Two
bits of news related to higher education caught my attention recently. The
first was the release of the 2017 Joint Graduate Employment Survey in
September, in which the stars turned out to be the Singapore Institute of
Technology and the Singapore University of Technology and Design.
This
led to a commentary asking if Singapore’s more traditional universities – the
National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University and
Singapore Management University – were “losing their shine as higher education
institutions”?
The
commentary lauded the newcomers, rightfully so, for providing real-world
“industry-centric and practice-oriented education”. And well they should, given
that universities perform a civic duty to prepare its graduates for working
life.
Then
I read the second bit of news.
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The
British moral philosopher Mary Midgley passed away on October 10 aged 99, after
a lifetime of asking inconvenient questions. This instantly recalled an essay
that she wrote in 1990 titled, “The Use and Uselessness of Learning”.
So
I now risk the ire of pragmatists and practitioners by posing the questions
that Midgley first asked in her article, “How useless are we scholars? How
useless ought we to be?”
When
Midgley asked how “useless” academic research and scholarship should be, she is
making the crucial point that knowledge creation is an inherently messy
business, one in which what started out being denigrated as useless could turn
out to be useful and transformative. The search for knowledge is one in which
we only know retrospectively what we were looking for once we have found it.
And
the research funding agencies typically do not know any better: they tend to
continue whatever lines of investigation that are established and, increasingly
so, immediately practical.
Of
course, researchers, particularly when funded by public monies, have an
obligation to solve immediate real-world problems. But the purpose of higher
education should not be confined to addressing these already known and
well-articulated problems.
Instead,
higher education should also be concerned with what new questions need to be
asked. It should go beyond a reactive mindset to creating the proverbial
“solution in search of a problem”.
Such
daydreaming, curious tinkering, and the restless modifications to accepted ways
of doing things might come across as intellectual hubris or extravagance. But
Nassim Taleb, of “Black Swan” theory fame, believes that these have been the
primary drivers of progress.
In
his book “Antifragile”, Taleb argues that innovations come about from freedom
and boredom: freedom especially from the publish-or-perish system that tends to
foment conservatism, and boredom that leads to flights of fancy. He points out
that in the 19th century the key agents of innovation were the serious hobbyist
and the English rector, often the same person.
The
two Thomases come to mind: the Reverend Thomas Bayes who developed Bayesian
probability, and the Reverend Thomas Malthus who gave us Malthusian economics.
Needless to say, Taleb is being facetious, although I suspect not overly so.
Another
case in point: our understanding of electromagnetism came about from the
curiosity and work of Faraday and Clerk Maxwell in the 19th century.
They
certainly did not have practical applications in mind. They could not imagine
the modern appliances that we now enjoy.
This
was basic research for its own sake, which in turn led to happy albeit
unplanned practical outcomes.
And
yet our research enterprise tends to overlook the role of luck in discovery,
and is instead conducted in a highly-directed, instrumentalist, linear, and
teleological manner, and under constant pressure to culminate in a gadget or an
app.
Universities,
in their traditional forms, have come under criticism for being “ivory towers”
disconnected from the real world. I would argue that, far from being
embarrassed about that label, we should embrace it.
By
all means, let us have some universities that are responsive to the needs of
commerce and industry, both in terms of producing work-ready graduates and
research that is immediately useful to corporations.
But
let us also create and maintain the space to ruminate and contrive solutions to
yet-to-exist problems or to invent problems to solve. Universities can and
should provide the deliberate un-directedness for serendipitous discoveries to
emerge.
This
is no mere romanticisation of the past, or a naive attempt at valorising Mr
Taleb’s clergy-scientist-hobbyist. There is a practical concern here. If we
cannot tell what areas of study will ultimately pay off, then what we need to
do is place a wider and more unusual range of bets.
Diversity
in thought and approaches is not a luxury but indispensable to knowledge
creation in this age of uncertainty and complexity. More than ever, different
approaches will be needed, and such approaches can only result from the time
and space to try apparently useless and irrelevant things.
If
simply because we cannot tell ahead of time if they might not turn out to be
useful and highly relevant.
So,
while it is important for universities to produce, say, a new generation of
engineers fit for industry and ready to do the job today, they also have a
responsibility to push the boundaries of knowledge and shape the field of
engineering for the future.
We
need a balanced higher education system in which we have our feet on the ground
and our heads in the clouds.
Sumber : Todayonline
Forex Trading Scams to Watch
The
forex market involves very active trading of over $1 trillion each day, not
including futures and currency options, which put the trading at closer to $5
trillion daily. The market does not have
much in the way of regulation, although things have started to improve
recently.
The
opportunity still exists for many forex scams, which tempt new investors with a
promise of quick fortunes through "secret trading formulas" or
algorithm-based "proprietary" trading methodologies. Before choosing
a broker or platform, go through your own due diligence by visiting BASIC, or
the Background Affiliation Status Information Center, created by the
self-regulatory NFA (National Futures Association).
01
Signal Sellers
Stock
Market Illustration
One
of the challenges a rookie forex investor faces is determining which operators
to trust in the forex market and which to avoid. Signal sellers make a good
example.
Basically,
a signal seller is offering a system that purports to identify favorable times
for buying or selling a currency pair. The system may be manual, where the
trader enters the info and gets a result, or it may be automated.
Some
systems rely on technical analysis, others rely on breaking news and many
employ some combination of the two. But they all purport to provide information
that leads to favorable trading opportunities. Signal sellers usually charge a
daily, weekly or monthly fee for their services.
Some
analysts propose that many or even most signal sellers are scam artists. A
frequent criticism is that if it were really possible to use a system to beat
the market, why would the individual or firm that has this information make it
widely available? Wouldn't it make more sense to use this incredible signaling
system to make huge profits?
Other
analysts distinguish between known scammers and more reputable information
sources such as Metatrader, that offer a well-thought-out signaling service.
Behind
these opposing views lies a larger difference of opinion about whether anyone
can predict the next move in a trading market. This fundamental disagreement
won't be settled any time soon. Nobel Prize-winning Economist Eugene Fama
proposes in his well-regarded Efficient Market Hypothesis that finding these
kinds of momentary market advantages really isn't possible.
His
economist colleague, Robert Shiller, also a Nobel Prize winner, believes
differently, citing evidence that investor sentiment creates booms and busts
that can provide investment and trading opportunities.
The
best way to determine if a signal seller can benefit you is to open a paper
money or practice trading account with one of the better-known forex brokers.
Be patient, and eventually, you'll determine whether predictive signaling works
for you or doesn't.
02
Phony Forex Investment Management Funds
In
the world of investing, outrageous claims are the surest sign of potential
fraud
In
the past few years, forex management funds have proliferated. Most of these, if
not all, are scams. They offer an investor the "opportunity" to have
his forex trades managed by highly-skilled forex traders who can offer
outstanding market returns in return for a share of the profits.
The
problem is, this "management" offer requires the investor to give up
control over his money and to hand it to someone he knows little about other
than the hyped-up and often completely false record of success available on the
scammer's website and brochures.
The
investor often ends up getting nothing, while the scammer uses investors' funds
to buy yachts and private islands.
A
good rule of thumb in the forex market, as with other investments, is that if
it sounds almost too good to be true, such as annual returns of more than 100
percent, for example, it's almost certainly a scam.
03
Dishonest Brokers
Trader
watching stocks crash on screen
Although the forex market is not entirely
unregulated, it has no central regulating authority. The forex spot market is
completely unregulated and accounts for the majority of trades. Unsurprisingly,
some forex brokers do not deal fairly with their customers and, in some
instances, defraud them.
You
have two ways to avoid bad brokers. Before engaging a forex broker, look the
brokerage up on a website that identifies dishonest forex brokers. Better yet,
trade with a broker that also handles other stock market trades and is subject
to SEC and FINRA oversight. While the forex trade itself may be unregulated, no
broker subject to such oversight would risk its license for other securities by
defrauding its forex customers.
