Back to Biking

After a gap of 2 years, I'm again back to biking thanks to the biker-friendly area of Redmond. I was a pretty much enthusiastic cyclist between the age of 12 to 21 and pretty much used cycle during all of my high school and college. I had a pretty good race bike in my college and drove it more than 10K miles in 4 years. I loved it a lot and miss it greatly. I've always dreamed of driving around the world in a bike (though it might never come true, I can at least try to go for longer bike tours).

I recognize that biking is a win-win situation for all the parties - the biker, the road users, the community, the government and the mother nature. By getting enough outdoor exercise the biker saves time in the gym and keeps himself fit always. The constant flow of blood to the brain in long, casual rides helps in thinking a lot. And more, it saves lots of money over riding cars. For the other road users, it saves a lot of space (imagine a rider on a SUV compared with 10 cyclists riding in the same space. Though, it brings a slight inconvenience due to slower speeds, on the longer run it is always beneficial to the other motor vehicles. The community benefits by lesser pollution and lesser wear and tear of the road. The government benefits by greater energy security (even if there is an energy crisis, the bikers can keep moving), lesser dependence on basic services (of highway system, metallic industries etc.) and lesser gasoline consumption. And finally, we do a great service to the environment by using lesser materials (20 to 50 times less than a big car) and fuel.

For all these reasons, I'm back to biking and doing my commute of 6 miles from my home to office in this. In the morning, I do 3/4ths of my commute by taking the bike in the bus and in the evening I use the bike trails to come home. The bike trails involve going along a lake, crossing a small river, crossing a major park, going along various sporting facilities, climbing down a small hill and moving alongside alongside a freeway with vehicles going at jet speed. In short, a very interesting and thrilling ride.

For this ride, I bought an amazing race bike (see the picture on the left) and it is similar to my older bike used during my college. So, I love it even more. With its carbon-fiber parts and 27-gear system, I got it at a much lower price (after bargaining a lot) of $900 including accessories.

I want to go on longer tours too. To start with, today I went on a tour around the major towns of Redmond, Kirkland and Bellevue at lunch. One enthusiastic MS biker organizes it every week and due to overcast conditions no body turned up today except the author - the 'brave' one. We went on a hilly track and I was gasping and that 22 km ride in lunch sapped all my energy as I was riding after 2 years of inactivity and have never driven on a hilly terrain.

But as it happens, I shall always stay 'brave' and go for more tours like these. Let me put future posts on other tours that I'm going to take part in it. Wait and see to see a great cyclist-blogger in me.

I'm back to Blogging

Hey Guys... Sorry for the long hiatus. I'm now goin to restart my vigorous blogging habit. I'll write detailed posts on what was happening in the last 2 months to me and to the world, in general.

In short, my status changed from a Masters student to a Software Design Engineer in the Windows core team of Microsoft with me successfully defending my Masters thesis in June.

I was pretty lax in my communication (through blogs, orkut, mails and phone) and now I'm gonna pack all my energy to get me back to the communication forest.

World moving toward mediocrity

This is one topic that is troubling me for the last few years. Is the world moving towards mediocrity? Every era had its share of great persons in every field and the process of producing the greats kept on getting accelerated ever since 15th century. People like da Vinci, Newton, Keppler, Bismark, Adam Smith, Shakesphere... kept on arising in various fields and created various fields and revolutionized the entire society.

By the dawn of 20th century the process was in extreme speed. The world was seeing doyens like Mahatma Gandhi, Albert Einstein, Henry Ford, Andrew Carnegie, Neils Bohr, Alan M. Turing, Richard Feynman, Marie Curie, Max Plank, Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, Swami Vivekananda, Wright Brothers, Marconi, Edison, von Neumann and Claude Shannon.

But, can you name any living person now or any person born in our era (after 1930) who could belong to this hall of fame, of the world greats?

The world during the period of 1870 to 1930 saw so many inventions and breakthroughs. Extrordinary breakthroughs in Physics came in the form of Quantum theory, Electromagnetic theory, electricity, radio transimission, Semiconductors, Superconductivity, Radioactivity and Relativity (... I cant recount every great thing) and great inventions came in the form of telephone, radio, x-rays, electric motors, automobiles, airplanes, microwaves, movies.... How many great things have we invented in our era?

Where do we get to see physists like Einstein, Bohr, Marie Curie, Linus Pauling, Nichol Tesla, Feynmann and Mathematicians like Kurt Godel, Ramanujam, David Hilbert, Max Plank, Turing, Claude Shannon, in the current era? Where do we get the great economists like Keynes and Fisher or psychologists like Freud? Can you name atleast one great inventor of current time, whose work could be compared with Edison or Bell or Wright Brothers or Neumann? Why didnt we have such great persons in our era? Why the flame of the greats got almost extinguished by the 1960's? If we ask a person in 1940 about the list of top 10 all-time great physists, the list would countain atleast half from their own time. But, what about now? Can you name atleast one current physist who could be placed in the all-time list?

How many great breakthroughs in Computer Science are brought after its first 20 years? We are using almost the same model of Turing and most of the concepts (right from databases to algorithms to networks) are just refined, polished and engineered, but nothing revolutionarily new is produced that is comparable to the works of the first 20 years. Why didnt we do much in space sciences after 1960's and why didnt we produce any great airplane in the last 40 years?

In the previous era, world saw extrordinary leaders in the form of Winston Churchill, Roosevelt, Gandhi, Nehru, Mao, Hilter and Stalin (the last two are criminals against humanity) who commanded uncomparable control over their regions. There were extraordinary literary persons like Emerson, Mark Twain, Ayn Rand and Bernard Shaw.... There were these uncomparable aggressive businessmen like Herny Ford, John D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan, Alfred P. Sloan (the man who broughtup General Motors) . Where are their successors?

While we should expect the process of producing great things should have accelerated in the last 70 years, with the revolutions in communication and transportaion and globalization, it is dissapointingly low. I suspect that there is something that is fundamentally wrong. The great instituitions like MIT, Princeton, Cornell and Stanford are no longer producing great things that can change humanity. The papers are more of engineering improvements than revolutionizing things. The professors produce more of good works than extraordinary breakthroughs.

Fundamentally, there is an enormous pressure to perform. Students have to worry about careers, PhD candidates have to worry about graduating, professors have to worry about tenures and later a decent publication career. And this produces the fear that acts against the guts to produce something new. If a physics student proposes for something like a work of general theory of relativity or if a computer science student produces a new computing model, it will most probably be rejected and the admission committee or later the professor might advice the guy to work towards more ahievable goals. And the student might not have guts to go further and work against all odds and might even quit researching.

Thus, we are caught in a circle of mediocrity and we need great force to break this cycle. For this to happen, the current era people have to realize that history would call us the era of mediocrity and to avoid that we need to do something revolutionary.

Human rights activists are Stupid

I read with great interest the story of a 4 year old running for 65 kms in India. It was so amazing and being from a country which seldom produces olympic medals, I was thrilled. I always believed that India's greatest sporting talent remains hidden in rural India, which is untapped by all the sporting bodies. Thus, 90% of India, wherein almost all the potential remains, is underutilized due to red-tapism and poor facilities. Thus, this kid's achievement is a big thing as he is from that 90% India. But, immediately the insane humans rights activists are agog.

I always felt that the world's insanest human beings were within the forums of human rights. Those crazy fellows who dont dare to condemn crime empathaize with teh criminal instead of the victim. I never found any human rights activist voicing concern for a victim, though almost always they voice for the criminal who victimized the poor fellow. Now, those lunatics have immediately jumped to criticize the boy's coach and even threaten to implicate with child abuse and planning for murder. What the heck is this?

The human rights activist have not sounded anything when that boy was sold for $20 by his mother. They dont do anything to rescue the poor children from bonded labor, young girls from devilist girl rackets, they do nothing to change the condition of malnutrion and disease problems. But, when a success story is produced they jump to criticize the coach.

Once again, I'm convinced that the human rights activists are lunatics.

Blog in action soon

Sorry for not keeping my blog updated. I'm submerged in Thesis work and so having lots of articles at the draft stage that have not crossed the stage for publishing. Updates will be there by next week.

Take a Break.

Rang de Basanti in Action

For those of you who thought that the events in Rang de Basanti are impossible, think again. There was a peaceful procession of medical students in New Delhi and the Delhi police used lathi charge and teargas and violence to ward them off. The protestors were for a cause and their methods were peaceful. Like RDB, the villian is a cabinet minister. And the police were indiscriminate. Time is soon running out and at some point we have to fight the locusts who have managed to control India for the last 60 years. But, we should do much more intelligent work than the innocent youth of RDB. We are not having a single enemy. The thing that stands before us is a heinous system of reservation that has brainwashed people enough that most people just fight on its implementation and forget its unjust concept. The system of quota is against the spirit of Indian Constitituion's Article 15 (equality and non-discrimination based on birth) and is also against the spirits of democracy worldwide (US and European courts have illegalized quota systems)

References:
Students protesting story

Tank Man

One of the most incredible personalities in the recent history is this tank man of China. During the Tianenmen square protests, where Chinese students wanted democracy and gathered at the historic tianenmen square, in Beijing, they witnessed such a blood and horror that charecterized our era. The Chinese government used tanks and heavy armoury to break the protest of innocent, weaponless students. But, one man chose to defy them. He stood valiantly against all the tanks and its stunning to look at that picture and the video, where a human 'warrior' stands brave against dozen armoured tanks. See this video.

If someone needs courage, then you need to see this. I'm always impressed with such people who can terrorize 'fear'. They are real humans, who stand courageous for a just cause. Unfortunately, we have become a society of dumb people, who are willing to compromize values, who are willing to be voiceless before injustice, who are villing to be cowards before fear and who become the main source of the evilness of the society.

"Evil can proceed only when the good become silent"

Protectionism in Europe

After a long time, I'm writing an article that doesnt directly concern India. The reservation (a combination of Affirmative Action and Racialism) issue in India has taken so much of my time that I could not concentrate on any other story. I wanted to write about the French job contracts in keeping up with the worldwide viewership of this blog, but I could not put up the articles although I wrote up an article in Wikinews.

For those of you who didnt follow the youth riots in France, earlier this month, let me explain in brief. There was a labor law reform in France that would allow employers to hire and fire freely young employees, under the age of 26, for the first two years of trial period, which is felt as a ncessary reform for modern companies to work. But, riots erupted so much that the deal was throw out and the main architect of the deal - de Villepin's (French PM) political career is doomed.

Unemployment among youth is extremely high and this not only generates riots, but also worsens the impact of already ageing country. If more than 25% of youth are unemployed and the average population is well past middle age, France is in deep trouble.

In this context, comes the CPE (First Job Contract) which would allow employers to fire their workers in the first two years of trial period, if they are under 26. The things surprizing for me is why only till 26 and why only 2 years of trial period. While, the rest of the world has come to terms with jobs where there is no guarantee that anyone will be retained for any length of time, I find even the CPE is a bit unrealisitc and not-enough reform. But, the French people surprize by having an enormous extent of riots and strikes that de Villepin (French PM) was forced to take back his policy. This is a crucial event that might dictate the future of this country.

First, France is not going to get any modern industry, without basic protections for the employers. How do you expect Yahoo or Google to give an employment for life, when they cant predict what will be their future in the next 5 years? Already, the French are ageing and so the modern companies dont find much market to sell and have little choice of workers. Thus, all the wealth generating modern companies will go to emerging markets with lighter labor laws, and French will be saddled with old-age companies.

Second, the defeat of de Villepin (who has been victimized for this policy and could lose his Presidential ambition) will dissuade the French politicians from talking reality to their subjects. They would be forced to tell the people, what they want to hear - a modern welfare economy, and this could spell disaster for the country.

Third, riots will worsen. The French people were rewarded for their unjust riots. Now, they will get the feeling that they can stop the govt. by indiscriminately goin on riots. As France starts to go down with a sagging economy the riots among both citizens and immigrants would rise and will bring France economy to a halt.

The problems are not just isolated to France. They are present in similiar or different forms in the rest of the Europe, where left wing socialists join hands with right wing nationalists to stop the countries from accepting reality and join the modern economy. During 1998-99 German govt. was forced to stop hiring more of Indian computer engineers, which significantly affected the growth of German s/w companies compared to their American counterparts. Last year, they(French and Dutch) stopped the common Euro constitution, which would allow the tiny continent of Europe to unite, as it gets impossible for them to make their voice heard in this world of giants.

France, like the rest of the Europe, is surging with opposing currents of leftists and rightist wing nationalists both of whom have marginalized the logical politicians. While the leftists try to promote more of isolationism and protectionism, in the name of labor rights, the rightists believe that France has a special place in the world and promote racialism and harsh treatment of immigrants. While we could understand the problem posed by indiscriminate entry of immigrants in the form of refugees and low-paid workers to add with the problem of poorly skilled second-generation kids of immigrants, we have to Agree that France has done preciously little to solve the actual problems.

France, along with the rest of Europe and to some extent Japan, is unable to come to terms with the modern economy and globalization. They are unable to understand the mammoth changes visible on the horizon, with India, China and to some extent Brazil and Russia rising as massive economies. They still dont realize that their wealth was mainly earned with the majority of the world was sleeping and chained in imperialism where they got cheap resources and labor supplies and got markets without much competition. Otherwise, a relatively small country tucked in Europe, without much of mineral resources and historical heritage, compared to many Asian countries (like India and China) couldnt have become a great economy. They had progressive policies, when rest of the world were riddled with the chaos of monarchy, clanism and communism.

Now, the rest of the world has started to wake up. Countries like India and China demand their fair share of world resources and wealth. Thus, France has to come up with reality. They cant expect their yesterdays to be same as tomorrow. They built up an overly welfare state on top of wealth, which wouldnt have come had they not interacted with the rest of the world. Now, there is no choice for them. They cant afford to close their economy. Their companies cant afford to be big by having only tiny markets of few million people, while giant Indian, Chinese and American companies drive them out from the rest of the world. At some point they have to realize that the only way Europe can prosper is by competiting with the rest of the world and thus there is no way they can avoid globalization and tuck themselves into the cozy blanket of protectionism.

Let us hope that they will realize Reality, before it gets too late.

Why not let us make a movie?

Reservation can hurt people and can kill them.

One of my cousins, who was one of the national level toppers in 1992, attempted suicide when Mandal commission was implemented and he was denied his dream Medical seat. After weeks of intensive care treatment in one of the country's best hospitals, his life was saved.

My family priest's son became a lunatic 15 years ago, when he was given a false information that he didnt get a seat, when he actually got one. Its pathetic to see a topper student running like a lunatic for 15 years.

Reservation has created much more horror stories than this and so many immolations and suicides have occured. So many families have been destroyed and doomed. So, many became mentally and physically ill.

Why, not let us collect our real-life stories and make them into a mini movie. We can select a best story and with just a video cam and 10 decent actors we can make a mini movie and with the comments of thousands of members we can really edit it to portray the actual horrors of reservation.

If it gets successful, we can invite even a mainline filmaker. If Rang de Basanti can get hit and change youth mindsets, why not let us change india with our real stories?

The orkut community for the interested members:

The wiki for developing the movie script and story:

Is everything applicable for everyone

Why did Jesus Christ give this statement?
"Don't give that which is holy to the dogs, neither throw your pearls before the pigs, lest perhaps they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces" - Matthew 7.6

Why did Lord Krishna choose Arjuna for delivering Bhagvat Gita, and not Bheema or any other person?

Why were some philosophies kept very secret from the masses? Even the divine prayer "OM Namo Narayana" was kept hidden from the masses for a long time till it eventually got out by the discourse of Ramanujacharya.

This is one concept that is troubling me for a long time - can lions become monkeys or viceversa?