FINITE ELEMENT DAN PESAWAT MH370

Tadi aku cakap dalam kelas finite element (in English sbb kelas aku ada international students) yang jgn tengok matrik K tu sebagai 100x100 atau 10000x10000 tapi tengok la matrik tu as a "nombor"; tengok K tu simply as K because thats the whole reason pun nak introduce everything in matrix forms, so that we can handle complex problem in a relatively easy manner.

Jangan tengok K as 10000x10000 because that is what it is pun in real application. Dalam real modeling of structures, itu memang saiz yang biasa dijumpai.

Aku ingat lagi waktu aku buat PhD dan guna software ABAQUS untuk model composite aku yang nonlinear. Even untuk satu batang beam tu pun ambil masa lebih sehari nak finishkan analysis sebab meshing yang aku guna kecik sangat untuk capture nonlinearity beam tu (waktu ni tahun 2004-2005 yg RAM computer aku 2G). Meshing yang kecik ni bermakna K yang sangat besar.

So kalau nak analysis sebatang beam ni pun makan hari, apa yang kita aspect dari analysis of satellite data dalam kes MH370? Mesti la ambil masa yang lama jugakan?

Macam harini, baru military China announced finding satellite imaging diorang walaupun ia diambil 9 mac itu hari. Diorang announced bila diorang dah pastikan size object yang satellite observed tu dalam magnitude yang suit dengan magnitude pesawat (i.e 10-100meter). Bukan nya diorang lambat tapi bukan senang nak pastikan magnitude tu. Itupun bukan diorang confirm pun itu adalah MH370, apa yang diorang confirmkan hanyalah magnitude (in length) of objek yang dicerap oleh satellite tu bersesuaian dengan sepatutnya.

Kenapa lambat? kenapa dicerap 9 mac baru nak buat announcement? Tu la, bukannya senang nak buat kiraan dan verification. Image satelite tu perlu di refined untuk dapat resolution yang tinggi dan ini semua adalah high precision analysis yang saiz "K"nya sangat besar. kalau beam aku yang sebatang pun took days to be analyzed yg ini lagilah, verification nya lagilah strict sebab ini bukan ttg thesis PhD tapi melibatkan world affair. Ingat boleh main2 ke?

Lepas tu apa nak marah2 sangat sebab lambat dapat information? Korang ramai ambil kelas Information System Pn Halina (my wife) kan? Didnt you remember, tak kesah lah kita ada information seribu ke, sepuluh ribu ke, semuanya takde value kalau ia tak verified.

Kenapa nak tahu juga macam2? Kenapa setiap kali PC kita nak dengar benda yang sama macam dalam FB? Kalau tak dengar, kita maki hamun kerajaan tak buat kerja la, tentera lembap la, marine slow la dan macam2 lagi.

Nak tahu sebab nak "seronok" ke? Bro, "keseronokan" kita should be the last consideration for them as other matters are far more important; nasib penumpang dan crew, perasan dan kebajikan family yg terlibat, hubungan antara negara dan etc.

So as final remark, aku cakap pada student2 aku, korang yang dah belajar dgn aku ni, yang lebih faham engineering, technology and science ni jangan lah berperangai macam orang lain. Biarlah orang yang tak berapa pandai tapi perasan pandai tu yang merepek di FB dan internet.

*Biarkan Khalid Samad merapu2 sesuka hati dia. So much of a leader-to-be! cehh

note: statement * di atas aku tak cakap dalam kelas tapi aku tambah di sini.

MY FATHER AND MY UPBRINGING

This is Mohd Yassin Shariff, my father. He retired as acting Perak's Jabatan Pengairan dan Saliran (JPS) Public Relation Officer (PRO) but originally was a draughtsman. He was acting the post until his retirement because he didn't have any university degree but was excellent in managing JPS state's affair hence the prolonged acting of the post.

From him I learned what passion, quality and integrity are. He took pride in all his works and would tell all about them to mom and we, his kids, would then listen to it as well with amusement and admiration.

I believe this what makes up the other half of life education. Whilst we learn the "technical" aspect of life in school, the other half, that is the "spiritual" one, we learn in at home, we learn it from our parents, we learn it from our family.

If our parents were the passionate kind, we would be passionate too. If they were men of integrity, we would be too. Because we are what we listened and watched when we were kids.

And looking further at my greater family; my cousins for example, although we are not that grandly rich and famous but we are doing not bad. Most of us are professionals and many are quite successful businessmen. In fact, one of my cousin is the CEO and owner of Tutti Frutti Malaysia. In addition, three of my cousins got to the level of state player in Malaysia's football premier league.

And I would say we are all self-developed Malays, in the sense we are not politically connected, in the sense we optimized what have been provided for us by the government but nothing more. In the sense, our grandfather, SAIDIN ALANG MAT JASAT was just a chicken seller on a bicycle.

Now, the reason I write all these is to stress that, although our education system is partly to be blamed for many mischiefs in our society but there is another half that must be taken into consideration that is UPBRINGING. This is where the role of parents, uncles and aunties, older brothers and sisters come into play.

If we can blame the teachers and the schools and the ministry, why can not we take a little time to look back at our family; have they done their parts, have we done our parts?

This writing of mine was triggered by my attempt to search for reasons why there are distinct differences in the behavior and performance of some malays in general and some malay students in particular as compared to their counterparts; in terms of passion, enthusiasm, sincerity, integrity and quality in their study (for students) and/or in their works (for society).

Maybe, when I talk, say, about PASSION to some, their appreciation towards that very WORD is less simply because it is alien to them; alien as they didn't get the chance to hear and watch the manifestation of that WORD when they were kids.

So, am I writing this to downgrade my people? NO!

Am I writing this to say there is no hope for my people due to the lacking of our upbringing? NO!

Instead, I am writing this to say that there is another half of life education that governs our performance both as an individual and as a member of society.

WE must START HAVING THIS OTHER HALF; those had missed it during childhood, they must ACQUIRE it by themselves NOW and those who are starting a family on their own must ensure this half of life education to be manifested in their future family.

For this is the only way our people can change as a group, this is the only way we can change our culture for the better.

The change must be done in a collective manner, the change must be done FROM HOME.

wallahua'lam

HURAIAN BUKU "SOME TIME WITH FEYNMAN" - part 2

(ini sambungan, sila klik SINI utk baca Part 1)

so, apa yg Feynman "ajar"kan kepada Leonard?

Pertamanya, Feynman kata jgn risau sangat. Mmg biasa utk ahli akademik untuk kadang2 tak dapat idea untuk research. So jgn panic.

*sama macam John Nash dalam A Beautiful Mind kan? Ingat tak aku tulis dulu how he searched for an original idea to distinguish himself. Ini la yang aku cakap, lagi banyak kita baca dan kenal ahli2 akademik tersohor, kita akan perasan (notice) how they shared the same values.

Kedua, Feynman kata kita kena ingat yang scientiest dan manusia-biasa tak jauh beza. Manusia-biasa pun buat creative work, buat prediction based on pattern CUMA BEZANYA, ahli scientist akan work dengan creative work itu dan buat prediction dengan cari pattern itu, untuk tempoh yang jauh lebih lama dan sangat tertumpu, sampai bertahun lamanya berbanding manusia-biasa.

Sbg contoh, katakan la utk manusia-biasa, Abu dan Ali sepatutnya berjumpa pukul 3 di satu kedai. Tapi selepas Abu tunggu disitu sampai 3.30, Ali tak sampai lagi. So, otak Abu pun ligat berpusing cuba mengagak (meneka) dimana Ali mungkin ada. So selalunya (pattern) waktu ini Ali ada di rumah makciknya. So, Abu pun start motor dan pegi ke rumah makcik Ali dan lihat Ali ada disitu, rupa2nya Ali terlupa yang diaorang ada buat janji.

So, inilah contoh bagaimana proses sains iaitu membuat pemerhatian (observation), membuat analisis (pattern tracing) dan membuat tekaan (prediction) adalah sifat semulajadi manusia dan semua kita mengamalkannya. Bezanya scientiest akan lakukan proses ini dengan lebih mendalam, lama dan beriltizam dgn satu tujuan, iaitu menambah baik sistem kehidupan manusia.

Feynman kata;

"Really all we do is a hell of a lot more of one particular kind of thing that is normal and ordinary! People do have imagination, they JUST DON'T WORK ON IT AS LONG. Creativity is done by everybody, it's just that scientists do more of it. What isn't ordinary is to do it so INTENSIVELY that all this experience is piled up for all these years on the same limited subject...it's trying to find the potentiality as a human being".

Ok apa yang boleh kita belajar ialah, nature utama pekerjaan kita sebagai ahli akademik, tak kiralah pensyarah atau students ialah

WORK ON SOME THINGS AND THINK OF SOME THINGS FOR A LONG TIME AND INTENSIVELY.

We dont give up, we persevere (bertahan) sehingga kita betul2 FAHAM, sehingga kita betul2 MASTER sesuatu subject, topic dan issue. Kita baca2, kita fikir2, kita derive2, kita buat2, kita ulang balik bacaan2, fikiran2 dan perbuatan2 tadi. WE ITERATE!!!

So pasal ni la aku di fakulti semacam "menyendiri". Bukan sebb aku suka buat kepala sendiri tapi as an academic, aku rasa kita perlu spend more time on reading alone, thinking alone and "working alone", else, our intensity akan terganggu oleh orang lain. Ada beratus benda nak dibaca, ada beratus equations nak difikir, so seriusly, mmg aku tak sempat untuk benda lain. And this is why, aku selalu cakap dan tulis

IN JB, IT'S STRICTLY BUSINESS, IN KAMPUNG, IS WHERE MY HAPPINESS AWAITS.

To me, this is PROFESSIONALISM.

Ok sambung balik. So basically its all about perseverence; macamana kita boleh terus bertahan untuk tempoh yang lama tanpa putus asa.

Sebab, dengan hanya bertahan then baru lah idea dan kejayaan boleh datang. Sapa2 yang cepat mengalah, idea dan kejayaan TAK SEMPAT NAK "DATANG" PADA DIA!

ok, untuk faham lagi apa yg aku cuba sampaikan di atas; kita baca lagi apa yang Feynman kata (seperti dibawah);

"I am working on this very hard problem now, and have been for the last few years. The first thing I tried to do with this problem is try to find some sort of mathematical way of doing it, solving some equations...In this case I just tried everything...I've struggled with this method and that method. Maybe that's what I do-I try as much as I can different kinds of things that don't work, and if its doesn't work I move on to some other way of trying it...so then I thought, well, if I understood how things behaved, roughly, that would tell me more or less what kind of mathematical forms I might try. So then I spent a lot of time thinking about how it worked, roughly"

So nampak tak? Ini came from the famous physicist ni, a noble prize winner lagi. So betul orang cakap, genius tu sebenarnya hard-work dan bukan setakat nasib sahaja. Sedangkan genius macam Feynman pun kerja tak henti2, fikir tak henti2, ini kan kita. Sepatutnya, kita kena lagi kuat kerja, membaca, berfikir berkali2 ganda dari feynman.

dan pasal ini la aku hairan, macamana kita boleh bazirkan banyak masa sedangkan kerja kita banyak sangat.

pasal ni la aku hairan kenapa students kita ada banyak masa untuk bercakap ttg politik dan bergaduh sama sendiri. kalau mmg pandai dan jawab semua soalan perfect, tak pe juga. tapi cakap phung phang phung phang, tapi bila soal pelajaran dia sendiri, merapu2 jawapannya. aku tahulah, aku yang marking paper exam diorang.

Sama juga dengan pensyarah, aku pelik macmana kita masih sempat "beraktiviti" yang macam2 sedangkan ada banyak lagi loophole dalam sistem pengajaran kita.

Pasal ini jugalah, aku menentang sangat pelajar2 tajaan negara buat PHD tapi buat kerja part time sedangkan duit tajaan sudah cukup. Kalau tak cukup, duit tajaan utk yuran sahaja contohnya, tak pe lah cari kerja part time; untuk survive tak pe. Ini tidak, bawak balik bawak "harta karun" ber tan2.

yes korang boleh kata, kerja part time tu tak mengganggu study korang dan yes korang kata korang boleh dapat PhD. Tapi kita cakap ttg what you and the country would be missing during that 3 hours sehari yang korang buat kerja part time lap lantai "orang putih" tu.

Kita cakap tentang, kalau orang lain, adakah mereka akan buat perkara yang sama (cuci lantai orang putih) jika diberikan"nikmat" yang sama (semua ditanggung)?

Kita cakap tentang, kita disana tu bukan atas duit MAK BAPAK KITA SENDIRI tapi duit orang, duit negara. Ada tujuannya negara tanggung kita belajar iaitu DAPATKAN ILMU SEBANYAK MUNGKIN UNTUK SETIAP SAAT YANG POSSIBLE, ULANG, SETIAP SAAT YANG POSSIBLE.

Kita cakap tentang 3 jam, yang kalau Feynman, dia akan gunakan untuk learn, think and try out all the possible solutions to solve a problem.

Dan mungkin ada yang kata, "arrghh malas aa macam tu, letih la macam ni..."

Ok fine, tak pe. Tapi yang cakap macamni, please:

1. jangan sambung PhD dgn tajaan negara. bagi peluang tersebut kpd yang betul2 menghargainya dan "tak malas" dan yang mahukan WORLD BEST

2. jangan jadi pensyarah sebab orang macamni cuma akan merosakkan lagi profession tersebut di negara ni

3. jangan complain hidup susah dan jangan salahkan orang dan kerajaan. kehidupan senang yang kita impikan tu cuma akan dapat kalau effort kita at least sama macam orang lain. kalau pensyarah dan students kita jauh panggang dari Feynman dan students MIT, macam tu lah jugak negara kita akan jauh panggang dari negara maju.

wallahu'alam

*Dalam Part 3 nanti, aku akan tulis ttg rahsia Feynman bagaimana dia boleh persevere (bertahan) dalam kerja dia.

**pic diambil di kedai minum tepi sg perak as scheduled

HURAIAN BUKU "SOME TIME WITH FEYNMAN" - part 1

Ini kisah Leonard Mlodinow dan pengalaman nya ber"kawan" dan ber"guru" dengan Richard Feynman, one of the best physicist in modern era and definitely the COOLEST. Kisah tentang bagaimana kerisauan Leonard dalam meneruskan kecemerlangan sebagai faculty member di Caltech selepas kejayaan PhDnya di Berkeley dan bagaimana Feynman gave a sort of comfort.

banyak yg boleh kita pelajari terutamanya bagaimana universiti di negara maju adalah tempat yang sangat "mulia" dan mempunyai "persaingan" yang sangat tinggi. kerjaya sebagai akademik bukan main2 sebaliknya satu "penghormatan" terbesar yang one could have.

Dengan baca kisah ini, kita boleh bandingkan dengan situasi kita; bila kita jadi pensyarah, adakah kita benar2 rasa "sangat terhormat" lalu menjaga amanah dan tanggungjawab di tahap tertinggi?

adakah kita merasakan, untuk berada di universiti, tak kesahlah sebagai students atau ahli akademik, adalah sesuatu yang sangat PENTING dimana seluruh human civilization bergantung kepada kita?

kita boleh jawab persoalan2 ini as we go along dengan kisah leonard ini.

kerisauan Leonard ini boleh kita baca dari petikan dibawah:

" I had been given my fellowship because my PhD thesis which was on quantum theory in infinite dimensions, had caught the attention of some notable physicist. Did I really fit in here (Caltech), with two Nobel Prize winners down the hall and the best students in the country all around me? Week after week, I came to my office and pondered the great open problems of physics. No ideas came to me. It was certain that my earlier work had been a fluke (nasib) that I would never again discover anything worthwhile"

Apa yang kita boleh belajar:

1. sepatutnya jadi pensyarah ni bukan senang, kena betul2 power baru boleh dapat. dan mcm leonard, walaupun dia dah habis power dah sbb dapat PhD berkeley tapi even that, dia masih lagi ragu2 jika dibandingkan di caltech. begitulah sepatutnya persaingan di akademia.

2. sepatutnya kita kena ada ahli akademik yang betul2 kita "puja" atau "angau" yang boleh bagi benchmark yang tertinggi. dalam petikan diatas, dua akademik yang disebutkan adalah feynman dan murray gell-man, dua nobel prize winners in physics. siapakah orang yang betul2 kita respect dan "angau"kan dalam universiti kita? kalau takde, kena adakan.

bercakap tentang "angau", sebenarnya Leonard dah angaukan Feynman sejak dia umur 20 tahun bila dia terbaca buku2 feynman. Ini tulisannya:

"i was twenty and felt grown-up...at night there was little to do except...visit the small library..which had a few dozen books in English...one of them was a paperback called The Character of physical law (aku ada buku ni) by a fellow i had vaguely heard-Richard Feynman...Feynman made it wondrous and magical. I was riveted. I wanted to read more. There were three other books by Feynman in the collection-his three-volume The Feynman Lectures on Physics...They were chatty; they were amusing; it felt as if Feynman was in the room speaking to you...I promised myself that I would someday make a discovery. And that I would someday meet this Professor Feynman"

ok, pernah tak kita angau kepada mana2 buku dan mana2 author, jawab pada diri sendiri dengan ikhlas. pernah tak kita jumpa satu buku yang "gila best ah!". kalau tak pernah, macamana kita nak jadi phD students dan pensyarah yang world class? kalau tak pernah, janganlah hairan yang universiti kita nombor 300.

Dan cita2 leonard waktu umur 20 akhirnya dapat ditunaikan bila dia dapat menjadi fakulti member di caltech spt yang ditulis berikut:

"At first I was ecstatic that not only did I have an academic job, but it was an elite university- the home of my hero Feynman. And it was a dream job, a particularly prestigious multiyear fellowship with complete academic freedom"

Hmmm, berapa ramai dari kita yang dah jadi pensyarah ni yang really2 menikmati kerja kita dan menghormati kerjaya kita macam diorang ni?

Ok cukup untuk malam ni. Esok aku sambung lagi pasal buku ni. Tapi sebelum aku undur diri, aku harap korang fikir2 kan lah jawapan kpd soalan2 aku diatas sebab ia mengdefinisikan skop tugas kita sebagai pelajar research dan ahli akademik.

CHAIN REACTION

Sekarang ni banyak sangat isu ttg pendidikan, PPSMI, ranking universiti, ranking negara dalam membaca, sains dan matematik, isu plagiat, isu graduan menganggur (bukan engineering), isu kolej dan universiti macam cendawan tubuh, politik universiti, KPI, dan macam2 lagi.

Permasalahan ini sebenarnya should be expected sebab dalam masa yang sama, negara ada masalah2 lain, harga barang naik, agamawan bergaduh, budak rogol dan bunuh budak, parlimen macam budak2 dan lain2.

It looks like, apa yang timbul sekarang adalah apa yang telah terkumpul selama ini, tinggal nak keluar je, dan sekarang dia dah keluar pun. Dan biasalah, bila kita sorok sesuatu bawah carpet, kalau dia nak keluar, dia akan keluar serentak.

Matematiknya, ia dipanggil Eigenproblem; phenomenon akan berlaku jika dan hanya jika, sesuatu state di capai. Sebelum dicapai, takkan terjadi langsung apa2, tapi once tercapai, dia terus meletup. Sama seperti quantum state of energy, sama macam kes natural frequency dan resonan, sama macam kes buckling and instability.

Salah kerajaan ke? ye tapi bukan keseluruhan. Its a vicious circle. Kerajaan menentukan sistem pendidikan, sistem pendidikan menghasilkan rakyat, rakyat pula memilih dan menjadi kerajaan, dan kerajaan menentukan sistem pendidikan, sistem pendidikan menghasilkan rakyat dan seterusnya.

So apa nak buat? kalau nak ikutkan circle tu, kalau nak ikutkan kita ni terhasil dari generasi yang dulu, sampai bila2 kita akan terus begini. Apa option yang ada?

First option, tukar kerajaan.

Utk option ini mungkin ada kebaikannya tapi bukankah alternative yang ada ni dari rakyat yang sama? Mungkin mereka nampak je bagus, sudahnya macam itu juga. Antaranya bila Rafizi Ramli kaitkan kemerosotan pendidikan kita kerana tiada kebebasan berpolitik di universiti. Ini apa cerita? Mungkin untuk yang ambil political science mungkin relevan, tapi aku tak nampak langsung apa kaitan politik dengan membaca buku. Kalau students tu penyokong PR, tak boleh masuk library pinjam buku ke? kalau dia PR, electric dalam bilik dia dipotong ke supaya dia tak boleh baca buku?

Apa option lagi?

Pada aku, the best option yang robust dan sustainable adalah ubah masyarakat. Tapi macamana? Lagi susah sebab lagi ramai. Tukar kerajaan jauh lagi senang.

Yup, memang susah tapi tak mustahil asalkan kita sanggup tunggu dalam 10 tahun.

Macamana?

Camni, kita mulakan dari sistem pendidikan, sebab ingat tak, pendidikan menghasilkan masyarakat?

Tapi macamana, bukan ke kerajaan yang control pendidikan? Betul pasal tu kita tak boleh tunggu kerajaan, pasal tu kita kena buat sendiri, pasal tu kita kena hasilkan "FLUCTUATION"!

Apa tu fluctuation? Hmm teknikalnya bermaksud an occurrence of abnormality but distinct, a spike in time( lebih kurang la), tapi yang senangnya macam ni.

Pasal ni la aku selalu cakap pada students aku, considering keadaan kita yang mendesak sekarang ni, WE NEED MORE LIKE-MINDED TEACHERS THAN ENGINEERS. So, I really hope those yang belajar dengan aku will be teachers so that diorang pun boleh jalankan mission ini, this CHAIN REACTION mission, BUTTERFLY EFFECT if you prefer.

This mission is simple. Katakan aku can produce 5 very good teachers in a year and I keep producing this in the next 10 years. Me alone will produce 50 good teachers. The first five (the first batch) however, cuma boleh start producing new teachers after they finish their PhD so akan lag 5 years, meaning as a good teacher, each of them will produce another five on their own but since they lag of five years, lets calculate their production utk lima tahun sahaja (bukan aku kata tadi, kena tunggu kejap 10 tahun, ingat tak?)

so the first batch will produce a total of 5x5x5= 125. But then, their students kita tak boleh kira dalam potential teachers sebab diorang akan lag 5 years, faham tak ni?

ok itu my first batch, my second batch pulak ada 4 years to contribute, so they will produce, 5x5x4=100, my third 5x5x3= 75, my forth, 5x5x2=50 my fifth, 5x5x1= 25.

Based on this, dalam masa 10 tahun dari sekarang kita akan ada seramai 425 very2 good teachers, as good as me. Dan percayalah, those yang pernah belajar dengan aku know HOW GOOD I AM. With 425 teachers as good as me at least, many will be better of course, our country can do anything, achieve anything insya Allah in no time (tapi sabar kena tunggu 10 tahun lagi la).

Tapi ini baru aku punya downline. Ramai kat FB ni pensyarah dan juga nak habis PhD. So kalau korang jugak belajar dan mengajar sungguh2 korang pun ada downline sendiri.

Based on list FB friend aku ni (artikel ni originally written in my FB), ada beratus pensyarah dan those yng tgh buat PhD. just say 100 daripada kita bersetuju utk buat mission ni (tak susah, nekad belajar dan mengajar sungguh2), pergh, in 10 years time akan ada 42500 teachers dan rakyat yang as smart as us and many more will be smarter.

if this can be achieved, percayalah, perubahan yang sangat2 besar akan berlaku. InsyaAllah perubahan yang membawa kebaikan.

Untuk increasekan appreciation korang terhadap this number (42500), aku pernah tulis dulu yang aku pernah diberi statistic oleh seorang professor dari Iran in his talk. He presented, while Japan alone ada 8000 world scientiests, US 5000 world (kalau aku tak silap la, tapi yang tentu mmg ribu), scientist Islam jika dikumpul dari semua negara Islam, di ulang, DARI SEMUA NEGARA ISLAM, cuma ada 300 shj. So nampak tak?

Ok jangan lah students bukan Islam aku kecil hati. No no, aku guna contoh diatas hanya untuk stress a point sahaja. Tidak bermaksud korang diketepikan. I love you guys sama. I see my students colourless, youre not Malay, youre not Chinese, youre not Indian, youre my students, youre Malaysian, I dont segregate my students. My student is my student. Eh dah la, student aku tau, aku macamana.

So setelah tulis panjang ni, jom;

1. student2 aku belajar rajin2 sampai faham betul2 dan sampai PhD dan kalau tak nak jadi lecturer takpe but jadi lah the best engineer and the best citizen

2. teachers, lecturers and teachers-to-be, lecturers-to-be belajar rajin2, faham betul2 supaya kita boleh mengajar bagus2, student senang faham dan jadi betul2 pandai sampai diorang boleh jadi teachers as good as us, if not better, or become the best citizens.

Insya Allah, the CHAIN REACTION will work. Aja! Figthing!

STUDENTS AKU TAK INGAT SUBJECT SEMESTER LEPAS: APA JADI DENGAN AMANAH?

Baru habis makmal buckling of strut. Subjek makmal ni subjek Tahun 2. Lepas aku habis derived the differential equation nya, aku tanya kat students macamana nak solve differential equation ni? Sorang pun tak jawab.

Ok, lepas tu aku tanya,

"korang ingat tak apa yang korang belajar dalam subject Differential Equation tahun satu?"

Diorang tak jawab lagi, senyum2 je.

Ok, lepas tu aku tanya lagi,

"Dalam subject tu, korang pernah dengar tak, separation of variables, undetermined coefficient method, laplace transform, fourier series?"

Terus diorang angguk2 tanda pernah dengar.

So aku tanya,

"buat apa korang belajar semua2 benda ni?

Diorang diam balik. Lepas tu aku jawab kan la,

"korang belajar semua benda2 ni sebab nak solve differential equation la."

So ini lah typicalnya sistem pembelajaran kita. Baru semester lepas belajar tapi students bukan sahaja tak ingat apa yang dibelajar, worse, diorang tak tahu pun diorang belajar untuk apa.

Ok sambung balik. Sebabkan itu, aku suruh diorang keluar handphone diorang letak atas meja. Ramai pakai samsung. Aku pun tanya kat diorang,

"korang tau tak handphone samsung ni la bagi duit kepada Korea?"

Lepas tu aku suh diorang tengok jam dan aku cakap,

"korang tahu tak jam tu la yang bagi duit pada Jepun (diorang ada yang pakai Casio)."

Lepas tu aku tanya, macamana Malaysia buat duit?

Ada yang jawab dengan buat rumah (engineering perspektif). Aku tanya balik,

"ok kalau kita buat rumah, kita ambik duit siapa? Kita buat kat Malaysia so kita ambil duit orang Malaysia juga kan? Dan orang yang bayar rumah tu mungkin dapat dari kerajaan melalui gaji dia tapi kerajaan dapat duit dari mana? Basically kerajaan dan negara kita dapat duit dari jual minyak, tapi kalau minyak ni takde macamana? Kalau minyak ni habis macamana?"

Lepas tu aku sambung lagi.

"Pasal tu la kita mengeluh sana, mengeluh sini, hidup ni susah, kita miskin, gula naik, minyak naik dan lain-lain. Memang sebahagiannya salah kerajaan sebab tak pandai menguruskan ekonomi tapi sebahagian lagi adalah salah rakyat yang macam kita, yang macam korang."

Korea, Jepun, UK, US maju, selesa dan mewah sebab rakyat2 nya boleh hasilkan teknologi untuk dijual, Samsung, Iphone, Asus, Nokia dan macam2 lagi. Diorang tarik duit orang lain masuk ke negara diorang.

Lepas tu aku tanya diorang, kenapa agaknya kita tak boleh buat samsung kita sendiri, iphone kita sendiri lepas tu jual seluruh dunia, kita tak nak atau kita tak mampu?

Diorang jawab, kita tak mampu. Yup, aku kata betul, mmg sebab kita tak mampu. Kita tak mampu sebab kita takda ilmunya dan kenapa takde ilmunya?

"Sebab korang tak boleh ingat pun subjek semester lepas, bukan sahaja tak ingat, korang tak tahu pun tujuan kenapa belajar subjek tu. Dengan hasilkan students yang macam ni,sampai bila pun kita takkan mampu hasilkan apa2. Sampai bila2 la kita akan mengadu susah dan miskin sebab kita tak mampu generate pendapatan utk negara pun.", aku cakap.

Dan aku sambung lagi. Ok lah, bila dah tahu ini semua, apa perasaan korang?

Apa rasanya tak tahu pun apa yang dibelajar?

Apa rasanya lulus semester lepas tapi tak tahu pun subject tu untuk apa?

Sedangkan korang students UTM, best universiti kat Malaysia in Engineering, kalau korang macamani, kat universiti lain lagi la teruk keadaannya.

Apa rasanya bila gunakan duit rakyat (melalui scholarship, PTPTN, guna facilities dalam universities) tapi korang tak "sedar" pun korang masuk kelas dan tak "sedar" pun keluar kelas, tak tahu pun "tadi" korang belajar subject apa dan untuk apa?

Apa rasanya tak dapat buat samsung, iphone, casio untuk negara sedangkan rakyat "bayar" korang untuk belajar dan kemudian hasilkan dan jualkan benda2 ni?

Apa rasanya tak ingat langsung subjek tahun lepas? kalau tak ingat subject tahun lepas, korang akan ingat ke subjek tahun ini untuk tahun depan?

Lepas tu aku cakap lagi, korang tau tak kenapa agaknya negara2 Islam semua miskin2, bergaduh sama sendiri tak habis?

"Korang islam kan, so kalau korang macamani, orang islam lain pun macam ni jugak, belajar sebab nak lepas exam, belajar tak ikhlas, tak boleh nak ingat pun apa yang dah dibelajar dan gunakan untuk buat sesuatu kearah kebaikan."

Mestilah keadaanya macam ni jugak, kalau tak pun mesti lebih teruk. Sebab kalau nak bandingkan dengan pelajar islam di negara2 lain, pelajar Islam di UTMlah antara yang paling top. So kalau yang top pun tak boleh ingat dan faham pun apa yang dibelajar, dinegara Islam yang lain lagi lah.

Tapi kenapa jadi macam ni? kenapa pelajar Islam macam korang boleh tak ingat apa yang korang belajar semester lepas?

Sebabnya fahaman islam kita salah. Sebabnya, kalau betul fahaman kita, kita akan anggap belajar ni amanah.

Amanah sebab kita pakai duit orang utk belajar.

Amanah sebab tugas kita adalah untuk majukan umat dan masyarakat dengan hasilkan sumber rezeki melalui ilmu2 yang kita belajar.

Tapi macamana kita nak buat amanah2 ni kalau kita tak ingat pun apa yang kita dah belajar, apatah lagi kalau nak gunakannya di masa depan?

Kita hanya diajarkan yang amanah itu jgn makan rasuah, jangan menipu, jangan hipokrit. Tapi ada satu amanah yang tidak pula di ajarkan iaitu menjalankan tugas yang ditakdirkan oleh Allah pada kita pada waktu itu.

Kalau dah ditakdirkan kita posmen, adalah amanah pertama kita untuk jadi posmen yang terbaik, selepas habis jalankan amanah ini, baru la kita buat amanah yang lain seperti berdakwah secara formal.

Begitu juga dengan jadi pensyarah kejuruteraan, jadi dulu pensyarah kejuruteraan yang terbaik dengan mahir betul2 dan hebat topik2 engineering dan teknik pengajarannya, dah habis amanah ini baru la buat amanah yang lain, dakwah formal ke, politik ke.

Biar dakwah agama secara formal dibuat dulu oleh para ustaz2 dan agamawan2. Begitu juga politik, biar ahli2 politik yang jalankan tugas mereka. Kita laksanakan amanah kita dulu, dah settle rasanya, baru la ceburi bidang amanah orang lain pulak.

Dan students, amanah korang yang pertama adalah belajar. So dah ditakdirkan korang belajar engineering, pastikan betul2 faham topik2 engineering tu dulu, topik lain, wahabi ke, syiah ke, sufism ke, politik ke, itu kemudian.

Biar students fakulti tamadun islam dan pengurusan yang bincangkan perkara2 ini. Korang dengar dan baca je perbincangan mereka dan ulas sikit2 cukup. Tak payah nak full swing bidang orang lain selagi bidang sendiri tak habis conquer lagi.

So, please revise balik subject2 yang dahulu dan relatekan dengan subjek2 sekarang dan akan datang.

Simpan niat dalam hati yang kita nak belajar sungguh2, faham sungguh2 supaya nanti kita boleh bangunkan umat dan masyarakat.

Let's jalankan amanah yang Allah dah berikan kepada kita, as an engineering students, engineering students lah, as lecturer, lecturer lah, as agamawan, agamawan lah, as politician, politician lah.

ALLAH KNOWS BEST.

A STORY OF PI AND THE NEED FOR TECHNICAL ENGLISH READING

This article of mine was published in The Malaysian Insider Oct 22, 2013. To read from the source click HERE

We are all familiar with Pi, the mathematical constant and its glorious treatment by scientists to the extent we have movies about it; the most famous one would be The Contact starring Jodie Foster. The movie was about Pi being the constant claimed to be understood universally even by the extraterrestrial. It was featured in the movie that, if the aliens want to communicate with us, they would send us the number 3.1416.....

But why is this? Why such claim? Why Pi is treated and accepted by scientists, mathematicians and engineers alike as so fundamental? These questions are what we about to answer.

To start with, Pi is the ratio of a circle's circumferential to its diameter. It is a constant having the value of 3.14 accurate up to two decimal places for all circles.

As a number, Pi is irrational thus has infinite decimals without any repeating pattern. This means, the decimal places will never end but weirdly though, there will be no repetition whatsoever in the occurring decimals. Meaning, there will be no repetition such as, Pi=3.14......676.......676.....676...infinity.

You got me?

So this Pi is but we also want to know why Pi is so fundamental, right? To know this, we must discuss the purpose of having the constant in the first place.

Well, if we want to talk about the purpose of Pi, we must hold to the concept that measurement only has meaning if it is referred to a point or frame of reference and usually this reference is a constant; a value that is applicable to all conditions.

In the context of a circle, Pi is the circle's property; a constant that is applicable to all circles regardless of size. Having established or accepted this constant, other properties of circle such as area, perimeter/circumferential and angle can now be defined based on this constant. Thus the reason why the area of a circle is given as Pi*r^2 and the perimeter as 2*Pi*r.

Accordingly, those entities that are circle-related such as the harmonic motion which can be described geometrically by the path of a circle can then be described using Pi, for example through Fourier series which components are An*sin(n*2*Pi*t/T) and Bn*cos(n*2*Pi*t/T).

I purposely mention Fourier series so that now we have at our disposal some mathematical expression (other than the circle) which can be used in answering question about the practicality of Pi such as "when Pi appears in physical use?"

For example, since the solution of the differential equation of a buckling strut can be given by a Fourier series, the buckling load of the strut is thus given as Pi^2*EI/L^2.

See the inclusion of Pi in the formula? This is an immediate demonstration of the use of Pi in physical problem beyond its use in just defining a circle's properties.

It is all come back to differential equation isn't?

This is an example of the building of mental construct which progress is built consecutively upon prior knowledge/concept.

The same mental construct (i.e the need for a "constant" frame to progress) is applied in other scientific arguments, for example, in Einstein's Special Relativity where the constant nature of light speed has been chosen as the point of reference for which other motions are relatively measured.

So it is the mental construct of science to:

1. First establish a constant which later to be taken as point/frame of reference

2. Define other entities relative to this point of reference

3. To apply the same mental construct to other problems hence its consecutive progress

(Point 3 in fact, highlights the limitation of science and human "brain").

This is why Pi is so "great". The mental construct that is built upon it what makes Pi so fundamental thus "great".

This is why it is claimed by those scientists that if the alien do exist, they would transmit this number so as to telling us their existence and that they comprehend the same universal laws.

We should not stop here as the understanding on the importance of a constant will increase our appreciation towards the standard way of scientific thinking, works and evolution. We have a glance at it already so we should say more so as to nail our understanding especially on the progressive building of a mental construct.

It would allow us to understand better, for example, why Newton's Law is insufficient. It turns out that, the insufficiency of Newton's Law is due the dependency of the law on space and time as the absolute (constant) entities resulting in the failure to describe the phenomenon of electromagnetism.

Extending the discussion would then increase our appreciation towards Einstein's theory who has resorted to the idea of taking the speed of light as the new constant (no longer space and time as in Newton's, in fact these entities change according to a transformation known as Lorentz's transformation) and solved Newton's deficiency.

And we should by now able to appreciate the search for TOE (Theory of Everything) as scientists believe that there should be a more fundamental constant than the speed of light that would define all physical phenomenons and omit the need to have separate laws for the macroscopic level (relativity) and microscopic level (quantum).

In other words, there should be (as they believe) a constant that will exist in all future mathematical statements, just like Pi appears in the circle's area formulation of Pi*r^2.

This is the example of the mental construct of math and science and if we look carefully, it is philosophical in nature, as philosophical as Immanuel Kant's, Friedrich Nietzsche's and others but with objectivity.

This is the reason why Stephen Hawking stated that "philosophy is dead". What he meant was, whilst a present scientist can understand the arguments of a philosopher, the latter cannot do the same to the former, on top of the latter's lack of objectivity.

Anyway, these are the mathematical and scientific mental constructs I emphasized in my previous articles, both in The Malaysian Insider, Let PPSMI be bygone but its spirit come alive in our universities (October 4) and NST (October 9).

And if someone ask me whether I can explain all these in Bahasa Malaysia, I will say yes but then remind him that this ability of mine only come after I read tens of English written textbooks. So it is a kind of chicken-egg condition. You see, what I wrote above cannot be found in a single writing or book but is a cross-reference from one book to another in providing relations, patterns and reasons; a mental construct. – October 22, 2013.

* Dr Airil Yasreen Mohd Yassin is a senior lecturer and computational mechanicist at the Faculty of Civil Engineering, UTM Johor Bahru.

SAINS DAN MATEMATIK MEMBENTUK PERWATAKAN INDIVIDU DAN MASYARAKAT SISTEMATIK

Nota: utk mengelakkan sebarang kontroversi, kita mulakan tulisan ini dengan pernyataan

"Sains dan matematik adalah ilmu Allah. Dan semua ilmu Allah akan membawa kebaikan jika diamalkan dengan betul"

diikuti dengan firman Allah

“Katakanlah: "Adakah sama orang-orang yang mengetahui dengan orang-orang yang tidak mengetahui?" Sesungguhnya orang yang berakallah yang dapat menerima pelajaran.(Az-Zumar: 9)

Ok, dengan dua perenggan di atas, insya Allah tiada kontroversi so let's start.

Sains dan matematik, dengan fahaman dan amalan yang mantap, akan mempengaruhi corak pemikiran dan tatacara kehidupan kerana:

1. Sains dan matematik melatih seseorang untuk menjadi orang yang consistent kerana formulasi sains dan math is all about consistency. Ia bermaksud, a valid argument or principle will always remain valid. Utk seseorang yang bekerja dengan sains dan matematik, beliau secara sedar dan tidak sedar dilatih untuk menjadi man of principle. Kalau hari ini dia tak buang sampah merata-rata, minggu depan pun dia tak buang sampah merata-rata. Dia akan rasa bersalah jika dia buang sampah merata-rata.

2. Formulasi sains dan maths sentiasa ingin cuba mengelak contradiction, jika adapun, ia akan dianggap paradox dan akan dicuba untuk selesaikan. Jika tidak boleh juga, then ia akan dianggap hypothesis dan theory yang baru but until then, contradiction adalah sesuatu yang cuba dielakkan. Kesannya, orang yang dibiasakan dengan sains dan maths akan cuba mengelakkan diri dari menjadi hipokrit. Kalau A, A lah, kalau B, B lah. Kalau dia rasa boleh dia kata boleh tapi kalau tak, dia kata tak boleh. Dia akan walk the talk dan until dia able to walking the talk, dia akan cuba buat dulu then baru cakap. Dia akan cuba dapatkan or buat proof untuk support opinion dan tindakan dia.

3. Kerja-kerja sains and maths perlukan sifat critical untuk progress. Untuk jadi critical, sains dan maths perlukan data dan knowledge diselidiki tanpa prejudis. Ini amat berlawanan dengan dogmatic. Kesannya, mereka yang dipengaruhi pemikirannya oleh sains dan matematik tidak mudah menerima sesuatu tanpa usul periksa tetapi akan mempertimbangkan semua; open minded. Mereka tidak benarkan orang lain membuat keputusan untuk mereka tetapi mereka akan membuat keputusan sendiri setelah membuat analisis yang mempertimbangkan semua sumber yang possible diperolehi dan dari semua orang.

4. Formulasi sains dan matematik juga biasa dengan konsep memudahkan persamaan umum kepada khusus agar penyelesaian dapat dicapai. Ini melibatkan penggunaan-penggunaan assumptions yang berkaitan serta limitations dan toleransi ketepatan yang terhasil. Dengan ini, seorang individu akan lebih realistic dan objective sifatnya. Dia tahu setakat apa yang boleh dicapai dan apa yang perlu di"sacrifice"kan. Dia akan lebih conscious on the cause and effect. Dengan mengetahui limitations sesuatu keadaan, dia akan lebih bertoleransi.

Berdasarkan keempat-empat point diatas boleh di simpulkan sains dan matematik membentuk pemikiran dan tatacarahidup seseorang individu yang:

1. consistent (man of principle)
2. non-contradicting (not a hypocrite)
3. critical but open minded
4. realistic, objective, conscious and tolerant

Bagaimana ini membentuk masyarakat yang sistematik pula? Of course, individu membentuk masyarakat. Jika majoriti individu didalam masyarakat tersebut systematic, naturally, masyarakat tersebut akan turut menjadi sistematik.

Bagaimana pula masyarakat yang sistematik boleh membawa kepada taraf kehidupan yang lebih tinggi dan selesa serta harmoni? Sebagai contoh, boleh dihujahkan kehidupan di negara maju lebih selesa dan harmoni disebabkan oleh pemahaman mereka yang lebih baik dalam sains dan math (sains dan math lah sesuatu yg mereka ada tetapi kita tidak ada, so itu mesti puncanya) tetapi bagaimana ini boleh terjadi?

1. Dengan being consistent, seseorang atau satu masyarakat itu boleh mengerjakan sesuatu tugas dengan berpanjangan secara tekun dan iltizam serta terancang yang biasanya akan membawa kejayaan. Being consistent juga bermaksud berdisiplin maka seseorang atau satu masyarakat yang consistent akan lebih senang diuruskan dan dikawal maka kurang kacau bilau. Bila kurang kacau bilau, tenaga dan masa boleh lebih banyak digunakan untuk kebaikan.

2. Dengan being non-contradicting, seseorang atau satu masyarakat itu akan lebih ikhlas dan kurang menipu. Bila ikhlas, output lebih berkualiti, lebih baik fungsinya dan lebih mahal harganya bila "dijual". Bila kurang penipuan, kurang kacau bilau dan ketidakadilan maka lebih aman, maka lebih banyak masa dan tenaga untuk kebaikan.

3. Dengan being critical, seseorang atau masyarakat itu akan lebih dynamic dan progressive kerana mereka sentiasa mahu perubahan kearah yang lebih baik dengan cara menilai semula sistem yang ada, jika ada kelemahan akan dibetulkan, jika ada kebaikan ditambahkan lagi. Criticality memerlukan oped mindedness agar tiada teguran yang terlepas pandang, tiada prejudis yang menutup pandangan maka perubahan yang baik sentiasa akan dibuat. Seterusnya, bila terbiasa dengan sifat open minded ini, seseorang atau satu masyarakat itu tidak mudah berkecil hati dan tidak mudah rasa terhina yang kesannya akan mengurangkan pertelingkahan kerana selalunya, sifat mudah berkecil hati dan senang terasa dihina lah yang mencetuskan pergaduhan. Sekali lagi, bila kurang pertelingkahan, masa dan tenaga akan lebih banyak available untuk kebaikan.

4. Dengan being realistic dan objective, seseorang atau masyarakat itu boleh merangka kerja yang boleh dicapai secara optimum dengan "cost" yang rendah dan rendah juga risiko kegagalannya. Selain itu, mereka akan lebih realistic dengan sesuatu keadaan yang melanda dan tidak capat melatah, kurang sifat menghukum serta lebih tolerant. Ini menyebabkan mereka menghadapi permasalahan dengan tenang dan objective.

So persoalannya:

1. Adakah kita, as an individual bersifat consistent, non-contradicting, critical but open minded, realistic, objective, conscious dan tolerant?

2. Adakah masyarakat kita bersifat consistent, non-contradicting, critical but open minded, realistic, objective, conscious dan tolerant?

Jika ya, sila nyatakan (dalam hati) usaha atau project jangkamasa panjang yang kita sedang buat sekarang secara tekun, iltizam dan terancang? Jawabkan juga untuk masyarakat kita.

Jika ya, sila nyatakan (dalam hati) apakah kualiti kerja kita? Apakah bukti yang kita telah walked the talk? Jawabkan juga untuk masyarakat kita.

Jika ya, sila nyatakan (dalam hati) adakah kita benar2 kritikal? Adakah benar kita dengar semua pendapat tanpa prejudis?Jawabkan juga untuk masyarakat kita

Jika ya, sila nyatakan (dalam hati), adakah kita selalu marah dan tak puas hati dengan orang? Jawabkan juga untuk masyarakat kita.

Jika jawapan kepada persoalan2 diatas kurang memuaskan, itu menunjukkan kita atau masyarakat atau kedua-duanya sekali masih belum cukup sistematik dan ini MUNGKIN disebabkan oleh cara kita dan masyarakat kita belajar dan faham maths dan sains tidak betul dan belum cukup lagi seterusnya menyebabkan ciri-ciri kebaikan yang sepatutnya datang dari ilmu-ilmu tersebut tidak terserap dalam pemikiran dan tatacara hidup kita dan masyarakat kita.

Wallahualam.

BUAT TV DAN SAINS MENYESATKAN?

Sekarang ni dengan adanya TV, kita boleh tengok secara live umat Islam tawaf di Makkah, dapat dengar khutbah jumaat live dari Masjid Negara dan belajar dari kuliah2 agama di TV.

Tapi pernah ke kita terfikir bagaimana TV boleh bagi kita semua ni? kata lainya, have we ever wonder how TV works?

Sebenarnya, teknologi TV ni "senang" aje. TV kita terdiri dari jutaan point pada screennya dan gambar akan terhasil apabila point2 ini memberikan warna sepatutnya.

Analogynya macam kita nak buat lukisan, kita akan pecahkan lukisan tersebut kepada grid2 dan lukis dalam grid2 tersebut. Jika grid2 tu kita kecilkan lagi, sampai satu tahap, satu grid cuma perlu satu warna sahaja. Inilah juga konsep TV.

So far ok? boleh faham macamana gambar atau imej boleh terbentuk dekat skrin TV kita?

kalau faham, boleh la kita bincangkan pulak macamana kita boleh tahu warna apa nak pakai pada point2 di screen TV kita agar ia dapat berikan gambar seperti yg sepatutnya i.e kalau orang tawaf di makkah, kita boleh nampak diorang tawaf keliling kaabah sedangkan kita jauh beribu batu.

Senang aja, analoginya, katakan lah ada kawan kita di mekah ketika ini dan memberitahu kpd kita di Malaysia melalui telefon bahawa point ini warna merah, point itu warna hitam, point sana warna hijau dan seterusnya. Bila kita siap warnakan point2 ni selengkap2nya, kita akan dapat gambar pada screen tv kita yang menunjukkan apa yg sedang berlaku disana.

itu analoginya, tapi konsep sebenar yg digunakan tak la pulak jauh sangat. basically, di mekah kita akan ada transmitter yang akan hantar signal dan di Malaysia akan ada receiver yang menerima signal2 ini. Signal2 inilah yg akan bagitau point2 di screen TV nak guna warna apa, just macam yang dah kita bincangkan diatas.

tapi persoalannya, macamana signal2 ni boleh bagitau warna apa nak guna? pun senang juga. signal ni boleh diadjust frequency, amplitude dan wavelength nya. Frequency sekian, amplitude sekian dan wavelength sekian bermaksud warna hijau contohnya. seterusnya, value frequency, amplitude dan wavelength yang lain di set kan khas untuk warna biru, merah, biru air laut dan lain2.

Sbg contoh, sebabkan kita boleh adjust frequency dan amplitude wave ini, itu la si Morse (orang yg buat Morse Code) define kalau bunyi

- tut tuuut maknanya A
- tuuut tut tut tut maknanya B
- tuuut tut tuuut tut C

so dalam kes TV kita, boleh la di setkan so that

-tut tut tuuuut tuuut tut maknanya BIRU

- tut tut tut tuuut tuuut HIJAU

dan seterusnya, ada faham?

tapi, macamana kita boleh adjust value frequency, amplitude dan wavelength ni? aaaaa, ini la ilmu yang kita panggil electromagnetic theory. Bila james clerk maxwell jumpa theory ini lewat kurun ke 19, manusia utk pertama kali sedar akan wujudnya satu bentuk medan yang baru.

medan ini sangat pelik kerana ombaknya (its wave) boleh bergerak tanpa medium. Disebabkan tak perlu kan medium, ia bole bergerak JAUH dan LAJU; sejauh alam ini dan selaju cahaya (cahaya ialah salah satu electromagnetic). Antara ombak2 electromagnetic ini, itulah yg kita ada radio wave, micro wave, x rays dan gamma rays.

Sebabkan tak perlukan medium jugalah, wave2 ini sahaja yang boleh bergerak di angkasa lepas, dari satu planet ke planet yang lain, dari satu galaksi ke galaksi yang lain sebab angkasa lepas adalah vakum (tiada medium). Benda lain tak boleh, bunyi tak boleh, angin tak boleh, semua tak boleh la senang cerita.

So kalau boleh travel angkasa lepas, tentulah wave ini juga boleh travel dari Mekah ke Malaysia kan? Bila dah tahu hakikat ini, manusia pun berpecah kepala nak eksploit wave2 ini dan akhirnya kita berjaya hasilkan TV, satelit, radio, wifi dan lain2 teknologi.

Teknologi2 diatas semua gunakan sejenis wave electromagnetic iaitu Radio wave.Pasal tu la radio kita dipanggil radio.

Tapi macamana wave ni boleh bergerak di angkasa lepas? macamana ia boleh bergerak tanpa medium? macamana kita tahu semua ni?

semuanya bermula apabila james clerk maxwell berjaya derived empat partial differential equations yang relate magnetic strength, magnetic density, electrical strength dan electrical density secara serentak.

Dan apabila partial differential equations ini diselesaikan, ia beritahu kpd kita, apabila medan electric berubah ia akan menghasilkan medan magnetic dan bila medan magnetic ini pula berubah ia akan menghasilkan medan electric. So penghasilan medan yang bergilir-gilir ini menyebabkan wave electromagnetic itu terus bergerak tanpa memerlukan medium. Ada faham?

Kesimpulan:

1. Teknologi membantu kehidupan kita termasuk dalam perihal ibadat dan agama.

2. Teknologi sebenarnya tidak sukar untuk dibuat dengan syarat kita benar-benar faham ilmu dibelakangnya.

3. Kita masih gagal menghasilkan teknologi kerana kita tidak cukup ilmu. Keadaan ini diterukkan lagi apabila kita "benci" terhadap ilmu, kita "malas" nak belajar ilmu bahkan ada yang kata ilmu sains adalah menyesatkan sedangkan kita naik KAPAL TERBANG utk ke mekah, kita guna MICROPHONE utk bagi khutbah jumaat, kita guna KIPAS utk sejukkan badan kita dalam masjid, kita OPERATION lutut kita supaya tidak sakit lagi bila sujud. (semua teknologi huruf besar diatas dihasilkan dari ilmu/teori electromagnetism)

4. Sumber ilmu sains moden berasal dari partial differential equations (PDE). Dalam kes yg sedang kita bincangkan, PDEnya adalah maxwell equations. Dari PDE ini dan ilmu yg terbit darinya, barulah ia dieksplotasi utk hasilkan teknologi spt TV, satelit, mobile phone, kapal terbang dan lain2.

5. so utk buat teknologi2 ini, kita perlu faham PDEnya. ini juga bermaksud, kalau kita as a society dan negara masih gagal menghasilkan teknologi2 kita sendiri, itu menunjukkan kita masih belum lagi menguasai pemahaman sebenar ilmu sains dan matematik kerana kita gagal memahami dari peringkat PDE (first principle) nya lagi.

*aku tulis ini kerana semalam ada orang komen dalam blog ni, bukan satu tapi sampai lima komen mengkritik seruan aku agar umat islam rajin belajar dan menguasai ilmu sains, matematik dan kejuruteraan. Pada aku, inilah golongan agamawan ortodok yang menjadi penyebab kepada kenapa orang Islam terus bergaduh sana sini, miskin dan ditindas tapi terus tak sedar diri dan tidak mahu mengubah hidupnya. Yang dia tahu hanyalah menyalahkan orang lain atas musibah yg menimpa dirinya.

Antara yang dia tulis aku cut and paste disini

"sebenarnya, secara senyap2, ilmu duniawi ni lah yang sedang menyesatkan umat-umat islam zaman sekarang."

"Kenapa Islam dulu betul-betul mantap? sebab mereka cuma berusaha 20% sahaja, tapi 80% lagi siang-malam berusaha memantapkan iman."

"korang fahamkan dulu apa maksud Islam, apa maksud orang mukmin, apa maksud orang beriman."

"Jadinya, kalau ilmu dunia kita ni dah terlalu banyak sangat berbanding ilmu islam, cube kengkawan pikir, kita hidup berlandaskan apa sekarang?"

Pada aku, orang yg macam ni adalah golongan warak yg bodoh dan memalukan (aku tak refer dia ulama sebab ulama bermaksud orang yg berilmu).

LET PPSMI BE BYGONE BUT ITS SPIRIT COME ALIVE IN OUR UNIVERSITIES (AS PUBLISHED IN TMI)

This article of mine has been published in The Malaysian Insider on Oct 4, 2013. To read from TMI, click HERE 

I wrote this article as a response to Tun Mahathir’s recent comment on National Education Blueprint 2013-2025, as reported in Malaysian Insider on October 1, 2013.

I was a strong supporter of PPSMI but as a government officer, it is my duty to implement national policies hence my acceptance for its abolishment and my present support for MBMMBI.

However, I strongly believe that the spirit of PPSMI should not be completely abandoned because it is an undeniable fact that the body of knowledge of mathematics and science, hence engineering for that matter, has evolved so deep, so wide and has gone through a revolution so fast, that their acquirement can only be best done by updating our reading on books and scientific articles written in English. The days of the Germans, Japanese, French, Koreans and Dutch to write their latest books and scientific findings in their mother tongue have basically long gone. Even if they write it, most of us still cannot read their mother tongue, can we?

Based on this, I would like to suggest that the spirit of PPSMI to be brought into a new realm, that is into local academia. At first, such a suggestion might sound trivial because we have the perception already that English has been the lingua franca of our academia especially with the internalization of our universities where almost in every class we would have international students. I would say no to this in the spirit of PPSMI.

In the spirit of PPSMI, mathematics and science are not about calculation and facts memorizing but they are mental constructs; they are ideas and concepts just like politics, philosophy, history and humanities. So as mental constructs, mathematics and science must be understood in words and delivered in a storytelling manner where symbols and numbers are only there to assist with the delivery and the understanding.

Math and science must be properly argued and reasoned. However, the sources for such arguments and reasoning are embedded in the body of writing within textbooks and scientific articles which sufficiency, elegancy and relevancy, in turn, depend on the authors. Great professors and researchers author great materials but nowadays the fact is, almost all of them are authored in English for greater readers and viewers.

So, the difficulties faced by our university's students, researchers and even teachers in reading "between the lines", in grasping the arguments and reasoning and to follow the "storyline" of books and scientific articles are what PPSMI was supposed to solve.

I myself had the same difficulties when I first arrived at Imperial College London for my PhD. I thought I was smart enough because I got a master from UTM only to realize that I knew nothing as far as the fundamentals required for a world-class research pursuit. I was forced to read the books all over again only to find out how were difficult actually the arguments of mathematics and scientific principles to be understood and obviously, to have language barrier definitely did not help, it only worsened the condition. As my independent learning initially was slow, I was forced to go around asking my seniors to explain to me what the meaning of this and that (not literal meaning as we have dictionary for this) to the extent one day, one of my senior said to me, "Airil, Malays are not ugly but stupid.” I swear to God he said this but I didn't buckle, they could say whatever they like as long as they taught me the knowledge. At that very moment, I made a pack with myself; there will be not a single day without knowledge for me.

After I came home six years ago and started to teach and conduct researches with the Malaysian students, I then saw it happened all over again. I watched how the students failed to read books and journal articles thus failed to understand it. Yes, they could do the calculations, but without reading the storytelling written in the materials, they could never have the proper understanding which without it, they could never produce anything good enough, worthy enough to provide the country with innovations required in establishing the much spoken sustainable economy.

Since it was not even an option for them not to understand, my research students went through the hardship of sleepless night of reading back the basics and took appreciably longer time to graduate. At my end, it took me to be besides them for appreciable hours revising all over again the basics of mathematics and science to the extent I read and explained to them words by words in my attempt to impart the skills of independent learning in them.

None of this would be necessary if our students were made guilty to skip the storytelling of the books, not encouraged to focus only on the simplistic lecture notes and not trained to go straight to the examples and drilled themselves with it for the sake of exams, as soon they stepped into the university. Instead, they would have understood the knowledge and produced worthy scientific output as well as innovations much quicker. In the world that is exponentially changing; to be quick but legit is the most important virtue of a person and a society. With my students, after all the hardships, we finally succeeded in producing engineering software that is equivalent to the foreign ones. Almost 200 unit have been sold at less than quarter the price of the foreign ones. Such an achievement only highlights the capability of Malaysian in being innovative and economically competitive, provided that we are accomplished by proper learning process.

Therefore, the recovery from our present malady would have been quickened by PPSMI but since it has been abolished, let its spirit come alive in our universities. The spirit of PPSMI is about making domestic changes, it is about domestic mass production of local world-class scientists and their scientific and innovative products. We send about ten per cent of our best brains to overseas but the rest remain. While the lucky ten per cent have the luxury of listening to the lecture of professors which knowledge bear their name, the remaining ninety per cent must resort to books for better understanding and they have to read them alone. The spirit of PPSMI is about allowing those that remain in the country to read their books lonely but quickly.

Thus, the spirit of PPSMI is about the new strategy, a special recipe injected after the strategy of sending and awaiting those sent to overseas to come back has brought us to a stagnant state (if not lagged) due to the fact that those around us have picked up a greater pace and momentum. They don’t call IT Revolution and Information Boom for nothing. While others are speeding up, the spirit of PPSMI should have been the reason for us to have a chance at overtaking those already ahead of us.

I therefore hope that this compromise of letting PPSMI be bygone and its spirit come to alive in our universities will be well accepted even by those fought for the abolishment. I hope they will not against it by positing the same old argument asking why the Japanese, the Mainland Chinese, the Koreans and other English non-speaking countries like Germany are using their mother tongue at their universities.

The people of these advanced societies are in the positioned of using their own language because, as many have not realized, they were in the same pedestal with the English speaking people in pioneering the modern mathematics and sciences.

How can we put the Japanese and us in the same pedestal when they have constructed their warplane, the Zero, independently during the 30's and 40's at time our forefathers still fishing with the net in the Selat Melaka? They had Shimura-Taniyama conjecture in the 50's, the conjecture used to proof Fermat's Last Theorem, to stress my point.

And if we look at the mainland Chinese, they have flocked into Cambridge and Oxford as early as the 19th century, leave alone their 5000 years old civilization and the Koreans, being sandwiched by these two great nations would then be influenced by them both culturally and intellectually.

On the point of the Germans, great scientists were Germans, from the time of Leibniz (contemporary of Newton) in the 17th century until now. Yes, there were times when they translated Arabic articles into Latin then into their language and now resorting back to English for scientific publications. But this only highlighted the domestic events taken place in Germany, events that shaped their culture, their mother tongue. It highlighted the dynamic of Germany's domestic.

But this was the time when there was no globalization, this was the time when everybody, the English, the Germans, the Dutch and the French were taking pace almost at the same time and size, and this was also the time when the superpower, the Abbasiyah, was crumbling down. In other words, this was the time of "no rushing".

But the spirit of PPSMI is about now, it is about the strategy that takes into account that the world is exponentially changing. Just about a decade ago we seized to use typewriter and had bulky low ram and small hard disk computer on our desk which could not even play movie on it but today we have computer in the palm of our hand and we are seeing Apple suing Samsung who are happened to be Koreans and we are also seeing China is building their own space station out of anger after being neglected by the international community in the development of the existing ISS.

It should not be a wonder to us why the world we live in is governed by these advanced societies for they were and still are the pioneers of sciences and technologies. It should come to us as no surprise just by looking at the world’s rank of their universities at time ours are stuck at 200-300 places. What the rank manifests is the rate of understanding and the mastery of mathematics, science and engineering and it is apparent that we still have a long way to go. But there are no cutting corners and short cuts; we must pass through the path of the greats, which is by acquiring the purest understanding of the subject matters but pass this path quick because as I said, we don’t have the luxury of those in the enlightenment era; there was no globalization back then.

On the argument that we should do translations, which part of the statement that we have international students in every class, that we don’t understand? Which part of the statement that the body of knowledge has evolved so deep, so wide and gone through revolution so quick that the available books are ten folds greater than the number of our translators, leave alone the facts that almost every day there will be new scientific findings published in English, that we don’t understand? Which part of the statement that the world is exponentially changing that awaiting for translation is not an option because our students must read their book now, quick and lonely, that we don’t understand?

So below is the list of actions our academia should take in letting the spirit of PPSMI to come alive in our universities.

1. All lectures must fully be in English. The reasons for this are two folds, to make the students to become familiar with the scientific phrases, to be found in textbooks and to prepare them for future encounter and engagement in scientific discussions and communications. Listening is a very important learning skill.

2. All lectures must use worldly established standard textbooks as major learning materials. Teacher’s lecture notes, if any, must be treated as secondary materials to include books authored by local teachers even if they are written in English unless it is shown that the quality and magnitude of the books able to meet the standard of the universal ones.

3. It is compulsory for the students to read the whole storytelling within the textbooks and no skip to the examples.

4. It is compulsory for the lecturers to describe the whole storytelling to include the philosophy of the subject matters, the history, the reasoning, mathematical derivation from first principles, the related physical laws, principle and assumptions as well as the state of the arts. Like the students, the lecturers should not skip to final equations, given tables and established procedures and of course, no skip to examples.

As a summary, mathematics and sciences are mental constructs thus must be delivered and understood in words and in a storytelling manner, through good teachers or through good books. However, as far as independent learning is concerned, whilst we cannot have our teachers at all times, we can always have our books. This was what PPSMI all about but since it has been abolished, why don’t we let its spirit come alive in a new realm that is our academia; the place where PPSMI should have mattered in the first place. - October 4, 2013.

* Dr Airil Yasreen Mohd Yassin is a senior lecturer and computational mechanicist at the Faculty of Civil Engineering, UTM Johor Bahru.