Portfolio 5nally

Some doctors suggested that brain mapping could help doctors in the study of autism, paranoid schizophrenia and Pick’s disease. (National Science Foundation) It might seem great that brain mapping can actually benefit those people who suffered from these illnesses; however this is just one side of the story. There are people who fear that brain mapping might be abused by some people and use it unethically. Since brain mapping can actually allow doctors to take a peek into one’s brain, some unscrupulous people can use it to forcefully obtain personal information like passwords, bank account numbers etc. However, there might be some ways to minimize this abuse.

Firstly, access to this equipment and technology must be safe guarded by the government, and certain set of laws must be drawn up to deter anyone from trying to abuse it. Everyone should be given a choice whether to allow doctors to use this technology on them. However there are some exceptions like during the interrogation of criminals or suspects, in order to save time and get the truth out as quickly as possible, the police will have to use brain mapping.

Secondly, those scientists should try to maintain the complexity of using this technology so that not any person can use it easily like the way they use handphone. This will reduce the number of people who are able to use therefore further reducing the possibility of it being abused.

In conclusion, there are no doubts that brain mapping will actually benefit the society but we must also be careful of the potential of it being abused. Although the potential of it being abused cannot be totally eliminated, there are steps which can be taken to minimize it. To end off, whether will it be abused really boils down to individuals, if one really wants to abuse it, he will fine means and ways to do that.

Portfolio 4

If EG1471 is considered an engineering module, this will be the only module whereby I will write a lot and indeed I face a considerably lots of difficulties. For the rest of the modules I m currently undertaking i.e. MLE1101, CS1101C, PC1431, MA1505 and EG1108, these modules do not require much of writing, instead a lot of calculations are involved. Therefore, I do not have many difficulties in writing for these engineering modules, perhaps it’s too early to tell for MLE1101 which I see a decrease in the number of formulas given during lectures and more explanations for certain properties a material possesses.

Back to EG1471, the reason why I m taking this module is very obvious, I cannot write well enough to pass the QET therefore writing itself is already a difficulty for me. EG1471 not only emphasized on writing alone but writing academically, those who take this module will know, you need to have citations to support your essay. This means that you have to read broadly and hopefully find some author who wrote some articles which actually support your own argument. Needless to say, in order to overcome this problem, you have to simply do more research and read broadly which means lots of man hours will be used up. Luckily for me, we are given a few articles for writing assignment 2 which saves me the hassle of searching over the internet for articles on Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS). Another difficulty is memorizing the APA style for referencing whether the day comes before the month or the year comes before the day and four other combinations. Furthermore, different type of sources has different way of writing them in APA style. To overcome this difficulty, simply practice more.

Portfolio 3: The Bad News About Green Architecture

Green architecture has been overly promoted whereby in some buildings, they actually do not achieve true sustainability. Some supposedly green offices are actually built in somewhere secluded so employees have to drive miles to reach the office which is not environmentally friendly. There has been an increased on the number of architects who registered with US Green Building Council (GBC) for LEED (Leadership on Energy and Environmental Design) certification because they will be given up to 35% of tax rebates. However, not many of these buildings are environmentally friendly at all. Houses are increasingly advertised as green although there is an absence of national standards to quantify what is a green house. The California Academy of Sciences is one of the few buildings which is not only green but also beautiful on the outside. It has a roof which planted 40 native species which do not need any irrigation. Surprisingly, the building is not air-conditioned at all because breezes that blow off Pacific help to cool the building down. There are weather sensors which adjust the brightness according to the weather, solar panels which store solar energy and recycled old jeans used as insulation. Architects in the future will be taught to fuse green with design, in the hope that some of them will come up with buildings which are even more environmentally friendly. Furthermore, the US GBC has changed its standards on what constitute to a green building like easy access to public transport will gain credit than the necessity of cars.

Reference
McGuigan. C. (2008, September 22).The bad news about green architecture. Newsweek, pp. 50-52.