TWC 7th lesson!

Alright i'm still amazed how time passed by so fast.. we're into our 7th week!


Today's topic is a continuation from last week, BioBusiness Revolution but this week we focus on Agribiology, Environmental Life Sciences and Industrial Biotechnology.


We started off today with a very short video showing "extreme" scenario of us, human population, are destroying the Earth. Some people may think that the video is a bit too harsh or extreme. However, I think that is the ugly truth of us. The slaughtering of poultry, the cutting down of trees, polluting the environment and corruption of the Earth are hard truth and the video actually shows how we go around doing it. For example, many of us eat poultry everyday. However how many of us actually seen a chicken getting slaughtered or feathers being plucked out of the chicken while the chicken is still alive? What we do is simply buy readily available meat from the supermarket or in wet markets. The point is, the slaughtering is there - just that we don't see it. The same holds true for other phenomenons.


One interesting point we talked about is that our growth rate, albeit increasing rapidly for the past decade, is now slowing down. It is estimated that our population will peak at 9.5-10billion people. It is fascinating to know that if our population is meat eaters, we have enough food to feed 10billion people but if all of us are vegetarians, our world can accommodate 30billion people. It is estimated that about 0.5 hectare of land is used per person for  a meat eater but only about 0.15 hectare of land is used for each vegetarian.


We went on to talk about the key bio-business opportunity areas covering agri-veterinary and food bio-business. The most important component is agriculture where there is a depletion of food. For e.g. fishes in the ocean has always been thought to be abundance but evidences show that fishes are actually depleting. If nothing is done, we could be in trouble. Many people in our world is actually dependent on fishes either on staple food or for a living. A depletion in fishes would have a significant impact on our world as fishes are one of our basic food.


Another interesting point learnt today is that there are actually a few colors assigned to different type of biotechnology. For example, blue is for marine, white is for industrial or environmental, green is for agricultural and red is for human.


We went on to talk about the readings. I find reading 4 interesting, written by Norman Borlaug (1970 nobel prize winner).

From reading 4, Ending World Hunger: The Promise of Biotechnology and the Threat of Antiscience Zealotry, the article talked about Biotechnology particularly in the agriculture sector. For example, using genes from cotton, maize and potatoes to control the number of serious pest.

One interesting point in the article is that “The world has or will soon have the agricultural technology available to feed the 8.3 billion people anticipated in the next quarter of a century. The more pertinent question today is whether farmers and ranchers will be permitted to use that technology.”

This is a highly controversial problem whether we should allow genetically modified food or not. My personal stand is we should allow genetically modified food because starvation is one of the substantial problems our world is facing. We should not deprive these people of food when GM food has not been proven to be harmful to the human body. I believe we should allow the provision of GM food and leave the choice to people as to whether they want or not to consume this type of food. A good analogy is fast food. Fast food is unhealthy and bad for the human body. However, we still provide it as a choice for people. Hence, the higher authorities should not dictate the people what food they can or cannot eat like some countries that banned GM food.

At the end of the lesson, an important point brought across is that we are actually working in a world where there is incomplete information. We do not know the exact effects of the implementation of a new technology hence there is always a fear - fear of the unknown. When new technology comes out in the past, there was no telling what effect it could have on our world. Like the introduction of cars or cranes or anything, it is beneficial to us but no one could foresee what the effect they could have in the future. For example, cars can lead to accidents. What we can do is to solve the problems then. At least, in my opinion, this is better than keep waiting and deter the technology from coming.

Overall, I rate this class 8/10 as today's topic was interesting for me and I've learnt quite a lot today. 

Cheers! :)

TWC 6th Lesson

Recess Week is coming soon, although it's a good thing but also means all the projects are due soon!

Today's lesson is on BioBusiness Revolution: Healthcare and Biomedical Science.

First we started off with a video. :)
Our video is Microsoft's vision: Future of Healthcare.

Yet another interesting video on what our future could be like. The video is from year 2009 where iPads have not been launched but interesting enough, we can see images of "iPads" in the video already.
One topic we discussed in class was if we believe such technologies may be implemented by the year 2020.

I believe it is quite highly possible for these technologies to be implemented by 2020 because actually we already have most of the technology shown, it just needs a bit of fine-tuning and the implementation. Of course there would be problems like the cost of usage of those technology or legislations but these problems will most likely be resolved with time as technology continues to advance.

The idea i liked most is actually on the credit card system at the end of the video where all the cards are electronic based and thumbprint secured. It'll save the hassle of bringing all the different cards out every single time. 

We went on to talk about the statistics of market size for BioBusiness. 

In the table, an interesting observation is that the US spending on healthcare is actually 50+% of global spending on healthcare. With US constituting 5% of the world's population yet making up a huge proportion of healthcare expenditure, there should be some problem about the US healthcare system. One of the reasons is because 70% of the healthcare expenditure in the US is spent on the last stage of the peoples' lives. This might be the less appropriate approach because i believe the government should focus more on young people or middle aged people as money spent on them is more well-spent. Not being unethical or something but I think the government should shift the focus to some extent as there are many younger people who are in need to medical attention but can't afford to do so. It'll be intriguing to know that at least 1/3 of the people in the US who are declared bankrupt are due to healthcare reasons even though they are insured. 

As time goes on, the world's healthcare system is moving towards privatization. It can be seen locally in Singapore where hospitals used to be government sector but over the years it has been privatized. 

There are a few types of healthcare system:

Primary - Deals with common illnesses

Secondary - Hospitalization; necessary treatment for a short period of time

Tertiary - More serious kind of treatment such as cancers

Quaternary - Rare diseases that requires highly specialized skills and is not widely accessible

Generally most government mainly focus on primary healthcare although tertiary healthcare should be paid more attention in developed countries with rising problems such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

An interesting point we talked about today is about spider web being one of the strongest materials in the world. A spider web that is one-inches thick will be able to hold up a jumbo jet. A rough idea was there's a group of researchers who tap into this field and tried to produce spider web. An interesting thing they found out was that the protein in goat milk in very similar to what the web that spider spins. Hence, through some genetic mutation or transplant, they managed to make the goat produce milk that can be synthesized into web. The milk is called spider silk milk. However, it is noted that no matter how hard they try, the web they produced can't seem to be as strong as a natural spider web. The good thing is the web made from spider silk milk is able to block rifle bullets but at reduced pressure. It still is not capable of blocking a bullet at full pressure but it is highly possible in the future and soldiers will not need wear heavy body armors instead they will wear costumes like how spiderman does.

Generally I rate this session 8/10 as there are new and interesting ideas on Healthcare and Biomedical science. However I feel like there are many other interesting areas that can be discussed but is not most probably due to the time constrain. Cheers! :)

TWC Lesson 5!

Week 5 is over! Which means my presentation week is over! :D

Today's lesson is on ICT and world change.

We started off with a video again - Project Natal - Milo.
I think starting off with a video is a really good way of starting the class as it grabs everyone's attention and sparks off interest for the class.
okay so the video is about artificial intelligence where a virtual character is able to recognize people, recognize emotions, display emotions and able to communicate with you. This is quite a breakthrough and in the future if this artificial intelligence is implanted in robots, it'll be a quite a revolutionary change.
As from Reading 6, there is a lot of ideas how thing technology can be implemented.
Some examples are companionship for single child or for lonely elderly people, or a virtual assistant that helps you record whatever you want to say rendering the use of keyboard useless.
Another example i think is it could be a 24/7 security system where it can identify people, records them and makes a din if it recognize a break-in or something.
There are unlimited possibilities as said in the blog - We are limited only by our imagination.
However, I feel that it may lead to more people living in the virtual world and kids might grow up being introverted and live in their own world. Hence caution must be taken with regards to this.

We were introduced to some areas of ICT such as mass media, internet, gaming, wireless technologies, interactive telecommunication, information systems, cloud computing and knowledge management. We talked about what these forms of ICT are and the past, present and future.

For example, mass media. Mass media means information for the mass(people).
In the past, information is passed through the word of mouth or is passed down from one generation to another generation. Mass media evolves with the introduction of newer technology such as radio, newspaper, television. In the current context, we're moving to using smartphones, e-books and the internet. Mass media has come to a stage where one is able to know about something that had happened at the other side of the world in matters of seconds.

Another interesting example is cloud computing. This is a more subtle ICT that many people are using it yet do not know the name for it. Examples are facebook and google.
Cloud computing is an application where anybody can use but at the same time, is able to customize to their own needs. Basically, cloud computing is the idea of an internet databank where everyone can put in their ideas.

We also discussed about the potential risks and danger with ICT. Examples are security concerns where people can hack into the system, espionage where important informations are stolen, invasion of privacy and exposure to corrupting influences. This is becoming increasingly important issue as people are increasing becoming dependent on ICT. It is evident in the recent case where hackers stole credit card information by hacking into Sony's network and resulted in severe problems for Sony and for the people whose credit card information were stolen. This is a good example on the severity of the dangers with ICT.

Reflection on my presentation for today. My presentation topic was on e-learning.
I realized I stammered quite a bit and keep pausing quite a bit at a loss for words. I was feeling pretty nervous as this was the first presentation I'm giving since JC time. I felt that I should have been more prepared as it would give me more confidence and perform better.
On the other hand, I was pretty glad my topic generated quite a bit of discussion in the class.
The reason I chose e-learning is because I like topics where people can easily relate to but have not enough in-depth knowledge about it, which is why the topic on Electronic Smoking some time back had quite some discussions going as well.
Although this topic was what i researched on, I learnt some new things in class as prof shared some ideas with us as well and perspective from different angles. An example is about Khan academy (http://www.khanacademy.org/) where it offers a comprehensive syllabus ranging from arithmetic to physics, biology, chemistry, history or even cosmology and astrology. Not only it teaches you but also offers you practice questions and test preparations. It was quite an eye-opening for me.

Overall, I rate this lesson 8/10. I feel that ICT and world change is too big a topic to be covered in one lesson hence we can only target certain areas to focus on. There are many other areas, scopes and analysis that we can discuss on. However, I still benefited a whole lot from this lesson. :)

I would like to end this post with a quote from the slides which i find interesting and liked a lot which is:

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”  

                                                                - Arthur C. Clarke 

Individual Topical Review Paper Outline

Individual Topical Review Paper Outline

i)              Specific Innovation of Interest

The innovation I have chosen is 3D Printer.

By definition, 3D printing is a form of addictive manufacturing technology where a three dimensional object is created by laying down successive layers of material.

Companies no longer need to offshore to supply parts or accessories as they can now produce everything locally with a single process.

3D printer is a disruptive innovation that is likely change the way things are being done, most particularly in the manufacturing industry. Not unlike how CD taking over cassettes or how telephones taking over telegraphs, 3D printing is going to take over big and expensive machines used for manufacturing.

ii)             Rationale for Selecting this innovation

3D printer is going to be the next trillion-dollar industry and is potentially the biggest change in how we make things. It is unlikely to only change how things work in the manufacturing industries but also how the world works.

Currently, 3D printing is still not largely used due to its high cost and most manufacturing companies already have their machines used for mass manufacturing. However, price of 3D printers are falling now due to increased number of competitors trying to produce affordable printers.

With 3D printers are becoming more affordable, it’ll lower the barriers of entry to the manufacturing sector. It’ll also be cheaper to produce goods with 3D printers instead of offshoring to other countries due to the savings on transport costs and there isn’t a need to purchase costly machines that only carry out limited processes. With the release of affordable 3D printers, the idea of large production line will become increasingly irrelevant.

iii)            Proposed Approach to Development of Paper

-       Executive Summary

-       Introduction

-       Positive Observations

·      Ability to print parts and accessories with different mechanical and physical properties

·      Decrease cost of production -> Cheaper goods

·      Green technology

-       Discussion and Analysis

Elaboration of key positive observations

-       Negative Observations

·      Not sure if there will be more jobs created in the new 3D industry than all the manufacturing jobs that will be lost.

·      Printing of Dangerous weapons such as air rifles or other illegal stuffs

-       Issues/Challenges

Elaboration of negative observations and possible solutions

-       Future Prospects

-       Conclusion

4th TWC LESSON!

Our 4th TWC lesson! Time passes really fast.. we're already in week 4!

Okay, our lesson this week is about Driver of world change and Change management and change leadership.

Drivers for world change. The underlying question is: What causes change to happen? There are many factors that cause a change to happen.

·     - Environmental drivers

·     - Scientific Discovery and Technology Innovation

·     - Social, Demographic Cultural, Ideological Change

·     - Commercial/Business Innovation

·     - Competition

·     - Globalization

·     - Changing expectations and “tastes” with changing time

For example for Environmental drivers, there are plague epidemics or global warming. For competition, it means that there is a need to come up with new ideas in order to survive hence a change will occur.

Although there are so many drivers for world change, I believe Globalization is the most significant and a key driver of world change. Because of globalization, countries open up to inflow and outflow of ideas which increases the competitiveness of our world. Globalization also leads to more pollution which is an environmental driver. Hence, there are necessary more important drivers which leads to more and more drivers for world change.

We went on to talk about a key issue: Evolutionary change VS Revolutionary Change.

Evolutionary change is an improvement to ideas and processes whereas revolutionary change is creating a whole new concept on how things are being done. The conclusion? Revolutionary change if you want to survive in this era. 

We also talked about disruptive change, whether it is the same as revolutionary change. In general they have the same meaning where both changes the game. The key characteristic about disruptive change is that it is an irreversible change.

An interesting thing we talked about this lesson is that there are 3 groups of people. One group is people who make things happen, another is people who wait for things to happen and lastly the group who wonder what happened. Ultimately, it all boils down to the need to be flexible. When the game changes, there must be a willingness to change.

Next part of our lesson is on Change management and Change leadership. 

Uninformed optimism -> Informed pessimism -> Informed realism -> Completion

This is the time curve that can be applied to all types of management. This is the usual flow of events for a situation and hence how we can manage situations when it arises. 

We also had a discussion on ways to manage changes. For example, should we look back or look forward when making a decision. Or should we make people do things by coercion or collaboration. This shows the difference between someone who is willing to adapt to changes or not. 

We continued to talked about how a change is being carried out. Effectively, there are 2 models or ways on how a change is carried out. 

1) Traditional model: freeze - unfreeze - refreeze

2) Modern model: continuous monitoring and renewal

An example of how the traditional model works is China's policy where the development plans and decisions are being made every 5 years. Modern model is to keep track and improve continuously.

No doubt the traditional model works but there is no model that can last forever. It may be effective in the past but new times require new skills and new models.

Overall, change management and change leadership is vital for survival in this current era.

I rate this lesson 8.5/10 because I have learnt pretty much today and had some interesting pointers as well. :)

3rd TWC Lesson!!

Today is 3^rd TWC lesson! It’s on a Saturday as a replacement for Hari Raya. K

Anyway, today’s topic is on (A)Techonology and Industrial Development: Towards Sustainability and (B)Technology and Innovation Management.

For part A, towards sustainability is the key. Our lesson started off with a video showing us from past to present, we have been moving linearly which means we're using up raw materials which are finite. Finite stuffs are, of course, unsustainable. The video talked about moving from a linear equation to a cycle which can be started off by reducing usage, re-using and recycling. 

A message brought through the video which caught my attention is we(human population) used 1/3 of the whole planet's resources in the past decade alone! US makes up 5% of the world population but makes up 30% of the world's resource usage. If our whole world use resources at the same rate, we'll need 3-5 planets to sustain but we only have one. This is indeed a huge problem and worse still is the usage is increasing exponentially due to economies expanding rapidly. This brings us to a next problem of Economic Growth VS Environmental Growth.

Sadly, Economic Growth and Environmental Growth are conflicting issues. Most companies are profit-driven and would oppose to slower economic growth as shown in the recent case in US. However, the underlying issue is can we achieve both?

I believe we can, we just need stricter rules and regulations. Economic Growth and Environmental growth are conflicting yet not inversely proportionate. They can be achieved together. Companies just need to be efficient in both in order to achieve it. If a government regulates it in a more stringent way, we could well be moving to a sustainable development.

From what I see, embarking on economic growth along with environmental growth is sustainable in the long run whereas focusing on economic growth is only a short run benefit and unsustainable in the long run.

We also talked about an interesting point "advantages of backwardness" as projected in reading article 2 - Industrialization as an Engine for Growth in Developing Countries. Adam Szirmai. Interesting concept: “advantages of backwardness”.

The advantages of backwardness is the reduced cost and risk that R&D encompasses. "Backwards" country and just buy, copy, reverse engineer products that are available from leading countries. As long as a country is open to new ideas and has an open market, the country will be able to grow exponentially with new product knowledge coming in.

For part B of the class, we talked about innovation management. 

First I would like to express the difference between creativity and innovation because they are often confused as being the same. Creativity is just interesting ideas but innovation is an extension of an interesting idea. Innovation include the execution part which includes processes to bring the interesting idea into the market in the form of goods and services.

This can be seen in the pyramid of Innovation as shown in class where creativity is at the base of the pyramid.

After reading the first reading material: U.S. Technology and Innovation Policies: Lessons for Climate Change, in general I believe the government plays an important role in innovation in areas where there are external externalities. Because these are external externalities, because companies are profit motivated, the government will have to intervene. Some of the methods government can adopt is they can provide R&D credits or production subsidies or set regulations.

Another takeaway from today's class is the categorization of the different type of innovations, namely Valley, Summit and Cloud opportunities. 

I believe this is a very clear and rational way of putting the different type of innovations which is how people are operating. This is a very interesting point and i believe is worth mentioning here.

Overall, I rate this session 8/10 as I've been exposed to new ideas and learnt quite a few things today - disregarding the fact that my Saturday was burnt of course. :)