Scientists

I should really salute these scientists. I thought Physics (in particular "basic Physics") is dead and gone. Let me pose a question:-

In today's world, what kind of truth (truth in a "Physics" context) can you find out with a beaker full of water, or half water ?

If you ask a question like this to a boring normal guy(like me) who has acquired ignorance and arm-chair philosophy due to daily-routine inertia, I would probably tell you about the story of a thirsty crow who dropped pebbles into a beaker so as to make it full. Or probably I would tell about Archimedes principle (buoyant force and all that).

In other words, I would say All that, which can be discovered with a beaker full of water, has been discovered by Newton (and his dog, diamond?) or Archimedes or Bernoulli.

But hang on!!!!! People still manage to do interesting things with a beaker full of water.When exposed to high voltage, water does some interesting things. From the article :

'water in two beakers climbs out of the beakers and crosses empty space to meet, forming the water bridge. The liquid bridge, hovering in space, appears to the human eye to defy gravity. Upon investigating the phenomenon, the scientists found that water was being transported from one beaker to another, usually from the anode beaker to the cathode beaker. The cylindrical water bridge, with a diameter of 1-3 mm, could remain intact when the beakers were pulled apart at a distance of up to 25 mm.'"

Well I guess it is just a question of having a "research attitude" and that keen eye. It's all about seeing whether the glass is half empty or half full ! These kind of properties will definitely have some application.

Have a look around the world around you. You will find at least some questions : (If not answers)

Hmmm...Now I guess I should think what happens if you dip a Compact Disc in a beaker full of water mixed with Salt and pickle and give a high voltage!!!

Have a look at this article : Water forms floating 'bridge' when exposed to high voltage

IT IT IT

And there are more unpleasant realities expected to come in the near future of the IT Industry. First is the falling dollar. I understand inter-dependence is of high importance for a national economy to flourish. But a falling dollar in reality indicates yet another recession in the heavily dependent services-based Indian IT sector. Moreover, it can be a hit for both small scale and large scale software companies with news like these :-

What worries IT firms more is that the STPI scheme, which exempts their export earnings from tax, will be withdrawn in 2009. The industry is lobbying hard with New Delhi and even BPO firms have raised the demand for similar benefits. So far, the finance ministry has given no indication of warming to the idea.

The STPI scheme has special benefits like "Duty Free" Import for Hardware and Software, exemption for Corporate Income Tax etc. The IT industry has been pampered atleast for the past 2 decades. In 2009, we have to see how things shape up. But I believe that the Indian Economy will kind of stabilize, with a software job becoming another normal chaakri naukri.

Read the related article Why IT chiefs are nervous about the future

Manorama 6 ft under - * * * *

Here's a movie which is a VERY good creation of a new director. The acting is ekdum first class with Abhay Deol, Sarika (whatte voice!), Raima Sen doing good justice to their roles.

Well, the plot of Manorama... is from Chinatown. I have a book of the script of Chinatown. I loved the multi-layered plot of Chinatown. Jack Nicholson as JJ Gittes..man! what a script. I am still hunting for a DVD version of the movie.

Manorama is a fitting adaptation of Chinatown, one of the best screenplays written. Chinatown was a multi-layered script.

Since I love the multi-layered script concept, let me give an "rough" example of a multi layered plot.

paragraph-1
A ragged cat goes to a pond, catches a goldfish with its paws, and chews it and is delighted with its catch. The another small fish watches the goldfish disappear in the cat's mouth with tears in its eyes.

paragraph-2
A few minutes later,the "small fish" is seen celebrating with joy with its friends. WHY????? The small fish was actually an enemy of the goldfish because the goldfish had eaten the small fish's lover, an hour ago. The cat had not eaten for three days and had fought vainly with dogs. The goldfish was a tyrant. The small fish actually shed tears of joy, when the cat ate it!

Okay that was a stupid plot , I agree, but I hope you get the gist! As you can see in paragraph-2, you are adding a layer below to the peripheral outer layer. It is not just a twist, but a whole story which was covered-up!

In Manorama..., the action happens in Rajasthan. The film itself has such a feel of the desert and the tagline "Nothing is what it seems" is a befitting title.

Folks, Grab your tickets before the film vanishes!

Bangaloreans : The woe is that you have to shell out a monstrous 200/= for a ticket on a weekend. Something has to be done about such ridiculous rates.

ayyo Rama !

Regarding the Sethusamudram Project, it is a tough job to take a definitive stance on whether the Bridge should be actually demolished.

The reason to see why the bridge should be tampered :-
A ship channel across the Palk Strait will be created allowing ships to pass through the channel instead of having to go around the island of Sri Lanka. 30 hours of shipping time will be saved.

The reason why the ship should not be tampered :-
It is a heritage monument. Moreover, it is a pilgrimage place. By demolishing this bridge, they are actually playing with beliefs and sentiments of millions of Indians in general and Hindus in particular.

The Central Government issued a statement of blunder (based on Archaelogical Survey of India's survey) saying No proof of Lord Rama . I am sure the BJP will fight it to the end. Sonia Gandhi might have withdrawn the statement, but in doing that she has made another blunder by provoking the atheist Karunanidhi's DMK party.

From the Central Government point of view, they should not have opened the Pandora's box of troubles.

However, the Nuke deal and its implications, is keeping the Left's useless morons and the whole Lok Sabha busy. So this issue might not blow up. But they may have strained relations with the DMK.

Have people gone crazy ?

It seems they are developing a web-server on a mobile phone. This is getting ridiculous. It may work, but why ?

From the article :-

Running a server on your phone is, at the moment, more of a proof of concept demonstration. However it has interesting potential uses. For example it offers away to gain access to information about where the phone is, what is stored on the phone (both contacts and pictures), as well as providing a personal web server that is more intimately connected to an individual.

Bollocks. When a phone is mobile why would the owner login to the phone when he carries it around ? (unless his whole world is centered on that goddamn phone and he is a forgetful person).

My advice to people who are students who want to come to software.
Give up the software dream; People have run out of ideas and have become stupid. Go back to farming. This is of no use.

Wow!

It was 1956 and these guys were trying to dispatch this hard disk somewhere.
The hard disk weighed 1 ton and it could store 5 MB of data.

This was one of the early hard disks. Have a look at the IBM 350 Disk Storage Unit.
We have come a long way.I somehow feel the oldies(ppl in the industry till the end of millenium) of CompSci were the real innovators...Can someone give the scientists a 4GB pendrive, please ?