Archive for September, 2008
Ouch
This is The Headington Shark in Oxford, officially its title is untitled 1986, named after the year it was installed. Well of course the battle with the planning authorities lasted for years but in the end the shark was allowed to stay. I couldn’t be happier.
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Add comment September 30, 2008
Gaad Bless
By Ardeshir Cowasjee
NINE-ELEVEN is a date on which we in Pakistan mourn a natural death and a date on which the world remembers and denounces an act incited by religious extremism which brought with it violent death.
On this day in 1948 in Pakistan our founder and maker, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, died, and in 2001 on the same date war came to mainland America with destruction of a kind never before witnessed or experienced.
Two days prior to 9/11 of this year, I was visited by a charming young woman and a cameraman, both from DawnNews. A friendly soul to man and beast, unlike some of the bearded heavyweights who visit and climb on to chairs or up trees when greeted by my team of Jack Russell terriers, the young woman reacted to them in a normal civilised and friendly manner. She had come to record a few words from me on Jinnah as I remembered him for a programme to be aired on his death anniversary.
What can I say, I asked, other than he was a gentleman, a man whose word was his bond, a man who lived life to the full and achieved what few have achieved — the creation of a country? He professed to be a democrat, but in reality was a benign dictator who harmed no one. He merely put his foot down when necessary — and that was most of the time.
How was he dressed, asked young Sophia? What did he wear? He bought his suits and ties from Sulka, and his silver from Aspreys, I told her. His monocles were made by Meyerowitz. His shoes were handmade, mostly ‘correspondents’ as opposed to the normal footwear. I missed seeing the programme so have no idea as to what was cut and what was actually broadcast.
I suggested to her that she interview Yusuf Haroon, now the only living man who was his confidant as well as his guard commander. Yusuf lives in Connecticut but is now in Karachi. Whether she got to him or not, I do not know.
This 9/11 our brand new shining president, Asif Zardari, supported by Governor of Sindh Ishrat ul Ibad, and the ever-faithful evergreen Sindh Chief Minister Commuter Qaim Ali Shah, with his freshly dyed Cherry Blossom hair and moustache and unchanging facial expression, come hell or high water, duly went to offer themselves up at Jinnah’s tomb. As is the custom, they raised their eyes and hands before the empty catafalque and addressed themselves to their Creator. What they murmured, no one heard, but what it was that Jinnah growled out to them we can all easily guess.
They then all moved on to the visitors’ book in which those who go to pay public homage record their innermost feelings. Recorded by Asif, in illegible handwriting resembling that of a stressed physician, were the words “May Gaad (sic) give us the street (sic) to save Pakistan.” Space precludes me from recording the lengthy ramblings of the other two.
Two days later, it can safely be said that the Omniscient and Omnipotent had heard Asif’s plea, for we read that his prime minister, the unsmiling Yousuf Raza Gilani, had assured us that Pakistan will not wage war against America. Faith had emerged triumphant, leaving Asif to finish off what Bush had started. At this, even I proclaimed, God be praised.
Now, on to the ravaged city of Karachi, and to parks and beaches the citizens are trying to salvage or save. Firstly, we have 55 acres of parkland, Ahmad Ali Park (locally known as Kidney Hill). Then, we have 450 acres of parkland, available for development for the benefit of the people, in the sewerage farm known as Gutter Baghicha. Also, 200 acres, stretching over some 14 km of seashore for which a movement known as Sahil Bachao (save the beachfront and resist the violation of the centuries old ‘Public Trust’ doctrine) has been launched by groups of concerned citizens.
Kidney Hill and Gutter Baghicha are in court, where conditions being what they are the people are floundering. Petitions filed by the citizens in the Kidney Hill matter have just been dismissed, as the court declared that the government had made contradictory statements. The court recommended that the petitioners now file a suit. The situation in court is the same with Gutter Baghicha.
In the case of Kidney Hill, Governor Ishrat ul Ibad was persuaded by a group of concerned citizens early last year to intervene and attempt to settle the contentious matter. He promised to do so, but nothing ever came of his promises. He may care to re-examine the issue anew.
What the few of us battling losers, concerned with open spaces and parklands in this congested overpopulated city, really want is money from those who have money and vocal support from the public, the awam, who are the ultimate grand losers when they find themselves with a city in which open spaces, parks and beaches are few and far between. The total area of just the three projects I have mentioned is 705 acres — no mean acreage for essential recreational purposes of the poor and deprived.
To battle the marauders, who are supported always by the government of the day, is not an easy job. But there is an alternative to battling. Can the all-powerful president of the republic Asif Ali Zardari come to the help of the people of Karachi, the city in which his wife was born, raised and schooled? Concerted cries of “Jeay Bhutto” will not keep her memory alive. He has named in remembrance of her a road in Rawalpindi and an airport in Islamabad. In Karachi what he can do is on each of these three open spaces build and nurture parks in her memory, erect monuments, plant trees and flowers, make them into areas of peace and tranquillity where the poor and the rich may rest, breathe the air, even meditate, and in tranquillity remember the good done by Benazir Bhutto.
Via: http://www.dawn.com/weekly/cowas/20080914.htm
Add comment September 19, 2008
A Tale: Finding Solutions
Many years ago in a small village ….
A farmer had the misfortune Of owing a large sum of money to a village money lender.
The Moneylender, who was old and ugly, fancied the farmer’s beautiful Daughter. So he proposed a bargain.
He said he would forgo the farmer’s debt if he could marry his Daughter. Both the farmer and his daughter were horrified by the Proposal.
So the cunning money-lender suggested that they let Providence decide the matter.
He told them that he would put a black Pebble and a white pebble into an empty money bag. Then the girl would Have to pick one pebble from the bag.
1) If she picked the black pebble, she would become his wife and her father’s debt would be forgiven.
2) If she picked the white pebble she need not marry him and her father’s debt would still be forgiven.
3) But if she refused to pick a pebble, her father would be thrown into Jail.
They were standing on a pebble strewn path in the farmer’s field. As They talked, the moneylender bent over to pick up two pebbles. As he Picked them up, the sharp-eyed girl noticed that he had picked up two Black pebbles and put them into the bag.
He then asked the girl to pick A pebble from the bag.
Now, imagine that you were standing in the field. What would you have Done if you were the girl? If you had to advise her, what would you Have told her?
Careful analysis would produce three possibilities:
1. The girl should refuse to take a pebble.
2. The girl should show that there were two black pebbles in the bag And expose the money-lender as a cheat.
3. The girl should pick a black pebble and sacrifice herself in order To save her father from his debt and imprisonment.
Take a moment to ponder over the story. The above story is used with The hope that it will make us appreciate the difference between lateral And logical thinking.
The girl’s dilemma cannot be solved with Traditional logical thinking. Think of the consequences if she chooses the above logical answers.
What would you recommend to the Girl to do?
Well, here is what she did ….
The girl put her hand into the moneybag and drew out a pebble. Without Looking at it, she fumbled and let it fall onto the pebble-strewn path Where it immediately became lost among all the other pebbles.
“Oh, how clumsy of me,” she said. “But never mind, if you look into the Bag for the one that is left, you will be able to tell which pebble I Picked.”
Since the remaining pebble is black, it must be assumed that she had Picked the white one. And since the money-lender dared not admit his Dishonesty, the girl changed what seemed an impossible situation into An extremely advantageous one.
MORAL OF THE STORY:
Most complex problems do have a solution. It is only that we don’t Attempt to think.
4 comments September 12, 2008
LHC: ‘Big Bang’ experiment under way
Science reporter, BBC News
BBC Science
The LHC has been in construction for some 13 years
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Three decades after it was conceived, the world’s most powerful physics experiment has begun.
Engineers are attempting to circulate a beam of particles around the 27km-long underground tunnel which houses the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
The £5bn machine on the Swiss-French border is designed to smash particles together with cataclysmic force, revealing signs of new physics.
This will re-create conditions in the Universe moments after the Big Bang.
But it has not been plain sailing; the project has been hit by cost overruns, equipment trouble and construction problems. The switch-on itself is two years late.
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 We will be looking at what the Universe was made of billionths of a second after the Big Bang  Dr Tara Shears, University of Liverpool
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The collider is operated by the European Organization for Nuclear Research – better known by its French acronym Cern.
The vast circular tunnel – the “ring” – which runs under the French-Swiss border contains more than 1,000 cylindrical magnets arranged end-to-end.
The magnets are there to steer the beam – made up of particles called protons – around this 27km-long ring.
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Eventually, two proton beams will be steered in opposite directions around the LHC at close to the speed of light, completing about 11,000 laps each second.
At allotted points around the tunnel, the beams will cross paths, smashing together near four massive “detectors” that monitor the collisions for interesting events.
Scientists are hoping that new sub-atomic particles will emerge, revealing fundamental insights into the nature of the cosmos.
Major effort
“We will be able to see deeper into matter than ever before,” said Dr Tara Shears, a particle physicist at the University of Liverpool.
“We will be looking at what the Universe was made of billionths of a second after the Big Bang. That is amazing, that really is fantastic.”
The LHC should answer one very simple question: What is mass?
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LHC DETECTORS
ATLAS – one of two so-called general purpose detectors. Atlas will be used to look for signs of new physics, including the origins of mass and extra dimensions
CMS – the second general purpose detector will, like ATLAS, hunt for the Higgs boson and look for clues to the nature of dark matter
ALICE – will study a “liquid” form of matter called quark-gluon plasma that existed shortly after the Big Bang
LHCb – Equal amounts of matter and anti-matter were created in the Big Bang. LHCb will try to investigate what happened to the “missing” anti-matter
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“We know the answer will be found at the LHC,” said Jim Virdee, a particle physicist at Imperial College London.
The currently favoured model involves a particle called the Higgs boson – dubbed the “God Particle”. According to the theory, particles acquire their mass through interactions with an all-pervading field carried by the Higgs.
The latest astronomical observations suggest ordinary matter – such as the galaxies, gas, stars and planets – makes up just 4% of the Universe.
The rest is dark matter (23%) and dark energy (73%). Physicists think the LHC could provide clues about the nature of this mysterious “stuff”.
But Professor Virdee told BBC News: “Nature can surprise us… we have to be ready to detect anything it throws at us.”
Full beam ahead
Engineers injected the first low-intensity proton beams into the LHC in August. But they did not go all the way around the ring.
Now they will attempt to pass a proton beam around the full circumference of the LHC tunnel.
“We see how far the beam will go,” said Steve Myers, head of the accelerator and beams department at Cern, “we will try and make it go round the full 27km sometime on Wednesday morning.”
10 comments September 10, 2008
