Confusing Symptoms with Causes

It's probably something to do with how our brains work. A lot of us confuse "symptom" with "cause". For example, social scientists have long argued that over-population is a symptom of a country's problems,  not it's cause. Yet, we frequently blame over-population for a country's ills.

Nowhere is this confusion more apparent than the current political discourse in the USA. Everyone seems to blame the President for the country's problems. But Donald Trump is a symptom of the country's deeper issues, he is certainly not responsible for everything that is going wrong with America.

Our brains like to simplify - to cling to simplistic explanations. "If only DJT were not the President, ..." the democrats like to say.

But what about the system that put him in power?

George Carlin made a brilliant observation:

"Everybody complains about politicians. Everybody says they suck. Well, where do people think these politicians come from? They don’t fall out of the sky. They don’t pass through a membrane from another reality. They come from American parents and American families, American homes, American schools, American churches, American businesses and American universities, and they are elected by American citizens. This is the best we can do folks. This is what we have to offer. It’s what our system produces: Garbage in, garbage out. If you have selfish, ignorant citizens, you’re going to get selfish, ignorant leaders. Term limits ain’t going to do any good; you’re just going to end up with a brand new bunch of selfish, ignorant Americans. So, maybe, maybe, maybe, it’s not the politicians who suck. Maybe something else sucks around here…"

Instead of focusing all our energy on one man, why don't we think of systemic issues.


1) The Two-Party System

The two-party system has a severe "lumpiness" problem - it lumps beliefs that are utterly illogical. For example, if you are "pro-life" i.e. you believe in saving lives, then you are forced to support guns, which take lives! 

Suppose someone (only for the sake of logical consistency) believes that lives should never be taken (either by mothers or by guns), then there is no political party that voices their beliefs. [Not to mention the whole "pro-life" argument itself makes little sense but that is besides the point.]

John Adams put it bluntly:

"There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution."

A lot of voters who did not like the current President ended up voting for him because they couldn't bring themselves to lump other opposing beliefs into the rival candidate. 

2)  The Electoral College

This dead horse has been flogged many times over, so I won't repeat the arguments here.


Systemic problems are the real reason why Donald Trump got elected. 


Maybe it is time to direct the anger elsewhere.

Facebook posts

Henry David Thoreau:

"

We are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to communicate... We are eager to tunnel under the Atlantic and bring the old world some weeks nearer to the new; but perchance the first news that will leak through into the broad flapping American ear will be that Princess Adelaide has the whooping cough.

"

Is business school research relevant?

In the world of SSENIUB,  there were islands known as U.N.I.V. ("Univ"s) , short for (largely) Unknown Neighborhood Institutions with Verdant structures.

These leafy islands primarily housed adolescent lives - mostly starry-eyed, 18 - 22 year old saplings that dreamed of becoming trees and 'taking on' the real world. But to grow into grand famous trees, saplings needed watering.

And that, was the most important reason they came to the Univs.

Naturally, given how important watering was at univ's, the wooded campuses started to advertize for the position of Plant-Waterer - to hire humans who could water saplings really well. In fact, adolescents paid a lot of money to find the right Univ's where they could receive water from the right Plant Waterers.

With a touch of pomposity, univ's gave an official title to the job of the Plant Waterer - T.E.A.C.H, short for Tree Enhancers Adept at Circulating H2O.

So, T.E.A.C.H was a very important function at any U.N.I.V.

One day, for some inexplicable reason (plausibly linked to how rich and famous saplings eventually became), these T.E.A.C.H jobs started paying off handsomely.  Suddenly, a lot of people wanted to become Plant Waterers. For the money. Why not? You could make a killing just by watering plants.

Thousands of people claimed, and rightly so, that they could perform T.E.A.C.H jobs at U.N.I.Vs. After all, unless you were egregiously bad, watering plants was not that hard. More importantly, a sincere hard-working person could improve his T.E.A.C.H abilities with a few years of practice. Also, minute differences in T.E.A.C.H abilities did not really matter - everyone agreed that much of sapling growth had to come from within.

That was a period known in U.N.I.V history as the Great Big Dilemma: How do you differentiate one "job candidate" from another, when the actual job (of watering plants) is not rocket science?


Someone came up with a brilliant suggestion. Since watering plants is (obviously) connected to water, why don't we select applicants based on how good they were at swimming in the water!
Never mind that swimming, while related to water, had nothing to do with watering plants. But the univ's were full of clever people. They could always come up with a convoluted justification why good swimmers could also be good at watering plants.

This eureka moment prompted univ's to come up with another officious title for swimming - R.E.S.E.A.R.C., short for Reputational Swimming for Reputational Capital.

Clearly, R.E.S.E.A.R.C. was entirely a reputation game.

The univ's themselves started training programs for the reputation game, solely focused on producing the best divers (Ph.D - Perennially High ranked Diver). Again, never mind that the best swimmers or divers were not necessarily the best at watering plants.

But the lure of swimming, was that, unlike watering plants, it was a skillful activity. Swimming was a differentiator that univ's could use !!

So, even if thousands apply for the job of watering plants , selecting (and more importantly, quantifying) applications based on swimming ability was nice and easy.

This somewhat halted the mad rush of applicants. But the ones eventually hired had exactly a coin-flip's chance of simultaneously being good at T.E.A.C.H, because of its utter lack of correlation with R.E.S.E.A.R.C.

Some smart individuals recognized this problem and started different hiring processes - for the "low skilled" T.E.A.C.H track (where you "deserved" to be paid less) and the "high skilled" R.E.S.E.A.R.C track (where you just had to be paid more).

But that led to another problem! Swimming was inherently not a very useful activity for the trees of the real world. Trees in the real world cared about water and how they could access it. But what wisdom did they receive from the divers and swimmers instead? Sophisticated and mathematically precise ways to do multiple somersaults.

Somehow, it never occured to the swimmers that, maybe, trees didn't care too much about learning how to do a somersault. That was the origin of the now famous phrase in tree language - "yes, but that's only of academic interest".


Some jaded trees that cared about saplings and society cried  "irrelevance!" .

Their voices remain strangulated.

Dual citizenship : Your money OR your life

India has a very strange law.

It does not allow dual citizenship. Funny thing is: there is absolutely no logical, social, economic reason for not allowing dual citizenship. Most countries in the developed world have it already.

SO weird.

Picture a man with a big family - living happily with his wife , kids and (elderly) parents. Suddenly, there is a random "law" that proclaims :
a) either live with your wife and kids, or
b) live with you parents.

You cannot do both. Nope, just not allowed.


Seriously, WTF !! Why ??


Sorry, no explanations for arbitrarily tearing apart happy families.


That is exactly what India's dual citizenship law does. It forces you to choose between wife and mother.

Tough choice indeed.

PhD and Entrepreneurship

I have been thinking lately on what it takes to do a PhD (or pursue an academic career), especially given that I am already in one!

Someone at an online forum remarked that doing a PhD is akin to entrepreneurship. The more I think about it, the more I am convinced :this analogy is right on the money!


Academics : Ideas  ::  Entrepreneurship : Products. 


To oversimply things a little, as an entrepreneur, your main job is to create and sell products. As an academic, your main job is to create and sell ideas. (Yes, selling ideas is as important as 'creating' them)


The analogy doesn't stop here.
The other crucial dimension where the two are similar is ownership.

Suppose you are an entrepreneur in the restaurant business. Few weeks into your new restaurant, you get a late night call that a fire broke out in the dining area. Your immediate response? Drop whatever you are doing, rush to fire-fight and try and save your enterprise.

Contrast this to a traditional job in a multinational company. If you got a call at 11 pm that your office building was on fire, you probably might get annoyed but you will go back to sleep! You might even rest assured there will be a no-work day tomorrow (depending on how much you love your job). In any case, it is not your responsibility. Your job is well defined enough to not involve extinguishing fires.

The example might sound over-dramatic, but notice the crucial difference: as an entrepreneur your responsibility in your business is complete and total. The buck really stops with you. You make all the decisions. You are completely responsible for everything that happens. You can never say, for instance : "I only work from 9 to 6. That was not my job".

This is exactly how an academic career is.

"Everything" is your job. You are wholly responsible for what direction your enterprise (= research agenda) will take. Nobody will tell you what area to research on, you will have to find it yourself. Just as no one can tell you what business you should start. Again, you are not answerable to anyone if something goes awry with your research agenda, because nobody really cares! If your restaurant caught fire, there is no convenient "manager" to lynch you. (Yes, giving yourself a beating is harder!)


Think of academics as being given an empty room and directed to "research". (however vague that might sound). That would exactly be as vague as putting an entrepreneur in an empty office space and asking him to "enterprise".

In both cases, you not only need enormous discipline to stay on 'track' (stay profitable) but also need something that helps you "self-start"(pick up from failed ventures and try again).

Gun Control

Somebody famous said, " If you don't have facts, we'll just use my opinions"

So here are SOME facts. They are pretty compelling. There is more, but I am having a lazy day.

As a social scientist, I know that such debates are rarely purely "scientific". The facts are on our side (indeed, I am picking a side!) but how do you convince people who get all emotional and political about it ? More importantly, how do you break the lobbying cesspool ? These are bigger problems.

Let's address the simpler ones. Especially the supremely dumb ones.

Supremely Dumb Argument 1 : "Guns don't kill people. People kill people"

This argument is dumb on so many different levels. Yes, people kill people. But guns make it easy for people to kill people.  Get that ? Give me a good reason why we should make it easy for anybody to take innocent lives? Who gives you the right to make it easy for a random nut job to kill children? Who gives you the right to make it easy to deny someone their fundamental right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

Let's turn the logic for all the gun-obsessed folks who make the stupid guns-don't-kill-people argument. Guns don't kill people, it is the bullets inside those guns, silly. So hand over the bullets and you can keep your stupid guns! See how illogical these arguments are?

If you buy the guns-don't-kill-people argument, then you should buy the nuclear-weapons-are-harmless argument. After all, it is not the nuclear warhead that kills people, it is the person who presses the 'launch' button! So by your twisted logic, we should encourage nuclear weapons. See how dumb your argument is?

Supremely Dumb Argument 2: "Cars kill people too. Will you ban cars next?"

This is really the height of ignorance. Cars serve a purpose. They help people get from point A to point B. What purpose do guns serve other than making it easy to kill living beings?
Don't give me crap about how it helps protect your family! You live in a country where law enforcement is extremely good. Trust me you have no idea. Back in my country, a "911" call has almost zero chance of being responded to. With a great law-and-order system such as the one here, there is absolutely no need to own guns.
The answer to guns is not more guns, it is less guns!!


I shudder to think of the day when our entire society turns into a wacko gun-loving violent one.

How high is your V.Q ?

We live in an age where parents are constantly obsessing over how high their children's I.Q scores are. B-O-O-R-I-I-N-G...

Indian parents! Please, give I.Q the boot - what your kid really needs is  V.Q !!

[ If you didn't already know, I am bringing you good news - V.Q is already in your blood...It might get a trifle supressed in your children though, especially if you  raised them outside India but then it probably just needs the slightest possible nudge ]

Of course by V.Q I mean 'Vasool'giri Quotient. There, there - did I hear someone patting my back already, but let me fully explain first :

In true Mayflower style, when the first 357 (yes, I cooked that up) Indians arrived on a ship to USA they brought with them their culture, their spices and guess what else - their exchange rate !!

It is true !! The exchange rate between India and US is the life-force of V.Q. It is what makes us walking human calculators (for those who wondered why Indians are good at arithmetic). Next time you see us shopping in Macy's, try coming close to us...and assuming you don't mind the creepiness factor....come close to our heads, 'cause they will be warmer than those of other shoppers. And if you get close enough, you can surely hear the whirring inside them - the exchange rate conversion - the rapid calculations $32.64 * 53 ~ Rs.1700 should I pay that much for a pair of jeans, I can get the same for 2K with 17% discount during Diwali sale and if I use my 234 credit points on......

Still not convinced ? Read on..

Paisa Vasool
Act 1, Scene 1:
The Wife and I (two representative Indians) at the Art Institute of Chicago

We see the paintings. No - I mean we literally see every single painting in every single room and listen to everything on the (free free free!) audio guide. While other art connoisseurs are slowly waltzing their way from Manet to Monet, we are gasping for breath as we leap from Rembrandt to Van Gogh and lunge toward Picasso (we can't tell the difference - French/Dutch/Spanish - who cares) - So the scene ends with the museum curator being so impressed that she offers us jobs as supervisors that we finally  politely decline.

Anyway, Paisa Vasooool. Yea !! We paid 20 bucks - of course, we want to extract as much value as we can!!

High V.Q .
High-five The Wife.

Paisa Vasool
Act 1, Scene 2:
Indians and Vonage phone connection.

Apprently for the money we pay them, the folks at Vonage give us free calling rights (evil evil smile) to 64 countries. Biggest mistake of their lives. Have you noticed news reports from around the world that random people in completely unrelated countries are getting missed calls for no reason.

Paisa Vasoooool. Yea !! We have paid for all 64 countries, haven't we ? So what if we don't know who is on the other end of the phone line. Just dial man!!


I can give more examples. But you get the drift.

Teach your kids some V.Q, or beware - they might lose their Indian-ness. Boo.

Arundhati Roy and her boring conspiracy theories

I wonder what is wrong with Ms. Roy. Is she just trying to be DIFFERENT for the sake of being different ? I never understand such people. They are...pathetic.

India hanged a terrorist. He deserved to die. The death penalty is awarded in the rarest of the rare cases. This was one of them.

And here Ms. Roy goes spreading conspiracy theories

If you read her article, you can see how cleverly she attempts to dissuade her audience from the main point in question : She asks  " What are the facts ? " - and ironically NEVER presents any new ones herself.

Argument 1: Ms. Roy says that he was not part of the 'team that opened fire'. 

So ? Does that PROVE he is innocent ? How does not being part of the 'team that opened fire' make him LESS guilty ? A really dumb argument!

And then she makes outlandish claims about how the movies we watch on TV make us believe that he is guilty. I don't know whether to laugh or cry at such statements.

Argument 2: Ms. Roy says that there is a 'material contradiction' because the police did not clarify whether they got to the terrorist through his comrade or they got to the comrade through the terrorist. So according to her, if A does not imply B, then C cannot imply B. 

Terrible logic. How do you argue with something like this ?
The good thing about facts is that they are.....facts. You can't dispute them. Afzal Guru had flirted with terrorism for a long time before he planned the attack. Get your facts right, Ms. Roy.

Argument 3: A SIM card found in possession of the terrorist was operational BEFORE the date it was sold to him. Hence he is not a terrorist.

The SIM card was used by someone who was planning the attack. These are the facts. If it didn't belong to him, what was he doing with it then ? Oh, he just happened to come across a random cellphone that was used by terrorists and picked it up off the pavement ? Ms. Roy is ready to believe the incredulity of this story but she not ready to accept that dates of purchase and dates of operation often get mixed up in day to day life (In India, an item bought today can virtually have ANY billing date on its voucher - nobody really bothers about such things).


Bottomline: If you haven't done any investigative journalism yourself, then you have no strong arguments whatsoever.

Finally, she completely ignores the FACT that Afzal Guru fought for clemency at various courts and there was more than sufficient time to build his defense. The very fact that he couldn't do so for such a long time should convince you that the case against him was air-tight.


Before she took to writing, Ms. Roy taught aerobics in 5-star hotels. She should reconsider this profession. Twisting and bending (facts) is what she excels at.

Lewis Caroll

I had no idea that Lewis Caroll was a mathematician at Oxford ! So impressive.

I am taking a course in Analysis at Wash U and we discussed a deep concept in mathematical logic called Modus ponens in class.

More than a hundred years ago, Lewis Caroll wrote a short story around familiar characters to explain this idea. Watch out for some lame puns of that era ! LOL .

India and Darwin's theory

Anybody who is exasperated with the social behavior of Indians, especially those living abroad, must get one fact right. First.

That we were born in an overpopulated country with severe resource constraints and a mostly dysfunctional government.

Yes, we tend to be indisciplined, impolite and discourteous. Yes, we never seem to follow queues. And Yes, we tend to find "workarounds" (has jugaad already entered English dictionaries?) even for things that work. And, at every possible opportunity at that.

But how did we get this way ?

Is it in our 'blood' ? Can't we never learn to be 'civil' ?

Tom Wilkinson in The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (an excellent movie, if I may add) makes a brilliant point. In India, life is a privilege, not a right.

In my country, we don't 'assume away' the basic necessities of life. We struggle to get them. Access to water, food, hygiene and electricity is NOT assumed. Not "obvious".We fight to get them. If you never lived in India, you might never understand what that means.

ONLY the top 1% of India's population can take these for granted, everywhere they go. Here's a scenario : The average Indian takes an 8 hour bus ride from point A to point B. After 4 hours, the driver stops the bus in order that passengers 'relieve' themselves. Now, how do they do that ? Use public toilets ? You must be joking! We know all too well that (unmanned) public toilets are unspeakably dirty and infectious, so what do we do ? We look for trees ! I claim that ANY sane person, from any part of the world, would behave exactly in the same way - if put in this situation.

You see - it is not in our 'blood'.
Again - Why don't we Indians learn to follow queues ? If you queue up in India for public transport, you will never be able to board an overcrowded bus or a train. Lets try the following social experiment in your favorite developed country - Cancel all bus routes except ONE , and keep the frequency at crazy low levels during peak time. Make sure there are only 20 seats in the bus for a passenger demand of 200. Allow the passengers to complain about this, but simply ignore them. Finally, report that the sun rises in the west if you still see people queuing up!

You see. In India, we need to fight to survive. Struggle to exist. We push, we shove and we make a place for ourselves. It is the only way we have learnt to live.

So, the next time you see us jumping queues or forgetting to open the door for you, admonish us. Counsel us and correct us. But PLEASE, understand us too.

From the frying pan to.....

This is a "personal dairy" kind of post. I really intended to write it for....me. And you'll see why.

Recently, I have been fighting to keep my head from drowning in the madness of business school PhD admissions. With insanely low odds of getting admissions into any school, there is understandably a lot of angst and hair-pulling from almost every applicant.

But I am 30. I should know better (you would think!).

In some sense, I seem to be going back a decade ago, when I was obsessing about competitive exams and college admissions. Back then, my main reason for trying hard to get into an IIT/NIT/IIM (or whatever letter jumble you can think of), was that I wanted "to prove" something. To whom ? I have no clue. In hindsight, I think it was to myself.

So, that's the thing - I don't seem to have fully exited out of this "proving" business and get on with doing what I really want to do. For example, I still seem to worry whether I will get into the highest "ranked" college that I applied to. For what joy ?

Lets see :
1) "Prestige" : I rest my case with what Paul Graham has to say about prestige

2) "Exposure" : What is "exposure" really ? It can't be about access to the best "resources" because that's the same at every school. And, if you are in a particular geography, say the US, you already are 'in the loop' in terms of conferences, whether they be at Harvard or Acme University. If it is about working with the "smartest brains", yes - I understand there is a point here. But, honestly, the 'gap' that already exists between a PhD rookie and any Professor is so great that you would NEVER run into a situation where the student "knows so much" that there is nothing he can learn from the older people around him!  And lets not discount the fact that research is largely a process of independent reflection and thought.  So, the "exposure" argument is marginal, at best.

3) "Monetary benefits" : eeeek. I didn't quit my high-paying job to worry about how much I would have earned in Harvard versus Acme! When the base salaries themselves are not too high (even if,  Harvard salaries are 50% higher than Acme's), it seems kind of sad to play this low-stakes game!

So, if you think about it a little, the whole "ranking" fuss in academia is kind of funny. To quote Paul again,
"...Most good mathematicians would work on math even if there were no jobs as math professors, whereas in the departments at the other end of the spectrum, the availability of..jobs is the driver.."

So, that's the thing. I really want to get on with my work without joining the Race of the Fastest Rodents. Been there, done that. I'll take a rain cheque on that one.

But I would be too naive to suppose that I can be in academia and not play the publishing game. Some things are true of every profession, and academics is a job (that I love), after all.
So, let me rephrase my statement to :
"I will join the Race, only as a Minimally Interfering Rodent", (where I will define my own minimum levels) !

An ABC Letter

My dearest Nephew,

It is winter of year 2012 (pronounced Two Thousand and Twelve for appropriate effect) and we are all very eagerly waiting for spring! Around the same time when beautiful flowers bloom in oak trees, your mother will a) offload a six-pound weight, b) heave a sigh of relief and….…c) beam. The rest of us will beam too and break into a waltz but you, my dear, will finally get some fresh air! I know, I know – all those vain attempts at kicking your way out – Never mind, you tried....

You know, the funny thing about coming into The World is that nobody, not one of us, can remember how we got here. All of us, including you, have to simply take our parents word for it. For instance, in exactly three years time, your Mama and Mami are going to convince you that it was the local stork that brought you to your parents’ doorstep.  And you will have to decide whether to take their word for it.  

But notice something funny about The World? You have to believe somebody first and understand things later.  It’s what we grown-ups call “trust”.  Let us call this Word A.

So, it was a beautiful afternoon in Spain and I thought it would be fun to write a letter to you (this is the first time I am writing to someone who is not born yet, hmmm…you should try this too!) Anyway, since you were still ‘in the dark’ (and that’s your first example of a pun…yes, you are welcome!) I thought I will tell you a bit about The World.

For instance, a lot of grown-ups have obsessed about how it looks like, from the outside. The first few guys said it was flat and then came a clever guy who said it was round (But he really got yelled at, for saying so). Never mind, you will learn about such things in that place we call “school”. But what they won’t tell you in school is that there was an even smarter guy who went back to saying it was flat and made a lot of money! See, it literally pays to think differently. So, remember, in your art classes, if you want to paint the sea yellow, the sun blue and the sky purple, then go ahead and do it! Sometimes we grown-ups are too afraid to color ourselves…differently. And there’s your Word B – “creativity”.

Three decades ago, I was in your place. I too was Being Born….Seems like a long time, doesn’t it ? But here’s the thing - time moves so quickly, you’ll hardly notice it. You will be so busy growing up that you won’t see time speeding by you. Don’t worry, growing up is not easy for anyone. You’ll have lots of questions about lots of things and you’ll face your share of challenges. I’ll let you in on a secret: It is really very simple. The only thing to remember while growing-up is this:-  When in doubt, always speak the truth. Yes, it is that simple. Your word C is “integrity”.

Ok, let me stop with that thought. I am so looking forward to seeing you!  Here’s wishing you a happy first breath!

Lots of Love,

An Excited Mama-to-be

One Woman, One Life.

Didn’t it start so strange? Us, two random people,

Brought together by technological chance

We started awkward, a balance delicate - feelings gossamer

Orthogonal thoughts ,antithetic backgrounds, shared values

Our story began, so commonly uncommon  

An emotional roller-coaster -

My reservation against your exuberance

My mistrusts , fears against your strength and confidence

Your unflinching devotion and your reasonable counsel

That naughty playful exterior covering solid pragmatic interior

Eventually leading me to see the world ,

With eyes - free of prejudice

And now, I slowly close them, to think of one thing to say

With a throaty lump and racing heartbeat,

“I want to be a better man for you”.

Chocolate Math

(Dusting the ol' blog after a long time..)

As I begin a career in academics, I have been thinking of what I call, the academic SPECTRUM of research. At the one end there is the empirical stuff which is very data driven and essentially an exercise in statistics. At the other end is the theory, which is driven by abstract mathematics.

What is amazing is how mathematics has really become the ONLY language of research - there is absolutely no other recognized way to communicate ideas in academics. Now, whether this is a good thing , especially in the social sciences, is a point of debate. (which, sadly, nobody wants to get into).

An uncharitable view of economics is that it is an elaborate exercise in "mathematical curve fitting" . By that, I mean - you pick up some nice smooth curves (log x, e to the x etc) from the mathematicians and then write stories to link them up with real-world phenomenon. Now, obviously - the properties of the above curves have been extensively researched by the math guys, so over-enthusiastic economists try to ascribe real world meanings to every one of properties and call them by grand names "Law of ..." this and that.. How else would you make a discipline out of it ! (The math guys will be like, whoa! dude - SLOW DOWN)

Anyway, the justification is that these are on a  "best efforts" basis. I buy that notion. After all, mathematics helps keep your thinking straight (and these are Krugman's words). But really, the most important thing that people seem to forget is this :

Math can only take you so far. We are nowhere close to the level of sophistication required to handle the real-world. Think of it as playing with binary digits while real world phenomenon requires the notion of complex coordinates.

More practically, what does this mean to all the academics doing research in economics & finance ?

Here's an analogy :
Imagine math as pure chocolate coming from the cocoa tree. There is a long line of economists lined up in front of the tree. At the very end of the line, far away from the tree, are the "white chocolate" economists - who use a little bit of math (chocolate) but a LOT of milk, sweeteners etc - in the work they do. They are far away from the "pureness" of the tree and closer to the town (real world) where they sell their economic ideas (white chocolate). At the very beginning of the line, are the "dark chocolate" economists, who use a LOT of math and very little of anything else. They don't really have much business with the town, most 'consumers' can't digest a lot of this variety. Right ON the tree are the mathematicians themselves ! Here, the chocolate cocoa is BITTER - Imagine, these guys must be really hard-core to like that stuff.

So, a potential researcher should decide which section of the line he wants to belong to. For myself, I can't be ON the tree ! Pure cocoa is too bitter for me. I'd like my feet grounded, though I prefer living in the forest rather than a being a man-about-town ;)  So, here's to the dark chocolate days !!

The Gilded Cage

The fledglings soared - higher, faster, stronger
They lived to 'Succeed', never to wander

But what comprises Success - the query hardly grows old
"Possession of food, and land and gold "

And so the brilliant birds, of glow and feather
Were taught to yearn - for promised lands of Enclosure

The Confined Land - it offered food, land and gold
But - in beautiful cages, of gilded bars manifold

Readily accepting, the birds began Life - in grand confines anon
The promise of regular food, turning whispers down

But Life got funny - it twisted and turned
Forcing birds to think - is it true , that which we learned :-

Is Success about land or is it about gold ?
Or is it Internal - a Fulfillment, to look back from old ?

And so began the longing - to break free and fly
To be just a Bird, sans gilded cage and rye

A chance Moment - door opens, but time is fickle
Two choices - blue, wild sky - closed, safe receptacle :
Crossroads - Zero Hour. Perched with wings spread
Awaits many a Bird.

‘Suitable’ Boys and Girls (On Why It Is Not What It Is – Or Is It. Not.)

It takes a fair bit of pluck to even attempt to understand Indian marriages. Consider, the fact that it is just not clear, till the very end, as to WHO is getting married. One would think that a marriage between A and B would, principally, involve exactly two people – (the above mentioned A and B). But no, my naive readers – it is much more complex than that. Take for instance, the case when A’s second cousin’s uncle’s grandfather had a show-down with B’s grandmother’s maternal cousin thrice removed -(at a time when a certain white powder was in vogue for dental hygiene). This random sparring of the grand-uncles, estimated to have occurred in circa 1900, if brought to light a mere 100 years later, can potentially damage the matrimony of A & B. So everyone is frantically trying to bury a non-existent hatchet. [ Never mind that, not just the hatchet, even the grand-uncles are already six feet under].

If you just rolled your eyes and looked skywards, then hold your gaze right there. We look up to the skies as well. After all, marriages are made in heaven(ly bodies). Douglas Adams would have called it the Galactic Improbability Correlation. The Galactic Improbability Correlation is essentially a piece of paper written about Mr.A and Ms.B (before either learned to read; and that’s the trick really) - with some Euclidean geometry thrown in for good measure. [Some call it horoscope, but that’s just semantics]. Anyway, this rule requires the planetary positions of Mr.A and Ms.B to have a high correlation. [ The astute reader might have guessed that by its very definition of improbability, the correlation often turns out to be imaginary].

Anyway, it is not all about imaginary worlds. We are intensely practical folks too. How else would you explain the fact that a working knowledge of a machine such as, say, an electric generator can actually help further your chances at marriage. Yes, we have power problems in India and it does help to have a handy ‘man of the house’. Is that it ? Er..not really. I was merely alluding to the fact that an engineering degree is a ticket to marital bliss in India. It is true, an engineering degree with a job in computer programming, will certainly take your stock in the arranged marriage market, north. Now, it is anybody's guess as to what the knowledge of electromagnetism has to do with matters of the heart, but enough said.

But let me emphasize that your humble blogger is merely making observations and reserving judgment. After all the proof is in the pudding: To put 1.2 billion people on the planet is no mean achievement.

What keeps me awake at night...

The High Court announced its verdict on Ajmal Kasab today. They seem to believe that he deserves some kind of punishment. I am impressed, really. Oh and it took them all of 3 years to arrive at that conclusion and it will take another 7 years before he MIGHT get punished. These guys are exceeding my expectations.

What is justice and why does society mete out punishment to wrongdoers ? These are important questions to ask and answer. (Disclaimer: the discussion here is NOT based on my reading or interpretation of the law, I claim absolutely no formal exposure to these concepts)

Okay, the answer to “why punishment” is not as obvious as it seems. Remember, no amount of punishment can ‘right’ a ‘wrong’. Punishing a murderer does NOT bring back the man he murdered. Period. And yet, as a society, we believe in delivering punishment. Why ?

There are two fundamental pillars underlying punishment : The concept of “retribution” and the concept of “deterrence”. Retribution arises from our fundamental subjective understanding of the ideas of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’. I won’t go into morality and its origins, but let’s just say that MOST (=sane) people such as you and me believe that taking an innocent man’s life is fundamentally ‘wrong’. So punishing a man who does so, reinforces our beliefs and provides mental satisfaction. In other words, “retribution” is inextricably linked to the emotional aspect of a human being and it is that, which indeed, makes us human. Take the simple example of two children eating candy bars: Child A snatches Child B’s candy, which rightfully does not belong to him. Now, the parent scolds Child A and punishes her. Child B is served retribution.

The second pillar of punishment is the idea of “deterrence”. By serving punishment to criminals, you deter other potential criminals from committing similar crimes. If a mass murderer is hanged, then society believes that the knowledge/witnessing of the hanging will make other psychopaths to think twice before they embark on their planned executions. In the example of the children, a third Child C, who sees Child A being punished will think twice before snatching a candy bar from any of her peers.

The important thing to realize is that these are not purely ‘logical’ concepts. They go deep into the fundamental idea of being ‘human’ and ‘moral’, so ANY person who does not understand or much less, believe in them, can be considered mentally deranged. In fact, the mind of a criminal/psychopath lacks this very concept of justice. Park this conclusion in your mind because I intend to bring this up later.

Now, I make the claim that DELAYING punishment flies in the face of the very fundamental notions of justice described above. Essentially I argue that if justice is delayed, then the very purpose of punishment is simply not served. It is almost as if, there is no need for punishment any more. Take the case of retribution. In the simple example of the children, it absolutely makes no sense for the parent to punish Child A, a whole YEAR, after her having snatched the candy bar. Think about it. Child B has long since moved on and it is very likely that he won’t even REMEMBER the incident. Since it has been a year , the punishment does not seem to “matter” any more. This is a very important point. We cannot talk of retribution without simultaneously accounting for the TIME dimension.

Now consider the deterrence argument. Since the parent punished Child A after an year, Child C who was deviously clever and observant came to the following conclusion : “ Whoa! So it takes more than a year for the grown-ups to catch up. Nice! In a year’s time – I won’t even BE in this neighbourhood. I can hardly predict what’s going to happen next WEEK, so who knows how things will be a YEAR later. Let me take my chances and snatch that candy bar !! “ Essentially, a DELAY in punishment has exactly the opposite effect. It serves as an INCENTIVE to criminals to take their chances and go ahead with their crimes.

To summarize, justice that is DELAYED serves absolutely no purpose whatsoever and contradicts the two basic pillars of punishment. Lets look at the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. Ajmal Kasab murdered innocent civilians in cold blood. That fact is undisputable. Now, Kasab will file an appeal with the Supreme Court and then the mercy plea with the President. It will be 2018 by the time he gets “punished” (will that word have any meaning any more?)

Ask the families of Ameena Begum or Mira Chatterjee, two of the many innocent women massacred at CST, if they care. Find out if it matters anymore for the kin of Inspector Vijay Salaskar or Constable Yogesh Patil who died trying to save lives. Ask the father of Vinod kumar who lost both his wife and son together in the senseless killings. These are normal people like you and me. And they didn’t deserve to die. They didn’t.

What kind of twisted perverted society do I live in ? To me, a society that condones delay in serving punishment is no different from the dark mind of a deranged criminal because, as I demonstrated earlier, the DELAY represents a basic travesty of the very two pillars of punishment. In effect, it goes against our fundamental notions of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ and finally questions our basic notions of being ‘human’. And guess what ? This inhuman society finds itself going all out to protect and provide for the mass murderer. The Times of India reports that Rs 45 crore has already been spent on the upkeep of his ‘special’ jail. At a daily expenditure of Rs 9 lakh, the tax payer will ‘sponsor’ the killer to the tune of Rs.200 crore by 2018. [Oh, did I mention that the innocent people whom he murdered in cold blood received half his DAILY expenditure as ‘compensation’]

And please please, spare me the ‘eye-for-an-eye-leaves-the-country-blind’ crap. What is the point of having eyes if we don’t even blink in the face of injustice ?

A dash of Bertie !!

Not just me, YOU, would have hardly imagined. Yet, recent circumstances in my life have distinctly taken a Wodehousian turn. Yes, the good ol' life, has just gotten....how shall we call it....Idyllic. Indubitably. That's the word. Truly, positively Bertie Wooster-ish.

Although I don't scamper off getting engaged to random-golden-haired-blue-eyed damsels as Bertie does, I undoubtedly share his penchant for faux pas on the romantic front ! My whole experience with the dating scene in our great country (blotted by acts of devouring random variants of a spicy dish made of semolina with caffeine on the side) , has been a tad too Interesting. (consider the deliberate capitalization as a forced attempt at being euphemistic).

And then there is the whole idea of having to work for a living. Bah ! So Bourgeois. My kind employer's extended sabbatical leave (which is sure to drastically end if they chance upon this blog) have so re-organized my day's schedule as to give me enough temporal latitude to attempt reading scary books such as these. But classic literature, does make you say la belle vie, doesn't it ? Some of the recent ones such as this (Sheesh, don't look at me like that, I turned ALL of a tender 29 yesterday) and this were splendid, to say the least.

And the Bertie resemblance doesn't end there. I have my fair share of aunts who's recent calling in life is to get me married ASAP lest they begin to chew-glass-and-make-sacrifices-by-moonlight.

All in all, I epitomize Bertie's fried-egg feeling.

Now, irrespective of how long these 'trying' circumstances of serendipity last, I have made a firm resolution on my 29th birthday (isn't that Bertie's perpetual age?). Witness under oath : Bili, a.k.a fellow Drone.

I intend to get more creative and serious in my not-so-idle pursuits. Writing. Here I come !!!

Sanskrit, sans SPIRIT

Had an interesting discussion with Bili the other day. It arose as we were ambling around in Gandhi Bazaar and discussing an upcoming Sanskrit Sammelana (conference) in Bangalore that both of us plan to attend.

Sanskrit always brings back fond memories of Vijaya High School, where I completely fell in love with the language.

As the name implies, Samskrutham = Samyak (well) + Krutham (done) Iti. (A language that is) well done. Period. There is an inherent quality of appeal in Sanskrit that is difficult to explain. You got to experience it.

And hey - like all languages, Sanskrit expects certain rules to be followed. I don't understand why people make a big deal out of it.

That's what Bili and I were discussing. Why is Sanskrit so MYSTIFIED, especially by people who don't know the language ? (I don't mean to sound pompous, I am no expert honestly) Anyway, the talk of Sanskrit, almost always, seems to imply " something to do with religion" ?! I don't understand why people confuse "antiquity" with "divinity". Yes, it is an ancient language but that doesn't make it divine per se.

Back in Vijaya High School, we learnt Sanskrit just as we did any other language. We played around with words and grammar, discussed language intricacies during lunch breaks - I remember a particular incident when our headmaster EAVESDROPPED into our conversation and began sharing HIS opinions! A great scholar of the language, he soon had us hanging on every word of his. And not only that, unknown to us, there was a small crowd developing around the entire flight of stairs where WE were accosted by HIM!

So, that's how our sanskrit teachers at Vijaya High School were. They made the language exciting to learn, simple. No divinity, no mantras, no fear. For us 14 year olds, it was pure play ! I remember we were disappointed that the language didn't have many(any?) abuses and so we even tried inventing a few !!

After all, don't you know namma Sanskrit has its POLI (Kannada for naughty/saucy) aspects as well ? Haha.

I remember a Subhashita that goes : "Durjanam Prathamam Vande, Sajjanam Tadanantharam. Mukha Prakshaalanaath Poorvam ___ ____".
[ Although a little vulgar, the metaphor is good, lets admit it !]

And can 17 year old males (who did PU-II Sanskirt) ever forget that racy dialogue on female underclothing from Kalidasa's Shakuntala ? LOL

OK, if you just felt that I am trying to "besmear" this ancient language, clearly you haven't understood my point at all. Sanskirt is one of our most treasured possessions and any semblance of "revival" can only be possible if we starting treating it like a "normal" language.

Remove the spiritual paraphernelia that is suffocating its existence.

We need Sanskrit, sans(without) spirit.

Games !

As I walk in front of my street, I hear kids playing cricket with a good measure of, what is most essential to gully cricket, Screaming.

Yes, be it fighting over who gets to bat first (because the ball is invariably lost before the end of the game) or over a misfield ("thoothu!") - screaming in gully cricket is the highlight of the kids' evenings, as much as it reminds home-owners of their dear glass windows.

Back in 5th grade, I remember playing endlessly in the hot sun on weekends. Too bad the ground I used to play in, has been converted into a park - 'keep off the grass' - Blah!

Vinay, Me, Amit, D.T, Asim, Junaid, Baddi, Vaadi and Chunts. (Hmm..Who am I missing?) We had a team of 11, and we fought cricket battles every weekend with the formidable "Scouts" and the quite-beatable "Korag-ers"[ LOL did you get that? 'Koragu' is Kannada for 'Crib'. They were notorious for cribbing on wanting to bat]

Good times.

So the culture of gully cricket, replete with all its expressions, has passed intact to today's kids.

" BOWLED'IM !!" probably made sense but, it took me a loooong time to realize what "AWZAAAAOUT !!" meant back then or how one should spell 'SCREEEZ' !! LOL.

So, that's the good news about cricket.

But what makes me a little sad is that I hardly see kids playing BUGURI these days. Buguri is an expertise game, where you spin wooden tops with metal tips using strings of ropes. An advanced players can hoist those tops anywhere - make them spin on their palms, for example (ouch). And then we had contests where we break the opponents' spinning Buguri with ours. Very skillful I must say. I wonder if shops even SELL buguri's these days.

And then there was LAGORI. Yet another amazing game. You pile up stones of different sizes and make a pyramid. There are two teams with opposing goals - of 'making' the pyramid and of 'breaking' it. The team making it must dodge the attack of the opposite team, which uses a ball as its projectile. Highly recommended when you have a big group.

There was CHINNI KOLU and there was TYRE ! The latter was totally a no-brainer. Meant for kids of the AATAK-UNTU-LEKKAK-ILLA variety. Essentially, those who were too young to understand any rules. You just give them a stick and find an old discarded vehicle tyre lying around somewhere. (We couldn't afford the whole vehicle you see!) And off you go speeding tyres and maneuvering them with sticks. Gosh ! I used to get so black and dirty playing with tyres :)

I wonder if kids today get out and get dirty as often as we used to.

Actually, today's kid prefers a WHOLE car to play with. Not just a tire. Hmm, evolution.