HOUSING PROBLEMS

To prevent illness, government should solve the environmental pollution and housing problems. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

It is indisputable that environmental hazards and substandard housing detrimentally impact public health. However, governments have obligations across many sectors. While improving these should be prioritized, completely solving such systemic issues is likely infeasible due to budget constraints. Pragmatic, progressive reforms balancing cost and wellbeing may better serve citizens’ interests.

Pollution regulation and housing codes already exist for good reason – they profoundly influence population health outcomes. Environments with toxic air and water directly cause respiratory/digestive illnesses and cancers. Dilapidated, overcrowded buildings often foster accidents and infectious disease spread. Thus, from a social welfare perspective, governments are right to target these through subsidies, taxes, zoning laws etc.

However, truly fixing these complex problems requires prolonged, expensive interventions at societal roots. Building water treatment plants nationwide helps but does not eliminate all toxins. Providing quality affordable housing in cities remains a major challenge even in wealthy nations. And the most aggressive proposals like carbon taxes or bans on personal vehicles invite controversy and voter resentment. With governments balancing education, healthcare, defense and other domains demanding large shares of budgets, comprehensive solutions may exceed fiscal realities.

In the end, pragmatic incrementalism is often the answer when shaping public policy. Steadily tightening emission limits, gradually expanding housing vouchers, regularly upgrading water infrastructure etc. is far cheaper and politically simpler than revolutionary change. While the threats posed by pollution and shelter shortages are real, getting the policy pace right ensures governments can make steady gains on preventing illness while keeping diverse constituencies reasonably satisfied.

CITY AND ART

Some people believe that the government should spend more money putting in more works of art like paintings and statues in cities to make them better places to live in. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

While beautiful architecture and artworks can enhance urban living, lavish spending on such non-essentials often invites reasonable scrutiny. With limited budgets, more vital infrastructure and social services should take priority before beautifying public spaces. However, smart investments in quality design do uplift city life for residents and visitors alike, if done judiciously.

Urban planners face no shortage of urgent issues – housing, transport, health clinics, schools, reducing pollution and crime. Additionally cities must create jobs, support businesses, and maintain aging facilities. With these core needs underfunded, diverting extra cash on elaborate fountains, sculptures, ornamental bridges etc may seem frivolous. The marginal benefits to wellbeing fail to justify the millions spent.

However, well-conceived public spaces do enrich daily life immensely. Thoughtful installations like interactive light shows or living walls can educate and inspire. Bespoke benches, bike racks, bus stops etc built by local artists bring visual texture. Even a colorful mural or small GREEN refuge with a bench can lift neighborhood morale. Not every project needs to be a grand marble monument! Modest touches bring joy.

In balance, while extravagant state-funded wows like golden dinosaur statues are tough to rationalize, smart mixed-use planning with quality design uplifts everyone. Cities can opt for multifunction installations – benched stormwater channels, kinetic wind power sculptures, rooftop community gardens with student mosaics etc. Creativity fused to purpose yields public art progress. Allocating 1% of infrastructure budgets to such enriching enhancements creates cities where people flourish.

SUBJECTS TO BE LEARNED

Some people believe teenagers should focus on all subjects equally, whereas other people think that they should concentrate on only those subjects that they find interesting and they are best at. Discuss both views and give your opinion.

When considering teen education, schools and parents aim to balance breadth and specialization. Some take an egalitarian approach insisting on equal attention across disciplines. Others believe teens should emphasize areas of passion and talent to excel. In my view, while a broad base is valuable, customizing studies around budding interests and skills boosts motivation and achievement.

Mandating equal time across all topics regardless of aptitude has some merit. It exposes teenagers to variety – science, math, language, art, etc. Gaining basic fluency can help them make informed career and lifestyle choices. Also, developing analytical ability not just factual knowledge is crucial, so exploring unfamiliar intellectual territory spurs adaptable thinking. Additionally, well-roundedness helps conversation and relationships.

However, imposing identical curricula ignores teens’ emerging self-knowledge. By mid-high school, personalities gel and areas of giftedness or curiosity emerge. Allowing driven students to delve deeper into advanced concepts of greatest personal resonance better engages them to learn. Eschewing one-size-fits-all structure enables customized acceleration or remediation too. Rather than enduring mandatory lessons in weak areas out of compliance, they can amplify strengths.

While balance is prudent early on, as adolescence progresses, integration should give way to specialization per individual talents or zeal. Schools can still scaffold core competencies for college or employment viability like writing, computer literacy and basic math. But beyond that, flexibility helps students own their education and shape it around formative identity – the perfect primer for more independent study to come. With this differentiated approach, average teens become exceptional young scholars on their own terms.

RAPID POPULATION IN THE CITY

What are the effects of rapid population growth in the city? How can the quality of life of city dwellers be maintained?

Rapid urbanization leads to several pressing issues including strained infrastructure, inadequate housing, increased unemployment, and environmental degradation. As the population soars, roads and public transit become overwhelmed, schools and hospitals reach full capacity, and basic utilities like water and electricity are unable to meet demand. The sudden influx also drives up rents and housing prices, forcing lower-income residents into slums and homeless encampments. However, proactive policies and planning can mitigate these downsides.



The most immediate concern for quality of life is the population taxing city services. Resources are stretched thin across more people. Governments must rush to expand public transit networks, increase entry-level jobs, build new clinics and schools, as well as augment energy generation and water cleaning capacity. Without these actions, daily life becomes arduous. Traffic congestion reduces productivity. Blackouts spark unrest. Preventable sickness persists for lack of access. As frustrations mount, social disorder can erupt, especially when new groups perceive injustice.



Long term, cities must also make density more sustainable via “smart growth” development. New areas should concentrate housing, green spaces, and commercial zones together to reduce transit needs. High-rises can also house more residents with smaller land footprints. Additionally, cities can encourage rooftop gardening, renewable energy, and efficient water use to supply resources despite ballooning demand.

With comprehensive preparation, expanding cities can thrive. However, without modern urban planning, overcrowding brings numerous problems. As global migration accelerates, responsible governance and infrastructure investment are compulsory to help people lead decent, dignified lives even in mega-cities with millions of new inhabitants year to year. The solutions exist if governments mobilize proactively.

IS MODERN LIFE BETTER?

People living in the twenty-first century generally have a better quality of life than people who lived in previous centuries. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

It is reasonable to argue that humanity’s quality of life has improved dramatically over the past few centuries. Advances in science, technology, medicine, and society have fundamentally enhanced how we live. However, “better” is multi-dimensional. While some facets like health and convenience have surely progressed, arguments around happiness, meaning, and social connection are more complex.

On the positive side, we are living demonstrably longer lives, with global life expectancy up over 30 years since the early 1900s. Medicine has conquered countless diseases through vaccines, antibiotics, and improved public health. Technology enables global communication and access to humanity’s collective knowledge at our fingertips. Standards of living have risen substantially, with less hunger, homelessness, and poverty rates in developed nations. By nearly every physical metric, things are better.

Yet, difficult counterarguments exist. Rates of depression and mental health issues are rising despite physical gains. Opioid addiction and suicides plague recent decades. Loneliness afflicts citizens of connected cities. And existential anxiety festers as religion declines. Perhaps we’ve traded contentment and community for material comfort? Or are even our psychological troubles better diagnosed and treated today?

In the end, there’s strong evidence of betterment materially and physically. But the verdict is split regarding fulfillment. If “quality” includes purpose and peace of mind, the 21st century offers no guarantees. But considering child mortality, infections, nutrition, electricity access, and other tangible realities, “better” seems clear overall, even as new pitfalls emerge. We cannot defy the toll of aging and death, but we have objectively enhanced how we live in the interim.

LUCK OR NOT LUCK

Whether or not someone achieve their aims is mostly related to luck. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

At first glance, luck seems to play a major role in one’s success. Opportunities sometimes fall into people’s laps through sheer happenstance. However, while chance events do occur, achieving most long-term aims relies more on dedication, planning, and effort. Luck may influence outcomes, but it is not the deciding factor.

Luck does affect individuals positively or negatively. Being born into privilege versus poverty shapes access to resources. A chance encounter may unlock a career door. Illness can sideline ambitions. However, those who doggedly prepare create conditions for that luck to be optimized. Focus lays groundwork. A growth mindset spots possibilities. Skills turn openings into results. And grit pushes past obstacles that may dismay others. More often, aims are won little by little through hard work.

What seems to be “overnight success” usually has long, plodding beginnings. Athletes rise pre-dawn for years. Entrepreneurs face multiple rejections before their big break. Scientists see ideas fail dozens of times before a discovery. With relentless drive, they turn bad luck around. The route may meander, but the destination is willed, not wished for.

In the end, both diligence and fortune are ingredients for success. But as the old adage goes: “Luck favors the prepared.” While no one can control all circumstances, envisioning a goal and tirelessly developing relevant strengths stack the odds. Those aiming high must expect setbacks, get comfortable with uncertainty, and retain fierce faith that their breakthrough is coming if they put in the sweat equity. For most who achieve their aims, it is effort over luck, three times out of four.

THROWAWAY CULTURE

People now tend to throw away broken things whereas people in the past fixed and reused them. Explain the possible causes and what are the effects of this phenomenon.

The phenomenon of people throwing away broken items rather than attempting repairs is likely driven by several economic and cultural factors. One major cause is that many products today are designed not to be easily repaired – they use glues, proprietary screws, and complex electronics that make DIY fixes difficult. Simultaneously, the prices of new goods have dropped sharply with globalized mass manufacturing. A new phone often costs less than a repair.

These economic shifts have been paired with changes in culture and perception. Repairing items takes time and skill, neither of which fit modern lifestyles well. As more households become dual-income, free time disappears. And with digital devices and automated systems proliferating, the ability to DIY fix mechanical items feels akin to rocket science. The convenience of tossing and buying new wins out. There’s also a growing sense that repairing lower-cost items isn’t worth the effort when replacement is easy. With Amazon Prime and instant digital downloads, getting something new takes minutes, not weeks.

The effects of this throwaway phenomenon are worrying when aggregated. Producing all these new goods strains natural resources and impacts the environment. Devices with lithium batteries can leach toxic compounds when landfilled improperly. And the cycling pace of “in with the new, out with the old” has social effects too – it can diminish a sense of lasting value and quality. An item that once evoked family memories and inspired skill-building instead gets unceremoniously dumped after a couple years when the next best thing comes along.

In the end, while throwing away what’s broken and instantly replacing it appears efficient for individuals, the implications writ large are far more complex. It may save us time and effort in the moment, but yield unfortunate consequences.

PUBLIC TRANSPORT IS THE BEST SOLUTION

Serious traffic problems are common in large cities today. It is often said that encouraging people to use public transport is the best solution to these problems. Do you agree or disagree? Are there other ways to solve these problems?

Today, massive traffic issues afflict the majority of large cities due to the increasing ownership of cars by a growing population. These issues encompass congestion, gridlock, time wastage, and pollution. Whether relying on public transport constitutes the optimal solution hinges on numerous factors.

The notion of ‘encouraging’ individuals to embrace public transport holds appeal, but their response will be affirmative solely if the available transportation is efficient, dependable, reasonably priced, and convenient. Many older cities struggle to provide these attributes. For instance, in my hometown, Sydney, commuters frequently voice concerns about reliability and costs, while convenience remains lacking in the outer suburbs. In a city boasting a robust transport network, individuals could be enticed away from personal vehicles through incentives such as special pricing promotions and/or penalties for driving, such as targeted taxes and substantial parking fees. Indeed, even a 10% shift in commuters opting for public transport could yield a significant impact.

Public transport proponents often overlook people’s deep attachment to their automobiles. Individuals desire and require private cars to sustain their existing lifestyles. Thus, alternative solutions are imperative. Firstly, technology is poised to offer various alternatives in the upcoming years, including compact cars and eco-friendly electric or hydrogen-powered vehicles. The development of autonomous vehicles promises enhanced safety and a reduction in road space consumption. Secondly, urban planning holds the potential to craft more intelligent cities, incorporating ‘hubs’ to minimize driving and travel distances. The establishment of bike lanes and an emphasis on pedestrian accessibility also encourage reduced car usage.

Addressing traffic challenges is a complex endeavor that might persist despite our efforts. Nevertheless, these issues can be mitigated through a blend of strategies tailored to local circumstances, which encompass enhancements to public transportation.