Sunday, August 30, 2009

Shit does not always float. Things change!

In the words of Irshad bhai only-- "हर आदमी जो सही दिख रहा है, कही अन्दर से टूटा हुआ है। "
And in mine words-- "जीना महँगा हो गया है और ज़िंदगी सस्ती हो गयी है."

I am just sum of these two lines in reality. Rest written here is broken and chaos of my mind.

I am trying hard to inculcate and dissolve ideas into mine reading material, thinking and writing. From now onwards, the frequency of posting on blog will be low and only original matter will appear. More composition, less compilation and adaptation. Instead of plagiarism, a phase to produce mine naive thoughts has came. Shit does not always float. It has to be flushed in sewer one day. Things had changed inside me now!.

Yeh woh Manzil to Nahin:
This is not the article I want to publish here just a day before. A disorganised, disoriented and unthemed writing. But this is how life is, unclear and changing our subjectivity of perception on recollection. Too much order was taking the breathe of the blog, hence a break from established pattern.

Under any 'ism', man exploits man, so the idea of utopia or holy struggle goes in smoke and a grand illusion surrounds regarding every topic. If racism, religious intolerance, and sexism are wrong, can nationalism which is so often upheld as noble, be right? All the emotions can be manipulated in wrong direction by radical falsehood thrust of oration skills. Logic and analysis fail and everybody is happy to just follow. There are thousands who claim to have read Bhagvad Gita but have yet to meet person who actually understood the philosophy and practiced it.Take a example like the principle of Karmayoga only. More than deliberate blasphemers of a scripture, the unconscious misinterpreters of a sacred text are the innocent criminals who bring about the wretched downfall of its philosophy for their own convenience and prejudices. There is no use to fight over the credibility of God who will ever come out to prove himself right or wrong.

I don't want to be fed any boring facts and figures. I'd rather starve my mind a bit and have to search out nutrition in stranger places. People want to breathe a live of luxury and flamboyancy with the route of credit also. The luxury industries is doing what it takes to cater to the whims & fancies of rising class. The aspirational lifestyle doesn't limited to material objects but it has evolved into unique and personal experiences. Our society has taken voyeuristic path and children turning on to the habits of adults. People love to see other's in pain. Yet there are those who have managed to find the balance, ensuring they do their bit to propel their nation forward. That gives me inspiration to preach and express my feelings. Acceptance, Care, Respect and Recognition are terms for which a man struggle. Parallel cinema to caste discrimination or gender inequality, everything revolves around these 4 words only. In the Rebel against the establishment, getting wasted on high dose of liquor or drugs and crashing bike in high speed around a blind turn is no solution. To rebel means to stand for something what you truly believe in till last breathe. The modern idea of world is about equality and the transcendence of social barriers, not about narrow dividing walls. In this sense inspiration may well have come from Rabindranath Tagore’s song: Jodi tor daak shuney keoo na ashey tobey ekla chalo rey. (If none heeds your cry to march together, just walk alone, no if or whether.)

A good news for my fans that I was quoted in a international e- magazine;India: A wave of suicides among farmers. Just learned one lesson of lifetime yesterday: To lead people walk behind them.

My views in yours words

"Blogging won't make you a millionaire, so you should only blog if you love doing it. If you don’t enjoy yourself, your readers won’t enjoy reading your blog." -- Unknown.
It is the first step for start of writing original writeup only. This post is written in the series of flushing collection of other peoples writing from my mind. Reminder, this post is full of plagiarism.

Education-- Tell me about yourself: a brief introduction, talk about your skills relevant to the position, experience are transferable to position available and career objective. It is the sort of basic questions faced by us. For me, a college degree shows not that its holder has learned something but rather that he is the kind of person who could learn something. Today, a hybrid talk on education.

Schools or Universities are places where most young people come together crossing the old boundaries of religion and caste. It is here where the new nation is being constructed in the minds of coming generation.

"Universities, are no longer ivory towers. They were meant to remain above politics, but are very at the very centre of it." -Deepak Nayyar former VC of Delhi University.
In the process of discovering alien side of things, one begins to lose one's identity and falls into the trap of becoming an alienated person contemptuous of everything natural and uniquely inherited in him. Rote memorizing involves the brutal repetition of material just as it stands.The fidelity of memory is greatly affected by the intention. Students like me make a great mistake when they study for the purpose merely of retaining until after examination time. We retain facts after they are once impressed. The ability of retention purely depends upon the way it is impressed onto the brain. Recall is the stage at which material that has been impressed and retained is recalled to serve the purpose for which it was memorized. Recall is thus the goal of memory. Whenever a remembered fact is recalled, it is accompanied by a characteristic feeling which we call the feeling of recognition. It has been described as a feeling of familiarity, a glow of warmth, a sense of ownership, a feeling of intimacy. I learned in graduate school that "knowledge is power" but found that it is not correct ! Knowledge is 'potential' power depending upon how it is applied (if it is applied at all.) It's not what you know, but how you use what you know !!!

Work environment of the place can make any job or academics interesting or boring. Choosing a field and being adamant about it is just restricting yourself unnecessarily. Interest is not something which a profile can develop, it depends more of on the work environment you nurture your mind in. When you are content to be simply yourself and don't compare or compete, everybody will respect you.

Cinema--
The majority of people retain better things that are visually impressed. Hence, cinema can be consider as more effective tool than literature for spreading awareness. The idea is to engage an audience and uplift them in some way and take them into an experience which is emotional at many levels. Cinema no more reflects the society because we no more live in a society. Today we live in a market. And like all other products the market forces also control cinema. In the words of Sudhir Mishra - A great film is a film where you lose the distinction between how a tale is told and the tale itself; where there is an investigation into the truth but simultaneously the idea of being wrong is also present. You want to know the truth but when you reach it you also have an idea that maybe that’s not it. A genuinely vibrant cinema that does not necessarily have to be realistic or naturalistic. All we have to do is not to succumb to those who force to mimic or imitate in the name of 'inspiration'.

Cricket--
A wise team does not depend on recoveries. Cricket is a simple game that can be made to sound very complicated. The people who do the simple things well are the people who are most successful. Simple is repeatable and repeatable is successful. Cricket is execution not a game. Cricket is an isolating and yet public game. Soccer players suffer when they miss a penalty. Cricketers risk that collapse every time they go out to bat. It is not a sport at all, it's an execution. --- Peter Roebuck

Monday, August 24, 2009

All about Kanpur

This is an aspirational information-gathering article. Don't consider it as an inspirational or nostalgic writeup for a land of the leather industry, Kanpur. Kanpur is a big city rich in history. The summed-up details are available on Wikipedia and Kanpur unofficial website .For highly irrational opinions take a joy ride with me.

Tourism: Places of Interest in Kanpur.
For more queries contact: Official blog page of the District Magistrate, Kanpur Nagar.

Hotels and Food:
A lot of hotels are established to cater to thousands of guests yearly. The Landmark Hotel, Kanpur with Mehak Restaurant restaurant serves authentic Chinese and traditional Indian dishes. The names are like this--Angithi Restaurant, Little Chet Restaurant, Chung Fa Restaurant. One person has taken a taste & reviewed nearly all of them. FYI, it's not me. Reviews are at --- My experience with Restaurants in Kanpur.

Cuisine:
Dish name : Kanpur Chapathi.
Processing Technique is explained with photos here.

Scholarly works on Kanpur History: (videshi university se bhaiyaji)
Forgetting the Violence, Remembering the Report: The Paradox of the 1931 Kanpur Riots by Priya Agarwal.

FM radio is now more popular than Vividh Bharati ki prasaaran seva ka kanpur kendra. Times have changed now.

IIT Kanpur:
In my all post, I have not described in detail a heaven on the land of Kanpur, especially for me. That was indeed IIT- Kanpur. It has got a huge campus with a peaceful environment where a feeling of respect & humbleness arises inside the heart. It has sent out many distinct students to the world to spread the name of India.

Official website of IITK.
Again take a look at Kanpur and IITK from a foreign angle: Kanpur Kanpur and IIT.
Excerpt of the talk with Prof Ashok Jhunjhunwala about IITK history.
Forgotten chapter of the History of IITK & MIT together.

Cricket:
Kanpur is also famous for the exaggeration of a simple line. Sahara once was in talks for IPL franchise before the recession. Nothing is yet final but people are damn sure than Subrato Roy about IPL Kanpur franchise. And forget to mention a special series of incidents a few years back would be Crime: A take on green park stadium. The incident was the entrance of a dog in one-day matches. It has happened 3 times at least in live in front of me. Pretty Hilarious interruptions of the whole police squad running after one dog. Also, GP is a brown park wicket for Ranji teams and turns into the lush green for international matches. Enjoy the account of Ken Herr about watching a match in Kanpur. You will be amazed, why I always give the point of view of foren baba's about Kanpur? For introspection, I am here na with Kanpur Series !!!

Friday, August 21, 2009

24 years of my life

I have became 24 years old today. My birthday is like gentle reminder that I am much more nearer to death and consequently I have that much less time to do whatever I want to do. With each passing day, the indefinite future grows a little bit darker, but the past just keeps getting brighter with nostalgic and sweet memories.

Girish Karnad had written his first renowned play 'Yayati' when he was a 21 year old in 1962. Orson Welles made "Citizen Kane" at age of 26 and Bhagat Singh became martyr at the age of 24. Here, I am inheriting this earth, still offering my service to a foreign company for livelihood rather than solving problem of un-proportionate distribution of power and wealth in my country. It's faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living. Still searching for that missing something !

What better to quote something bhokali on birthday:

In life we all have an unspeakable secret, an irreversible regret, an unreachable dream and an unforgettable love. ~Diego Marchi

All above philosophy is worthless without the joy of celebrating birthday for a moment. Happy Birthday to me and Murali. This year celebration was good but the bumps were drastically reduced in comparison to college. Remembered Tintin's kick ass at GPL ceremony at birthday of each person. Great Days of friendship and feud...

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Facts about Higher Education

Let me begin with the paragraph cited from above article: Redefining meaning of world class:-

What a pity! 18% of the worlds population (Indians) call third rate colleges as world class and continue to delude themselves. Not only that, they fight tooth and nail to fight to get into universities which are trash by any standard. To add icing to the cake, these 3rd rate institutions say that they are better than Harvard (factoring in just the exclusivity factor) or say that they are "world class". Its better that they these institutes recognize the garbage they are in and first come out of the trash can, before trying to make any claims to delusionary greatness.


Thats one reason why our colleges never look beyond national rankings. Every year, one sees different magazines coming up with headline breaking news, that some IIT has overtaken the other as the top college or that one of IIM's A/ B/ C has been ranked above the other. And the gullible Indians lap up this trash being doled out to them. Never mind that they learn nothing from such rankings because its the same trash being served in different ways year after year. And everyone is happy, the public with the hope that these institutions would help them get the "world class" status and "world class" opportunities, and the media because it sells a record number of copies of their magazines.

I don't completely agree or disagree with his views. Still, they are worth looking for introspection.

Recently, In the latest issue of Current Science, the director of NISCAIR, Dr. Gangan Prathap has written an article, Ranking of Indian engineering and technological institutes for their research performance during 1999–2008. Three esteemed bloggers has done their work of evaluation on this matter: Prof T Abi of IISc, Prof Giridhar of IITM & Cogito Ergo Sum.

I would like to present a view of my friend who wants to remain anonymous [Highly Credible Source].

Prathap's paper about the 10 years research progress at IITs/BHU/ISM/IISC. He didn't consider a few things like IITs/BHU/ISM are indeed technical institutions which specific mode towards engineering education and they should only compare that component with IISC or Jadvapur. Recently, US NEWS has done that. The rankings should be passed to as many people can be, so that the old faculty of India which is on a constant urge to nullify the best technical commodity to the entire world. ---- World's Best Colleges and Universities

A take on Old Indian faculty problem with reasons:

1: They they are nationalistic by holding PHDs of students from 6.5 to 8 years in fundamental sciences in India. They blame it to the equipments but I don't know how equipments play a role in Theoretical Physics.

2. They don't want any free transaction of knowledge in between you and the collaborator which hinders a lot of insight about the problem. Guys who really solve the problem never get to be on the committees which are meant for having discussion on the problems.

3. Most of the Indian PHD professors have anti-Btech emotions especially at IIT M/K and B. I dont know about your institute. They think Btechs leave India for their own good, but think about it, a PHD student gets a salary of 10-15K in India on a MHRD project worth 25 lacs and I have seen professors billing 1 lacs Rupees on Miscellaneous items, and Believe me he is one of the most famous Professors from India. They will never accept that a good sum of money is going to their individual pockets and they dont spend that money paying the students or buying new equipments.

4. For an equipment, they will write another grant and as usual that will get accepted. A student will be employed to set it up obviously on a low enough salary and expected to do the bullwork. Again Miscellaneous.

5. Newest of the faculty cribs: We should get higher salaries. Okay agreed. Tell me what is the quality of your publication and why should I buy your research when it doesn't solve any problem in industry, only meant for making publications at the cost of hapless students.

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Welcome to Kanpur

Every city has a character, a pulse of its own. Kanpur as a city is infamous for its uneven roads, irregular traffic and heaps of garbage. But its people love the city. They add color and spice to this city. They love to live here, no matter how bizarre their ways! This post is all about searching colors of life in this city in the images through the images taken by a foreign tourist.





Business:

Elgin Mill, Kanpur’s oldest textile mill, J K Cotton Mill, Pulse mills, J K Jute Mills, Kanpur Unnao Leather Development Company (KLC), Ghari detergent & Duncan Fertilizers were all part of the industrial culture of Kanpur. The city may have been robbed of its historic smoking chimneys and requisite infrastructure, threatening the expansion of existing industries, but Kanpur still remains a commercial hub for traders. For more, Why Kanpur is still UNDEVELOPED?

Pollution & Traffic:

There is nothing more for me to say about the Pollution of Kanpur. Kanpur has topped the list as the most polluted city in the state. [Ref]. I will give you a summarized view of traffic and pollution from a blogger view---

Dust never settles down on this road, just like a desert rally. The traffic at Ghanta Ghar, Kidwai Nagar and Tatmill always create a lock jam. Most of times, people are trapped in matrix of trucks formed by their grand entry possibly from all directions with Their revved up engines were kicking up dust plumes. The rush of cyclists, hand driven, cards, loaders, tempos, car, buses and trucks, rickshaws has never been easy to conquer. The visibility can become zero and first impression was the entire stretch was shrouded in thick blanket of fog. The lights couldn't penetrate the cover and you will vigil scampered for the missing road. The bravehearts on their motorcycles negotiated the potholes with such speed and perfection, Ghost Rider with all his divine powers might be ashamed of himself.

Always in the media for all the wrong reasons. Run! Quick! Cover the girls! or Fake Cheque Scam.
Kanpur & its people are magnanimous. They will live on if it means living with problems, problems, problems, and problems. Seriously, Nothing rhymes with Kanpur.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Independence Day


A collection of songs for provoking emotion of nationalism in this numb mind.

Hum Hindustani


Hum Honge Kamyaab


Aye Mere Watan ke


Aye Watan Aye Watan


Sarfaroshi ki Tamana


Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength; loving someone deeply gives you courage. Loving my country gives me courage to change it for better tomorrow and alter yesterday's mistake. Despite many intellectuals think 15th August,1947 as change of government, I prefer to stick to mine opinion. All those who sacrificed blood and life for this country were not fools and they deserve respect from our side. And there is also no use of silent gratitude for all martyrs. They deserve more than these patritoc songs, they deserve more...

I know that hundred years of rule did not just colonize the land but it also colonized the body, mind, thought and culture of the conquered people. Independence to the Indian people was supposed to have come over 62 years ago but we are not free because of the brown sahibs surrender and denial of their self esteem and their dominance in politics, media and public discourse.

Still, want to read more. Stop and just think on this line -- "What do they know about India, who only know about India !!!"

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Do the Right Thing - 2

A man far greater than you or me, Mahatma Gandhi gave us a talisman “Recall the face of the poorest and weakest man you have seen, and ask yourself if this step you contemplate is going to be any use to him.

I see this line in class 1st in ncert books.
I was able to read this line in class 3rd in Hindi book.
I understand true meaning of these magical words at this phase of life.
I don't know when I will feel those words ?

Leave this idealistic talk one way, be practical for a while. FYI, I have done a small share of mine social responsibility. I have just taken fees burden of Sruthi [Profile] completely and Hemant [Profile] partially for this academic year. This is made possible through a NGO, Sankalp Foundation. I had enquired about this NGO completely before helping the students in their educational endeavours. Arun Tangri [CSE-06, ITBHU] is the person who had arranged all the formalities and meeting with the parents of Sruthi and Hemant.

Reason to take credit publicly in blog is simple. I want to show you a way through an example. I am just a person like you, a earning member of society. If we could donate just 1% of our annual income towards good causes, our society will become a better place to live for us and others. Please invest (not spend) your hard earned money or precious time to make life better for others. A helping hand by you is really a great help for someone.

Kindness in words creates confidence, Kindness in thinking creates profoundness, Kindness in giving creates Love.-Lao Tzu.

Monday, August 10, 2009

Jay Hind! Title Track : First Look



Lyrics : Varun Grover
Sung By: Sumeet Raghvan
Music : Claver
Directed By: Abhigyan, Varun, Jeevak and Rahul

Sure a big controversy will arise and I am waiting for moral scavengers to attack on this show [Streisand_effect]. My personal reason to cheer it, off course Varun Sir and plain satiric truthfulness of opening song.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

No rain drop blames itself for the flood

JRD Tata had once observed “I don’t want India to be an economic superpower. I want India to be a happy country.

Currently, there is the alienation of students from the ground realities of India. In the race to become technologically advanced, we have given no attention to social science and the rural sector. See, everyone knows and has seen the fact that if the rich sell a gun, the poor use it to destroy them. As long as the idea of 'potential resource' is equated to power and control, development will always be about money. Never about people or real social development perhaps. Deep Joshi, Magsaysay prize winner in 2009 points out the fact that "Development work is considered intellectually inferior, unlike high science, industry or diplomacy. We want to prove that it is both a challenging and a noble choice."

The lack of social scientists is hurting the growth of India. There is a lack of serious study of economics and social science in India. Read Fractured Social Sciences for a detailed view.

There is a huge lack of awareness among youths about our own country. I once commented in desperation " When youth do not associate their identity with the social and cultural fabric of their country, nothing is going to change. People from UP do not know about Vijay Tendulkar and people from Tamilnadu do not know about Amrita Preetam. A whole English medium-oriented generation has no idea of the ‘Samporan Kranti’ movement by Jayaprakash Narayan and Ram Manohar Lohia. They will die to see MTV Roadies or Splitsvilla but do not have heard names of Carnatic or Hindustani classic music."

The whole system has failed to equip students with either reasoning, language, or logic skills, this is the effect of putting a premium on mediocrity over the last 60 years. Indians have fallen in love with selectivity. Everyone loves rejecting everyone else. Infosys selects 1% (link), jobs paying 100 rupees a month claim 5% selectivity (link), police jobs claim less than 1% selectivity (link), and becoming a police constable in Bihar implies you belong to the top 0.7% out of 130000 applicants (link) and the list goes on. Unfortunately, no one asks what the standards of our top institutions are.

Technical growth was the main area of progress along with learning English as a medium of communication. We are ahead in the service sector more due to our efficiency with English rather than technical super skills. What we are waiting for is, for the whole of Africa to learn English and adapt to technology. Then these MNCs will switch their production and services to Africa and the third world for the search of cheap labour and we will become a leading developing country with 100 million consumers and a very tiny contribution to world trade. Our country has turned into a dustbin of MNCs as a country of mass consumption rather than mass production. This growth will not long last if we don't invest this wealth in the production/ manufacturing sector. For example: We need to create tech companies like Google, Microsoft, and Adobe from the generated money through the IT industry.

There is a great paradox of what economist A.K. Shivakumar points out the children of the rich go to public universities and children of the poor go to private money-squeezing institutes. These second-rate institutes turn out second-rate students, condemning the peripheral to further periphery. The lack of scholars from our universities is stagnating our chance to grow as a developed nation. A blogger correctly pointed out the fact that:

In the humanities, we need a William Dalrymple to teach us about the history of the Deccan, or Delhi. There are many economic and social factors involved in this sad state of affairs, but one of the most prominent of these factors is the utter lack of a vibrant university system fostering unfettered interaction and exchange of ideas among people of widely disparate interests and expertise. All this affects another important part of the higher education system of the country – Graduate School. We are creating more PhDs than any other country in the world with the possible exception of China, but are our PhDs really worth the title of “Doctor of Philosophy”? I am not sure. Are our research institutes producing loads of doctorates who are nothing but highly trained technicians or are we producing leaders and thinkers who can cross boundaries of discipline and think creatively?

Another blogger makes an analytical study on social sciences in this worth-reading article. One paragraph on the liberal arts education is worth excerpting here:

Regarding education in the liberal arts, you have to admit there is a certain class element to those who choose to/can pursue serious study in its various fields. For example, someone who is a first-generation college student, i.e. first in his/her family to pursue education beyond high school, would much rather choose a ’safe’ field such as engineering or medicine or aim at clearing the IAS exam, simply because it makes the most economic sense to do so. I would even go so far as to argue that for a country to have a vibrant intellectual environment in the liberal arts, a substantial middle class is a pre-requisite; the liberal arts being a more likely choice of perhaps the 2nd or the 3rd generation college student. Now whether the second or the third generation born in India post the 1991 reforms demands better avenues for education in the liberal arts remains to be seen.

India is and has been a banana republic where organized greed always defeats disorganized democracy. Our populace never felt to be really democratic; it is dishonest, corrupt, and opportunistic. The middle class has degraded to rank money making without ethics, businessmen profit without quality, and at our basic nature in the country, we are becoming aware of rights but unaware of duties. It has eventually led to politicians and bureaucrats who are liars and hypocrites with additional power-hungry nature. The increasing disparities between the rural and urban sector is creating a big vacuum in the development model. The irony is that nobody bothers about the poor anymore or needs a real change. The most basic need is urgent and inexpensive medical care. There are teachers in private schools who don't get even 4,000 a month. And so many other people working in hundreds of other unorganized sectors. A serious illness or an operation in a family is enough to give them a financial jolt for several years. As the vocal middle class has abandoned places like government hospitals and schools, nobody takes up these issues as newspapers and mass media only listen to this class of the software techie, the BPO guy, a businessman, or an IIM graduate. It is this particular section of the urban class, which constitutes less than 5% of the population, that gets disproportionate coverage. Job shredding at the airlines becomes a bigger issue than the mass suicide of farmers in our country.

We as youth are the tools of change. We have to raise voices for our countrymen who are fighting for their survival daily without any representation. And I don’t want to be a product of an environment where only no. of zeroes of your salary will reflect your potential & prestige in relatives and society. The environment of society should be balanced by giving empowerment to women and removing caste discrimination. Dalit, farmers, and women's social empowerment embedded with democratic values can only guide India towards integrated development. How India uses health care, consumes energy, and educates the next generation, the future will be determined. No raindrop blames itself for the flood, we as citizens are that rain drop...

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Value of College Education

1- What a College Education Buys:

But the education kids are rewarded for may not be the same education their parents think they are paying for. Economists would say that a college degree is partly a “signaling” device — it shows not that its holder has learned something but rather that he is the kind of person who could learn something. Colleges sort as much as they teach. Even when they don’t increase a worker’s productivity, they help employers find the most productive workers

In recent decades, the biggest rewards have gone to those whose intelligence is deployable in new directions on short notice, not to those who are locked into a single marketable skill, however thoroughly learned and accredited.

2- College Education and The Placebo Effect:

The placebo effect is scientifically established, well-known effect in medicine. Basically, when doctors prescribe a sugar pill (a placebo), a good percentage of patients do get better. Note that while a placebo is just a sugar pill, the effect on the patient is very much real - patients do get better, not just imagine that they get better, so there is no quackery involved. The human mind and the human body have powerful self-healing mechanisms, and these seem to be triggered by the placebo.

3- Education Unbound:

IIT Bombay has a budget of Rs 120 crore a year, of which Rs 100 crore comes from the central government. With 5,000 students, this means a subsidy of Rs 2 lakh per student per year. This is not sustainable and is the key reason why the government system has not expanded. The private sector has to step in, and it has.

When you turn degrees into commodities and anyone can buy one from somewhere, you're going to lower the overall level of education in the population - while those with the pieces of paper hold them up as proof that they are educated. They FEEL educated. The universities are charging for their human capital as much as their teaching prowess. Yes, it is partially selling certification and there is no doubt that many schools engage in this. The value of this certification fades over time, though. The chance to be around so many people who are driven and creative and resourceful at an important time in life does not though, it pays dividends through the years.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Vichaar Shoonya + 1

From RGV's blog, a thought for the day---
Q: Can you give me an example to differentiate between knowledge, intelligence, genius and wisdom?
Ans: Knowledge is to know that a snake contains poison; intelligence is to figure out what the poison contains and how it can kill you. Genius is to create an anti venom. Wisdom is to know all this but yet not to fuck around with the snake just in case the first three go wrong.

Capital gains : A vivid, wide-ranging (and very scary) portrait of unbridled consumerism in the post-liberalisation years. [Thanks to Jai Arjun Singh]

Infamous List: To clarify, the people in these lists are/were good, honorable people. What is unpleasant/infamous about the lists are the circumstances in which these people found themselves.

Rabindranath Tagore in Conversation with H. G. Wells

Gapminder: Unveiling the beauty of statistics for a fact based world view.

Free Hindi Ebooks Download.

Mentor Yourself: Five core strategies for developing a more satisfying and successful academic career.