Using facts and figures to discredit yourself and your case

Our govt and elite pride themselves as no nonsense organisations and people, and they often used facts and figures and statistics to prove their case. This is obviously good and it was obvious in the past that facts and statistics were convincing. I said that was in the past when people were simpler and easy to persuade due to ignorance, low level of education, and unsophistication. Can people still use facts and statistics to prove their case? Sure, when the faith and trust of the people are there, the audience would believe in genuine data, not distorted data, selective data or fabricated data. They trust the person providing and using the data.

Today, everyone with a little education knows that statistics lied, facts also lied as they can be fabricated or twisted to give a false or distorted truth. Maybe some in govt and authority are wondering why people no longer believed in what they said, even with facts and statistics. They could be wondering why they were so clever to come out with their sets of statistics, but still could not convince the audience. The only thing I could think of is that they thought, yes, people nowadays can think, or started to think, that they are the only smart asses around but still think the people are daft.

Take the case of SGX presenting its slew of statistics after 1,200 remisiers signed a petition to Tharman. The SGX must have thought their data were flawless and convincing, and telling the truth. I am not going to question that, and I swear I did not read or hear the data being presented. I don’t even know who presented what. All I heard was a session of disbelief and head shaking of course.

The best answer to what the SGX statistics presented meant to the public is in Narayana Narayana’s letter to the Straits Times. And I produced the gist of the letter here.

The Forum Editor,
The Straits Times,
Singapore.

6th February 2015.

SGX's kneejerk response 'SGX cites rise in retail activity to rebut petition' (ST Money February 6 2015) is on a par with its
earlier equally defensive support of its change in the tradeable market-lot from 1000 previously to 100 units wef January
19 2015 ('Retail demand for 100-share lot encouraging' - ST Money - January 20 2015).

The assumption that 'the opening of '71,043. new CDP accounts in the past year, a 12 per cent rise' would somehow translate
into corresponding increase in trading activity defies logic. A friend who was offered preferential allotment in an IPO opened a
CDP account simply because he needed one to park/hold the shares. He has no intention, nor inclination, to trade at all.

It is telling that 'more than half of 1.7million CDP accounts have share investments' with the inevitable corollary that the rest 'less than half' do not. It would be educative to learn how many among the former have an investment other than SingTel shares allotted two decades back.



SGX asserts with a slew of statistics that 'the number of daily retail investors/transactions has skyrocketed (sic)...since 100-unit board lots were introduced...'). Sad to say, this optimism appears to be at odds with the 'Market Summary' published daily in the Straits Times. Admittedly, '2 billion shares worth $1.1 billion were traded' on January 21 (ST Jenuary 22 pg B11) but much of that gilt disappears when taking into consideration that 'Top Activitist' hogged the limelight with 616.4 million turnover - trading at '0.1 cent - On other days, trading has at best been desultory, and just yesterday (February 5) volume dipped below one billion, a benchmark of sorts….

What do you think? Should SGX be thinking that it has presented its case well and the matter shall be closed? Should Tharman or the MAS be satisfied that there is really no issue and there is nothing else to pursue? The Stock Market is in the pink of health!

What do you think the public, the investors, and the remisiers were thinking? Does the SGX believe that these people believe in the statistics presented? Should SGX, MAS and Tharman all agree that we should move on, the SGX has explained and that’s it?

The issue, if there is a problem, is the problem real? If the problem is real, you cannot just walk away after saying your piece. The problem will come back hounding you. And if one is presenting something that no one believes in, instead of convincing the audience, one is as good as discrediting oneself. There will be a lost of faith and trust.

Now I am wondering what would Tharman and the MAS be thinking? Would they be saying what Boon Wan said, that he thought the tender of the columbarium were in order and that he had to put the matter right? The number of people affected, and the votes going to be lost, would be more than the number of aggrieved potential buyers of Sengkang West in this case. 1,200 signed up and there are a few thousands more in support of the letter but chose not to sign for whatever reasons.

Where to go from here? Everything is fine?

Hsien Loong received death threats

This must be the most important piece of news today. It has never happened in our history, to my recollection, for a death threat against a Prime Minister or President or even a minister. I even cherished the thought that our political leaders are the safest, they could walk around in public places unescorted, with people only asking for their autographs. This death threat changes everything.
 
The threat is direct and serious. The threat against me by Raymond was to see me at my funeral and asking me to prepare a mugshot for the lorry head. In this case it is about bullets into Hsien Loong’s head. The police are investigating.
 
The threat is reported in The Real Singapore and I quote:
 
‘Police have confirmed that they have received a report about threats made on facebook against Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
 
They explained that investigations are ongoing in to the threats which included a death threat to PM Lee.
 
The online postings on a Facebook page challenged PM Lee and the Poloice to find them before PM Lee was shot in the head.
 
Another post by the same page also suggested that a bomb has been planted at Changi Airport.
 
More details about the specific threats here: ONLINE HACKERS THREATEN TO SHOOT PM LEE HSIEN LOONG IN THE HEAD’
 
This is no joking matter.

Smart mosquito traps – To laugh or to cry?

There is an article  in the ST with a photograph of a foreign talent pushing a platform of potted plants and a water contraption, the aggregate is called Ovitrap, or in layman language a mosquito trap. It is supposed to be a smart device that would lure mosquitoes to lay their eggs there and the water would be purged regularly and refilled automatically. NEA has granted a patent attorney to a Martin Schweiger to conduct a pilot trial on this smart device on condition that he would have to closely monitor to see that it works.

I remember during the dengue outbreak a few years back, a local lecturer, I think, conceived of a similar concept, by laying water contraptions in strategic locations around housing estates for the mosquitoes to lay eggs and then to pour the water away. It is as simple as that. Some laughed at the simplicity of the idea without wanting to know how effective it could be and how cheap and efficient to operate the concept given the abundance of resident committees to give a hand.

The problem is that he did not call the idea a smart idea and did not put in a few batteries and water pump to do the job automatically, in the current thinking calling it a smart mosquito trap. Also I think he is a local and is not recognizable as a talent. In this island, locals are branded as daft and foreigners as talents.

So the same concept, one is laughed away, another is seen as a smart device and approved for trial. The first one, not so smart, can be operated cheaply and efficiently, the other is going to cost a lot of money. Oh, the mantra, it must be expensive to be good.

Shall I laugh or cry for the increasing stupidity of a people that no longer thinks, incapable of thinking, and is in complete reliance of foreigners for ideas?

Xiaxue granted court order to expose Internet Brigade for harassment

‘Local Blogger Wendy Cheng known mainly by her online moniker, Xiaxue, has gotten a court order to force Satirical Facebook Page SMRT LTD (Feedback) to stop harassing her.
The court order also apparently requires the page to post an apology and reveal their identities.
Acknowledging the receipt of the court order and legal letter from Xiaxue’s lawyers, SMRT Ltd (Feedback) posted an update on their facebook page explaining that they intended to follow the requirements and will reveal their identities:’


The above is quoted from an article posted in TRS. The new anti harassment act is taking effect with the first batch of anonymous bloggers waiting to be reviewed under court order after an application by blogger Xiaxue.

The bloggers that are here with an intent to harass me or anyone personally, please take note of this new act. I can be generous but don’t push your luck too far. I am waiting for an apology from Raymond. I have given him enough time to apologise for the life threat against me. I have yet to press the button.

To all my fellow bloggers, I hope we will all have some peace in our provocative and thoughtful discussion on national and social issues from now onwards and be free from harassment by Internet Brigades posting as anonymous bloggers henceforth. We can accept and even tolerate strong and robust views, but nothing personal and degrading. Let’s raise the level of discussion on matters close to our hearts.

Redbean

SMRT – Revisiting the thinking of the sick

When SMRT was first introduced, there was the thought that travelling in public transport could be gracious, clean, smooth, convenient, fast and stylish. Then the money making mind set in. We want to be like Tokyo, crammed them in to the fullest, hire pushers to get as many commuters into the train as possible. Make the seats as small and narrow as possible to max the limited space. Good for the revenue. Nevermind the squeeze, discomfort and inconvenience. Nevermind the smell in this humid tropical island, never mind the unwashed foreigners. Who cares about gracious living. Gracious living was just a thought or meant for the rich.

After some crying and kpkb, there was a return to sanity. Instead of squeezing everyone into the train, they realized that there is another option, provide more trains. Silly that they did not think of it and only thinking of squeezing and squeezing. Have more train lines and more trains, higher frequencies, and encourage off peak travelling to create room and space.

But this kind of thinking is only meant to be short lived. They are going back to the old thinking, squeezing more people into the trains. The latest idea, tip up seats, to create room and space. Uncles and aunties, sorry hor. In this money minded island, everything is about making money. You oldies, legs weak, no seat, just too bad. What gracious living? What more trains? There is a maximum capacity, when reached, you cannot squeeze more trains on the lines. And there is a need to prepare for the 6.9m or 10m. How to increase passenger load?

I got a better idea. Shrink the population. I mean shrink the physical bodies. Feed everyone with a shrinking drug to half their size and the capacity will double. Or get our scientist to develop a shrink capsule and put the people in, and out comes all the midgets.

You want 10m? 20m also can. When you make the population smaller in size, everything will fit. Eat less, use less space, productivity sure to go up. Use Science, not dull brains of the past trying to push a square peg into a little round hole.

PS. Long time never drink kopi already.