The Changes Start: Online Changes

I remember mentioning about the changes that will happen to me this semester. Part of those changes will be on my online "identities": my Blogger blog and Multiply account.

Because of so much free time this semester, I might try to make some more major changes in both my Multiply site and my Blogger account. It has been a while since I posted on this blog and made some changes in my Multiply site. I also want to give some updates about my status in life after the sudden changes and adjustments after May 31, so I will post some entries from time to time. I will also update myself about the happenings in and out of UP through my former colleagues' Multiply blogs.

As for the changes I made in my Blogger account, I changed my profile a bit, including my picture, plus added more details such as favorite movies and books (which I just copied from my Friendster account). I'll try to use another template and background if my free time and little money still permits (I still rent because I don't have my own internet connection). Also, as an added income-generating scheme, I subscribed to Google AdSense, so you'll see an ad at the bottom of my blog. Just in case you're curious about the ad, please click on it so that I can have some moolah ^__^.

Well, so much for the information. After this I'll still tweak on my accounts a bit before doing what I do all the time: downloading anime :p

Poor Thing: UP Closed to Brightest of the Poor

This letter by Dr. Noli Reyes of the Institute of the Mathematics in UP Diliman was published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer on June 20, 2008, and in turn posted by Tina Bargo on her Multiply site (the title link of this post). I was really alarmed and troubled about the situation in UP so I decided to post the letter.

To all UP students and alumni, please read this and be concerned....

UP closed to brightest of poor

Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 02:46:00 06/20/2008


On the third day of classes in the hundredth year of the University ofthe Philippines (UP), a freshman from Cotabato province, a Chemistry major at UP in Diliman, Quezon City, had to drop out. Together with his father, the brokenhearted young man went to see each of his instructors to have his subjects invalidated.

While his Math 17 instructor was deleting his name from the class list,I could see the poverty, desperation, anger and sense of resignation intheir faces. It was not the disappointment of winning the lottery andbeing denied the prize later. The young man is a member of a minority group in Mindanao. Without any connections and in the absence of anysocialized admission policy, he qualified as a freshman in the Collegeof Science of UP Diliman, a distinction he earned through intelligence,pure hard work and perseverance amid poverty. But in a few days, father and son are going back to Mindanao for good.

The father explained they could not afford the "socialized"tuition at P600 per unit for students in Bracket C, families whoseannual incomes range from P135,001 to P500,000 per annum. The father andson expected to be in Bracket D, families with annual incomes ranging from P80,001 to P135,000. Students in bracket D pay P300 per unit.

UP president Emerlinda Roman seems to be disconnected from reality, orshe must be fooling herself by insisting that the new Socialized Tuitionand Financial Assistance Program (STFAP) is fair and proper for an"iskolar ng bayan" [scholar of the nation]. Her family shouldtry living on P6,666.75 a month (which when multiplied by 12—the number of months in a year—equals P80,001, the lower bound ofBracket D incomes).

UP, no longer conscious of its role in society, chooses to ignore the long-term impact of offering greater genuine educational opportunities to the brightest among the poor, who are getting poorer amid the reported economic gains of the country. Socialized admission and tuition fee schemes do not lower academic standards. I've had countless students from public schools and far-flung provinces. They come to UP not as well prepared as their counterparts from the best schools in Metro Manila. But many later outshine the sometimes overconfident Manila-raised kids.

After the new STFAP took effect last year, UP is no longer an option forthe brightest among the poor. I agree with the cab driver whose daughter qualified for UP Diliman, as narrated in Youngblood (Inquirer, 3/24/08) by Mariel Kierulf Asiddao, a UP Mass Communication student. The cab driver insisted it was ESTIFAK and not STFAP.

NOLI N. REYES, professor, Institute of Mathematics, University of the Philippines, Diliman, Quezon City

Does Yahoo! Answers REALLY Answer (Correctly)?

While downloading some files to satisfy my anime fix and checking mail to see if someone will save me from a possible school year of unemployment, I came across an e-mail from Yahoo! Answers announcing that I was "promoted" to Level 2. I don't really care about the "promotion".... It's just that the e-mail actually prompted me to check out Yahoo! Answers again, after two years(!).

When I first encountered Yahoo! Answers two years ago, I was impressed on how Yahoo! made such venue for Yahoo! users to exchange information via a "question and answer" format. When the answers come in, the asker can choose among all the answers as the "best" answer. The users then accumulate points for every question they post or they answer. The users can also help other users who are in dire need of quick information, especially those who ask problems in the "Science and Mathematics" section.

The catch in Yahoo! Answers is this: if the question is not resolved by the asker at a specified time frame, the users will actually VOTE for what they perceive as the "best" answer to the asker's question. It may seem that this system is placed because the voters are INTELLIGENT enough to choose the BEST answer... Unfortunately, it's NOT always the case....

For your information,I was actually a "victim" of a "best answer" to my question! To test how users (intelligently) answer questions in the "Science and Mathematics" section, I posted this question:

In evaluating limits, why is 1 raised to infinity considered an indeterminate form?

(I was actually teaching Math 53 then and our topic was L'Hopital's Rule). I totally forgot about the "time limit", so when I checked out the "answers" to my question the users already voted for the BEST answer - from a user named "samk". And lo and behold, this is the BEST answer:

Best Answer - Chosen by Voters

Who says it's "indeterminate form"?

lim 1^x = 1
x->infinity

• 2 years ago

50% 3 Votes

Gyabo! WHAT KIND OF BEST ANSWER IS THIS??!! And it got just 3 votes! OMGWTF (sorry, I don't usually belt out and spell out swear words even in blogs). I actually read two very good answers - they even gave explanations and their sources! But, why did they vote for samk's answer????

This is not just my bad experience in Yahoo! Answers. I actually posted an answer - with explanations, sources, and all - to this question posted by a certain "Carbonbased Lifeform":

Anyone good at symbolic differential equations?

Can anyone solve this?

Obtain the solution of the differential equation

dx/dt+ax=A*sin(w*t) x(0)=b

I need the solution in the next 2 hours please.

• 2 years ago

Additional Details

2 years ago

The x(0)=b is the initial condition, not part of the equation. I should have put some more spaces in there.

I refreshed my Math 65 memory a bit and did some research, and came up with this answer:

If a and w are constants, the equation dx/dt + ax = A*sin(w*t) is a linear first order differential equation, and you should use an INTEGRATING FACTOR e^v, where v = integral of a dt = at (dropping the arbitrary constant)

Hence, the left side of the equation becomes

d/dt(e^v * x) = e^v*(A*sin(w*t)) or d/dt(e^(at)*x) = e^(at) A*sin(w*t)

and integrating both sides of the above equation yields

x = e^(-at) * integral of [e^(at)*A*sin(w*t)] dt. You can do the integration, for sure. After which, you solve for the arbitrary constant C by invoking the initial condition x(0) = b.

I hope I have helped you even a bit with my answer :)

• 2 years ago

Source(s):

(1) Elementary Differential Equations by Rainville
(2) http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Integrating...

Well, I left some details so that the user can exercise his brain cells a bit, but I think my answer is okay. But again, a stupid person (codenamed "JimmyR.com") actually got the BEST answer. And the answer is:

Best Answer - Chosen by Voters

dx/dt+ax=b :P


mathematica had some online find-the-derivitive program, last I remember

• 2 years ago

Mukyaa! >__< What irritated me more is that it only got ONE vote - and I presume it came from the USER who gave the answer! I just hope Carbonbased Lifeform bothered to read my answer and just forgot the time limit just like me....

I also read some questions and answers in that same category. To my dismay, what happened to me also happens to other askers as well: the stupid persons get to vote for the BEST answer given by another idiot like them.

Because of that, my belief of having intelligent users in Yahoo! Answers is already shattered to bits. It might not be worth my time visiting the site....

Now, If you don't know what the heck is Yahoo! Answers, go to http://answers.yahoo.com and ask, answer, and discover for yourself how stupid some users can get :p

P.S. Before I vented my ire via this blog, I actually answered two problems posted by users: the integral of 1/1 + cos x and solving for 'a' in the literal equation a^3g^12=at^4/b^2. My enthusiasm just got doused when I read those two "horrific" entries again... and I expect that the baka bunch in Yahoo! Answers will choose the most baka answers in the questions I answered. Sheesh >__<