In the Dying Light

Re: # 147

Okay, so I should not have brought in that gentleman`s name - the gentleman, for what it is worth - who I admire greatly. A simple inadvertant instance of third-party catalysis-ism, I suppose - which should by no means be confused with a cataclysm!

(Incidently, I was unaware that Mr. Coelho writes for this website.)

Humor can take many forms - some of which can be considered ``sick`` by some (usually by the supercilious types). Frankly, I have seen plenty of what should be TRULY considered ``sick`` humor around here - because such ``humor`` hits individuals in areas of life over which they have little control - including ridiculing whole nations, regions, religions, ethnicities, languages - not to mention gender - and creating stereotypes! All of that seems to be fine with the current management - writers, ``writers``, and interactors all feel free to indulge in that food-fight willy-nilly - but point out a single trivial inconsistency in this instance - and all hell breaks loose! (Sorry, ma`m - NOBODY is perfect - so nobody is beyond getting caught reaching inside the cookie jar - and nobody is too big to be called out by this interactor!)

It is within my perfect legitimate rights to appear on whichever board I choose, and unlike your great ``fan club`` - I DO like a variety of topics and I do feel I have to say something when I do say it - so I say it. And I do have a certain advantage which comes from being a simple ordinary individual - unlike the hall-of-famers haunting these hallowed (but in many instances mostly hollowed) halls - so I can speak my mind plainly!

If you have a problem with what I say or how I say it - you have the power to ban me (in the end it always boils down to that gun of user ID/password, doesn`t it?) Simple as that! Feel free to exercise it! Otherwise, feel free to get used to it!

Why do some people get ticked at what one has to say? And why do some people persist in saying stuff that is most of the time highly provocative - whether of substance or not? Good question. You don`t happen to know anybody like that, by any chance?

[...If you have an opinion, please send in an article.]
How do you know that I have not in the past already published articles here? (Hush, everybody!)

My ``feedback`` on enhancing the value of this site by increasing its transparency (and by dismantling its class structure) has been already documented elsewhere and - from all indications - promptly ignored! And what is four months in the scheme of things?!

Re: # 146

Hamidm -- see this is what happens when good Mulims like you don`t believe your own Koran has the cure for cancer -- the good Hindus will jump in to take the credit for (``TV, FM, AM, XM, Cellphone, Bluetooth - you name it``) -- with their puranay Puranas.......

#160 by nasah

[Hamidm -- see this is what happens when good Mulims like you don`t believe your own Koran has the cure for cancer -- the good Hindus will jump in to take the credit for (``TV, FM, AM, XM, Cellphone, Bluetooth - you name it``) -- with their puranay Puranas....... ]

Try not to make asinine statements. The point was that Bose, a ``Hindu`` was the ACTUAL discoverer of Radio, as opposed to Marconi. Has nothing to do with the puranas.

#160 by nasah


There is a difference between the ACTUAL achievements of the Hindu mathematicians etc., as opposed to the camel dung theories popularized by the illiterate bedouin like how the sun goes around the earth, how the earth is flat, and how mountains serve as paperweights to prevent earthquakes.

ramanuja,

... stop it before people of your ilk from the other side start flooding this board with articles on how their bedouin ancestors invented algebra, medicine and surgery in addition to perfecting the art of suicide bombing ..............

...... who cares about what our forefathers did way back then, when they are still squatting on the railroad tracks and running around in loin cloths and generally behaving like a bunch of savages - call centers and underwear is but a small step in the right direction .......... but coming up with zero and negative numbers centuries ago is quite irrelevant, isn`t it ? ......... i marvel at the greatness of panini every time i have his sandwich, the other panini never crosses my mind even though i might share a few genes with him .........

........ what is really sobering is the thought that we are still struggling with the concept of indoor plumbing and eating utensils ......... who cares about yativrsabha varahamihira aryabhata ......... but i do agree that bose did invent the radio for fools who don`t understand the concept of price and value ............

Re: # 159

[Humor can take many forms - some of which can be considered ``sick`` by some (usually by the supercilious types).]

We have been there before...those who do not agree with you become supercilious. Just look at your posts everywhere; you are patronising and you tell new writers about how late you have come to their boards as though they have been waiting for you.

You have seen nothing yet...and your so-called ``short-lived`` appearances are just attention-getting devices. Not only that, you use phrases from my articles, posts, ilogs in a feeble attempt at `getting back`. If you have seen plenty of truly sick humour around here, then you are hugely responsible for contributing to it. (Do not forget those nasty references and lewd language...)

You do not merely create stereotypes, but imaginary demons to come out as the `knight` you once so fancied yourself being.

And YOU ought not to be talking about inconsistencies...on every article you carp, then you say you have re-read the piece, then you demur, then you realise you need to come up with a smart come-back...oh, enough...

[(Sorry, ma`m - NOBODY is perfect - so nobody is beyond getting caught reaching inside the cookie jar - and nobody is too big to be called out by this interactor!)]

Oh dear, who cares? You seem to have this huge chip about being this terminator (one of your nicks boasted about being a lion!). You are not.

[It is within my perfect legitimate rights to appear on whichever board I choose, and unlike your great ``fan club`` - I DO like a variety of topics and I do feel I have to say something when I do say it - so I say it. And I do have a certain advantage which comes from being a simple ordinary individual - unlike the hall-of-famers haunting these hallowed (but in many instances mostly hollowed) halls - so I can speak my mind plainly!]

You speak your mind plainly? Hah...you need to come with all your nicks on my writer`s page and leave your comments. Do not worry your little head over my so-called fan club. Do not forget your old posts...it is a whole lot of interactors who have coteries here and who keep posting and badgering writers; they take 50-100 posts to say they did not like something. Strange.

[If you have a problem with what I say or how I say it - you have the power to ban me (in the end it always boils down to that gun of user ID/password, doesn`t it?) Simple as that! Feel free to exercise it! Otherwise, feel free to get used to it!]

You were banned because you were using multiple nicks and spamming one board long ago. As long as you stick to the guidelines, there is no reason to ban you. And I don`t have to get used to you...there are several hundred interactors who need my attention as well.

[Why do some people get ticked at what one has to say? And why do some people persist in saying stuff that is most of the time highly provocative - whether of substance or not? Good question. You don`t happen to know anybody like that, by any chance?]

Ask yourself first before trying to show the mirror. I have kept quiet all this while because I thought at some point you will cease being single-minded in your agenda, and anyone looking at your `history` here carefully will know just what it is all about...

You had sent in one article that was published. If you are using another name/nic, then that will have to be looked into.

[My ``feedback`` on enhancing the value of this site by increasing its transparency (and by dismantling its class structure) has been already documented elsewhere and - from all indications - promptly ignored! And what is four months in the scheme of things?!]

Your `feedback` has been nothing but a litany of complaints about issues that have to do with increasing your interact index. It has to do with YOU. Wonder why you never thought of this class structure before I came in in the new role. Don`t teach us transparency. All the details are there if people choose to check them out.

Many use the FP forum only to gain more visibility for themselves and appear to be the keepers of other people`s consciences.

If you wish to enhance the value of this site, then first learn to conduct yourself with decorum (I am not talking about your comments on this board).

One is aware that you feel the desperate need to have the last word, therefore say what you wish and be done with it. I have had my say.

Best wishes.

PS: I am aware this is off-topic and should the need arise, this post will be filtered out.

ramanujam I know I know -- just kidding about this subcontinental puerile preoccupation .....pedaram sultan bood....my dad can beat up ur dad.....my yogurt is butter than ur yogurt.......:)

......sorry if I hurt ur feelings.........

#163 by hamidm2

We in India have a problem that is very different than faced by westerners. People in India are so used to the languid weather and fertile lands, that they never felt the need to develop the sciences for material necessity (unlike in Europe, all scientific discoveries in India had been mainly for religious purposes). until it was too late, and the population had exploded. Add to that a spiritual bent of mind, and you have a distinctly non-materialistic tradition. Also, because India is such a mix of diverse culture, different segments of the population developed in the sciences and education in general differently.

But all that is changing now. If you watched the Daily Show videos I posted recently, India has turned confident at the grassroots level. Because of that, it will be very difficult to stop India`s progress. Because the impetus is bottom-up, not top-down. Indians have also turned materialistic (regrettable to some extent), and I think that an economic juggernaut is building. I predict that in the coming years the majority of fundamental research will be by the Indians and Chinese. Just like today Americans feel low-tech and a step behind when they meet the Japanese and the South Koreans, the day is not far off when that will apply to the Indians as well.

Keep watching. You will see.

Ramanujan

The web is infested with people selling snake oil. Among them, drowning others in ``information`` is a common and time-honored tactic.

That`s why, it is better to say a little and be believed, than to say a lot, and be dismissed.

Re: # 146

Hamidm Sahib:

I am a big fan of your sense of humor.

Von-Nauman`s model of computing machinery created in 1940s, I believe is the basis of computer architectures. Students (you can these classes too) take a theoretical computer science class at Stanford, or MIT, find out about Panini`s formal grammar for the grammar. I have the research book titled ``Panini : the first formal grammarian`` (or something like it). This was published by MIT about 25 years ago. It is a very interesting reading, if are interested computing technologies.

Kaalchakra is correct that Panini was born somewhere in Pakistan (the name of the place slips my mind right now) near Afganistan border. Pakistanis can certainly claim him as their own.

Anil
We all wish MIT and Stanford were in the third world, would you not agree?

#167 by kaalchakra

[Ramanujan

The web is infested with people selling snake oil. Among them, drowning others in ``information`` is a common and time-honored tactic.

That`s why, it is better to say a little and be believed, than to say a lot, and be dismissed. ]

Those who argue not to find out the truth, but only to win (Mantolives, Tahmed32, masadi etc.), will dismiss it anyway.

And those who are actually curious, will read and find out the truth.

Re: # 168

anil mian,

..... actually you aroused my curiosity and i googled panini to find out that he was from attock which is sixty or so miles from my hometown .......... but of all the interactors from the wrong side of the border i do read yours and alephnull`s stuff with some seriousness (even though he appears to be an unrepentant shiv sanik) - more often than not you two have something to say .............

......... but i do find that people from the less developed world are rather insecure and feel it is necessary to run around in leopard skins and dhotis extolling the value of their culture and the contributions their gandpas made to mankind ......... kids in india will jump up excitedly and tell you that gopinath krishmurty invented the zero and that gandhi jee invented the spinning wheel ...........on the other hand kids in the us, for example, wrongly blame benjamin franklin for inventing school and couldn`t care less if calvin klein invented blue jeans ...........

and here I was the ignorant one who thought that phonetically Panini sounded more like an Italian opera singer.....than a Hindu phonetic gramarian of yore -- who was born in Pakistan but died in India or born in India died in Pakistan -- around 450 BC..

....without him Backus could not have concieved the computer language......!

Re: # 170
Hamid
I`m not so sure that it`s just true of people in the less developed world. It could be a simple issue of people with something to prove. I know quite a few Americans and their children who are aware and proud of their countries development to literature, science etc. I say countries because there are aware of where their fore-fathers came from. Now I see this more with Jewish people over here than other races perhaps because they, like ourselves still see themselves as a little different and, secondly in the 20th century in the US, they have been the largest contributors to the sciences and music, despite the fact that in the early years Universities were actively against their admittance.
I don`t think that is bad. It does provide something to strive for. It`s better to strive for excellence than make peace with mediocrity.
After all conversations between Al-lah and Gabby or the Sage and Urstruly are much better to read than some of the drivel that goes on here.-))

Re: # 171
Why is it that you did not know this? I would have thought it would be necessary to know these things. After all Punjabi is descended from Sanskrit roots and is spoken in Pakistan. I`m sure knowledge of Panini`s grammar should exist in the Universities.
My Uncle who was in the Indian Army, once told me long ago that Kautilya`s Arthashastra was read in Pakistani Army Officer`s courses. I don`t know if this is true. Would anybody be in a position to verify this?

hamidm2, nasah:

You mind if I put in my 2-cents here?

I view societies somewhat like trees. For a tree to be strong and healthy, it needs to be nurtured by fresh air and sunshine, but it also need to have strong roots. It can develop different branches which can all bear fruit. A really strong tree, such as the Indian Banyan tree, is even capable of developing roots wherever the branches go. The Jewish Diaspora survived and prospered because it had strong roots as does the European, Chinese and Japanese societies. The Indian society has similar strong roots.

I think that one of the reasons why Pakistan has so much problem finding a true identity is not that it is not open to new inventions, almost every modern invention finds place in Pakistan, even in Madrassas, but because it insists upon ignoring its roots. Even moderate Pakistanis would rather trace their roots to the African bushman than to the land to which they belong. Nobody seems to have any serious problem with the fact that their history is presumed to start with the arrival of foreigners in their land. It is like the American natives saying that their history started with the Pioneers landing in Massachusets. Even white Canada has now starting teaching its children that Canadian history started with the natives and not with teh arrivals of the White Man. In Pakistan, even the native has fully accepted the history of the colonialist and every Pakistani knows a lot more about the history of his conquerors than of his own ancestors - even those who do not claim that they are descended from those conquerors.