Weekly Reflection 24#2: Strong Wind Blows

This article is a record and reflection on the week from 2024-01-07 to 2024-01-13.

Strong Wind Blowing#

On Sunday afternoon, the sun came out, so I went out for my first run of 2024 in the winter. Inspired by the running_page project, I decided to download Nike Running Club again. This was the first running app I used, and I ran my first 10 km in college using this app. When it decided to exit China last year, I backed up my data, although I have forgotten where I backed it up:( But when I downloaded the app again, I was pleasantly surprised to find that my previous running records were still there, so I had no reason to give up running this year.

Although I knew that the sun outside the window was fake and couldn't provide any warmth, I underestimated the cold winter wind in the Netherlands and chose to wear clothes with good breathability. I chose a distance of 2 kilometers, but the heat generated during the run was all blown away by the wind. I couldn't warm up at all, and my efforts to generate heat through speed ultimately failed. My hands gradually lost warmth in the cold, and my fingertips were icy. When I finished running and wanted to end the running record in the app on my phone, my fingers were a bit stiff.

This is my experience of the winter in the new year, and all the coldness turned into soothing water vapor after a hot shower at home. After taking a shower, I suddenly thought that January is the time for the Hakone Ekiden, and I remember seeing a live stream of it last year when I was in China. Unfortunately, this year's Hakone Ekiden ended on January 3rd. In this 100th Hakone Ekiden, Aoyama Gakuin University won and broke the race record. It's really wonderful. I learned about this event because of the book "Strong Wind Blowing". Although this book has the tag "inspiring", I was also infected by the passion in it. But today, when I think of this book, I only feel the lightness of the runners in the strong wind. Haruki Murakami said in "What I Talk About When I Talk About Running", "Because I don't want to run, I have to run even more. This is the thinking of a long-distance runner." This is also what attracts me to running. Many times, the biggest difficulty is just taking the first step: every time I want to be lazy and not go for a run, I think about just running 1 kilometer, but the result is often that I can run 5 kilometers or even farther, and I feel lighter and lighter as I run.

SDG Challenge#

The SDG Challenge officially started this week. During the Kick-off Online Meeting, I found that I only knew the IBM team among the 5 partners. The next morning, when I woke up and prepared to catch the train to participate in the Inhouse Sprint, it was still dark outside. I even encountered a bus delay while waiting for the bus, so I hurriedly went to another platform to catch the bus, avoiding further delays in my journey. After arriving in Amsterdam, I missed the bus shuttle because of a metro delay, so I had to walk to IBM. At IBM, the person who received me was surprised that I wasn't wearing gloves. It was at this moment that I realized that I had been cycling in the Netherlands for too long and had lost the common sense of going out for a walk.

At IBM Netherlands, I learned that IBM also has a consulting business line, and all the people we discussed with this time are from this business line. During the whole day of activities, we discussed the sustainability of maritime shipping. I learned that maritime shipping transports 40% of the world's energy and 80% of the goods in supermarkets, so it directly affects the global economy and the stability of the supply chain. However, these journeys that take place in the ocean are rarely known to end consumers. Although some leading companies have launched and promoted the cozev standard aimed at decarbonizing maritime shipping, the issue of sustainability has not yet been transmitted to the maritime shipping industry.

Promoting the sustainability of maritime shipping requires unique financing solutions, but there are currently the following problems with obtaining financing:

Banks need to have control over the underlying assets, but cargo ships lose network communication after leaving the port, and the inability to synchronize transmitted data causes uncertainty.
At the same time, data collection will also be a difficult process. It costs money to install sensors on cargo ships, and there is still a need to explore unified standards for determining what data to collect and data integration.
In addition, the average lifespan of a cargo ship is 20 years. After 20 years, how to increase the residual value of the cargo ship and scrap or reuse the cargo ship in a sustainable way becomes a new challenge.

Stories related to the ocean fascinate me: the origin of ocean civilization, the shaping of history and geography by complex ocean currents, and the exploration of the world in the Age of Discovery game all stimulate my curiosity. Observing contemporary and future society through the ocean may also provide interesting perspectives and stories.

Life#

TV Series#

This week, my partner and I watched half of the TV series "Reply 1988". Last week, we marveled at the show's portrayal of the last century, and this week, we were amazed by the writers' grasp of delicate family relationships, especially between parents and children. Although I can guess the writers' emotional tricks, I am always fooled by them. It seems that I can always find traces of my own life and my family in this show, and these small moments connect me and my family across 8000 kilometers.

Venus Flytrap or Michelangelo#

One afternoon, the weather was so nice that my partner and I went out for a walk. On the way, we even saw sheep and horses huddled in the cold wind. Our destination was a large garden center, where various flowers and gardening tools were displayed. We picked a stick to support our lucky bamboo, and on the way home, we chose the name Michelangelo for our Venus flytrap from Austin, Woolf, and Michelangelo.

Data Science#

I continued the Data Scientist Professional with Python track on Datacamp this week and completed the course "Introduction to Data Visualization with Matplotlib". I mainly learned:

How to create basic histograms, scatter plots, bar plots, and box plots.
How to create two different types of plots with two y-axes.
The correct way to save images, not just right-click and save as in Jupyter Notebook.
I also learned how to use yfinance to load trading data for publicly traded companies.

I updated my learning notes for this week in 8_Introduction_to_Data_Visualization_with_Matplotlib.

Internship#

After completing the final round of interviews, I received a rejection letter. It was disappointing to receive such a result after completing four rounds of tests, but at least it confirmed my career direction in financial risk management and made me realize that I still need to improve my communication skills in workplace English. Next, I need to plan my master's course schedule and make time to find an internship in the second half of the year.

Outputs#

In the past week, I wrote a weekly reflection and an article on learning, "Exploring CDF vs PPF in SciPy: Understanding Probability Functions". Although the writing process was filled with discomfort as I gradually regained my ability to express myself, I am satisfied with this new beginning after a long time without writing.
While writing the articles, I found that the template I am using for my blog website does not support math typesetting. So I spent an afternoon integrating Katex into the website.
In addition, I started reviewing "Django in Action" last week, but the progress was not as expected. I only completed 3 chapters last week. This is the last week, so I need to catch up.

Reading#

"Don't Be Greedy"#

Influenced by "Reply 1988", I became curious about the prototype of the character Azhe, Lee Chang-ho. During the interval of waiting for the printer, I read the first chapter of his autobiography, "Don't Be Greedy". The title of this autobiography comes from the "Ten Commandments of Go":

The first commandment of the "Ten Commandments of Go" is "Don't Be Greedy". Its literal meaning is "The more you desire victory, the less likely you are to achieve it." However, the reason why the author initially placed this commandment at the top of the "Ten Commandments of Go" is that he realized the profoundness of "Don't Be Greedy" is not only limited to its literal interpretation. It is the general principle that governs the other nine commandments and is a guide to life with universal values.

This kind of understanding also runs through Lee Chang-ho's career, calm but precise. In the book, Lee Chang-ho said that Go is more about the pursuit of a certain "artistic path", such as tempering the mind, enhancing patience, and improving cultivation. He also observed that those who enjoy this higher level of pleasure are often amateur players who have truly let go of their desire for victory. Professional players often care more about victory and the prize money behind it, so they cannot imagine a broader world like amateur players can.

This experience is similar to my previous experience of playing chess. Usually, I enjoy solving chess puzzles and finding the best solutions for the current position. However, when I actually play chess, I become too concerned about my rating and ranking, and then a series of mistakes occur under this additional pressure. Lee Chang-ho further extends this experience to the level of life:

The goal of life is naturally "to win", but if you are too attached to the goal, you will become restless, narrow-minded, and rigid in your thinking. "Don't Be Greedy" does not mean giving up the desire to win, but it requires us to keep a calm mind, avoid various temptations, and understand ourselves in order to maximize our potential.

The story of buying a casket and getting a pearl is well-known, but in life, those who can truly surpass specific goals and enjoy the process are the minority.

"Chip War"#

I finished Part 1 of "Chip War" this week.

I thought it would be a book full of obscure semiconductor terminology, but the overall reading experience was surprisingly good. So far, it feels more like a book about the history of innovation than the history of the chip industry. The author starts with the history of human demand for "computation" and connects the evolution of computing units: humans -> transistors -> integrated circuits.

Certainly, the explosion of the semiconductor industry relies on innovative theories, but the real introduction of semiconductors from the military market to the consumer market was achieved by strong-willed individuals: Robert Noyce of Fairchild Semiconductor, Morris Chang and Mary Anne Potter of Texas Instruments, and others. They helped realize the leap from theoretical chips to mass production and continuously reduced costs and improved yield rates.

In the mid-1960s, Fairchild chips that previously sold for $20 were cut to $2. At times Fairchild even sold products below manufacturing cost, hoping to convince more customers to try them.

Each leap in this process is an innovation that is difficult to replicate. There is a book called "Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned". So far, the answer to my question is:

Firstly, innovation is a product with uncertain inputs and outputs, but planning often requires control over both inputs and outputs, which makes planning itself anti-innovation.
In addition, innovation itself represents the negation of existing frameworks. Therefore, creating something that breaks the existing environment in a given thinking framework and environment is a challenge. Marshall McLuhan's quote reveals this dilemma to some extent:

"We don't know who discovered water, but we know it wasn't the fish."

Weekly Gems#

Music#

This week, I found the soundtrack of a movie on Spotify and used it as background music while working.

Data Science#

I registered for the data API of FRED, which provides the latest and historical economic data for the United States. If I choose to focus on financial risk management for my master's thesis, I will need to find datasets from here.

Code#

Git is a very useful tool, although I have never figured out how to handle merge conflicts. This week, I found that freecodecamp has released a book called Gitting Things Done – A Visual and Practical Guide to Git [Full Book], which should be a great learning guide.
100-Days-Of-ML-Code can be used as a hands-on project when I enter the field of machine learning in the future.