Saturday, May 19, 2007

Miscellaneous topics

Hi friends,

I warn u guys that its gonna be a heavy/ foolish/ nerdish/ cool/ absurd article. I am tryin to cram up the data otherwise sufficient to churn out 2-3 blogs. Hope it sails through and well.

Topic no 1:
Unification:

Right from the stone age, human beings are trying to compress the knowledge. Most common form is books. Another is artwork. We try to compress diversity into unity. Somehow it seems that human beings like unity. The idea is to "unify" our experiences and to influence the world (this outcome maybe unintentional).
We try to compress specifics into abstract ideas. This capability is unique n thats one of the things that distinguish human beings from other animals. Most elegant example of abstraction is Mathematics.
Another, how we describe India as "unity in diversity".
Another, the ancient idea of panacea.
Another, how the physicists are trying to come up with "the theory of everyhting" which will explain every minute action in this universe.
And what about this?
The idea of "The ultimate truth" or "The only truth". Is it also one of such attempts? To explain everything by tossing up only one answer.
The harmony of unity with diversity is what makes life confusing. Only one form of energy exists but in various disguises. Is that the game? Isnt it interesting?


Topic no 2:
Asymmetry of knowledge.

The author of "freakonomics" says something about asymmetry of knowledge. Its the asymmetry of knowledge and physical limitations that run the world. We all earn our bread and butter by selling our ideas to ppl who dont have as much knowledge as us in that area or who are not enough resourceful to solve the problem themselves. Vegetable monger, shopkeeper, IT professional, fishermen, Microsoft, Autowallah are all governed by the same thing.

That was a cool idea. Asymmetry of knowledge. Freakonomics is an interesting book though I couldnt complete reading it.


Topic no. 3:
Technology wins!

I dont understand the hype about services sector. Whats so much about it? We are giving service to Americans or UK or some other advanced countries. Its bringing us money. Money is ok till one extent. The only thing that brings a nation up is development of new Technology.
They say, US is ahead of us in science by at least 200 years. Doesn't it sound cool? What do you think? Are we really gonna come up? No way. We all buy dumped technology for double price. Where other countries are planning for 4G technologies, we are still at 2G.
Only technology has won wars and diplomacies. You have technology, things ends there.
British won half of the world only with the help of their technology. We are witnessing a upgraded version of that phenomenon now.
We hype about management. But management is an upper layer service. Those guys need input. I hate Indian govt attitude in this area. Being at IISc helps to understand this better. Big MNCs like GM, Microsoft, Motorola, Qualcomm constantly keep an eye on upcoming technology and try to incorporate it. Its a constant effort. Then they develop applications and we buy it after it gets nearly outdated in developed countries. Very few Indian companies do that. Its outrageous. Economic wars are not won by management techniques alone. You need to have something strong as foundation to make management guys rise and take other economies at loggerheads. Apart from tech institutes (number in one digit), we have nothing. There in developed countries MNCs n academicians go hand in hand and keep comin up with something new, something innovative. Here, collaborations between Indian companies and academicians, ha! Not even a thousandth part of that in developed countries. All those ppl do is to buy technology from Foreign companies and sell us. Its just lik a middleman.
Its technology+management wins. Technology is the input. Management is the strategy. And we are not gonna do that in ages if Indian govt doesnt realise it now.

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