"Buses and taxis turn green" - but WILL YOU?

Buses and taxis turn green!

In a move to do its part to conserve mother earth, SMRT is launching a fleet of environmentally-friendly vehicles.

Aside from a clean and green commuting experience, the new Euro V buses are also the first of its kind in Southeast Asia.

Dong Tianzhao with more.

Duration: 2 min 55 secs

from The Straits Times (online) - Multimedia

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE VIDEO

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Some interesting points:

Transport sector: 19% total CO2 emissions
(but that 19% is composed, more dominantly, of private transport)

newer vehicles: 42% less nitrous oxide pollutants than older counterparts

there will no significant changes in fares (for taxis and buses)

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My first impression is that such a change is brilliant. (Finally) there’s some concrete change towards environmental friendliness rather than mere empty talks. (Finally) something to write about in the news.

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A move towards environmental friendliness is always welcomed. Likewise, I firmly believe that charity events and donations are very noble and respectable causes. Yet in the cases above, rather unfortunately, there is still a need to be slightly sceptical – to discern and pick out the truly ‘altruistic’ ones from the rest, for some may simply be taking advantage of the situation to buff up their personal/corporate image by riding along the “go green” hype.

Environmental Friendliness. Environmental Friendliness. Environmental Friendliness.

I think the EF word has proved to be an extremely lucrative term. (Gasps)

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I don't know what to make out of it. Somehow, there is a feeling that this change isn’t too significant. Perhaps, that it is not as big as it seems. I think it would be apt to describe it as: the biggest, smallest change. That is, it is a large scale change, but its impacts are tiny.

I consider the effects to be tiny because changing the buses and taxis would hardly impact our lifestyles and our mindsets.

If you have to get from location A to B urgently, you would just use whatever form of transport that is fastest and most convenient. And if it is by bus, you would take the first that arrives – be it one with a smoky exhaust, a solar car, a compressed natural gas fuelled car, or even a magical flying carpet...

If people’s mindsets do not change for the better, I doubt upgrading the hardware will be of much use. If this continues, we will just see more legislations forcing fine Singaporeans to install the latest catalytic converters, solar panels, fuel cells, and so on… Effectively, technological upgrades and improvements are commanding us to change our lifestyles. That is not going to be helpful. We should not be the slaves of technology. What we want is the reverse – the hardware to be commanded and driven by the people.

Achieving a mindset (software) change is not difficult, look:

If this carries through, and if the major supermarkets* and retailers follow suit, living through a day without sinfully touching a plastic bag may be possible. A month later, using plastic bags would become a conscious consideration. And a decade later, maybe you can find it in the antique shops.

*If I remember, NTUC did do something similar, but it takes effect only on a particular weekday… or something like that, so it wasn’t too effective. Pls correct me if I am wrong.

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Identity & Language

Either this is weird, or I am weird, or you are:

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When someone calls your name, you turn around, right? Right.
(note that, calling your name does not equate to talking directly to you, it could mean hearing people saying your name in their conversation, et cetera)

Let's say, someone calls out, not by your given name, by whatever you are associated with, for example, "red shirt guy", "mugger", etc. You turn around too, right? Right.

That means you have accepted that as one of your identities - whether willingly or not.

I have always thought that it is safe to talk about someone, who is physically near you, without the person noticing. I thought it would be fine as long as you don't refer to them explicitly. That is, to avoid explicit language - just vaguely use "the auntie", "the girl", "that guy". I had always thought - but I guess I'm wrong.

I say this because there was once, significantly etched in my memory, when I was walking, with my friend, to the bus stop. We were talking (negatively) about an auntie we encountered earlier, who had like no manners... but that is not the point now, I shall not digress. We were talking quite loud, probably, and when we reached the bus stop, my friend started a remark (in a rather irritated tone), which was something like "eh, that auntie damn-" and walaa! 3 women suddenly turn around to look at us. *a moment of silence + eyeballing*. then they turned back.

Weird, because I thought people don't usually react that way. But it's pretty cool, we went other places to experiment. Tried out other 'trigger' words... and watch that amazement! It is rather amusing.

..and so now you know, there is not need to be so rude probe into people's phone. If you think test subject X loves test subject Y, conduct this experiment and anticipate the positive result for "X's boy/girlfriend"!
[Disclaimer: ~ just joking. ]

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Well the earlier half on top is about how people listen and react ... this half is about how vague we had been...

At the NUS Co-op, a book on linguistics caught my attention. I saw the chapter on the use of explicit language and er.. something... it's the opposite lah. Basically the difference is that the earlier can be clearly understood without knowing the context, whereas the meaning in the latter is highly dependent on the context. To illustrate:

Three boys were playing football in their school's soccer field and one of the three boys kicked the ball...

contrasted with,

They were playing football over there, and one of them kicked it..

and you will realise the ambiguity and instability of the references.

I thought this point as mentioned in the book is highly relevant to what happened - the meaning of "auntie" shifted, slightly.

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Well, just my thoughts. I don't suppose all of you really care about such details.. but such stuff grates me every now and then.
Comments are always welcomed -

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed

I think this movie/documentary will be very intriguing...

Darwinism has always been flawed fundamentally, as is Science and reasoning. I think it has greatly changed the way we think, as in.. about knowledge and all that. Flawed - because although it is a more convincing school of thought in the 'core' areas of science - medicine, engineering, et cetera - it struggles (and arguably, fails) to explain human cognition and existence.

In my opinion, the alternative is simply an excuse - Creationism... and so the creator is the explanation for everything, including 'self.

I would go on to say, Intelligent Design is just a devious concept that attempts to straddle science and theology (reason and faith, respectively), conveniently avoiding both the paradoxes of the belief in God (that the omniscient, caring and all-powerful God allows evil & suffering; that He is both eternal and temporally present in time as a man) and the limitations of reasoning (keep asking "why?" to everything, and see how far can you go). This won't work out, nor convince me, because ... it isn't reasonable.

If Creationism is proposed as an addition to religion, then I'm fine with it. But to propose Creationism as an alternative to Science (herein defined as systematic rational thought), is nonsense!

Science probably will never provide all the definitive answers to all our questions, especially regarding our existence, but I think Science shouldn't and doesn't have to do so. That is not scientific reasoning is about anyway... I perceive it as a method of thinking, not a set of answers.

Aye, whatever, you may disagree. Please do.


here are some things to chew on, if you are still hungry:
the thesis
and the anti-thesis


and I hope the documentary will be out soon, in theatre or DVD...

I'm looking to it, not for answers... but... for a lighter perspective (it is a movie after all, how academic can it get?) on such a topic

anyone interested?

Birth

At this very moment - my blog is born!

// blog design will come soon... I'm, after all, ashamedly HTML-illiterate, you know... and I don't think Flash can be easily integrated here... sigh.