Holiday Time

Diwali Holidays are going on (OK, coming to a close, but I don't really want to admit that). Holidays are always good, but this time they are turning out to be remarkable (for purely personal reasons of course). For one thing, I am reading at least as much as to please myself. The list of completed projects now includes Rosalind Franklin: The dark lady of DNA by Veena Gawankar, Antimatter by Frank Close, Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges and Not even wrong by Peter Woit [let me add that each one is good enough to deserve a review of its own, something which I haven't gotten around to yet]. A couple of empty rooms, devoid of any furniture except the bare minimum, but which allow complete isolation are proving to be my reading haven. I am also spending a lot of time observing a) beautiful cloud patterns and b) the biodiveristy around here (which frequent rains exponentiate). And every time my (untrained) eye finds something new. Another important thing is that after a long time the holidays of me and sis have coincided, so another big chunk of my time goes into pretending to be ten years younger. Distractions are to a minimum, I hardly watch TV and rarely access Internet. Calls and messages are down to a minimum. I can almost pretend these things haven't been invented yet. Today was the first day I left town, but in return it allowed some precious time with bhaanje-bhaanji to their now rather old mamu. I don't care much about food, but that front is well covered too (Gulab Jamuns are waiting as I write this :). All this , together, makes this time so remarkable. And dear reader, thanks for reading so far, but this post could've waited. Holidays won't last forever, make the most while they last. I am getting back to the same thing..

Enjoy!! [And a belated Happy Diwali]

Highlights: How I won a bunch of cookies..

I had never won a bunch of cookies before (except from a webserver). That happened yesterday, and consequently, I believe my excitement hubris over it would be quite understandable.

The occasion was Diwali party at office, and a new game was proposed, Dumb C++. Contrary to what I thought, there were no technical questions. A homegrown (or rather officegrown) variation on 'guess the movie' theme, and a lot fun too.. Teams as usual, but here the whole team enacts the movie and one guy guesses it. Should have been called Dumb 3 (if why 3 is your question, ~ is the answer).. So here is Sandip enacting a movie for yours truly..

Your's truly doesn't get it, so Rahul jumps in.. Look at the two photos carefully and you can guess the movie name (or cheat and take a look at Zarin's blog).
Tick....
Tick....
Tick....
[Actually there was no real ticking, and if there was, nobody heard it amidst all the shouting].
But I finally got it. Yippeee!!!


Winning is sweet, especially when the prize is cookies :p. As usual 'loser' teams wanted their share (which in a fair world is zero (I would say that now, wouldn't I? :p)). Here with the teammates and the trophy.

And finally Rasna.. The drink of the Winners

There was much besides cookie-winning at the party, superb food being one prominent item. For a less narcissistic (and more complete) account, see Zarin's blog.

Enjoy!!


[This post is tagged under GhumnaFirna, cuz the party definitely brought everybody out of their respective shells].

टॉलस्टॉय: एक माणूस

Just finished reading a biograpgy of Leo Tolstoy (टॉलस्टॉय: एक माणूस, सुमति देवस्थळे). My knowledge of Tolstoy so far ended with the name 'War and Peace'. But here is a story of great drama, of the highest in human values and also the lowest in human nature. The name of Tolstoy is more famous for his literary work, what is less well known (it seems to me) is that the philosphy of non violent, truth based opposition that was so successful in giving us our freedom first originated with Tolstoy (Gandhiji also considered himself his follower). While rote learning and strict discipline were the norm of the educational system, his come-and-go-when-you-like school, with the responsibility of keeping the attention of students being that of the teachers proved a successful reform, and many of its principles were later adopted by modern educational systems. He did not feel that the textbooks were good enough, so he wrote his own, which are still read. He was a promoter of education of the elderly, but when we noticed that the literate among those still hardly had anything good to read, he wrote his own books for them too. In later life he became a champion of reform of and for the poor. He accepted God but rejected all the superstitions and rituals. His compassion made him a shining ray of hope for the whole world.

But Tolstoy's life was also one of paradox. He was often disappointed in his experiments, because the same people he wanted to help were not sufficiently patient, or focused on short term gains. He preached restraint, but was not very successful in his own life with this (as his very frank diary entries show). He preached love for all humanity, but his focus on high ideals led to ignorance of his children (the story of Gandhiji and his son Harilal has some parallels here). He rejected all compromises about his principles, so he was unable to see their practical limits and chose to ignore very valid objections. Towards the end of his life he was torn between the demands of his publicity hungry, materialistic and (later) hysterical wife, and those of his followers who wanted Tolstoy to live all his principles to satisfy their idealogical needs, but forgetting he was human too. And this son of rich landowners who voluntarily rejected all comforts, died a tragic death beacuse of it. But in the end all this, the strengths and the shortcomings, the triumphs and the defeats together make us human. And the book does a commendable of job of portraying the human side of Tolstoy. As for me, I am glad to have read and learned from this book. Maybe I'll pick War and Peace in my next trip to landmark!

Re: Documentation missing

Writing documents is considered by many all to be a boring activity. But they are useful, and I learned this the hard way. A certain amount of documentation always helps, no matter how great your code is. (If you disagree, you are probably thinking about documents as those written using MS Word and seven different fonts. Not necessarily. Remember, a manpage is also a document. And if you can code without RTFMing, congratulations, You are God, so see if you can do something about World Peace). Anyway, as I was saying, good documentation is very important for any project. But as can be seen by worthy souls still lurking around here (I am hoping there are still some left), this aspect of the all important project called life (also known by the alias Journey) is being increasingly ignored (The last patch was released more than three weeks ago) by its lead developer (that is yours truly) (and despite claims to the contrary, see here). Of course he is not the only developer, lots of contributors being vital to the development, but bearing the ultimate responsibility for how the project turns out, it is also his responsibility to provide relevant documentation. So here is he announcing that even though the powerful bugs of boredom, laziness and nihilism (present in module cerebral_cortex) have not been entirely eradicated, they have been tamed enough to allow for at least a few releases of the missing documentation. The team (that is your's truly again, with all his alter egos) sincerely hopes that those interested in the project will find the documentation useful (in at least some sense of the word).

Enjoy!!

Now playing

ख्वाब ना सगे
हो ख्वाब ना सगे
ज़िन्दगी ठगे
हो ज़िन्दगी ठगे
फिर भी जाने क्यों
फिर भी जाने क्यों
उम्मीद जगे.....

एन्जॉय...

It's good to be back..

I am back after my worst illness in last ten years. It was 'only' a normal viral fever, but strong enough to knock me out of action for a full week. And for the first three four days I was too weak to even change the channel. Good news is, I am almost normal now (as normal as I usually am) and you can expect some action in this (and other) space. A word of thanks to all those whose invaluable support made all the pain bearable.

Enjoy!!

Recently Read

Quantum by Manjt Kumar. Saying this book is comprehensive, masterly or highly readable would be an understatement. A history of quantum mechanics from Planck to Bell, which importantly focuses on ideas as well as people. The story of quantum is a story of paradox. Einstein, who pioneered the use of quantum to explain the photoelectric effect, spent many later years trying to show the standard Copanhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics to be inconsistent / incomplete (the most famous example is the EPR paper). And Bohr, later the staunchest proponent of Quantum theory, went so far as to suggest the abandonement of conservation of energy when Compton effect proved the reality of light quanta (the BKS proposal). The book keeps you glued to your seat like a good novel, and you will learn a lot in the process. Highly recommended.

Blackberry by Rod McQueen. The device is in news recently and the book does a good job of profiling the company which created it. Worth your time, and I personally liked the fact that Mike Lazaridis, founder and co-CEO was instrumental in getting Perimeter Institute started.

The large, the small and the human mind by Roger Penrose. The book is not as long as the title :). It grew out of the Tanner lectures Penrose gave in 1995. The topic was 'values of the mind' and Penrose talks about his approach to the problem of consciousness which is detailed in The Emperor's New Mind and Shadows of the Mind. Afterwards there is commentary, from two philosphers of Science and Stephen Hawking. The reply from Penrose is also printed. I did not understand everything (as expected) but the book still classifies as a fruitful read.

माझे पौष्टिक जीवन

लाल पेटीवाली पोष्टं इतिहासजमा होऊन त्यांची जागा आता blog पोष्टांनी घेतली. पण ओळी तिथे पण खरडायच्या, आणि इथे पण.. [आम्ही भाग्यवान, दोन्हीकडे आमच्या एंट्र्या.. पुढच्या किंवा मागच्या पिढीचे ते भाग्य नाही].

तीन वर्ष, ३०६ posts आणि एक आनंददायी प्रवास.. माझे पौष्टिक जीवन, पु.ल. स्मृतीस सादर..

Rest of the weekend

Great Dictator येतोय World Movies वर, अभिजात विनोद म्हणजे काय ते Chaplin कडून शिकावं.. Chaplin चे सगळे सिनेमे पाहिले पाहिजेत..

अजुन पुस्तकं ढीगभर आहेत.. वाचायला आहे भरपूर, वेळ सोडून..

घरी राहण्याचा सगळ्यात मोठ्ठा फायदा म्हणजे 'चहा'.. त्यासाठी पायपीट आपल्याला मंजूर नाही.. [आता dinner साठी पायपीट..]

पुस्तकातले धड़े जिथून छापतात ती पुस्तकं आत्ता समजू लागली, म्हणजे त्यावेळी आपण गाढव होतो का?

मराठीत पहिलाच post, त्यामुळे मस्त वाटतयं.. त्यातून आता 'च्यायला' वगैरे अस्सल शब्द.. उदा. उद्या monday, च्यायला.. :) ['नाद खुळा', 'चक्कीत जाळ' वगैरे पण आहेच.]

माणसाच्या घराला खिड़की ही असावीच.. दोन चार झाड़ं, आणि मोकळं आकाश दिसावं.. सांगून कदाचित पटणार नाही, पण फार फरक पडतो त्याने..

चला हादडायची वेळ झाली.. परत भेटूच..

Weekend so far

And some other stuff..

The weekend started with a party. Let me say this is print, I do not have any respect left for people who build two hotels in the same galli with the same name (differentiating in the third word doesn't count, note for the nitpicks). It was a lot of fun, but afterwards my mind kept coming back to this, in IT your almost entire friend circle changes every few years (assuming you make friends at the workplace, some people successfully manage to not but I am not the one). My dad (who is a professor) has workplace friendships going back more than my age. I am sure that makes our lives a little less rich, a little less complete.

Finished reading Massive, on the enginneering scale a pass-class book (a distinction (not the grade) your truly used to enjoy while in college). Next came H.G.Wells' The Time Machine. I had heard so much about it that I was bound to like it :).

The mistake is to say life is one thing or another. It's an optimization problem. Which means most of philosphy is ruled out and you can not die in peace.

TV continues to insult and madden me, nowadays more than ever. They should design a game where you can shoot TV shows.

The sky is pale blue, I can see a few trees through the window. A bird flies by. The road buzzes with traffic. Life goes on..

Dialogue

Monday, around 9:00 PM,
A remote corner.

Pal do pal ka sath hai.. Ab na jaa..
Chhoti si ek baat hai... Ab na jaa..
The Machine says.

For the record

I had certain 'opinions' about Malcolm Gladwell's books (without having actually read them, I might add, but based on what I heard from one or the other). I recently read one of his pieces online, and said, wth, I might as well actually read and see. I read Outliers yesterday, and report enjoying it.

Enjoy!!

An important book

Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life. The longing for love, search for knowledge and unbearable pity for suffering of mankind.

So begins the autobiography of Bertrand Russell. We have met Mr.Russell before, and the chief reason for me picking up this book (apart from a general curiosity about the life of Mr.Russell), was that I wanted to know how Principia Mathematica came about. I wanted to know the intellectual milieu that fuelled its creation, the decade long effort that went into making it and so on. OK, so on that one count the book disapppointed me. There is not a lot about the things I mentioned above in the book. But the book on the whole is so good, and so important (so it seems to me) that that one particular point dimineshes into insignificance. I knew Russell as a first rate mathematician and a first rate writer, what was new to me was his public life; his countless battles for women's rights, disarmament, justice for war crimes and a number of other issues fills one with awe. Russell was blessed with a long life, ninety-eight years in which he retained all his mental faculties almost to the end, and more importantly, continued utilizing them. Almost all the leading intellects of the era were in his touch, and sought his counsel. A curious feature of the book is that after each chapter, letters from and to Russell from that time are also printed, which make for great reading. Some are personal, some seek counsel, some even heap scorn on Russell, and all in all make the book a lot more interesting. On a personal note, I tend to read more books about facts, because I like to know them. On that count, I learned very little from this large book. But there is also a kind of learning, shaping of thought that I don't think I can express in words, and I learned a lot on that count (I think). Just one concluding observation now, Russell's clarity makes (almost) all others seem like schoolboys. I haven't been able to read anything since last night (when I finished his book) because of it :).

Enjoy!!

Impressions

server rooms are great for contemplation (even when they freeze you to death)

bash is beauty, SHLVL is your totem

hungry like a dog, mad like a dog, basically a dog (and that is called duck typing)

when will I learn?

A short note

On a short book, John Gribbin's In search of the multiverse. OK, just to be clear, there is no 'The Multiverse'. The basic idea is that our visible universe is just a part of a much bigger (possibly infinite) thing, called multiverse. Why do you need it? To explain say, why the universe had low entropy to begin with, or say, why it is so supportive of life (I won't go in much details (the author does it nicely), except mentioning that there are multiple ways to go theorizing about it, for example the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, or chaotic inflation, or cosmic landscape of string theory, and so on). The writing is accessible, but certain parts were not very clear to me (though not due to any fault on the author's part, I think at a certain level words are no substitute for equations, but then you have to go to textbooks for them). Importantly, it packs a lot of information in just 200 pages. A good read if you have read a few popsci books before, and want an upgrade.

Enjoy!!

Bad Science

You know how ICUs came about?
Polio causes paralysis of muscles, and in case of an attack on the chest muscles, patient can die because loss of breathing. But these attacks are also known to retreat spontaneously, and hence doctors came up with the idea of `just keep'em breathing and we might save them`. And to cater to this need was born the Intensive Care Unit.

Just one of the interesting tidbits from Ben Goldacre's Bad Science (which I finished reading recently). But this book is far from just a collection of interesting stories (of which it contains many). It is a serious attempt at public education about science focusing on the medical domain. There is a highly readable discussion of how clinical trials are conducted (and what does a double-blind-placebo-controlled study means). We learn about the caveats in conducting and interpreting these studies (something to which even the researchers are not immune sometimes). We meet some high profile new age health gurus (not local to this land, but you might be able to draw parallels). But probably the most important part of the book is about statistics (note: it's good but could've been better) and how to use it to 'read' news. We are constantly bombarded with miracle cures (and no, not the jaduii pendants (we all are too smart for those) but pills for concentration, creams for bedaag gorapan and not to mention, machines with which you can lose weight (our public seems to be obsessed with this one issue) without exercise). Next in line are health drinks which help your kids grow dugani teji se and even garmiyo me. Next, a drink which has both nature aur science ke guun. Well, my friend, science is not a substance, it's a process so you can't put that in a product [and also, having a robot as mascot for science doesn't help, that's technology]. I can go on, and you can come up with your own list, but that isn't helpful. What this book sets out to do is develop a more sceptical, more rational outlook. And that makes it a must read. Ben (himself a doctor) appears as a supporter of a normal healthy diet, something your mom told you about; and it's a piece of advice soarly missing in our supplement obsessed world, I think.

I am more than willing to share my copy of the book so if you are interested, let me know. Also there is a lot of good stuff on the author's website. Do check it out.

Enjoy!!

P.S. Trick or Treatment would be nice complementary reading to this. You can find my review of it here.

Aah Consistency!!


# 1 + 2.1 ;;
Error: This expression has type float but an expression was expected of type int

# 1.0 + 2.1 ;;
Error: This expression has type float but an expression was expected of type int

# 1.0 +. 2.1 ;;
- : float = 3.1


More of the same

I seem to be losing (rather quickly) whatever little capacity I had had for writing posts about one topic. Welcome to today's collection of random notes

Cartoons - Their importance can't be put into words, neither can their impact. For me, almost all of the favorites remained those I picked up as a kid. Not that I stopped watching cartoons, but somehow no one entered the inner circle (the area occupied by Johny Quest, Aladin, Darkwing Duck and Centurians, just to name a few). That's not the case now. Gates have been opened for another worthy candidate, Phineas and Ferb. Thanks to bangi for introducing us.

This one again relates to childhood. Your truly (and many of his friends) still retain their fascination with stationary section of a shop (along with Toys, and yes, Tools). In one of those leisurely strolls, I came across a package. It was almost a compass box, ruler, protractor and stuff but for one thing, it also had a pocket calculator. Now what does that tell you?

I finished reading the 2007 Edge book [more about edge in the linked post]. The question for that year was 'What are you optimistic about?'. Wonderful reading, as expected. It's hard for me to pick the best response, so I'll tell you the one which I liked most
Sometime in the 21st century, I will understand 20th century Physics.
Something yours truly is optimistic about too. Now time to get the new Edge books [haven't seen them in the bookstores yet. but for the impatient: they are available online]

Started reading Anathem recently. Haven't read much yet, but am wondering, how much of the alternate universe created by an author (prime example: Middle Earth and Tolkein) with all the hard-or-impossible to pronounce names (remember kwisatz haderach?) is genuine requirement of the story, and how much is it a vehicle for showing the writer's genius? The answer would vary per case, and it's too early to draw conclusions (at least in this case).

And the last point, WHERE ARE THE RAINS?

Enjoy!!

The fifteen year old question (approximately)

Why do red ants bite while black ones don't?

When I was a kid (hence fifteen years in the title), the prevalent theory was that because black ones were from god and red ones from devil, and hence it was ok to kill red ants. And as far as I remember, I did buy it. Now today, and it's a little hard to explain why, the question popped back in my mind while having lunch. And having the great power of the internetz at my fingertips (which my ten-year-old-library-scavenging self would have been totally awed at), I decided to put it to good use. And the short answer is, not sure. Stinging is the dominant defense mechanism in the ant family tree, but recently evolved subspecies lack it. Which means the black ant I met as a kid (most likely some relative of black carpenter ant) is younger than the red ant (most likely some relative of fire ant) in evolutionary terms (again my ten-year-old-self would have been totally awed by this, having no concept of evolution). In the process I learned a bit about different defense meachanisms employed by ants, bite-and-spray-acid vs sting-and-insert-alakoloid etc (red ants do not actually bite, they sting. Some workers from black ant family do bite) and discovered this interesting blog (in fact, many of the facts in this post come from this post). Take a look, gooood stuff!! To top it all, there is even a sting index (so sting like a bee is 2.x if you are a honey bee). Fundoo!! As for me, I am just glad, you know that pure gladness which we all knew as kids (which now seems to have deserted for the most part), that kind of glad to have made a little more progress :).

Enjoy!!

P.S. I realize there must be more to this than my few minutes worth of googling revealed. If you do come across further info, please let me know. Thanks in advance.

Sixty-three minutes

The Eight-Minute XML Tutorial
The Ten-Minute XPath Tutorial
The Ten-Minute LDAP Tutorial
The Twenty-Minute SNMP Tutorial
The Fifteen-Minute SQL Tutorial
[All from oreillynet]

Well wasted.

We've come a long way

From here to here.

I say Progress.

Worst Thing

Being at the mercy of network latency.

Things to do if this happens to you.
1) Run 'ping' and try to look for a pattern in 'time=' value. Based on its value imagine what the sharks might be doing (next point)
2) Run a quiz 'What happened to the transatlantic cable?' Options
a) Sharks nibbled the bytes
b) Captain Nemo
c) The little mermaid
3) Hate sharks, Captain Nemo and The little mermaid
4) Try to remember names of the last five books you read, in order.
5) See who else is around. Try not to feel lonely.
6) Read blog. No understand. Write blog.
7) Try to think of the seventh option. Make it the seventh option. To infinity and beyond.

$Enjoy!

An exercise in logic

Just finished reading Alfred Sloan's My years with General Motors. For those who don't know, Mr.Sloan was chief executive of GM from 1920s to 1950s, fundamental to the spectacular growth of GM in that era, and the book is his business autobiography. And a business biography it is through and through. Never once Mr.Sloan says I was happy or frustrated or sad, but he'll painstakingly explain the logic of his decisions. There is not a single reference to the events of his personal life, but there is a lot about evolution of GM, modeling of competition and market, design of employee benefit programs and so on, in a tone rational but not cold, humane yet detached. An intersting point, GM being the giant it was at that time, the general response to any crisis was 'I created a committee'. Only that (contrary to popular opinion), it seems to have worked. Of course some parts of the book went over my head, the book being (supposedly) aimed at professional managers, but having never really managed anything of value (including myself) , I was still able to enjoy (and hopefully learn from) it. Give it a try!

Enjoy!

Assorted (but not sorted) list of updates

[Note: You were supposed to be reading this rant 48 hours ago but for the thing in the last para, appended today].

The last book I read was The Strangest Man, a balanced personal + scientific biography of quantum pioneer Paul Dirac. Dirac was single handedly responsible a lot of great ideas in the early days of quantum theory, and singulary eccentric. A good read!

Recently I purchased a sony NWZ E443 8GB Mp3 player. I wanted once since long, but was confused between iPod and Sony. There is not much difference in the music quality, some 'music experts' told me, and I took their word. iPod has this awesome feel about it, but lack of FM and the restriction of always going through iTunes and price difference of around 2K meant I purchased sony. When I bought it, only songs were on my mind. It was only later that I realized the wealth of knowledge spread around the net in the form of podcasts. I have already started building my podcast library. Let me know if you know of any good podcasts. One especially good one that I found was the weekly sciam science talk. Good Stuff!

Watched Rajneeti yesterday. The first half is nicely done, but the second half is copy-pasted from B R Chopra ki mahabharat. Some scenes are so out of place (eg the nihattha scene towards the end) that they cannot be there by accident. Prakash Jha wanted it to be a copy. But why? we all have seen mahabharat on doordarshan. Is it for the younger generation who hasn't heard of DD? What explains the bunch of steamy scenes then? In short, a one time watch.

Prasad Musale aka aaba (my college buddy) was here on Sunday. What started as a 10AM breakfast plan at Goodluck expanded to 10AM breakfast at Wadeshwar (one of us thought GL is not hygenic enough, can you believe that?) + Rajneeti at Mangala + lukkhagiri on roads + evening snacks at GL with a lot of bakar bakar interspersed throughout and ended at 7:30, only because aaba had a bus to catch. A day wonderfully spent!

Weather here has been exceptionally good for a last couple of days. Makes me feel like singing a crappy song from a crappy movie, but with rather nicely fitting words, mausam yeh, awesome bada! :)

The awesomeness mentioned earlier turned into freaking awesomeness on Monday. Really heavy rainfall combined with the changed geography (new buildings etc) meant the water found safe haven in our parking lot. And by a stupid chain of events I found silencer of my bike filled to the brim. Bike is currently recuperating at the mechanic's, but the knee-high water in the parking lot, taking out the bikes with one carried over the shoulder cuz the owner was not present and the maddening traffic was a fun experience in a strange sense. And what a sight!

That's it for now. I hope I will return sooner with the next bunch of updates.
Enjoy!

Today =

Joro ki hawa + halki barish + dhool mitti + french fries (bhajiya would've been better though) + do cup chai = Total freaking awesomeness.

Enjoy the Winds!

Hattrick

I was looking for it since long. Thankfully, my latest Landmark trip proved fruitful and I was able to gift myself a copy of Galileo's Daughter (Why the word 'gift'? Well, I had declared (in one weak moment, no doubt) April to be a 'No books month'. Which meant I was not to buy even a single book for a whole month. Now if you know me, you also know that's quite a challenge for me. My friends understandably expressed their concern in the beginning (and astonishment in the end when I did complete it). Hence the word 'gift'. Anyway).

As I said, I was looking for this book since long, having read and liked both Planets and Longitude by Dava Sobel. Again, Sobel did not disappint. This book is a biography of Galileo, but an important part is the correpondence between Galileo and his daughter Virginia (who became a nun and adopted the title 'Suor Maria Celeste'). So here we meet the man who on one hand is creating the foundations of modern science and on the other hand is caring enough to cater to even the smallest requests from his daughter, like silk for making collars. Virginia had inherited her father's intelligence, as is apparent from her requests for manuscripts of Galileo's works. The drama of trial of Galileo is covered well and will connect to your heart. Specifically noteworthy is the part in the end, where Galileo is allowed to return to his home after his trial and after many unnecessary delays, but his daughter who is eagerly waiting for him succumbs to an illness before he reaches. Like other Sobel books, it's completely unputdownable. That's why the title. Highly recommended!

Enjoy!

QnA

Q. If they make a 3D version of Snakes on a plane, what would it be called?
A. Snakes in a Space [According to Wikipedia].

OK. I am bored.

Longitude

Just finished reading Longitude by Dava Sobel. We've met her in planets, and Longitude delivered on the high expectations set by the earlier book. The story revolves around the solution of the 'Longitude Problem', namely, determining your longitude in the sea (lattitude could be determined from the elevation of the pole star, which is overhead at the north pole and at the horizon at the equator). This was a pressing issue, a single accident in 1707 due to the miscalculation of longitude turned into loss of four ships and two thousand lives. This led to the Longitude Act of 1714 in UK, where a prize of 20000 pounds was declared for the correct resolution of the problem. The problem could be solved if a clock reliable enough to work accurately in the unsteady sea could be constructed. Then you can set the clock to some known meridian time, take it with you on the ship and compare its reading with the local time. The time difference can be converted to a longitude reading. But constructing such a clock was an undertaking of no small magnitude. Pendulums could not be kept steady in the turbulent sea, temperature differences meant different parts might expand and contract by different amounts, and there was the general problem of reliability (it's a bit hard to appreciate these difficulties in our age of Rs20 digital watches, sold by kilos, and more accurate by orders of magnitude than the best of that era). A self taught clockmaker named John Harrison, using novel techniques invented by himself succeeded (his still surviving masterpieces are named H-1 through H-4), but had to struggle long to claim the prize money because the evaluation committee, composed of Astronomer Royal and other learned men was predisposed towards astronomical solutions and against what 'mechanics' wrought. Especially, Nevil Maskelyne, the fifth A.R. did everything to make Harrison's life miserable [As a side note, Maskelyne was instrumental in establishing Greenwich as the de facto prime meridian which had earlier resided in Rome, Pisa and Paris among other places. And as a side note to this side note, the de facto standard became de jure in the 1884 International Meridian Conference]. But Harrison and his clocks triumphed in the end, and launched into a new era of marine clockmaking and it has been suggested that the source of naval power that made the British empire was this advance in navigation.

Sobel's writing is as is to be expected, wonderful. The Longitude Problem occupied all the great minds of the time including Galileo, Halley, Newton, Hooke and Cassini, but interestingly, we do not hear much about their contributions in this area. I am just glad that I picked this book.

Enjoy!

The Equation that couldn't be solved

Talent does what it can, Genius does what it must.

-Owen Meredith

The Theory of Groups is the branch of mathematics in which you do something to something and then compare the result with the result obtained by doing the same thing to something else or something else to the same thing.

-James Newman

The book I recently read, The Equation that couldn't be solved is about these two things chiefly, Genius and Group Theory. I say chiefly because it really does cover a very wide range of topics, but aforementioned themes stand out. The equation in title is the general quintic (which is a just a fancy name for an equation of degree 5, like the quadratic is an equation of degree 2). If nothing else, all our schools taught us the formula to solve the quadratic. Solutions to ax² + bx + c = 0 are

[Image from Wikipedia]
This formula is effectively known since the time of Babylonians. But what about equation of higher degree? Mathematicians over the years discovered similar (but more complex) formulas for third and fourth degree equations (known as cubic and quartic respectively). It was thought that the trend will continue for equations of higher degrees until two nineteenth century genius, Abel and Galois proved that no such formula (expressed in terms of coefficients, and using only the four arithmetic operations plus extraction of roots) can exist above quartic. But both these genius' led tragic lives and died in their twenties. Consider this
1. Abel proves the insolubility of quintic and sends it to Gauss, the best mathematician of his day. After Gauss' death, Abel's letter is found in his papers, unopened.
2. Mathematical establishment fails to consider even his later work.
3. Abel dies at twenty seven, in his own words 'as poor as a church mouse'.
Irony: Abel prize, which is given in his memory, is worth $992,000 today.

Or about Galois
1. Galois loses his father in political intrigue at a young age.
2. Galois submits his landmark work on the insolubility of quintic (the progenitor of Group Theory) for a prize contest. One of the judges, Fourier takes the work home, but dies after a few days and the work is lost.
3. Galois dies in a duel at twenty, after spending time in prison in the politically turbulent climate.

But despite this not-too-promising start Group Theory survived and has become a keystone of modern science, and the book covers the basics well. The chapter on Galois is a short and very readable mini biography. The history of the solutions of cubic and quartic is worth a separate book in itself. As Group Theory is the official language for describing symmetries of a system (e.g. an equilateral triangle under rotation by 120, 240 or 360 degrees, there is even a bingo ad about this ;-), the book also touches on fields ranging from visual perception to anthropology and music to evolutionary psychology where symmetry pops up. All in all, this book is a masterpiece. Don't miss!!

Enjoy!

The Loom of God

Mathematics is the loom upon which God weaves the fabric of the Universe.

-Clifford Pickover

Mysticism fascinates all. Math fascinates (remarkably) few. So it might come as a surprise that a lot of mysticism has its roots in math (admittedly ancient though). Take for exaple the tetrektys of pythagoreans, who lived about 2500 years ago

It was a symbol they worshipped. It shows important musical intervals (3:2-fifth, 4:3-fourth, 2:1-octave), and pythagoreans beleived that just as simple numerical ratios create harmony in music, so is true for the Universe. The total number of dots is 10, which a triangular number. Or consider the sacred pentacle,

the digonal of which is in golden proportion with its side, which is considered to be the most irrational number of all (if you want to know why, go here). And if you want more of this stuff (and chances are you do if you've read 'Da vinci'), be sure to pick a copy of The Loom of God by Clifford Pickover.

Pickover takes us through many places and times, we visit ancient monuments like stonehenge, see ancient computing devices like quipu, and even hear many predictions of apocalypse (many of which have passed their expiry date). There are programs in the end to compute many of the number sequences discussed (beware that many of these are in BASIC though). Overall the mathematical material is not significantly different from what is found in other popular science books, but the blend with mysticism is worth a try!

Enjoy!

[All images taken from Wikipedia].

More books..

The last long long weekend (as the long weekend was appended by 2 days leave) allowed me some much needed time to read, in quiet. Here I am always surrounded by some kind of noise, but my hometown gives me a nice break. I managed to finish one-and-a-half books actually, with the remaining half taking last two days.

The first one was Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot, sequel to the legendary Cosmos. I liked it even better than its predecessor. The book present Sagan's vision about the human future in space. He ranges over our planetary system and the places where life may be found (Titan for example), the social issues surrounding spaceflight (who needs it when thousands are dying of hunger), the achievements of past missions and what we can expect in the future. Sagan's acclaimed writing style means you won't want to leave this book once you start. Read this book even if you are not a fan of space, just to see how the master wrote (and as a bonus, you might in fact become a fan in the end).

The second one was Gurcharan Das' India Unbound, which is a fundoo look at our journey as a nation from the independence to the 21st century. The book can be divided in two parts, with the first part talking about the polito-economic history from independence to the reforms of 91, which is a tour de force. The second part talks about the post reform India and the rise of the information economy, but it has a kind of the-world-is-flat feel about it and it rather bored me. But there is a lot to learn in this book, and the writing style will keep you glued. And as an added bonus, after reading it, you might be better able to appreciate 80's bollywood movies :).

Enjoy!

I too had a dream..

[I have worked myself into a worse-than-usual blogger's block. [For example, see this]. I am trying to get out, and you might see a series of small posts in this space in near future, but let's leave that for later and see what we have today].

Recently I finished reading I too had a dream by Verghese Kurien. The name is not as well known as it should be. Mr. Kurien was the architect of the white revolution (popularly known as Operation Flood), the project that propelled our country to self sufficiency in milk and derived products. Kurien is the guy behind 'Amul' and 'Dhara', household names today. He is straightforward and blunt in his writing, mincing words neither in criticism nor praise. I found the book a riveting read. I have often heard the opinion that all our heroes lived before the independence. I knew of one glaring exception, Kalam. Now there is one more.

Thanks to Zarin for sharing the book with me.

Enjoy!

I need to do something..

..about my blogging frequency.

QOTD

Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purchased at a lesser price.

-Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)

I am getting lazier by the day

How else would you explain my failure to document my experiences with paranormal activity (not the movie, the real PA I mean). Thankfully other people are not so lazy. Go read Vinaya's blog.

Enjoy!

The days after!

The days after a wonderful vacation are tough. High spirits, laughter, fun, a break from all your worries, and the vacation evaporates before you realize. It's like an equilibrium (and a highly desirable one at that). Afterwards, when you return to your 'normal' life, all the tiny (and some not so tiny) problems reappear on your radar. And there are some that you wish/hope/pray would just disappear as if by magic. Now this has its own equillibrium state (how else would we survive otherwise). You solve some problems, ignore some and (re)start whining about others. But this second equillibrium takes time to set in. And in between the two equillibriums exists an ongoing case study in cognitive dissonance.

To our beloved frisbee

We are all frisbee lovers here. What if I am a bit late? Happy Birthday Frisbee!

Natrang

My review at the movie blog.

Enjoy!

Vapi Trip

When you are falling asleep, thoughts become increasingly less connected (and hence logical), slowly.. until the consciousness completely fades away. I don't like to get disturbed in this state (I suspect nobody does), cuz then I cannot sleep for hours. This happened last Friday. We were to leave for Vapi (Khyati's native place) on Saturday morning (4 am, so it would be more appropriate to call it Friday midnight. Anyway.), and I wanted a good sleep before we begin. I left office early, and pulled the sheets over my head at 10:28. At 10:45, I heard Mithunda. In the TV. Being a Mithunda + DID fan, it would have been unworthy of me to sleep, so I watched the show. The sleep had left me though, so I read something after the show. Still no sleep. Thankfully Dushan Devta was coming on Max. I even sms'd people about it in case anyone else was suddenly hit by insomnia.

We left Pune pretty much on time the next morning (Thanks to Rabitt, who made a significant contribution by coming on time :p). The journey to Vapi takes about 6hrs but we did not feel it, because, surprise, surprise, everybody slept almost throughout. I remember stopping at a Kamath restaurant, where Sabudana Khichdi was rather good.

We reached Vapi by 11 IIRC. The town is an industrial center and a bit rusty look is to be expected. We were to stay at Khyati's place palace. This was my first experience of Gujju Aatithya. The high praise it has earned is not without reason. I almost felt like I was at my own home. Then I experienced the Gujju meal, again for the first time. Unsurprisingly I We ate like dogs (Kutte jaise khaya ka trans.). It might be my largest single meal till date. There was so much variety, and everything was so delicious. We automatically dozed off after (suspending the plan for Daman beach for a while).

We left for Daman beach (snap below) in the evening. It's quite close (an hour's drive max). We played on the beach, had a mast bhutta. Most of the junta didn't enter the water though. Can you believe they said it's dirty, like it matters? :p Daman port is worth a visit, and a good location for those interested in photography. Boats make an ideal backdrop. The church there is beautiful from the outside (and I heard that it is very beautiful on the inside).

Then we visited Mirasol, a garden resort. I think everybody, and I mean everybody has this fascination with trains. We jumped onto the toy train like kids! After that came boating. The artificial lake they have created is fundoo. Being the self appointed captain of the boat ship (see snap below) (I appointed Rabitt as the navigator), a dream had came true and we discussed Godzilla, Jaws, making dynamos, navigation using stars and other highly logical and related topics (people later wondered how come the fellow passengers of the boat ship did not revolt and throw the captain out. Did they actually tried doing exactly that is going to remain a mystery. And I must add I prefer it that way :p).

After this we went to the Jetty for food. Had anybody asked whether we wanted to eat, the answer would have been a resounding no. But then everybody hogged (again. Ab to aadat si ho gayi thi). The thing I most liked there was the statue of Saint Jerome (snap below). There are so many symbole there, and inscriptions in portugese and demons and stuff, I guess there is a job opening for a full time Robert Langdon. If only those cheapo groups wouldn't be there! I maintain that do kaan ke neeche (ulte hath se) a day will go a long way in solving their problems! Another thing I noticed was every board and sign was in Gujrati plus English. I actually asked whether there is a law mandating that. The answer was no, and I felt good about it (after all that we have seen happening in Maharastra).

After returning we fell asleep rather quickly, and two individuals provided the background score we absolutely did not want! The plan was to get up early next day and go for a morning walk, but then you know us. Half of the population maintained that they actually went out for a walk, a story that I am not going to believe.

The next day plan included visiting Silvasa. But before it came the Gujju breakfast. My definition of breakfast (after being a hostelite for 9+ years) includes a cutting chai + creamroll, but here you have scores of dishes just for breakfast. Dhokla, Fafada, Undhiyu, Khari, Khajli.. the list went on, and rather unsurprisingly, (again) kutte jaisa khaya!. Must mention that I hadn't had such nice Jalebi in years!

After the breakfast (and nap? I don't remember) we left for Dudhni. The road to Dudhni is scenic. There is boating facility in waters of Damanganga. I tried rowing but couldn't do it very well. It's one of the tasks that looks easy at a first glance, but is not.

So we made paper boats!


Thankfully(!) my wallet always has a lot of kachada (and very little actual money :p). We went for a sugar cane juice after the boating. The paryatak niwas at Dhudhni has two rather nice fish tanks. One of them had a kachua, and we spent a lot of time observing and clicking snaps. Discussion natuarally ensued on whether Kachua can breathe underwater. I don't remember how it was concluded.

We started our journey towards Pune at around 2:30 in the afternoon, and we were to make a halt at Amit's place in Thane. The journey was full of songs, laughter and even a few serious discussions. The lines of the song 'Dil chahta hai' kept coming back to me, and I thankfully had it on my mobile. I guess they were not that far from other people's minds too. My rather non-existant song compostion skills got me in a trouble though. Now I have made it mandatory for myself to wear helmet at certain places, even when not driving :p. After a brief halt at Amit's place which included pohe, ladu ani chaha, we started the final hop of our return journey. Reached Pune by 12 or so.

Nobody, absolutley nobody wanted to return to the mudane existence of daily life (read Monday at work), but then we hardly had choice. Thankfully we have these cherished memories! Thanks to Khyati (for taking the not insignificant risk of inviting us) and her family and also to Amit, Charuta, Lalit, Manish, Shruti and Zarin for making the weekend so wonderful!

Enjoy!

[The real yours truly].

Planets

Recently I finished reading Dava Sobel's The Planets. The book is about (duh) planets, but what distinguishes it from what has gone before (and there is a lot of that) is the wonderful blend of literary skill and science. For example, the chapter about Mars is written as if a mars meteorite is telling its story (for those curious about exactly which meteorite, the answer is ALH84001. For more about it, go here). And the chapter about Jupiter blends Astrology, Astronomy and Galileo (who separated them) in the most entertaining way. I usually scoff at mentions of Astrology, but didn't this time. I also learned quite a bit. Some interesting facts..

• Sun contains the 99.9% mass of the solar system (it converts about 700 million tonnes of Hydrogen to Helium per second), and on the planetary side, Jupiter is more massive than twice the rest of the planets put together.


• Venusian surface has been extensively mapped, and in concert with the ancient identification Venus has with femininity, all the surface features have been named after Goddesses, mythical giantesses and heroines (both real and invented). There is only one exception to this rule, a mountain range named after James Clerk Maxwell.


• The person who makes maps of Mars is called an Areographer. (Ares: Olympian God of war, Mars: Roman God of War, Simple). Wouldn't have imagined there is a word for that.


• The New Horizons spacecraft (launched in 2006, and which will make a flyby to Pluto in 2015) carries some the ashes of the discoverer of Pluto, Clyde Tombaugh.


• The far side of moon might be the safest place in the Solar System from radio noise from Earth.

Overall, the writing reminded me of the master of popular science writing, Carl Sagan. We would be much better off with more writers like Sobel and more books like The Planets.

Enjoy!

For the photographer inside you

First ever pictures of snowflakes taken (in late 19th and early 20th century) by Wilson A. Bentley, who is also known as Snowflake Bentley. I honestly don't understand how nature produces such beautiful symmetries (even after reading wikipedia), but thankfully, understanding is not a prerequisite to appreciation.

Enjoy!

Paranormal Activity

My review at the movie blog. I won't recommend it as the first thing in the morning.

The man who knew too much

It seems like ages since I finished a book. I actually checked, my last post in the Books category is dated 7th Dec, last year. Meanwhile I hadn't stopped buying books, making substantial additions to my collection. You keep doing that and there comes a point when the towers of books on the table (and chair), under the cot etc become just too much to bear and makes me park my lazy ass and do some actual, continuous reading. Lacking any big plans, the weekend offered the opportunity.

The book was David Leavitt's biography of Alan Turing. All you CS grads know about Turing machine, Turing test, Turing award and so on. No doubt the man was a Genius! He started his career as a pure mathematician, specifically tackling the decision problem (he proved it is insoluble), and it is for this task that he invented the concept of 'a-machine' (which later became known as Turing machine). During WWII he was among the chief cryptanalysts of Britain and broke the formidable Enigma cipher. Later, he proposed the 'imitation game' (which later became known as Turing test) as a test to decide whether a machine can be deemed intelligent. But despite his towering intelligence and important contributions, he led a tragic life. He was a homosexual (which was punishable by law in 1950s), and when this fact was discovered, he was deemed a security threat by the authorities, his security clearance was revoked, and he was forced to undergo a course of estrogen injections (intended to cure him) which was effectively chemical castration. Humiliated, he took his life by biting into a cynaide laced apple in 1954.

The book is a good read, but it is not extensive. The 'computable numbers' paper (in which Turing proposed the 'a-machine') is well explained, but I found the description of Enigma breaking a bit confusing (read Simon Singh's Code book if you really want to know). Also there is a theory that the 'Computing machinery and Intelligence' paper (in which the 'imitation game' was proposed) has a parallel meaning as describing Turing's feelings regarding his sexuality, which I found rather amusing. Now maybe I should go and read The biography of Turing.

Enjoy!

Useful lies

Found this on Bad Astronomy (it's not about science btw). Read the whole thing. Real Good!

Enjoy!

In local news..

Well, that's not the moon. Believe it or not, it's the Sun. As you might guess, the photo was taken during today's Solar eclipse (A tip o' the Hat goes to MD). There was this phase in secondary school when I could think of nothing but Astronomy. FF to the present, and I was totally unprepared for today's eclipse (All I could think about was why nl_set_encr is saying invalid args), and might have missed it if not for Vijay and Sonal. First we used a folded black sheet (which apparently doesn't filter UV, we're able to see anyway). Later, courtesy Milind, we got a better look through eclipse glasses (I don't know what they are called otherwise). I think it is stuff like this that rekindles the fire within! It was a beautiful sight, and I am glad I did not miss it. And I hope you didn't too.

Enjoy!

True Story

[Location: Office, 9:30 PM]

Guy 1: Are tuze kuch bataana tha..

Guy 2: Han bol..

Guy 1: Are yar bhool gaya..

Guy 2: Sale yaad kar..

Few moments later..

Guy 1: Han yaad aaya, Windows 7 ka service pack 1 aa raha hai..

Guy 2: Ohh..

Guy 2: Chal pizza khate..

Few moments later...

Guy 2: Chal ab pizza khate khate yaad kar kya bataane wala tha..

Guy 1: Abe bataya na, Windows 7 ka service pack..

Guy 2: Ohh, mai bhool gaya...

Guy 1 and Guy 2: Ghar jana chahiye..

Discovery of a Sage

OK, that should really read 'Discovery of the Sage'. Anyway, just to avoid any possible confusion (and more likely, shocks), let me explicitly state that I haven't entered the realm of mumbo jumbo spirituality, yet [Update: forgot to add ;-)]. What I am talking about is Sage. To scrap the website a little, it is 'a free open source mathematics software system licensed under the GPL', which 'combines the power of many open source packages into a common Python-based interface'. I went through some of the documentation and it really appears to have a lot under its hood. I mean, it has NumPy and SciPy and SymPy too. (here is the full list component list. And a little disclaimer, I have heard about but never seriously delved into either of the last three links). That I plan to do now (it is getting installed as I write this). To use the oft quoted phrase, 'I am really excited', and will keep you posted how it goes.

Enjoy!

Bitterness?

So reality did not match your expectations! Thankfully, you can always think about Morley's theorem. So No.