It was a long time ago, in my school days, that I wrote a defiant letter to the principal of our school. I was in the eleventh or twelfth standard, and our school had just got a new principal. The school had been in a state of confusion after the retirement of our previous principal and students […]
Author: raman
Associative Learning and the Root of Stereotypes and Prejudices
A few weeks back, I was showing “Avatar – the Last Airbender” series to my daughter. It took only a little more than a week for us to cover all three seasons (or Books, as they’re called). In addition to cultivating in her a refined taste for high-quality cartoons, I hoped that it would help her […]
Exposing the Institutionalized Injustice of Caste-based Reservation
I saw this image doing the rounds on Facebook (without my own comment in that clumsily crafted star, of course). Though it is a rather stupid argument being made, and takes very less to expose, unfortunately there are many who buy this nonsense without caring to make even that minimum exercise of their brain. Even […]
Titiksha – The Defining Spirit of a Martial Artist
The injury that I got while sparring in the class turned out to be a calf bone fracture, and my leg has been in a plaster cast for over a week. This has made difficult many of the things that I had taken for granted – walking, driving, bathing, even turning over in the bed. Martial arts training has been completely […]
Redress of Historical Wrongs and India’s right to the Koh-i-Noor
Discussion on India’s right to the Kohinoor were recently in the news after the Government of India told the Supreme Court that the diamond was gifted to be British and not stolen by them. This led to further debates on whether Government’s position was factually correct, whether we are the rightful owners of the diamond, and if we should strive […]
Traditional Wisdom for Investors and Entrepreneurs
Much of the wealth of knowledge passed down from an age when writing had yet to be popular is in the form of terse sentences (or phrases) that hold condensed drops of wisdom, referred to as sutras (which which roughly translates to aphorisms in English). One such sutra, which embodies a key aspect of traditional wisdom for investors […]
Relevance and Significance of National Symbols
The recent controversy around someone refusing to shout “Bharat Mata ki Jai” reminded me of an incident sometime back, when a family was reportedly harassed in a theater because they did not stand up for the national anthem. It is bad enough to have a legal requirement to play the national anthem at every screening, and it is absolutely outrageous for […]
JNU Row – Nationalism and the Right to Dissent
Recent events at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Delhi, and the political drama that followed has divided Indians into those who identify themselves as nationalists and others who, equally proudly, proclaim themselves anti-national. The debate has pitted those who pretend to champion freedom of expression and dissent against those who will tolerate no act that may be deemed seditious or […]
Head Transplant in Humans and Some Questions that Follow
New Scientist reported earlier this week on a surgeon’s claim to have conducted a successful head transplant on a monkey, and that he (the surgeon – not the monkey) has plans to attempt the same on humans towards end of next year. Putting aside the obvious and difficult questions of whether the claims are to be believed, and […]
Curious Result of Percentage Changes in Value
This will be elementary to those who are sound in high school maths, but might easily be overlooked by others. Since it is counter-intuitive to the untrained mind, as well as relevant in many day-to-day situations, hope this discussion will be valued at least by some. Yes, value is the topic of this discussion – specifically, the […]