Biology Coursework

Our Biology coursework is on friday. Hopefully, everything will be just fine. I have already finalised my plan and await my classmates' opinions. Meanwhile, I'm fretting over whether or not I missed something.

There's been lots of other coursework as well: History, Economics, English. But all seems fine. There isn't much pressure.

SAT schecule

I finally managed to finalise my SAT schedule with my tutor. He says I should be able to take the ones in November and December this year. I sure hope I'm ready. Maths is no problem. But there's some holes to fill for English and Science. Chemistry and Physics are nearly there though. We covered most topics: Thermodynamics, Motion, Waves, Bonds, Structure, Electrolosys, Gases, Thermochemistry, Stoichiochemistry...

Birthday coming up

My birthday is nearing. Ugh, it seems so sad. After another year I'm still in this mess and nothing seems to be working so far. There were improvements though. I went through a lot this past year. I learnt a lot. But the winds of change are always blowing. Change is the only constant.

Dearest Year 13s

This following post is a tribute to those 4 precious VI Forms which sure made this year very fun and enjoyable: Tom, Jisoo (Head Boy and Head Girl resepctively), Daniella (Greatest SG), and Vishal whose name says enough.

Tom Jackson

"EE-ran not EYE-ran" Yes, this is the great Iranian Delegate at the HKMUN 2006. He is also Island School's charismatic Head Boy, who always seemed to have something to say. Well, I haven't quite managed to develope much of a friendship with him but I sure respect him. He was a brilliant speaker and debater. His amazing ability to think on-the-spot and crush other's arguments seem to be unique until...

Daniella Mak

Daniella who I have been so fortunate to become a friend of. She is, forever, our dearest SG and will continue to inspire me for the rest of my life. She has an air of intelligence and authority, which gives a sense of don't-mess-with-me, but also possesses such sweet kindness and warmth. I certainly enjoyed working with you. Kudos to you.

Jisoo

(My lips look swollen in that photo; I was enjoying some chocolate cake.)

On the far left, is our Head Girl who also decided to recite Hamlet in Korean as an opening speech. I certainly enjoyed working with her for HKMUN. She has certainly left a very good first impression of Year 13s with her friendliness and calmness. She has an odd yet fantastic combination of quite calmness and a hilariously fun sense of humour. You feel like the elder sister I never had, Jisoo. I will miss you.

Vishal

Well, it's Vishal. I certainly would like to smile at this moment. Vishal, I don't know what to say. With your amazing capacity to pick up girls at debating events, your hilarious demeanour at speeches and glasses I am left speechless. Gimme five, man.

I Will Miss You All...

JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED!

Okay, you must be thinking "OMG... what a weirdo."

But no, I have a very good reason to be so excited over these kinds of things. I believe all of us should have a part of us that dream of having super powers. I personally believe that all of this is simply physically impossible at the moment but I like to dream about it. Believing in something so incredible, it gives me security and, in a sense, hope. It's so hard to describe the feeling. When, I have dreams of flying. They're remarkable. They make me feel free and powerful. I think of all the things I can do with superpowers. I think of the freedom and power I get. I think and dream.

And so I feel to excited about these things about people with superpowers, especially Static (dude, producing electricity with your bare hands, thats hot). It gives me hope.

Strength of Mind

Life does not like me. It likes to throw curved balls at me. Well, in your face life, I overcame. I persevered. I overcame with my Strength of Mind. No matter what happens, I can deal with it now. I am strong. My mind can overcome all.

I've had it with you. I cannot stand it anymore. But I overcame. You cannot harm me anymore. I am invincible.

*On the moon*

You know I care for you
But pretend and lead me on, thats all you do.
I tried to still believe but now I'm through.
And the only place I see, Is calling out to me.
It's the only place I know, Its the place where I must go...

On the moon,
Thats where you'll find me soon.
I'll be alone again.
But thats okay I must be alone again.
But I'll be waiting on the moon, for you.

I'll sit and reminisce for many hours.
I'll miss the rain and all the pretty flowers.
I'll dream of all the citites and their flowers...

I am invincible. You cannot harm me anymore.

My life is in complete ENTROPY.

I bet most of you have no idea what I'm talking about. In fact, I wouldn't know myself 3hrs ago.

Entropy is something you may learn when coming across thermodynamics in Physics. It is amongst one of the most abstract yet logical ideas I have come across. I'm just going to say it all out in here because it basically helps me think through it and understand it better. Besides, Jisoo or Tom can help me if I got anything wrong.

On the first level, it appears as a state symbol. It helps describe the state (condition or situation) of a system in terms of energy and thermodynamics. Mathematically, the change in entropy is the quantity of energy transferred divided by the absolute temperature of that system. What this does is give us a good index to represent energy flow and transfer.

So far we can also deduce that the net entropy of the universe, as a system, increases with time. Entropy is vector. It will have a sign. If energy flows OUT OF a system, change in entropy is negative. But if energy ENTERS a system, change in entropy is positive.

Referring back to the mathematical relationship of entropy and the deduction I just gave, if we imagine a hot object transferring energy via heat to a cold object, the net change in entropy is the change in entropy of the two objects added together:

The change in entropy of the hot object is negative because the energy is LOST towards the cold object. But the change in entropy of the cold object is positive where energy enters it. BUT, the change in entropy of the hot object is also quantitatively smaller as the temperature is higher but the cold object has a higher change in entropy. Therefore the deduction above makes sense. |Positive change in entropy| > |negative change in entropy|

WOW, isn't all that amazing? It will indeed take time to digest. But it sure makes sense.

Now, for the second level of entropy, entropy and chaos.

Entropy is also concidered to be an index for disorder, or rather, the probabilty of something to happen. Seemingly unrelated? Well...

Concider any real life physical phenomena, you should notice that most occur in absolute chaos, disorder, and randomness. For example, leaves falling. I doubt any of you will find leaves falling off at a perfectly orderly pattern but at random. If I pick 4 marbles out of a bag of 50 marbles of each two different colours, the probability of getting one with most "disorder" (in this case, 2 of each colour) is the highest. Therefore, we can easily conclude that the probability of disorder is much greater than that of perfect order.

How does that relate to entropy? Entropy has something to do with energy transfer. Now, imagine a plane of orderly set-up marbles, representing particles. They have no energy at all and are perfectly still. All of a sudden, someone throws a heated marble at them. What happens is that energy from the marble is transferred to the marbles on the plane, in a disorderly, chaotic way. The energy transfer is NOT equal amongst the marbles. And all this results in absolute chaos and movement.

So it appears that entropy can also be a measure of disorder and probability. Sure enough, entropy is used very often in statistics. But, it all makes sense... And the level of entropy will depend on how "chaotic" a system becomes... It all makes sense...

So yes, my life is in complete ENTROPY...