A Bike Ride to Pune

It’s another early Saturday morning, and I get off the phone. I look at my watch and it’s about five. I take my feet off the table and collect my gear as I head off to the parking. The cold air is refreshing and I don’t really mind the strap of the bag that is cutting into my shoulder. I have bigger fish to fry. I have to ride 150 km to my house in Pune, after a full day of work and staying late in office.

I switch on the music and put in earphone in my ears. I lay all my gear on the bike, ready to dress up. Having been a veteran at these early morning Pune trips, I have a fixed procedure. First my jacket goes on my torso, and then the cell phone goes into the inner breast pocket. The earphones come out and hang over my ears. The muffler is tightened around my neck and now the earphones go back in. I zip up the front and wear my bag. This is followed by the helmet, and at last, my gloves. Now I am ready to take on the world. But before that, I need to the wake up the watchman.

The watchmen at the office are weird. They lock the main gate and go off to sleep at night. And every single night when I wake them up to open the gate, I get the stinky eye from them. Today, however, is different. The guy is sipping his tea, and gets up before I can break, in front of his cabin. Without much of a fuss, he opens the gate & I’m off. I take the quick start as a good omen, and quickly lower my visor as I speed off towards the Highway.

I’m now on the Thane-Belapur road. This road is very familiar to me, and my mind starts wandering off. I recollect the first time I had biked on this road, almost two years back; That night too we were biking from office. But we had left office two hours early, and were going to Jimmy’s Birthday party in Khargar. What a change in those two years. Not only in me, but also in this road. It was basically a glorified dirt track then. Now it’s a respectable concrete road, one can ride on without too much of trouble.

I reach Nerul, and am riding in Pitch dark. I know when the paved road patch starts, and I’m waiting for it. The undulations of the paved blocks is dangerous, if ones attention wavers, and I want to reach home in one piece. A ST bus can be seen in the distance. It is dark and dusty, with no reflectors or light, so I constantly have to struggle to dynamically place it. It’s moving in the middle lane & I plan to overtake it from the right. Just as about 100 feet separate me from the bus, something catches my eye. I can’t quite make out what it is, but the light from on coming trucks, shows me there is something directly in my path about 100 feet away. Within a few hundredth of a second, I realize that it is a plastic bottle, and I start staring at a spot exactly one foot to the left of the bottle. My eyes are now fixed on to that point, and that is all I can see.

Initially, the bike does not waver, but I have enough fate in myself. I keep staring at the spot, and soon enough, my bike first dips to the right and then instantly to the left. The bottle is coming closer every second and I’m still not sure if I’ll make it. But I have enough faith in my body. The bottle is just about 10 feet away, and just about 6 inches off my path. I continue staring at the fixed point, and as expected I pass over that very spot.

I have now reached the Asugav junction, where the Express way begins. I however have to take a right and go via Panvel to the old Mumbai Pune highway. I hate this stretch, and have to put my mind and reflexes on high alert. This road is a two lane, two way highway with no divider. The oncoming traffic is causing a glare in my eyes, and I am practically blind. Thankfully the road is flat and porthole free, so I don’t have to worry about that. I just tell myself to watch out for oncoming traffic and stay out of the way of stray vehicles. My fears are justified just a few minutes later, when a sumo coming from the other side, is travelling in my lane, and I have to travel on the shoulder of the road to avoid getting hit. I know I can’t rest till I go over the Expressway and reach Shedung village, where the NH4, becomes a four way toll road. Thankfully I have an uneventful ride till Shedung

On the old NH4, the 4 lane road becomes a two-lane road at Khalapur. As I biker I’m very afraid of getting into accidents, and am especially guarded on roads without dividers. Hence my joy on the NH4, ends at Khalapur, and I’m again on full alert till Kopoli, which about 8 Km ahead.
The Ghats start at Khopoli & that is where the fun starts as well. The road is scenic and curvy. There is no traffic on that road, and I leisurely climb the hills, swinging out on the turns. It is still dark, and I can feel it getting chilly as I climb the ghats. I have to ride on low gear because of the steep climb, and my bike has to struggle to maintain speed. The sound of my engine at low RPM is the only sound I can hear. There is no other light around except for my headlights, and I am totally at peace.

I approach the Expressway. Before I get on the Expressway, the road goes over a strangely shaped flyover. It is narrow, has a steep decline and a sharp turn. The view from the sharp turn is amazing and I’ve often stopped there before. You can see the lights of Khopoli and the valley surrounding it. The sun hasn’t risen yet, and there is not much light in the valley, so I carry on, and get to the highest gear as I touch the Expressway.

Even though I know that I have to get to the Expressway, every time I have done the Mumbai-Pune ride, I have this insecure voice in my head, asking me if I am meant to be there. I ignore that voice and carry on. There is a lot of slow moving Truck traffic. I prefer this to the high speed car traffic, since the trucks are slow moving and I can zoom in and out of their paths, without any issue.

I get off the Khandala exit, and begin one of the best parts of the journey. The road from Khandala to Lonavala, is specious, wide and curvy. It lies along the railway tracks, and a couple of times, I’ve has the good fortune to travel alongside a train. If you haven’t done that, you cannot possibly understand the joy and excitement one feels as one races a train.

I pass Lonavala, and the highway expands to a nice 4 lane toll way. I look at my watch and see that it is 6:45. I have been neither too fast, nor too slow. I know I will do the next fifty odd km in about an hour. The road is flat, and the cold air is blowing. My bike is shaking and I’m shivering. It is a good experience, and brings back the memories of the Ladhak expedition. I can see the sun shinning, and look at the big orange blob, as it is rises just a few degrees above the horizon. The day is just beginning and I’m dead tired. It will be another interesting day in Pune.

The transition to GChat

For the last few weeks or so, I have been using Gchat in office instead of the usual Gtalk. This all began when there were whispered murmurs in Office, that our Instant Messenger conversations were being monitored. This can easily be done by a Network Administrator with tools like IMBoss and IMspector; that's why I didn’t dismiss them as baseless rumors.

I really don’t have much to hide, but I very much value my privacy. Hence to keep my conversations private, I turned over to using GChat, the Chat Widget in Gmail. This uses an encrypted channel when passing information in-between your computer and the GMail Servers, if you have the HTTPS option selected.

At times I have been rather annoyed at the difference when compared to GTalk and at other times, I have been surprised at how easily I have adjusted to the change.

Many people have preferred GChat for many years now. The most attractive feature for many people is the ability to ‘appear offline’ and then chat with people. Somehow this is not important enough for me. I accept that I am an Internet Addict, and am not ashamed to admit it. I have no problems being seen online, since I am online so much. In addition there is no one that I would like to hide my online presence from. I am quite open that way. If there is someone I don’t want to chat with - like a man - I tell them I’m busy, or ignore them.

Now this might come off as rather rude, and quite a few friends have been offended by this behavior of mine. I apologize, but they too have to understand my situation a little bit. When they usually ping me, it’s usually evening or night. They have come home, had dinner and are now chilling out and relaxing. I on the other hand, am working at this time. The evening hours of nine to eleven, are often the most productive part of my working day. And it’s not as if I’m deceiving them. I have put my status as Busy. What did they think the Red circle was for?

In some ways, I think that Instant Messenger conversations are tricky business. You never know what kind of mood or situation the other person is, nor do you often have much to say. Everyone is busy multitasking, so you never have anyone’s undivided attention. You can have only shallow conversations and useless chit chat. This is why I prefer emails. They are very effective when you have something to say, or something to ask. I know that this kind of behavior is rather rare, but I love it nonetheless. They are also better when you work like me: with an intense focus for a 15 odd minutes and then Chill out for a couple of minutes. This way you can reply to them appropriately whenever you get some time out. And since emails are so rarely used for these kinds of purposes, I get so excited, whenever someone actually uses them in this way.

Another reason why I am not so enamored by the ‘Appear Offline’ feature is something that is sort of contrary to the above points. I have often had these magical conversations with people, when I least expected them. I know that these people would not have left me an email and would only have had these wonderful conversations with me after I got them talking. This would not have happened if I ‘appeared offline’ and due to this, they wouldn’t have thought of pinging me.

So after I was forced to decide to use GChat, I decided to make the best of it. Like an obsessive compulsive geek, I arranged my Inbox. I got the GChat window to the right, and switched-off people’s status messages. I minimized the font as much as possible and made sure everything was perfect.


I had earlier decided to try this as an experiment for just a week, and see if I could adjust to it. And not only did I adjust to it, I took to it, like a fish takes to water. After using this setup for almost three weeks, I do have some observations.

Firstly I do miss GTalk. I miss the feature of File transfer that it offers. I miss the way that you can just alt-tab your way through different conversations. Secondly the most annoying thing about GChat, is that when you are IM’ing with someone, and they send you a message: Their window keeps on flashing. It isn’t enough that you have read it. You actually have to go and click on it with your mouse. For me, Gmail was a Keyboard paradise, where I could do everything without touching a mouse, and now I constantly have to use a mouse.

Another thing is that my chatting has decreased. This is because even though Gmail will always be open in one of the tabs in Firefox, it usually doesn’t have focus. I always have Firefox as well as Internet Explorer Eight open. Besides that I will usually have a window of ArcMap open, and atleast two different IDE’s open. If this wasn’t enough, sometimes I am not even working on the same machine. I might be working on a virtual machine or might be working on some other Machine through Remote Desktop/VNC.

This has been doing wonders for my productivity, but I am not sure how much it is doing for my social life and friendships. If you ping me on GChat, there is a big chance I might actually not read it, even though I am sitting right in front of the desktop. Compared to this, the Gtalk windows were prominent and sometimes grabbing attention, even though I was working in Visual Studio in full screen mode. And often at the end of the day, I want to pick up from the same spot the next day. Hence I do not disturb my setup; I just close Firefox so that next day it opens up with the same tabs.

So if I have missed any of your messages, I am truly sorry. Don’t take it the wrong way. It wasn’t personal.

Will in continue to use Gchat? The answer is twofold. In office I will, but at home I can’t live without Gtalk.

Social Networking and Me

With everyone getting onto the social networking bandwagon, I think it is high time I explain why I’m still very skeptical about the whole thing.

Being an Internet freak, I must confess that I am quite an old hand at these Social Networking sites. I was member of Orkut in mid 2004, when it was just beginning out, and I had very few real life friends on it. I was on Facebook, when it was opened up to the general public, just as everyone else was getting on to Orkut.

Some people have called these sites, Walled gardens, but that is not why I don’t get them.
The main problem I have with these sites is the absence of compartmentalization and the possibility of only one profile, which may or may not be public.

Let me explain. Being a wannabe polymath, I lie at the intersection of almost disjoint social circles.
I have interests ranging from Geeky ones like Physics and maths to not so geeky ones like Biking and Hindi movies. Besides that, I also have professional interests like .Net and GIS.
And my social contacts tend to lie in such kinds of broad categories. I know what you are thinking. These are not my social contacts. These are people I know.

Ok, then lets talk about my social contacts. I could basically categorize them as people from my primary school, those from my secondary school; Some from my JC while others from Xaviers, and some more from SIG. And this doesn’t even take into account the friends I have first met randomly: Either online, or in person via other people I have known, or just plain randomly.

Friendship is rarely transitive, when it comes to me, and most of my friends hardly know any of my other friends. I have such narrow and small sets when it comes to interpersonal relationships, that with many people I share no other common friend.
In this kind of situation, the usual purpose of S.N.S. is wasted on me. I can hardly put up pics and have 20 different friends tagged in it with 20 more commenting.

Further more social network is all about sharing. And what I have to share totally depends on my mood at that time. And what is on my mind at that moment will not be interesting to all my friends. Let me try to explain.

• There are certain fora I frequent, where it is perfectly alright to type out DISREGARD THAT, I SUCK COCKS, while at others I could easily begin with Fuck You, two of my friends died… If I did this in real life, or did it somewhere else, people might question my sanity.
• Often during the weekdays, I am mostly thinking about work, or have found an interesting thing while programming. If I share that, most people wouldn’t get it.
• This is not only with me. If A friend sends me a link to her companies website, asking me to check out their product, I will mark it as spam in a jiffy.

The other major problem I have, is with my worlds colliding. I show a very different face to different kinds of people. Many people think I am quite serious and decent. I don’t want to relieve them of this illusion, and would rather not show them my pictures taken while drinking and other wild things.

I think the problem stems from the fact that we as a society have shifted from having deep meaningful relationships with a few people, to having shallow relationships with a lot of people. The times when a person was your best friend, just because he lived next door,are gone. Gone are the days when your friends group, of 10 to 15 people, would do something together and be happy with that.

We now tend to select friends based on common interests and shared ideals, rather than physical proximity. And our Friendship with everyone is different. We are infact a different person for each one of them.

The Loneliest man

It was 40 years ago, from today that a man first took a step on the Moon. His name was Neil Armstrong. He was shortly followed by the first man to pee on the moon, Buzz Aldrin. But there was a third man, Michael Collins, the Command Module pilot that we often forget.

I consider the Apollo Space program to be Mankind’s greatest Achievement. At one time over half a million people were working towards a single goal, - of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth- as JFK once poetically said. Never before and never again in the history of the world, has so much mental and creative energy been channelized for such a good cause. I celebrate this day, not only for the three men who were up there, but also for these lakhs of people who worked towards this goal.

No doubt, this day will be remembered in all eternity for this one man:


Not surprisingly, very few photographs of him on the moon exist, as he was the main photographer, and almost all the photographs that we have from the Apollo 11 trip on the moon are of Buzz Aldrin taken by him. This is sort of like how most of the photographs I have, are of different people taken by me. But I digress.

The person I most identify with was actually Michael Collins.
One of the most accomplished Fighter pilot, he was the Command Module pilot. The Command Module(named Columbia) was the Mothership, and orbited the Moon while the lunar Module went to the moon, and part of it came back. The two moonwakers would then re-join the Command Module, and the Ascent stage of the Lunar Module would then be jettisoned. The three astronauts would then reenter the earth’s atmosphere within the Command Module, after it separated from the Service module.

Atleast that’s how it was supposed to work in theory. No one was 100% certain, since the whole system was never completely tested. The Lunar Module had never landed on the moon before Apollo 11, and even the engineers were not sure if the Ascent stage of the lunar module would successfully blast off the surface of the moon at the correct velocity, to mate with the command Module.

As two Astronauts left in the Lunar Module, Collins was in the Columbia, as it went around the moon. The important thing to remember is that when you are orbiting the moon, there will be times when the moon will be in-between you and the earth. In such a position, you are out radio contact. You are truly alone. And you don’t know if your two fellow astronauts will make it back.

I can only imagine what must be going through his head, as he patiently waited in Columbia, hearing nothing from the earth, or from his teammates, as they landed on the Moon. I have always known that in many ways, Coins has the hardest job. He could have faced returning alone to the earth if the two explorers in the lunar module did not make it back.

But thankfully, it all worked out well, and Collins could take this wonderful picture, showing the earth, the moon, as well as the Eagle.

I do not think that any other picture captures the beauty of the Space programme as well as this one.

The Problem in Answering Questions

Richard Feynman had the uncanny talent for making things so simple, that anyone could understand it. He could look at anything and figure out what is critical to understand it, and remove everything else out of the equation. This comes out somewhat from being trained in science, but he had that special gift, which was beyond all of this.

I have often felt very inferior and stupid whenever I have heard him talk, or read his writings. And I mean this in a good way. He was a magician, and if you looked at him talk, or try to get an insight into his way of thought, you would soon realize that he thought about things in a way that no one else every thought about them. I forget who said this, but someone once said that if you ask Feynman how an electron would behave in a certain situation, he would ask himself: “If I were an electron, what would I do in this situation?”

All scientist in specific and thinkers in general, have a framework for their thought process. You generally, have a framework, upon which you work. You build upon what you know, and use your existing knowledge to understand something new.

In many fields, not only science, the framework itself is so large, that understanding only the basics itself is a lot of work. Take an Accountant for example; He or she will have to know the 3 basic rules of Accountancy. On top of that you need to know your local laws. Add to it the conventions followed in your industry and so forth. Very soon, the knowledge base evolves to a humongous size. No wonder, filing your tax returns is such an annoying task. I should know; I did that just yesterday.

Something similar happens when one is describing basic physics to a lay person. I have no problem understanding how EM fields propagate, and how light is given out by an electron, when it comes down to ground state from and excited state. I have no problem accepting the fact that light is neither a wave nor a particle, but can behave like a wave under certain circumstance and like a stream of particle under some other circumstances. I can sleep perfectly at peace, knowing that particles themselves behave wave-like in some circumstances.

But when you try to explain these kinds of things to the lay person, it is often very difficult to convey the exact meaning without taking too much out of it. We tend to take these things very trivially, because they have become a part of our framework of thinking.

Here is a video of the great master himself explaining this, and telling us why he prefers not to cheat, by dumbing down the explanation.

Feminism

I was watching this Song on a show on Etv Rajasthan. The name of the programme was Bhule Bisre Geet and the name is perfect. Such a song can never be made today; Not only because there is no one like Shakeel Badayuni, but because such a song would never be accepted today.
Listen to the lyrics of this song:

n jaao saiyyaa, chhudaa ke baiyyaa
kasam tumhaaree main ro padoongee
machal rahaa hain suhaag meraa
jo tum naa honge, to kyaa karungee

If a song had similar lyrics today, the feminists would raise a furor over this. How dare a woman define her happiness by a man? How dare her world revolve around a man?
This in short is my main problem with the feminist movement. With the sexual revolution in the 60’s, women have progressed a lot. Let us get this straight. I am not against women’s liberation and emancipation.

What I am against is the ill-effects caused due to women blindly trying to do everything that men do. It is like they selected the worst things that men do and then tried to do it.
People might not agree with me, when I say that Family is the most important part of life. Life is too short to live it selfishly, in an individualistic life. The Glue holding two people together is the knowledge that they share a world, which is different from the whole world, and is experienced by only those two.

One of the requirements for that to happen is that their worlds revolve around each other. This is true for the man, as well as the woman. And if that doesn’t happen, then the motivation for both of them to remain in the relationship is affected. So is the passion, as well as the commitment.

One must be happy for all the growth in our society and culture; But not for a moment must one think that everything has been for the better.

You know you are a geek

You know you are a geek, when you can relate to the following article. You can not only relate to it, but you look back at the time you did this...fondly

What Happened to my Laptop

The unique position of Manmohan Singh

I’ve often been asked about my political views, and I say that all politicians suck. I might agree with one of them on one issue some day, and might call him or her a total nincompoop on some other issue.

One of the very few people in politics that I truly respect and trust (not surprisingly) is Dr. Manmohan Singh. I think that he is the only person with personal credibility and total integrity. I might not agree with everything that his government has done over the past 5 years, but one can’t have everything that one wants.

Look at the recent G-20 summit. The way that Gordon Brown and others treated him, is indicative not only of the significance of India, but also his personal standing. I’m not sure if someone else could have made the same Impact. Imagine someone like Lalu prasad Yadav or Mayawati, or even Rahul Gandhi. I shudder to think what would have happened.

He gave an interview to the Financial Times, which is definitely worth your time.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7f6fea0e-1bcc-11de-978e-00144feabdc0.html

Look at the some of the questions that he was asked, and his answers.

FT: What is the future of capitalism, especially in India?

MS: Capitalism with a human face. We are a mixed economy. We will remain a mixed economy. The public and private sector will continue to play a very important role. The private sector in our country has very ample scope and I am confident that India’s entrepreneurs have the capacity, and the will to rise to the occasion.

FT: In your opinion is India a “great power” that can stand up to scrutiny of its internal affairs by the international community? Is India willing to make sacrifices for the good of the world beyond its borders?

MS: I think we have made strides in the past decade or two and the world is taking notice of what India is doing. I cannot claim that we have solutions to all our problems. But we have shown that it is possible for a pluralistic and diverse society to grow and flourish in an open democratic framework. The Indian experience is important for the world. I have great faith in the creativity and imagination of our people to address the challenges that confront us and this can be seen in our growing soft power that is making an impact on the world.

India is deeply conscious of its role in the international arena and we have been seeking a restructuring and reform of the global polity that will allow us to play a commensurate role. I can say with pride that Indians have made sacrifices beyond their borders for the good of the world…

Another interesting question was the last one:

FT: India has been criticised for not doing enough on climate change. Is there really a serious lack of commitment to curb emissions?

MS: India currently has one of the lowest per capita emissions among large major economies including major emerging economies at 1.8 tonnes of CO2 per annum. The US figure is over 20 tonnes. Even in total volume terms, India’s emissions constitute only 4 percent of the global figure whereas the US and China are responsible for over 20 percent each. This is the result of India consciously pursuing a path of sustainable development and reducing the energy intensity and therefore the carbon intensity of its growth. Over the past decade our economy has grown by 9 percent per annum while energy use has increased by 4 percent per annum.

But most of all, I loved that he could answer the first question the way that he did:

FT: Do you agree with China on the failures of the global monetary regime and the case for a new reserve asset in place of the dollar?

Manmohan Singh: Well these are not new issues. I was associated with the first committee of 20 with Paul Volcker in the 1970s. ... There are virtuous technical solutions but I don’t see these are the issues that can be resolved through technical analysis.

America... Land of the free?

This is something that I have been struggling with, over the last few days. A friend’s casual remark, that called America the land of the free, was what set it off.

I’ve been spending a lot of time on reddit, especially the economic sub-reddit, and am amazed at what I’ve been reading. Over the last few months, with the tanking of the stock market, and collapse of the banking sector, as well as the bail-out have been events, have been the source of lots of frenzied activity here. Not only are the articles informative, but the comments have been interesting. What has been surprising is how pro-market the redditors are, but at the same time, they want stronger regulation by the regulatory bodies. This was just the starting point for my quest.

Their Anthem, might call them the land of the free, but I’m quite skeptical, just how true it is. They might have declared that all men are created equal, but somehow that did not include women and blacks for quite some time.

America has done quite a lot of stupid things when it comes to freedom. And I’m not talking about the things done by G.W.Bush. Remember a guy called Joseph McCarthy? Or remember what happened to the Japanese people living in America during WW2?

Nor is America very free when it comes to sex and what not. If you look at their codes, to prevent the corruption of the Youth, like the Hays Code or the Comics Code Authority, you’ll be surprised. Things got so out of hand, that the authorities were not allowing the publication of a comic, because it mentioned that the story was told by a wolfman. Never mind that the name of the story teller was Marv Wolfman.

And if you look at the things they are doing with respect to science, it’s even scarier. Just yesterday, the Illinois legislature, declared that Pluto was a planet, as far as Illinois was concerned. In other news, in Oklahoma legislature a resolution was proposed, banning Richard Dawkins from speaking at a University.

There is this strange belief that somehow, America, is very special in the world because of its History and ideals and freedom. It is called American exceptionalism. I’m thinking more and more that it might be a lot of propaganda, and you know what? I’m not the only one.

Crossword has a sense of Humour

Crossword Bookstore is my favorite bookstore chain. But I've always known that it sometimes puts books in weird categories.

I remember that in the Inorbit store, before it was renovated, the Science books were placed under the shelf named Occult. I've always chuckled at that.

Today I checked out the Oberoi Mall Branch. It places the Astrology\Palmistry and other pseudo-science books under the shelf titled Non-Fiction

You know that people hate Maths

I have posted a photo of a toothpaste earlier, but now I bring you the ultimate toothpaste, which will not only prevent cavities, germs and bad breath, but will also protect you from Calculus.


This will be a good product for hoverboy to advertise. Don't know who hoverboy is?? Check this out then: http://tinyurl.com/hoverboy

India’s Unending Journey: A review

Mark Tully is one of the most respected and well-known journalist in India. Probably because he was the voice of BBC, for almost 35 years in India, when the only alternative was DD and A.I.R., and people hardly believed the propaganda that came from the national broadcaster.

When he talks, most people listen, and in this, I am like them too. He has written this book, with a very specific aim in mind. He wants to show the world, what it can learn from India.

Now, Indology, as a subject, has a quite long history, and god alone knows how many forest trees have been pulled down, to make paper for books, with this aim. Yet, this book is different. And it is definitely recommended.

Sir Mark Tully makes many points in this book, and the main point, as I see it, deals with balance. The balance that is a very integral part of everything that India holds dear. Be it about talking about religion, economics, or politics.

We in India, use some words in ways, that the world at large, hardly recognizes. When we say secularism, we mean-to be equidistant from all religions- not ignoring all religions, as the world usually uses it. This is why when France bans the wearing of headscarves in schools or wearing pagdis by sikh children, we in India can not understand what they are talking about.

Tully, even explores why the Muslims in particular and others in general, are so antagonistic towards the western culture, as well as what the west could do to solve these issues.

Tully wanted to become a priest, and became a journalist by chance. It’s now wonder then, that faith plays an important role in his life. He covers his early education as well as why he almost lost his faith. He writes about things that most people will never even talk about, like humility, and the value of not being certain.

This is book that people like me should read. People who are Indian by principles and ethics, but Western by training and education. We are caught in a strange no mans land, and we need the services of a sensitive and articulate outsider, to show what we truly are.

We often find ourselves, at crossroads, where our feeling and thought are contradictory, and these contradictions arise from our dual upbringing. We would be well served if we look this book, because it serves as an excellent mirror; the image it shows, is one we have hidden, or tried to deny; A better Understanding of ourselves, will lead us to greater things, the things we were destined to do.

Microsoft Songsmith

Microsoft just released on of their research projects, called Microsoft Songsmith, which can provide music to a song, that a user sings. So it basically creates music to vocals. When their advertisement came out, most people noticed that they were using a Mac, in the video.

They did not even begin to imagine how this software could be used. Yes, some sites did review it, like Ars Technica and others.


The advert itself has gone viral. You can check it out here. It’s definitely worth a chuckle.
But once it has been introduced into the wild, it is being used in ways, Microsoft did not even think of.
A lot of people have been feeding it vocals from songs, and asking SongSmith to create the music.
The results have been, from the wonderful:



To the horrendous


Funnily enough, I heard about this from Linus torvald’s blog where he wrote:

This may be a shock to everybody, but I have to admit that I'm not generally a huge fan of most Microsoft software ("No, really, Linus? Tell us more!").

But I may have to admit that I was wrong.

No, I'm not talking about Windows 7. I'm talking about Songsmith, which is clearly a true work of genius. Yes, yes, the commercials are painfully cheesy, but when used right the end result is undeniably art.

The thing that convinced me was hearing Billy Idol's "White Wedding" as re-interpreted through Songsmith. Nobody will ever convince me that that isn't just impossibly brilliant. Sheer genius on just an incredible scale. I'm getting carpal tunnel syndrome from just clicking "Replay" over and over again.

Control is freedom?

I subscribe to one of those greeting sms services, and usually get some cheesy line to read in the middle of my sleep. There was one message, which however has been troubling me for the past two weeks. And I mean that in a good way.

The message said: Always remember that Self control leads to freedom. Now that sounds quite Orwellian. I can see it nicely mix with the party’s slogan. War is peace! Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength. Now if you just add: Control is Freedom; no one would bat an eyelid.

The reason why this has been such a thought provoking point for me, is that it is sort of my mantra; I just hadn’t put it into words, and this message completely clarify my thoughts. Let me try to explain this paradoxical concept. One would wonder, how in the name of God, can Self control, or ‘holding oneself back’ be equal to freedom?

Let us look at most people, who I know, who keep moaning about life. These are the same people, who do not think about what they are doing, neither are they concerned about the repercussions of their actions. They often find themselves draw into situations, which cause them a lot of grief. They find their options to be limited, and are constricted in their future course of actions.

Now these are the same people who blame me, for being too ’rigid’ or something like that, and claim that I cannot experience all that life has to offer me. Later in the conversation, when they tell me their problems, and ask me for advice, I often give them several options. (Most of which are based on the plan of action I would undertake, if facing such a situation). They would then dismiss these options, saying that they won’t be able to do it, for various reasons. Who has less freedom in this case? Who is being held back?

One can claim that to be truly free, is to be like a cut Kite. If you believe that to be true, then you must also be prepared to be torn in parts, dragged anywhere without your choice, and being subject to forces, beyond your control.

I do not feel that this is what freedom is. Freedom is the ability to have the entire world open before you. You must break free of the shackles and restraints that situations put on you. For this, you may need to put some shackles on yourself. The benefit of these self-made restrictions is that they pain a lot less, and lead to fewer frustrations, and feelings of impotency.

Why is it, then that so few people agree with me on this? I feel this is so, because, it is not easy to set limits, and follow them. You require great strength, when nothing is stopping you from breaking your own rules. The limits, and just imaginary lines, no one will know if you cross them, except for you. One can get weak, and give in to temptation; though this path is simple, it definitely is not easy.

I’ll just like to add a small clarification at the end. Self-control does not mean lack of spontaneity. It does not imply that you cannot flow like a paper boat, on the river of life. All it means is that you are in control of path you take, on the wonderful journey called life.

Ingenuity Of Babylonian Mathematics

Babylonian mathematics has had a great impact on Mathematics as we know it. It’s a real shame that we hardly every talk about it, and instead worship the likes of Pythagoras Euclid and Archimedes, and other Greek mathematicians.
Maybe this is because the Greeks, valued Mathematics for itself, and did not view it, just as a tool for commerce, which many claim, is what the Babylonians did.

The Mesopotamian region has been the centre of the Sumerian Civilization, which was later followed by the Babylonian civilization. Both of them were largely settled civilizations, with farming and trading as their major occupations. They built large cities, and trading took place. They needed Mathematics for practical reasons, like measuring and weights, building irrigation canals, predicting the seasons and ownership of land.

Algebra as we know it came about much later, and these people had some ingenious methods to calculate.

Take the following example.
There is a rectangular piece of farming land of 168 sq units, and the longer side is 2 units longer than the shorter side.

Today we would solve it, using quadratic equations, like this:

Let the shorter side be x. Then:

x * (x+2)=168
x² +2x-168=0
(x-12)(x+14)=0

Solving for positive x, gives you
X=12

Now this concept, of using x for an unknown quantity, is a very abstract concept, even though it seems natural to you and me. It was unheard of, in those days. So what did they do??

They knew only number, and liked squares, so this is what they did.
You have a parcel of land like this:


You then increase the shorter side by half the difference, and decrease the longer side by the same amount.


Now if you add a small square, with the side equal to half the difference, you get a complete square.

The area of the Big Square, is 168 +1*1=169

Therefore the side of the square is 13

Hence the original side was 13-1=12

This is before the Greeks, who thought that Geometry was above all, and the most beautiful and purest part of Maths.

Just to remind you, the most elegant proof of the Pythagorean Theorem, is just three diagrams long: