Advertisement has been with us for an extremely long time. It exists everywhere, in various forms, ranging from shopping and food to beauty products featuring "hot babes" smiling and saying "It works!" We watch them, and we learn from them. However, before the people who got "seduced" by the advertisement and decide "NO, I'm going to get the television NOW." they probably need to think how much do they really know about the product based on the advertisement.
It is very common to see advertisements featuring 1) Mouth-watering food that makes your jaw drop just by thinking of it. 2) Body centres or products that features models with astounding figures (whether its the face, the legs, the arms, the waists or the erhem chests) which will sometimes attract people to try it even though they all know that it won't work so easily. 3) Continuous blasts of "Mega-Sales" and offers which will always remind you that no matter how bad the economy was, is and will be, there will always be shops which are kind enough to bring the prices "down" for the customers' sake. So now the main question is: How true are these advertisements?
Firstly, there's the issue of truthfulness in the showing of advertisement. People with the correct mindset will know that the selling end will never lose money, otherwise there's no point selling them. Hence no matter how "magnificent" the prices may be, the selling end will always get some profit. The exception is that the economy is so bad that they would rather sell the things then letting the things "stone and rot" at their storage houses, or its the kind of strategic way of selling which mostly occurs in TV dramas in which by selling something at low prices, you can get more buyers and after that even if you raise the price the buyers will not mind as long as your product is good. And considering both "options", the economy crisis is less likely as you don't see Wallstreet crashes everyday. The second one is more likely but as based on a quote from a piece of IHC homework, "Singaporean managers do not dare to take risks." hence oh-so-sad.
Back to the point on truthfulness, people often get attracted to the colourful pictures and impossible sounding bargains from the advertisements, but no all times the advertisement shows the whole truth of the product. For example, a food-advertising advertisement will probably feature the food as a large serving, looks good, taste good, is nutritious and does not contain some chemicals that people will try to avoid. (e.g. MSG) Naturally, people are attracted. Who won't want to buy such good food that is literally overall goodness. However, as people do not know what the product really are, especially when the advertisement only talks about the positive side of the product, the end result is sometimes unhappy buyers because they believed they were "scammed" of their money. Usually the deluxe example will be food advertisement, in which the size is smaller than shown on TV, leading to some people who went all the way just to buy the food saying, "Its a scam".
From the buyer's point of view, I feel that the advertisement should be comepletely transparent to the viewers, as in all the terms-and-conditions and the dates and other information that I would want to know if I would like to buy the product. It is better for me to know the whole picture of the product before I buy it, its features, its weaknesses and the effect on me (if it is a consumable) and such will be of very important informations to me, compared to a 10 second advertisement featuring two hot babes smiling and saying, "It works".
However, from the product seller's point of view, it is nearly impossible for me to sell a product if I reveal everything about it, since other competitors will simply point to my product's weaknesses and claim that theirs is better, leading to my product being more difficult ot be sold.
Hence, I feel that advertisement itself is imperfect. No matter how it is changed, it will surely affect one side (whether it's the buyer or the seller). The only way is to completely abolish advertisement, but then in this world nowadays where there's even online advertisement, there's no way of "abolishing" it and by doing so affects both buyers and sellers. So for those customers who complained that they were "scammed" of their money, tough luck, face it. That's life.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Science - A Menace to Mankind?
Since the "successful" progress of science, from the theory of evolution to the development of super computers, many people have developed the concern of whether science is really a help or menace to mankind. People have critisized science from a great variety of ways, from biology to physics to chemistry, science often appear as something negative that often result in a dystopian society or as the reason of mass destruction on Earth.
Just as an example, many books and films often depict the future world in one of the three basic situations:
1) Technology is so advanced that
a) It takes over the roles of humans completely
b) it is even more advanced that it takes over the human race, leading a minority of humans left, or controls over the humans and became the world's ruler
2) Biology is so advanced that
a) Every human being is simply created through cloning or test-tube experiments
b) Somehow a deadly virus that is horribly contagious is realised into the world, resulting in the majority of the people either dead or deformed.
3) Chemistry is so advanced that
a) Humans are simply made from particles (which in a sense even worse than cloning)
b) It is frequently used in warfare for victory (normally the use of biological weapon is more often)
So people question the purpose of science altogether because of the possibilities that science can be used in such immoral way.
However, I do not agree to what these people feel about science. Yes, because of science we are now in the nuclear age. Yes, because of science cloning is made possible. But, we should also consider what "good" things science have done for us. Because of the development of science, we can communicate through more alternatives other than letters, although this does not mean that we no longer use letters as a way of communication, as some people who ironically use the internet themselves. Also, the progress of science made what originally thought to be the "uncurable dieases" curable. Whenever you go to the hospital for something as simple as a cough, imagine what people may have to go through hundreds of years ago, where even a cough will need complicated and sometimes bizarre ways to treat.
As many people realise by themselves, humans are mostly made up of pessimists who see the world around them filled with danger, thus they would rather critisize on the bad side of science than the good side. Also, human beings have a natural urge to be recognized, thus the fear of being dominated by machines which they feel are not alive.
Science by itself is not the menace. The main culprit is the humans behind the scene. I feel that science by itself is sacred, because it is a mixture of all the most basic knowledge that no matter humans want to deny its existence or otherwise, still exists in various ways. The main reason why people are afraid that science would be a menace is because they are afraid of some people who will make use of science out of greed, which often result in the rest of the world suffer due to that few people's greed. On the other hand, a person who makes use of science in order to save people's lives would be hailed by the public.
For example, Alfred Nobel, then inventor of dynamite, invented dynamite in order to help people to clear mountains in order to buil railways. However, people found that dynamite, being so detructive, is able to be used as a weapon. This shows that the original intention of Nobel is good, but there are some people who made use of the product to achieve other purposes that is evil. This shows that the main issue is not science itself, but the person who is making use of it, of what he is using it to do.
All in all, I feel that science by itself is not a menace to mankind, but instead is the people who are using science to achieve a certain goal who is responsible for what will happen if science is being used that way.
Just as an example, many books and films often depict the future world in one of the three basic situations:
1) Technology is so advanced that
a) It takes over the roles of humans completely
b) it is even more advanced that it takes over the human race, leading a minority of humans left, or controls over the humans and became the world's ruler
2) Biology is so advanced that
a) Every human being is simply created through cloning or test-tube experiments
b) Somehow a deadly virus that is horribly contagious is realised into the world, resulting in the majority of the people either dead or deformed.
3) Chemistry is so advanced that
a) Humans are simply made from particles (which in a sense even worse than cloning)
b) It is frequently used in warfare for victory (normally the use of biological weapon is more often)
So people question the purpose of science altogether because of the possibilities that science can be used in such immoral way.
However, I do not agree to what these people feel about science. Yes, because of science we are now in the nuclear age. Yes, because of science cloning is made possible. But, we should also consider what "good" things science have done for us. Because of the development of science, we can communicate through more alternatives other than letters, although this does not mean that we no longer use letters as a way of communication, as some people who ironically use the internet themselves. Also, the progress of science made what originally thought to be the "uncurable dieases" curable. Whenever you go to the hospital for something as simple as a cough, imagine what people may have to go through hundreds of years ago, where even a cough will need complicated and sometimes bizarre ways to treat.
As many people realise by themselves, humans are mostly made up of pessimists who see the world around them filled with danger, thus they would rather critisize on the bad side of science than the good side. Also, human beings have a natural urge to be recognized, thus the fear of being dominated by machines which they feel are not alive.
Science by itself is not the menace. The main culprit is the humans behind the scene. I feel that science by itself is sacred, because it is a mixture of all the most basic knowledge that no matter humans want to deny its existence or otherwise, still exists in various ways. The main reason why people are afraid that science would be a menace is because they are afraid of some people who will make use of science out of greed, which often result in the rest of the world suffer due to that few people's greed. On the other hand, a person who makes use of science in order to save people's lives would be hailed by the public.
For example, Alfred Nobel, then inventor of dynamite, invented dynamite in order to help people to clear mountains in order to buil railways. However, people found that dynamite, being so detructive, is able to be used as a weapon. This shows that the original intention of Nobel is good, but there are some people who made use of the product to achieve other purposes that is evil. This shows that the main issue is not science itself, but the person who is making use of it, of what he is using it to do.
All in all, I feel that science by itself is not a menace to mankind, but instead is the people who are using science to achieve a certain goal who is responsible for what will happen if science is being used that way.
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