Very good one. One can actually feel belonging to one particular classification.

A taxonomy of bloggers by psychological profile.

My life. last deepavali(2001) to this deepavali(2002)

hi friends,
as deepavali the festival of lights nears, i hope to fulfill a wish that i have been trying to do for sometime. i will use this occasion to list out the things that have happened to me over the last one year:significant ones as well as insignificant ones. i hope to use this as a sounding board of my mind,my thoughts and hope this will also tell my friends wot i have been upto. i have got some emails from you asking me wot am upto now a days. hope this mail will serve this purpose too. this will also serve as a kind of record of my feelings.

last deepavali was kinda frustrating. i thought things would not go worse. i had had a accident. lost my car. had a job offer rescinded because of the telco meltdown and all that...i was doing my coop in a great field. real hi-tech stuff..really enjoying life and then all the tech meltdown happened...my job was gone...i was even afraid that i might not be able to complete my coop. fortunately that didnt happen. my whole team was out. i was directly reporting to the managing director. my project was scrapped and add to that i could not go to india in dec.

i returned to my univ after dec. started work on my thesis. was getting by without any means of money. but there was hope...hope of getting a job. a new kinda life. got a job in a aviation electronics firm. not great work but a source of income and a chance to do something better in life.

on the emotional side of things:
i got out of a net based infactuation. gently broke up(dont know wot relationship it was...but i used to spend a lot of time talking to her)with a girl who i had met over chat and who had come over to my univ. now we are friends. learnt many things on the way. how some things have a way of avalanching down the slope. will be very carefull in this regard in future.
then met another girl with whom i still spend some time but it has no bf-gf kinda thing. we just meet and talk for hours. thats it.
for a couple of weeks i was also interacting with another girl a lot. we have a lot of common tastes:impressionist artists and books. went and saw both phila and ny metropolitan meuseum with her. was mucha impressed by her genuiness towards things. but was never close to her. now a days i dont even meet her.

i went to india on aug 13 and returned on sept 12. the second/third day i was there i got an email from the firm that they are no longer giving me the job. was not much sad abt it initially..guess it takes soemtime to seep in. had a good madurai(in south india) trip. enjoyed it...total laid back lifestyle.

started thinking seriously abt philosophy and life in great detail while i was in india. heavy influence of one of my mamas(mm). very impressed by his intelligence and thought process. i consider him as my mentor for most things. started reading the geeta. still doing that. gave up alcohol.

came back to us. did job hunting in full earnest. no hopes for jobs in us. started job hunting in india. guess i can get good jobs in india. gave up that option and readying myself for a second ms in compu science.

hope to put somewot more regular posts like this(maybe once a month or something like that).

The jewels lost by India to UK and the real jewels of India. An analysis of how much value was lost by India to UK in the form of jewels

The Jewels of India by Sam Murthy on Sulekha

Do you want to know EVERYTHING about the infomercial industry??!! Then this is THE article for you. From shooting to sales. comprehensive.

FORTUNE - The Making of an Infomercial

A long one warren buffet. talks abt everything abt him. really good one

FORTUNE - The Oracle of Everything

The story of Level 3: the telco gaint. It will survive

FORTUNE - The Inside Story of Level 3

this article discusses if a larger attack on the internet's backbone routers: the cores, is imminent or not. It says the recent downing of 9 root routers was just a test case.


Is a larger Net attack on the way?

How the rich and he powerfull in India can get away with anything : Even Murder.

rediff.com: Varsha Bhosle on the Salman Khan case

Another article from an Australian former-diplomat which says that india was the aggressor in the indo-china war of 1962
rediff.com Special Series: 40 years after the 1962 Sino-Indian war

A Researcher at google answers talks about his job, the system and the economics of answering questions. how much is an information worth? Intriguing article
Information for Sale: My Experience With Google Answers

Aahhh....a Ode to the humble Betel leaf; our Pan.
Fowler | Scholar | Betel

Wired 10.11: Power Houses
Home networking comes of age. The best article i have seen on this topic.

Wired News: Servers Bounce Back From E-Attack
DDoS attack on the Root servers. Seven of the thirteen failed.

The Atlantic | October 2002 | The Roaring Nineties | Stiglitz
Nodel prize winner on why the ninneties were not such a good time.

Murthy to Patni, with love - The Economic Times
Murthy's reply to Patni's allegation.

Murthy, patni aur woe - The Economic Times What Patni feels about narayanamurthy leaving patni and forming infosys

Why Vegetarianism

Her Majesty is Queen of Greece and His Hoiness is the Sage Shri Shankaracharya of Kanchikoti Peetham.

Her Majesty the Queen Mother said: "Some of us who have adopted vegetarian food habits are asked by friends in the West to state the reason for such adoption. If we give the reason as the desire to avoid causing pain to animal life, they ask if vegetarianism does to involve inflicting pain in the vegetable world." His Holiness explained clearly and in detail the basis of vegetarianism: "The ideal life of complete compassion and non-violence is possible only for a few. IT would involve subsistence on fruits and leaves that fall from trees and plants. In the case of others they can only be gradual approach towards that idea. The rule is: if it is possible to live by causing less injury to other lives, it is wrong to inflict more violence. It is on this principle that vegetarian diet is greatly to be preferred to meat-eating. In the first place, when vegetables are plucked, the plant are not destroyed, whereas meat cannot be had without killing the animal to which it belongs. Secondly, animals are more sensitive than plants; they have a greater number of, and keener, sense-faculties than the latter. In fact, there is not much difference in this regard between an animals and us, humans. The feeling of pain is almost the same; the suffering is of the same degree. The plants do not suffer to the same extent. Plucking vegetables or leaves is comparable to the clipping of nails and the cutting of hair. Thirdly, intrinsically there is not much to choose between cannibalism and eating of animal-meat. The arguments against the one hold good equally against the other. If the civilized people who are meat-eaters are against cannibalism, it is more on grounds of sentiment. It is clear that meat-eating causes more suffering than living vegetables. And, every effort for reducing the quantum of suffering commendable."

The Atlantic | November 2002 | Varieties of Religious Experience | Updike updike's story on 9/11....very good.

The Atlantic | November 2002 | The Fifty-first State? | FallowsWhat happens after the iraq war? things that Us will have to do after the first day,first week,first year etc. very comprehensive.

Feeling Antigravity's Pull - Can NASA stop the apple from falling on Newton's head? By Adam RogersIs anit-gravity research...ok ...ok..bending gravity research science or sci-fi fraud.

The mother of invention How productivity gains can be improved: Schumpeter's work and thousands of bubbles of temporary monopoly power.

rediff.com Special: Brahma Chellaney on the Sino-Indian conflict An alternate view (generally accepted by most indians) on the india-china war. mao's legacy still lives on.

rediff.com: rediff.com Special: Who was to blame for the 1962 war? Was it India or China who initiated the conflict? Very indepth and scholarly account of the 1962 War.

The 'Bhajan Belt': Serenity in the Catskills The rise of Alternative Indic lifestyles in America.

Wonder if anyone remembers this....

Dance your cares away,
Worry's for another day.
Let the music play,
Down at Fraggle Rock.


Work your cares away,
Dancing's for another day.
Let the Fraggles play,
We're Gobo, Mokey, Wembley, Boober, Red.


Dance your cares away,
Worry's for another day.
Let the music play,
Down at Fraggle Rock.


Performed by: The Fraggles and Doozers
source:http://laughingbuddha.blogspot.com/

rediff.com: Ashwin Mahesh on a convenient naivete, or a guilty connivanceOne of the best articles on what i would call Social Accounting. that is, the idea that one has to look at all the consequneces of ones actions and not just the economic or monetary aspect. one should also consider the social and human aspects of the action. his particular piece is on agencies like a world bank and imf and how their activities affect people in gujarat adversly. a real life experience is recounted.

A great article on Bloggin by one of the foremost blogger : Glenn Harlan Reynolds aka InstaPundit.
notice the way he diferentiates between blogging devoted to analysis and commentry and reporting devoted to hard new news. thats the way future is going to be.

Blogcritics: Hearts and Ears: The Voice of America in middle east

rediff.com: The sixth battle of Panipat A good article on how the loss of a leader or a strategic retreat is always followed by chaos and total loss of morale in india.

Unilateralism and multilateralism: i think now(oct 2002) there are four major forces operating in this world : Unilateralism, multilateralism, extremism and democracy. the difference between the last two is self evident and i believe in the long run its democracy which will prevail. but the first two are not so evident when we come to think of it. we think its pretty much well known what the two words Unilateralism and multilateralism mean. but it has a deeper meaning too which i think is now a days lost among the ramblings of the daily news.
multilateralism is what the countries in euraope are trying to build. they already have an eu which has the same currency and many laws are common. all the decisions are taken collectively and generally consensus prevails. all disputes are resolved by international(or eu centric) laws and courts. one entity's thinking cant just prevails over any other if its not logical. this is close o the concept of Gaia which i have talked abt earlier.
on the other hand we have the us president bush advocating unilateralism even leading to pre-emptive strikes. this is a dangerous phenomenon. some might argue that this is the way to deal with dictators like saddam. talking and laws dont deter him. but i believe a united front against him will have a better effect, that is multilateralism will be better than unilateralism. unilateralism can lead to lots of heartburn and bad feelings towards each other. this can to avoided(or greatly reduced) in multilateralism.
this also reflected in the regional parties coming of age in indian politics. earlier when one national party dominated the spectrum leading to feelings of neglect(in tamilnadu and andhra pradesh) there was unilateralism at its peak(only one national party existed:like USA today and it could do as its wishes) leading to struggles etc. now regional parties have more power and most issues are resolved through concensus and talks rather than violent struggle.

OpinionJournal - Thinking Things Over
A map of freedom in the world as of 2002. notice that from north africa to east asia, India stands as an exception. India is the only democracy in the whole two continent region other than the stable democracy of japan. south korea and thailand converted to democracy rather late.

Facial Hair Styles
the different terms of definition and the figures are good. a good resource for people who wants such reference material.
interesting read.

Burrhus Frederic Skinner, March 20, 1904—August 18, 1990 | By Howard Rachlin | Biographical Memoirs
The Best One : very articulate and scholarly piece on the one of the most important sociologist of our times. I have read his sutobiography of his early years. all tough the book dosent have any important events(other than things which affected him) it is a real page turner. it is because of his style of writing where he analysesw each and everything and reflects on its influence on him. read it in july 2002.

B. F. Skinner Foundation - Biography : the founder of Behaviorism

The Homeless Guy this is the regularly updated bolg of an homeless guy.
very educated and well thinking guy. very interesting

BW Online | October 14, 2002 | Global Poverty

Winning the Kashmir election : HindustanTimes.com: A good article on current kashmir situation:Oct 2002

Notes on Nobelity: Buchanan talks about how nobel prize changed his life style :more number of lecture tours, more fees etc. A very well thought out writing

Nobel e-Museum: The Green Revolution Revisited and the Road Ahead: By the man himself Dr. Borlaug

The river runs through them: A good exposition on future water problems of the world

Meaning of life 3 : Existence of soul
i guess after the points discussed by thinkingnow so eloquently i will have to give a credible and logical answer to support what i have been saying for sometime.
all my previous talks have been saying that the life we live through is not worth living for our body...the drudgery we go through is not worth it. but what is there was something else because of
which we undergo all the pain. what if we undergo all the pain for the sake of the "SOUL".

what is this soul. let me try to explain what i have learnt about this over the past few yeards i have spent reading and thinking about this topic.
i understand that each and every living being posses a soul. it can also be termed as counsiousness(yeah plants have this too).
all the souls are supposedply part of the one higher soul(entity or being). this might be termed as GOD. all souls go thourgh a lot of struggle
and drudgery to learn some essential qualities like honesty, strength of character, ability to face challenges with the right attitude etc.
in each birth-death cycle the soul is given many chances to learn these truths. each development is rewarded by the escalation of the soul
towards higher living entities(bodies=clothes the soul wears). the concept of Gaia is also representative of this fact. this concept states
that all living beings share counsiousness at some level or another.

so why should a soul strive through daily life. a soul cannot commit suicide. a soul cannot die(in the normal sense of the word or in any other sense of the word).
this is the stick policy. also if a soul becomes advanced it can go on to the next higher level. this is the carrot policy.
so the normal carrot and stick policy is followed here too. ultimately when the soul is advanced enough it can integrate with other such advanced souls
which is termed as being one with god.
but this is not heaven as many commentators say.
heaven is just intermediate step for the sould before joining the ultimate ONE.
there are many exampls in the hindu mythology of peple who have come down from heaven and have lived in earth. this means that sould can degenerate also
if they dont follow the correct path.
more concepts and fundae on this topic will be posted later.

i guess it all boils down to ones perception of joy, happiness, sadness, sorrow, et al. your perception of joy would be different than mine and so would the case with someone else. at this point of time, i wouldn't like to be like mother teressa or do some social work because i know i am not going to be happy by doing that. maybe you would be or somebody else would be. i hope we could have some kind of an agreement here. it is solely upto an individual about how he/she feels about the struggle/fight/drudgery etc etc. and i guess that would be one of the reasons why people go into depressions, have nervous breakdowns, become psychics or even commit suicide. when people start thinking that whatever they are doing is not worthwhile and is not going to bring them happiness or joy which they desire, that is when they start questioning their very existance. you say that the pleasure achieved is short lived and is not what you deserve after all the hardships you go thru. then how do you decide what you really deserve, what you are really meant for. it is i guess this short lived, temporary happiness that drives you. again its a matter of perception of what you think about this joy or happiness that you achieved. it could be long lived for many. but whatever it is, it is this very thing which makes you go in this search for happiness, sometime, someday you would achieve what you thought of and you would be happy. but then you can't be complacent and you desire to be more happy and go in search for more happiness and in turn face more hardships, more bitterness... but then at the end of the day you want to be happy and hence you go thru the hardships to achive it. and it is these small, temporary, short lived everyday pleasures which make you strive for better pleasures of life.

hi thinkingnow,
your write up is the classical reply which most people give for questions like this. but i dont think they are justified. firstly i believe that one struggles a lot and goes through innumerable difficulties. Also the joy one gets in a life time is limited and short lived most of the time. one also has to repeatedly work to get the joy that one has at any point of time. i visualise this as running on a treadmill. you dont get anywhere but keep running at some pace. even joy as its normally defined is not good enough. acquiring wealth or having near and dear ones with lots of love and affection give temporary, short-lived pleasure. but it dosent give the pleasure as deserved according to the drudgery one goes through. ok..ok...maybe doing social work or being like mother teresa(if she actually did things which she is supposed to have done) may give one genuine pleasure but then that will be the subject of later posts. everyday pleasures are not worth living for...

very truly said that there seems to be no scintific reason/ logic behind this question "why do we live". there has to be some motivation for someone to do something. there has to be some driving force which would make one live. i guess this driving force within many of us is to be happy. not very sure if you want to make the others around you happy but then you also strive to make your nado happy. at least you strive to achieve it. now in this search for happiness, you tend to do a lot of things, different ppl have different perceptions of happiness and each one tries to achieve it in some way or the other. and on your way to achieve this happiness you do suffer pain, sorrow, and many more bad things that can happen to you. but still you continue to live because the feeling of happiness and achievements outclasses all the bad things that happen to you. and you strive to achieve it. i guess that is the motivation for you to live which science is not able to answer.

Matter, antimatter, and the origin of everything | csmonitor.com

Meaning of Life 2 : Why do we live?
this is a very important quetion. as explained earlier it is very easy to die and be relieved of all the burdens of life.
but we still live. this means the motivation to live is stronger than the motivation to die.
this fact cannot be explained away by reasoning that we dont want to cause anguish to our near and dear ones by dying.
thats not the reason we live.
i mean we dont live because dying is bad for the emotions of our near and dear ones(from now on acroynmed to nado =
near and dear ones). so there is an inherent motivation in each and every one of us to live.
and i can safely say that most of us are not living to do good for the world (pl dont take this as an insult.i feel this is the truth)
nor are we motivated by any strong (good or bad) idealogy like militants or gandhi for that matter.
i dont think there is any scientific reason/logical reason for us to continue our living.
and since we are all not comitting large scale suicide we have to look beyond the scientific/logical sphere of influence.
the concept of the soul comes into play here. maybe the idea of existence of the soul can solve this puzzle.
lets look into this in more detail.

Meaning of life 1
why do we live?
no seriously i mean it...why do we live...we go through a lot fo difficulties, pain, anguish and mental torture in our life.
we have to live upto expectations, fulfill the huge moutain of desires both ours and that of our near and dear ones.
life dosent always go as we think(thats an understatement). there are lotsa diversions and paths leading upto
places we dont want to go but since they are easier we end up taking them instead of being steadfast on our
path and aim. this leads to infinite heartburn and sadness. we spend most of our time in trying to fulfill our desires
or to have our sensory organs active even tough this might not be what we want to achieve.
we can end all this by just comitting suicide or something like that.
but still we live. we dont give up. we struggle. people say there is always hope. hope for what continuing the
dry existence of life? what does that acheive?
why do we struggle and live instead of just quitting by comitting suicide?

hi all,
this is my first blog post....hope to use this board as a place to bounce of my thoughts, readings and general meanderings of mine.
i am a guy who was born in south india in tamil nadu but grew up in bombay(now mumbai)...did my undergrad in electronics engg in mumbai...
then decided to do my higher studies in comp engg in philadelphia,pennsylvania,usa.