HIstory Repeats Itself !!

Hello people,

Perhaps it is an unfortunate coincidence attached with my blogging, or its an indication of the well known fact - history repeats itself.

One year ago, i started blogging and jogging. One of my earliest posts was on Saddam Hussain's trial and hanging. Its been one year since Saddam died. An now, after one year, one more political leader, Benazir Bhutto was killed (27th Dec). And coincidentally i have started jogging again !

When Saddam was hanged, i had commented that 'the unusually rapid trial and conviction may be due to USA's fear of him rebounding back to a position of power in iraq. US didnt want that, and hence the trial'.

Now that Benazir was killed in such a brutal manner with the elections in Pakistan so close, it indeed is very thought provoking. First of all, elections in Pakistan are ..well.. cant find a proper word for it.. so lets say rare. With two of the former leaders Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto returning to Pakistan with the elections in mind, the killing seems to be a brute force way to eliminate competition. But, is it so?

These are some of my views on the possible motives behind it (Separated by OR):

1) Its a brute force way to eliminate competition, used by Mr Musharraf ?. But the killings really endanger his own public profile. Or is it going to be an opportunity for Mr Mush to postpone the elections indefinitely and declare emergency again? OR lets say by other political leaders, not only Mush. Was this a way to turn the elections into a blood feud?

2) Is there a hidden US motive behind it? Mr Mush has put Pakistan in a much better position with the US with his statesmanship. All the stuff on fighting the war against terror, the no use of nuclear arsenal strategy etc etc have him in good books with US. So does US want to use Mr Mush as its puppet and to maintain him in power, they are ready to kill the opposing leaders?

3) Is it really some terrorist organization who plans to bring anarchy in Pakistan and to gain control, like taliban did in Afganistan. There have been murder attempts at Sharif and Benazir in the recent past, but none on Mr Mush. This seems a bit against this particular view isnt it?

4) Well, couldn't resist putting this point. Is it possible that India had some motive behind it?
In the terms of Sharif and Bhutto, there was a lot of terrorist infiltration secretly supported by Pakistan. During Mush's regime, these apparently had ceased. The indo-pak relations were in a much better position. Is it possible that India was afraid of the possibility of either of Sharif / Bhutto returning to power?

If anyone has comments or any arguments with/against these views they are very much welcome to write. This is a highly interesting point to discuss (Not the unfortunate incident but the cause of it). I am sure that politics analysts all over the world (not politicians !) would be thinking about the incident.

P.S. I have written these views as a part of my own brainstorming process, they may not necessarily have any kind of validity / factual proof.

Local Vs Global Optima

Statutory warning: This blog is a scientific discussion.



In maths, there is a concept called as optima. I wont define wot it is. there are two types of optima, local and global. They mean literally that.



These concepts are used bery widely in many fields. Lets first discuss some of them before we go to the main topic of the blog.



1) Industry:

Industrialists all over the world are continuously analyzing their performance based on some criteria. The main problem in front of them is whether to achieve a local optima in each of their units, or to achieve a global optima in the whole pipeline as such. The achievement of a local optima is preferred by individual units as they have better performance to report. Whereas the big bosses see the 'big picture'.



2) Protein folding: (correct me if i m wrong)

In the process of protein folding, the protein goes through various free energy points which are local optima points. However the protein is supposed to fold in such a way that the overall free energy is the global optimum. But the protein in reality, in vivo is never at the global optimum, its at one of the local optima.

This brings us to the topic of this blog. Does life also have any such things?
For the sake of discussion, lets call optima as the 'good' state of life.

We all know that there are ups and downs in life. I think that they are like local fluctuations on a timeline. Sometimes we achieve local optimum, sometimes its a 'down' state. This takes us to the fundamental question, which is translated as: "Should one try to achieve the local optima always, or sometime sacrifice the local optima for the global optimum"

I think global optima is the choice (or traditionally its known to be the 'wise' choice). But is it?
On a timescale, global optimum would be at the end of the whole context, which translates to death here.(?)

Moreover, in striving for the global optimum, are we allowing some irreversible damage?

Well, i sorta forgot wot i was thinking (i was on the bike then). But lets discuss another situation.

I am applying to US.. investing more than a lac Rs in the process. Plus there are these other exams an all. So lets take it somewhere around 1.5lac. This is to achieve the global optimum right?.
But if the process fails somehow, the damage created by it is going to be a big blow. So in order to achieve the global optimum, i m putting the local situation in danger. Is that a wise thing to do?

let me ponder over it for some time.. meanwhile, any comments / suggestions are welcome.

Hello,

Hvnt been online much.. (well atleast on the blogger).. been busy with US applications... SOP, recos, univ shortlistings, transcripts etc etc... dint get much time to write anything.. which brings us to the topic of this post.

See, in the last yr, when i was teaching GRE maths to a girl, i never thought tht i myself wud give GRE an all.. but somehow i went through the pipeline.. (i m not regretting it at all)..
an then when actually i realized tht after all the prepn, (if i get thru), i wud be goin to US for my PhD, it was a different feeling... the same thingn i.e. goin to US for phd.. was different when i casually talked abt it, an now when i m actually preparing for it, its a whole new thing.
A long time ago, in say 7-8th std, i had read a poem, marathi one.. called साग़रास.. by Swatantryaveer sawarkar. i remember the words :

गुण-सुमने मी वेचियली या भावे , कि तिने सुगंधा घ्यावे
जरी उद्धरणी व्यय न तिच्या हो साचा , हा व्यर्थ भार विद्येचा

These are the words which continuously keep coming to my mind. Not that i have already gone an cant return.. but still there is a feeling something like that...

Am i doing the right thing? am i leaving the country, leaving my family, leaving the place where i belong? What is the reason tht i m so much motivated to go to US? is it the same feeling as conveyed by these words (from the same poem)?:

मज वदलासी अन्य देशी चल जाऊ , स्रृष्टिची विविधता पाहू ॥
तंइ जननी ह्रं विरह शंकित हि झाले, परि तुंवा वचन तिज दिधले ॥
मार्गज्ञ स्वये मीच पृष्ठी वाहीन, त्वरितया परत आणीन ॥
विश्वसलो या तव वचनी मी,
जगदनुभव योगे बनुनी मी,
तव अधिक शक्त उद्धरणी मी, ॥

येइन त्वरे कथुन सोडिले तिजला, सागरा प्राण तळमळला, तळमळला सागरा ॥

I am worried that its a similar feeling tht i m experiencing..

dont know wot to do now.. lets see.. will think more abt it..

till then goodbye

-Alok

Continued from the last post....

Now probably i understand the fox and his sour grapes.. grapes are probably meant to be sour.. or the fox is not meant to eat those grapes, or simply both.
But i cant help thinking that the fox is probably wise.. an sour grapes do seem like the right choice...
The fox was wise, he knew that there is a chance that the grapes are sour, wot about me?
I also knew that .. still i didnt make the choice.. i m a lot less wiser than the fox u can say..

and probably, accepting the fact that the grapes are sour takes bravery..

Sour Grapes

Hello,
i m back again after a long time.. had nothing to write..

I remember tht story about the fox who wanted to eat grapes off the vine, but they were too high, so he decides tht he doesnt want those anymore cause they are sour.

I cant help thinking whether my condition is like tht.. say i have two options, one is out of question, (well then y is it an option at all?, but still) and the other one, i dont know whether there is any way if i chose that one..
So i m thinking of both of them as sour grapes... why?

Because it is comforting? probably i m weak enough to not face the facts.. Am i missing out on something? or is it just better that way.

Life somehow becomes a bit easy (in the present) if i chose not to take any one of them.. but is it necessarily better for my future? i cant decide.. so am i better off thinking the grapes are sour? or should i think about the future too?

See, this is an issue where i cant predict the consequences of any of my actions.. and previous experience has taught me that there are grave consequences of the smallest actions.. but if i cant predict the repercussions, which choice to make? or defy both? because even not taking any choice is itself a choice, and that has its own effects...

So if i cant predict, what should i do? i m confused thoroughly..
so currently sour grapes seem attractive!!

The butterfly effect??

Hello people,

i am back after a long time. this blogging had become redundant for me, an i was losing the effect of that.. so took a break from that.. now i m back..
I have experienced a huge change in life over the past few months, an sure as hell its gonna affect my exams.. adversely.
When i look back at the last semester (being a student, the unit of time for me is a semester), i say to myself, what did i gain and wot did i lose.. well a lot of things both ways..

Lets review the last semester (This is a critical point in the blog, those who want to stop reading, stop right here...)..

It began very well.. i developed new habits of jogging and blogging.. i was reading stuff, books, papers, with a great interest, my thought process was continually running.. then i got my laptop, these reading etc things were even faster and better now.. life seemed well-set.. no hassles, i was sure that i was on the right track..

Then the road became bumpy and bumpier.. dont know why.. may be because i paid too much attention in wots the effect of other people on me.. i should have been detached.. i was in the beginning.. but i got entagled into mess everywhere.. that was my own foolishness.. i paid too much attention to my heart, than my brain.. i did a lot of talking - waste of course... and soon my academics suffered.. i started losing interest in the course work.. i got rejected at several places for summer training and i realized that i m nowhere.. i am a succesful nobody

then just when i thought that the road is getting better, i hit a roadblock.. my life suddenly was turned to black.. that was when the whole delhi trip happened.. i lost all the respect for myself.. an believe me there is nothing worse than that.. it sorta eats you from the inside.. the delhi trip really exposed my flaws, my own weakness.. and the greatest weakness of all was that i allowed myself to be weak..

After the trip, i set my feelings aside, and started afresh.. caught on with my course work.. i was working at a good pace.. and i knew if i stopped, it would take me a long time to get back on my feet.. but was i wary?.. i was.. but i still stopped.. knowing that it would be detrimental.. i still stopped..

when i stopped.. i became the rabbit in the race.. i stopped in the hope of something, i faced rejection there too.. an believe me, that was bad.. i not only became the loser rabbit, but a roasted one... now the song black made sense .. it made all the sense..

I suffered losses everywhere.. my exams were bad.. my mental and physical state worsened.. and my depressions no longer remained times-with-my-own-self ... they were real depressions.. mental and physical.. and they proved to be addictive, once again exposing my weak self.. i never regained the lost respect, instead i lost it further more.. then i wrote the stupid post 'the awakening'.. it turned out to be very prematurely written.. that wasnt my real awakening.. thses things arent like that.. i cant face that much of a change overnight.. it has to be gradual..

But even after that, the road wasnt much worse.. it was better than wot i had before.. but it got better... now its much better.. i am experiencing the real awakening.. i am scientifically more active, indulging in other things than my own stupid thoughts.. did a great summe training.. so i m much more on the track.. so lets say i m better off now..

but i still know that i am goin to experience the consequences of the last semester.. they are gonna be bad.. but i am raedy to face them.. I know the real meaning of the term 'the butterfly effect'..

The awakening

Exams over!! finally.. well almost over..
lots of stuff has passed by... lots of stuff has gone theu my mind, some of it is still left..
I ask, y do people have feelings if they are not gonna come true one day? wot is a feeling?? specific stoichiometric combination of neurotransmitters firing at specific places? hehe..
No no.. no boring stuff here in this blog..

SO, after the boredom is over, i am all fired up for a change in my daily life.. so new morning comes...

Jus awaking from the slumber... and deep sleep...
Let there be new light !! .. amen