Just My Thoughts!

The Happiness Equation - Nick Powdthavee

2012-01-20T10:44:00.001-08:00

This one is a good summary of the extensive research conducted in the field of Happiness, why and what makes us Happy & UnHappy. Technically the field is Psychology.

Point to note is the stark opposition that exists between Economists and Psychologists. Economists feel the method of simply asking people to report the levels of their happiness is unscientific, the psychologists of course think its quantifiable & hence can be measured in this way. Well, the Psychologists have no choice really - asking people is the only way.

Key points to note about our state of well-being
- Happiness is relative not absolute
- Money does make us Happy, but only to a certain degree
- Its surprising how fast we get over things
- Any grief can be compensated monetarily
- Its not known for certain that success/money/socializing make us Happy, or Happy people tend to acquire these things

The key motivation behind all the research on Happiness is said to be monetary compensation in judicial matters. As an example, how much should an accident victim or a widow be paid. And not just how much but HOW as well i.e. a lump sump or in periodic installments. The reasoning is that - if we can determine how much & for how long grief lowers happiness and how much money enhances it then compensations can be accurately determined.

Quote
"Nothing in life, good or bad lasts for ever, at least in terms of Happiness"

Why We Make Mistakes - Joseph Hallinan

2012-01-18T10:43:00.000-08:00

This is the first in a series of books I am reading on the irrationality of my species.

It is filled with accounts of mistakes made by professionals in medicine, finance, transport security and art. Also plenty by commoners as eyewitnesses, shoppers, planners, map readers etc. There are also a lot of facts, statistics and results from research in Psychology.

However, there is no mention of the biological roots that make us the way we are. A look at Evolutionary Psychology for some material would have greatly helped this book.

A very good thing about such books is they really make the reader analyze her own behavior for rationality.
A very bad thing is the assumption that we all wish to optimize our actions for either time or money.

Quote
"Its not where you live that makes you happy, its how you use your time"

Mind of the Market - Michael Shermer

2011-10-08T19:53:00.000-07:00

I would describe this books as being partly psychology, partly scientific and partly philosophical. The goal of this work is to provide an insight into why people make the decisions they do? Evolutionary Psychology is kept as the fundamental reasoning tool behind almost all answers.

The main view of the author contradicts with the view of evolutionary struggle between organisms being absolutely ruthless. Instead the author argues that at least in the case of social organisms like ourselves altruism is as much an evolutionary trait as any other.

The book provides lots of interesting scientific findings and philosophical anecdotes. I will just list some of them here which should clearly indicate what this is about.

- "Happiness is a subjective state of well-being that depends on relative frames of reference, grounded in an evolved psychology that finds meaning in the simple social pleasures and purposes of life"
- "Once a decision is made, we carefully screen subsequent information and filter out all contradictory data, leaving only evidence in support of our choice."
- "For every random act of violence that makes the evening news, there are ten thousand nonrandom acts of kindness that go unrecorded every day."
- "There appears to be a sharp distinction between how people view their own beliefs—as rationally motivated—and how people view the beliefs of others—as emotionally driven."
- "Wonderful things are especially wonderful the first time they happen, but their wonderfulness wanes with repetition. Psychologists call this habituation, economists call it declining marginal utility, and the rest of us call it marriage"

... and this one i really like
- "symptoms of depression—restlessness, agitation, loss of appetite, disturbed sleep, impaired concentration, and loss of motivation—may not be signs of an illness; rather, they may represent an adaptive response to prod you into doing something different in your life."

Try and answer this!
You are walking along a railroad line when you come upon a fork in the track and a switch. There are five workers on one track and one worker on the other track. Suddenly, you realize that a trolley car is hurtling along and is about to hit and kill the five workers unless you throw the switch and divert the car down the other branch, killing the one worker instead. Kill one to save five. Would you throw the switch? Most people say that they would. In a second scenario, instead of coming upon a switch, you happen across a bridge where there is a large man standing next to you. The trolley is once again speeding down the track and is about to hit and kill the five workers, unless you push the large man onto the track, killing him but stopping the car. Kill one to save five. Would you throw the man? Most people say that they would not.

Introducing Mind and Brain - Angus Gellatly & Oscar Zarate

2011-05-20T19:16:00.000-07:00

A fun comic style attempt at understanding the workings of the human brain.

The approach here is to identify disorders and map them to the physiology of the brain. A reasonably good approach since this how we have come to understand a lot about how the brain works (although feel a bit for people who experience such disorders).

Here are some disorders that I had no prior knowledge of ...

achromatopsia : loss of color vision caused by damage to V4 region in the brain
broca's apasia : disorders of speech
ideomotor apraxia : difficulty making movements and gestures
scotoma : blind spot caused by damage to V1
object agnosia : inability to recognize objects
form agnosia : can see color, depth and contour but percieves only parts, not whole objects
simultagnosia : objects are percieved and recognized, but only one at a time
associative agnosia : a patient can describe or draw visual scenes and objects, but there is a failure of recognition
prospagnosia : problem in recognizing familiar faces
jamais vu : recognition without familiarity
balint's syndrome : can recognize objects accurately, but cannot accurately reach for them

The Evolution of God - Robert Wright

2011-02-20T21:25:00.000-08:00

I really enjoyed reading this book and highly recommend it.

The book maily addresses (via discussions) two main points:
First, a historical record (although somewhat debatable) of how the concept of God has evolved over time in human society. How it started as the hunter-gatherer's view of gods attributed to their experience of natural events to the roles of chiefdoms & shamons, then to monolatory and finally monotheism as it exists today in all Abrahamic religions (Juadaism, Christianity and Islam).

Second, the evolution of a truly moral God as it exists today. Looking at history of religious sciptures this was not always the case. It is as if God has matured over time to become the just, forgiving, morally righteous God known today.

The gist of the story is that religion and thus the concept of God has evolved in response to the social and political conditions on the ground and vice versa. Religion in time has served needs not just of worship or spiritual pleasures but of governance of states, trade and thus economy. It is only in our time that there is a quite clear distinction between religion and other matters of governance commonly referred to as the 'separation of church and state'. In most of human history at least in the times when these religions were born this was not the case - Religion was the law of the land.

The author also briefly touches upon the discrepancies between biblical records and archaelogical evidence which are very interesting to note. Also time and again he points out the difficulties involved in interpreting religious scriptures and how this leaves room for mis-interpretations either purposeful or mistaken.

Hinduism and Chinese religions are seldom touched upon in this work. The only significant mention was of how the violent teaching(s) from the opening passages of the Bhagwat Gita were downplayed by Mahatma Gandhi.

The final chapter of the book discusses the possible biological reasons for the origin of religious concepts themselves (in human minds) which is very nicely summed up in conclusions such as "Religion arose out of a hodgepodge of genetically based mental mechanisms designed by natural selection for thoroughly mundane purposes"

The only part to overlook is a chapter on religion and terrorism which seems completely out of context for this book. Other than that the book is outstanding. It clearly undermines the simplistic view of religion that people portray.

How Much Should a Person Consume? - Ramachandra Guha

2011-02-11T11:43:00.000-08:00

The title of the book is a complete misnomer. In the whole text the author does not come anywhere close to answer this question. However, it is still an interesting read at least in parts.

The book is mainly a narration of the history of environmental movements in India. A large part being devoted to the works of prominent people in the environmental movement.The history of the interactions between the villagers (people who depend on the forests for their living) and the government bodies like the forest department are very interesting to read about. Particularly the perception as to how a developing economy can be in opposition to the sustainability of its natural resources.

I found it strange as to how all the visionaries have missed including a growing population as a factor in their schemes. May be this was not a concern in their times. Today, it is hard to imagine how a system dependent on resources can be sustainable without a curb on consumption.

The comparison between environmental movements in India (agrarianism) vs the US (wilderness thinking) is very interesting to note. In the later this has been an after thought while in the former all movements are directly linked to livelihood. E.g. in the US the farmlands are considered as an inrtusion on to the natural environment while in India they are a part of it (author's opinion). Since I had read a bit about the development of the parks system in the US I found this very relevant.

Way Beyond the Three Rs - Y.S. Rajan

2011-01-15T00:10:00.000-08:00

It is claimed that in India, 70% of eligible children do not receive higher education (beyond class 10th). For sustained progress of the country and to improve the standard of living of the masses it is imperative to tackle this issue. The author thus sets out to achieve exactly this. As expected there is no single, short, brilliant idea to achieve such a lofty goal for spreading education. Hence the book is filled with pretty much any suggestion one can think of. As an example the author is keen on changing the recollection based reward system in our schools to a more creative way of educating children, something me and others around me have been hoping for a long time.

In my view most qualified people today in the government, industry or education would come up with the same solutions as suggested in this book. However the real hard part is how to get it done. Even in this writing I could not find any detailed and concrete plans that could be taken up as is and implemented over a period of a few years.

I like the author's idea for increasing autonomy in the education system - not just at the level of colleges but for individual teachers as well. At present autonomy is hard to find in the Indian education system drawing parallels with the permit Raj prior to liberation in the early 90s.

Overall, I liked the book - especially the way it discusses the social problems faced by people deprived of a satisfactory level of education, something I personally have taken for granted all this while.

The Brain - Cordelia Fine

2011-01-14T12:05:00.000-08:00

We know people by their looks, actions, words etc but all of these are a product of the activity in their brains. It seems to me that, amongst all the organs in the physical body the brain remains the least understood. We think we might know so much about the functioning of the brain, but this is hardly the case.

The anatomy of the brain apparently is known in quiet detail. Even at the level of the basic structures (e.g. working of individual neurons) a lot of information is available. However, understanding how these anatomical features result in the the overall functioning of the brain is yet elusive.The primary reason for this has been the sheer complexity of the human brain.

This book is a summary of up to date research in the fields of neuroscience and psychology. It begins with a detailed outline of the brain's anatomy and follows this with the techniques used to study it's workings (memory, language, intelligence, sleep and consciousness). A large part of the book is also devoted to the discussion of the illnesses, mental disorders and therapy.

In the author's defense it is difficult to convey so much information in a single book, so at times the reader may feel a little short changed.

Introducing Evolutionary Psychology - Dylan Evans & Oscar Zarate

2010-12-20T13:06:00.000-08:00

A very brief comic strip based introduction to Evolutionary Psychology. Although fun to read, this is not an apt introduction - its just too short and as a result omits lots of details and explanations.

A better one is "Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters" (link)

The happiness–income paradox

2010-12-19T14:14:00.000-08:00

Well, I was surprised to learn about studies that actually set out measuring a state of mind such as Happiness in relation to other factors. The one that caught my eye is the recently published study in PNAS titled - 'The Happiness Income Paradox - Revisited' (link)

The claim is that this is the first study to measure the long term relationship between income and happiness of nations. Below is my understanding of the findings

Over the long run (10 years or more) the relationship between Happiness and increasing income is virtually NIL.

A few things to note are
- Here income is the GDP of a nation
- In case of developing countries Happiness is actually Financial Satisfaction

Well the thing that strikes me, is how on earth do you even measure something as abstract as Happiness (at least it is abstract to us today). I mean it is not like we can check the levels of reward chemicals in the brain, measure them and rate Happiness of an individual. The methods used here are rather subjective and simple and are also influenced by political & social events - just ask people how happy they are. Apparently there are surveys that do this on a regular basis - World Values Survey (WVS) from the World Values Survey Association and the European Values Study Foundation. The underlying agenda of these surveys is to gather a lot more information than just about happiness but the process is the same - gather a large number of answers from the target population.

I looked into one of those to see what these question are exactly. The 'Latinobarometer' survey also used by this research has one question on happiness shown below

I can call this at the most interesting work since accuracy will always be hard to prove.

The Ape and the Sushi Master - Frans De Waal

2010-12-18T13:45:00.000-08:00

This one is an elaborate discourse on the nature/culture divide in human behaviour. The position of the author is first of that culture is not unique to humans. Of course this is given the following definition of culture - "Culture is the transmission of habits and information by social means". Under this definition, culture is widespread in nature. The arguments mainly come from observations of primate behaviour and the book is filled with anecdotes on the behaviour of apes and monkeys.

It almost seems like the author is making a huge effort in an attempt to convince others (so called behaviorists) about the plethora of evidence suggesting complex learned behavior in other primates contradicting the widely held belief that this is something only humans are capable of. This was a surprise to me since from what I have read in the past the widely held view is that culture (under this definition) is not unique to humans. Maybe this was true at the time this book was written or I was just mistaken.

For some reason towards the end the author delves into the famous "altruism" debate. His views seem to be contradictory to "The Selfish Gene". But again this is done without a clear cut definition of altruism. In my view many people consider mere acts of social behavior to be altruistic. I feel that anecdotal evidence of altruistic behavior should be aimed at animals that live solitary.

One interesting remark is when he calls physics as "armchair prediction" :)

An interesting follow up read should be 'Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes'

Fun time on the road

2010-08-26T21:26:00.000-07:00

Last month it was the third time I drove across the country, it is hard to believe how much I have enjoyed spending so much time on the road. This time just to share the experience & on a request I took pictures along the way. The idea was to record how the landscape changes from state to state. Growing up in India my only impression of this country was based on the big cities and the corporations. But living here and getting opportunities to travel I have realized how beautiful this place is and how the big cities etc are merely distractions. Anyway without further delay below are some snaps from the last drive from the bay area to NYC. This time I used the shorter, northern route which is about 500 miles less than the southern route I took in Jan. I have tried to add a few liners describing parts of the route. The complete album is posted here

Leaving the bay area as expected I had to battle some traffic. Fortunately it wasn't so bad that day. My estimate is that there is consistent traffic for about the first 250 miles.

The famous Tahoe region with its up and down roads is always a pleasant drive but the best is about to start. Entering Nevada is like entering paradise..I know its a desert..but my ghosh is it beautiful. This is by far the most pleasurable part of the journey. Open straight roads & no traffic. Just put the car in cruise, put on some music (Kishore Kumar works best for me), sit back and enjoy the scenery. Utah is very much comparable to Nevada and the enjoyment continues there.

Wyoming which is next is a little patchy, in the beginning it resembles Utah and slowly transitions into the green Nebraska.

Although the landscape turns green in Nebraska the road and traffic conditions are pretty much the same as the desert. It is exciting to notice this change from brown to green. For me it means a little bit of disappointment now that I have left the desert.

The weather was really cloudy from Iowa and across Illinois where I stopped for a few days. One thing immediately comes to attention here. If you look away from the road on either side then you can see the furthest distance in Nevada and Utah. I love this feeling of being in the open. Approaching Iowa, Illinois the distance reduces and trees block the view. Come Pennsylvania and New York I am pretty much looking straight ahead.

Leaving Illinois is a gloomy feeling. Expect steady traffic all the way up to New York. Oh yes! and get ready to pay some tolls.

Ohio, Pennsylvania are lush green and so is New York until one hits the city. Get ready to drive in traffic. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the traffic too and surprisingly the erratic ones I deal with in India but after 3000 miles it is a pain. Pay toll again, cross the George Washington bridge and vallah! its NYC.

Some statistics
miles - approximately 3000
gas - approximately 100 gallons. The people protesting global warming will probably want my head.
time - I stopped along the way to meet friends but I think 4-5 days is good for a comfortable journey.

ANTS - Julian Huxley

2010-05-17T17:44:00.000-07:00

Probably the oldest book i have read first published in 1930. The focus of the book is on the social life of ants and termites. The main objective of the author being to criticize the view of his peers that ants, termites, bees and wasps are very comparable to human society because of their social lifestyle. The author strongly disagrees with this view stating a number of reasons. The crux behind all his reasoning is that ants, termites, bees & wasps behave as they do because they are programmed by natural selection. Even the class structure in their societies is based on genetic pre-selection. They do not possess any ability to learn at least not in the sense that humans do.

The book has numerous accounts of how different species of ants organize their nests, raise their young, cooperate with each other, hunt & gather food, make slaves of other species and live in symbiosis with other insects.

All in all the book is worth a read.

Hiking Light - Marlyn Doan

2010-05-16T14:25:00.000-07:00

This is a really good one. Very well organized and to the point. All the details have been neatly stacked at the end of the book and can be read independently. The points covered are pretty much the same as in 'One Step at a time', but a lot more interesting to read. Also staying away from details such as prices of gear does not make this book entirely outdated.

Note that the title does not refer to the current trend of light-weight hiking which is also dubbed 'Hiking Light'. It is combination of being light on one's wallet, the environment and one's body.

What the bones tell us - Jeffrey Schwartz

2010-04-30T01:21:00.000-07:00

This book touches upon the areas of paleontology, anthropology, archeology and osteology. In many museums I have seen thousands of bones & fossils of species that are now extinct. I am amazed as to how much information has been deduced from fossilized bones not just about other species but also about ancient civilizations. However, until now I did not know how. This book explains a lot about how scientists analyze bones and draw conclusions from them.

Note that bones are fragile, get easily damaged and can be lost in time. Only under suitable conditions do they become fossilized. This means that we do not find as many bones as we would like to answer all questions about the history of life on earth

The ones that do get fossilized have the potential to tell us a lot ... such as
- which animal do the bones belong. Many times this leads to the discovery of new species
- which part of the body the bones made up, even the side, left or right
- whether the bones were burnt with flesh on them or de-fleshed
- age & gender of the individual
- lifestyle of the individual(s) since bones can preserve scars of injuries & marks when they heal
- location where bones are found tell us about the organisms that lived there
- in some cases fossil evidence has contradicted writings in ancient books

However, analyzing bones is by no means a straightforward process. Most of the points mentioned above are possible to determine only if specific bones with just the right characteristics are fossilized. The author has included interesting stories which depict the hard work and assumptions that go into the work and also how mistakes can & have been made.

This book does suffer from a drawback like some non-fiction books i have read in the past do. It has just too many details. Even the anecdotes are described elaborately. Well...as a reader who is not even remotely connected to these fields I have no chance of remembering most of this information, hence reading most paragraphs from this book seems pointless. I have done a very selective reading and hope to find a book more suitable for a lay man.

Backpacking: One step at a time - Harvey Manning

2010-04-20T14:23:00.000-07:00

I do not know about experienced hikers but this is a reasonably good read for anyone curious about what the state of the sport of backpacking is. I wouldn't normally call backpacking/hiking a sport but reading this book has changed that.

The most striking issue covered in this book is the author's concern for preservation of the wild lands. Although written in the 80's it still presents a danger to the wilderness by the increasing number of hikers. I wonder what the situation is today. It also does a very good job in bringing to attention how simple activities like camping or gathering & using water or making a fire can damage the wilderness, sometimes irreparable. If not for the reviews of various gears and tips on the essential equipment I suggest reading this book solely for understanding how to be a responsible hiker (of course, this is only if one actually cares that future generations should have the same privilege).

It is incredible as to how much economics is behind this sport - The plethora of gear available, the nuances and details of selecting clothing, food, bedding etc. It is almost commensurate with setting up a home. Don't get me wrong, I do think it is all essential but somehow my impression was that people passionate about hiking would be a lot less materialistic - but I wouldn't be. Getting lost or hurt out there is something that will arouse fear in any one's mind. In fact this book concentrates more on the aspects that raise fear rather than the ones that arouse pleasure from hiking which in my view is the right approach. The pitfalls of ignorance and minor mistakes can very well turn out to be fatal. A common argument says that we take a lot more risk each time we merge on a freeway or cross a street. The difference is that out there help can be a long way away.

All in all it has further enticed my curiosity and i intend to read a lot more about this.

Expectation from Documentaries

2010-04-04T14:22:00.000-07:00

Documentaries are truly a modern tool for improving the intellectual of the masses, superseding books and other written material. I also find them to be more entertaining that much of mainstream media. But documentaries have a sense of credibility associated with them. They are assumed to be accurate with the content they present and the people who make them are respected as well.

I am an avid documentary watcher and am very grateful to the people who are putting in the efforts to make them. They make it possible for a lay man to understand concepts and get insight in matters that otherwise would be too tedious. But watching too many documentaries also has led to side effect. I have become more skeptical now both about the information they convey and the motives of the people who make them. Again i mean only skeptical not critical or ungrateful. I still love watching them. The reasons are to do with the accuracy of the content that they present. Especially since many documentaries are biased in that they only present one side of the story - this may not be intentional, since in most cases the motive is to shed light on some issues that involve grave concerns, jeopardize the future of humanity or even expose crime

I think that there are certain steps that documentary makers should follow to ensure viewer's confidence in their research and data. Such as...

- Never present charts, graphs without sources. All that needs to be done is to display the source in some corner of the screen
- Whenever clips from newspapers and other magazines are shown display which newspaper was it from and what the issue date was
- When playing an interview especially of a expert in the concerned topic display the name & qualification of that person - to show what is it that makes the person knowledgeable on that topic and why her opinion should be given any consideration. And show this information each time the person appears on screen. Many documentaries show this only once and the viewer cannot be expected to remember this.
- The tone of the narrator should not express opinion or take sides. It should simply report. Let the viewers decide based on the evidence
- Do not use excessive graphics - this particularly applies to documentaries in the fields of cosmology, quantum physics, time etc. For e.g. portraying the Big Bang as a colorful explosion (We know that we cannot observe it from the outside)
- Try harder to get opinions from both sides of the story. Many times documentaries just stop at saying that the alleged side declined their requests for interview(s). But I don't want to be too harsh with this point as I can understand the problem
- Do not get expert opinions from non-qualified people and do not harass people you interview

Again, this is just my opinion. I can imagine many situations where the incentive may clearly be not to follow any of these points.I just think documentaries are such an excellent tool and hope they stay away from corruption, prejudice and sub-standard research

Why Beautiful people have more daughters - Alan Miller & Satoshi kanazawa

2009-11-15T14:21:00.000-08:00

This is the first time ever I read a whole book non-stop. Went to Borders and purchased it around 2 pm and by midnight I was done, breaking only to go out and fetch dinner.

The book attempts to explain various aspects of human behavior using Evolutionary principles. This field of science is called 'Evolutionary Psychology'. Although I did not learn anything fundamentally new from this book it helped me correct my terminology and strengthen arguments about the concepts I understood before. The issues dealt with in the book and the arguments presented would make fascinating dinner table discussions. If you are looking for interesting topics to discourse on then read through it. The topics are such that they force the reader into pscho-analysis and introspection.

The authors primarily engage sex and reproduction as the underlying motive and reasoning for almost all of human behaviour. And they are not wrong since evolution is in effect all about sex and reproduction. Only in the very last chapter of the book do the authors deal with more interesting issues (for me) such as religion and somehow manage to connect them (although cautiously) to sex & reproduction as well. I guess any investigation if given evolution as the tool for reasoning will end up doing so. I have found some interesting reference links though for further reading and will get around to them soon. Although to their credit most of the theories listed seem plausible.

It would be even better if 'Evolutionary Psychology' could be put under the test of prediction like many other Scientific theories do. What I mean is that we make predictions using 'Evolutionary Psychology' and see if they turn out to be true (how to do this? I do not yet know). At the moment it seems that it only accounts for things in hindsight i.e. having come across an observation seek an explanation for it.

The most enjoyable part that I found is at the very end of the book where the authors dicuss questions that 'Evolutionary Psychology' yet cannot explain. One of them is 'Why do parents in advanced industrialized nations have so few children?' - this is my view is not just a mere mystery for Evolutionary Psychology, but a sizable blow and must be averted.

Genome - Matt Ridley

2009-11-07T23:45:00.000-08:00

I am trying out a more creative way of expressing my joy of reading this book. It has an almost perfect balance between technical discussions, political & social issues & history on the subject. Highly recommend this for anyone interested in light reading on genetics.

hilarious!

2009-10-02T14:09:00.000-07:00

This website is absolutely hilarious

Continuing Studies...

2009-09-22T14:08:00.000-07:00

After a break in the summer (mainly due to lack of any interesting courses being offered) I have enrolled again for a couple with Stanford Continuing education. The first one is 'Statistics - A Gentle Introduction' taught by Prof. Michael Walker. The course apparently will focus primarily on examples from biomedical applications which is exactly what I am looking for.

The other one should be really fun - the course title is 'Mountaineering' and the instructor is Prof. Frank Sarnquist. This is just a two day course with 6 hrs instruction on each. The course advertisement even says that there may be an opportunity for interested students to join the instructor in the ascent of a technically easy but high peak in the Sierra Nevada mountains. The reason of pursuing this one is my crave for one day taking this up as a serious activity. I have been hiking for the past year and have planned a couple of more trips in the next month. One day i wish to leave my footprint high up in the Himalayas. So far time is the only thing keeping me away from this but I am working to resolve this. One option i am already considering is 'Project Himalaya'

Stumbling on Happiness - Daniel Gilbert

2009-08-29T18:02:00.000-07:00

This is one of the two books that I read on my trip to india this month. First of all the name of the book is misleading. It is not a tutorial on How to be Happy as the name suggest. It is likely that a prospective reader might think so since such books are available in plenty on shelves of bookstores. Instead this book really is about the Psychology of the Human mind. Happiness is the term used to define the goal that human actions hope to achieve.

The author makes a startling claim - "Human beings are the only species who can think about the future". Sure ants store food and birds migrate but for them it is a response to the changing environment and not a conscious thought.

So the claim made in the book is that human beings are very poor at predicting the future, not at foretelling the future but at judging their own feelings in the future aka how happy they would be at a later time given their assumptions of events that would take place. The book uses evidence from numerous psychological experiments conducted as part of variuos research projects to support this claim.

I enjoyed most parts of this book. Most chapters are very informative on the workings of the brain while a few seem to delve in philosophical discussions. Overall it is a pleasurable read and certainly forces the reader into introspection.

Cool facts (quoted from the book)
- When people seem to be staring directly at something, their eyes are actually flickering slightly away from the thing they are staring at 3-4 times per second, which is why eyeballs look jiggly if you study them up close
- There is a blind spot at the center of the eye where the optic nerve attaches

Cool judgements (quoted from the book)
- We treat our future selves as though they were our children
- Memories, especially memories of past experience are notoriously unreliable
- The details that the brain puts in are not nearly as troubling as the details that it leaves out
- We fail to recognize that our future selves won;t see the world the way we see it now
- Because we tend to remember the best of times and the worst of times instead of the most likely of times, the wealth of experience that young people admire does not always pay clear dividends

Bad Science - Ben Goldacre

2009-08-24T14:05:00.000-07:00

This is the second book I read on this month's India trip. Can't believe just how productive transit time can turn out to be.

I would call this book 'Bad Medicine' rather than 'Bad Science', nonetheless its principles apply to any stream of science.

From Homeopathy & mainstream medicine to the MMR hoax, the author has expressed educated criticism of how bad scientific practices are widely prevalent, endorsed and accepted. The author has not shyed away from criticizing personalities made famous inspite of their pseudo scientific practices. In fact he has written dedicated chapters aiming the blow the cover of famous personalities in the business of nutrition science. I don't follow this field, so I was intrigued to learn about it.

I am thoroughly impressed by all the information that has been compiled and presented in this book. Lots of references to studies and facts and figures.

The main lesson to be learnt here is how to conduct unbiased and largely accurate research (mainly clinical trials). This is a good read for any skeptics or scientists alike.

Some of the more interesting chapters of the book deal with the role of journalists and their ineptness leading to the spread of bogus scientific stories, treatments and claims. The point to note is that the reasons for their support of substandard scientific stories is not necessarily malintentions but sheer lack of knowledge & skills - knowledge about how research (more specifically clinical trials) should be conducted so as to get the right results and skills to identify inadequacies in methods used for medical research.

The problem i feel is much more grave. A layman has to rely on information conveyed by the mainstream media. One cannot expect him to be able to verify every possible claim that he comes across in the news. It simply is not possible. So he has to rely on journalists & the so called specialist and their opinions to make his own decisions. That, I think simply cannot change.

So what can be done? One thing that popped in my head as i was reading was a simple law, stated as follows - "For any claims made in media the entire evidence to support that claim must be made publicly available" (Clearly my linguistic skills in legal settings leave a lot to be desired). But i know - as for any law the real burden is in effective enforcement and not in the legislation.

I am reading another book similar in nature called 'Panicology' - first impressions seem moderate.

1lec.com

2009-08-03T14:01:00.000-07:00

1lec.com is a cool website that contains animations explaining various topics in the following areas

Genetics
Biochemistry
Immunology
Physiology
Microbiology

many thanks to the people who are doing this!

Laws can be funny

2009-07-21T14:01:00.000-07:00

In the past few weeks I have seen two legislations moving society in completely opposite directions. One towards more tolerance and revoking un-justified punishment while the other taking a step back to the middle ages.

On one hand the de-criminalization of private homosexual activity within the Indian constitution is commendable, and on the other the Irish governments attempt's to criminalize blasphemy seems ridiculous.

The news has been covered well here and here

The problem I think lies not with the law itself but with the definition of the word blasphemy - "that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion". Are you kidding me! How can this be a basis for judging whether something should be made illegal.

In my view any concept based on unsubstantiated evidence and still not open to debate holds no credibility. Giving it protection by law is taking it too far.

23andme

2009-07-10T19:23:00.000-07:00

The genotyping results from my dna have now been made available at 23andme.com. Took me a little bit to browse through the data.

For introductions: 23andme.com is one of several companies that sequence and analyze an individual's genome. In case of 23andme.com the process is really convenient, I just sent in a bit of my saliva using a pre-ordered kit from 23andme.com, they extracted the dna from it, sequenced the dna, analyzed it and made the information available on their web site, where I can log in and browse through it. They have given it a social networking feel wherein one can share genomic data with friends and family. The site is also very educational with 101 type videos and pretty detailed info about diseases and traits. 23andme.com analyzes about 550,000 SNPs which is about 5% of the total estimated SNPs in the human genome. May be in the future they can do more.

At a first glance nothing striking appears that draws immediate attention, which is probably a good thing. I was kind of expecting a lot more stuff to show up. Moreover, each time I look at a trait or a report it says "This result applies to people of European ancestry. We cannot yet compute more precise odds for those originating from South Asia" - which is kind of disappointing.

In all I can see 10 clinical reports and 8 Carrier Status. The clinical reports are ones that are accepted in the scientific community to be reasonaly accurate. A Carrier Status simply says whether I am a carrier of certain genes or not. In addition to these there are a bunch of research reports available based on my genetic data. These are more interesting than clinical reports but are not yet as convincingly accepted by the scientific community.

So what did I find out?

For some of the good news - I do not posses the genes for Hemochromatosis or Bloom's Syndrome or Cystic Fibrosis (Delta F508 mutation). Until now I did'nt even know what Hemochromatosis or Bloom's Syndrome meant. And as per one of the research reports I only have typical odds of baldness :)

For some of the bad news - I am at a risk of Age-related Macular Degeneration, which totally sucks but don't need to worry about it for another forty years. And yes type 1 diabetes - should blame this on my mother.

My maternal ancestry seems to be Europe while Paternal ancestry is Southern Europe/North Africa

What I am really interested in and is one of the reasons I signed up is that the raw genetic data is available for download. Someday I plan to play around with it.

For now this information is not much more that amusement to me, but science in genetics is progressing impressively each year. I am certain that in the future most things about an individual would be determined way before birth and more fantastically even altered. Companies like 23andme have taken the right step towards making a business in this area.

At least my knowledge of medicine is slowly improving as I am reading through the results. Now I know names of symptoms and conditions I never would have thought existed. And I love the user interface of this web site, really good job done by the designers.

Super-colony of Ants

2009-07-07T23:59:00.000-07:00

I maintain that there are many other species more successful in the occupation of the planet than our own. Leaving out microorganisms I suspected ants to certainly be one of them. There are over 12000 known species of ants found almost on every corner of the world. The number of individuals one can imagine has to be staggering

Now there seems to be some evidence for this. Reported here and here. The original research appeared in the journal Insect Sociaux.

Apparently the Argentine ants have formed a global supercolony. The first question I guess comes to mind is how to define a supercolony. The simple definition used in this research is colonies that are not aggressive towards each other and comprise of individuals of the same species can be considered to be one. More or less I agree to this notion. Ants are territorial and colonies have been known to fight with each other.

So what has been observed here is that individuals belonging to colonies which may be continents apart appear to be tolerant of each other and show no signs of aggression.

The interesting thing is that the creation of the ant supercolony may be attributed to humans. By connecting the continents together humans may be responsible for spreading the Argentinian ants to different parts of the globe.

Interesting tidbits
* As few as ten workers and a single queen can establish a new colony
* ants may be the only group apart from mammals where interactive teaching has been observed
* ants may contribute 15–20% (on average and nearly 25% in the tropics) of the total terrestrial animal biomass, which exceeds that of the vertebrates

Kayaking

2009-07-07T16:35:00.000-07:00

Went kayaking on the south American river this long weekend. It was a real thrill. Fell off the boat twice (with one complete roll over) in the rapids which my instructor had ensured was definitely gonna happen on that day. In fact he rolled over once too so that does not make me feel so bad.

Some more pictures here

The Story of India

2009-06-26T01:57:00.000-07:00

I loved History in school. A new textbook each year giving a perspective on different national and international events from the more recent past to times when the country wasn't even defined. However, I feel that the yearly system and individual disconnected textbooks never gave a picture of India's history which could be grasped and admired entirely. Fortunately, I came across the documentary by Michael Wood called "The Story of India" and just finished watching the whole series a couple of days back. Spread over six episodes it is the ideal source of getting a picture of the entire birth of civilization on the subcontinent. From thousands of years in the past to the end of British Raj it clearly depicts all the changes that took place in the region - how new rulers came to power, how cultures and cities rose and then perished, how are they linked to each other.

Even more fascinating are the accounts of personal characteristics of famous names in Indian history. For e.g. Baber's goal to find the common denominator in all religions. Something I am still trying to Google my head around. I am not sure this information was included in the textbooks of my schooling days. I thought they were too factual.

I specially liked the way the documentary was picturized (I guess I could call it cinematography). Even though the narration in the background would be about history the pictures would be of present times in the same location or events that the narrator is talking about. The effect I found to be really moving.

On a more philosophical note - How individual events can completely change the course of future events that are to follow is simply amazing. This is not only applicable in the birth of a civilization (as evident from this documentary) but on even larger time scales. For e.g. the evolution of modern humans. And I don't even need to mention how the same is applicable to individual lives as well.

Understanding Genetics

2009-06-02T18:28:00.000-07:00

The Personal Genome Project Study Guide locate here is a great source for understanding the fundamentals of genetics. If it arouses more curiosity consider participating in the project. The next phase of enrollment has just opened up

My Talk at the Erlang Factory

2009-03-20T20:16:00.000-07:00

My talk at the erlang factory

Erlang Factory 2009 Palo Alto - Sumeet Bajaj - Erlang at SAP @ Yahoo! Video

Sleep and Dreams

2009-03-17T19:54:00.000-07:00

Read an interesting book called '101 questions about Sleep & Dreams'. Its not entirely convincing scientifically but gives somewhat plausible answers to most questions. The author is not an expert on the topic but has assembled the information from credible sources.

Did not gain much insight from this book though, but it has inspired me to do one thing. I am monitoring my sleep from now on.. every night ...recording time etc and noting down how the following day goes. Since I sleep variable hours day to day I have a feeling something interesting might show up. Can't gather a large number of subjects so I am the only one.

Biography of a Germ – Arno Karlen

2009-02-26T08:45:00.000-08:00

A very interesting read this one. Its about Borellia burgdorferi, the bacteria that causes lyme desease. Although the title says this is a biography of Bb the author digresses into a number of other topics. Some of which are fascinating, like his description of the life of a tick. Thats how the whole book is. In parts it is absolutely fascinating, in other parts it is simply informative. But overall it is thoroughly enjoyable. Organisms like bacteria might seem trivial to many but this book certainly takes a step towards altering that perception

The Fabric of the Cosmos – Brian Greene

2009-02-08T16:42:00.000-08:00

This is probably the best book I have read so far on Cosmology. I can't write on what the book is about since it covers a wide range of topics from Relativity to Quantum Physics to String Theory.

What was impressive about the style of writing was that it is almost like reading a novel. The flow of things with respect to time is commendable. Everything builds up as a story, which was kind of unexpected to me when I picked it up.

It is like reading the story of the 'Study of Cosmology'.

The examples given in the book to explain various concepts are plenty, clear & descriptive - which makes them interesting to follow.

I would recommend this to anyone interested in knowing 'what is known' in this field.

The only minor negative aspect would be that at time I found it too verbose, especially towards the end.

Coming to life – Christiane Nusslen Volhard

2009-01-24T02:23:00.000-08:00

I had left this one half-read so thought I will complete it tonight. Actually I found this book to be a bit too technical. It is a good book, no doubt about that but contains too many details which I won't remember in any case - so reading them does not make much fun. I had skimmed through a text book on molecular biology on my last trip to India and at times I felt I was reading short summaries from that one.

The highlight of the book for me was the following few lines towards the end. I list them here verbatim
"There is more variation (genetic) between people within a given population than between different populations. This is surprising because superficially, people from different parts of the world can look rather different in terms of body size or skin color. However, their overall difference in the genes is tiny compared to the differences between individuals within one ethnic group. Thus, there is no real genetic basis for the idea of human races."

And like any good technical book it lists some very interesting facts
- Humans have approximately 10^13 cells
- Life came into being more that 3 billion years ago
- Multicellular organisms first appeared about 600 million years ago
- More that 99% of all species that ever existed are extinct today

My new toy!

2009-01-23T02:23:00.000-08:00

I got this microscope last month - thought it is pretty cool. It is not lab quality or proffesional grade but fun to play with. Should be great for kids (and me). The cool thing about it is that it has an 3.5 inch LCD screen in place of an eyepiece. I am not an expert at microscopes but I think that makes it a lot easier to use and the best part is that several people can take a look at the same time.

Oh! and it also has a 2 megapixel camera for taking pictures and video

I have not spend too much time with it so far. I learnt that the real key in using a compound microscope is the preparation of the specimens. I have obtained some basic kit for that purpose too and will try and learn slowly.

I will later post a couple of cursory pictures that I took

Actually Celestron has released a bunch of cool microscopes in 2009, unfortunately I already bought this one towards the end of December.

What I don't like about it
- The LED light at the top is in the worng place. The light from it completely gets blocked by the 10x and 40x objectives. This makes it impossible to see specimens that are not transparent. I will go to a hardware store sometime and find another light source that I can use. Anyways this is not supposed to be a stereo microscope so I guess I should not be complaining too much over this.

Continuing Education

2009-01-06T04:20:00.000-08:00

One of the items on my long list of this year's resolutions is to get some form of education in areas other than computer science. I have been looking around for opportunities in this regard for quite a while now. Finally! I found something worthwhile.

Stanford is offering some really interesting courses as part of their Continuing Studies Program. I have enrolled for the following courses in this winter quarter (Jan - Apr 2009)
1. Cosmology (PHY 28) taught by Prof Leonard Susskind
2. The Math Behind Technological Innovation (SCI 19) taught by Prof Margot Gerritsen

I don't have cycles for graduate studies at the moment (not just because of work) so this looks like a great option. Interestingly the median student age for these courses is 46.

I thought this would be a great way to learn in a more serious manner without the grueling efforts of being a full time student. Lets see how it goes. Each course has about 10-12 lectures with each lecture being about 2 hrs in duration. I have enrolled for the grade option so I guess I will get to test myself a little bit.

Combined with the following talks at SLAC & the Physics department that I have been attending since the last semester I think this resolution of mine should be covered
- SLAC Colloquim and Public Lecture Series
- ACKS Seminar

My goal has been to attend one talk per week and so far I have managed to keep it up.

Stanford has also made some of the lectures (in video) from the Continuing Studies Program available here on ITunes. But I prefer the in class option.

Harnessing the power of the Stars!

2008-12-30T06:19:00.000-08:00

Came across this news in the Times of India about the National Ignition Facility and their attempt at using nuclear fusion as a source of energy. I have heard before of work in this direction but this time I was more intrigued so thought I will take a deeper look.

Simply put the process involves re-creating the stellar nuclear reactions (like the ones that take place in the center of our sun) in a controlled way. But there is nothing remotely trivial in achieving this. It will be a marvelous technological feat as we'll probably find out in a decade or two.

Although modern nuclear weapons do make use of fusion (with a fission based trigger) their reaction is uncontrolled and non-sustainable. And that exactly is the challenge.

Further searching on the matter led me to this report by the Institute of Physics, London. It does a very good job of explaining the basics of fusion, investment trends, the technology etc. They also have a video here. The approach which is described in detail in this report is known as Magnetic Confinement (MCF) wherein magnetic field(s) are used to control the plasma. The approach used at the NIF employs a more recent technology - Inertial Confinement (ICF) which makes use of lasers to trigger fusion reactions. The NIF website has some good videos and animations describing the process. They are worth taking a look at. The main difference between the two approaches being that the MCF produces a continuous energy output while the ICF using lasers produces energy in pulses (more like a combustion engine).

So why fusion?
Well, there is no doubt that it is probably the most powerful source of energy we know. After all, it is what lights up our universe. Can't you feel the warmth of the sun even though it is 96 million miles away - well, that's fusion. But the main reason claimed in its favor is that its a clean source of energy - does not involve any CO2 emissions (unlike fossil fuels), no waste products (unlike fission reactors) and the needed fuel (isotopes of H) can be produced on earth (Deuterium from sea water & Tritium from Lithium).

I know that advances have been made in harnessing renewable energy (wind, sunlight, tides, rain, geothermal). And a significant effort is being put in these technologies. To give an example - I attended this talk about the 'The Global Climate and Energy Project' by Prof Sally Benson at SLAC. This is a ten year initiative funding various projects looking into renewable energy resources. Their main focus though is solar cell technology. However, I have always been a bit skeptic about these technologies. For the future energy needs of mankind fusion may be the elixir. The EU has a goal of building the first fusion plant by 2035 (link).

On a more interesting note with successful use of fusion we will move one step higher in the categorization of intelligent civilizations
Category 1 - Harness the power of the atom (this is where we are now)
Category 2 - Harness the power of a star
Category 3 - Harness the power of an entire galaxy

Observing the Heavens

2008-12-27T22:14:00.000-08:00

Although I have been an avid reader on the subjects of Astronomy and Astrophysics, I was never keep on observing. Only recently I have decided to give it shot.

As a starter to learn my way around the skies I got these binoculars. The first thing I did was take it to a local star party and get an experienced astronomer's opinion. I was surprised at the comments I got. Apparently according to him, very few people get a good pair of binos and I had been very lucky to have landed with one. The most common problem is that the eyepieces are not aligned which means that one eyepiece is above or below the other (the eyepiece are on the side from where we look). This makes it very hard to look through them even for a couple of miutes at a stretch (its probably like using the wrong prescription glasses).Anyways, convinced that my equipment was in order it was time to glance at the heavens.

First, the moon. I was amazed at the details such a simple piece of optics could turn up. Its as bright as I could have imagined and the craters are visible in some detail. Next step was the real thing, how about looking at the twinkling specs in the sky.

Light pollution is a biggest spoil sport in any star gazing activity. So I could only fully realize its potential on this weekend's trip to Death Valley National Park. The cold weather hindered any extended viewing but I was quite amazed at what I could see. Just looking through them brings tons of stars in view and the wider field of view (compared to a telescope) makes it all the more impressive. Caught a glimpse of a couple of shooting stars too, which were impossible to spot with the naked eye.

Though the primary purpose of getting these is for star gazing and as an accompanying accessory to my telescope, they are excellent for terrestrial viewing too.

This is just a stepping stone in my pursuit of amateur astronomy. I am trying to build up my own interest in it. I keep reminding myself not to expect anything remotely close to the pictures in magazines and documetaries. Ultimately all I would see are points and hazes of light. But I have come to realize that its not all about spectacular images. Its about looking at things directly with my own eyes. Its about learning my way around the sky just like I know my way around the city I live in. Its about looking at the celestial giants and relating with them the physics that I learn about in books.

Can't wait till summer gets here and I can go ahead and get my own telescope.

A 100,000 Gender Benders out there – whats the result?

2008-12-19T11:09:00.000-08:00

The other day I came across an article at 'The Independent' titled "It's official: Men really are the weaker sex" - Catchy title isn't it, but don't be influnced by it, coz if the claims are true this really looks like a serious problem.

Whenever we think of extinction or something closer to it, the immediate thought that pops up in our minds is of something causing individuals of species to die in larger than normal numbers. But there can be another route to it i.e. if individuals of species simply cannot reproduce at a sustainable rate. Both seem close enough but there is a subtle difference.

Anyway, leaving that thought lingering around I want to get to the gist of the article and the research it reported.

Few days back CHEM Trust released a report titled "EFFECTS OF POLLUTANTS ON THE REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH OF MALE VERTEBRATE WILDLIFE - MALES UNDER THREAT". It is a collection of conclusions drawn from around 250 studies around the world. What is claims is that chemicals released in the environment (due to human activities ofcourse) is causing impact on hormonal activity of male individuals of a number of species. They call them 'Endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs)' or 'Hormone Disruptors', also known as 'Gender Benders'. The effects include, and I quote 'reduced number of sperm, genital deformities and deformities of other structures under sex hormonal influence'. Effects are observed in fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals (not humans since they were not covered). However, they say that 'all vertebrates have similar sex hormone receptors', so it clear what the hint is.

I don't mean to say that 'Children of Men' is being scripted here, but to me it looks like something to keep a watch on amongnst the million other concerning problems.

A shorter version of the publicly released report can be found here
For the more enthusiatic reader the detailed version is located here

Is terrorism that big a problem?

2008-12-05T10:15:00.000-08:00

I was reading Bruce Schneier 's comments today on the mumbai attacks. He made an interesting point on how the attacks were so inefficient. His measure was number of deaths caused per terrosist and the result was like 11 dead and 13 wounded per terrorist.

This got me thinking whether the number of people dead is actually a good measure of determining the gravity of an incident. If so then the reaction of the piublic and the media in india does not make much sense to me. People/Actors/My friends are all uproared by terrorist attacks such as this. Everyone has their opinions on how to solve the problem, some more drastic than others - "The government should do this, the government should do that... we''ll take it to the streets.. politicians are completely inept in providing security.. we should build a stronger navy.. we should equip police with better arms" etc etc - all pretty viable, I agree.

I am not trying to propose any solutions of my own, cause frankly I don't have any idea as to what should be done and I am sure most people including the media and politicians do not either.

What I want to find out is whether we are concerned about the right problem. Does terrorism really demand such a big reaction or there are other more grave problems which are getting neglected? So I decided to take a look at other recurring incidents that cause the maximum number of casualties/suffering/losses in india.

Let me start with terrorism itself

Terrorism
The times of India reported the following on 27 Aug 2007

"All of these vast swathes of the globe lost a total of 3,280 lives in terrorist incidents between January 2004 and March this year. India alone lost 3,674 lives over the same period of three years and three months."

"Outside of Iraq, 20,781 people were killed in terrorist violence between January 2004 and March 2007, according to data available from the Worldwide Incidents Tracking System (WITS) of the US National Counter-Terrorism Centre (NCTC). Almost half of them, 9,283 to be precise, were killed in South Asia."

If I calculate based on this then on an average it is like 18 deaths per day world wide, 3 per day in india.

Road Accidents
According to indiandrivingschools 78,911 people were killed and 3, 99,265 injured in india in 2000 alone. Over 80,000 people die in the traffic crashes annually, over 1.2 million are injured seriously and about 300000 disabled permanently.

In 2004 the number of deths due to road accidents in India was 90,000 (highest for any country) - it was 42,636 in the US.

This means that on an average 219 people die everyday due to road accidents alone. This is more than the mumbai attacks too. And note that this is everyday.

This is not just my view bio-medicine quotes that
"The death toll from car crashes in developed countries is almost 400 times greater than the number of deaths caused by international terrorism, reports a study in the latest issue of Injury Prevention."

Floods
cnn.com reported this on Sep 24 2008

"The death toll from monsoon floods in eastern India rose to more than 2,400 Tuesday as authorities reported that another 32 people had perished in the disaster that has affected millions of people. The latest deaths in Uttar Pradesh state brought the countrywide death toll from the floods to 2,404 since June, according to the federal home ministry's disaster management unit."

If you watch the news this seems to repeat every year.

Dowry
In 1995, the National Crime Bureau of the Government of India reported about 6,000 dowry deaths every year according to wsws

Ok so these are old numbers - may be the problem has abated now - I don't no.

Tuberculosis
The 'Ministry of Health and Family Welfare' says here that
"In India today, two deaths occur every three minutes from tuberculosis (TB). But these deaths can be prevented. With proper care and treatment, TB patients can be cured and the battle against TB can be won".

two every three minutes, thats like 960 every day! I hope thats incorrect.

I wanted to check the numbers for HIV/AIDS as well but I believe these are difficult to find for any research since they are not directly a result of the epidemic. A good argument for this is found here

Suicide
Times of india reported here that there were 122,637 suicides last year (2007) - an average of 336 every day as reported by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). Ok - so suicide is an individual's own business so I will not take this any further.

So why is Road Safety and Floods not our topmost priority. They don't get the same reaction from the public. Some may say that floods are just natural calamities, well thats not entirely true, it is an infrastructure problem. The BJP government had plans to resolve it I think but never got anywhere.

Road accidents are an ever better example cause in my view its not just the government that can be blamed for it. Sure the infrastructure is poor, but based on my observations of the driving habits of my fellow citymen & women they can be equally held responsible.

I feel that all of these including terrorism are unavoidable problems, we can only hope to reduce their intensity. If saving peoples lives is what we wanna do then why not start with the most injurious?

P.S. These are just my thoughts!

The Selfish Gene - Richard Dawkins

2008-12-04T00:04:00.000-08:00

I heard about this book from a colleague and I had to read it. Its a real excitement right - when one finds an author who shares the same views as yourself and especially if its someone as elloquent as Prof Dawkins.

The Selfish Gene is the explanation of survival of the real survivors - the genes. Prof Dawkins uses examples from the living world to explain how complex behaviour no matter how altruistic it seems has only one agenda behind it, which is 'survival of the genes'. Its not about the individual, not even the species, its about the replicators.

The author is careful to avoid examples using human behaviour and only briefly touches upon them now and then. In fact he also hints that humans may be the ones able to act beyond the control of their genetic masters (something I have been wondering about lately). The central idea behind the book is that we and all animals are machines created by our genes and all behaviour of these machines has only one aim - to ensure the survival of the genes themselves.

Every now and then he makes these small statements which by themselves but forth the grand idea and sort of stick in my head . I can't help but list a couple of them here

- 'If you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature'
- 'True warfare in which large rival armies fight to death is known only in man and in social insects'
- 'If there is human moral to be drawn, it is that we must teach our children altruism, for we cannot expect it to be a part of their biological nature'

Overall this a fascinating look at evolution. I must say I have somewhat become a follower of Dawkins and can't wait to complete the next one - 'The God Delusion'

How do astro-physicist do their research?

2008-12-03T02:04:00.000-08:00

If you are an physicist/astronomer don't read ahead.

For a while I used to think, how do astro-physicists do their work, meaning how do they get all the observational data. Long nights staring throught the big scopes seems an option and is done is many cases I guess. But there is another way - The sky survey projects!

This would sound pretty obvious to astronomers or to many people in general but it was an insightful information for me. I attended the talk by Prof Andy Lawrence (University of Edinburgh, UK) at the SLAC (Stanford Linear Accelerator Center). He talked about the UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Survey. Well some of the results from the survey might get physicists and astronomers interested (way above my level of understanding) but what caught my interest was the way the sky survey project(s) work.

Survey projects look at a large portion of the sky and take a huge number of images. The images can range from visible to infrared to X-rays and cover a range of redshifts. Another popular example is the Sloan Digital Sky survey. The data collected (and a huge amount it is) is then made available to researches. How? Computer science ofcourse. Prof. Lawrence even demonstrated sql queries used to pull out the desired data. He had very little understanding of it ofcourse. In fact his project involved developing more effective tools to do the research. It looked more like a computer software project to me.

So physicists don't have to look through telescopes themselves each time they need to observe. Thanks to sky survey projects data is readily available and easily accesible (barring political reasons ofcourse). Sounds like a very obvious way to work in the field but was somewhat new to me. So I thought I will out it up here for other equally ignorant people to read.

How much do my teeth need?

2008-12-02T20:47:00.000-08:00

According to many web pages The correct amount of toothpaste to use is the "size of a pea" (some toothpaste companies may disagree)

Why not a lot? Because of Fluorosis?
Overzealous use of fluoridated toothpaste can lead to a condition known as fluorosis, in which teeth become chalky white or yellowed and in severe cases, brittle. The discoloration is permanent, but teeth sometimes can be brightened with bleaching techniques. Fluorosis causes no other known physical problems. (coutesy link)

I think the last part of the sentence about no other problems may be incorrect.

The CDC seems to disagree with dentristry.com! They Say

- Only children 8 years old and younger are at risk, because this is the time when permanent teeth are developing under the gums.
- Once the teeth erupt (emerge through the gums), they are no longer at risk for fluorosis.
- Adults, adolescents, and children older than 8 years cannot develop enamel fluorosis
check link if interested

In addition animated-teeth.com says "In order to cause dental fluorosis the fluoride must be ingested (swallowed) during that time period when the child's tooth enamel is forming". Still dont know why though?

So in conclusion, use a pea sized amount of toothpaste, but not beacuse of danger of excessive fluoride use. hmm.. I still have doubt

Extras
Some interesting facts........ (courtesy link)

- When the economy is good the tube exit has one size...when the economy is bad the exit is larger so you tend to use more.
- The amount of force necessary to open the tube is less than 4 gms/inch...so the people with arthritis can open the tube.
- The reason tubes no longer stay folded is so you always see the logo.+

Others
Toothbrushes have been used since 3000 BC (The first bristle toothbrushes, similar to what we use today, were used in China around 1498)

Thats just ridiculous .. 27 years on this rock and I know so little about the thing i use everyday

What I love about Netflix

2008-11-24T18:43:00.000-08:00

I have been a netflix user for over 2 years now. In summary this is one of the best services for me. I am currently on the 8 at a time plan.

I watch a lot of movies and really enjoy them more from the comfort of my sofa. Sure the big screen and sound in a movie theatre makes for a good experience, but my big screen TV with a Home theater system is satisfactory.

As far as Television is concerned I hate watching commercials. Not so much the commercials themselves, but the fact that they keep showing the same commercial over and over.

With Netflix life seems so simple. I order the DVDs, they arrive by mail, no problem! But there is much more to that than just the delivery of movies. It makes it so much easier to find movies online than in a store. I remember occasions when I have spent over 20 minutes looking for a movie at some of the popular DVD rental stores.

And the collection at Netflix has really grown well. I can watch documentaries & foreign movies & my favourite Tv shows (Most importantly without commercials). Yes, there is a delay attached to this. I have to wait until things get released on DVD, but it is worth it.

There are some improvements I would like in Netflix though - The "My Account Activity" interface is not good at all. It is so hard to determine things like - how many movies I saw/rent last month? How much time I spent watching those? Did I see any movie on a particular day? etc. (May be they don't want people to see this on purpose). I know looking at these figures might get some customers to feel bad about themselves, but I would really like to know about my activity.

I think the online collection of 'Watch Instantly' movies is poor. The number of titles sound good - 12000 the last time I heard but there seem to be only a few which are worthwhile.

I have thought for some time on how much I actually spend on Netflix. I know my subscribtion costs $XX per month - but really how much am I paying per movie. I will do that & put it up here