purely sweet.
We then abhor the bitter, and blame our coffee Brewer or chocolate Chef for it.
