Some Thoughts…

Note: This post has something to do with politics and religion (again), so if you’re not comfortable about these, leave while you can! By the way, inductive reasoning is dangerous: I never say who ’someone’ is!

Looking back the years of someone, it has been really tumultuous. It’s nice to write an extension to A Little Story since there’s still some time before I want to have dinner…

Changes in belief of a viable political system, and in relation to his world view
It may seem deeply contradictory to someone’s belief today, but he was originally a believer of monarchism and imperialism. When he was still small (i.e. around 10 years old), he was convinced, by way of reading, coming into other people’s lamenting of old colonial days, and possibly some other means, that it is good and especially efficient for a nation’s administrative power to concentrate on a benign despot, of the likes of Yao and Shun. The behavior of the gahmen leaders of the day (and the accompanying ‘news’) further strengthened his belief that this was to be the case. It is therefore natural for him to get interested into something like this and ways of doing it successfully. It is frightening indeed that a primary school kid was convinced over things like that! Unfortunately (or rather, fortunately ), due to his lack of ability and his young age, he never got into the stage of planning for an actual ’something’, although serious study was already underway, on ways of raising physical force and its sustenance, ways of claiming legitimacy, and political models. Such was the beginning of someone’s exposure to politics as the study of power.

It is of interest to me on the degree of influence such study has on someone’s world view (and its development on his later stage). His belief has led him into a sense of perpetual struggle, and, in later years, of perpetual vulnerability. That someone even got to the stage (q.v. A Little Story, section 2) where he has disposed of his trust towards his family, and the preparation towards eventual severance. It remains to be seen how things has worked out since, although the reconciliation has gone well.

In recent years he studied the thinking of John Locke and other thinkers. He also learned a number of valuable lessons, seemingly inappropriate and useless to other people, but essential to his survival.

*** *** *** *** ***

Changes in the view of investment
This can be summarized nicely in a few sentences. He originally favored the accumulation of commodities and technology: raw material being, well, raw material for production, and technology enables something to be produced more efficiently with less input. In addition, he favored such ’strategic industries’ as energy and defense companies, business which he can easily put into good use for the achievement of his ‘purpose’. As said earlier, (luckily) it did not materialize. He now subscribes to a more ‘normal’ thinking, that with Ben Graham being his primary source of enlightenment, and with meaningful returns as primary motive for investment, not with strategic reasons. The story between the two stages can be read from A Little Story.

*** *** *** *** ***

He was lucky in that he did not end up being labeled as insane. However, while he got the wrong start, he was lucky to eventually get into the right track, after years of struggle and near ruin. What did he learn?

• Policies may be big words in politics, but is something practical to someone. It is good to write down, in actual words, the policies someone intend to practice, practice it, and revise it from time to time. Dump it when it is no longer useful.
• Force is not the way to solve problem; self restraint is. It may seem strange to many people to associate self restraint with democracy, but the two go together. One can do whatever one wants without coercive interference from others; more importantly, one cannot stop others from doing whatever others like insofar as one’s personal space is not threatened.
• He should observe strict separation of his ’self’ and affiliation with other beliefs related to politics, religion and world view. This arises not out of mere personal belief but more of necessity, from his (rather ‘weird’) social position. Especially, he should take full advantage of the constitutional guarantee of freedom of religion and thought to protect his personal space. He of course could discuss such matters freely, but should observe neutrality and the use of reasoning. He also learned in classes that he should not throw undue onus upon himself when it comes to these issues.
• Always remain prepared to lose something ‘big’, not only physical possessions, but including his family and acquaintances. He has (well, nearly?) done it once. Of course, the loss shall not be caused deliberately!

What else shall he learn? What else is there for him to learn? Hmm… It’s not something normal, but essential for him to remain normal… So he shall continue to refine his thinking and policies.

Well, time to have dinner

Wawasan 2020 – An Economic Consideration

Well, someone said…

With regard to the establishment of a prosperous society, we can set many aspirational goals. I believe that we should set the realistic (as opposed to aspirational) target of almost doubling our real gross domestic product every ten years between 1990 and 2020 AD. If we do this, our GDP should be about eight times larger by the year 2020 than it was in 1990. Our GDP in 1990 was 115 billion Ringgit. Our GDP in 2020 should therefore be about 920 billion Ringgit in real (1990 Ringgit) terms.

Obviously that certain someone is kinda like me: Being born as the only child in the family. Being the only child, I do not have to scramble for toys, so I just have to be concerned about the total amount of toys daddy or mommy bought for me. But the same is not applicable to those who had sisters and brothers. The appropriate question is, obviously, “How much do I have relative to my siblings?” If you had two brothers and your parents bought three toys (to be distributed equally), there should be not much of a problem. But if the amount of toy bought is reduced to two, a large chance is that there will be trouble.

Now… How many people are there in Malaysia? There are more toys to play with, obviously, but still, there may be problems…

*** *** *** *** ***

This thing just somehow got into my mind, so I might as well grab it to do some mathematical exercise. Suppose that currently a developed economy has a nominal per-capita GDP figure of (US)$40,000. (The corresponding figure for Singapore is $31,000, the United States $42,000, and Luxembourg $68,800.) The advanced economies grow at an average of 5 percent per year (of course, the range is significant, and assuming that inflation is accommodated in the case). There is still thirteen years to 2020 (okay, I’m being lenient). Put these together, the nominal per-capita GDP for an advanced economy in 2020 would be:

($40,000)(1.05^13) = $75,426

The nominal per-capita GDP for Malaysia, at the current moment, is about $5,700. The desired growth rate of Malaysia, so that this figure can be matched within 13 years, can be found by equalling the per-GDP figure for an advanced economy with that of Malaysia, in 2020:

($5,700)(x^13) = ($75,426)

Rearranging,

(x^13) = (13.23)

Take log for both sides and after simplification, the equation becomes

log x = 0.08628

The growth rate is simply

x = 1.2197
Desired growth rate = 22.0% per annum

Now, give me (or rather, the gahmen) some magic prescriptions to achieve this result…

p/s: Correct me if I’m wrong… My maths is weak

post p/s: Why I use nominal instead of real GDP, whereas that someone used real terms? If Malaysia does not trade, of course it would be perfectly alright to use real purchasing-power comparison. However, as the Malaysian economy is open, exchange rate is extremely important in determining the purchasing power of the currency, that is, the proportional amount of goods the money we hold in our pocket can buy. As Malaysia needs to use Ringgit to purchase foreign goods, Malaysia need to sell Ringgit for foreign currencies. Currently, the purchasing power of the Ringgit is nearly at parity with the U.S. Dollar, but the exchange rate does not reflect this fully (i.e., Ringgit is undervalued). Therefore, Malaysian exports are cheap while imports are expensive, resulting in a comparatively depressed standard of living. Taking this into account, the use of nominal, rather than real, value corresponds more fully to the implications of the economic as well as monetary development Malaysia has to undergo in order to reach the status of a fully-developed country. But this seems to be out-of-scope for the purpose of the article huh?

What a Failure…

Note: This post may be offensive to some people, as I am going to write about arguing politics and religion (or rather, my view of it). If you do not feel comfortable, please do not proceed, k? (I hope you will take the preceding note literally, rather than as an implicit invitation to read further… )

I’m a bit afraid of arguing impromptu with others about politics and particularly, religion. My mind turns slow and, after I went to the Logic classes, I just realized that I’ve been somehow ‘tricked’. There are two pitfalls which I am prone to suffer from, namely (being the victim of) wrongly shifting the burden of proof, and (being the victim of) creating a false burden of proof.

Wrongly shifting the burden of proof is essentially this. If there is someone who wants to argue for something ‘incredible’ (or seemingly defy common sense), he bears the burden of proof. That is to say, it is his responsibility to present the arguments to the other parties, not the other way around. However, there are a great many instances where the person, who tries to argue for something ‘incredible’, is shifting this responsibility to others. Here’s an example from the Logic note:

A: “The moon does not circle the Earth. It just sits there in the sky.”

B: “What? You must be joking. Why do you say that?”

A: “Well, why do you believe that the moon circles the Earth? Have you ever seen the moon do it?”

B: “No, but this is common knowledge. You will find it in any encyclopedia.”

A: “That doesn’t really establish much. Do you believe everything you read?”

B: “Of course not. But an encyclopedia is not a magazine. It is a reliable source of information.”

A: “Reliable, but not infallible. The people who write encyclopedias are human beings. They sometimes make mistakes.”

B: “Yes, but that is very unlikely. Look, any astronomer will tell you that the moon circles the Earth.”

A: “Well, has any astronomer told you this? You don’t really have solid grounds for believing that the moon circles the Earth, do you?”

You see what happens? A is the one who tries to argue for something, but B ends up trying to defend himself! It’s incredibly efficient for A to ‘argue’. Sadly, I’m not that different from B… What B should do is…

A: “The moon does not circle the Earth. It just sits there in the sky.”

B: “What? You must be joking. Why do you say that?”

A: “Well, why do you believe that the moon circles the Earth? Have you ever seen the moon do it?”

B: “Sorry, but the more pressing question is why you believe that the moon does not circle the Earth. Yours is the more incredible proposition.”

Hopefully I’m fast enough in getting out of this pitfall (or, being the victim of it)…

The second pitfall that I’m so good at being preyed is creating a false burden of proof. It means that someone who does not bear the burden of proof is being placed into a position that he apparently is. An example will illustrate, also from the note:

Theist: “God exists.”

Agnostic: ” There is no evidence for that proposition. You should not believe any such thing.”

Theist: “Speaking of evidence, what is the evidence that God does not exist? People go around criticizing my faith, but no one has shown me any good evidence that He does not exist. Can you show me some? Otherwise, this question of evidence is pointless, isn’t it? You ask me for my evidence, but I can just as well ask you for your evidence.”

Agnostic: “Well, some people say that there is evidence from the sciences and the theory of evolution. The God-hypothesis just seems to be unnecessary in order to explain the nature and order of things.”

Theist: “Well, that what everyone says, but there are also many things that science cannot explain. Science cannot explain consciousness and the mystery of death. Science cannot explain the existence of miracles and the power of prayer. Science does not have an explanation for everything. What rush to conclude that the God-hypothesis is unnecessary?”

Agnostic: “Yes, but we should give science some time to mature. In a few hundred years, you may see that the God-hypothesis is unnecessary. We may be able to explain everything through the laws of science.”

Theist: “That is just wild speculation. No one knows what will it be like in a few hundred years.”

(But wait, isn’t that agnostic is one who neither believes that God exist nor do not exist?) Haih, the agnostic should just say…

Theist: “God exists.”

Agnostic: ” There is no evidence for that proposition. You should not believe any such thing.”

Theist: “Speaking of evidence, what is the evidence that God does not exist? People go around criticizing my faith, but no one has shown me any good evidence that He does not exist. Can you show me some? Otherwise, this question of evidence is pointless, isn’t it? You ask me for my evidence, but I can just as well ask you for your evidence.”

Agnostic: “I’m sorry, but I never say that God does not exist. I have no idea whether God exists. But you positively believe that God exists. So tell me again, what is your reason for upholding that proposition?”

I finally know why I admire Lee Kuan Yew so much: He is incredibly good at avoiding getting into such situation. Should I make you watch at the video again?

Dawning of (Another) Crisis?

Hmm…

Yea, laugh all you want… But my skepticism leading to my earlier article remains: is that the really right way of going around marking the essay? What’s the point of teaching language then? Hmm…

Dawning of a Crisis?

It’s not really so propitious a moment for me to contemplate such a matter as long-term health problem, yet I had to, for I am one that can never sleep well when I know that great problems are waiting for me, even those are far into the future. It is good also, that I at least have the chance of acting early. Before I start, consider the following two scenarios, in my usual third-person tone…

He looked at the assignment and got panic in a sudden, because he thought the date was due and he still had not started to write the essay, let alone completed. Therefore he rushed to the library and started to write, hoping that he could at least scramble some things to pass up. However, upon calling the lecturer and the tutor, he was told that the due date was two weeks ahead. Apparently his memory had misled him.

Now the other one…

He reached the seminar room, where his discussion group is conducted, early. The time was 3:30pm. He had a presentation to do during the discussion. Since he thought that the discussion group starts at 5:00pm, he figured that he was better to wander around, since there were no where better to go. So he strolled in the vicinity of the seminar room until 4:22pm. He looked at the timetable he took along and to his horror, the discussion commences on 4:00pm. So he entered the room hastily, while guessing that people would think him crazy, since he was strolling outside the room while he was suppose to attend the session! Luckily there were still fifteen minutes left, and he used all of it to present his case. And to his relief the result of the essay was satisfactory.

Clearly, any people would advise me that I had some problem, but strangely, no one did. Being deprive of money to carry out an MRI scan for myself, I can only keep on convincing myself that these things happened because of a lack of sleep. Here are some of the facts I observed…

• I could effortlessly memorize things which others would think as inconsequential, such as the specifications of airliners and the economic statistics of nations, some times in a series (i.e. for multiple years). I am also good in recalling the call numbers of books. An even weirder thing to remember is the location of a particular footnote in a book (this greatly aided me in the Labor Law exam)!
• Last time, I could very well remember people that did bad things to me, but this is eroding to a negligible level.
• I could not recognize other people’s faces well. Even if I could recognize, for much of the time I would need a long response time to realize this.
• The same can be said for my memorization of other people’s names, and even titles. I could recall last time, when I nearly called one of my relative, whom I am very familiar with, ‘uncle’ (I am not supposed to call him uncle since there is a proper title in Chinese!).
• I frequently confuse time and date (examples had been given).
• The last and the worst. Sometimes I will take in possession of something but forgot what I want to do with it. When I want to recall what I want to do with it, I forgot the context I am in. Let me give you another example.

He wanted to fill in a form, so he got himself a pencil. But upon grabbing the pencil he forgot what he wanted to do. So he sat down and thought hard, but still could not get a hint. In the end he was confused what he was doing actually, so he got out to do something. Only hours later that he recalled, “Ah, I wanted to fill in the form!”

The divergence (between my ability to remember and my ability not to remember) has gone greater and greater, and it had manifested itself in such a manner upon me. I wanted to find this out scientifically, but such a prospect is poor. And the last example is really a worrisome phenomenon for me, and it refuses to go away. For my friends who are knowledgeable about this, any advice?

A final consolation for myself: I know Benjamin Graham did worse than I in this respect. He can drive his son to the park for a stroll, and take a subway back, since he forgot that he actually drove there!