Global warming....

Grave danger?
http://www.ecobridge.org/content/g_dgr.htm
As the eagle was killed by the arrow winged with his own feather, so the hand of the world is wounded by its own skill. -Helen Keller

A study, by scientists at the World Health Organization (WHO) determined that 154,000 people die every year from the effects of global warming, from malaria to malnutrition, children in developing nations seemingly the most vulnerable. These numbers could almost double by 2020.
http://www.climatecrisis.net/

Fake/spoof?
http://www.rightsidenews.com/200811052492/editorial/the-great-global-warming-swindle.html
Getting electricity is a matter of life and death for about a third of the world's population. Africa has coal and oil, but the greens say these must be left untouched. This is barbaric. To try to restrict the world's poorest people to using the most expensive and unreliable forms of electrical generation (wind and solar) is effectively to tell them they can't have electricity.

http://www.hidesertstar.com/articles/2008/11/05/editorial/opinion2.txt


Well.. I don't know.. both sides of the coin..
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_4387552
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/207774/the_global_warming_controversy_.html

One thing seems to be sure.. The earth is heating up..
The discussion is whether human activity caused this or not.. This discussion is critical as this leads to what we can do to prevent global warming (if at all this needs to be prevented, which again is a point of discussion)..

All said and done, global warming aside, no one can deny the fact that man induced greenhouse gases are doing no good to the earth or it's inhabitants (even if they do not cause global warming). It would be a good initiative if we consider carbon footprint as one of the parameters judging our progress.

Less Facilities: More Enjoyment

A passage from one of the papers of the great Knuth.. This certainly seems to be a practical way to arouse passion for computer science among students..

One rather curious thing I've noticed about aesthetic satisfaction is that our pleasure is significantly enhanced when we accomplish something with limited tools. For example, the program of which I personally am most pleased and proud is a compiler I once wrote for a primitive minicomputer which had only 4096 words of memory, 16 bits per word. It makes a person feel like a real virtuoso to achieve something under such severe restrictions.

A similar phenomenon occurs in many other contexts. For example, people often seem to fall in love with their Volkswagens but rarely with their Lincoln Continentals (which presumably run much better). When I learned programming, it was a popular pastime to do as much as possible with programs that fit on only a single punched card. I suppose it's this same phenomenon that makes APL enthusiasts relish their "one-liners." When we teach programming nowadays, it is a curious fact that we rarely capture the heart of a student for computer science until he has taken a course which allows "hands on" experience with a minicomputer. The use of our large-scale machines with their fancy operating systems and languages doesn't really seem to engender any love for programming, at least not at first.

It's not obvious how to apply this principle to increase programmers' enjoyment of their work. Surely programmers would groan if their manager suddenly announced that the new machine will have only half as much memory as the old. And I don't think anybody, even the most dedicated "programming artists," can be expected to welcome such a prospect, since nobody likes to lose facilities unnecessarily. Another example may help to clarify the situation: Film-makers strongly resisted the introduction of talking pictures in the 1920's because they were justly proud of the way they could convey words without sound. Similarly, a true programming artist might well resent the introduction of more powerful equipment; today's mass storage devices tend to spoil much of the beauty of our old tape sorting methods. But today's film makers don't want to go back to silent films, not because they're lazy but because they know it is quite possible to make beautiful movies using the improved technology. The form of their art has changed, but there is still plenty of room for artistry.

How did they develop their skill? The best film makers through the years usually seem to have learned their art in comparatively primitive circumstances, often in other countries with a limited movie industry. And in recent years the most important things we have been learning about programming seem to have originated with people who did not have access to very large computers. The moral of this story, it seems to me, is that we should make use of the idea of limited resources in our own education. We can all benefit by doing occasional "toy" programs, when artificial restrictions are set up, so that we are forced to push our abilities to the limit. We shouldn't live in the lap of luxury all the time, since that tends to make us lethargic. The art of tackling miniproblems with all our energy will sharpen our talents for the real problems, and the experience will help us to get more pleasure from our accomplishments on less restricted equipment.

In a similar vein, we shouldn't shy away from "art for art's sake"; we shouldn't feel guilty about programs that are just for fun. I once got a great kick out of writing a one-statement ALGOL program that invoked an innerproduct procedure in such an unusual way that it calculated the mth prime number, instead of an innerproduct [19]. Some years ago the students at Stanford were excited about finding the shortest FORTRAN program which prints itself out, in the sense that the program's output is identical to its own source text. The same problem was considered for many other languages. I don't think it was a waste of time for them to work on this; nor would Jeremy Bentham, whom I quoted earlier, deny the "utility" of such pastimes [3, Bk. 3, Ch. 1]. "On the contrary," he wrote, "there is nothing, the utility of which is more incontestable. To what shall the character of utility be ascribed, if not to that which is a source of pleasure?"

lyrics by sirivennela.. - click to watch video

eppuduu voppukovaddura votami..
eppuduu vodulukovaddura vorimi..

vishraminchavaddu ye kshanam
vismarinchavaddu nirnayam.. appude nee jayam nischayam ra..
eppuduu voppukovaddura votamiii..

ningi entha pedda daina rivvumanna guvvapilla rekka mundu takkuvenu ra..
ningi entha pedda daina rivvumanna guvvapilla rekka mundu takkuvenu ra..
sandramentha goppa daina eedutunna chepa pilla moppa mundu chinnadenu ra..

paschimana ponchi vundi ravini mingu asura sandhya vokkanadu neggaledu ra..
gutakapadani aggi vunda saagarananeedukuntu tuurupinta telutundi ra..
nishavilasamentasepura.. ushodayanni evvadapura..
ragulutunna gunde kuda suryagolamantidenu ra..
eppuduu voppukovaddu ra votamii..

noppi leni nimushamedi jananamaina maranamaina jeevitana adugu aduguna..
noppi leni nimushamedi jananamaina maranamaina jeevitana adugu aduguna..
neerasinchi nilichipothe nimishamaina needi kadu bratuku ante nitya garshana..
dehamundi pranamundi netturundi sattuvundi intakanna sainyamunduna..
dehamundi pranamundi netturundi sattuvundi intakanna sainyamunduna..

aasha neeku astramaunu.. swasa neeku sastramaunu.. aasayammu saradhaunura..
nirantharam prayatnamunnada.. nirasha ke nirasha puttada?
nirantharam prayatnamunnada.. nirasha ke nirasha puttada?
aayuvantu vunnavaraku chavu kuda neggaleka savamu paine gelupu chatura..
eppuduu voppukovaddura votami..

Nandankanan

Recently I have visited nandankanan zoo in bhuwaneswar. It was indeed a real feast to my eyes. We had to travel for around an hour from bhuwaneswar to reach nandankanan, but it was worth the effort..

Be it the large barn owl staring at you inside the cave(I was very reluctant to leave it.. It was the first time I loved the sight of an owl.. The only time it blinked it's eyes is when the flashlight from my camera filled it's eyes), handsome lions or flamboyant elephants(they are moving everywhere and always ready to bless u with their trunks), the place is an amazing spectacle. I loved the macau(very beautiful but got a ear-breaking harsh voice). The guide explained that this zoo is filled with happy families(sukhee) (chimpanzee) as well as sad families(dukhee) (orengetton, spectacle monkey, hirans). Initially I ignored his comments but upon seeing the animals, I had to believe it :))

Coming to birds.. dancing peacocks (white and green), ostriches, numerous kinds of parrots and pigeons (I liked the green pigeon), love birds, ducks.. while your eyes savour on their beauty, their chirps and quacks will definitely put your hearing device to test..

The crocodiles breeding ground (oh my god.. so many crocodiles),elephant bathing centre, cunning hynae, rattle snakes and pythons, tigers(white and bengal), big bears, small bears, black buck (guide explained as the one salman khan shot), large numbers of beautiful birds flocking on the trees around crocodile breeding ground, leopards (u don't need to be a poet to appreciate their elegance).. It was indeed an experience which will stay with me for long..

Introdutory sentences from David Copperfield..

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. To begin my life with the beginning of my life, I record that I was born (as I have been informed and believe) on a Friday, at twelve o'clock at night. It was remarked that the clock began to strike, and I began to cry, simultaneously.

In consideration of the day and hour of my birth, it was declared by the nurse, and by some sage women in the neighbourhood who had taken a lively interest in me several months before there was any possibility of our becoming personally acquainted, first, that I was destined to be unlucky in life; and secondly, that I was privileged to see ghosts and spirits; both these gifts inevitably attaching, as they believed, to all unlucky infants of either gender, born towards the small hours on a Friday night.

I need say nothing here, on the first head, because nothing can show better than my history whether that prediction was verified or falsified by the result. On the second branch of the question, I will only remark, that unless I ran through that part of my inheritance while I was still a baby, I have not come into it yet. But I do not at all complain of having been kept out of this property; and if anybody else should be in the present enjoyment of it, he is heartily welcome to keep it.

nothing more needs to be said about the style of charles dickens.. Go grab the book if you haven't read it already (Don't complain I didn't warn you that it is a classic and contains a lot of melodrama in it..)

Digital library of India

Digital library of India is a great abode for telugu(for that matter any indian regional language) lovers.
Though the interface is very lame and unfriendly, the books compensate for that. Some great regional books are scanned and uploaded here for online reading.
You can find some all time greats listed here. Be it the wisdom of SriSri guiding you, chalam questioning you through his musings or the wit of chilakamarthi amusing you.. you can find some nice telugu stuff here. Some of the books that belong here are published back in 1850 s.
There are also books on different subjects, newspapers, journals and manuscripts.

philosophy

Right from my childhood, whenever I heard the word 'philosophy' or 'philosopher', I heard them for all the wrong reasons.
When someone says "Oh my god! this world is getting on me.." people say that he is talking like a philisopher. But are philisophers really so boring and lame??
Recently I read the book Sophie's World and came to the conclusion, "NO".
Philosophers are the most rational people in the world.
They are the brave enough to break all the chains which the human beings formed around themselves and set out to find the truth.
Every philosopher has his philosophical aim, to find the answers to some of the questions facing the humanity.
Philosophers are the pillars who built the world in which we are living. One philosopher's aim was to find how human is built. From there came the biological sciences. Other philosopher is more interested in how human should live.. And it lead to social sciences. Philosopher don't have any scientific equipment to find truth about his questions.

His only weapon is his mind and he puts it to atmost use. His approach is through reason.
He finds the truth much before the scientists get the equipment to certify it.
Democritus said that every thing in this world is made of atoms, long long before the invention of microscopes to certify that.

This whole world is like a white rabbit pulled out of a big hat, by the world's most wonderful magician.
We are like small ants in the fur of the rabbit. While others go deep down the fur and hide themselves in the comfort and warmth present there, philosphers raise to the very tips of the fur to have a look at the magic being displayed.
They want to see the magic. They are excited like a child entering a magic show.
They want to see how the magician is and the reason behind the trick he performs.
They want to understand there role in this whole show.
Philosphers are not indifferent. They are indeed the ones who are not indifferent.

Moving on

This one might prove to be a little bit heavy.. but I found it helpful..
These are some points I came across in an article

"It is better to have loved and lost than not to have loved at all.
It is better to be cheated than to be a cheat. It is better to have suffered the wrong
than to have done the wrong. Bitter yesterdays create a better tomorrow because of the maturity gained out of those experiences. When bad things happen to good people, they
become better people. This is the plan on which life is built. Don't ask for an alternative design… none exists."

"A saying goes - 'Today can be the last day of your life'. True. Equally true is the fact that today is the first day of the rest of your life. The beginning is from where you begin.
Let us begin today. Begin now. Begin here and move on."

"Carrying is an effort. Dropping is a decision. You have been labouring over your emotional baggage. Make a decision and drop it. The person you will become in life is waiting for you in the future. Go and meet him."

So my dear friends, if you are depressed about your past, this is the dose you need.

Fuel consumption tips

Hi guys,
Here are some useful fuel consumption tips that I found in my companies newsletter:

Car Owners:

1. Frequent stopping and short distance travel consumes more fuel.

2. Traffic conditions - The mileage will be less in heavily crowded areas than in smoother roads.

3. Needless idling at traffic lights affect fuel consumption. For example, ten minutes idling wastes 100cc of fuel.

4. Tyre pressure - Recommended tyre pressure should be maintained. The tyre pressure should be checked in cold condition, that is, during morning. The recommended pressure is given in the sticker pasted on Fr. RHS door and in the owner’s manual. Less tyre pressure will increase fuel consumption.

5. Driving at higher speed consumes more fuel than driving at steady speed of 45 to 55 km/h in top gear.

6. Changing of gears should be carried out -From 1st to 2nd @10 Km/h, 2nd to 3rd@20 Km/h, and 3rd to 4th@30 Km/h. 5th gear should be only be put if you are sure constant speed can be maintained for some time.

7. Adulterated or less quantity of fuel dispensed by petrol pumps would indicate poor fuel efficiency.

8. Clogged air filter, worn out clutch, badly tuned engine and high pollution levels increase fuel consumption.If the fuel consumption is high, you must visit your authorized dealer for inspection and fuel consumption testing.

Bike Owners:

1. Avoid traveling in low gear as much as possible. At any speed, try to stay in as high gear as possible without bike giving jerks due to chain snatch or engine stalling.

2. Avoid using brakes as much as safely possible because by using brake we are wasting energy (==petrol).

3. Avoid higher speed, because at higher speed we are wasting energy (==petrol) in overcoming air friction resistance rather than covering distance, which is our objective.

4. Keep brakes as free (loose) as possible, so that they do not unnecessarily touch (and waste energy==petrol) when we do not need them.

5. Keep air pressure in tires to the recommended level because less air in tires creates higher friction resistance between tire and road surface, and wastes petrol.

6. Keep clutch well adjusted, because slipping of clutch wastes petrol.

7. Clean air filter regularly.

8. Clean carburetor, especially float chamber and jets, and also clean spark plug regularly every 2000 km.

9. Daily check for leakages of petrol from fuel cock, cracked fuel pipes, fuel filter, and all pipe joints.

10. Also check and adjust chain tension regularly.

Hope they are useful considering the mounting petrol rates.
Thanks.

an inspirational quote

As one person I cannot change the world, but I can change the world of one person.

frozen thoughts..

hi,

I wonder why I named my blog as frozen thoughts..
Might be the website www.frozenthoughts.com I used to browse stood as an inspiration..
But there's much more.
I want my blog to be the point where I freeze the best of my thoughts before they are drifted in the endless stream.. So this is the museum where I intend to preserve and display a few of my thoughts which I feel valuable.. Let me share with you some of the interesting facts about freezing your thoughts I have come across in an article recently..


Various sources suggest that the average number of thoughts per day is around 12,000 to 50,000. Most of these thoughts tend to be habitual.

Each of these thoughts, at the physical brain level, releases a shower of chemicals. These
chemicals in turn transfer their messages throughout the body. Neuroscientists estimate that the human brain contains 100 billion neurons with each neuron having about 1,000 connections. Each connection on an average fires 200 times per second resulting in 20,000 trillion calculations per second! And all this consumes loads of life energy. If we can reduce the number of thoughts even by a small percentage, it will have a huge bearing on our lives.


Our minds behave as though they have a mind of their own. Now, when our mind gets
carried away and runs out of control, it may seem like an infinite number of thoughts. But if we
write them down, we'll find no more than a few dozen. Our minds rarely churn out as much
'original thought' as we think. Ninetyfive out of the hundred thoughts we have in a day are the
same as those from the previous day. Despite our huge potential for fresh thinking and creativity, our mind mostly repeats. We deepen decade-old ruts minute after minute after minute. For all the variety that exists, the perceptions that run through our minds each day are similar. The memories are similar. The urges, the emotions, the plans - they're all similar. If you
pluck a few minutes of your thoughts from your day, you may easily pluck a minuscule of your
whole life. This is the habitual mind. When we feel tired at the end of the day, it is rarely because of the work we did; we are actually tired because of the countless and
needless revolutions of our mind.


It is truly dangerous for man to live his life not even aware of his own thoughts. When we succeed in reducing the number of thoughts, we will observe a remarkable improvement
in the quality of our thoughts. How? If we reduce the number of thoughts we have, the thought
congestion comes down, and then we will find that we are able to hold every thought a little longer. The longer we can hold on to a thought, the more potent the thought becomes. Every thought has creative power and the longer we hold a thought, the more powerful it becomes. With every thought we send out this essence of ourselves, which then mingles with other essences and creates and re-creates our physical environment. In that sense, our life is not our master but our child. This is why it is so important to develop selfawareness to such depths that no creation can come about in our life without us making the choice.


So, when you resolve not to talk, even though the transition will be challenging, when
you eventually succeed, you will observe that the urge to talk has come down. When the urge to talk comes down, the compulsion to think comes down. When the compulsion to think comes down, the number of thoughts comes down. When the number of thoughts comes down, the quality of thoughts improve. Also, when the number of thoughts comes down, we become more aware of our habitual, stale, repetitive thought patterns. The more we become aware of it, the greater will be our control over our thoughts and that will open newer and more creative possibilities. Above all, withdrawing from sensual compulsions including the compelling need to talk will prepare you for the seat of meditation. When we quieten our mind, we will
begin to perceive the divine oneness that we all participate in. So, I strongly advocate to all of
you to abstain from talking for an hour a day or a day a week … in the parlance of a voice therapist take 'voice rest', and go into this state of restful awareness. The benefits of creating moments of withdrawal from talking will be far greater than anything that you can perceive.

“Speak only if you can improve upon silence.”

novel writing..

hi..

Did you ever think about writing a novel?
I am sure most of you would.. but you will never find enough time to do it.
It needs a lot a dedication and consumes an amount of time which we cannot spare.
Last week I was browsing the net and found an interesting site.
It's called NaNoWriMo.org..
Here, all those people with a dream (not ambition :-) ) to write a novel will come together and write their own novel in a month.
In one MONTH!! believe me..
You can be a novelist in your own way.
You don't need to pull out something big.. Nobody cares..
Just let your imagination take a hold..
The site has all the resources that will help you complete a 50,000 word novel in one month.
Remember, this is not for those who take novel writing very seriously.
Just make some fun out of it.
The novel writing month is november. .
Turn yourself into a J.K.Rowling and start writing..

A good quote

Friendship isn't a big thing - it's a million little things

Hi all..

Hi friends.. My name is kiran. I am a software professional.