I remember something similar happened when I was around 10 years old.  This that the world was going to end and I was really scared. So I can really relate to the trauma such news must have caused.  At least at that time there were no news channels to constantly hammer the fear into our minds.

Anyway, the experiment has started and I’m still writing this, and you are reading this, and this is a very good indication that we haven’t vanished into the black hole yet (unless of course we are in some parallel time dimension without realizing it).

It is heartening to know that among the 7000 odd scientists engaged with the project, 70 are Indians.  Although 70 is not a big number but at least there is some Indian presence there and we are not merely acting as the fear mongers.

This Wired blog has some great information on the CERN project. You must particularly read the grey box, it contains some cool facts about the experiment, in Twitter format. And look at this URL carefully.

The old post follows:

The massive particle accelerator is supposed to get in action tomorrow, that is September 10, 2008, and many believe that by conducting this experiment the scientists involved are going to annihilate the entire world and may be the entire universe. The experiment is supposed to create the exact conditions that existed in the very beginning of the Big Bang.

The experiment will solve many mysteries of the universe and how our world was formed. They aim to arrive at the “theory of everything”, the unraveling of all the puzzles that have been baffling our great scientific minds, or at least many of them.

So why are people scared, even to the extent of sending death threats to the scientists who are working on this experiment? Some people, and many of them are scientists, believe that this experiment will create tiny black holes that will replicate themselves and consequently they will suck the earth, keep growing bigger and bigger, and eventually it will suck the universe. This tells it is quite an eventful day in the history of the universe. Who could have imagined in the infinite wisdom of our universe that some intelligent life on a tiny planet going around a small star at the edge of the Milky Way would someday collapse the entire universe?

Should we be scared? No, according to the scientists preparing to launch the large Hadron Collider in Geneva. They say that the chances of creating an out-of-control black hole miniscule; such things keep on happening in the universe and nothing drastic happens. Well, you can never be too sure when such massive experiments are involved. What if the world ends tomorrow? Should these scientists be stopped? Frankly, I have no answer.

Whether we survive or vanish, you can see the event live in case you live to tell the tale.

Technorati Tags: CERN, particle accelerator, Hadron Collider, end of the world

Just downloaded and installed Google Chrome…Google’s entry into the browser world. Many are wondering why Google launched Google Chrome when there are already some excellent browsers available, for instance, FireFox and Opera? I think Google has long-term plans to dominate the online software applications market. From e-mail to wordprocessing, from web analytics to ad-click management, Google is offering cutting-edge applications to its users on a platter.  Of course there is the search engine and RSS reader.  Once people begin to use Google Chrome Google will start building all the applications around this browser.

A time will come very soon when the only software people will have on their computers, apart from the basic operating system, will be the browser, and all the applications will be used through that browser. Most of the day-to-day applications these days are remotely hosted and accessed. For instance, many people in the West use Googledocs for their wordprocessing and spreadsheet requirements.  Entire versions of Microsoft Office applications are available online.  In India we don’t notice such developments very fast because pirated software is so easily available and there are no strict laws against copyright violations.  Google’s aims to target the market that uses remotely hosted versions of legacy applications.  I have already noticed that Gmail looks better in Google Chrome — the display is better, and, I don’t know if this is actual or just an illusion, it is quite fast too.

Google Chrome screenshot

Of course there are many plug-ins and features in Firefox and Opera that we take for granted and are so used to using them. Their absence in Google Chrome is a bit annoying but I am sure these features and plug-ins will be available for the new browser very soon.  Another odd thing was when the browser was installing it mentioned something about importing the Firefox bookmarks but the bookmarks never showed up when I loaded Chrome.  Even when I imported the bookmarks manually they didn’t show up.  Nonetheless, it is a cool browser to use and it organizes information very cleverly, and has a few features that I had begun to miss in FireFox. It doesn’t even have the omnipresent menu bar but I don’t miss it.  I would like to use it as my regular browser as soon as I can use with it the plug-ins that I use with Firefox.

Technorati Tags: Google Chrome, FireFox, Opera, browsers

Today I read there are lots of people all over India and abroad who want to help the Bihar flood victims but don’t have the right information. Keeping this in mind I’ve setup a wiki on Bihar floods information. Although I’ll be putting all the information I can get hold of, please sign up and add there all information that you think people can use. You can also help by putting this code on your website/blog, that will display the logo you can see on the sidebar:

<div id="biharfloods">
<a href=http://www.writingcave.com/biharfloods/index.php
title="Bihar Floods Info">
<img src=http://www.writingcave.com/images/biharfloods.gif
alt="Bihar Floods Info" border="0" /></a>
</div>

A 17-year-old girl was raped by two men and the trial court convicted the culprits. As it normally happens, the culprits appealed to the Allahabad High Court. Manifesting a great travesty of justice the High Court judge stunningly acquitted the culprits on the ground that the girl who was raped, was “promiscuous” and was not a virgin when she was raped. Fortunately the U.P. Government appealed to the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court ruled that the HC verdict was bullshit and it should rehear the case.

The logic of the High Court judge was that how can a girl who is used to having sex be believed that somebody had sex with her forcibly? Supreme Court ruled that rape is rape whether the victim is a virgin or not. It took Supreme Court to express such a natural sentiment.

What a shocking judgment it was by the High Court judge. This judge should be immediately removed from his post and should be sent to a mental asylum. Just imagine, so many lives depend on his judgment. What if tomorrow you have to – by any chance – face a trial and this psycho judge is sitting there, about to decide whether you should go to jail or not. Will you trust his judgment if you are in your right mind?

This is a rare case that was backed by a State government and it got some press coverage too. There might be millions of cases being handled by such nutcase judges all over India. Just imagining spending the rest of your life in jail just because your case was heard by such a judge. A precedent should be set; this is not a question of wrong judgment, this was clearly criminal. If this judge can justify a rape then he himself can rape some body, some day. I wonder what stand the Women’s Rights Commission is taking on this, and what other women intellectuals have to say.

Coming back to the question in the heading: should Shiv Sena and Bajrang Dal be banned just the way SIMI is banned? Based on the records of the past SIMI is a terrorist organization that places bombs at public places to cause large-scale destruction. Shiv Sena and Bajrang Dal instigate people and organize and orchestrate riots. So yes in their own big and small ways all these three organizations aspire to cause public disorder and destruction. They are certainly not concerned about their communities. If they were responsible for the Gujarat riots and if they are involved in the current ongoing violence in Orissa then they should certainly be banned. Since they are not full-fledged terrorist organizations they should be banned for a few years. The leaders should be arrested and they should be put on trial like any other criminal. Similar logic should be applied to Christian organizations if they are causing disorder with their activities – there might be a few and our mainstream media being what it is, it might never be covering them.

We need to keep in mind that whenever a citizen is attacked whether by terrorist organizations or by religious outfits it should be handled like a normal criminal case and no justification should be entertained (oh, we are perpetually being vicitimized, oh, they are making us Christians).

Holding a grudge against someone is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.

This is so very very true. I think sometimes we get in these never-ending loops of arguments and counter-arguments without realizing when the discussion has metamorphosed into a senseless talk where more than the topic the important thing is who is proven wrong and who is proven right and who gets to say the last word.

But it is not always right to keep mum and let the other opinion dominate the environment. For instance right now there is lots of misinformation and vicious propaganda in the mainstream media propagated by the so-called "secularists" and "liberals".  In this case lots of harm can be caused if something is not done to counter this propaganda. If a lopsided opinion is thrust upon the masses then lots of social unrest can crop up. All those people who can express themselves should do so in order to maintain a sense of sanity in the country.

Other than that, if there is no national level crisis being caused by your silence and nobody is going to be harmed if you don’t retaliate then it is always better to practice patience whenever somebody — who might already be having some personal problems — attacks you to vent out. Holding a grudge and resenting people for having a different opinion is not worth it.  It needlessly saps your energy and produces toxins inside your body.

The technology will be more beneficial if such energy can be derived from other movements too (no, I knew you would think like that, but I’m not talking about bowel movement), for instance cycling, swings in the park, walking cattle, newsreaders, and all those movements that are prolonged and consistent.  With millions of cellphones in circulation just imagine how much electricity can be saved by such motion based charging.

The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act of 1967, amended in 2004-05, says, "Secession of a part of the territory of India from the Union includes the assertion of any claim to determine whether such part will remain a part of the territory of India." The offences listed under this law include any assertion or statement "which is intended, or supports any claim, to bring about, on any ground whatsoever, the cession of a part of the territory of India or the secession of a part of the territory of India from the Union, or which incites any individual or group of individuals to bring about such cession or secession".

A good thing about our country is that you can speak up your mind without scores of fanatics stalking you and vying to decapitate you, and people like Arundhati Roy know it well, and that is why – since they need targets to feel important and relevant – they chose soft targets. Everybody knows what a bloody history the Muslims have had and – I hate to talk like this but the fact smacks at your face with amplified clarity almost everyday – the expression Islam and peaceful co-existence is an oxymoron. Salman Rushdie and Taslima Nasreen took up cudgels against Islam and you have seen what happened to them. Arundhati Roy, on the other hand, couldn’t even spend a single day in jail in order to take a stand. She knows pretty well that Hindu fanatics are not going to come after her throat, and she knows that there are many obfuscated and somnambulantly liberated people in the country, and abroad, who are going to support her views.

I’m not writing this to badmouth about a community – this is the last thing I want to do – but as a religion, you can only progress if you can indulge in self analysis and rectification, and this is anathema in Islam. And people who support Islam blindly and criticize other religions irrationally are in actuality doing it a great harm. In Sikhism there is this great saying (written, interestingly, by Bhagat Kabir Das):

Sura so pahchaniye jo lare deen ke he

The real warrior-champion is that who fights for the oppressed. These days it has become a fashion to side with Muslims and Christians – at least in India – even when they commit the worst human crimes; by dint of no possible logic they can be viewed as oppressed. It has become kind of a peer pressure. The majority has, all of a sudden, turned into the Gestapo and every minority is like the Jews in Germany; which is totally wrong. They are playing a dangerous game and every right-thinking person in the country should actively oppose such subversive activities.

The Indian state as usual is at its pusillanimous best. I’m wondering how dare a Pakistani flag be waved on the Indian territory. Such people should be immediately shot, and I’m not saying it in anger. You take your flag to another territory (disregard the Olympics and other international events) when you have taken over that territory. If they want to hoist Pakistani flags and want to chant slogans like Jeevey Jeevey Pakistan. Long live Pakistan, then they should be either put behind bars or packed off to Pakistan. They should be slapped and told: no Pakistani flag on the India-occupied territory. It sucks? Yes, it does; too bad.

The older post follows:

Reading this article in the New York Times, you’ll feel what a repressive regime the Indian government is, and how an average Kashmiri craves for azaadi, and is ready to die for it.

A few waved Pakistani flags. Some shouted praise for Lashkar-e-Taiba, the banned Pakistan-based militant organization that India blames for a series of terrorist attacks in recent years. “India, your death will come,” they chanted. “Lashkar will come. Lashkar will come.”

Another mass gathering, however, is planned for Friday at the martyrs’ cemetery, where two generations of those killed in the conflict are buried, with all the potential to become yet another flash point of conflict.

“Before the storm, there is always a calm,” a Kashmiri woman, Assabah Khan, 34, declared. “The uprising we see now is the latent anger against the Indian state that has erupted again.”

Mehmeet Syed, who only a few months ago could sing her heart out on stage with her five-piece rock band, remained caged in her home, as her city erupted in a series of fiery protests and strikes. On the road leading to the Syed family home, children guarded a homemade roadblock the other day, clutching stones.

On Monday, on the edges of an open field where tens of thousands had gathered to vent their anger at Indian rule, Abdul Gani Mir, 62, marveled at a young man who had scaled a chinar tree to plant a green Islamic flag.

Mr. Mir said being here filled him with hope. “We succumbed, but I don’t think this generation will,” he said, and then he chuckled. “I wish I were young.”

His niece was among 20 unarmed Kashmiri protesters killed by Indian security forces last week, as they set off on a march to Muzaffarabad, in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.

Sheik Yasir Rouf, 27, said he had never before taken part in a demonstration so large, so intense. He was a child in the early 1990s, when the anti-Indian rebellion was at its peak. “This feeling was always there,” he said. “We are fighting for our one right to be free.”

A BBC article on the similar lines (OK, I know someone is going to say that both have been, surprise, surprise, written by Bengali writers).

The paralysed nature of the talks seemed bearable since the insurgency in Indian-administered Kashmir since 1990 ebbed during these years.

The valley’s population feels that their homeland is essentially occupied, and harbours a deep sense of oppression over several decades and generations by Indian governments.

This powerful sense of unmitigated grievance was triggered by yet another ’slight’ - the decision to transfer land without any consultation with the valley’s people.

Although the second article is a bit unbiased. I was just wondering, in the international press, why don’t we find articles explaining the Indian side. I use the expression “explaining” because I see this propaganda going on unabated and it is not being cleverly countered.