On the primacy of the English language in the hard sciences

That English language competence is a significant aspect of an engineering student’s academic life and prospective career.

I disagree with the statement.

I would like to distinguish the language as a tool and the language as an expression. Two of them can be the same language. The difference is whether speaking it is an intentional choice or a natural inclination.

English language is indeed a useful tool in the engineering aspect. Majority of computer programs are written in English. Many thesis, papers are published in English or translated to English. Being competent in English is indubitably an advantage for engineering students to get updated with the latest technology. However, language as a tool is supposed to service the world which has a majority of non-English speakers. For example there will be non-English internet domain names in future so that people do not have to learn English in order to use the internet. Furthermore, language is not the sole ingredient for success. Everyone has different strength and weakness. Without English competency, one could be strong in other areas, or other languages. Therefore being incompetent in English will not stop them being successful in life and career.

‘You can speak to God in any language.’ No matter who has invented languages, the diversity should be preserved, instead of conforming to one language. English is the lingua franca by force, not choice and the force is diminishing nowadays, as the world is more aware of language preservation. Furthermore, the population of speakers, the widespread of usage should not determine one’s inclination of language. That’s why people find it fake when someone speaks ‘Queen’s English’. Eloquence, fluency may be advantageous especially for businessmen and lawyers. In my opinion, being genuine is more important for a complete person. For engineering students, it is especially important when we be are truthful to our work, instead of over-representing it in fanciful words.

To sum up English as a tool is useful but not almighty. The command of language is one of the aspects of an engineering student’s academic life and prospective career, and the language is not necessarily English.

The Importance of English to Engineers

Decades ago, there was a pervasive misconception about the importance of English to engineers. Engineers were thought to be people who were always doing technical things behind stage. Therefore, English is not playing an important part in their career. However, more and more people are holding another view that English is an indispensable part for an engineer.The change of people's view may also reveal the significant change of demand for engineering skills.

First, English is important for communication in a large project team. As a matter of fact, big project teams consisting tens or hundreds of engineers are very common nowadays. There is a trend that projects will need teams with more and more engineers to support. In this sense, engineers need to have a good knowledge of the English language to maximize the efficiency in collaboration and quality in output. With the background of globalization, high chances are a project team would have engineers from different countries. Due to the education and culture differences, they may have different approaches to a same problem. Only by communicating effectively, collisions and misunderstanding would be minimized with inspirations created.

Second, the importance of English also lies in the selling of engineers' designs. The fact is that most of the techniques developed for solving a same problem would be similar or at least not easily distinguishable. Thus, Engineers need the skill to sell the best points of the design, to make people believe in the value of his/her design. Take Apple as an example, the mac notebooks designed by Apple are definitely not much better than notebooks produced by others in terms of performance. It is the concept behind the design that counts. It is easy to see the importance of English to engineers.
In conclusion, English is playing an important role in the career of engineers. It not only help engineers achieve higher efficiency of collaboration, it also adds value to the designs of engineers.

The Significance of English Language in Engineering Students' Academic Life and Prospective Career

As we know, there are a lot of language in the world. Different countries have different languages, for example, Chinese speak Mandarin and Indonesian speak Bahasa Indonesia. They need a language that both of them understand to be able to communicate each other. This is where English takes place as a language to connect people in the world.

As we know, English is a very important language. People accross the countries communicate using English as their language of communication. English is the only way to connect people with different race, country, and language. They who can not speak English fluently will have difficulties to communicate with people who do not share the same language as them. So why do engineering students have to be able to speak English fluently? What is it for to them?

In real life, engineering students will not be able to do all kind of things by themself. They will face many problems that can not be solved without asking other people with other knowledges to help them. Those people may be from other countries also, because sometimes engineering student's will not find the answer for their questions from people from their own country only. This is why English is very important.

Another importance of English is that because engineering students have to use English to express their thoughts, ideas, and inovations in order to make every person in the world understand what exactly his or her ideas are. Hence, in my opinion, English is a very important language that every engineering students need to study it.

Portfolio 3 - Issue on Roundtable Discussion

Our last roundtable discussion which was being held on Week 10, was discussing about nuclear reactors and its future. Nowadays, people are too scared with nuclear reactors. The reason is because nuclear has a very destructive power which can destroy the entire city, like what happens at Chernobyl. In the last twenty years since Chernobyl disaster, scientists around the world are searching for a better solution to reduce the risks on using nuclear reactors. They try so hard so that they can fulfill the demands on energy without making people scared on it. They try to make it as safe as possible. Last year, scientists came up with new types of nuclear reactors which are claimed to be safer and also more efficient in producing energy than the old nuclear reactors. These new types are called nuclear reactors Generation IV (GEN IV).

GEN IV consists of 6 types of nuclear reactors. They are gas-cooled fast reactor, very high temperature reactor, lead-cooled fast reactor, molten-salt reactor, sodium-cooled fast reactor, and super-critical water-cooled system. These six nuclear reactors is different each other. Although, six of them are the solution from scientists to surmount the problems regarding nuclear reactors, there are still some arguments whether they are really safe or not. Many people still suffering because of Chernobyl disaster, therefore, some countries still do not want to use that. Hence, one thing that scientists should do is making a prove that these new types of nuclear reactors is safer. If they do that, I am sure that GEN IV will be developed faster and finished sooner than now.

Portfolio 3 - Issues on Roundtable Discussion

From the round table discussion held in October, 2009 by our classmates, it was the consensus that the nuclear power will be the sole solution to meet the increasing demand for energy. In addition, the Generation IV Nuclear Energy System is believed to be safer and more efficient. However, the approach to the problem is mainly from a technical point of view. Which I strongly feel is deviating from the real life situation.

Discarding the engineering approach, or rather looking into the problem from a broader base, does a single solution solve the problem of population increase, environmental pollution and providing safe and abundant energy? If it does, it will be more dangerous. The demand of Man is never satisfied. One propulsion which makes us ‘engineer’ the world at our convenience.

Nuclear power fanatic claim that the Gen IV system is the best in many aspects. It seems true because right now our scientific knowledge can only enable us to implement in such way. However, decades later there will be Gen V, Gen VI and so on to replace the current one, with knowledge gained probably from the failure of Gen V reactors. Previous nuclear power systems were also thought to be the ‘best’ at that point of time. Therefore the current claim is invalid.

Professionals tend to present the advantages with jargon, to shy the general public away from discussing with them in technical aspects. Though it is ‘safe’, in real life the risk is never 0. Theoretically risk can be minimized (from research), assumed (by the public), transferred (to other institutions such as an insurance company) or avoided. For the public, avoiding a tame monster is still better than living next to it, no matter how tame it is. However, technocracy has determined that with/without our consent, the program will still carry on. (And we have to support one of the reactors in order to complete EG1471)