Deathbug

Reality and its future are quite gloomy. Last night, I was able to watch the Maalaala Mo Kaya episode (ABS-CBN) and the life of Francis Magalona (GMA). The MMK episode depicted what I Love You Forever means while the Jessica Soho documentary showed who Francis Magalona was, the kind of person he has been, his battle for the big C, and the impact of his life to other people. The MMK is the story of what life is at old age and the documentary is a version of living for a short time.

Life leads to death whether you like it or not. The reality only offers two ways of dying, either you die young or you die old. We all have the ‘switch of death’ that can be triggered by illness, accident or murder and age is not a predicting factor. The actual death will take only a negligible fraction of your lifetime though dying may take some of your lifespan. As what Morrie did (Tuesdays with Morrie), The most important thing is not how you died but how you lived even if you are dying. Dr. Gregory House also quoted that Almost dying changes things but dying changes everything. But the dying stage is not applicable to some individuals because those individuals will experience the sudden death. So, it is always better if we are prepared. We should not wait for our dying stage before we make something out of our lives. Dying is not our checkpoint to slow down and ponder on our purpose. Instead, we live out our lives, do what is right and reach out to people. They may be clichés but they are the honest truths.

How do you want your life to end? As for me, I want it to be sudden. Though unexpected death can cause more pain to the people around you than death with prior notice.

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ANOVA and Pearson for Likert Scale Analysis, Huh?

I had been analyzing data of masteral students (my teacher corrected me before that there is no "masteral" word but "master's student" doesn't sound good). One problem I had encountered was the use of parametric tests to those that concern ordinal variables. My professors in UP taught me that Always, Often, Sometimes and Never are ordinal variables and they had also quoted that the measurement of this likert scale is still debatable to whether it is nominal or ordinal. I analyzed two questionnaires with this type of measurement using nonparametric tests like Mann-Whitney, McNemar, Friedman Test and Kruskal-Wallis but the panelist who checked them both refused the tests that I had done. They suggested the ANOVA and t-Test for the differences and reconstructed a problem to concern correlation/association. The tests they suggested for the correlation was Pearson R. What?!


My classmate once asked my professor this issue on ANOVA for the likert scale and yes they agreed that the test is not appropriate because ANOVA is for interval variables. So, Pearson R is also not an appropriate test for the correlation of ordinal variables as for the rule. There are no special rules for the use of ANOVA and Pearson for the ordinal variables, right? I just followed the panelists’ advice because I want those students to pass their thesis defense. Even if I feel that I violated my learning, I am still not in the position to contest their knowledge because they had been advising theses before I was able to gain my statistical knowledge. It’s like they are veterans already and I am just a fresh bud. It just confirmed my belief that some schools in my country are not providing the students with the right learning. I hope that those in their level will be kind enough to tap these people's backs and enlighten them on the issue. I may be wrong with this so please let me know!

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Who is Marky Cielo?

When I heard the news about his passing, his name is just a name for me. (ok,now you hate me, i am just telling the honest truth). I stared at the moving image of him on the news yet I can't seem to remember him. I had watched portions of Asero before but still no click from my brain. Who is he, then?

He died, inspired and brought pride to people but i don't know the person even as a celebrity. He surely made it to the news when he won 'the ultimate male survivor' and the first and only 'Sole Survivor' title. Maybe i was so eat up with my studies that time and TV viewing had been out of my system. Never heard and never seen. The news of his sudden death had made so many people disappoInted. He had potentials and talents to make it to stardom (he is in the process anyway, the Guillermo Mendoza Award had seen it).

After the news was aired, i made a research on what it is like to be Marky Cielo. Wikipedia had presented detailed facts about his life. His family status, the time before he became a celebrity, filmography and the last hours before his death (makes me wonder why he used internet cafe if he can have wifi in his house, he won 10M right?) He was tagged in articles as the first celebrity with indigeneous descent. Is he proud to be named that way? For those who are also not aware of his existence in the showbiz industry, they will also remember him as That first celebrity who died young, goes with the name of Rico Yan and Mico Sotto. That's all. But for those who had traced and been in his progress in the industry, marky cielo is a good friend, dancer and all the good things you can say to sympathize with the dead. That's the way life is. You died, your death made it to the news, lots of people came into your wake, your life ended. The sad truth is in time,it will be great if generations can still remember your name.

Everytime i heard his name in the news, i don't know why i always have the feeling that tears are forming in my eyes. He was a stranger to me but i am aware of the feelings when someone died unexpectedly. You can't accept it and continue to live as if he is still there. You can only deal with it once you become lonely and acknowledge the feeling of being left behind. They say time will heal the wound. As for my experience, you can neglect it but never forget. Every time you remember, the feeling rushes back.

For the man who earned different titles during the short span of living. May the world will remember you in different ways.

Check out the rumors behind his death in my post Marky Cielo (Ditto).

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Rollbacks yet no Rollback

Oil price rollbacks had been the recent news on Tv. From the price of PHP 50 per liter, it is now worth more than Php 30. Then,some oil companies have also announced that there will be another rollback this December as 'gift' to the drivers.

How come that the tricycle fare in my town is still PHP 8? It was 6 pesos before but due to continues oil price hike, the fare also went up last september. There have been rumors that if there will be a reduction, it will only amount to 1 pesos! The government unit responsible to implement this change haven't acted til now. Whoever lead that unit, he surely is playing safe. The drivers want more, the commuters want less. So, he is to make the best solution, that is to meet halfway. Before, there were so many hikes yet the drivers strived to exist with only 6 pesos as fare. Now that oil price has gone down,they can't take to risk to resume the old fare. Are they afraid that there will be another boom in the future?So they are taking the opportunities now to prepare for such event. I don't get the logic. When it goes high again, the commuters will understand if they take action to increase rates again. But now that the price is backsliding,they should also consider the interest of the commuters.

Philippine centavo coins

You've seen them. They had gotten into your pockets. Yet, you haven't used them to pay for what you bought. They are the 5 and 10 centavo coins.

What's their use in the philippine monetary circulation?

You got hold of them when you purchased things which amounts to ***.95 in malls. The cashier wanted to give you the exact change. Sometimes we just don't mind those change. But have you imagine that stores can also get profits from those neglible amounts? If they accumulate,they will surely amount to something. Have you seen how many people make purchases in stores everyday? My professor once told us that if we can learn to hack banks' account system,we can really make big money even if we will just get Php 0.01 from every bank accounts they have in everyday basis. People will don't mind losing that amount if they see it in their account,right?

Once we got hold of these coins, have you ever tried using them to pay for your purchase. In my case i haven't. I just stock them in a drawer after i receive them. Even if you use them to pay for your discounted jeepney fare, the driver will just return them to you and give you an insulting smile. There are also instances where you can get the .05-.10 discount if a store doesn't use them and your due is ***.80 to .95.

There is these stores in my province who give candies instead of giving a .50 change. Why then they price their stuff with .50 excess if they are not gonna make a .50 change? Very opportunistic especially if you pay them in bills.

See,once you got them, you can't get rid of them unless you use it in stores which circulate them. So, if people just stock these coins then there is a loss in our fund. If many people do this,have we been wasting a something amount in our monetary fund if they were not able to circulate?

Cat Stevens: on biography

Let me share what i learned from his biography.
He was such a person who strove hard to define his purpose. He was a famous pop singer yet he believed that his celebrity status is leading him to nowhere. After he suffered tuberculosis, he began his search for answers. It was also during those times that he started to write books and novel. His life made a sudden turn when he got hold of a book that reflects the kind of life he has and the life he wanted in the future. He researched on topics like spirituality and living. He learned to read the KORAN in Arabic language and turned his back from his career. He professed his faith to be a Muslim. He changed his name to Yussuf Islam, wed his wife and taught his kids the ways of being a Muslim. He built the first Muslim school in UK using his own money. He auctioned his instruments and gave the proceeds to charity. With his popularity, he became the spokesperson for the Muslim community when war broke in Bosnia. He returned to his singing career after his 15 years of abandonment. His songs now depicts life and the music was different from before. He was such a person who searched and found what he had been looking. I am truly inspired on how he made a significant life out of his lifetime.

for my future posts!

Achievements and character

It has been my observation all my life that a man's achievements rest less on his abilities than they do in his character. It's not what a man can do; it's what he will do. That's why you find so many brilliant failures, so many people of no more than average talent who succeed. They have put to use all they had while the other fellow either misused or misdirected it.

Of murders and convictions

Lovers of crime fiction and even more so, followers of true-life crime stories have a weakness: They want the story to come to a satisfactory climax and denouement which finds justice being evenhandedly meted out, the guilty punished, the innocent freed to resume their normal lives. Neat 360-degree affairs rounded off legalistic tidiness. In the case of murders in a certain town there just wasn’t that happy, convenient set of conclusions followed by the lights coming up, THE END hanging in limbo as curtain rattles closed.
The fact was, the murderer was never brought to justice or even revealed; identified by some of us, yes, but never quite brought to heel. The motive remained hidden from the public and the murders remain officially unsolved. And the innocent would never return to the lives they had once found quiet, comforting, normal.

My life was one of those which exploded. I was no writer, no observer, no reporter. I was a participant. And the story kept peeling away, like a snake dropping away its skins, it was I who held it wriggling and twisting and darting out. The truth, when such extreme efforts are made to conceal it develops a peculiar life of its own. It struggles to make itself known, to receive the credit it deserves, to achieve the capital T. The Truth dies hard. Maybe it never dies at all, but lies sleeping, waiting for someone to find it, decipher its code.

The truth exists independent of us all, for its own sake. It has no moral validity. It reminds me of Melville’s white whale. Captain Ahab was wrong: Moby Dick was not evil, he simply was. And so it is with the truth. There it sits, expressionless, a disinterested party. I am what I am, says the truth, and the rest of us are stuck with it.

You will know the truth and only you will be able to decide if it was worth learning. Worth it for the people involved, worth it for you, and most of all if it was worth it for me.