Ravi S. Iyer: Worldly

Last updated on 7th May 2019 As I am working on my part autobiography, I felt that I need to include my recollection of 9/11 terror attacks on USA. I decided to make a post of it first. In September 2001, I was living with my elder brother and family in Dombivli, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dombivli , a city close to Mumbai (India), from where I would commute by suburban train to Mumbai for my work. If I recall correctly (IIRC), I was at home (elder brother's flat) when I saw TV reports about one of the Twin Tower buildings of New York City being on fire. Note that the first Twin Tower attack happened at 8:46 AM Eastern Standard Time (US), which would be 6.16 PM (or close to that) in India. IIRC, I was watching CNN broadcast on what was then a big fire (but not yet declared as a terror attack). I think this CNN broadcast would have been either on CNN International channel or on CNN-IBN a sister network of CNN in India. Then, IIRC, I saw live (or close to live), the seco...

India’s Elections Last For 39 Days. Here’s Why. | NYT News, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vKgiS-ZNds , 2 min. 28 secs, published by New York Times on 24th April 2019 ---- A journey to a remote corner of India to capture one vote of 900 million, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_ko3QeypoY , 4 min. 11 secs, published by the Washington Post on 18th April 2019 Ravi: The single voter covered in this video, is in India's north eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh which borders China. Interesting to note the pains the govt. officials took to enable her to cast her vote. But I think if a postal ballot arrangement or something on those lines was made for such cases, it would have been more appropriate. Enabling her right to vote is vital. But perhaps India should look at how USA handles such cases of voting in remote areas of USA (USA is a huge country which some say should be viewed as a continent and not a country). ----

Sri Lankan Accused of Leading Attacks Preached Slaughter. Many Dismissed Him. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/world/asia/sri-lanka-attacks-mastermind.html , 25th April 2019 Very informative article from NYT about the ideological background as well as dangerous actions of the young Sri Lankan radical preacher and mastermind of recent Sri Lanka terror attacks, ***before*** these terror attacks. Apparently the police were given many warning signs in the past of this man's dangerous behaviour and dangerous incitement of his followers but there was no action. Sufis (followers of a mystical form of Islam) and idolators (which would include Buddhists and Hindus) were a target of his fury. I think such articles will help in attempts to prevent future such tragedies. I thank the New York Times and the authors for this very useful article. =========================================================== About an earlier related Times of India article: We have to know the reality an...

The linked article is for those who want to know what seems to be the hard reality of Carbon Dioxide pollution in the world, country-wise from 1850 to now. The industrialization that was seen as a great advance of mankind came with a terrible price to pay. And now the people of the world are so badly trapped in a CO2 polluting industrial world that it is really hard to change those ways. I wonder what it will take for people at large to know how big an existential threat to our world this CO2 pollution is, and so decide to take drastic action to tackle the problem. And will that be too late? That's another very worrying question. Why the US bears the most responsibility for climate change, in one chart, https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2019/4/24/18512804/climate-change-united-states-china-emissions , 24th April 2019

Readers may want to see my recent post on another blog: Why Puttaparthi and not Pittsburgh? (Why did I choose to focus on spiritual quest and spiritual ashram stuff in India instead of doing some great software development work in USA?), https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2019/04/why-puttaparthi-and-not-pittsburgh-why.html .

Hats off to USA investigators and prosecutors for showing the moral courage to investigate and charge 53 medical practitioners across USA for over-prescribing opioids and worse (exchanging opioids for sexual favours), https://www.cbsnews.com/news/opioid-takedown-appalachian-regional-prescription-department-of-justice-today-2019-04-17/ Nobody should be above the law. Rogue medical professionals, rogue academics, rogue scientists, rogue technologists, rogue spiritual masters, rogue religious institution/NGO paid employees and even free service staff ... all should be  held accountable. Of course, like in this case, the charged persons should be able to defend themselves in court with the burden being on the prosecution to show beyond reasonable doubt (or the appropriate legal standard for the charge) that the rogues did commit the crimes. Note that I was a free service staff in a charitable (free education) deemed university in South India for around 9 years. I consider myself...

Oh Well! Those who names got excluded from Voter's list (in India) may not feel so bad now as even Rahul Dravid (star cricketer) and poll ambassador, has been excluded from Voter's list (as he moved house and his relative submitted a form for deletion of his name from the area where his earlier house was located). Dravid seems to have not done the due diligence of going to (Indian) Voters portal and checking whether his name is on the list, well before the elections, and paid the price for that lack of due diligence. I did check on the Voters' portal, https://www.nvsp.in/ , and found that my name was on the Voters' list sometime in end January (thanks to a friend's post in a Facebook group that I am a member of). It’s official: Poll ambassador Rahul Dravid can’t vote tomorrow, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/elections/lok-sabha-elections-2019/karnataka/news/its-official-poll-ambassador-dravid-cant-vote-tomorrow/articleshow/68914847.cms , 17th April 2019.

A tragic reality of India, which perhaps has reduced somewhat over the years and decades but has still not gone, is the bias towards fair complexion and bias against dark complexion. The shared article reports on an extreme incident and tragedy, but I don't know whether the reporting is accurate. In UP, wife sets man afire for his ‘dark complexion’, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bareilly/in-up-wife-sets-man-afire-for-his-dark-complexion/articleshow/68915764.cms , 17th April 2019 I was reminded of a popular comedy Hindi film song in my youth in 1980s. The song is from the 1965 movie, Gumnaam (a murder thriller which I think was based on Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None (original title which I read has a pejorative word in today's context and in USA context)). The main words of the song are: Hum kaale hain to kya hua dil wale hain which means in English: What if I am black, I still am a man of heart (loving man). The actor is the comedian Mehmood. ...

March 2017 2 minute video of Richard Dawkins arguing against simple majority Brexit decision. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaySOifpusg Ravi: I tend to agree with Richard Dawkins arguments against simple majority decision for Brexit. And his words said around 2 years ago are relevant even today! I don't think the British people who voted to Leave with a simple majority, knew enough about the very complex matter. Just one single majority wins referendum approach to decide on as vital a matter as Brexit whose impact would last decades and impact a few generations, was, in my considered opinion, a very inappropriate decision by then UK government. Hmm. I vehemently disagree with Prof. Dawkins on his "God Delusion" views. Quite interesting, though not surprising to me, that I largely agree with his views on simple-majority referendum for Brexit being the wrong way to decide on Brexit.

Readers may want to visit my recent on another blog here: Free download of draft version of my next book - Autobiography of an Indian Software Techie and Spiritual Aspirant – Part 1, https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2019/04/free-download-of-draft-version-of-my.html .

Readers may want to see my recent post on another blog here: My skepticism about Golden Age predictions where the rulers are enlightened beings or awakened souls; I think people powered movements can bring in better times for today's Left Outs, https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2019/04/my-skepticism-about-golden-age.html .

Last updated on 14th April 2019 The Guardian view on the Amritsar massacre centenary: time to see ourselves as others see us - Editorial, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/12/the-guardian-view-on-the-amritsar-massacre-centenary-time-to-see-ourselves-as-others-see-us , 12th April 2019. I think this Guardian editorial article's views are wise. In her short reference to Jallianwala Bagh massacre (known as Amritsar massacre in UK), British PM Theresa May said in UK Parliament that it was a shameful scar but did not go as far as making an apology. Note that an apology may have legal consequences in terms of reparation claims. PM May also said nice things about India UK relationship today and about the contributions of Indian diaspora to UK. Her short remarks can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWI6SsIXknU , 43 secs. The Guardian article says, "Some other countries are better at this self-examination. Germany is one. Belgium, which is trying to...

Last updated on 12th April 2019 I was very happy today to have cast my vote for both the Indian Parliament (Lok Sabha) and Andhra Pradesh assembly elections. I fulfilled my obligation as a citizen of democratic India which is the largest (most populous) democracy in the world. Above pic shows my inked finger after I cast my vote today. I thought it would be appropriate for me to make a detailed post of my experience of casting my vote in these elections. I first checked my miscellaneous blog to see whether I had put up a detailed post about me casting my vote for the previous elections of 2014 which too, if I recall correctly, were simultaneous elections for both Indian Parliament and Andhra Pradesh assembly. I could not find any such post. The elections were in April-May 2014, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Indian_general_election . I clearly recall that I then spent a lot of time reading up on the electoral process, going through the Election Commission of India websit...

Interesting! UK gets more time for Brexit. I think this seems to be a reasonable decision hammered out by top leaders of the countries that make up the EU. Democracy may be slow and cumbersome. But I love this transparency of democracy. To a large extent, citizens know which top leader said what in these meetings that take such top decisions. And the UK Parliament's efforts in this regard are on full public display not only to the UK and the EU, but to the wider world (including this writer-guy in India). Perhaps an autocratic regime may have done better. But it could have done worse too! An autocratic regime would have arrived at the decision much faster. But it could have arrived at a bad decision and provided an inaccurate picture to citizens about how and why they arrived at the bad decision. That's the big danger of autocratic regimes. A good and noble autocracy is perhaps a great system of governance. But the history of the world teaches us that such good and noble...

Readers may want to view my recent post on another blog: Religious faith provided one of the sources of FDR's (US President) unflagging optimism,  https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2019/04/religious-faith-provided-one-of-sources.html .

Ravi: I am sharing this video ***ONLY*** for sharing the concerns about high CO2 levels aired by a top former USA presidential administration person. I am publicly politically neutral about USA politics and so it is NOT a Democrat vs Republican thing for me. High CO2 levels in the world impacts the whole world including my country India. So I am alarmed by John Kerry's statements about high CO2 levels. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRBfM709Yqc , 5 min. 21 secs, published by CNN on 9th April 2019 Ravi: BTW I have a first class Bachelor of Science (Physics) degree from Bombay University (now Mumbai University). I do find the statements made by John Kerry (who says in the video clip that he has a Bachelor of Arts (Political Science) degree from Yale university) as something which seems logical and based on scientific data. I am saying seems as I would need to know the references used by John Kerry for his statements to confirm whether they are leading and reputed science sour...

Most of the industrial societies from 20th century onwards were powered by oil (petroleum), the black gold. Before oil became the driving energy source, there were no cars and no planes of the type that have dominated the 20th century and early 21st century so far. I think that ships and, to some extent railways too, moved over from coal and steam power to oil (petroleum). Oil has been a vital part of modern industrial life of the 20th and early 21st century. It has triggered wars, regime changes and a boost in its prices has negatively impacted electoral fortunes of incumbent political leaders and their parties in democratic countries' elections, including in India (my country)! I think this 14 min. 15 secs video on the modern history of oil including the very important factor of its price over time, is utterly fascinating. For those interested in modern history this is a must view video. Petroleum - summary of the modern history of oil, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMQU...

When author of post or comment is not mentioned, it should be assumed that it is me (Ravi S. Iyer). https://www.facebook.com/ravi.s.iyer.7/posts/2476199025929993 Could not believe it but it seems to be true! That's very, very tragic! "As of Saturday night, 272 election officials had died, mostly from overwork-related illnesses, while 1,878 others had fallen ill, said Arief Priyo Susanto, spokesman of the General Elections Commission (KPU)." [Shared article: Over 270 die in Indonesia counting ballot papers by hand during elections, https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/over-270-die-in-indonesia-counting-ballot-papers-by-hand-during-elections/story-uVB9LuOm8NNWrtmLwMS47L.html , 29th April 2019] ============================================================= https://www.facebook.com/ravi.s.iyer.7/posts/2473794296170466 Lovely rendition of Rahe na Rahe hum from 1960s movie Mamta by Saritha Rahman in Kozhikode, Kerala in 2010s, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N...