Author: जयकृष्णः | ജയകൃഷ്ണൻ

Ancient Economic Giants

During the late 17th century China and India were economic giants in manufacturing. This article by Philip S Golub has many interesting facts

Before 1800, trade flows between Chinese, Indians, Japanese, Siamese, Javanese and Arabs were much greater than those within Europe. The level of scientific and technical knowledge was high – more so in many fields than that of Europe. Joseph Needham, an authority on Chinese science and technology, emphasised that in terms of technology China was in a dominant position both before and after the European Renaissance (7). Its lead was apparent in fields such as iron and steel, mechanical clocks, engineering (suspension bridges), firearms and deep drilling equipment.

It is not surprising that Asia had a preponderant place in world manufacturing at the time. According to estimates by economic historian Paul Bairoch (8), in 1750 China

One more for Ireland Solution

It was few days back that Salman Khurshid suggested a serious study of the Irish peace process to see if that can be applied to solve the Kashmir problem. Now the moderates in Hurriyat have suggested the same too.

Talking to the Daily Times, the former chairman of a moderate faction of the APHC said there was no harm in seeing the Irish model as a viable option, claiming also that it was an idea once supported by former US President Bill Clinton and it was now being backed by a couple of Indian leaders.
“We feel that among other options it can become the basis for talks aimed at resolving the Kashmir dispute,” the paper quoted him as saying.
“Kashmiris are the main party to the dispute,” he added. But Ansari said any model for the resolution of the dispute must be adopted after considering the pros and cons of that idea. No idea can work if we pick the plus points and ignore the minus,” he said. He said the Irish model must be adopted as a whole and that Pakistan-occupied Kahsmir should not be excluded from the solution to the dispute.[Hurriyat favours Irish model for Kashmir]

Earlier they had come up with the Andorra model solution for the problem. I don’t think the General will be happy with this as his solution is much more simpler

Buddha in Tanjavur

Theodore Bhaskaran discovered some panels in the Great temple at Tanjavur showing the Buddha.

There are at least two panels featuring the Sakyamuni: one at the base of the second gopuram and the other in the main temple. Here, events are depicted in comic-strip style, using small sequential sculptural panels. This was an artistic convention that can be observed in the temples of the medieval period in Tamil Nadu. You can see similar story-telling miniature sculptures in other temples also. It could be an episode from mythology or depicting a historical event. At the Vaikuntha Perumal temple in Kanchipuram, certain events from Pallava history are told in the manner, while at the Gangaikondacholapuram temple, the story of Bhagiratha is depicted similarly.

The second set of Buddha figures is in the body of the main temple, on the right balustrade of the step leading into the sanctum and on the southern side. There are three sculpture pieces here. The first one shows Buddha seated under a tree, flanked by royalty. The gandharvas are depicted on the upper part of the frieze. The next one shows Buddha standing under a tree, and royalty worshipping him. Behind them are the gandharvas, also in a posture of supplication.The Buddha at Thanjavur

In that article there is mention of Buddhism flourishing in the coastal region during the Chola period and Jainism in the delta region. In Kerala there were many Buddhist temples many of which were later believed to be converted to Hindu Temples. The most famous of them is Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala.

Languages and Brain

There has been a study in Britain on the brain structure of bilingual people and

They found learning other languages altered grey matter – the area of the brain which processes information – in the same way exercise builds muscles. People who learned a second language at a younger age were also more likely to have more advanced grey matter than those who learned later, the team said. Scientists already know the brain has the ability to change its structure as a result of stimulation – an effect known as plasticity – but this research demonstrates how learning languages develops it.

The scans revealed the density of the grey matter in the left inferior parietal cortex of the brain was greater in bilinguals than in those without a second language. The effect was particularly noticeable in the “early” bilinguals, the findings published in the journal Nature revealed. Learning languages ‘boosts brain’

Since most Indians learn multiple languages in school (I had to learn three languages, English, Malayalam and Hindi), does this mean that we have more density of the grey matter than anyone else ?

The Australian Elections

John Howard won by a narrow margin in Australia with a swing of less than 2% and James Taranto immediately branded it as a defeat for al Qaeda as if the whole election was fought on that issue. Australia has only 800 odd troops in Iraq and they have not suffered any casualities.

The election was not a referendum on the Iraq war because the issue was buried by the Labor Party and the mass media. Despite the mountain of evidence showing that the war was based on lies, Howard was never challenged by opposition leader Mark Latham, who maintained that the issue of

Undisclosed Location

ABC news has an article on Pakistan’s test of its nuclear capable Ghauri V missile from an undisclosed location. The undisclosed location news was carried by all major newspapers in India too, like Times of India. The ABC news was from AP while PTI reported the Times of India news.
Only if these newspapers had used Google, they could have found this information

ISN SECURITY WATCH (12/10/04) – Pakistani dictator General Pervez Musharraf marked the fifth anniversary of the military coup that put him in power by test-firing an upgraded version of the Ghauri (previously known as the Hatf V) medium-range ballistic missile. The missile, in its fourth test-firing from Malot in Jhelum District, about 121 kilometers south of the capital Islamabad, is capable of carrying both nuclear and conventional 700-kilogram warheads to a maximum range of 1

North Ireland type solution for Kashmir

This is the season of proposing solutions to the Kashmir Problem. There was a solution to adjust the LoC so that India would give some land to Pakistan. Then there was the Andorra proposal. Now a Congress leader Salman Khurshid has suggested looking at the Northern Ireland model for solving this problem.

Pointing out to the emergence of the European Union, which obliterated the issue of territorial boundary in Northern Ireland, Khurshid said: “If that (emergence of a Union) happens here, then the intensity of the conflict will also go away,” he said. Referring to the resolution of the diplomatic and sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland through a referendum that led to the formation of a Northern Irish parliament, Khurshid suggested a serious study of the Irish peace model in South Asia. “The Irish model is very complicated and deep rooted like (the problem) that we share with Pakistan,” he said.[Khurshid suggests Irish peace model for India, Pak]

Sumantra Bose has a discussion of the North Ireland type solution for Kashmir in his book Kashmir : Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace. But that requires a giant leap of faith and trust between the two nations which is currently lacking.

Indian Ink and Afghan Elections

First the writing of the constitution was considered an impossible task and that was done. After postponing the elections once, Afghans had their chance to vote for their President. But there has been one problem with the indelible ink which was donated by India.

Three years after the fall of the Taliban, Afghans voted in massive numbers Saturday to elect their president for the first time. But the historic and largely peaceful poll quickly fell under a cloud of uncertainty as 15 candidates alleged irregularities and fraud and said they would deem any result “illegitimate.”

The dispute centered on the supposedly indelible ink applied to voters’ thumbs to prevent them from casting ballots more than once. In many precincts, voters said, washable ink was used or indelible ink was applied improperly, allowing the marking to rub off easily and opening the door to repeat voting.[Afghan Votes in Security, but Fraud Allegations Arise]

On BBC News, there was one of the Presidential candidates showing his fingers after voting and his fingers were clean. I have voted many times in Indian elections and all the time the ink would stay for few days and then disappear. So what happened ? Was it the ink that failed ?From a caption under the photo in the Washington Post, it seems the election officials applied regular ink instead of the indelible ink.

Book Review: Digital Fortress

coverLike all other Dan Brown novels this one also starts with a murder. The murdered person, Ensei Tankado was an employee of the National Security Agency, who wrote an unbreakable code which the NSA’s powerful codebreaking machine could not crack. Enter Susan Fletcher, a brilliant and beautiful cryptographer.
At the same time the deputy director of NSA has sent Susan’s boyfriend to retrieve a ring from the dead body in Spain where he is followed by a mysterious assasin. As Susan Fletcher discovers more secrets, you start turning pages more rapidly and as the cover of the book says

The NSA is being held hostage… not by guns or bombs, but by a code so ingeniously complex that if released it will cripple U.S. intelligence. Caught in an accelerating tempest of secrecy and lies, Susan Fletcher battles to save the agency she believes in. Betrayed on all sides she finds herself fighting not only for her country, but for her life, and in the end, for the life of the man she loves.

This book has too much excitement. Each chapter is like one page and ends in a cliff hanger. When you have three hundred such pages, it gets a bit boring and cliched. But you read page one and you cannot keep the book down.
With this book I have finished all of Dan Brown’s books and my favourite is Da Vinci Code, followed by Angels and Demons. Deception Point and Digital Fortress did not impress me as much.