TWC Session 2

There are two topics that we had covered in this week’s lesson. The topics are technology, society and global dominance and technology and human development. We started off the lesson by discussing on how to identify innovation leaders and dominant players. We used a concept that was created by our professor. This concept allows us to classify a country as a rising star, dominant player or falling star. The traits of a falling star are open perspective, optimistic, hungry to learn from others and keen to invest in new ideas. Conversely, the traits of a falling star are closed perspective, pessimistic, not interested in learning from others and not keen to invest in new ideas. As for the dominant player, it is one with is on top on the pyramid. Well, I think that in order to be a rising star, one must remain hungry and be willing to learn new things. Those that are staying on the same spot thinking that they are at the top on the hill or those that are doing something that are not progressive shows that they are on the way to becoming a falling star.

This is the first week where we have student lectures to teach us more about the topics that we will be covering. The first presenter presented on Google. I think that Google is not making us stupid but it is making us smarter. With Google, we get to access to a whole lot of information easily and quickly. And I also think that Google is not making us be like one another; I believe that is has got to do with how the information is used.

We had two presenters who presented on the second topic. One of the presenters mentioned about how new technology can allow humans to live for a limitless amount of time. I think that this has its own advantages and disadvantages. If we were to stay forever, we will not feel sad when someone close to us has passed away, but I bet that there will be insufficient land since people are producing and no one leaves the world. The next presentation was on technology and genetic engineering. We discussed on parents being able to choose their own child’s features. If this were to happen, I think it might lead to a situation where human further dwell in the endless chase for the perfect appearance. And no people will be taking up low paying jobs if babies were engineered into extremely intelligent, artistic, athletic geniuses.

Our professor also showed us a video entitled The Millennium Development Goals. This video is about eight international development goals that entire international community have agreed to achieve by the year 2015. Its goals are improving social and economic conditions in the world's poorest countries. I think that having these goals is definitely a good thing but I think that it is too idealistic and not quite feasible.  All the goals may not be achieved but there are definitely some progresses and I believe that the number of people who are suffering from poverty and hunger will be reduced.