Accidental Blogger
A general interest blog
Category: Educational, Cultural & Social Matters
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(Photo: Shunya’s Notes) You flick the light switch to ON and the room lights up. Suppose you know nothing about your town’s central power grid, generators, transformers or the nature of electricity, it is a pretty good guess that you will associate the light coming on with the position of the switch alone. If your…
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I must confess that the first time I heard of Norman Borlaug was a week or so ago in a segment at the end of the Evening News. The occasion was that of Borlaug being awarded the Congressional Gold Medal for his life long work of successfully fighting world hunger. An agronomist still active at…
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Although there have been no riots, death threats or demonstrations of protest, a cartoon published in a satirical Spanish magazine lampooning Spain’s Crown Prince and Princess has been banned and the author faces possible prison time. I suspect that the idea of "freedom of speech", even in progressive Europe, is sacrosanct as long as it…
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The hoopla over Year 7 has finally come to an end. Bookstore owners are gnashing their teeth that the publishing juggernaut of Harry Potter has finally rolled to a stop."What next, now that Harry Potter’s done with?", they agonize.Fans are jubilant at its arrival after the long, much hyped midnight launch parties, even stamps are…
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A couple of nights ago, Discovery Channel aired a two-hour special on the search to find the mummy of Queen Hatshepsut, complete with photogenic archaeologists hyperventilating in front of the camera. Phrases like ‘stunning discovery’, ‘amazing find’ , ‘shocking news’ peppered the script so generously as to induce sneezing fits.
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So, you have a favorite movie or love a great book. Certain music rocks your entire being. You are enthralled by a painting, awestruck by a piece of sculpture. But is any of them any good – by an objective yardstick? Who or what defines the value of art? What constitutes an aesthetic experience? Is…
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William Deresiewicz of Yale university has written a very interesting article in The American Scholar. The essay, Love on Campus bemoans the rapid disappearance of the intense and intellectually erotic Socratic relationship between the teacher and the taught. He blames the loss on the obsessively sexual nature of mass culture in America – a relatively…
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The people have spoken – via the internet and long distance telephone calls. Yesterday (Saturday, 7/7/7) the official 7 New Wonders of the world were declared in Lisbon, Portugal. Four of our reader Namit’s picks figure on the final list and Dean’s does not. It will be interesting to see if the "democratically" decided designations…
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The popular stereotype of the garrulous female and the man of few words, is so pervasive that even many women believe it. The image of giddy teenage airheads to gossipy middle aged women on the phone and in coffee shops, talking nineteen to the dozen is perpetuated by movies, books and mostly by misogynistic jokes.…
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Which one would you vote for? This or this? Okay, one of them no longer exists. But you can vote for the other colossus. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and Bernard Weber, a Swiss-Canadian filmmaker and author have together (the New7Wonders committee) organized a…
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The beguiling city of New Orleans has inspired many a literary mind. Tennessee Williams, Walker Percy, Ann Rice and John Kennedy Toole, to name only a few. In Toole’s memorable satire, A Confederacy of Dunces , New Orleans is as much a living, breathing character as the motley human crew who populate the book. (I…
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On any given day in Texas (and many other states), at intersections of busy downtown streets, outside local Home Depots and other strategic corners wait throngs of day laborers hoping to find small jobs. They are hired by businesses and home owners looking for someone to do odd jobs on the cheap. The men congregate…
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Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Colombia’s only Nobel Laureate, recenty visited his home town of Aracataca which he immemorialized as the fictional town of Macondo in his literary tour de force One Hundred Years of Solitude. Garcia Marquez, who lives in Mexico City, returned to his place of birth after twenty four years and for the eighty…
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Our school bus route used to take us past the famous Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in central New Delhi. Every Monday morning during our middle and high school years, my friends and I (most of us non-Christians) used to eagerly look forward to the new signs on the church’s curbside billboard that were posted every…
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If you do, your distrust may have its roots in your early years – what ideas you were exposed to and from whom. So say Yale psychologists Paul Bloom and Deena Skolnick Weisberg. For those who may not wish to read the detailed article, I will…
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