More on Interactive Thinking

As quoted by professor Amitava Bose:

Moriaty: "All I have to say has already crossed your mind."

Holmes: "Then possibly my answer has crossed yours."

Stuck in a Beauty Contest

Excerpts from our Macro Economics class:

"Supposedly a newspaper prints 100 photographs and readers are asked to select six faces which they think liked the most. The winner would be the one who would select the most popular faces. "

"It is not a case of choosing those [faces] which, to the best of one’s judgment, are really the prettiest, nor even those which average opinion genuinely thinks the prettiest. We have reached the third degree where we devote our intelligences to anticipating what average opinion expects the average opinion to be. And there are some, I believe, who practise the fourth, fifth and higher degrees.”

Professor Amitava Bose added, "Prospective Buyer has some information suggesting that prices would go up but the seller also has other information suggesting that prices would go down (or at least prices of other stock would rise more than the one he is selling). Furthermore a buyer has to believe that when the price has reached its maximum there would be another buyer willing to buy the stock from him especially when the prices now are bound to go down. Can two 'rational agent' agree to disagree." 

Professor Amitava Bose is one of the best teachers I came across. Nobody I believe could make macro economics as simple and interesting as him. And his (oh- so- interesting)  redention of way in which stock market operates spurred me on to think more. And I fell into that ever worsening spiral of independent thought. I reasoned that since Girls generally wear all those nice clothes to attract boys and boys wear what they wear to attract girls. Does that mean boys who dress as boys (and girls who dress as girls) generally do not like what they wear themselves? Then why would guys generally shun a one of their own kind whose dress looks a bit  feminine. 

Does this mean that girls wear what they anticipate that boys will like but they eventually end up wearing what they (girls) like and boys hate? or Does it mean that I have a seriously messed up interactive thinking?

Guns will lead us..alright!

Never before had I felt as proud for being an Indian after hearing Shivraj Patil's statement on terror attacks. Nowhere was the strength expected from a leader at the head of a country as great as India but there were plenty politically correct statements to be found.....And how fondly do I remember my Chest swelling up with pride when he remarked that NDA govt lost 11000 Indians to terrorist..while till date they lost just 6000 (and still counting even as I write this post)...did I hear somebody say that we aren't making any progress....now try and better this....(of course he was also counting the casualties in Kargil war...the gujarat riots...and all J&K casualties...but these are just minor statistical assumptions aren't they?). PM as usual was extremely quick to condemn the event (really surprised how efficiently he manages to do this after every mishap). IB was also extremely quick in labeling this attack a terrorist attack because the AK 47 the terrorist (thank-you-IB-or-I-would-not-have-known-what-to-write-here) used are not available to normal people (ah! how I wish they had been sold at our friendly neighbourhood store...may be..we could have defended ourselves then).

Amid all this lets...not forget the media...but I would not dare say anything in their honour lest you all leave my blog for (obviously) better readings.(try some news site)...but I can not ignore the a incident so striking that I don't think I would ever be able to forget it again....Lying on ground was a man injured from a blast with no one to attend and our blessed cameraman was busy getting a better angle. Obviously for our viewing pleasure ...is not a better camera angle more important than tending to his wounds...(and people still say that media is not dedicated enough)

I remember a holy man once said that he would pray for us a land where the mind is without fear and the head is held high. I do not know when the day would come when my mind would be without fear....but I do know people in my land always hold there head high to look as far as they can so that they may know where to duck when the terrorists strike next.

Dilbert Quotes

It is all arbitrary... who is your pet, who is your food and who is your insurance sales man!!!

Q. So how do I convince people that my pet is not food....

A. Teach the pet to be an insurance salesman

But don't we have reasons for these distinctions..

Aww...who cares they are not good reasons anyways..

Courtsey: Scott Adams

Ethically Right and Morally wrong?

"Such an unethical way of learning ethics"

Thats what my sidey commented when I asked him for some ready-made answers to the case study to be disscussed in same class few minutes later.

I was (as usual) answer less (or should I say speechless), But my other class mate came to my rescue..."Its his choice, professors are not ethically obliged to force him to learn, if he doesn't want to......"

Prof entered the class...started teaching but there discussion didn't stop (Now was this ethically correct?)

With so many viewpoints flying about I could not help but not understand any of them, hence another one of my class was wasted...(That is Rs 7000/Hour)

All that said and done....(but not underestood) I turn the pages of the newspaper and I wonder if it is ethically correct, for an unemployed man to kill himself when no one loves him.

Here are some excerpts from my ethics class (which I somehow still registered):

Situation 1. Suppose Bill is a healthy man without family or loved ones. Would it be ok painlessly to kill him if his organs would save five people, one of whom needs a heart, another a kidney, and so on? If not, why not?

Situation 2. You and six others are kidnapped, and the kidnapper somehow persuades you that if you shoot dead one of the other hostages, he will set the remaining five free, whereas if you do not, he will shoot all six. (Either way, he'll release you.)

Situation 3. You're in the cab of a runaway tram and see five people tied to the track ahead. You have the option of sending the tram on to the track forking off to the left, on which only one person is tied. Surely you should send the tram left, killing one to save five.

But then why not kill Bill?

Since I fancy myself to be a thinking existence (who still retains some of his mind)...I have thought out a possible explanation for the above three situations. But since I also fancy myself a supporter of free will (and thinking) my ethics does not allow me to publish my thoughts and hence restrict your own thoughts. But I still can't control my desire to write my mind in this post...so here I come on to compromise (and life is all about compromises). A week from now I will write my own thoughts in the blog, which again would not make much of a difference since no one reads this blog but I am a manager.

I am back...am I worse

One fine day I was browsing through my head and I came upon one of those memories...yes that one that makes you want to smile and cry at the same time.....some memories that might fade but never goes away....oh! how my heart aches to relieve those moment just once more. 

I was never perfect, neither am I better now but I was happy and isn't that what really matters. 

But these memories do fade....one of my (oh-so-dark) friend once said that there are certain bitches who come into your life and makes you forget all of those memories. I haven't come across any such bitch yet..but just in case if I do, I don't think I would like to forget any of these memories for all the bitch-ness of this world..

So here I write some of them to so that if some day my mind might fail me...and I wander then I have someplace to turn back to:

My days in ISM

1. 25 April 2008  11:50 pm

Nirbhay woke me up at those exact moments from my sleep. And I don't know why but it was the happiest I ever felt waking up from my sleep. May be because it was the way nirbhay is or maybe becoz  the way he woke me up..or maybe becoz next day was last exam to test my 4 years of BTech. But that day I felt that I would never ever be alone in my life..I have someone who will always care for me...and I made some friends in my life whom I can boast about.....

2.  Bhatinda Falls

Been always afraid of falls and rivers...but then I can go anywhere with my friends as long as they come along.

3. Human Piles

Was it the feeling of being crushed under or was it the screams. Was it the joy of inflicting pain or was it the security of balance, was it the figthing and struggling or was it the feeling of getting overwhelmed...I guess it was just friendship

4. Shades of Gray (our tryst with rock bands)

Today I am on my way towards becoming a manager, but there was a time when (like every one else) I too wanted to be a rockstar..(though I was never good enough). Shades of Gray almost made me one. It was a real honour playing with a genius like Nirbhay (god bless his vocal chords)

5. Group Think

So many times we spoke to each other without saying a word and so many times we said and shouted and screamed without talking....I only wish that we may talk again in the same way even when we are so far apart...

6. Vatsal Speaks

Cut back to first term when I came to accept myself as one among the many. I like so many other was selected through a system fine tuned to select the best...So if I was one among the best back home here I was just one in the mass...and I accepted that.....but then one fine day vatsal (from the other hostel wing) come across me in the gallery and our conversation goes like this:

Vatsal : Yaar tumhari wing mein to bahut phodu (read: intelligent) log hain.

Me : Kahan yaar tumhari wing jayada baap hai.

Vatsal remians adament on his argument.

Me: oKay lets do a head count of phodu (read: intelligent) log and see who have more of em'

Vatsal : Okay

Me: You start from my wing

Vatsal : Okay...Ravi Mittal, Tiwari,..Nirbhay.....................YOU..

And there were more....

The quizzes in vc's room or the bc in Np's room or Inki-Pinki-ponki near PS Gupta's house.....

People say everybody have one moment in there life that makes it truly worth living...I don't know if I have had lived through one of those moments ...but I do know that these guys have already made my life worth living as it is.

Thank You all

Luv u