Priority-wise, it simply makes sense to take care of yourself before you start searching for a higher meaning. You aren’t much good to anyone else if you’re unhealthy, a financial burden, or an emotional basket case. Fix yourself before you turn outward. It’s best for everyone.
The Dilbert Blog
Blog
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Sound Advice
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March 26, 2007
It’s been a long time sine I’ve been thinking about joining HBCSE library to get more books to refer for the SEDSAT 2 Project. I haven’t gotten around to doing it yet.
I am thinking about starting the next big start up. No, not on the Internet, though it can have a website. I am just not getting around to thinking about it since I am doing some crazy thinking for SEDSAT 2.
I want to make my team enjoy the stuff that they’re doing. Make them innovate a few things that would help in mass budgeting. The thing looks so un-do-able (is there a word like that?) that my resolve for doing it is just sky-rocketing (what a word to use!)
I am thinking several things together but doing nothing, or so I feel.
I used Google Co-op search to build my “Outer Space Search” engine.
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What’s in a name?
Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog, The Tranquil Eye for which I do not remember the domain name. I recovered the text from my email. This post appeared on March 2, 2007 as per the time stamp on my email. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.
The name, “The Tranquil Eye” comes from Aubrey Menen’s book, The Space Within the Heart. Here’s what the necessary paragraph says:
I was there. I. Not the person weighing 72 kilograms and whom my mother and father named Aubrey Clarence: not the writer of this book: not the person whose life, when he is dead, will be displayed in a glass case one day by Mr. Gottlieb (or so he promises me). Another person.
I gave it a name. I called it the Tranquil Eye. The play on words amused me, and it was near the truth. I found I could retreat into the space within the heart whenever I wished. For a time, I needed the quiet and loneliness of my room to do it. Later, when I gave up my room and returned to normal life, I found that I could retreat into the space anywhere, even in company, for the sheer of pleasure of doing it. The Tranquil Eye had seen an unforgettable sight. It had seen the whole of my life lying around it: and it was comical. For it saw that my life had been the laborious construct of other people, some well-intentioned, some malign, some just interfering. -
of Accidents
My friend, Shirin was recently in an accident. Hope you get well soon! She says she was passionate about driving her own car.
Now, come to my point, my passion for cars increases only when I put a dummy in it and crash it against a wall. Have been doing it, since I was a kid. Hopefully, there is no ‘Prevention of Cruelty against Dummies’ yet. I also like it when you take a plunger and just destroy the car. After all, destruction is the apex of creation.
What really drives me are airplane. My way of taking interest in them is to not learn about them at all. It’s all strange. After all, I am from a strange land – India. A land where a group of snake charmers managed to take over industry and give a 9.2% GDP growth p.a. Cool no?
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Communicating Science and what not…I’m sick
Two posts have made me write this. This one and this one.
The first one deals with science writing. Communicating science to people. The second one deals with, well in a tangent sort of way the old rivalry between science and religion.
On the first point, there is one site which you shout visit, The Institute for Figuring. The first post deals with the fact – how do you cover science or rather how do you communicate science? Do you do it with a beautiful girl of 21 wearing a bikini saying,”The effect that you had when you saw me was similar to the impact of a nuclear bomb”, which makes you want nuclear bombs fall or do you do it with a much more official way. The Director of the Institute explaining how the neutrons are bombarded into the nucleus etc. and all the rest of it in style.
My friend once said to me he believed that the Indian epics were way to communicate science. I would add to it by saying, it was also the way to communicate some common sense. Some of the descriptions actually tell you of the development of science in India. Quotes like – “I will beat you just as surely as the sun rises in the east”. It’s a cool way to tell the kid that the sun rises in the east. Try telling that to him more directly and he would say, “What the hell for?” More on this when I’m feeling better.
The second one….just read both.
I’m sick right now. I have what doctors call – “viral diarrhea”. But, I describe it more unscientifically as going to the bathroom hundreds of time….er, have to rush.
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Nothing is Permanent but Change
I’m trying to reflect this philosophy in my blog. How? I’m changing the theme everyday.
I understand it’s not a very intelligent way of doing a blog, but who says it has to be intelligent? The thing is – even if I don’t post anything on my blog, I change the themes. So, there’s something to watch out for everytime you’re here.
We all face problems because we need security – we need to return to the same space again and again. Remove that security and you’ll realise that half the problems of the world dissolve. Think about that.
The “b” key of my keyboard isn’t working too well.
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Tragedies and Safety
India faced two tragedies back to back. One, with the twin explosions in Samjhauta Express, run between India and Pakistan. The second happened when a boat capsized killing about 19 10 year-olds.
The first incident is getting national coverage since it involves an international dimension – most of the victims were Pakistani nationals.
The second happened because the boat carrying the children was not water-fit. This is not the first time. Will it take the death of these 19 children for the administration to act?
What further action will be taken? Will the administration atleast act now? Accidents are almost an everyday event in Kerala. Safety is requireed in land, water and air. I was wondering what sort of a catastrophe will it take to move the administration to implement safety laws?
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GIS in India
Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog hosted as https://blogs.seds.org/pradeep. I recovered the text from the WayBack Machine. This post appeared on February 20, 2007 as per the timestamp. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.
The NSDI has been trying for a long time to implement GIS in India with the aims of “to ensure that departments open their trove of information maps and data on forests, minerals, town planning, rainfall, archaeology for being placed on a proposed Geospatial Information System (GIS) backbone”.Yesterday, they must have had the happiest day of their life (I’m just thinking here) when they read this half-page report.
The Indian Government has finally decided to release data stored in files, cans and what not to the modern GIS. This comes as a surprise even for the NSDI. GIS will also provide imagery.
As the report goes on: “The NSDI web-user interface will provide open access of the information processed by the project. But further access to its metadata, data about data or a cataloguing system, will be secure. The metadata server will be the brain of the system and guide access and use of the NSDI agency server which contains the spatial data.”
There are also talks of releasing .8 m resolution satellite images available thanks to CartoSat 2. Let’s see how thinks go. The Defence establishment has already given the green signal.
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Mirror Blog
This blog will have a mirror blog setup by me on Blogger: http://paraspaces.blogspot.com. This is where I used to blog about a year or so ago. I’ve cleaned that up to put more space blog posts. I was considering removing this blog, but later decided to just mirror this blog in that one.
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of TV
It’s been wonderful to read blogs from different countries from across the globe. Some, over at WordPress.com (which hosts this blog) and some through other blogs. They all talk about the wonderful stuff that they can achieve using computers today.
But, the sad fact is that the computer is least of the worry for atleast 20% (as a very minimum estimate) and 50% (as a very maximum estimate) of the population. These people can’t catch up with the speed of today’s technology train. They have to worry about things like food, water, shelter and clothing. Things, which the other half of the world does not even need to think about.
That’s why I appreciate this post by Robert Scoble. It’s not only that some people are not ready to leave analog TV. In some places, people can’t afford either HDTV or flat-screens. Here, in India, there’s a TV at almost every home – slum, apartment or bunglow. But, that’s because of cable TV. The revolution happening right now is DTH (direct-to-home TV). The local Government telephone provider, MTNL, is also thinking of introducing IPTV here.
But even then, you can’t beat the pricing of an analog TV.
Parallel Spirals 